Unshakable Comfort
Time flowed on and on until, before we knew it, the day of the decisive battle that marked the beginning of the third episode had arrived. Lunchtime—the moment when Sylvester’s assault and our theft operation would begin—was fast approaching, and the tension had us all wound tight.
Or rather, to be accurate, it wasn’t all of us. Just me and Raul.
“Zzz… Hooo…”
Seeing Lucia resting her head on my shoulder, sleeping as peacefully as a baby, I could only sigh. Was this confidence, or just a total lack of thought? How could she sleep so soundly with less than thirty minutes left until the operation started?
“…What are you doing?”
I had been gently stroking Lucia’s hair while she used my shoulder as a pillow when Raul, watching us from the seat in front, spoke in a tone dripping with disbelief.
Whoops. It just looked so fluffy I couldn’t help myself.
“Lucia, wake up.”
“Mmm… five more minutes…”
I tried shaking her awake, but when she grabbed my right arm—the one supporting her head—and started whining, I immediately gave up. Yeah. If she’s cute, she wins. Lucia, do whatever you want!
After all, even if I let her sleep like this, her close-quarters combat ability was second to none. Letting her rest wasn’t a bad idea. Mm-hmm. Most importantly, Lucia’s physical condition came first.
“You crazy lovebirds…”
I heard Raul muttering from the seat ahead of us, but I lightly ignored it. The guy had been single for a thousand years; of course he wouldn’t understand. I’d forgive him with a generous heart.
“Hey, the student flirting back there! Would you care to explain how to construct an instantaneous explosive flame spell using a timepiece?”
Just as I was magnanimously forgiving Raul with a heart as vast as the sea, a voice pierced my ears. The professor, clearly annoyed by how loudly I had been talking, had thrown the question at me. Naturally, it was meant to trip me up—the difficulty was considerable.
But.
“You construct the magic circle with triple linkage, add two more vertical strokes to accelerate activation, then twist it once in a reverse spiral. That’s what I understand.”
I hadn’t earned my spot in Campbell Academy’s A-class by luck. The practical exam and theory test had both been part of the entrance examination. I had suffered for eight long years to get into A-class; failing to solve a problem like this would have been ridiculous.
“…Correct. That will be all for today’s lecture. Enjoy your lunch, everyone.”
The professor ended class with a somewhat sour expression and stepped down from the podium. If I had dragged out my answer, it would have only delayed the end of class. Good thing I answered quickly.
Ignoring Raul’s surprised stare, I decided it was finally time to wake Lucia for real.
“Hoo.”
“Eek?!”
I blew gently into her ear. The reaction was perfect. I’d have to do this more often.
As we hurried toward the floating core, Lucia scampered up beside me, cheeks puffed out.
“Hmmm…”
But I didn’t spare her a glance. I focused every sense outward. Sylvester should be arriving any moment now. For the plan to work, she had to cause a commotion outside first. Only then would the security company’s forces be drawn to her, leaving the defenses around the core thin enough for us to seize the Magic-Engineering Floating Core.
“She needs to get here soon…”
Murmuring to myself, I stepped into the academy’s secluded garden.
“…You’re seriously telling me that whatever-it-is core is in a place like this?”
Lucia sounded skeptical, but surprisingly, the Magic-Engineering Floating Core was indeed hidden in this utterly ordinary-looking garden. More precisely, it lay beneath the academy’s fountain in the center of the garden. And even then, you couldn’t just lift the fountain; you had to access a hidden passage underneath it that led to a vast, maze-like space. Only by reaching the center of that maze could you obtain the core.
Not to mention the countless anti-theft traps scattered throughout the maze…
And on top of that, the security company that constantly patrolled the secret underground passages beneath the academy. They had layered security measures two, three, even four times over. It was more than enough preparation for protecting one of the academy’s main power sources and one of the Five Great Relics.
Boom!
At that moment, the sound of something exploding echoed from beyond the far wall. Sylvester must have smashed through it to create the promised disturbance. There was no other reason for such a loud blast inside the academy.
“You said we just have to wait a little longer, right?”
Raul had been fidgeting like a puppy that desperately needed to go outside. I quietly nodded. He had been anxious ever since he heard Sylvester’s name. She really was a stubborn one.
“Yes. By now, the people chasing her are probably confused because the situation isn’t what they expected.”
The request I had written in the letter to Sylvester was simple: I would lure her near the wall so Raul would be caught in the attack. At the exact moment, she would strike Raul from beyond the wall and finish him in one blow. It was a plan that exploited the fundamental assumption that no one could possibly emerge from the other side of a solid wall.
But what she would actually encounter after breaking through would be the fully alert security company. Still, even they were only human; it would take them time to reach her location. So we had to wait here just a little longer.
“It would be troublesome if we rushed in and got caught first.”
We waited like fishermen calmly watching our bobbers. Once a proper fight broke out in Sylvester’s direction, that would be our cue to move. Since she fought using explosions just like me, we would definitely hear them once battle was joined.
Boom!
Just like that.
“Let’s get ready.”
In time with the explosion Sylvester had set off, I activated Explosion and blew open the area beneath the fountain. A wide passage immediately appeared below it.
“…Why does this academy have so many paths underground?”
Lucia grumbled, half-joking, but I completely agreed. Dream demons dug tunnels. The floating core was hidden using tunnels. Still, what could you do? It was an educational institution; there weren’t many places to hide something except underground.
“Ugh…”
Once inside the tunnel, all we saw were long, twisting dark corridors. Any half-hearted intruder without a map would probably get lost right here.
“Raul, can you locate the Magic-Engineering Floating Core?”
“Of course.”
Fortunately, we had a detection dog with us. A thousand-year-old spiritual beast with superior mana sensing—the perfect scout who could instantly distinguish the core. I had copied this method from the original story, and it worked just as well in reality.
“There will be traps, so stay alert. Step on the wrong thing and you might lose a foot.”
Normally Nihil would have taken the lead, expertly disarming traps, but he had left to find his wife. I did my best to recall the novel’s descriptions and swept my hands across walls and floors the way he had, searching for triggers.
“Let’s not go this way. The wall’s texture feels different.”
It actually worked fairly well. Raul’s mana detection gave us the shortest route to the core, so we had to take a few detours, but avoiding the traps was a huge advantage.
We advanced carefully through the dark paths for a long time.
Cling.
Lucia suddenly grabbed my arm and whispered.
“Ugh… it’s kind of scary…”
She held my arm tightly, glancing around as if something might jump out at any moment. Had she always been this timid? I found this new side of her puzzling, but kept walking. Raul muttered as if to himself.
“Just a little farther and we should reach it. I didn’t expect us to arrive this quickly.”
The security company had already rushed out, I was breaking through the traps, and Raul was finding the path. Thanks to our brutally efficient route, we had reached the area much faster than expected. It made sense; they couldn’t honeycomb the entire academy grounds with tunnels. A few dozen minutes was more than enough time to navigate the underground maze and reach the center.
“Oh.”
Before us lay a fairly spacious chamber, and in its center was the Magic-Engineering Floating Core embedded in the floor. The mystical glow it emitted was so beautiful it could captivate anyone who simply looked at it.
Raul began walking toward it as if spellbound.
“…Wait.”
Something felt off. The entire process had been far too smooth, and that very smoothness made me uneasy. This place’s defenses were supposed to be so stringent that even Nihil—who could be considered a trap-disarming specialist—would have nearly been caught once. Yet we hadn’t encountered any particularly difficult traps on the way here.
Besides, could the entire security company really have abandoned this place…?
In the original story, this was where the largest concentration of people gathered. Even in an emergency, at least one guard should have remained. Yet there was truly no one.
As I stared ahead warily, a human silhouette suddenly emerged from behind the Magic-Engineering Floating Core. The figure looked at us and smiled brightly, as if delighted that we had noticed their presence in advance.
“Haa… I really didn’t think anyone would make it this far.”
The person brushed back their blue hair and stroked the core once before stepping forward into view. The one who had been waiting for us was none other than—
“…Why are you here?”
“Hello. We’re already acquainted, aren’t we?”
The Student Council President, Francis Watson.