The Hero Party and the Academy Principal
Berta Fortress. Berta Fortress was a stronghold the Kingdom had erected beyond its western border to stem the Demon King’s advance. Against all odds, it had proven a vital strategic point, and the Kingdom’s forces had repelled the Demon King’s army there time and again. This time, however, things were different.
When the Demon King was still in power, only a few hundred to a few thousand mid-ranking officers had ever attacked this region. Now the Demon King’s army had come in full force, led by one of the Four Heavenly Kings—Pector of Despair.
Pector was a brute whose only talent lay in raw physical strength. Whatever his massive sword struck was obliterated without exception. Because of that overwhelming power, any attempt to subdue him through direct assault was futile. At the Kingdom’s urgent request, the hero Eugene had stepped forward to face him.
After countless sacrifices—including the fortress itself and many soldiers—Eugene had “withstood” Pector’s onslaught. He had not won. If anything, it was closer to Pector choosing to withdraw on his own.
Inside the battered fortress, Eugene lay sprawled atop a pile of rubble, his body heavy with exhaustion.
“We barely held them off,” he muttered.
Covered head to toe in blood, Eugene had taken deep wounds from Pector’s attacks. Even lying down was agony.
“Can we really call this holding them off?” Cyria asked wearily.
At first glance it might have looked like a successful defense, but the damage to Berta Fortress was catastrophic. Of the three thousand troops stationed there, a thousand had died. Most of the remaining two thousand were wounded, and an entire section of the outer wall had collapsed.
“The losses are just too heavy,” Ella sighed, her limbs still trembling.
Still, they had prevented the fortress from being overrun, so technically they had won. A victory that felt like anything but.
“How the hell did that gloomy bastard stop him?” Ella muttered, her voice faint.
She still couldn’t believe it. Pector of Despair had been monstrously strong. Defending against his attacks had been all they could manage. The hero’s party had always known Noah was powerful, but they had never imagined Pector would be on that level. They had assumed Noah had won with moderate effort against a moderately strong opponent.
Reality had been far crueler. Every punch from Pector had shattered sections of the fortress. Every swing of his blade had swept away ranks of soldiers. Even Eugene would have been killed in a single blow if not for the Holy Sword’s power.
While massaging his aching muscles and checking his wounds, Eugene recalled the words Pector had spoken when their blades clashed.
When Eugene had asked who he meant, Pector had simply replied:
With those words, Pector had withdrawn, as if the hero held no interest for him whatsoever.
It wasn’t that they had failed to injure him. Eugene didn’t consider himself a particularly righteous hero, but for the sake of his pride he had fought with everything he had. Honestly, after the midpoint he had simply been fighting to survive.
“The real question is how the Kingdom will react to this,” Cyria said, letting out a deep sigh.
“What do you mean?” Eugene asked, his face drawn with fatigue.
“We’ve never suffered losses this severe whenever we repelled one of the Four Heavenly Kings before.”
She was right. Until now, the regions the hero’s party had defended had never taken damage on this scale.
“That’s because Noah took care of everything,” Ella muttered.
Did that mean Noah had fought those monsters alone? The Holy Sword hadn’t worked. Cyria’s divine power had been useless. Ella’s arrows couldn’t even scratch Pector’s armor.
“From today’s battle, one thing is clear,” Ella said carefully. “That gloomy mage must have been properly repelling Pector every time.”
“What are you talking about?”
“If he had only barely won, we would have seen the same kind of devastation. But the man who actually fought the Heavenly King showed nothing but slight fatigue—no wounds at all.”
They should have asked him for information back then. Because he had repelled the Heavenly Kings with almost no collateral damage, they had underestimated the threat.
“What do we do now? This is only the beginning.”
If this war of attrition continued, the Kingdom might truly be destroyed by the Four Heavenly Kings. Pector alone had caused this much damage—what if all four turned their eyes toward the Kingdom? They had to prepare for the worst.
“Damn it. If only he’d taken care of all the Heavenly Kings while he was at it,” Ella grumbled, brows furrowed.
Was that something a hero should say? It was true that Noah had repelled the Four Heavenly Kings every time, and it was strange he had never killed them, but still—
From the start, all of this had been the hero’s job.
“For now, we must return to the royal capital,” Cyria said.
In their current condition they couldn’t fight if Pector attacked again. The hero’s party desperately needed time to regroup.
Aetlina Academy, Imperial Capital.
Aetlina was an educational institution where elites from commoners, nobles, and even the imperial family were trained. Within its walls, every student held equal rights regardless of birth. Students could choose whatever courses they wished, and the academy’s history stretched back hundreds of years. Just the main building and grounds were second only to the imperial palace in size. The headmaster, Magrid, was a former SS-class adventurer.
Magrid had received a report about Olivia from his former pupil Galledo.
“Is this true?”
“Yes, Headmaster.”
The arrogant young woman who had relied solely on the Ashtar family name and obsessively pursued the crown prince had actually been hiding her power. Given everything he had heard about Olivia until now, it was genuinely hard to believe.
There had been many rumors in the student council as well, so he had ordered a swift investigation. Never had he expected the results to be genuine. Even the swordsmanship and magic professors seemed to have experienced Olivia’s true ability firsthand.
“Olivia possessed this much power? A demon? Did the barrier break?”
If so, a demon was the only plausible explanation. Yet even that seemed unlikely.
“Not at all.”
Had it been a demon, the entire capital would already be in an uproar. Besides, Olivia was hardly valuable enough for a demon to risk infiltrating the Empire. She was an illegitimate child whose fiancé had been stolen by her younger sister. Her reputation was poor, and she held no important position—she was simply a student.
For a demon to break through the Empire’s barrier at the cost of its life just to reach her? It made no sense. Galledo shook his head as well.
“There is no possibility of a demon. Besides, demons have no reason to target the Empire, do they?”
The Kingdom that had produced the hero might be different. While the Demon King’s army had recently been sighted near the border, there was nothing to gain by sending a demon here. The only possible objective would be to fracture the strongest human nation, but even then Olivia made no sense. They would need to target nobles hostile to the imperial family or the military—not a single academy student.
“That’s true, but I still can’t believe that Olivia was hiding her power.”
The headmaster’s doubt was reasonable. From Olivia’s past behavior, there had been no indication she possessed such strength. It was almost more believable that a demon had slipped through the barrier and corrupted her.
“From what I observed, it is definitely Olivia’s own power,” Galledo insisted.
He had watched her every movement carefully. Olivia was undoubtedly arrogant. She knew her own strength and tended to look down on others because of it. What surprised even Galledo was how refined her combat technique was—too refined for anyone to challenge.
She had created arrows purely from mana without using physical projectiles. Materializing mana into arrows required exceptional magical ability, and only the purest mana could be shaped that way. In other words, it had nothing to do with the corrupted mana used by demons.
And that wasn’t all. She had struck the exact center of the target repeatedly. Not once, but many times. She had also hit the center of her provocateur’s target ten times in a row.
Such insane skill could never be gained through a contract with a demon.
Those who contracted with demons gained great power, but only power. They did not acquire delicate techniques or foundational combat knowledge such as swordsmanship or archery. Yet Olivia had fired those arrows as naturally as breathing.
Nor was that all. She had handled a firearm. Magic guns were prototype weapons given only to families that had funded the armory’s development. House Ashtar had been unable to provide funds at the time due to the great famine, so they had received none. Even if they had, the prototypes would have gone to the eldest or second son—not to Olivia.
Yet she had picked up the magic gun for the first time that day. After firing a few practice shots, she had struck the center as easily as if she were using a bow.
New weapons cannot be mastered through archery talent alone.
One had to learn the delicate art of channeling mana into the gun. Too much and the weapon would break; the control required was extremely precise. Olivia had done it perfectly from her very first attempt. It was as if she were a god of war.
“Then she really has been hiding her power all this time. Is that even possible?”
“Now that I think about it, Olivia began to change after her engagement to the crown prince was broken. It started when she entered her second year.”
“If she revealed her power only after the broken engagement… hmm.”
In other words, she hadn’t wanted the crown prince to see it. Yet now that the engagement was over, she didn’t seem to be trying to impress him either.
“It is suspicious.”
“She’s acting like she’s been set free.”
Perhaps the engagement to the crown prince had been a shackle binding Olivia. If the clingy, fawning behavior she had shown him had all been an act, then she was a truly terrifying woman. She had thrown away every ounce of noble pride to make the prince despise her.
“Hmmm. So she was waiting for the engagement to be broken on purpose. And the moment it was, she revealed her power, slapped the prince in the face, and drove out the hostile noble students?”
“That seems to be the case. In fact, commoner students are already signing up for swordsmanship and magic classes. The spots left by the nobles are being filled.”
“So the commoners are the ones who benefited.”
The departments once dominated by nobles were now seeing an influx of commoners. Equality was the official stance, yet commoners had always been suppressed within the academy. Nobles had priority in registering for classes that produced future officers, knights, and mages.
“And with that ability, she finishes every test in her chosen subjects instantly and spends the rest of her time freely?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm. Quite impressive. She may prove more useful than I expected.”
Headmaster Magrid smiled wickedly. He had never imagined the girl called the villainess would be this helpful.
“You mean helping commoners advance?”
“Let’s be honest—the nobles have enjoyed their privileges without any sense of crisis for far too long.”
The Empire was a great nation overflowing with population, yet it had always been ruled by a handful of nobles rather than the common majority.
“Indeed.”
“Olivia’s actions aren’t bad. Moreover, what is her family name?”
“Ashtar.”
Yes—the greatest house in the Empire, House Ashtar.
“With the front lines against the Demon King expanding toward the Empire, the imperial family and nobles have been discussing giving commoners opportunities to rise. It has been nothing but talk until now, but if Olivia continues like this, won’t the next generation belong to the commoners?”
Even if the nobles were expelled this time, they would eventually return to the academy. They would repeat a year, and whether they liked it or not, the majority of the next graduating class would be commoners.
“I suppose so.”
“I may be the headmaster, but in truth this academy is the crown prince’s little empire in miniature.”
Naturally the nobles threw their weight around. The crown prince seemed willing to treat commoners well, but in practice it was difficult. Most of his close aides were still sons and daughters of the great families that had supported the Empire for generations.
“How are the students who were beaten by Olivia reacting? They aren’t fools—their futures are on the line. Surely they’ve run crying to their families? We’ve already received quite a few protests from the houses of those expelled from swordsmanship and magic classes.”
“Judging by the atmosphere, formal complaints will arrive tomorrow.”
Of course. But it wouldn’t end with mere complaints. Even against House Ashtar, nobles had their pride. Their children had nearly had their futures ruined over a mere bet. They would not let it slide.
“The day after, they’ll send people in person. And Olivia’s response?”
“She says she will never forgive them.”
That was just like her personality. It probably wouldn’t change at least until the head of House Ashtar arrived.
“In the end, those proud nobles will take a solid hit to their honor. Still, Olivia is a talent the Empire cannot afford to lose. Make sure she doesn’t become drunk on power and stray onto the wrong path.”
She certainly possessed strength worthy of her arrogance. Yet throughout history, those with such power rarely avoided corruption. For now her arrogance was beating down the stagnant nobles and enforcing justice, but eventually it would become poison. The world was already unstable with strange movements from the Demon King. Perhaps some character education was necessary before it was too late.
“Is something wrong?” Galledo asked.
“According to a report from Berta Fortress in the Kingdom, the hero managed to drive Pector back.”
It was welcome news, especially with the Sword Saint, High Priest, and Divine Archer—Noah—still missing.
“Then they won, correct? What’s the issue?”
“Half of Berta Fortress, which had held for so long, lies in ruins. Over a thousand dead. The hero’s skill is far worse than we thought.”
The hero’s party had clearly been relying entirely on Noah’s power all this time. Otherwise they would never have suffered such losses. The Empire had known. Though they had not been the main battlefield, every time imperial forces were dispatched to aid the Kingdom or the hero’s party resolved incidents caused by demons or monsters, it had always been Noah, not the hero, who shone.
There had even been eyewitness accounts of the hero visiting brothels or embracing women while Noah fought. It was absurd. Galledo had participated in battles against the Demon King’s army and knew the truth well.
They had treated Noah as the weakest member of the party. The Empire’s upper echelons, who already knew the truth about the hero’s party, had doubted Eugene’s ability. This battle at Berta had proven it beyond doubt.
The hero was weak.
“How has he been playing the hero until now?” Magrid wondered.
Whenever he had seen them in the Empire, it had always been Noah who looked like the true hero, not Eugene.
“They must have left everything to the Sword Saint. Tsk, I don’t understand why the Goddess would bestow the Holy Sword on such a man.”
The Goddess was truly blind. Why choose someone like that as the hero?
“Well then, I’ll take my leave.”
“Go ahead.”
After Galledo left, Headmaster Magrid turned toward the window. A small letter had been slipped between the panes. When he pulled it out and examined it, his eyes widened.
A letter bearing the dragon emblem of House Ashtar.
“Hmm? Oh ho.”
Olivia might be in for quite a struggle.