The Hero from Another World
"I'm sorry..."
I couldn't breathe.
We attended the same school, so I had braced myself for the day we would inevitably cross paths. I had never once imagined she would come for me like this, and so immediately.
Her name was Rebecca, lover of the Hero who bore the Sixth Holy Sword.
We had arrived at the academy together only this morning, and already new people had gathered around her. Rebecca often kept those who followed her close at hand, yet her skill with people was hardly so great that she could grow familiar with this many of them before even half a day had passed. Most likely the Clorand family at her back, and the fact that she was the Sixth Holy Sword Hero's lover, had done the greater part of the work.
It didn't matter either way. What mattered to me was not whom she had made into her limbs, but how those girls chose to treat me.
Though it was our first meeting, they looked down on me with unwelcome eyes, as if they had put their heads together and agreed to follow Lady Rebecca's lead. A brief curse, and then a stream of abuse. Beast. Monster...
The words echoing in my muffled ears were impossible to make out clearly. I didn't want to.
Just then Rebecca lifted a hand to sweep back a lock of hair that had fallen across her face. That I flinched and trembled on reflex was surely a mistake. Perhaps that very reaction only whetted her sadism. With a twisted sneer she snatched my wrist as sharply as ever and jerked my hand up high.
This time, it's really going to happen. I squeezed my eyes shut, telling myself I had only to endure the sharp sound that would follow, and the stinging pain.
Flutter—
It was only the feeble sound of a single sheet of paper whipping through the air.
I felt no pain. When I cautiously cracked my eyes open, his figure showed through the blurred scenery, utterly unexpected.
Professor Neferna stood with his arms folded, wearing a strangely triumphant look.
"Oho. I had no idea our transfer student was so eager for my class. No need to hunt for the form so aggressively. I can spare you a sheet."
"...What? Who are you?"
Faced with Professor Neferna's sudden appearance and the unfamiliar document now in her own hand, Rebecca flared and shouted.
"Heh heh heh... Asking who I am? An excellent question! I, if I may say so, am the son of Hero Neferna — the Hero of the Second Holy Sword, who annihilated the eastern Snowfield thirty years ago! Eugene Sir Neferna! That would be me. Applaud to your heart's content! Bwahahahaha!"
"What is this lunatic even— ...Wait. Neferna? Neferna...? I feel like I've heard that somewhere..."
"Hahaha. Even a student who transferred in today knows me. My fame really is someth—"
"Aha...! So that's what this is. You're this beast's advisor? Kyahahaha! Good thing I asked my father! I begged him to stick me with the trashiest, most perverted teacher in the whole school, and of all people I land a terminal case of severe insanity like you!"
Rebecca burst into peals of laughter.
A sneer so chilling that even I, merely listening, flinched. It was nothing short of an open insult aimed at Professor Neferna. And yet the professor himself only grinned, utterly unbothered, and didn't so much as twitch.
It was Professor Freyja who could stand to watch no longer. She came over with her lovely face drawn tight in a frown.
"Hold on. Don't you think that's going too far?"
"And you... what are you supposed to be?"
"Eugene is faculty at this school too! Apologize, right now! I'll grant that he's pretty hopelessly ill-mannered, but still!"
"...Freyja? You really didn't need to tack on that last—"
"I'm asking you what you are!"
It was naked hostility. Jealousy aimed at an overwhelming presence.
Face to face with Professor Freyja, Rebecca visibly began to falter. A moment later she was glaring with eyes venomous with envy, shrieking in a sharp voice. It did not appear to have been a wise choice.
The students trailing after Rebecca must have been enrolled here from the start. They hadn't so much as blinked at Professor Neferna, yet the moment they saw how Rebecca was treating Professor Freyja, cold sweat began to bead on their faces.
"Um... Lady Rebecca? That is Professor Freyja. Anyone else, perhaps, but her of all people..."
"That's right, Lady Rebecca. Not now. Come back another time. You seem a little worked up, and that would be better. We're sorry, Professor Freyja. We'll be going on ahead."
"...What?! What's gotten into you all of a sudden? Did you forget who I am? I'm— mmph...! The Clorand family...! Mmph...! If I tell my father, every last one of you—! Mmph!"
The speed with which they clapped a hand over Rebecca's mouth and vanished, pale-faced, was swift enough to inspire admiration. Professor Freyja was left blinking, a blank question mark written across her face at their sudden retreat — or would have been, had Professor Neferna not clicked his tongue under his breath a moment later.
"Tch. They ran. Boring. One more word and the Freyja Appreciation Society lurking around campus would've taken her head clean off."
"Haa... That nonsense again. Even now, you just want to tease me?"
"...No, I'm telling you it's real. They're at the school. That's why those kids bolted. How many times do I have to say it before you believe me?"
"Say one more strange thing and next time I really won't help you. Be quiet."
Professor Freyja shot him a thoroughly irritated look, then turned to me with a gentle smile.
"Are you all right?"
Shame and bewilderment washed over me, and I ducked my head, turning my gaze away. I knew perfectly well I ought to at least thank the two of them, but my face wasn't thick enough for that. And so I hated myself all over again. I was disgusted with myself.
When I kept my mouth firmly shut, I must have looked pitiful. Professor Neferna changed the subject as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"You look tired. Shall we call it and let you rest? Nothing left to do, and the hour's about right."
"We should. Hmm, the dormitory, was it...? Miss Cecilia, have you unpacked at the dorm?"
"You think the Chairman would have had the sense for that? I can't go into the female dormitory, so Freyja, you show her the way."
"Ah, yeah. Got it."
Professor Freyja nodded with a bright smile, then belatedly did a double take.
"...Wait, hey! Don't ask me! I'm a man, you know?"
"It's just showing her the building. Why? Is the dorm matron going to stop you or something?"
"Mmm...? No...? That's not it, but..."
"Right? But listen, Freyja. If I walk in there, the dorm matron's bullet fist — forty-five years of pounding steel — is going to give the floor plan of my internal organs a complete custom rebuild."
"So you're saying that because the matron doesn't stop me at all, I look like a woman?"
Not that she looks like one. She is one, isn't she?
I could hardly call the time I had spent traveling the world beyond my homeland a long one, yet even within that shallow experience I had never once laid eyes on anyone as beautiful as Professor Freyja. That I, a woman myself, had nearly forgotten how to breathe the first time I saw her — and that Rebecca had burned with jealousy from nothing more than a glance at her face — was hardly an exaggeration.
A race of enchantment and chaste love, of sensuality and temptation. A Vanir Divine Kin, whose lovely wings of purest white glittered in the light.
It was not my first time seeing a Vanir Divine Kin beguile those who beheld them. But an existence that soared so far beyond the rest, as Professor Freyja did, was all but unheard of. That was simply the truth. I didn't know why the professor insisted on calling herself a man, yet the body curving so beautifully it made one's heart drop was unmistakably a woman's, tracing a clear line even beneath a somewhat loose robe.
Even a pout was enough to undo the composure of everyone around her. Boys passing by flushed and hurried off, and now and then someone simply stood there staring, soul gone from their eyes.
Professor Neferna, for his part, only let out an ambiguous little huff of a laugh, turned his gaze to me instead, and brought up something else entirely.
"Oh, right. Cecilia. Tomorrow we're heading out to the Snowfield for practical training, fighting monsters. Do you have gear?"
"...Yes."
"Then we're fine. I've got class starting now, so I need to head in. Thanks for sticking with me while I was out recruiting. For today, just go rest at the dorm with Freyja."
"...Yes."
"Really glad I met you today. See you tomorrow. .........Oh, right! Almost forgot."
Professor Neferna gave a casual little wave, then hurriedly began rummaging through his inner pocket.
"I put it in here... mm, found it! ...This. You take it. This pendant's a gift. A bit late, maybe, but either way it's an incredible perk for my very first disciple."
".........?"
"Keep it on you, think of me — Teacher Eugene Sir Neferna — and call, and you can summon me anytime. Incredible item. Put it to good use."
"What even is that...? What does Miss Cecilia gain from summoning you?"
"That's how bonus freebies work. What were you expecting? All right, I'm off~"
I still hadn't managed to offer my thanks. I had only just closed my hand around the pendant and begun to fidget with it when Professor Eugene was already gone.
I stared blankly into the empty air, and Professor Freyja laughed softly.
"Shall we go?"
"Ah! That's the Female Dormitory. Starting today, you'll be living there..."
It wasn't far. The dormitory building was already coming into view in the distance. Beyond a gently sloping hill, blue-green trees stood in a row, and between them a white building showed itself.
Professor Freyja seemed to have been worrying the whole way about my empty hands.
"You don't have any luggage of your own?"
"...No. I don't."
"Clothes, or anything like that...? Something casual to wear besides the uniform."
At the word clothes, I found myself at a loss.
Most of what I had brought was made with battle in mind, so I had been forced to dispose of it the moment I transferred. I had no casual clothes. All I possessed was the single uniform I had been given.
"Then on a day off, let's go shopping — you, me, and Eugene. It might not suit your taste, but I'll introduce you to a clothing shop I go to often."
"...You needn't concern yourself..."
Even at an answer as blunt as mine, Professor Freyja only smiled softly and spoke in a gentle voice.
"I don't know whether you heard it from the Chairman, but our school has a system called the assigned student. They dress it up with words like advisor and supervising professor, but in practice it's a relationship no different from family. A professor can't take on an assigned student just because they want to, and a student can't find a supervising professor just because they want one. More often than not, the bond doesn't end at the school. The student becomes the successor who inherits most of the magical achievements the teacher spent a lifetime building."
"........."
"That's why we're especially mindful of you. This is a first for Eugene too, so please bear with him. He isn't prepared in a great many ways. And if you're Eugene's student, you're as good as mine. So please don't feel quite so burdened by it."
I couldn't give the professor any answer at all.
Setting the system aside, I wasn't even sure I had the courage for such a thing, let alone the right. To speak honestly of the ugly thing in my heart, even kindness like this was more than I deserved, and a large part of me would rather they simply ignore me.
It was as I dragged those heavy steps up toward the dormitory that it happened.
A young man appeared out of nowhere and planted himself in front of us.
"Ah, Cecilia. There you are."
"............."
"Oh? And who might you be?"
I flinched back on reflex from the man who had suddenly shown his face, and Professor Freyja tilted her head. But when Rebecca appeared right behind him, the professor seemed to guess his identity at once. She spoke with a wary look.
"Ah... The Hero of the Sixth Holy Sword. Kim Yu-seong. So you're the one the Chairman mentioned."
The party leader of the Sixth Holy Sword party I belonged to, and the man summoned from another world at the call of the Sixth Holy Sword.
His name was Kim Yu-seong.