Chapter 2
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 2
Chapter Title: Omen -2-
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"Y-You... you damned bastard!!!"
Bang! Crash!
A bottle of ink sloshing with black liquid flew through the air and shattered against the wall.
The old man slamming the table and hurling objects in his rage might seem like a naturally hot-tempered sort.
But in truth, he was the dean of Lofty Academy, renowned for his cool-headedness and sparing words.
"Th-Those bandits used dirty tricks..."
Slap! Slap!
"You son of a bitch!! Is that your excuse right now?!"
The dean vaulted over the table and started laying into the middle-aged man bowing his head low.
With strength unbelievable for a frail old man, the dean's slaps whipped the man's head back and forth until he lost his balance and toppled over.
"Die! Just die! I'm as good as dead anyway, so let's go together!!"
"Guh—Khek!"
The dean's fury still unspent, he stomped down on the man with his shoe.
The middle-aged instructor, the one taking the beating, offered no excuses—just groans as he endured it.
"D-Dean! Calm down! You'll kill the instructor at this rate!"
The administrative officer, who had been standing silently to the side, tried to intervene, but the dean showed no sign of stopping.
"I'm stomping him to death on purpose, so he should die! Huff—huff..."
"Dean, please calm down for now. If we put our heads together, I'm sure we'll find a way out!"
"A way out? Your brain must be a flower garden... Huff... As if... huff... something like that... exists..."
Having spent half his life seated at a desk, the dean's aged body rebelled against the sudden exertion, leaving him gasping for breath.
Had the renowned mage of a dean resorted to magic, the instructor would have been blasted into hundreds of pieces and gone.
The fact that it hadn't come to that was proof—however faint—that some shred of reason still lingered, or so the administrative officer believed.
"Aah—! Th-This is really it. The end. Damn it all..."
Snapping out of his blind rage, the dean confronted the harsh reality he'd dreaded, his hands trembling uncontrollably.
Tomorrow, the grim reaper would truly come calling.
Lofty Academy in the capital was the Harun Empire's largest and finest educational institution.
As such, anyone from an imperial organization aiming for a prominent position had to pass through the academy.
Even now, with the Church running its own training programs, the current cardinal and paladin captain were academy alumni—as was the commander of the Imperial Knight Order.
The public's idols were overwhelmingly academy graduates.
Young talents eager to bloom their dreams followed in those idols' footsteps via the academy path.
And the academy's purpose wasn't limited to boosting raw combat prowess.
From alchemy to various theoretical subjects, of course.
It was also actively cultivating civil servants devoted to the empire, including administrative studies.
Wherever you went in the empire, look up, and you'd see an academy graduate.
Their connections bred sky-high arrogance.
Pulling strings for each other had solidified promotions based on pedigree.
Drenched in chosen-people ideology, their pride and honor formed a flawless, unscratched sphere.
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He'd thought he'd spend his whole life like this.
But nothing lasts forever—disaster struck.
The trigger for the tarnished honor was trivial.
A band of nasty bandits had begun raiding nameless villages near the capital.
Attacks on slash-and-burn farmers and peasants happened several times a season—common enough.
Usually, mobilizing adventurers or private guards sufficed.
But the Knight Department instructor thought differently.
The current cadets had been spoon-fed the best, brimming with mana but sorely lacking real combat experience.
Why not use this chance for some light practice against weak bandits?
"Instructor—are you finally losing it?"
Hearing the pitch, the dean scowled in firm opposition.
The screw-loose Third Prince was obsessed with knighthood and enrolled in the Knight Department, along with several highborn noble heirs.
Step in recklessly, and if anyone got hurt, who'd take responsibility?
(I'll stake my life to protect them!)
(Please allow it!! It's for the empire's future!)
No matter how many times he bellowed, the instructor kept banging on the dean's door.
"Really... I can't win against you."
The instructor's earnest zeal swayed the dean, riding the tail end of male menopause.
On an unusually sentimental day, he stamped the seal as if entranced.
But once done, anxiety gnawed; he summoned and warned the instructor dozens of times right up to departure eve.
Absolutely! Absolutely! Under no circumstances must anyone get hurt. He'd attach a mage and priest for the trip.
Request already made—stop by the Church en route to link up with support.
Despite the dean's earnest pleas, the instructor charged straight ahead.
Just bandits, after all.
In his brash knight days, he'd swept them solo.
'Overkill with extra manpower would only diminish the academy's prestige.'
The result—
The Third Prince lost a finger.
Precious heirs from pillar noble houses suffered big and small wounds.
A baron's firstborn lay in critical condition, stabbed by a rusty blade.
Some might call it the instructor's bad luck.
Not mere bandits, but a mercenary band turned robber, reveling in plunder.
The self-proclaimed leader proved far stronger than expected, trading blows with the instructor for ages.
Cadets drilled in rote formations and discipline lost their commander and floundered in real chaos.
Merc-turned-bandits flung dirt, poisoned darts, and hidden blades without hesitation.
They seized noble ladies hostage for leverage.
The cadets couldn't cope with the irregular swarm tactics.
Knights escorting the prince from afar rushed in to quell it, but too late.
The prince's tantrum against bodyguards had kept surveillance distant, delaying intervention.
Word spread by watching adventurers, info guild agents, and those eager for noble disgrace—Lofty Academy's reputation plunged from peak to pit in a day.
Knight Department cadets beaten by bandits? Even fatal for graduated, active knights.
Could they endure the Swordsmanship Department's mockery?
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"H-Huh... heuk...!"
Thud!
Hearing the news, the dean fainted dead away on the spot.
No time for rest—he was roused by imperial envoys storming his office.
"In two days, the emperor's proxy will arrive to convey his will. Prepare yourself."
"...I-I obey."
Once the Third Prince's finger healed, his own head would roll.
From that day, the dean neither sipped water nor took a bite.
In the end, he'd stamped the seal himself.
'Aah—it's over.'
She approached from afar.
Flanked by knights in gleaming full plate.
The dean knelt at the academy gates, awaiting the reaper to claim his neck.
Beside him, the instructor with a face swollen like a ripe fruit trembled openly in terror.
Clatter—whinny.
The warhorses halted before them.
The dean and instructor swallowed hard, sensing a colossal mountain looming.
"Raise your heads."
A beautiful voice, laced with icy charisma.
No fools here ignorant of her.
Guardian of the imperial house, the emperor's blade—Imperial Knight Order.
Squire to Sword Saint Asen Premiller.
Least of the Empire's Five Knights.
Eclair Dreitna, the Harun Empire's supernova, had arrived at the academy.
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Her current role: not knight, but imperial proxy.
The dean lifted his head first, the instructor moments later.
Astride her mount, she wore the imperial uniform, sword at her hip.
Silver hair tied tight gleamed in the sun; ruby eyes gazed down.
Flanking her, knights in full plate bore imperial banners.
Their flawless discipline shone through.
"Stand by."
One knight dismounted, handing her a scroll.
A crimson dragon coiled around it—imperial decree within.
'Th-That... damned fool...'.
The dean ached to leap up, incinerate and tear the instructor apart.
Had they just brought Church priests and mages, none of this.
Glare of death on the instructor broken by the scroll's unrolling—he dropped his eyes to the ground.
"Hear this, Doran Escaro!"
No earl title, no dean position mentioned.
The instructor unmentioned—only the responsible party's name.
Academy Dean Doran Escaro made no verbal reply, bowing deeper.
Eclair intoned the decree in a resonant voice.
"As dean of Lofty Academy, you have long served the empire and guided promising talents. We would praise your merits, yet your negligent handling of this incident cannot be overlooked."
The dean yearned to spring up, explain his precautions and the instructor's madness, wailing.
But rage and fear left him shivering instead.
"Even executing you and exterminating your kin would not sate Our wrath, nor restore the empire's stained face. The prince's loss is mended, but this matter stands."
Kill or spare? Ambiguous words halted his breath as he strained to listen.
"We intended to judge you by righteous retribution! Yet at the prince's earnest plea, We grant light punishment and chance to atone."
Shing!
'Chance?!'
The drawn blade's murderous ring froze dean and instructor like stone.
"Lately, Our subjects' complacency troubles Us."
Her mana weighed the air heavy.
"Think not peace eternal while federations endure. To sustain our mighty empire's glory, the academy's role weighs heaviest. Doran Escaro, take this overturned cart as warning—devise training and measures for battle-hardened knights, preventing such folly."
Ping—!
A bowstring snapped at full draw.
Decree ended, Eclair's sword flashed—the instructor's head rolled, the dean's right arm severed.
Roll—
Bowed low, the dean glimpsed the instructor's head and his own arm.
Punishment precluded regeneration or reattachment.
Milder than beheading and kin-slaying, indeed.
The dean clenched his teeth against agony, holding posture.
Ten seconds passed, mind fading—then the reaper spoke.
"Thus ends the decree."
"...With deepest gratitude for His Majesty's boundless mercy, I vow full recompense."
Rites complete, the dean rose, staunching blood with magic.
'I-I lived!'
Relief at miraculous survival short-lived.
Thinking ahead, he seriously wondered if death might be better.
- Train cadets not in showy drills, but battle foundations.
- Train to counter unforeseen variables.
Establish training and education for real-combat strong knights.
The mage dean's assigned task.
No time to feel the void of his missing arm.
"What should we do..."
At the dean's mournful voice, the administrative officer gauged mood before speaking.
"Shouldn't we hire a new instructor with proven combat experience..."
"Sigh... Of course I know that. But appointing a new knight as instructor—even then, how can we claim those empty chivalry-worshippers differ from the last?"
Silence blanketed the office briefly, but the officer spoke with pure curiosity.
"If I may overstep, Dean—do we really need to fixate on knights? For a Knight Department instructor, isn't sword skill all that matters?"
A remark that'd earn a knight's slash on sight, uttered without hesitation.
"...Go on."
"Why not merge the Swordsmanship and Knight Departments, or add joint classes—"
A deskbound theorist's classic proposal, never battlefield-tested.
Future knights would foam at the mouth hearing it, but the dean prized substance—a mage.
Thus, the mad idea struck fresh.