Chapter 315: Festival Preparations (End)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 315: Festival Preparations (End)
When I arrived at the academy this morning, the place was in total chaos.
Ah, wait. Let me rephrase that.
To be precise, I already knew the academy had been turned upside down because of a text I received last night.
It would be more accurate to say that the moment I finished my commute was when I saw it with my own eyes, accepted the reality, and gave up hope.
Actually, it wasn’t the entire academy that was turned upside down.
The only place in shambles was the Holy Sword Class’s classroom, and the culprit was currently feigning innocence, claiming it wasn’t intentional.
Of course, since it was the festival preparation period, the Holy Sword Class’s room had been filled with the decorative lights they were working on.
The culprit who wrecked the classroom?
Leilan Claudia. She had stepped forward to apologize to the students and actively offered to help with the restoration, but there were only two days left until the festival.
Common sense dictated that a full restoration was impossible.
“No, wait. This is actually a bit unfair!”
“What is, Chairperson? And even if it is unfair, what are you going to do about it? Oh, were you planning on wrecking the Holy Fire Class too?”
For the record, I was currently being treated to tea by the very person who had trashed the Holy Sword Class’s room, mostly because I had been dragged here the moment I stepped onto campus.
“First of all, I didn’t do it on purpose. It was clearly an accident…!”
“I’m sure it was. If someone committed a crime on purpose, they’d be a villain, not a hero, right?”
Hmm? Why was I being so overbearing? It was because Ga-eul and Ha-ni were incredibly mopey because the things they had prepared were ruined.
Consider this a petty bit of revenge.
“That…!”
The Chairperson started to say something, then took a slow breath and admitted her fault.
“Fine. Honestly, no matter what I say, it’s just an excuse. I have no face to show the cadets.”
…This is why I can’t bring myself to dislike this woman.
As people get older and become adults, so many of them view apologizing as a stain on their pride. How could I hate someone who apologizes so sincerely to cadets much younger than herself?
Besides, it was hard to blame the Chairperson entirely for the cause of the incident.
To summarize the event: the War Demon and Ban Gi-san suddenly started trading blows in front of the Chairperson. The two of them had been sparring while maintaining some semblance of restraint, but the trouble started when they accidentally got too fired up.
A massive shockwave was expected from the clash between Ban Gi-san, who was emitting golden light and wielding the energy of the earth, and Seo Tae-ho, who had swung a fist clad in protective aura. The Chairperson stepped in to neutralize that impact.
The problem was that those two were more level-headed than the Chairperson had anticipated.
As if they had coordinated it, they both stopped their attacks simultaneously, realizing it was getting too dangerous. That left only the Chairperson’s attack, which she had fired to stop them, with nowhere to go.
Seo Tae-ho and Ban Gi-san took the full force of an S-rank hero’s strike, and the truth of the matter was that they were sent flying straight into the Holy Sword Class’s classroom.
Naturally, a classroom where a guy clad in protective aura and a guy empowered by the earth’s energy came crashing in was bound to be a disaster zone.
In other words, the Chairperson was a bit of a pitiful figure to be labeled the sole perpetrator in this incident.
“So, I have a favor to ask. Would it be possible to run the restaurant the Holy Sword Class planned and the cafe the Holy Fire Class planned together…? Among the first-year classes, only the Holy Fire and Holy Sword classes applied for cooking facilities.”
After reflecting for a long time, the Chairperson finally got to the point. I actually knew she was going to say this.
The problem was why she was saying it to me.
“Why are you telling me this? Lilac is the class representative.”
I admit I’m in a bit of a unique position, but officially, I’m not the class rep or anything.
“Because the other cadets can’t speak to me, the Chairperson, as an equal.”
I thought she was going to ask me to help persuade Cathy Noona or something, but her answer was quite unexpected.
“…Excuse me?”
“I’ll be blunt, Cadet Kang So-hyun. Setting aside Cadet Lilac, who naturally considers other people’s perspectives, how many cadets do you think among those opposed to merging the classes could look me in the eye and speak their minds honestly?”
“Aha. Well, none, I suppose?”
There probably weren’t many people gutsy enough to boldly say “no” to a powerful figure like the Academy Chairperson, who was also an active hero.
Among the first-years, maybe Lee Yu-na or Cheon Yu-hak could, but those two didn’t seem like the types to oppose a merger anyway.
“Exactly. However, Cadet Kang So-hyun, you are one of the few cadets who can clearly tell me ‘no’ if you don’t like something, while also being able to listen to the opinions of your classmates and relay them to me honestly.”
“Now that I hear it, I guess I am the right person for the job.”
“Can I count on you?”
Hmm. To be honest, I wasn’t really feeling it.
If the person asking had been someone I didn’t care about, I probably would have refused.
Still, the Chairperson always looked out for my convenience, and it wasn’t like I didn’t owe her a few favors.
I also felt a bit guilty about having seen her secret diary.
“I’ll at least ask the kids.”
I eventually nodded, making a promise that would rank among my top mistakes of this festival.
* * *
As it turned out, the reaction from the Holy Fire Class was split down the middle.
Well, not exactly half, but while most agreed to a joint booth with the Holy Sword Class, a few classmates who had beef with certain members of the Holy Sword Class voiced their opposition.
Even if the class representatives got along and most people welcomed the idea, you couldn’t completely ignore the minority opinion.
The moment you did, you’d end up with defectors, or in the worst-case scenario, people trying to sabotage things. Either way, you could kiss the idea of a “fun festival” goodbye.
“So, what are you going to do about it, you bastards?”
Seo Tae-ho and Ban Gi-san, who were currently performing headstands on the ground, flinched.
Ah, just to be clear, I didn’t make them do that. They decided to do it themselves.
They claimed it was a sign of apology, but unfortunately, what I wanted wasn’t a meaningless apology, but a clear solution.
“I’ll ask the Boss to provide the best equipment possible…”
“Rejected. If it was just about equipment, I could have solved it with money. The problem is that things the kids put their hearts into making themselves were destroyed.”
“I will supply vegetables for free, and though it’s not my specialty, I’ll ask my partner farms and livestock producers to provide meat at my own expense.”
“You just keep your head on the ground.”
Yeah, honestly, it would be weirder if an accident didn’t happen while preparing for a festival.
While I was agonizing over how to handle this, a familiar woman in an unfamiliar guise approached.
Kalia.
The current Director of Arcadia, an S-rank villain, and the woman known as the Fragment of Omnipotence.
She seemed to be wearing a disguise and using perception interference, but just like with the War Demon, it wasn’t enough to fool my Fiery Eyes and Golden Pupils. She bowed her head the moment she saw me.
I was about to get annoyed if she just apologized again, but fortunately, an apology wasn’t the only thing that came out of her mouth.
“I sincerely apologize for the mistake my subordinate made. And since I figured you wouldn’t like it if I just apologized, I’ve prepared a temporary solution.”
She gave a signal while her head was still bowed, and soon a large, box-like object appeared beside her.
“It’s an artificial artifact I made. If you put a broken object inside, it will repair it to its previous form after a certain amount of time.”
Hmm, not bad. It wouldn’t be able to restore the classroom itself, but it could fix things like broken signboards. It was certainly better than nothing.
“So, is that it?”
“No, if that were all, I’d be too ashamed to even come here to apologize.”
The moment she shot a sharp glare at Seo Tae-ho, the man, who had been subtly slacking off, obediently pressed his head back into the dirt.
“After hearing the situation from Tae-ho, I brought something that can resolve the current situation as much as possible.”
I guess Kalia is the boss for a reason; she’s definitely better than him.
The first thing Kalia pulled out with such confidence was…
“It’s an instant brainwashing device with absolutely no side effects. For the duration of the festival, we can use this on the cadets who are opposing…”
The problem was that this woman’s problem-solving methods were much closer to those of a villain than I expected.
“Are you guys some kind of insane, psycho villains? Oh, wait, you are.”
“…Eh? Do you not like this sort of thing?”
Kalia reacted as if she were genuinely surprised, but I could understand why she’d react that way.
In reality, I wasn’t the type to shy away from such methods either.
I just didn’t like the idea of brainwashing innocent kids and preventing them from doing what they wanted at the festival.
If I were going to go that route, I would have just brainwashed them myself.
“Uh, well. Honestly, I thought you’d like it because it’s convenient, but… would you like to see the other things I brought just in case?”
She seemed flustered for a brief moment by my unexpected reaction, but she soon showed me the second tool she had prepared for just such an occasion.
“Oho.”
To be honest, the second tool was actually quite good. If she had shown me this from the start, my opinion of her might have actually gone up.
“…Do you really like that one better?”
“Why? This is much simpler.”
“No, I mean, it is, but…”
The second artificial artifact she showed me was called a Space Expansion Device.
It was an artificial artifact modeled after the structure of a dungeon. It supposedly turned a space with doors or windows into a pseudo-dungeon, making the interior much larger than it actually was.
With this, even if it was technically one booth, they could use it as if it were double the space. The kids would accept that.
“Well, if that’s what you prefer, it’s fine by me. Though I think you might regret it later.”
“Hmm?”
As a side note, a short while later, I would find myself thinking I should have just listened to Kalia and used the brainwashing beam. But since that was something that would happen after the festival started, there was no way for me to know at the time.
“If vegetables and meat aren’t enough, I’ll even provide drinking water and milk at my own expense…!”
“…Fine, do whatever you want then.”
* * *
Well, to state the conclusion first, I had overlooked a more fundamental problem.
In the end, as long as they had to do business in the same space, the primary issue was that people who disliked each other had to see each other’s faces.
Everyone had accepted this much thanks to my persuasion and the fact that I had even expanded the space, but then a second problem emerged.
Even if the space itself was larger, the fact remained that it was still only one room.
In short…
“There’s only one entrance.”
That was it. With the classes split in two but only one entrance, they ended up in a position where they were stealing each other’s customers.
Well, strictly speaking, that side was a restaurant where food was the main focus, and we were a teahouse where drinks were the main focus, so we could have reached a reasonable compromise, but…
“I can’t give up on the ‘Make it delicious, Moe Moe Kyun’ omurice served by maids…!”
“We can’t give up on our pre-meal and post-meal teas either…!”
This time, the originators of the ideas from each class started fighting.
…I didn’t want to feel this way, but they really are still just kids.
It would have been a pain if they actually started brawling and flipping tables, but fortunately, it hadn’t reached that point yet.
However, the part that had become a problem now was…
“Hey, what did you just say?”
“…I said that while I don’t know about cooking, there’s no way we’d lose to you in tea. Honestly, aside from you, no one else over there is even remotely intimidating.”
“…Oho.”
“Can you handle every single order by yourself? If multiple people make them, how do you plan to maintain quality? Are you going to raise everyone else to your level? Or are you planning to serve customers food with inconsistent quality?”
Cheon Yu-hak, his competitive streak ignited for the first time in a while, threw down a provocation.
“Hey, Cheon Yu-hak. Why are you running your mouth so much? You scared?”
And Ha-ni, who had been relatively quiet lately, fired right back.
“Scared? Don’t make me laugh.”
“Then shall we settle this?”
“A contest? Fine by me.”
“Guys, this is a festival we’re doing together, let’s not be so aggressive…”
Lilac tried to mediate, but of course, neither of them—no, none of the cadets from either class—listened.
“Let’s settle it with sales.”
“Ha, fine. What are we betting?”
“No, guys… let’s really not bet on things…!”
Lilac’s mournful cry was ignored by everyone; the duel was as good as settled.
Hmm. Maybe something like the winning class buying drinks for the other would work?
Just as I was wondering if drinks could cool down the overheated atmosphere…
“Then how about the winning side from the first day absorbs the losing side?! On the second day, you’ll do business under only one signboard!”
At the suggestion of Professor Park A-ram, who had suddenly popped out of nowhere…
The fired-up cadets grinned.
…Is, is it really necessary to go that far?
“Say your goodbyes to that signboard in advance. It looks like you’ll only be using it for one day.”
“You guys better be prepared. We’ll make good use of that maid labor on the second day.”
And so began the meaningless battle between two classes, neither of which could even conceive of defeat.