Chapter 43
Chapter 43
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 43
Chapter Title: Book
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The midterm evaluation passed by quietly, as if nothing had happened at all—almost unbelievably so.
Well, actually, excluding me and Klaus, nothing had really happened to anyone else.
‘...Does Lev count too, if we’re being precise?’
Then, midway through.
“Charlotte, the dean stepped in personally, so you can stop worrying now.”
“No... ha...”
In the area where those who had been eliminated during the evaluation gathered, Charlotte was stomping her feet in frustration.
‘What’s her deal?’
My mind filled with all sorts of thoughts.
Had some bizarre phenomenon suddenly occurred during a fight, and someone was kidnapped right in front of her?
Then another thought flashed by.
‘More importantly... Charlotte got eliminated?’
No matter how I thought about it, that seemed even stranger.
Someone like Charlotte should have handled any typical emergency cleanly, whether with brute force or her wits.
‘Unless someone forced her out... did she choose to drop out herself?’
That was absurd in its own way.
Honestly, what reason would a girl like Charlotte have to give up voluntarily?
She wasn’t as leisurely as Erwin, bailing midway with a “This is annoying.”
But right now, my brain cells weren’t operating on that high a level.
‘More than that, when’s it going to... no, when’s it going to end?’
I stared blankly at the large screen set up in one corner of the waiting room.
Then, gazes began to gather on me one by one from around the room.
“Um... Adel, shouldn’t you go to the infirmary...?”
“How’d you get blood on you...?”
“Wow... how intense was the top seats’s fight?”
“More importantly, where’d the mask fight? I didn’t see it.”
“Me neither.”
The surviving students were sweating buckets as they moved across the screen.
Most of the eliminated ones stuck around to watch until the end, or headed back to the dorms to rest.
Normally, I’d have gone back to the dorm and sprawled out too.
But not today. No way.
Why?
...Because I was going to watch that traitor Klaus—who stabbed me in the back—get eliminated with my own two eyes before I slept.
If I threw myself onto the bed in this state, his smug grin would definitely pop into my head.
No way I’d fall asleep then.
For me to stretch out and sleep comfortably tonight, Klaus had to be eliminated no matter what.
“Ooh... who’s that guy?”
“Isn’t that F Class? Holding his own against two S Classers?”
On the screen, Klaus was clashing head-on with Serros and Rufus.
‘...Wait, he’s not going to win this, is he?’
Sudden anxiety gripped my nape.
The worst-case scenario played out in my mind.
If that turned into some comeback victory?
I wouldn’t just miss out on a good night’s sleep—I’d be hurling pillows, kicking off blankets, and having nightmares to boot.
“Oh.”
“Of course.”
“Well, F Class versus S Class—they were never evenly matched to begin with.”
A sigh of relief escaped me.
The moment Klaus’s magic tool shattered on screen, a wave of liberation washed over my whole body.
I stood up from my seat.
No need to watch any more.
Now I could head back to the dorm, pull the covers over without a care, and stretch out fully.
***
[You have defeated the 「Space Mage」! ]
[You have acquired the achievement ‘Sword that Sheathes Wrath’. ]
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
【Sword that Sheathes Wrath】
You blocked the wrath of the 「Space Mage」.
: Your Strength stat increases by 1.
Your sword will rage.
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
‘Oh, an achievement.’
Just seeing that one line halved my fatigue.
As soon as I got back to the dorm, I flopped onto the bed.
The ceiling filled my vision for a moment, but my eyes naturally drifted to the status window.
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
[ Adel ]
Breakthrough Limit : ★☆☆☆☆
Attributes
: 「Abyss」
: 「Space」
: 「Nothingness」
Unique Traits
: 【■■■■】
: 【Laplace’s Eye】
: 【Linguist】
: 【Stigma】
: 【…】
Achievements
: 【King of the Abyss】
: 【Slime Slayer】
: 【Class A】
: 【Tenacity】
: 【Group Project Master】
: 【Sword that Sheathes Wrath】
: 【…】
Stats
: Vitality : 13 (D)
: Strength : 3 (F)
: Intelligence : 27 (B)
: Mental Fortitude : 30 (A)
: Mana : ■ ()
Talents
: 【All talents are fixed at ‘Lowest’ due to 「Stigma」.】
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
Strength at 3.
I wasn’t sure if that was progress or just a desperate twitch.
But a stat increase was always good, so... I smiled contentedly and shifted my gaze.
‘But... where’d the absorbed fragment of calamity go?’
The lone obscured trait in the unique traits section.
‘This one?’
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
【■■■■】
: 【Fragment of Wrath】
: 【■■■ ■■】
: 【■■■ ■■】
: 【■■■ ■■】
: 【■■■ ■■】
: 【■■■ ■■】
: 【■■■ ■■】
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
‘What the hell is this trait?’
A mysterious one that, from the day I possessed this body until now, hadn’t even shown its name properly, let alone a description.
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
【Fragment of Wrath】
Even if my life was shrouded in moments of misery.
I never once shed a tear.
And never bowed my head.
: Stats rise in proportion to your wrath.
I swallowed my tears and, in the end, devoured the world in rage.
✦━━━━━━━━━━━━✦
‘...Oh?’
My eyebrow twitched upward.
Did that mean I got stronger the angrier I got?
Of course, assuming I could control that rage.
Otherwise, my head might explode mid-battle. My life had always been far from calm anyway.
‘No, but... this is surprisingly good?’
Honestly, I hadn’t expected much.
A fragment of calamity—its name alone sounded ominous, full of side effects.
‘And if all five stats rise at once...’
My heart pounded.
The chains of the stigma that had bound me felt like they were loosening bit by bit.
‘Spring is finally coming for me too.’
I pulled the blanket up to my chin and grinned endlessly in satisfaction.
As if my efforts hadn’t been in vain, my eyelids drooped shut on their own.
The next morning.
When I opened my eyes, the clock hands had already blown past 9 a.m.
That’s right.
I was late.
***
“Hey, you little shit, when are you gonna stop being late?”
The moment I opened the classroom door, Veronica’s bellow—thunderous enough to smack my ears instead of a morning greeting—rang out.
[There were circumstances, Dean.]
“The whiteboard’s changed again?”
[That had circumstances too.]
“When are you gonna drop that ‘circumstances’ excuse?”
[When you stop getting mad, Dean.]
“That seems impossible.”
[I think so too.]
Too short for a conversation, too pointless for persuasion.
Kneeling in front of the lectern, looking up at Veronica, she pressed her forehead and let out a deep sigh.
“Ha... fine, get lost.”
[Violence is bad, Dean—]
“Before I make you clean the whiteboard with your face, get lost.”
[Yes ma’am.]
Shge was resorting to brute force like a coward.
As expected of the dean.
“Ugh...”
Veronica leaned against the lectern and ran a hand through her hair.
“Anyway... good work on the midterm... uh... whatever. Keep it up.”
Her voice lacked energy, her expression somewhat downcast.
“Yeah... good job.”
With that, she left the classroom.
...Only to come right back in.
“And Adel, come see me later.”
[?]
“I said come, so come.”
Then she vanished.
Before I could mull it over, Serros slung an arm over my shoulder from the side.
“Top seat. Looks like you need to stop causing trouble, from where I’m standing.”
“Agreed.”
“See? Even second place agrees—it’s serious.”
“You little—!”
Thwack.
Laphia’s fist slammed into Serros’s side, sending him crumpling to the floor.
S Class was the same as always today too.
***
‘This must be it.’
Cradle’s library.
For a school library, its grandeur rivaled that of the imperial palace’s.
In a dusty corner, I pulled out a single book.
‘Here it is.’
Old photos, names, grades, and brief evaluations lined up in sequence.
In simple terms... a graduation album from 100 years ago.
I flipped through the pages.
One name caught my eye.
‘Arvel.’
At the top of the page, proudly holding the number one spot: the hero.
It overlapped with the form I’d seen when using 【Calamity Devourer】.
‘......’
It was identical, strangely so.
Even after a century, there was almost no difference between the calamitized form and the hero in the photo.
I didn’t know why he had fallen to become the 「Space Mage」 calamity.
I felt no guilt for defeating him.
What I’d faced was absolute evil.
‘One thing’s for sure.’
A single truth I realized the moment I browsed the records.
Calamities aren’t born as calamities.
Calamities... are chosen.
‘......’
Time passed quite a bit in the library like that.
“Hey, let’s go eat.”
“OK.”
Among the many books in this world, there were plenty of intriguing ones, so I lost track of time reading voraciously.
That’s when it happened.
“...Huh?”
Golden eyes met mine.
“You...”
Carnel.
It was our student council president.
[Hello, President.]
“You... what are you reading?”
[A book.]
“...That’s written in Elvish.”
I turned the book I held this way and that.
Looked fine to me.
She called it Elvish, but I could read it just fine.
“You... you really are an elf?”
[Nope.]
Carnel looked like she was misunderstanding again.
Why did she keep linking me to elves? I’d never even met one of those pointy-eared types.
“What’s this now...”
Carnel gaped at the stack of books beside me.
“Orcish... Goblin...? You... know beast tongue too?”
[Yeah.]
“Acting like you're hot stuff...”
I’d just been joking around, but it backfired critically.
No, ‘acting like hot stuff’? Isn’t that a bit harsh, President?
[There are a lot of fun books, huh, President.]
“Hmph... Then why don’t you recommend some.”
[Uh?]
“You said there were a lot. Recommend some, go on.”
Caught off guard by the sudden demand, but with time to spare, I casually picked a few.
Given Carnel’s personality, she’d probably like fairy tales too, so I mixed in a couple with useful info.
“......”
When I placed the books in Carnel’s hands, she stared at me in bewilderment.
[What?]
“...Not a single one is in Imperial tongue.”
Was that so?
They all looked the same to me.
[Then—]
“Never mind. I’ll read them myself.”
[Sure.]
With that, Carnel left the library, beaming cheerfully with the books in hand.
***
“Hey~ Carnel’s here... What’re those books?”
Carnel burst into the student council room, slamming the books down on the desk.
“Fun books, Violet.”
“Oh... really?”
Violet picked up one from the pile.
“Eek... This isn’t even in Imperial?”
“Hmph. I’m gonna savor them one by one.”
“Ah, sure... go ahead.”
Violet sighed, grabbed a random book, and opened it alongside a translation dictionary.
She cautiously began deciphering the title word by word.
“Tr... alero... Secrets of Breeding?”
She tilted her head, wondering if she’d mistranslated.
Was there a problem with the dictionary?
But shaking off the weird feeling, she started on the next title.
“Slime... Excretion... Behavior...”
Something’s off.
This feels wrong.
What kind of books are these?
But... what came next was even more absurd.
“Plu... plu... plump... Ttafur’s Bedroom Techniques Gui...de...”
Thud.
Violet slammed the book shut with the dictionary and hurled it far away.
“Please... read them slowly... for real, please...”
Please.
She just hoped Carnel never actually deciphered these books.