29. Angels and Demons
29. Angels and Demons
The academy was abuzz with talk of Atlas.
They called him a promising freshman—no sooner had he arrived than he'd clashed with the Five Pillars and single-handedly trashed the Newspaper Club.
The more incidents Atlas caused, the more the Companion who was constantly by my side advising me grew wary of him.
-Atlas's momentum is unsettling. He may have already made the contract.
He warned me that Atlas was dangerous every time an incident broke out around him.
When he beat up Lemnos's entire crew in the hallway, when he took down Lemnos himself, when he wrecked the Newspaper Club—he was always on guard.
He never stopped telling me, almost to the point of making my ears calloused, that Atlas would definitely form a contract with a demon.
I wanted to dismiss it all as nonsense, but that wasn't something I could do.
Because ever since I met the Companion, his words had never been wrong.
After the conspiracy of the Demon Church—the demon worshippers' organization—in my territory was resolved, the Companion's voice, which only I could hear, always guided me down the right path, as if he knew the future.
And so, as the Companion kept talking about Atlas, Atlas began to look different to me.
What was most cowardly was that I myself didn't fully trust Atlas either.
Atlas had two faces.
The Atlas he showed in front of me and Liber—a considerate, comfortable, angel-like Atlas—and the terrifying, demon-like Atlas who cut down anyone who crossed him...
These unpredictable shifts in Atlas's demeanor kept throwing me into turmoil.
When I saw him helping Liber with swordsmanship training during morning exercises, the Companion's worries all seemed like nonsense. But when I saw Atlas chopping people's legs off, his words seemed to be the truth.
What proved most decisive was what happened yesterday...
The day Atlas and Phrygia, who'd been absent, returned to school—what I witnessed that day sent the Companion into shock.
----
It was during the morning, when Atlas suddenly vanished from sight. The Companion, finding it suspicious, had me search for him.
I found Atlas in an empty, out-of-the-way classroom in the academy building. He was having a secret rendezvous with Phrygia.
"...Atlas-nim, I hold tea time every afternoon. Would you perhaps care to join me...?"
"I'm not going. Your underlings make the place too crowded."
I knew about the Golden Phrygia.
I'd heard plenty of rumors, and she was one of the people the Companion spoke of with utter revulsion.
I'd heard she was famously arrogant and haughty, yet she was using exceedingly polite speech.
"I will clear them all out."
"Then it'll be noisy because you're having a private audience with me alone. That's even less reason for me to go."
"It is a matter between Atlas-nim and myself. Others have no right to say anything."
"I'd be uncomfortable if those guys whisper about it."
"In that case... I shall prepare a private place."
Phrygia was clinging to Atlas.
Atlas was politely refusing Phrygia's suggestion, but Phrygia was practically begging and pleading with him.
Just what in the world had happened between those two?
I couldn't understand it at all.
-Tuk
As Shara kept pressing with different terms, Atlas suddenly began tapping his fist rhythmically against his palm—tuk, tuk, tuk.
"Shara."
"...!"
As the sound of fist striking palm echoed at a steady beat, Shara Phrygia's expression changed.
The face of a girl in love shifted abruptly into the expression of a frightened child, cold sweat breaking out.
"I said I'm not going."
"....I overstepped."
At Atlas's firm refusal, Phrygia finally squeezed her eyes shut and gave up.
"Then, off you go."
The moment Atlas's voice cut off, the Companion screamed inside my head.
-He noticed! Use the hourglass, now!
'R-right now??'
As soon as the Companion shouted, I flipped the small hourglass hanging from my neck upside down.
At the same moment, I heard the sound of something shattering above my head.
With that motion, I felt as if my body had been flipped upside down, and the scenery before my eyes changed.
I was back in the dormitory.
-If you'd been just a little later, we would've been caught.
"He noticed us?"
The 'Rewinding Hourglass' I'd just used was a rare artifact I'd found thanks to the Companion.
By flipping the hourglass upside down once a day, it possessed the ability to spatially move me to any location I had been in up to one day prior.
There are plenty of spatial movement artifacts of that caliber, but the 'Rewinding Hourglass' was special—it was undetectable and could be used even in places where spatial movement was normally impossible.
There were many times I didn't use it because it only worked once a day, but if we had to use it, the situation must have been truly urgent.
The scene I'd just witnessed was a truly astonishing one.
The two of them had been having a secret rendezvous, as if carrying on a clandestine affair.
'Or was it not like that? Atlas didn't seem to like her much.'
It was true that Atlas had thoroughly rejected Phrygia's advances. But there might be a form of love like that too.
I was surprised, but the Companion was so shocked his voice trembled.
-Phrygia... using polite speech? To Atlas?? Damn it, are we already too late?!
'They seemed to get along well... Is that really such a big problem?'
-Phrygia is a traitor to humanity. There is only one person besides the Emperor that that bitch has ever bowed her head to... and that's a demon. That woman is the very one who sides with demons and brings the Empire to ruin...!!
It was what he'd said before.
He'd told me that except for those among the Five Pillars who died earliest, they would all eventually form contracts with demons.
-That woman is the heir of the Golden Duke. The only people in this Empire worthy of her bowing her head to are the Emperor and her own father. And yet, that Phrygia is serving Atlas as if he were her lord.
-At the end... did you see how Phrygia was trembling in fear...? Atlas forced her to submit. Atlas may have already become a demon.
"That's a lie..."
That couldn't be....
If Atlas really had become a demon... I would have to kill him.
—————————
Though my head was a mess over the matter of Atlas, classes continued.
Living as an exam-admission student at the academy was an incredibly difficult thing.
Those admitted by recommendation letter looked down on the exam-admission students, considering them a grade below.
I'd seen plenty of people who smiled brightly in greeting, only for their expressions to change the moment they saw the shape of my brooch.
Among the exam-admission students, several had already run afoul of the wrong vicious types and were suffering underhanded harassment.
As for me, I was enjoying my academy life immensely.
Liber was always by my side, protecting me from such people, so at least within our class, I didn't have to worry about that.
And Atlas... he always treated me comfortably.
I couldn't face Atlas the way I used to because the Companion's words kept ringing in my head, but he always treated me just the same.
I took the liberal arts class Magical Engineering Theory alone.
It was a class I'd been taking because, on the Companion's advice, I needed a great deal of magical engineering knowledge to maintain the weapons I was using.
It was difficult, but the Companion would catch the parts I didn't understand and explain them clearly, so I could keep up fairly well.
When class ended, the sunbaes sitting in front of me called me over.
"You're that shrimp's pet, aren't you?"
"M-me?"
"Follow us outside for a moment."
The shrimp's pet... were they talking about me?
I wanted to argue, but the words wouldn't leave my mouth.
'The two of their pet... that does seem about right...'
The daughter of a mere viscount—with a territory so run-down it was practically collapsing—was nothing compared to those two, who'd been admitted through recommendation letters...
There was no benefit at all in hanging around me.
Why did the two of them even bother to stay with me...? Thinking about it, it was a strange thing.
"Hmm~ So this is the type he likes."
"Exam-admission students all look sturdy, don't they."
"Relax your face. We're not gonna eat you."
The three of them stood, practically surrounding me, appraising me at their leisure.
They didn't seem all that strong.
If it came down to it, I could probably take all three of them down and escape.
-That's the young lady of the Laipou house. She's got the average noble temperament—no manners, but she's not a vicious type.
Having grasped the suspicious atmosphere, the Companion gave me appropriate advice.
Saying they weren't vicious meant they wouldn't do anything that might put my safety at risk.
If I pushed back needlessly, it would only cause a commotion...
Unlike Atlas, I couldn't afford to be expelled from the academy, so it was best to avoid creating any incidents.
"Here, take these."
"These are...?"
What they held out was their own luggage.
"It's tradition for hoobaes to carry their sunbaes' bags."
"...Yes."
Including my own, I ended up carrying the luggage of four people total.
I trained regularly, so it didn't feel heavy, but the bulky books and teaching materials were difficult to hold all at once.
Each of the two liberal arts classes per week, they made me carry their bags like a pack mule and frequently said things that were hard to respond to.
Mostly jokes comparing me to a pet.
But that was about it.
They didn't demand money, nor did they inflict physically unbearable abuse.
The jokes were a little mean-spirited... but still—some people would slap you if you didn't react; having them just giggle was practically being a saint.
Yeah, this much was fine.
It was bearable.
"Hey, what the hell are you guys doing."
But apparently, it wasn't fine in Atlas's eyes.
When he saw me carrying the sunbaes' luggage, he flew into a furious rage at them.
It wasn't about his own issues—he was angry on my behalf.
"Take your shit back, you pieces of trash!!"
"""Eeeek?!!"""
After chasing the sunbaes away, Atlas came back over to me, huffing and puffing.
"If anything like that happens again... no, never mind. I'll just swing by nearby more often."