11. The Academy's Spring

Two women faced each other. One gaze held hostility, the other suspicion.

The hostility was the Chairwoman's. The suspicion was Chloe's.

Chloe could ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠not believe the reality in front of her.

'No, wait, why?'

'You're not going to deny your own detection spell, are you?'

'...It's real?'

Why had the detection spell aimed at Adam reacted to the Chairwoman's lips?

The answer was obvious. She had used those abhorrent lips to bite, to suck, to do everything to Adam.

The instant Chloe pictured it, one emotion surged up inside her.

'Is she insane?'

'In what sense?'

'Every sense, obviously!'

This was unequivocal sexual harassment, a power-based sex crime. A Chairwoman over a hundred years old biting and sucking a man in his early twenties—the depravity was extreme.

Not that the Kingdom's or the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Empire's legal codes criminalized "sexual harassment" with any clarity, but this went beyond law. It was a matter of basic decency.

'I have to save Adam from that deranged hag.'

'So you finally see it.'

In this moment, Chloe and Adult Chloe were of one mind. The two Chloes fixed the Chairwoman with undisguised animosity, not mere suspicion.

Even as Chloe wrestled with her turmoil, the Chairwoman had been ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠staring her down from the start.

Faced with the fact that the Chairwoman was genuinely jealous of her, the two Chloes felt both a baffled 'Does a woman that old have no shame?' and a flicker of the superiority that comes from knowing she's jealous of me.

With Adult Chloe's coaching, Chloe spoke first.

"In any case, as I said earlier, I saw the Finance Director."

"So... on the last night of the festival?"

"I watched the fireworks with the Finance Director. Thank you for recommending such an excellent spot to him, Chairwoman. We had a wonderful time."

"...Ha."

Chloe had started it, but Adult Chloe provided the assists. Inside Chloe's head, she was laughing with genuine delight, whispering one provocative line after another.

'Was that spot really the Chairwoman's recommendation, though?'

'Don't you remember? When Adam first saw you, he asked if the Chairwoman had sent you. She must have sent him ahead so she could show up later. Gotta hide the wrinkles, right?'

'But she never came.'

'Who knows? I'm sure she had her reasons. The point is clear. She's the one who told him about that spot. She just couldn't make it herself.'

Which meant the next step was simple.

Just a little careful insinuation would do.

"Did you have a good time? A good time?"

"Since you recommended the spot yourself, you must know—the fireworks were spectacular from there. I happened to be passing by and saw the Finance Director. When I approached, he invited me to sit beside him."

"..."

"The Finance Director was waiting for you, Chairwoman... but you never came. I couldn't just leave him there alone, so we watched the fireworks together."

Chloe beamed as she said it, as if to ask—what exactly is the problem?

The Chairwoman's fist clenched and unclenched.

That single motion made sweat break out cold on Chloe's back. But even so, the Chairwoman did not throw the punch.

Chloe had expected as much. Throwing a punch over a remark like this was absurd. And even if Chloe was 5th Rank, a single blow from an 8th Rank Chairwoman would kill her outright.

Adult Chloe, however, reacted a little differently.

'Prepare your teleportation spell.'

'What?'

'Just in case. If the old hag actually swings, I'll buy you a moment. You teleport straight to the Chairwoman's office.'

'Why there of all places?'

'Why do you think? The Chairwoman just exposed a weakness, so you go straight to Adam. But teleporting right into his office would look suspicious. You head to the closest viable location.'

'...'

Adult Chloe's words were, how to put it, a bit clingy. As if she had run through this exact scenario in her head countless times.

Now that she thought about it, it made sense. Adult Chloe had been trying to win Adam's heart ever since the Chairwoman died.

It was deeply ironic that someone so hopelessly inept at love could still cook up every scheme imaginable inside her own head.

This sounded like one of them. A fantasy of taking Adam for herself in the Chairwoman's place, of winning against the Chairwoman. Adult Chloe's own private little scenario.

At least it was helping her now, so Chloe quietly followed the advice.

But during that brief hesitation while Chloe considered her countermove—

The Chairwoman, whose expression had twisted, took a slow breath and regained her composure.

"I see. The fireworks were enjoyable, then?"

"Yes. Very enjoyable."

"How fortunate. Though the Finance Director did look rather tired. Surely you didn't keep him too long?"

"That's..."

"He must have wanted to go straight home, yet he made a point of watching the fireworks with a student. The Finance Director truly is an exemplary faculty member."

"..."

In an instant, Chloe's boast was reframed as a teacher humoring a student. And because she couldn't flatly deny it, the words cut deeper.

After all, she really had just watched fireworks with Adam. Even the conversation between them had stayed firmly within the boundaries of faculty and student.

They had agreed at the very end to call each other by name, but even in that moment, Adam's tone had felt less like warm affection and more like a man who had simply given in.

The Chairwoman smiled at Chloe, momentarily robbed of speech.

"I hear you've been assisting the Finance Director lately. Do try not to exhaust him too much."

"Exhaust... him?"

"I check on his condition daily, you know, and his dark circles have worsened recently. You're supposed to help lighten his workload so he can rest more. How flustered he must have been—a student who's been helping him suddenly approaches him, and he can hardly tell you to leave. He had no choice but to ask if you'd watch the fireworks together."

"...He didn't look tired at all."

"Of course he hid it in front of a student. I don't normally say this sort of thing to a student, but please don't pester the Finance Director too much. He is the Academy's single most important asset."

And that all-important asset—you sexually assaulted him, didn't you?

Chloe barely managed to swallow the words that surged up her throat. By now, the image in her head was painfully vivid: the old hag forcing herself on Adam, and Adam, hating it but unable to say anything to his superior, reduced to a victim.

And above all else.

"Well, I do give him a special comforting every day. So kindly don't monopolize my Finance Director."

"..."

Comforting.

Comforting, she said.

'She touched her lips on purpose just now, didn't she?'

'She'd know full well we're using detection magic. How shameless. I might understand if it were me, but you're still just an Academy student.'

'Does never having a relationship for over a hundred years really turn someone into that?'

'Maybe she went through menopause without ever losing her virginity. Could that actually be it?'

"..."

"..."

The conversation lapsed into a lull. Both had traded their opening blows and were now watching for the next opening.

The atmosphere had been sharpening like two gladiators circling for the killing stroke—

Vrrr.

"Oh— Finance Director?"

<Chairwoman, where are you right now?>

"Well, as the Finance Director knows, I stepped out briefly..."

<It's already been twenty minutes. I'm busy enough as it is—what on earth are you doing? Come to my office immediately.>

"Yes..."

The instant the Finance Director's irate voice crackled from the communication device in the Chairwoman's robes, the tension collapsed.

While the now-deflated Chairwoman endured the Finance Director's scolding through the device—

Chloe, hearing Adam's voice, immediately called out.

"Finance Director! I'm right here!"

<...Student Chloe? Are you with the Chairwoman?>

"Yes!"

"W-wait just a moment!"

"Didn't you just tell me not to pester the Finance Director too much? Isn't a long-distance communication far less bothersome?"

"..."

"Finance Director! In that spirit, I would also like to receive one of those communication devices, just like the Chairwoman—!"

<Student Chloe, between a student and a faculty member such an item is both unnecessary and an unwarranted expense. More to the point, the fact that you're with the Chairwoman is fortuitous.>

"Pardon?"

"Excuse me?"

Click.

"..."

"..."

Adam had delivered exactly what he needed to say and cut the connection, brisk and businesslike. The Chairwoman and Chloe were left in a silence so awkward it was excruciating.

"Shall we... go."

"...Yes."

The Chairwoman, who moments ago had been working herself into a fine dramatic fury only to be soundly rebuked by the Finance Director.

Chloe, who had seized the opening and lunged, only to be cut down with a single stroke.

And even Adult Chloe, who had gotten slightly carried away by the sheer authority in Adam's voice.

Quietly, they all set off toward the office. They walked the same path for over ten minutes without exchanging a single word. The Finance Director had told them to come together, so the Chairwoman couldn't rush ahead, nor could Chloe use her teleportation magic.

Until just moments ago, the two had been adversaries.

But right now, a strange sense of solidarity wrapped around the pair of them...

*

Kirke felt as if she had woken from a very long dream.

'What... is this.'

Liberation. She felt a strange sense of liberation.

The feeling of being released from this mortal world, from all its cares, from every affliction.

So it was that Kirke opened her eyes.

"Professor Kirke, you're awake?"

"..."

"Professor Kirke?"

She shut them again.

Liberation, her ass. With that devil standing right in front of her, the only thing she could feel was despair. Kirke found herself missing her laboratory—missing the sickroom she'd lain in for days.

But this was no sickroom, and she'd already been discharged. She couldn't flee reality forever.

Kirke opened her eyes with an interminable sigh.

Flutter-whisk.

"Ah. More hair has fallen out, I see."

"Ah... aah...!"

"You underwent purification magic and a Church blessing immediately after the incident, but you were surrounded by an intensely concentrated hair-loss inducer with no protection. That it's only this severe is frankly fortunate."

Nothing the Finance Director said was wrong. The analyzer exploding had been Kirke's own fault, and only the fact that she'd been rescued within ten minutes had prevented complete baldness.

But circular patches of hair loss had bloomed near her crown. Worse, these circles of social death were growing, little by little. Kirke stared at the fallen strands with hollow eyes.

Yes. His logic was flawless. Not a word of it was incorrect.

So why was she so furious?

Couldn't he at least soften the phrasing a little when he was talking to the victim her—

"Ah, but I suppose you might consider yourself unlucky. Given the sum you now owe in damages."

"...It's entirely my fault. So please, just—anything but a salary cut!"

"Oh, what are you saying?"

"Finance Director...!"

"This isn't something a mere salary cut can resolve. Your salary has already been cut by ninety-eight percent, hasn't it, Professor? Lopping off another two percent would hardly begin to cover it."

Smiling, without so much as a change of expression, the Finance Director shoved Kirke straight into the pit of despair.

Then he shuffled the documents in his hand and began ticking off figures.

"Ordinarily, explosion or collapse incidents are covered by the Academy, but this case is somewhat special. The investigation leaves no doubt: the fault is entirely yours, and had things gone a little differently, the hair-loss agent could have spread across the entire school."

"Th-that! You were the one who demanded I proceed that way in the first place, Finance Director!"

"Correct. If the incident had occurred on the second day of the festival, I'd already be calculating your raise. It would have been far more convenient for me personally. But that isn't what happened, is it?"

"..."

"In any case, a salary reduction won't come close to covering it. We'll have to draw from your personal funds, Professor—but you've already stated you have no more money, haven't you?"

"...Yes."

That much was true. She'd been pouring every coin she earned into various schemes for years. Now that her salary was ninety-eight percent gone, those schemes had dried up, and without savings, she was struggling just to make ends meet.

Obviously, she had no means to pay the damages the Finance Director was demanding.

So why was he smiling like that, as if none of this inconvenienced him in the slightest?

That smile.

It terrified Kirke.

"Then how about chicken instead of pheasant?"

"I beg your pardon? Chicken...?"

"Simply put, you can repay me with something other than money. For example."

The Finance Director's gaze swept over Kirke's body. She clutched her chest in alarm at that chilling look.

Despicable, filthy bastard. So that was what he was after.

Furious, Kirke ground her teeth. But he held every card here, and all she could do was glare at the Finance Director with contempt—

"Your research."

"...Excuse me?"

"The hair-loss remedy research. Surely your motivation has grown a bit more urgent? You initially projected twenty years, but at this rate you'll starve long before then. And your circular hair loss continues to expand."

"Ah, well..."

"As it happens, I've secured some excellent labor. I'll need you to devote yourself exclusively to the research alongside them."

The hair-loss remedy research was already consuming every hour she had outside of the bare minimum required for sleeping and eating. The Finance Director surely knew that.

Which meant that by saying this, he was implying something else entirely.

"The new laboratory is already built. Meals, lodging, clothing—all will be handled inside the lab from now on. Your lectures have been placed on indefinite hiatus. Your students have been quite worried about you, as it happens."

"J-just a moment, Finance Director?"

"Not to worry. You may request whatever food you like, and we'll have it brought in. You'll be permitted outside once every three months, give or take. Naturally, you'll be accompanied by our personnel."

Food? Request? Once every three months?

Kirke scrambled to her feet at this parade of ominously ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠specific words—

A soft click.

"Fi-Finance Director. I'm here..."

"Finance Director, and myself."

"Chairwoman, Student Chloe. Both of you made it. Allow me to introduce you: this is Professor Kirke."

"...Ah."

But the two figures who walked through the door—and the sight of the Chairwoman in particular—froze her in instinctive terror.

With her voice lost, the Finance Director laid a hand on Kirke's shoulder.

"From here on, all you need to do is research. Develop the remedy, and I will release you immediately."

"..."

At last, Kirke yielded to reality.

For the plan. For her relocation to the Holy Kingdom. For her career. And for her livelihood and her hair.

Tears slid from Kirke's eyes.

By coincidence, they fell alongside strands of hair, and were hardly visible at all.