Hunting Down the Culprit
Hunting Down the Culprit
Leaving a flabbergasted Piar behind, I turned and walked toward the back of the hall.
Then I stopped in front of someone and spoke up.
"I feel terribly unwell. Could you please guide me to the infirmary?"
Clutching my stomach, I looked at her and asked for help.
Piar stared in bewilderment at the two people walking out of the hall.
The son of the ducal house had suddenly appeared, greeted him, and immediately left—and walking out with him was the female instructor who had been guiding people.
He couldn't make sense of what was happening at all.
But since both his arrival at this academy and his delivery of the Freshman Oath had already been filled with wondrous occurrences, perhaps he could brush off today's incident in the same way.
"As Master said, as long as I stay grounded and keep my balance, I'll be fine."
He didn't know where Master had come from or where he was now, but just as Master had said, he was standing side by side with nobles. He would simply trust Master's words and forge ahead.
It was Master who had awakened both him and his older cousin, who had once been ordinary commoners, and it was Master who had taught him how to use his ability.
It was Master who had told him about this academy, and Master who had taught him how to deal with nobles and people in general.
Thanks to him, Piar had been able to come to the academy and deliver the Freshman Oath as the commoner representative.
After coming here, he had realized that not only nobles but some commoners could awaken, too. Even so, he could never forget the grace of having awakened both him and his cousin.
'He told me to keep our awakening an absolute secret.'
Master had left the village with a warning: if any noble found out, not only Master but they themselves might be put in danger.
Naturally, both Piar and his older cousin intended to follow Master's words to the letter.
Coming here had made him realize once more just how extraordinary an awakening was.
Even without Master's advice, he fully intended to keep the secret.
'Still, why did the Duke's son come looking for me?'
As Piar tilted his head in confusion over the question, the student sitting next to him was pondering something else, muttering to himself.
"Was there anyone named Alex among the Duke of Gracia's children?"
Regrettably, the entrance ceremony began right then, and his mutterings vanished into thin air.
"Is your stomach troubling you that much?"
"I'm sorry. It's just getting a bit hard to endure."
"If it's that bad, going to the infirmary to receive divine healing from the priest will make you better in no time."
The staff member—no, the female instructor—leading me toward the infirmary looked just as pale and grim as I did.
To be honest, I was faking it, so naturally I was totally fine.
Yet unless she was a kindly instructor genuinely worried about me, there was no reason for her to look so uneasy.
Her eyes trembled with anxiety, and she kept glancing back toward the entrance ceremony hall.
No matter how I looked at it, that wasn't the behavior of someone worried about me.
But having figured out why during my previous death, I had no intention of pointing it out yet.
"Ugh... By the way, teacher, what is your name?"
"Ah, your name is Alex, right? I'm Isidora. A liberal arts instructor."
An ordinary-looking female teacher in her early thirties answered me.
A commoner. And an instructor, not a full professor.
This very female teacher was the mastermind who had blown up Piar earlier.
When Piar exploded again inside the ruined entrance ceremony hall, I scrutinized every single person present.
When the hall blew up the first time, there had been too many people to check everyone. But during the explosion just now, there was hardly anyone around.
Just the high priests, junior priests, a few staff members, and the injured.
And the female instructor walking beside me right now.
She had slipped out right before the hall detonated, then walked back inside after the disaster.
Her body was covered in black soot, yet she had no injuries anywhere.
Back then, even I hadn't suspected her in the slightest.
Since she had been at the back of the hall, she could have exited early, and rushing back to rescue people after a terror attack was only natural for a teacher.
Her wandering around looking for survivors afterward hadn't seemed strange to me at the time, either.
But the moment Piar arrived, something about her caught my eyes and senses as they swept the surroundings, setting her apart from everyone else.
She spotted Piar before anyone else, and as soon as he appeared, she scanned her surroundings and backed away from the scene.
That prompted me to fix my eyes on her, and the instant she reached a safe distance, I felt a faint flicker of mana flare from her body.
At the same time, mana surged inside Piar's body, triggering another explosion.
And just like that, I died again.
If it had been crowded, or if she hadn't retreated so far, it was a subtle shift I never could have noticed.
I also realized why everyone possessing inherited abilities had perished.
The moment Piar exploded, I felt all the gathered mana vanish instantly.
Or rather, should I say it was sucked into Piar? It seemed Piar's ability detonated not just by using his own mana, but by amplifying and utilizing all the ambient mana around him.
It was a truly terrifying ability.
The more people with powerful mana were present, the grander the explosion, while the ability users themselves lost their mana and couldn't even block the blast.
On top of that, ordinary people had no means of defending themselves against it to begin with.
An inherited ability meant specifically for targeting ability users who don't even realize they're walking bombs...
Inherited abilities were far more varied and frightening than I had thought.
After exchanging a few words as we walked, the infirmary building came into view just ahead.
"I have to head back to the entrance ceremony hall, so I won't be able to stay by your side. I'll inform the priests, so just rest comfortably. Once you feel better, come back to the hall. Otherwise, I'll drop by after it's over."
Oh boy, that's a bit troublesome.
Looking around, I saw hardly anyone on the road. No one was watching us, either.
Okay.
"Ugh, w-wait a moment."
Groaning in distress, I grabbed her arm.
"Are you alright?"
Startled, she caught me. Gasping for breath, I pulled her close.
"Huh?"
As I pulled her against my chest, she stared at me in surprise, and I pressed my hand against her abdomen.
Thump.
Mana erupted from my palm and struck her abdomen.
Whoosh.
My mana swept wildly through her body.
"Why...?"
Instructor Isidora stared at me with wide, astonished eyes. But even as she looked at me, her eyes immediately fluttered shut.
She wasn't dead. She had merely passed out.
She was no ordinary commoner liberal arts instructor; she was an ability user possessing an inherited ability.
But unless she was a physical enhancement type skilled in manipulating body mana, there was no way she could withstand a surprise attack from a knight-tier physical combatant who had trained for years.
My mana, tempered through countless deaths, tore messily through her internal organs, and she couldn't endure the impact.
"You shouldn't have let your guard down."
I whispered that ridiculous advice into the unconscious woman's ear. Then, supporting her body, I stepped into the infirmary building.
As I walked in, I called out.
"Over here! The teacher is sick!"
Startled priestesses and a middle-aged priest rushed over.
I had observed the healing magic of priests ever since I was an infant.
Through getting poisoned, injured, and killed time and again, I knew the capabilities of priests in this world better than anyone.
The powers of priests in this world were neither divine holy power granted by a god nor the result of faith.
They were simply inherited abilities, just like those of nobles.
Though their powers weren't handed down from parents like those of the nobility, they had inherited the healing power of the hero who had exercised healing magic during the Great War.
While their wound-healing capability was impressive enough, they had failed to detect an infant's poisoning that even an alchemist had caught...
...nor could they recognize unconsciousness caused by a mana disruption.
After laying her down on an infirmary bed, the priest immediately placed his hand over her body and unleashed his healing power, but she didn't awaken.
"What happened to her?"
"She suddenly said she wasn't feeling well and wanted to rest for a bit. Since I was nearby, I escorted her here. But she fainted right outside the door."
"...What a good student."
The priest looked at me with a bewildered expression.
A teacher claiming to be unwell being escorted from the ceremony hall by a student must have been hard for him to make sense of.
Well, it wasn't as if he had any way to verify it here anyway.
And besides, though my methods were unorthodox, I was definitely a good student.
"Her breathing seems stable and there don't appear to be any other abnormalities, so what should we do..."
Clearly, even the priests knew their healing abilities weren't omnipotent.
"You need to get back to the entrance ceremony hall as well, student. So you should head back first—"
"I'll go fetch another faculty member."
I cut off the priest's words, beating him to the punch.
"...That would be best."
After pondering for a moment, the priest nodded.
It seemed he felt uncomfortable heading to the ceremony hall himself because of the delicate relationship with the academy staff.
With a worried expression, I rested my hand on her shoulder.
"Please rest comfortably, then."
After double-checking that her internal mana remained tangled, I lifted my hand from her shoulder and left the infirmary.
Then I headed toward the entrance ceremony building. Walking at a brisk pace, I stepped inside and checked the people standing at the back of the hall.
The entrance ceremony had begun, and everyone was completely absorbed in watching the event.
As I entered the hall, someone who appeared to be a staff member approached me.
"Where is Instructor Isidora who left with you?"
I looked at the staff member who spoke. An ordinary man in his twenties.
Was he just a staff member who happened to see me leave with her? Or was he an accomplice who had plotted this together with her?
There was no way to tell right now.
I could only confirm that he possessed no mana. He was an ordinary person, not an inherited ability user.
I didn't answer his question.
"My apologies. Urgent matters first."
Instead, I begged his pardon and walked past him toward someone else.
"May I speak with you for a moment?"
At my request, the royal chief knight who had accompanied the Princess looked at me with a puzzled expression.
But he didn't ignore me.
He was one of the senior chief knights of the Royal Knights Order, and a key pillar of the Queen's faction who had been introduced to me by Queen Ria, the Princess's mother.
Her request for me to help the Princess while attending the academy had never been meant as empty words.
Naturally, I had been introduced to the butler tending to the Princess and the knight guarding her, and finally, I had exchanged greetings with Chief Knight Noaro, a core pillar of her martial power.
And at first glance, he had recognized the true extent of my skills. Truly fitting for a royal chief knight.
"What is the matter?"
He slipped into a corner and asked me in a quiet voice.
His voice hummed softly, vibrating right around my ears.
The sound of the entrance ceremony proceedings up front was now barely audible.
This was because he had isolated the sound using mana.
"There is a terror suspect."
When I said that, his expression hardened.
"Don't tell me... the instructor who left with you?"
As expected, it seemed he had never slacked off on keeping watch over the surroundings.
To think even someone like him had been wiped out en masse earlier...
"Yes. Instructor Isidora. She appears to be linked to the incident at the Hierro Marquisate. Suspecting her, I feigned pain and had her escort me to the infirmary, where I pressed her a little, and she bit right away. I knocked her unconscious and laid her out in the infirmary."
She probably had nothing to do with the Marquisate, but frankly, it was hard to come up with any other pretext.