Chapter 92
Chapter 92
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 92
Chapter Title: Help Me
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The day after the incident.
We were resting in our dorm.
Of course, after such a major event, there was no way the academy could operate normally.
"Hee-hee~ Getting paid to do nothing is the best~"
"...But why are you two perfectly fine?"
Luna's question was directed at Yui, who was eating snacks at her desk, and me, who was lazing around on the bed.
Luna, the only one among us who was injured, was covered in bandages—on her arms, legs, and side—making it obvious she had gone through quite an ordeal.
"It's possible to be fine. If you have a problem with it, you should just get stronger."
"You did fight, right...?"
"I had a veeery! tough time!"
Yui said, as if asking for praise.
But from what I heard yesterday, I think she just played rock-paper-scissors.
"I fought, too."
I didn't fight Alter, but I fought someone else.
But come to think of it, didn't I fight the most?
I took down Hex and a demonic human.
While you were sleeping in your chair, Luna, I was fighting a demonic human.
"Never mind. Just rest. The academy is closed for the next three days anyway."
"It really is... just like you said, Luke. It's no different from a battlefield..."
"See?"
"I never got injured this badly even when I was hunting as an adventurer."
In fact, even in the original story, events didn't occur this frequently in such a short period.
If there was an event every month, the academy would have to shut down from all the students dying before the story even ended.
But with two transmigrators in one world—when even one is enough to mess up the plot—the story seems to be progressing not twice as fast, but maybe four times as fast.
"Is this... Made in Heaven...?"
"Huh?"
"It's nothing."
"Still, it's nice to get a break."
"To be precise, only we are resting."
The academy is closed for three days for the students to recover, but the Headmaster and professors are too busy to even catch a wink of sleep.
They have to handle the aftermath for the deceased students and are busy explaining themselves, as they bear the responsibility for failing to prevent such an incident despite being on high alert.
To draw a parallel from my past life, it would be like a press conference.
Of course, they won't be relentlessly hounded.
Even though Lucia, the Headmaster, has a kind disposition, it's often said that nice people are scarier when they get angry.
If they keep playing hot potato by relentlessly blaming each other and Lucia finally snaps, a meteor will crash down on the territory of whoever is left holding the bomb.
Then that territory would vanish from the map overnight, along with the family. So everyone is cautiously watching each other, trying not to be the victim of this game of hot potato.
The reason we're the only ones who can rest in this situation is because of our title as temporary instructors.
Outsiders don't even know I'm an instructor here.
This world doesn't have the internet, and the appointment of a mere temporary instructor isn't exactly front-page news.
Naturally, there's no way outsiders would know about me.
Besides, it's always the school that's in a bind, not the invited instructor.
In the first place, being an invited instructor means I wasn't the one who needed this job. The moment someone gives me trouble, I can just quit.
Isn't that how it usually is with invited instructors?
In my case, the moment even one person starts giving me shit, I'll quit my instructor position and go kill them immediately.
-Knock, knock.
While I was lost in thought, someone knocked on our door.
"Who is it?"
Who would dare interrupt this precious break?
There's no one who would visit us at this hour.
Lucia is a possibility, but she's swamped with work right now.
She wouldn't have time to come here.
"Yui. See who it is."
"Okay~"
Yui scurried to the door, flung it wide open, and said.
"Who is iit~?"
But since she opened the door wide, revealing the person outside, I knew who it was without having to ask.
The two-toned hair I'd never seen on anyone else, the yellow eyes that seemed to glow even in the evening.
And one arm, immobilized by bandages due to the recent incident.
It was Liche.
She walked straight into the room and stopped in front of me, where I was lying down.
Then she looked down at me with an expression so disheartening it was draining just to look at.
"Isn't this the instructors' dormitory? How did someone who isn't an instructor get in?"
"...There was no one at the entrance."
Seriously?
Even if all the instructors are away, does it make sense for a student to just waltz into their dormitory like this?
Maybe I should take this opportunity to do some more house-robbing myself.
"So, why are you here?"
"......"
"I asked why you're here."
"......"
What's with her?
She came here with something to say, so why has she suddenly gone silent?
After a moment of a strange standoff, she, who had been pursing her lips, finally managed to speak.
"...Do I have to?"
"What?"
"What am I supposed to do now...?"
Showing up out of nowhere and spouting nonsense.
When I looked at her as if she was talking crazy, Liche clenched her good fist, trembling as she spoke.
"I tried so hard, but I still lost. He was mocking and taunting me right to my face, and I couldn't do anything..."
Liche said, her gaze lowered, her eyes half-dead and draining the energy from anyone who looked at them.
In short, her confidence was shattered.
Why beat around the bush so much?
"What am I supposed to do now...?"
I'm not a career counselor, so why is she asking me?
Usually, people who say such things want one of three things.
They want empathy, they want help, or if not those two, they want comfort.
But the first one is impossible.
Can a lion empathize with an ant? How can the strong empathize with the weak complaining about their weakness?
The second one, I've already done.
Not enough for her to achieve her goal, but I did help her grow to a level far beyond other students.
So, the third one?
Unfortunately, giving comfort isn't my specialty.
I've always thought that comforting people is a talent in itself. Besides, what kind of nerve is it to ask for comfort from the person who already helped you?
Right now, Liche isn't looking for the first or second option. She probably doesn't want the third either, but it's likely the best she can hope for. In reality, comfort is all the people around her can offer anyway.
"Why don't you go get comfort from Arthur instead of me?"
He'd probably pick flowers and offer all sorts of comforting words just to raise his favorability with you.
I don't know what she wants to hear, but why is she coming to me with this?
"I've been wondering for a while, why do you keep pairing me with him?"
"Because you're his heroine."
"What's a heroine?"
"The female lead in a novel."
We've talked about the novel before.
Back then, I only mentioned Liche's family and nothing else.
I don't particularly want to hide it, but repeating the same thing over and over is a pain.
So.
-Clap, clap.
I clapped my hands as if calling a waiter.
At that, Luna, who was now used to this, took over for me.
Based on the information she had heard from me, Luna explained everything one by one so that Liche could understand.
Of course, she didn't know all the minor details, so she added her own thoughts to some parts of the explanation, but since her assumptions were mostly correct, I didn't stop her.
Liche's expression changed with every sentence Luna spoke. The explanation continued for about five minutes, and after Luna's final sentence, she asked me.
"Is that really true?"
She seemed to be wondering if maybe even Luna and Yui were being deceived.
That's how shocking Luna's words must have been.
"Believe it or not, that's up to you."
So that's what I told her.
There's no reason to explain it to someone who refuses to believe.
It's just a waste of breath.
"I'm... destined to be that guy's lover...?"
"Yep. You even had sex with him."
"Th-That's a lie!!"
Denial is just a form of escapism, isn't it? Pfft.
"Your ears."
"What...?"
"What do you mean, what? It's your erogenous zone."
That's also in the novel.
Liche, getting her ears sucked by Arthur.
"Lies...! How would you know an erogenous zone that even I don't know about!"
"If you're curious, try touching it when you masturbate later."
"I don't do that kind of thing!!"
People can pleasure themselves, why is she so embarrassed about it?
Who doesn't have sexual desires? If anything, self-pleasure is an essential act for preventing sex crimes.
"Th-Then the reason I can't win... is it all because the ending is already decided...?"
"I told you. You can't win no matter what you do."
No, you could probably win. If you put in an unimaginable amount of effort.
Even Luke, who would have been doing who-knows-what in the original story, became an overpowered anomaly after I possessed him.
But for you, it's already too late for that.
As I looked up at her with the eyes of a sage who knows everything, she seemed to make a decision and took a step toward me.
"...Then I'll be direct."
Help me.
That's what Liche said.
"What?"
"Help me. You, not Arthur."
Putting aside the hassle and the reward.
I was just fascinated.
Why?
Because Liche was the type of character who would rather die than ask anyone for help.
'Is this a change, too?'
Of course, she did ask for help getting stronger a while ago, but that was mostly asking for information or for training so she could kill Hex herself—a request for indirect help so she could do the deed.
But what she was saying now was a request for direct help—for me to kill Hex for her.
A stubborn character who had never once in her life asked for help.
Was asking another person for help for the first time.
"Yeah, no~"
But what reason do I have to do it?
***
The Headmaster's Office.
At a table piled high with documents, Lucia pressed a hand to her forehead and sighed.
"Haaah..."
She hadn't slept a wink since the day before.
While she was used to pulling all-nighters from her adventuring days, the mental fatigue from dealing with student deaths, compensation for the bereaved families, and a mountain of other tasks was beyond description.
Just as she leaned back in her chair to take a short break.
-Knock, knock.
Someone had come to visit.
Immediately after, a professor's voice came from outside.
"Headmaster. The headmaster of Zwey Academy has come to visit."
Zwey Academy.
Besides Jeomineol Academy, where Lucia was the headmaster, there was one other academy in the empire.
Naturally, with so many students, one academy wasn't enough to accommodate them all, so the empire had established another.
The headmaster of that academy had shown up unannounced, without a single word of notice.
Normally, since both were busy people, they would have arranged a meeting on a pre-agreed date.
But Lucia had a good idea why she was here.
"Come in."
As soon as she gave permission, the door opened and a middle-aged woman who looked to be in her fifties entered.
"Hoho, it's been a while, Headmaster Lucia."
"It has been a while, Headmaster Bernice."
This middle-aged woman was none other than the headmaster of Zwey Academy, Bernice Somerset.
Lucia guided her to the reception table and sat down across from her, at which point Bernice spoke.
"It must be difficult for you, with the student deaths."
Lucia detected the mockery hidden in her words.
Bernice had been hostile toward Lucia ever since they first met.
Lucia suspected it was a feeling born from inferiority.
Normally, she would have found it almost cute, thinking, *She's just being jealous again.*
But Bernice had chosen to mock her over the death of her students, which soured Lucia's mood.
Not that she was in any position to talk back, having been unable to do anything until students had died.
It was the height of absurdity.
An opponent identical to herself.
She had managed to win and get out, but it had taken too long, and the incident was already over.
"More importantly, isn't 'that' event coming up soon?"
Bernice said, feigning concern.
The 'event' she was referring to was the annual tournament held around this time of year.
Normally, it was a festival-like event where the academies selected students from each year to compete.
But right now, the students of Jeomineol Academy were in no condition for such things.
They were all injured and busy with treatment.
"...We have no choice. We'll have to skip it this year."
"Hmm... Instead of that, would you hear my suggestion?"
"What suggestion?"
"Instead of the students, the instructors will compete against each other."
She was proposing to hold the tournament with the instructors from each academy as the competitors, instead of the students as originally planned.
"It would be a good motivation for the students, don't you think?"
"...However, we have injured instructors on our side as well."
"There's still some time before the tournament, isn't there? I believe the instructors will have plenty of time to recover by then."
Do we really have to hold this tournament?
Especially when one side is in no condition to participate normally.
Her intentions are painfully obvious.
She's trying to steer things in a direction favorable to her side, but Lucia wasn't one to just sit back and take it.
She focused on the word 'instructor'.
"I'll agree, if you accept a few conditions."
"Hmm... Let's hear them."
"They're simple. The match format will be a captain's battle, and neither side will be held responsible for anything that happens during the tournament after it concludes."
"Of course, we headmasters won't be participating, you know that right?"
The headmasters don't participate. The gap between a headmaster and an instructor is significant, and since they are both aware of their difference in skill, they deliberately abstain, knowing it wouldn't be a fair match.
"Of course."
"Excellent. Then let's hold the tournament on the scheduled date."
Watching Bernice readily agree, Lucia smiled inwardly.