The First Hero
The Academy looked no different than usual.
Chirp— chirp—
Birdsong drifted over the neatly kept fountain. Flower-lined paths swayed in the breeze. Warm sunlight poured down over a scene of perfect calm.
And yet today, all of it felt strangely unfamiliar.
The scenery itself hadn't changed. The people moving through it had.
Everyone's footsteps were hurried, almost fleeing. Uniforms hung askew, as if their wearers had rushed out half-dressed. And beneath the murmur of their voices ran a current of raw fear.
Beside the main gate, beneath the shade of an old zelkova tree, someone stood watching that alien landscape.
Pink hair stirred in the wind beneath a deeply drawn hooded cloak.
Linea Judith.
An Academy graduate, called the Blue Magic Tower's brightest rising star—her gaze drifted blankly, or rather with obsessive intensity, across every face that passed.
"Black hair, black eyes… height about… that much…"
The mutter slipped between her lips.
People were gathering at the Academy one by one. A campus that would normally have thrummed with energy was today choked with anxiety and dread.
"Our fief was completely devastated! Black fog settled over everything, and people started going mad…"
"My father is dead. He was holding the defensive line when it broke…"
"Shadow-things appeared that magic wouldn't touch…"
"They weren't even monsters—creatures so strong and grotesque they made everything before look like nothing!"
Students poured out the horrors they had lived through, trembling with terror. On the faces of the elite noble heirs once called the pride of the Empire, arrogance had been replaced by the hollow dread and despair of survivors. But Linea cared about only one thing.
"No. Not that one. Too thin…"
She rolled her eyes over every passerby in turn, matching them against the appearance she had burned into her mind dozens—hundreds—of times.
"Black hair. Pale skin. Tall…"
Whispering the description under her breath, Linea swept the crowd again.
"Where are you? Please…"
Her fingertips trembled. Beneath the hood, she bit down hard on her lip.
Leaving Seorigol was a heavy thing.
It wasn't only that I had to leave a fief still scarred by the Eclipse, and a young beastkin girl who had only just begun to open her heart to me.
The wreckage of burned carriages. Columns of refugees fleeing south in terror. The exhausted faces of wounded soldiers…
The Eclipse had not been Seorigol's catastrophe alone.
Western fiefs swept clean by monsters. All of them were still groaning under the aftermath.
And yet human resilience is a remarkable thing.
"Stack more bricks over there!"
"The priests are arriving soon!"
Scenery slid past the carriage window. People who still didn't know the meaning of surrender were coaxing new shoots up from the ruins.
Six hours by carriage to the western continental hub portal checkpoint. Two portal transfers to the capital checkpoint, then another three hours by carriage before I'd finally reach the Academy.
A campus that would normally have bustled with noble heirs in glittering carriages and lavish clothes was packed instead with students drowning in anxiety and fear.
A few of the once-sparkling magic streetlamps were shattered. Some of the carefully tended garden trees had been scorched or snapped in half.
Even the capital, it seemed, had not entirely escaped the Eclipse's reach.
The moment I came into view, whispers started up among a handful of students.
"…Hey, isn't that Ian Darkest?"
"That's the guy. The one who predicted this disaster."
"Prediction, my ass. He just got lucky."
"But he was right about the world going pitch-black, too, from what I heard."
The open mockery and contempt of before were nowhere to be found. In their place, the students' eyes held a tangled mix of awe, fear, and something that looked almost like guilt.
"Darkest."
I turned toward a voice that sounded familiar.
One of the students who'd laughed at me during the last fief management presentation. I couldn't remember his name, but he'd clapped and howled so hard it had stuck with me.
Gone was every trace of his old arrogance. He watched my face with a thoroughly cowed expression.
"I… I'm sorry about last time. I should have believed you…"
He offered that half-hearted apology, ducked his head in a hurry, and vanished into the crowd of other students.
Since when does the Fief Management department produce students who know how to apologize?
They'd all been so busy ignoring me or making my life miserable.
Other cadets I passed along the way either edged out of my path the moment our eyes met, or dipped their heads awkwardly and hurried past. Every last one of them looked either worn down or completely vacant.
Unbelievable.
Change the situation and watch the attitudes flip. A snort of laughter escaped me.
But I didn't bother mocking or scolding them. This wasn't the time.
The Academy's great central clock tower rang out the hour of the emergency assembly. I let myself be carried along in the current of cadets toward the grand auditorium.
Inside, the hall was already packed wall to wall with students. Under ordinary circumstances they would have sat segregated by rank and department, but those distinctions looked meaningless now.
Anxiety and confusion marked every face, along with the despair of the terrible news that had come from their respective fiefs. Even sobs threaded through the low roar of voices.
A short while later, a figure who looked like a senior Academy official mounted the podium and shouted through amplification magic.
"Attention! The emergency general assembly begins now! Everyone, be silent!"
With the shout, he swept the staff in his hand.
In that same instant, a small slip of paper settled onto my palm.
Fief Management students are to gather in Classroom 3 after the emergency assembly.
…Magic really is amazing every single time I see it.
I folded the note and slipped it into my pocket.
A professor was climbing the podium with a heavy expression. Professor Aramant—one of the twelve highest-ranking faculty. His eyes were grave and solemn.
"You will all have heard by now. Over the past several days, an unprecedented catastrophe has struck our Empire—no, the entire western continent."
His voice rolled through the vast auditorium that held tens of thousands.
"Rumors claim this was caused by the disappearance of the sun, but this was no mere astronomical phenomenon."
Professor Aramant swept his hand, and above his head a complex star chart bloomed into view, along with the visible flow of mana.
"According to ancient records and the Magic Tower's latest research, this Eclipse is clear evidence that the fundamental laws underpinning our world have begun to warp. The boundaries between the stars are weakening, and chaotic mana is flooding into the material realm."
His explanation was dense with specialized knowledge of magic, astrology, and ancient prophecy, but the substance was unmistakable.
"A vast catastrophe that threatens the entire continent has begun."
The world had changed—and far worse things were still to come.
"Going forward, we will witness the appearance of monsters more powerful than anything we have ever faced. Not merely magical beasts. Creatures have been observed that mock human reason and shatter the mind. Even unknown entities that have crossed over from other dimensions… The chaos will only deepen, and the existing order may collapse."
The longer he spoke, the louder the students' unrest grew.
"Professor! Then how are we supposed to prepare?"
"It's not just the monsters… There are rumors of a strange plague spreading as well!"
Questions rained down. The students' voices were thick with terror and desperation.
Nobles. So much for honor and dignity.
The snide thought rose unbidden, and I cleared my throat. Too much built-up resentment, I supposed. Watching the same brats who used to howl about honor panic over a single episode—before the main story had even started—was just pathetic.
The professor raised a hand to quiet them.
"According to a letter from the Blue Magic Tower, massive monster waves of this kind can be predicted going forward. Fortunately, it seems we will have some time before the next wave."
Huh.
I felt a flicker of genuine admiration.
The professor and the Blue Magic Tower were right. After the Eclipse had knocked the peaceful world into line, there was a stretch of breathing room before the next invasion wave. I knew that from game knowledge—but the Blue Magic Tower could actually forecast it. True to form for the tower most devoted to magic of them all.
And that tower's ace was Linea Judith.
Fragments of recovered memory about the heroes surfaced on their own. I still had questions. Had she singled me out to help—or had she frozen time for every aberration across the region?
Either way, the result was staggering for its own reasons.
"…In the end, what matters is military strength. Raise your walls. Expand your defenses. Increase your soldiers' numbers, and manufacture weapons without shortage so your troops are properly armed. Approach this with the mindset of a defender preparing for invasion, and you will be able to minimize the damage."
With that conclusion, Professor Aramant left the podium.
The Imperial Royal Academy lives up to the name, at least.
A disaster that had struck without warning—and in only a few days since, they had already identified the cause and produced a reasonably effective response. The Imperial Royal Academy: a place where countless talents gathered and were forged. That was why it became one of Theore's major stages.
Still, there's something disappointing about it.
Unlike the insight Professor Aramant—or rather, the Blue Magic Tower—had shown, the conclusion fell short. That advice to simply expand military power.
The disasters ahead would have hard limits on what raw physical force could stop. Monsters would proliferate, yes—but the real problem was the aberrations.
Beings that fed on humanity's negative emotions and grew stronger for it. They would hide in the shadows and slowly begin to devour mankind from within. Perfect irregulars that had stepped beyond the human framework.
That was why the exploits of those called heroes mattered far more than sheer military quantity.
Which means I have to grow the fief as much as possible.
How many heroes I could draw to my territory would decide victory or defeat from here on. I already had several plans for fief development in motion—
"Next, we will hear from a specially invited speaker. Having made the difficult journey from a distant Magic Tower…"
— BOOM!
Before the moderator could finish, the auditorium's massive doors swung wide inward.
Every student's gaze snapped toward the entrance as one.
And standing there was…
"P-pink hair?"
"A mage of the Judith family?"
Whispers thick with shock, admiration, and suspicion rippled through the entire hall in an instant.
The jewel of the Blue Magic Tower. The genius who commanded time and space. One of the heroes I had poured the most effort into raising.
Linea Judith stood in the doorway.