10. Demon in a Bottle (22)
10. Demon in a Bottle (22)
Every Wednesday at Rekachev, a program called Meet the Pros brought in an active acrobat to give a lecture.
The guests were typically performers of first-rate or near-first-rate caliber currently staying near Yeterinpurk.
The line between first-rate and near-first-rate came down to a single factor.
How much of their own pocket the invited lecturer spent on snacks for the students.
Spend every coin of the honorarium on the students, and you were first-rate. Pinch pennies, and you were near-first-rate. That was the logic.
The ones who had dreamed up this absurd grading standard were, of course, the students themselves.
Their reasoning went like this: if a renowned senior acrobat presented a miserly image to the next generation by skimping on snack money, it was proof their own earnings weren't keeping pace with other first-rate performers.
From the lecturer's perspective, the students' logic seemed positively bandit-like, yet no acrobat ever turned down an invitation from Rekachev.
The accompanying benefits were simply too great.
Just standing at the podium guaranteed a write-up in that month's magazines, and making your name known to Rekachev's elite paid enormous dividends later in one's career.
A lecture depends as much on the audience's engagement as on the speaker's preparation.
The whole atmosphere shifted according to how actively the students responded.
So acrobats who took the podium never hesitated to open their wallets wide in hopes of earning a first-rate rating from the students.
In that sense, this semester's first invited guest went beyond first-rate—they deserved to be classified as "epic." The speaker had personally funded a spread of snacks worth several times the honorarium itself.
At the entrance to the lecture hall, each student received a gift box of expensive confections from Slagbort Confectionery, a freshly made non-alcoholic cocktail, and a souvenir set crafted by a famous Yeterinpurk workshop.
The Circus Grand Prix season was unmistakably in full swing; the caliber of the invited acrobats was on a different plane from the usual ones.
Invitations weren't even issued to anyone below troupe-leader rank.
For all that money spent, however, the first lecture's atmosphere turned hostile.
Because the guest speaker that week was none other than the Golden Carnival's leader, Lord Fantastic—Simon Magier.
His relations with Rekachev had never been cordial.
The students were already in a frame of mind hostile to outsiders, thanks to the Grand Prix.
The moment he appeared, they went on the attack.
Consequently, this semester's first Meet the Pros session turned into something resembling a public hearing.
Ella, having publicly aired his petty antics at the draft's closing event the week before, had furnished the students with ample ammunition. All through the lecture, they kept firing off pointed jokes and heckles about those incidents.
Lord Fantastic had to endure a thoroughly miserable time.
The one mercy was that Clara—renowned throughout Rekachev as the most articulate and clear-spoken student—kept out of it. She sat quietly in a corner, citing illness as an excuse. Had she joined in, Lord Fantastic might have suffered a truly spectacular humiliation that day.
A week had passed since then.
Today was the second session of Meet the Pros.
The invited lecturer was Wonderstein.
Ella handed him the lecture materials she had revised and re-revised all night.
Seeing Lord Fantastic torn apart had shocked her into spending the entire week preparing Wonderstein's lecture. She had agonized over every last detail, dreading the thought of him being embarrassed.
"It's not much different from what you saw yesterday. I just polished the wording a little."
Wonderstein accepted the sheaf of papers.
Every letter, every slash mark, radiated her devotion.
"Thank you for the hard work. I've once again run you ragged, haven't I."
"What are you talking about. I'm your Deputy Leader."
She yawned, then let her head thump against his chest.
Since her confession that day, this kind of contact had become routine.
Wonderstein patted her on the back.
"I don't consider you my Deputy Leader."
"...What do you mean?"
Her expression stiffened slightly.
He looked at her and chuckled.
"You're the real leader. I'm the deputy."
Wonderstein tapped her shoulder with the bundle of papers.
Ella let out a small laugh and scratched the back of her head.
"Heh. Your ideas were so good, putting the materials together was easy. I've always thought you have an incredible eye for detail. How do you come up with that kind of thing?"
"Ah, experience, I suppose."
Wonderstein deflected vaguely, thinking back to his game-streaming days.
Ella nodded as if that made perfect sense.
"Experience? Ah, right. You said you've stood on the Wonder Stage before, didn't you?"
Wonderstein froze for a beat.
"...Did I ever say that?"
"You told me you'd stood in front of thirty thousand people. Is there any other place like that besides the Wonder Stage?"
He swallowed a silent curse.
She'd interpreted it that way.
The Wonder Stage was a thread that could connect him to the Black Magician.
A knot of unease settled in his chest.
Thankfully, Ella didn't press further.
Maybe she was afraid of triggering more of her own returning memories.
Lately, she'd stopped deliberately trying to unearth things people kept quiet about.
Instead, she refocused on the special lecture ahead.
"You really don't need my help? I can make time to assist with your lesson prep."
"Miss Ella, you have your own class right before it."
Ella let out a short, derisive snort at that.
"Like that matters. School is just a diversion when I've got free time. My place is here. I'm your partner, aren't I?"
I laughed out loud.
Just knowing she had my back made me feel steady.
"That's right. So trust your troupe leader, Deputy Leader."
He stroked her sleep-tousled hair.
She flushed and averted her eyes.
"F-fine. But if you stumble around up there or make a fool of yourself, be ready for an earful."
"Understood. Naturally."
The two of them headed down to the dining room.
The troupe members seemed busier than usual today.
Ratman workers were stacking loads brought from somewhere into neat piles in the corner of the dining room.
Ella, recognizing them as party supplies, fought to keep a smile off her face.
When they entered the dining room, Maya was just rising from her seat.
She stepped in front of Wonderstein with an expressionless face and spoke.
"I have a practicum this afternoon."
"Oh, a practicum? You're taking a practical class as well, Miss Maya?"
He'd assumed she was only studying circus theory.
Things like Illusion Magic, or stage direction using lighting and such.
He'd never imagined she was actually learning acrobatics.
Ella also wore a surprised look; she had thought the same.
"Yes. An introductory dagger-handling course."
Wonderstein shot her a worried glance.
"Knives? That seems dangerous for you, Miss Maya..."
She was so sedentary and deliberate in her movements, he simply couldn't picture her handling blades. He couldn't imagine her throwing and catching anything with the swift, sharp motions of an Ella or a Reina.
"I'm good at it. Come watch."
Her voice carried a faint edge of irritation.
Yurakne gave a wry smile as she served the food.
She already knew Maya had been practicing acrobatics.
Their rooms were right next to each other, so she'd seen the girl heading down to the yard late at night, clutching her daggers.
She could guess why the child who'd always been content quietly drawing pictures had suddenly taken up acrobatics.
She wanted recognition from the troupe leader.
"Troupe Leader, I think it might be nice to go and watch Miss Maya's acrobatics. You could stay there through the afternoon and then the three of you could return together. There's a party this evening, after all."
Maya echoed the word with a puzzled voice.
"A party?"
"Yes. Today is Miss Ella's birthday. You didn't know? I mentioned it just the day before yesterday."
Maya shook her head.
"I forgot."
Ella let out a deflated sigh.
That sharp-as-a-tack girl forgot that?
This was a provocation!
"Well, I've given up expecting a present from you. Not that I was hoping for one anyway."
Maya answered her sarcasm with a flat, indifferent voice.
"I'll get one if you need it."
"Forget it. That's like asking for a bow while lying flat on the ground."
Sensing another argument about to flare, Wonderstein swiftly interposed himself between them.
"Understood. I'll finish the lecture and then go watch Miss Maya's practicum. Now, Miss Ella, let's eat. I heard there's morning assembly today?"
Ella let Wonderstein steer her further into the dining room.
Maya climbed the stairs alone, quietly.
At last, she could stand before the troupe leader as an acrobat.
She would execute her practicum brilliantly.
And formally be acknowledged as his disciple.
Would the canvas of her mind grow a little wider then?
She got ready for school.
She used telekinesis to shove her things into her bag, her thoughts drifting to Ella.
Truthfully, she had remembered Ella's birthday.
It was just that the first time she'd heard the date had been the moment she'd seen the troupe leader spoon-feeding her. So she had deliberately ignored it.
Her seventeenth birthday, today.
A coincidence, but a strange one.
Maya fingered the Memory Disk tucked inside her coat.
Today was the day her mother had died.
Seventeen years ago—the day of the terrorist attack at the Hippodrome.
***
Rekachev normally didn't have anything like morning assembly.
But today, everyone had gathered in the lecture hall early in the morning for just that.
So long as the school bore the name Rekachev Circus School, this day could not pass unmarked.
Everyone bowed their heads before the flag and observed a moment of silence.
Elpara, delivering the eulogy, glanced toward one of the professors.
Professor Phairen of the taming discipline.
Her eyes were closed and her head respectfully lowered, yet not the faintest trace of sorrow could be felt from her.
The girl who had once so fervently sought her master was gone.
The girl who used to look up at him with wary eyes whenever Elpara visited his office was gone.
For the past seventeen years, since the attack, there had been many murmurings that something inside her had broken.
The other professors had occasionally glimpsed madness glinting through her kindness.
Had her master's death twisted her into that?
Or had something else happened to her afterward?
It pained Elpara to see her friend's disciple turned into that.
The memorial service had dampened the entire school's mood from the morning onward.
So Elpara decided to announce some cheerful news.
It concerned the Freshmen Welcome Party.
As though their earlier gloom had been a mirage, the students burst into lively chatter at once.
The Freshmen Welcome Party was one of Rekachev's annual traditions.
Since everyone spent the first week scrambling to adapt to timetables and school life, the event was typically held on the second Saturday of the semester.
This scheduling had a distinctly positive effect on the freshmen, because right up until the party, the upperclassmen treated them with extraordinary kindness.
The Freshmen Welcome Party was an event exclusively for the freshmen.
Senior students, aside from the few top-year organizers, were not allowed to attend.
Their only ticket in was a single method.
Being invited as a freshman's partner.
Each freshman could invite one guest.
This year's Freshmen Welcome Party extended the same privilege to the auditing students, treating them as freshmen.
"The envelope before each of you contains two cards. One is your admission ticket. The other is a Partner Invitation Ticket."
A Partner Invitation Ticket.
The moment those words were spoken, the three figures standing at the front of the three groups of auditing students all thought of the same person at the same instant.