Class Exchange Match (2)
Among the cafés Olympia’s students favored most was the Golden Apple—part date spot, part hangout for friends to gossip over drinks. There, Ruby and I sat across from each other with our cups.
A thin ribbon of red liquid traced the curve of her small, pretty lips. True to her own coloring, she had ordered strawberry juice. She smiled, blissfully lost in the sweetness, then picked the conversation back up.
“What a shame. I wanted to get a little more out of Senior Penelope for the interview.”
“Don’t even try. You know what house she’s from? Pester her and you’ll lose your head.”
“Ah—well, yes. No matter how much a journalist isn’t supposed to bow to outside pressure, House Moira is the exception.”
House Moira: one of the Empire’s most prestigious ducal families. Their beloved daughter, Penelope, had already fled our company—driven off by Ruby’s shameless questions and the mortification she couldn’t endure. Which left me behind to deal with Ruby instead.
Not that I stuck around for nothing.
If she got too annoying I could always refuse the interview. But Ruby Duerre had singled me out for a reason. That was why I was humoring her at a café in the first place.
“All right, then—shall we get Senior Heracle on the record? You’re a rare guest who’s actually agreed to talk, so I’ll keep it short and cut straight to the core.”
Cut straight to the core. Charming choice of words.
With a rustle, Ruby pulled several sheets from her coat. The headers that flashed past carried ominous titles like Heracle’s Trail: From Enrollment to the Present. She had come prepared.
“Right now, Senior, you’re the subject of endless curiosity and speculation among the student body. You’re aware of that?”
“More or less.”
“Let’s walk through the recent exploits of a second-year who used to rank dead last. First up: the ‘Exercise Monster’ roaming Olympia. Care to explain?”
“……What kind of ridiculous nickname is that.”
Exercise Monster. As if I were some kind of dungeon mob.
“I work out for myself. Survival, academics, training—it covers all of it.”
“Oho, oho. Understood. I see……”
Scratch, scratch—from a handful of short answers she somehow decided she had enough. Her small hand flew across the page. She didn’t show me what she wrote, but I could guess the tone. Something aggro-heavy and sensational, designed to hook every student who read it.
Ugh.
If I hadn’t had my own reasons, I would have flicked her on the forehead already.
“Next question. There’s a rumor that in Introduction to Elementalism, you completed Instructor Angelina’s assignment first—and better than anyone. Is that true?”
“It’s true. You’re stacking a lot of adjectives, though.”
“So you’re not denying it?”
“Right.”
Ahem—her pen went to work again. The corners of Ruby’s mouth climbed toward her ears. No doubt she was already counting the extra copies my interview would sell.
“Then, the final question.”
At last, the real reason. Why she had gone out of her way to hunt me down for an interview. She let the silence hang a beat, eyes bright, and asked:
“Your reason for entering this year’s Class Exchange Match! And the attitude you’re bringing into it! May I hear them?”
“……”
Not a flicker of hesitation in those sparkling pupils. As if she had nothing to hide at all. I wasn’t buying it.
“Before that.”
“Yes?”
I set my cup down with a soft click, pushed the coffee aside, and looked at her with a serious face.
“It’d be easier to answer if I knew who my opponent is.”
“……Hm? What do you mean by that?”
The innocent reply almost sounded steady. But I saw it clearly—the way her red eyes wavered for a fraction of a second when she heard me.
“I already know. Academic Affairs put you up to this, didn’t they? They stacked the bracket so I’d get publicly humiliated.”
“Um—uh—no? That’s not—”
In the end she couldn’t hide the fluster; her words tangled. I clicked my tongue inwardly at a so-called journalist folding so easily under a little psychological pressure.
Tch.
Figures.
The situation boiled down to this:
The Mage Department instructors were uncomfortable with me. Probably because they decided I was dragging down the department’s prestige.
As I’d said before, I was the Mage Department’s cast-off child—no talent, no grades. The harsher ones likely considered me a disgrace and wished I’d just get expelled already. So the instructors had cooked up a scheme.
—Get him to say something reckless in an interview, then shame him when he loses. Make the expulsion airtight.
And the grounds were obvious.
My opponent ranks higher than me.
Much higher.
“You can be honest. I won’t hold it against you. You’re Newspaper Club—you’re just doing what you were told.”
“……”
“Spit it out. Who is it? My opponent.”
I lifted my cup again and took a sip. Ruby started to deny it, then finally gave a small, resigned nod.
“……As expected. You’re exactly as the rumors say. No—better than the rumors. Looks like it’s not just your body that’s sharp.”
“……”
“Your guess is right. Academic Affairs deliberately ordered the interview so you’d make inflammatory remarks. I thought it went against a journalist’s duty, but I wasn’t exactly in a position to refuse……”
“So who is it?”
“Jackson.”
Ruby named him. The thug I’d run into the moment I possessed this body. The same bastard I’d told the vice headmaster I wanted matched against me.
“Jackson, seventh in the second-year Knight Department. He specifically requested you.”
The name didn’t surprise me. If anything, I’d half expected it. Some gut instinct had already told me he’d come after me.
“……Hmm.”
I rolled the coffee over my tongue and thought it through.
Good thing I took the interview.
If I hadn’t met her, I wouldn’t have known my opponent. I would have adapted to whoever showed up, but knowing ahead of time was a real advantage. I already knew Jackson’s habits. I could build a strategy for tomorrow’s duel.
Ruby, though, seemed to feel the opposite. She sighed and let her shoulders slump.
“Haa. Anyway, I’m screwed. If the interview subject can read the whole setup this easily…… this article’s dead.”
“No. It’s not.”
“Huh?”
“We’ll do the interview as planned. I’ll give you the most inflammatory lines I can—print them as-is. Hell, spice them up more if you want.”
“……Pardon?”
Ruby’s eyes went round. She’d just watched me dismantle the entire scheme—so why was I volunteering to walk into it? That baffled look was all over her face. I grinned and answered.
“Getting played isn’t any fun on its own.”
Inflammatory statements, then a loss, then public shame?
Wrong way around.
Trash talk only tastes right when you win.
The next day.
Once the third- and fourth-years had finished their Class Exchange Matches, it was the first- and second-years’ turn. I arrived at the Colosseum attached to the lecture halls—true to its name, the place Olympia used most often for duels.
—Ah, please…… are we losing again?
—Why can’t anyone just win?
Students were already packed into the viewing stands on both departments’ sides. As I walked toward an empty seat on the Mage Department side, I took in the scene.
In the arena at the Colosseum’s center, one knight and one mage were already up. They must have been going at it hard from the start—magic kept detonating in loud, continuous bursts.
Boom— boom-boom—
For all the noise, there wasn’t much substance to it. A blade hissed through the air, and the magic cut off. Looks like the Knight Department took this one. The mages’ dejected voices followed at once.
—Losing again this year?
—Knights took the championship last year too, right? Second year and it’s the same damn thing.
—Just wait. The real win is the top-rank match. If Penelope wins, we’re good.
They weren’t wrong. Among Olympia’s second-years, the Knight Department held a decisive edge in head-to-head records—especially with how often Penelope had lost to Apollon. All the more reason everyone was pinning their hopes on her taking it this time.
A low rumble faded as the duel wound down. An instructor called the next pairing.
Next. Knight Department, second year — Apollon Simon.
Mage Department, second year — Penelope Moira.
Please step into the arena.
A top-rank matchup at last. The whole venue boiled over with excitement.
—Please. Penelope, win!
—Shove it down those Knight Department bastards’ throats!
While the Mage Department students poured out their desperate hopes, I dropped into an empty seat and quietly watched the arena.
Penelope appeared at the call, walking out at an unhurried pace.
Can she actually win?
Honestly, I doubted it. In the original story she had lost. All I could hope for was a hard-fought showing—
“……Hey!”
“Huh?”
A sharp cry cracked against my ear. Berry. Whatever had her so worked up, she came barreling toward me, breathing hard.
“Hey—hey……! Have you lost your mind? What is this? Are you sane?”
“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”
“Look at this—this! Read what’s written here!”
She waved a newspaper in my face until my vision swam. I reached out, caught her slender arm, and spoke firmly.
“Calm down first. Nothing useful comes out when you’re this worked up.”
“……Huu. Fine.”
She flinched when I took her arm, then drew a steadying breath as her head cooled. She dropped onto the seat beside me and shoved the paper under my nose.
“Look at this. Your interview is tearing through the whole academy right now.”
“Oh. What’s it say?”
“See for yourself!”
I looked at the headline she held open. An aggressively baited line snagged my eyes at once.
This reporter has successfully recorded an interview with the student of the hour, Heracle. He is the eccentric currently treating the entire academy as his personal gym, and despite being unable to use magic, he completed the Introduction to Elementalism assignment……
My review after skimming it was simple.
“Is there a problem?”
“Of course there’s a problem!”
Berry flared hotter than I had. Pointing at word after word as if the whole thing were a personal injustice, she tore into it.
“Look here. ‘Jackson? Not even Apollon—Jackson’s a bit much.’ ‘I’ll half-kill him. Shame I can’t finish the job.’ What is this?! They fabricated quotes you never said!”
“Ahh.”
I understood why she was angry. She thought I’d been set up and was raging on my behalf—assuming Ruby had deliberately cooked fake news to be as inflammatory as possible. Berry was probably terrified of the backlash if I lost.
But.
“Why are you getting mad? It’s all true.”
“You can’t just invent—wait, what?”
Behind her glasses, Berry’s eyes went blank for a second. As if she couldn’t process what she’d just heard. She stammered it back.
“I-it’s true?”
“Yeah. Everything in the interview is true.”
“……A-a-are you insane?! How do you plan to take responsibility for this?!”
It wasn’t even her problem, and she was losing it. Berry shook my shoulders like the mockery waiting for me was already eating her alive.
“Don’t you know how ugly the mood is among our year already? If you drop lines this provocative and then lose, do you have any idea how hard people will glare at you?!”
“That’s exactly why I did it.”
“What?”
Berry had it completely backward. You don’t do trash talk while fretting over the risk of losing. What you focus on is—
“Because this makes winning so much more fun.”
—the payoff when you win. The pure satisfaction of flipping every bit of spite that had been aimed at you.