Entering the Academy - 4
By the time I neared the main building in an effort to avoid the students' eyes, the morning arrival window had closed. The sparse figures who had still been visible earlier were gone completely, and only through the windows could I catch fleeting glimpses of classes already underway.
I had achieved the result I wanted—staying out of sight—but the reason for that success left a sour taste. If I had not taken the long way around, I would at least have had time to share a cup of tea in the principal's office.
Not a capybara. Catnip, maybe?
Perhaps Luise was a pink, catnip-scented capybara. The blond man who had immediately changed course the moment he spotted me was one of the four people I needed to watch most carefully—the three who had crawled in from abroad, plus the sole domestic priority target. The Third Prince, Ainter Libnoman.
Wow. Of all people, the Third Prince had to show up there. Was there something about that girl that twisted people's fates?
In an academy that vast, Ainter had been spotted near Luise at precisely that moment. Goosebumps rose on their own. Ainter himself was already a problem, but the fact that he had been observed near Luise meant the other three could easily get tangled up as well, didn't it?
Forced attendance at a full gathering of every person of interest on my very first day of assignment? Absolutely not. If someone wanted to drag me into that, they would at least have to offer an already-opened bottle of Welch's as a bribe.
For a second I pictured myself standing in a place where four continentally important figures had gathered. Just imagining something even the Minister of Foreign Affairs had never experienced drained so much mental energy that I sank onto a nearby bench and stared blankly into space.
Sitting like this at the Academy made me feel like a college student waiting for the shuttle bus—except the Academy had no shuttle buses, and I was not a student. Was it even reasonable that the only school-days nostalgia a man in his twenties possessed had to be dredged up from pre-possession memories?
I pressed a hand to my throbbing forehead. Four years of civil-service life had honed my sixth sense, and from the moment this assignment was decided it had been sending steady warnings that the days ahead would be brutally rough. The real problem was that even when you heard the warning, there was no way to dodge it.
It felt exactly like watching a fist fly toward your face in slow motion yet being unable to move, so you just took the hit. Reason and instinct had both opposed the assignment, but the crushing weight of public authority from above had made it happen anyway. The most terrifying force in the world was public authority…
I clicked my tongue once, rose from the bench, and retraced my steps. With no students wandering about, it was time to finish the original goal of mapping the layout.
As befitting an educational institution thronged by blue-blooded nobility, I examined the large, ornate buildings, and whenever I spotted students moving between halls or stepping outside during a break I simply passed them by with natural ease.
During the morning rush the sheer volume of stares had made me feel like an animal in a zoo, but that was no longer the case. Besides, I could hardly spend my entire stay at the Academy forever dodging students.
I should introduce myself as an auditor by tomorrow at the latest.
I could not very well greet every person whose eyes I met with, “Hello, I’m an auditor. I’m here on official business.”
I wandered every corner, storing a complete mental bird’s-eye view of the Academy, then checked my surroundings and pulled out my communication orb. Immediate tasks were finished; better handle this before I forgot.
I called the deputy director with the orb I had taken from my coat. After a few vibrations his face appeared.
“It’s been a while, Director. Have you arrived safely at the Academy?”
“Yeah. Got here this morning, but I got sidetracked with a few other things, so I’m only calling now.”
“I’m relieved to see you don’t seem to be having any trouble.”
In truth, problems had poured down the moment I set foot here. The heroine Luise, Erich whose “You’re a good friend” ending already shimmered before my eyes, and Ainter drawn in by the catnip-scented capybara.
But there was no need to add those details and make the deputy worry. Coldly speaking, he would be of little help with this particular assignment. Quietly I tucked the names of Luise and the other two into a corner of my mind.
“Well, more or less. But on the way here I saw something strange.”
“Please go ahead.”
“There should have been a budget line for road maintenance on the route to the Academy. The road was a complete mess.”
Track it down and clean them all out.
Even though the order sounded as casual as telling someone to pick up a few things at the market, the deputy simply nodded in acceptance without a single question. The nameless local official whose name had climbed to the top of the kill list inside the carriage was thus marked for disposal.
This was my final gift to the Ministry of Finance’s express carriage, with which I had shared a long, miserable journey and a small friendship. I kept the faith, express carriage…
“I will process it and report back. Do you have any further instructions?”
“No. Oh—everything quiet over there?”
“Yes, nothing out of the ordinary.”
Thankfully the section chiefs seemed to be keeping their heads down. Relief loosened my expression on its own. The deputy had not contacted me separately, so no major chaos had erupted, yet I had still been anxious. Hearing with my own ears that there were no problems let me finally breathe easier.
“Good. Hang in there. Contact me the moment anything comes up.”
“Understood.”
With no further business I gave the deputy one last earnest reminder and ended the call. Knowing he was still holding down the office was a greater comfort than I could say. If even the deputy had been gone, the moment the reins slipped the section chiefs’ antics would have piled up without limit—that much was obvious. The ending would have been the Audit Department blown to pieces by an enraged minister.
Would that actually be better?
If the department were smashed by the minister’s hand, I, as director, would have no choice but to take responsibility and retire. Of course, a man like the minister would probably invent a nonexistent department, stick me in it like a penal unit, and work me to the bone.
Still, even briefly imagining the possibility of retirement lifted my spirits a little. I tucked the communication orb away again and set off with lighter steps.
Confirming that Karl’s face had vanished as the connection cut, the deputy slipped the communication orb into his coat and immediately opened the door behind him. The room had been rather noisy, hardly an ideal environment for speaking with the director, so he had stepped out for a moment.
When he opened the door again and stepped back into that far-from-ideal environment, a full-blown circus of chaos unfolded before his eyes.
“Section Chief Three’s all-out cuteness festival! Watch this!”
“Heehee, hee-heh-heh-heh-hek.”
“Khh, hey! The director’s glass is empty!”
Of the three bastards, Section Chief Two was by far the loudest. He was even calling for the director in a place where the director was not present. The deputy’s gaze shifted and found a life-size doll seated in the director’s chair, Karl’s portrait stuck over its face. Section Chief Two staggered slightly toward it, filled the glass set before the doll to the brim, and then flung the entire contents straight onto the portrait.
“Director drinks so well!”
Section Chief Two cackled and refilled the empty glass. The hastily propped-up doll was gradually transforming into the real director inside Section Chief Two’s mind.
Compared with the sheer absurdity of the scene, the trigger had been surprisingly trivial. Karl’s fury had shredded the carefully prepared placards and the planned Academy-departure celebration party into confetti and scattered them to the winds.
But a section chief of the Audit Department did not abandon something he had set out to do over a minor variable like that. If they could not throw a farewell party for the Academy, why not throw an arrival party instead? Section Chief One’s suggestion had struck a deep chord in Section Chiefs Two and Three.
They had pushed work forward or postponed it to free the morning hours, then the section chiefs themselves had run around on foot preparing the party.
“About this size is roughly the director, right?”
“Whoa, even the portrait is flattering.”
Since the real Karl was absent, the idea of roughly attaching Karl’s portrait to a doll and seating it in the director’s place had passed unanimously. The placard Karl had torn to pieces had somehow been salvaged as well; they had patched it back together and hung it directly above the doll.
Ah! The Blossoming Academy Life of One’s Twenties!
In the process they had discarded unnecessary letters and stuck the remnants together like rags. For an official of the Audit Department, reassembling shredded documents was basic cultural literacy. A restoration that merely looked presentable was nothing at all.
The ragged banner born of the original sin of being torn rather than burned now flaunted its majestic presence. The deputy’s gaze dropped from it.
As his eyes settled on Section Chief Three performing midair somersaults in front of the doll as a “cuteness festival for the director” and on Section Chief Two once again flinging liquor onto the portrait, Section Chief One spotted the deputy who had just entered and held out a glass.
“Deputy Director, you drink too!”
Without hesitation the deputy took the glass Section Chief One offered and drained it in one go. He had already downed six glasses with the section chiefs before receiving Karl’s call.
“Everything quiet over there?”
Those were the words Karl had spoken earlier, laced with anxiety and restlessness. To them the deputy had answered firmly that nothing was wrong. In a certain light it could be called a false report to his direct superior…
I’m more uneasy precisely because they aren’t causing accidents.
Lamentably, the deputy looked at the section chiefs throwing their chaotic party and concluded that they were “not causing accidents.” What Karl had failed to anticipate was that the standard for “accidents the section chiefs cause” inside the deputy’s mind was extremely generous. As long as the pot did not leak on the outside, the deputy paid it no mind. He knew that forcibly plugging the leaks inside only produced pandemonium outside.
Until now the section chiefs had moderated the internal leakage while watching Karl’s expression, so this side of the deputy’s temperament had never shown. Unfortunately, Karl was not here.
While watching Section Chief One smirk and refill the glass he held, the deputy’s eyes met those of Section Chief Five, who had been sitting quietly in the corner. The deputy nodded. Section Chief Five nodded back. And both of them casually emptied their glasses. Once afternoon work began they would sober up on their own, so it did not matter.
And so the party for the Karl-less Karl continued in high spirits.