The Eyes of Envy
The rumor had already begun to spread.
“Hey, look over there…” All eyes turned my way. Being something of a celebrity at the Academy, I was used to this kind of attention. Today, however, the stares carried a heavier weight than usual. Guessing the reason wasn’t difficult. At this particular moment, there was only one thing that could cause it.
The rumor that Lana and I had shared a personal meeting must have gotten out.
“Why would the Saintess ever…”
Sure enough, whispers tied to that very question reached my ears. It was only natural. Right now Lana drew more eyes than anyone else in the Academy. The title of Saintess alone would have been enough, but her looks and personality drew even more attention. Despite her impossibly exalted station, she treated everyone with genuine kindness. She accepted greetings as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world and conversed comfortably with anyone who approached her. Everyone wanted to speak with her. Everyone wanted to grow closer.
Yet despite that fierce interest, Lana never grew especially close to any one person. She was kind to all, always smiling, but she was famous for refusing every single personal invitation or meeting. And now the rumor that such a girl had done exactly that with someone had begun to circulate. It would have been strange if I, the other party in that rumor, didn’t become the center of attention.
“Just like the last Saintess… Does that guy have something special?”
Besides, this wasn’t even the first time. I already had a history of growing close to Julia, who had allowed no one near her. Whatever the truth might be, on the surface I was the man who had drawn the interest of two Saintesses in succession. At that point, people couldn’t help but wonder if there was something special about me.
Not really, though.
Strictly speaking, there was. If one measured the density of fate, I shared a bond with those two that no one else could compare to. But that belonged to the days when I had been Gunter. The connections the current me had formed with Julia and Lana were nothing more than coincidences stacked upon coincidences. In other words, I had simply gotten lucky. To everyone else, of course, it probably looked very different.
…Anyway.
Those glares are downright murderous.
Thanks to the original owner of this body—Kyle—the gazes directed at me had never been warm. Now they felt even sharper. The hostility they carried seemed to have grown several times stronger than before. The most prominent emotions among them were, naturally, envy and jealousy.
Yes. These people were jealous of me.
It wasn’t this bad with Julia…
I had experienced something similar during the Julia incident. The stares had increased then, too, and the emotions behind them had been new. Jealousy had certainly been among them. But the proportion was clearly different now. Back then, jealousy hadn’t occupied nearly so large a share.
The reason for the change was easy to guess. It came down to the difference between Julia and Lana.
While she stayed at the Academy, Julia had never allowed anyone to approach her. Her sharp, rigid aura alone had been enough to keep most people from even daring to try. So even after word got out that she kept me close, not many people harbored jealousy. And those who did didn’t feel it very strongly. To them, Julia had been an untouchable tree from the very beginning—one they couldn’t even dream of nearing.
Lana was different. Unlike Julia, who permitted no approach at all, people could speak with Lana. They could get close. If Julia had been a tree no one could even consider reaching for, Lana looked like a tree one might actually be able to approach.
People do not covet what holds zero possibility. They covet what holds even the slightest chance. That was why the stares directed at me overflowed with jealousy. They believed I had stolen a place any one of them might have claimed.
Which is exactly why this is bad.
It was an unpleasant development. I didn’t care about the stares aimed at me. The problem was that they might affect Lana as well.
…Just to be safe.
Having made up my mind, I decided to check on her.
Finding Lana was easy. A huge crowd had once again gathered around her today. The size of the crowd itself wasn’t much different from usual, but the atmosphere definitely was.
“If it’s not too much trouble…! Could you possibly spare me a moment this weekend…!!”
The voice pierced straight through the noise. With a crowd that large and all the buzzing voices, it should have been swallowed up, yet it rang out clearly; the speaker must have been shouting at the top of his lungs. The voice belonged to a man. I didn’t recognize his face, but he was calling out loudly all the same—directly to Lana.
It wasn’t hard to grasp the situation. The content of what I’d heard made it obvious. He was asking her for a personal meeting.
Lana wore a troubled little smile.
But before she could answer—
“No.”
Anne cut in.
“Y-yes…?”
Whether the man was flustered or not, Anne continued coldly.
“That won’t be possible. The Saintess is busy.”
The man looked startled for a moment, then pressed on.
“T-then when might she have time…!”
He refused to give up, but Anne shut him down without mercy.
“We’ll have to see when the time comes. So just get lost.”
“Ah, wait—!”
The man tried to continue with a wronged expression, but he never got the chance. In the end he withdrew.
It looked as though the matter had been settled. It hadn’t. That had only been the beginning.
“If it’s all right with you…!”
“Saintess…!”
“Please, with me…!”
As if the first man had lit the fuse, people began hurling proposals at Lana one after another. Of course, none of them succeeded. Before they could even finish speaking, Anne the priestess blocked every single one.
That didn’t mean the situation was resolved peacefully.
“Tch!”
One man, deciding words would never get past Anne, tried to force his way toward Lana physically.
He never made it.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Anne repelled him before he could take more than a step. Physically.
“Gaaah!”
The man flew backward in a spectacular arc after Anne’s blow.
“How dare you try to approach the Saintess? Know your place.”
Anne spoke with a deeply furrowed brow. Her aura was so intimidating that the surrounding crowd unconsciously took a step back.
Watching her, I let out a quiet whistle of admiration.
Not bad at all.
I had assumed anyone stationed at the Saintess’s side would be no ordinary priestess, but Anne’s skill surpassed even my expectations. I had only glimpsed a single movement, yet I could roughly gauge her level. She was exceptionally talented. It wasn’t an exact measurement, but she appeared to be stronger than Jerim.
That was impressive. By my standards it was nothing special, but Jerim was a genius by ordinary measures. Of course Anne was a few years older than him, but even taking that into account, her ability was outstanding. Besides, she clearly wasn’t the type who only knew how to use her body like Jerim. They wouldn’t assign just any priestess as the Saintess’s aide; she must be capable of using a wide range of holy arts from the Luur Order as well.
In other words, overall she was already far superior to Jerim. That level of skill made sense for someone allowed to stand at the Saintess’s side.
Even so, I couldn’t feel at ease. I knew all too well that I was the reason this situation had erupted. I hadn’t done anything wrong, but the rumor itself had become the problem.
Until now Lana had treated everyone with kindness, regardless of status. She accepted every greeting and gladly held conversations with anyone. That was why crowds always formed around her. Everyone wanted to stay near her. Everyone wanted to grow closer.
Yet not everyone could make personal requests of her. The reason was simple. No matter how kind she was, she remained a Saintess—a precious, exalted being. So exalted that ordinary people would consider it blasphemous to even meet her eyes. Just because such a person treated them kindly and warmly did not give everyone the right to make personal overtures. Not if they knew their place.
Therefore, the number of personal invitations Lana had received at the Academy couldn’t have been very high. And even those would have come only from people of similarly noble birth.
Then the rumor that she had grown close to me began to spread. Among those who heard it, some were bound to think, If that guy Kyle could do it, maybe I have a chance too.
Anyone with a functioning brain would realize the odds were extremely low, but the existence of a precedent versus its absence created a massive difference. And so there would always be people who clung to that tiny sliver of hope and acted on it.
Just like the scene unfolding before me now.
…This is bad.
I had no idea how long the situation would last. It might die down soon, or it might not. What was certain was that Lana had been placed in a far more troublesome position than before.
It would have been better if it had been one of the other two. Julia would never have allowed anyone near her in the first place. If such a situation arose, she would have either ignored it completely or personally driven away anyone who crossed the line. Alice… I wasn’t sure about the present, but the Alice I remembered would have thoroughly punished anyone who overstepped and silenced the disturbance. Neither of them would have felt the slightest guilt for doing so.
Lana was different. She tried to treat everyone kindly and gently. She cared about others. So it would be hard for her to push people away heartlessly, and even if she did, her heart would not be at ease.
“……”
I watched Lana, who wore a smile that showed traces of distress unlike her usual expression, with complicated eyes.