Nightmare (1)
I was an orphan.
I didn’t know what my parents looked like. I had grown up on the streets from the moment I first became aware of the world around me and began, in my own clumsy way, to think.
Of course, there must have been people who gave birth to me. But even now, I didn’t especially want to see their faces, much less go looking for them.
Because even if they weren’t my parents by blood, I already had people I could call family.
Letitia, Seria, Eli, and Lobelia.
Children just like me—abandoned by this world, and by their own parents.
We weren’t bound by blood, but I cared for them with everything I had, treating them like my real younger sisters.
In a way, maybe I was trying to heal the wounds I’d suffered by raising those four girls.
Call it hypocrisy if you wanted. I truly did treasure them, and I had every intention of loving them for the rest of my life.
But there was one problem.
I was an orphan of unknown origin, and this world was by no means kind to a single orphan who had nothing to his name.
The age gap between my sisters and me was only two years.
And yet, from a very young age, I had to do anything and everything just to feed them.
Among all the jobs I’d ever taken, the one that suited me best was mercenary work.
It might sound arrogant, but it turned out I had quite a talent with a sword.
And, though I’d never told anyone, I had one special ability besides.
The money I earned by throwing myself into situations where I might kill someone—or die myself—was substantial, and I used it to feed my sisters and saved whatever was left little by little.
I was a bottom-rung mercenary, but I would never let my sisters live the same kind of life.
The more blood and sweat I spilled, the more I wanted to make sure those girls would be happy—even if I had to do it in reverse proportion to my own suffering.
That resolve drove me to scrape together every coin I could, and to work myself to the bone so they would never have to live as I did.
One of the things I did, just in case, was spend a ridiculous amount of money on an aptitude test to measure the talents dormant within my sisters.
I hadn’t expected much, but if even one of them had some extraordinary gift… then maybe she wouldn’t have to live the same life I had.
And so, a week after my sisters’ aptitude test was finished, I received some news.
My sisters were geniuses.
The results showed that all four of them had been born with unbelievable talent.
Letitia had a mana capacity and computational ability so immense that even the Tower Master of the Magic Tower would covet her.
Seria possessed divine power greater than that of most bishop-level clergy.
Eli had been born with a body and reflexes perfect for learning swordsmanship.
And Lobelia had been born with such absurd affinity that she could touch and see intermediate spirits even before signing a proper contract with them.
As expected, the entire world was thrown into an uproar, and my sisters transformed overnight from lowly orphans into talents destined to support the empire’s future.
And when I saw them like that, I found myself celebrating as if it were my own achievement.
They had always struggled under the wing of such a useless older brother, and now I wanted nothing more than for them to walk nothing but flower-lined roads from here on out.
That evening, after their talents had been confirmed, someone of high rank in the imperial family came to see me in secret and asked to talk.
Of course, the subject was my sisters’ future.
“So, your name is Sian, was it?”
“…Yes.”
“We did a little background check on you from our side. Name: Sian. Occupation: mercenary. Estimated age: seventeen. Parents unknown. You started working as a mercenary at nine and keep most of your earnings in a bank. You’re not blood-related to your step-sisters. Did I miss anything?”
“…No.”
Honestly, I was stunned. Barely a week had passed since my sisters’ talents were discovered, and in that short time they’d practically torn apart the whole story of my life.
Or maybe it just means my life is so insignificant it could be picked apart in a week.
As I gave a dry smile inwardly, the man watched me for a moment before speaking again.
“I’ll be direct. First, the empire hopes to enroll your sisters in the academy.”
“What?”
That was not something I had expected at all.
“Your step-sisters were born with talents so rare that even if you searched the entire empire, you’d be hard-pressed to find their equal. If they were properly polished, they could become talents that would be remembered throughout imperial history. But unfortunately, they do have one fatal weakness.”
“…Their status?”
He nodded at my bitter reply.
In truth, I had already guessed that my background would be a problem. Street orphans generally sat at the very bottom of society, and mercenaries were one of the most despised professions there was.
But I had both of those stains on me, so of course it was impossible not to care.
Because I was, after all, their older brother.
“…And what exactly does that have to do with my sisters entering the academy?”
“The empire… more specifically, the imperial family, doesn’t much care about your step-sisters’ status. No, in a way, we’d actually welcome it. The lower your standing, the less likely they are to be dragged around by other nobles, and the more freely we can support them.”
By then, I was starting to understand where he was going with this.
“You want to use my sisters as the imperial family’s hunting dogs?”
“Well, that isn’t entirely wrong. But if you prefer, I’d rather call ourselves the tall gentleman who sponsors your sisters.”
He smiled at my answer, then suddenly fixed me with a sharp stare.
“But no matter how little the imperial family cares about your status, we can’t completely ignore public opinion. There are plenty of people in this world who look down on orphans who used to sleep on the streets.”
“…And you’re saying that the way to offset my sisters’ weakness as orphans is to enroll them in the academy.”
“Exactly. ‘Orphan academy students’ sounds a good deal better than just ‘orphans,’ doesn’t it?”
The only academy run by the empire, Lutra Academy, admitted students based not on status but on ability alone.
Because of that, not only nobles but also talented commoners enrolled there in large numbers, and I’d often heard that, since the academy didn’t care about class divisions, it was far less restrictive than the rest of society.
“You don’t need to worry about tuition. There are already several people who want to sponsor your step-sisters, and even if they don’t, the imperial family intends to cover their scholarships.”
I thought over his offer carefully.
…Honestly, it isn’t a bad proposal.
No, it was better than not bad. It was genuinely an excellent offer, because I had often thought that if I ever had the chance, I wanted to send my sisters to Lutra myself.
Lutra was the empire’s finest educational institution, backed by the imperial family.
Simply graduating from Lutra was enough to make it natural to rise to a high office or be treated as a prized talent.
Still, there was one thing that kept me from accepting his offer without another thought.
“Then, may I ask one favor?”
“What is it?”
“I want to enroll in Lutra Academy with my sisters.”
“Why?”
“I’m their guardian.”
To be exact, what I meant was that I didn’t trust them and wanted to keep my sisters within my line of sight.
At my words, he gave a faint laugh and nodded.
“Very well. We’ll permit it. However, you are not one of our sponsored students, so pay your own tuition. And you’ll pass the entrance exam on your own as well. We’ll overlook that much.”
“…Understood.”
And so, the following year, I entered Lutra with my sisters and became a first-year student.
Everything seemed to be going well, and I felt a quiet satisfaction watching my sisters look happy.
Because their happiness was no different from my own.
But six months later, my sisters gathered together, called me over, and suddenly said this:
“Big brother, we’re sorry, but please drop out of the academy. For our sake.”
That was the beginning of my nightmare.
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