12. The Melancholy of a Certain Protagonist
12. The Melancholy of a Certain Protagonist
"Finance Director, what in the world just happened in there?"
"...I'd rather like to know that myself."
I stepped out of the faculty office and into a room in the building directly opposite. The Chairwoman was already waiting inside. Milia might only be a 3rd Rank, and I had brought every countermeasure from Rigid Energy to a dozen other contingencies, but any threat to my personal safety had to be preemptively annihilated at the source. That was why the Chairwoman had concealed herself in the opposite building, ready to intervene at the first sign of trouble.
As it turned out, none of that proved necessary. Nothing happened.
Right now, that wasn't the problem.
"How did Milia end up being the one to bring up the terror attack first? It was as if..."
"As if she had read my mind."
Given how the conversation had flowed, I had been squarely in the position of interrogating Milia about her ties to the Wish Order. I hadn't shown the slightest hint that I was trying to maneuver her into anything. Even if that had been my ultimate objective, I hadn't let it show. And yet Milia had brought up the word "terror" with absolute precision. It should have been impossible unless she had read my thoughts.
"Chairwoman, is it possible Milia used some kind of mind-reading magic? I'm not well-versed in such things..."
"At the 7th Rank level, perhaps. But a 3rd Rank couldn't deceive me. Milia did not use magic."
The Chairwoman's declaration was absolute. And she was right—if a mere 3rd Rank could fool the Chairwoman's senses, that would be a problem in its own right. Still, suspicion lingered on her face.
"All the same, something felt... off."
"Excuse me?"
"Behind Milia's chair. I sensed something strange there. How should I put it... a rather deeply ominous mana."
Ominous mana?
'Behind Milia's chair.'
Was she talking about that shadow? The spot where Milia had abruptly tripped over thin air?
Now that I thought about it, that shadow had felt subtly wrong, hadn't it.
"You don't know what it was either, Chairwoman?"
"If I had been in a position to sweep the room with Rigid Energy in earnest, I could have identified it. But at that moment, I couldn't risk Milia realizing I was monitoring the situation. It wasn't feasible."
"That makes sense."
"One thing I can state absolutely: it was the most horrifying and most ominous mana I have ever sensed."
"...Coming from you, Chairwoman?"
"I've encountered vast and overwhelming mana countless times. But what I felt just now was... how should I describe it, a sensation of being filled with nothing but sheer malice? Ordinary monsters don't emit that kind of mana."
Milia. The Wish Order.
Mana so foul that even the Chairwoman called it the most ominous she'd ever felt.
Could it be?
'The Dark Sword?'
Horrifying and ominous mana. That exact phrasing appeared constantly in Dark Kingdom's descriptions of the Dark Sword. If it was vile enough for the Chairwoman to call it ominous, it had to be the Dark Sword.
'But the Dark Sword doesn't exist yet right now.'
This wasn't a matter of "it's strange for a cult to carry it outside" or "it's not an item an individual can simply use." The Dark Sword literally did not exist yet in this timeline. More precisely, it hadn't been fully actualized. The strategy guides had all said you could only obtain it after progressing at least to the middle of Part 2.
No, wait.
What if it wasn't the Dark Sword itself, but its remnants? What if someone held a rank high enough to access the yet-unformed Dark Sword and wield its power on a regular basis?
"...It seems the Wish Order's infiltrator isn't limited to Milia alone."
"What? Are you saying there was someone else inside that room?"
"I see no other explanation. And that ominous mana you sensed, Chairwoman—that would be the second infiltrator."
"But to remain undetected by me... don't tell me."
The Chairwoman's face drained of color as she arrived at the same conclusion. Even accounting for the distance and the fact that she'd focused solely on protecting me to avoid alerting Milia, the Chairwoman was an 8th Rank. Any ordinary concealment would have been exposed instantly. Yet this presence had evaded the Chairwoman's notice—even if she hadn't been at full vigilance—and carried mana foul enough to be suspected as a remnant of the Dark Sword.
"An Archbishop of the Wish Order?"
"Or perhaps the Pontiff himself."
Decades ago, the Archbishop who had infiltrated the academy with a detached force had been 7th Rank. Since then, the Wish Order's influence had expanded, not contracted. Above all, if they kept the Dark Sword as their most central holy relic, then even in an incomplete state it could likely produce a 7th Rank. And the Pontiff—of whom I knew nothing—would also be at least at the 7th Rank level. 8th Rank? If the Pontiff were 8th Rank, he'd have picked a direct fight with the crumbling Holy Kingdom long ago.
It was highly likely that the one who had brought up the terror attack as if reading my thoughts wasn't Milia at all, but this presumed Archbishop or Pontiff.
"What if an Archbishop or a Bishop was hiding in that room, concealing himself with the power of a holy relic?"
"...As I said, Milia is incapable of hiding anything. But if there were an infiltrator at the peak of 6th Rank or higher—at the 7th Rank level—that changes everything."
"That explanation is far more natural."
Come to think of it, there was no way the Wish Order would send Milia as their sole infiltrator. Her whole bumbling manner only reinforced that. Those strange, unknowable memories I'd glimpsed at the end—were those the Order's doing too? Milia had seemed to undergo some sort of change after that.
'Now that I think about it, didn't she say something about the Order collapsing?'
She'd definitely said that when she started going off the rails. But thinking back on it now, the claim was absurd. If only the Dark Sword had been lost, maybe. But an operative of 6th Rank or higher carrying its remnants had come here as an infiltrator—what collapse? It had all been lies meant to deceive me, and evidently that whole bumbling act had indeed been a performance. Or if not, Milia had been on the back foot and under pressure, so perhaps the other infiltrator had intervened indirectly.
If things had gone wrong, I might have been ambushed in that room. The Chairwoman had been watching over me, so I wouldn't have died, but it still sent a chill down my spine.
"By the way, Finance Director—that holy relic you mentioned earlier. It is what I think it is."
"The Dark Sword."
"So that was the identity of that ominous mana. If I'd known, instead of killing everyone back then I should have captured one or two and tortured them."
"That was decades ago. Please don't dwell on it."
In the end, my contact with Milia had yielded a degree of success, but it also left behind an unsettling residue. I had made contact with the Wish Order as intended and drawn them out, but in the confusion caused by those inexplicable memories, my thoughts about the terror attack had been read. Most likely the work of that presumed-Archbishop-level infiltrator. A mage past 6th Rank could certainly manage such a feat.
'So those disquieting memories were illusion magic after all.'
I couldn't think of any other cause. Accepting that and moving on was the easiest path.
...Or perhaps I was deliberately avoiding the question. My head hurt too much.
"In any case, it seems I'll need to meet with Milia and the other infiltrator again."
"Can't you go right now?"
"I did summon Milia again, but she didn't come. And more to the point, they were the ones who said we'd meet again—so one way or another, contact will be made."
If the Wish Order learned that the Chairwoman was involved in this matter, they would vanish immediately. For now, I had to remain the sole face of our side. The Chairwoman would eventually intervene, but that was for later. Until the final exams began, until the terror attack began, I alone had to maintain contact with the Wish Order.
The Chairwoman's expression deepened with worry, but I rose from my seat first.
"If you'll excuse me, then."
"Finance Director?"
"We can't simply sit here agonizing forever. We have far too many things to do."
Unlike the Wish Order, the Chairwoman and I couldn't afford to spend all our time contemplating countermeasures for this affair. We had to handle a mountain of paperwork and financial duties alongside it. Naturally, before Milia and the other infiltrator made their next move, I would need to confer with the Chairwoman—but right now, a backlog of work awaited.
The Chairwoman let out a sigh and rose from her seat as well.
"Then once today's work is finished, I'll come find you at your dormitory."
"Can you make it before midnight?"
"Hm. That might be rather difficult."
"Studying is off the table for tonight, then. Understood."
As for sleep—between military-grade stimulants and the Chairwoman's Rigid Energy, I'd manage somehow. It looked like another prolonged forced march was ahead. Times like this made me miss the uninhabited-island midterm exams. That whole week had been a genuinely sweet respite.
I was just about to leave the room when the Chairwoman suddenly spoke.
"Are you going on ahead, Finance Director? We're both heading to the office anyway—let's go together."
"Apologies. I have a prior engagement."
"...An engagement? Is that one of the things you have to do?"
"It isn't playing hooky. It's something I should have done long ago and am only now getting to."
That damn junior of mine had only gotten back to me once the festival was nearly upon us, and during the festival itself I'd been swamped with the hair-loss inducer leak and everything else. Now that the festival was over and my workload had finally lightened, this was the optimal window. If I put it off any longer, the Wish Order and the terror plot were going to bury me in chaos.
So I was going.
"I'm off to meet Student Rus."
"Ah."
At long last. Truly at long last.
I was finally keeping a promise I had made to that hero over a month ago.
...She'd be furious, wouldn't she? I'd be furious too.
'At least I was smart enough to tell her to come to my dormitory.'
I'd get there ahead of her and have something ready. Anything was better than dealing with an enraged 6th Rank student head-on.
And Rus was a guy, so if I just apologized sincerely, he wouldn't be petty about it... right?
*
"Hah... hah..."
She ran. Ran and ran and kept running.
Concealed by the darkness, never loosening her grip on the Dark Sword in her hand.
Rus sprinted until she ducked into a secluded back alley.
And then.
She collapsed.
"..."
Rus pressed her hands over her ears. Even so, the words and thoughts she'd just overheard kept thrashing through her mind. Adam meeting with Milia. And the terror attack. Those facts were causing her pain.
'Adam... is it really true?'
That declaration Milia had made at the end—that they would carry out a terror attack. It had been so utterly out of nowhere, yet Adam hadn't been especially shocked by the statement itself. He had been startled, yes, but it was a different kind of shock. Less about the word "terror" itself, and closer to "how did she know."
...Rus had once lived in the same dormitory as Adam for over three years. She could tell. From Adam's gestures, his gait, his expressions, his voice—she could parse at least a fraction of his true intent. That was why, when she'd first confronted Adam on Burning Hill, she had known immediately that his corruption was real. The possibility that Adam might be allied with the great evil called the Wish Order. That the two of them might together unleash a terror attack upon the academy.
That possibility alone made it hard for Rus to breathe.
She was terrified that everything she'd known of Adam had been nothing but an act. That he had been corrupt from the very beginning, deceiving her all along.
'But. But still.'
Not yet. Nothing was certain yet. Adam had never been the one to bring up the terror attack first, had he? And no matter how long she'd known him, the human heart was never something you could grasp perfectly. She couldn't reach a conclusion without clear proof. Rus barely managed to wrench herself free of that worst-case imagining.
But if Adam truly intended to terrorize the academy alongside the Wish Order—
What possible reason could there be?
'...Adam.'
Were you ever really the person I knew? Was your gentleness, all the things you said to me—were they all lies?
Was it the side effects of the Dark Sword? Or the gradual disintegration of your spirit?
Crouched there motionless in that familiar corner, Rus suddenly—
"...Ah."
—realized something, and slowly rose to her feet.
She had briefly forgotten, caught up in the matter of Milia and Adam, but today was the day.
The day she was supposed to meet Adam.
'Right. I'll go see him and find out for myself.'
A promise made well over a month ago. A promise she had despaired over, convinced Adam had forgotten it. But Adam had contacted her just yesterday. The letter had contained a string of profanity aimed at the Student Council President, an apology for making her wait so long, and a single line: let's meet today.
A letter she had reread dozens of times, breathed in its scent dozens of times, read again dozens of times—and felt relief.
Proof that Adam hadn't abandoned her yet. That he hadn't forgotten her.
She had to confirm it.
'I'll go and settle this for certain.'
Now that she thought about it, her attitude toward Adam had been painfully two-faced. Telling herself she had to draw a clear line, yet still longing for his warmth. Struggling to hate him, yet still watching him. Living alone in Adam's old dormitory. Thinking about their memories. Recalling his words.
She had to decide on one. If she kept wavering like this, she would never reach any kind of resolution.
She would decide today.
"...I'll go to Adam."
The letter had included a map to the dormitory. It was an oddly winding route through back alleys—apparently the only way to reach the building. Adam had once been quite wealthy as Finance Director. She didn't know why he was staying in a different dormitory now, but surely it would still be a fine place.
The reason for the change in dormitory, and the events of today—she would uncover both.
Having made up her mind, Rus set her feet in motion. Once a decision was made, she couldn't shake the feeling that things would somehow work out.
'Right. If you really think about it, Adam has no reason to terrorize the academy, does he? They say he and the Chairwoman are especially close. It's nonsense.'
Perhaps she had overreacted. If anything, if Adam was being manipulated by the Wish Order, then she had to help him however she could.
Speaking of the Wish Order.
'That bitch Milia mentioned some kind of mine.'
A collapsing cult that had invested in a mine and suffered a massive failure. Had that happened in the previous cycle too? Only one mine came to Rus's mind—rather too conveniently.
'The rock salt mine... there's no way, right?'
There were countless mines across the continent. What were the odds the Wish Order had invested in that very rock salt mine where Rus had intervened? But if it were true, then good. Unwittingly, she had dealt a major blow to the Wish Order's footing. The thought of having screwed over those fanatics lifted her spirits. Feeling ever so slightly better, Rus wound her way through the serpentine alleyways—
"Huh?"
—and arrived at a dormitory so old, so shabby, and so small that it scarcely seemed habitable. A building the color of ash.
"Ah, Student Rus. You made it."
"...Finance Director?"
"Come in. I'm embarrassed to welcome you to such a humble place."
Adam's bright smile and welcoming words weren't empty pleasantries. Faced with a life so utterly different from the one Adam had once lived, Rus felt as though her heart had plummeted straight through the floor.