Why Him? (2)

Isaac's Golden Rattle gleamed. So did his eyeballs.

Haha. Well-bred little colts, biting the hand that fed them. Sending them off to school early was worth it after all. Hm?

Isaac's eyes darkened.

Before him stood roughly twenty male students, all smirking as they looked him over.

Smiling Isaac had no choice but to be dumbfounded.

So what is this, exactly? Some kind of hazing-the-new-guy bullshit?

They all wore the same undyed priest robes, making them hard to tell apart, but surely none of them were commoner-born.

In other words, nobles.

"Hey. Hang him upside down."

"He's light. Easy to string up, too."

…You'd think young masters would have at least a shred of dignity, but no? And are these bastards even priests? Where'd they get the eyes of street thugs?

Did you little shits not hear about what I did at the Ordination Ceremony? Huh?

Well, fine. I'll allow that much.

It's possible they were evacuating and missed the whole thing.

The problem is the cause.

And at this point, there are two possibilities.

Possibility one.

Kim Shuri, that little bastard, sold me out.

Hm. Well. Yeah.

Kim Shuri. I did torment him a lot.

If you had to name the person who'd taken the most rattle beatings, it was Shuri, hands down. Sure, it was to stuff holy arts and knowledge into his head, but as an older brother, he had every right to hold a grudge.

'So he asked his classmates to rough me up on his behalf?'

Yeah. Plausible. I'd do the same.

In fact, hadn't Shuri told him to go on ahead to the dormitory, saying he'd bring snacks for everyone to share?

And possibility two.

Shuri ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠knows nothing about this.

Honestly, the odds were higher on this one.

Why?

"It's a secret from Shuri?"

Because these bastards had said to keep it secret from Shuri. If it were pre-agreed, there'd be no need to say that.

And if this were the case, the problem was considerably worse.

They'd brushed off Shuri's 'take good care of my little brother'! Which meant his classmates were treating him like a total pushover!

But then again, they were supposedly close. Surely even so, Shuri wouldn't be treated like a complete sucker—

"Hey. What if Shuri catches us doing this?"

"What if we tell the professors?"

"Relax. Our Shuri's too much of a pushover to raise a stink. He's an Eshua, after all."

…Yeah, he's being treated like a pushover, all right.

"If he scolds us, we just ask House Eshua for another favor as payment. Do you know how ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠precious Eshua knights are? People can't hire them for any amount of money, and yet he lets us use them personally. What a deal."

Unbelievable. This bastard went to school, made friends, and now he's got a straw stuck in the family, sucking away.

But they kept whispering at a level they were sure Isaac couldn't hear.

"He won't snitch, right?"

"He's an Eshua all the same. Faith for the weak and all that. The man absolutely cannot stand seeing others come to harm. Pfft."

What the hell is this 'Eshua image'? What image? Why am I, of all people, getting this treatment from a bunch of snot-nosed priest chicks?

"Can he use any other holy arts?"

"Shuri said so. Useless at everything except Purification."

"Ah. Fucking trash?"

Fuh… WHAT did you say, you little punks??

At the completely unexpected word, the muscles of Isaac's face twitched.

'First they do this, and now children this small are calling me… WHAT?'

Back when he was the Demon King, even cardinals couldn't lift their heads in his presence! Your seniors pissed themselves without so much as glimpsing my face!

You little hatchlings—no, you're not even hatchlings. What kind of fertilized eggs call the Skeleton King trash—?!

'The Demon King's dignity is in serious shambles here.'

But they snickered and crept closer.

"It's fine, it's fine. It's all strength training. Priests need to build muscle too."

"Besides, we want good results this time and a posting to the capital."

Soon they came back carrying rope, and Isaac's mouth twisted into an expression of serene enlightenment.

"Ah. Right. Strength training."

"Yes. Think of it as a bonding exercise to—huh?"

They tilted their heads at the object Isaac had produced.

They'd assumed he'd brought some priest's tool, but that was, no matter how you looked at it, a baby's toy…

Pfft. A laugh slipped out before they could stop it.

"What's that? Big body, but still a toddler on the inside after all—GUGHK!!"

The one who'd come closest took the object to the face and went flying. At the sheer absurdity of it, the nearby novice priests doubted their own ears.

'What?'

That impossible sound just now—

No, wait. He just got hit in the face with a rattle—

…What?!

A RATTLE?!

They had no choice but to gape at the object in Isaac's hand. No matter how they looked, it was a children's rattle—but what was welling at its tip was blood…

…What? Blood?!!

The novice priests' pupils trembled.

But Isaac's eyes, swinging the weapon this way and that, glittered with a wild flash.

"Honestly, THIS is the problem. However pure your intentions, there's always some loach-faced little shit like you lot to ruin everything."

"Wh-what?"

"Because of you bastards, an honest man like me has to suffer, you fuckers!"

Isaac vented his fury, slamming the rattle down without mercy.

"AAAAGH!"

"AGH!"

He'd cast reinforcement magic on the rattle, and as a bludgeon it worked beautifully. Of course, his body had grown since the old days, making the rattle hard to grip, so the beating lacked a certain… satisfaction.

There was the option of using Whisper to launch the rattle around, but too many eyes were watching. Levitating objects was a hallmark of magic, and word getting out would be troublesome.

Though I suppose getting a reputation as 'the lunatic with the rattle' would be fine? Isaac mused, but either way, troublesome.

"Ah. This body makes even this work awkward. Can't be helped."

The novice priests finally breathed a sigh of relief as Isaac lowered his hand. They'd thought the little lunatic had gone completely feral and was about to start slashing, but thankfully he seemed to have recovered his senses—

"I'm changing its form."

FUCK! NO HE DIDN'T! That kid is genuinely out of his mind!

As Isaac stroked the rattle, something astonishing happened. The rattle he'd carried for ten years responded to his hand and began to glow—

FLASH!

"Wh-what is that thing—?!"

The rattle's handle stretched long, warping into a grotesque shape.

CRACK!

"A whip?!"

The novice priests went white as sheets.

At the sight, Isaac burst out laughing. Puheheh.

What!

Are magic items so wondrous ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you can't shut your mouths?

Truthfully, that wasn't why he was laughing, but Isaac chuckled away anyway. Kuk, kuk.

Surely in life there comes a time to use magic, and pulling it openly out of the mana core inside your body is dangerous.

So Isaac had stored mana inside objects in advance. That way, people would simply think 'magic item.' Like the heating apparatus installed in luxury carriages.

Granted, the power was weaker than drawing from his own body, but for pipsqueaks like these—

"Wh-what are you doing?!"

The novice priests retreated in panic, but Isaac cracked his neck.

"Fine. Sure. I understand why you're doing this. I got seriously pissed off studying holy arts too, you know."

…I'm sorry, what?

"There's a lot a priest has to uphold. Stress builds up. Mm. You feel me?"

No, I feel like the point got lost somewhere.

"Right? Those goddamn gods—'don't do this, don't do that, don't do the other thing'—what kind of nagging bullshit is that?!"

Wh-what did you just—

"No snacks! No booze! No gambling, no meat! Don't even hit people! Don't even kill your enemies!"

No! That's not—

"FUCK!! Does any of that make sense?!! Let's just kill them all!!!!"

That bastard's eyes are insane…!

The novice priests were, on the contrary, terrified. It felt like they'd touched something that should never, ever have been touched.

"N-no, wait. We're sorry. We were in the wrong."

"So… you don't like these kinds of pranks. We apologize, so please calm down—"

"Prank? I'm always dead serious!"

Isaac raised the rattle high.

Shuri was struck speechless.

Uh. So. Fine, he came to the dormitory carrying bread for the group to share, that's all well and good, but—

"…What is this? What am I looking at?"

Did I walk into the torture chamber by mistake?

Inside the dormitory, noble young masters lay prostrate on the floor, whimpering. And perched atop the whimpering pile was the little brat—

"Shuri's here, isshit."

Holding his bag of bread, Shuri had no choice but to stare at Isaac in disbelief.

"…What are you doing?"

"Team bonding."

"…Normally, bonding means you do it face to face."

No sooner had the words left his mouth than Isaac raised his voice.

"Hey! You want face-to-face? Sky-facing push-ups! NOW!"

"WHAT?!!"

Shuri wondered if that was even a physically possible position, but as Isaac stroked the rattle, everyone rotated to face the sky.

At the same time, Isaac plucked a bottle of juice from the bag Shuri had brought.

"Oh? My dear big brother brought delicious juice for us."

He popped the juice bottle open and cheerfully poured it down the throats of the men facing the heavens.

Shuri was flabbergasted.

"…What on earth are you doing?"

"What am I doing?! Can't you tell just by looking?! It's a TEA-BEAT party!!!"

Shuri had no idea what had transpired, but Isaac was clearly, enormously pissed off. In the end, Shuri's classmates turned to him with faces begging for rescue.

"Year Rep! Help us!"

"He's your little brother, isn't he?!!"

Shuri tilted his head as if he couldn't follow.

"How many of you are there again? And not a wound among you. Are you sure you're not volunteering to play with him?"

They all looked far too healthy to have been 'disciplined' by Isaac.

But the novice priests hearing this were going out of their minds.

Volunteering? VOLUNTEERING???

'You think we didn't try to rush him?!'

He was one small child, after all, so they had tried to bury him with numbers.

But every last one of them had been sent flying by a Reflect holy art.

This isn't working, they'd thought, deciding to demand compensation from Shuri for their injuries—but lo and behold.

"Ha. I hate holy arts, but this one, I like."

"Wh-what?"

"You won't even see a single drop of—er, a 'bleed'!"

CRACK!

That lunatic had been swinging the rattle while casting reinforcement and healing holy arts at the same time.

In short: you got beaten and treated simultaneously.

'Nobody said you could cast holy arts simultaneously, you maniac!'

So when his classmates begged Shuri with their eyes, Shuri sighed.

He didn't need to look to have a rough idea of what had happened.

Come to think of it, when he'd first told them about Isaac, hadn't these same guys offered to discipline the boy for him?

'I told you, then, that the ones getting disciplined would be YOU.'

And so it had come to pass. Truly.

Shuri clicked his tongue and looked at Isaac.

"Have you forgotten? These people are my group members. We need good scores. What do you gain from wrecking our relationships, huh…? Wait. What's this?"

Shuri tilted his head at the paper Isaac held out. It was a list of the students assigned to his team.

"What is this?"

"Your list of friends to sever ties with."

"…What?"

"Well, not all of them. I did a one-by-one background check, and a few turned up. The ones planning to stick a straw in you."

"???"

Shuri's face warped as he read the list. And as he looked at the students marked with red checkmarks, his expression turned glacial.

"Ah……"

So THAT'S why Isaac was so pissed?

Because there were leeches trying to drain the family?

At that look, the checkmarked students raised their voices in outrage.

"Hey, you believe what he says?!"

Shuri double-checked with Isaac.

"What's the criterion for the checkmarks?"

"Bastards who pay back NOTHING while burning through astronomical upkeep!!"

"Ah……"

In short: ingrates.

"Seven whole years of borrowing from House Eshua, hand over fist. And in all that time, what have they given back? Not one copper. Fine, you don't want a relationship built on repayment—but even so, this is a bit much."

Sweat poured down the checkmarked students under Isaac's gaze.

Damn it. It's true House Eshua is the least repayment-hungry of the Five Great Families, that's exactly why we latched on, but—

"N-no, well, House Eshua is a great noble house. They surely already have everything we could possibly offer. So we didn't think they'd need our help—"

"Oh? Doesn't your family run a pharmaceutical business? And recently you developed a sedative, didn't you? Your older brother took it, spread his legs for five people at once, couldn't even hold the position, got slapped around for being a cheap slut, and got thrown out of the party. Am I wrong?"

The student went corpse-pale, and Shuri's face contorted.

…You absolute lunatic. What the hell did you investigate?

"And you couldn't even give THAT to Shuri?"

Why the hell would you give that to ME, you bastard?!

"He probably wouldn't be popular anyway."

More popular than YOU, believe me.

He's got the Eshua face, at least! He's not losing in the looks department!

"Anyway, you're all noble young masters. Friends? Why are you acting like amateurs? You may not be equals, but you shouldn't let the scales tip this far to one side."

The novice priests trembled from head to toe.

This bastard's eyes have completely rolled back into his skull.

"B-but we have nothing to give—"

Isaac grinned and grabbed the priests by their heads.

"Oh, you have ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠NOTHING? There's a fine, healthy body right here. Do you have any idea what a blessing it is to have organs inside you? And they're worth MONEY, on top of that? Wow. Fucking incredible. Amazing?"

"??!!"

The former skeleton, who had once possessed not a single organ worth harvesting, beamed with both eyes flashing.

Truthfully, this might have been the real point all along.

"Understood? What I want isn't complicated. You want a posting to the capital? Then stop pointlessly racking that useless brain of yours pretending to think of the family's interests. Purely and simply: devotion, cooperation, and loyalty to group activities. Got it, big brothers?"

"……!"

The terrified novice priests could only nod, again and again.

Only then did Isaac rise, satisfied. Ha. Fucking hell. Fertilized eggs treating House Eshua like a piggy bank—I snapped. Can't blame me.

The only one allowed to treat the Eshua family as a wallet is this magnificent body of mine.

He'd only issued the warning because, left alone, it was one hundred percent certain to sabotage the team activities.

"Good. With that, the TEA-BEAT party is adjourned."

…Was that seriously a tea party?

"Well, that should be enough re-education for the leech squad."

…Does this bastard realize that the first criterion of the upcoming Pentagon is 'Harmony'??

As he lamented, Shuri kept scanning the list and tilted his head.

'One person's missing. Where did he go?'

And that very missing person was at that moment sprinting out of the dormitory, gasping for breath.

'Damn it. Nobody said anything about THIS!'

He was, in fact, a spy planted by Niger Sephet of the enemy Ducal House.

Damn it. What was I even supposed to get close to him FOR?

'Either way, I have to tell them I can't do it.'

He tore the note he'd meant to send to the enemy ducal house into tiny pieces.

And around that time.

In the Papal Court's office, Cardinal Verith tapped the desk. His gesture seeped with irritation.

He summoned his attendant and asked.

"I believe I gave orders for Isaac Eshua to come. Why has he not arrived? Did the letter not go out?"

"N-no, Your Eminence. It was delivered."

"Perhaps he simply hasn't seen it."

"Ah… no. We sent the letter five times, and my fellow attendants went to fetch him in person three times."

Cardinal Verith fell silent.

"So, in short, he is ignoring me…?"

"Yes."

"When a Cardinal summons him? A mere novice priest?"

"…Yes."

This lunatic?