Into the Novel (1)
Strange messages made of light.
I waved my hand through them, and they passed right through as if nothing were there.
What the hell was this…
Would you like to record a new narrative?
[Yes.] [No.]
A narrative record. So it meant a novel.
I had read a ridiculous number of web novels.
Ever since high school, for more than ten years.
And this did not seem like something a human being had set up.
If I picked the wrong one, whether it was a god or a demon, I’d be royally screwed.
I had no idea whether it would hurt me or help me.
Was there any reason to keep thinking about it?
My life was already shit.
“I choose Yes.”
Then the messages shattered and scattered.
A list spilled downward, one title after another.
Whoa. They were all coming up?
――――――――――――――――
1. Tame the Academy Delinquent Noble Ladies.
2. Possessed by a Soap Opera from Hell.
3. A Female Celebrity Who Served in the Military Hides Her Strength.
4. The Tower-Climbing Life of an Invisibility User.
5. Hiding an Infinite Warehouse in the Apocalypse.
6. I Obtained the Hand of Omnipotence.
7. I Became a Girl Group Trainee Who Served in the Military.
8. How to Live as the Younger Brother of the Tower’s Top Actress.
....
――――――――――――――――
The titles kept coming, endless as a waterfall.
For a moment I wondered if it was just the order of the novels I’d recently read, but it wasn’t that either. At a glance, there had to be over two hundred of them.
It said it would record a new narrative.
Guess I’d have to see how this worked.
“Number 1, Tame the Academy Delinquent Noble Ladies.”
Selected narrative 1.
Entering narrative 1 shortly.
Right now?
Could I leave if I wanted to?
It wasn’t going to send me somewhere on my own, was it?
I got out of bed and sat up.
At that moment, light burst across my vision.
<1. Imperial Academy 1>
When I opened my eyes, I saw the sort of unfamiliar ceiling you only ever got in the most clichéd of setups.
Odd wallpaper patterns. A smell I didn’t know.
It looked like a dorm room.
By the window, where light was spilling in, there was a desk and a stack of books, but the letters on the covers were nothing I recognized. And then there was my arm.
Was I white? Pale skin. Muscular.
I got up from the bed and looked into the mirror hanging on the wall.
Holy hell. That was me?
I was, quite literally, a walking flower boy.
Blond hair, blue eyes, a tall, straight frame.
Along with unfamiliar memories packed with hardship, anger, and sorrow, the language and swordsmanship of this world came flooding into me one after another.
Hung on the wall was a mage’s robe.
I think I’m the protagonist.
Yuri Osgard.
A knight from a kingdom destroyed seven years ago by the Empire’s invasion. He had infiltrated the Imperial Academy and come here to kill the emperor.
This academy stood in the imperial capital, and the students who attended it were the children of imperial noble houses.
The sons and daughters of the people who had ravaged the protagonist’s homeland and slaughtered its residents. Their noble young ladies.
Was I meant to come here as the original protagonist?
But this work hadn’t been finished yet.
What was I supposed to do with a new narrative?
Looking out the window, I could see a broad garden and a training ground.
Young trainees and students moved back and forth through it.
It felt so real.
As if the world of the novel had become reality.
Just as in the novel, an enormous power was crouched and sealed somewhere near Yuri’s chest.
In the latest chapter, he had unlocked it.
Yuri, leaving behind his ruined kingdom, had wandered dangerous lands after rescuing a prince, and then he had met an ancient dragon on the verge of death.
As that dragon died, leaving its heart behind for Yuri, he inherited great magic and mana.
Right now, Yuri didn’t know the spell to break the seal.
What was there to wait for? I knew the spell.
“By the name of the supreme contract, I command thee. Break free from the engraved chains and claim your liberty.”
Hssssss—
Light flared from my body from the very first phrase, and when the spell reached its end, brilliance exploded outward.
At the same time, a vast power surged through my entire body, then was instantly sucked back into my chest.
I’d expected unbearable pain.
There was none. It was as if magic itself had taken control of my body.
So this really worked.
I was possessing Yuri Osgard, but it felt as though I had truly become him.
Maybe because of his memories and experience.
Not imitation, but the real thing.
(Yuri. You’re late today.)
It was a voice coming from the orb on my desk.
The unfamiliar language sounded like my native tongue.
“I’m coming, Professor.”
He was the full-time professor for tactical magic in the Department of Magic.
I was some kind of assistant professor, teaching basic magic as a general studies course. In Academy terms, I was in charge of the main curriculum—the collegiate division.
Had I overslept?
I hadn’t even eaten breakfast, and it was already time for class.
I washed up quickly and put on the professor’s robe.
Then I took my introductory magic textbook and left the room.
It was amazing how quickly I adjusted.
Probably because I knew this story so well.
“Good morning, Professor Yuri.”
The trainees greeted me politely as they passed.
Through middle school, high school, and the Academy’s lower division, only trainees from knightly houses were admitted; in the main division, only those from prestigious noble families could advance.
I climbed to the third floor.
Along the corridor, the main-division students had gathered in various places, chatting idly. The male students wore uniforms with absurdly broad cuts, while the female students wore miniskirt uniforms.
“Morning, Professor Yuri.”
“Yeah, sure.”
One of the male students gave my back a few light taps.
As I walked past, they burst into snickers.
They’d stuck something on my back, those bastards.
Rattle.
I opened the classroom door and stepped inside.
The classroom was a complete mess.
Paper balls were flying everywhere, someone in the back was wrestling, and the female students were all touching up their makeup.
Then the bell rang with a clear ding.
The students were still chatting.
“Could you at least sit down now?”
Snickering, the students drifted back to their seats.
Were these people nobles, or delinquents?
“Today’s lecture is about battlefield control.”
I wrote the topic on the blackboard.
At that moment, I heard a snicker from behind me.
“Yuri! Is your dick really that big?”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s on your back. It says, ‘My dick is so huge it’ll tear your asshole apart if I shove it in.’”
“Hahahaha.”
Well, at least they hadn’t called it a peanut.
I peeled the paper off my back and tossed it away without a second thought.
“Class is starting. This material will definitely appear on your graduation exam, so pay attention.”
I opened the textbook.
“Battlefield control teaches us this: the thing that decides victory in war is not powerful magic. It is formation, supply, information, messengers, and retreat routes. If you cannot control these five things, magic means nothing.”
One student said, “Wouldn’t one fire spell be enough?”
I ignored him and went on.
“War never moves by force alone. A hungry soldier will run, and if a commander’s orders don’t reach the line, the formation collapses.”
“Professor Yuri, have you experienced that yourself?”
I looked at the female student who had asked.
“Of course I have real battlefield experience.”
“Not that kind of experience. I meant with women.”
That sent the girls into peals of laughter.
The one who’d asked the question even touched her own chest.
That hadn’t been in the novel.
“Nobles learn war in a hopelessly flamboyant way. Massive explosions. Heroic charges. Flames that blot out the sky. Armies and soldiers who believe in and follow them.”
I looked at the students as I spoke.
“Do you know what the war you all so badly want to march into is really like? It’s nothing but rolling in mud laced with blood, barely keeping your mind together among the corpses of your comrades. And then—”
Suddenly, the classroom fell silent.
“The people you think are worthless insects you can kill without a second thought are human beings just like you. The residents of the destroyed kingdom, wandering the wasteland after losing their homes and starving to death—those people too! They could have been your own people.”
It was as if I had dumped ice water over them.
From the very back, a female student spoke quietly.
“That’s a dangerous thing to say, assistant professor.”
Rachel.
The student known as the academy’s greatest beauty.
She was of imperial blood, the only daughter of the Northern Grand Duke, who was called the Empire’s strongest sword. The finest sword of her generation.
“It’s basic common sense.”
Rachel curved her lips.
“How amusing. Those filthy, vulgar, stinking commoners are equal to me? Whether they starve to death or not, they’re the ones who refused to become glorious citizens of the Empire.”
Another student chimed in.
“Your politics seem a little suspect. Are you really from the Empire? You didn’t crawl in from a fallen kingdom, did you?”
“Could be. His accent is kind of weird.”
“Hey! Report him to the Imperial Inspection Bureau! He admitted he was from a destroyed kingdom and still dared to infiltrate the Imperial Academy.”
“What if he isn’t?”
“Then he isn’t. Heh heh heh.”
The students were mocking me as a group.
They were already tormenting Yuri for daring to teach them as some low-ranking mage, and now this.
We were still at the beginning of the novel.
“I’ll continue the lecture.”
“Go ahead.”
“Therefore, war is not a contest of who is stronger, but of who refuses to break until the very end…”
Thwack—
A wad of paper flew at my face.
Then another, and another—thwack, thwack—hitting me across the face.
“Will Professor Yuri break? Or not?”
“Kekekek. That bastard’s frozen solid.”
The students laughed and kept throwing paper balls.
“Could you stop?”
“You don’t need to take that useless general studies class anyway.”
Taking the hits, I looked over the students.
“I said stop.”
“And what are you going to do? Go beg the dean to fire you? You know who my father is, right?”
“What’s with the act? A low-ranking mage like you.”
Looking at them, I said, “If all of you came at me together, I’d still win.”
“Yeah, right. We’re knight candidates!”
“If you don’t believe me, then come and try.”
Then Rachel stood.
She walked toward me, staring straight at me all the while.
She wore a uniform blouse and a short skirt.
“If I challenge you, will you accept?”
“It’d be a shame if that pretty face got scarred.”
“Then you’ll die by my hand.”
Rachel smiled as she spoke.
“If I land even one hit, I win.”
Without a word, I stood.
I took off my robe and rolled up the sleeves of my shirt.
Rachel waited with complete confidence.
Then, one by one, the students rose and gathered around me. All sixteen of them faced me at once.
“Win, Rachel!”
“Kill him! Just kill him!”
The students shouted at the top of their lungs.
Rachel drew a dagger with a hiss.
“Weapons aren’t allowed.”
“So what?”
Whoosh—
Rachel’s dagger cut through the air and came at me in a gleaming arc.
As expected of the finest sword of her generation. Her footwork was different.
Clack— I knocked aside Rachel’s dagger.
Then a fist came in!
Clack—blocked again.
Rachel looked at me in alarm.
And then, at that very moment—
Domination
“Freeze.”
Ting—
With a ringing note, a fierce power of domination burst forth, swallowing Rachel and the gathered students whole and seizing them completely.
The entire group of sixteen froze at once.
Only their eyeballs rolled back and forth.
I’d set the direction of the new narrative.
It was going straight into a train wreck.
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