The Negotiation
A small person sat at the desk.
Small, however, did not mean young.
Hair gone white with age, a long cascading beard, and a face etched deep with wrinkles made plain that he had lived a great many years. The reason for his stature was simply that he belonged to the little folk — he was a dwarf.
Behind round spectacles, his eyes tracked diligently across the papers spread over the desk. The quiet room held no sound but the soft rasp of turning pages.
Then another sound overlaid that one.
Knock, knock.
Sudden though the noise was, he did not startle. He had already known someone was coming.
"Come in."
The door clicked open, and through it stepped a girl of about ten whose appearance was impossible to forget.
The smooth platinum-blonde hair and the cute face suited to her age would, on their own, have been ordinary enough. What set her apart were the odd eyes — one a blue-green, the other pure gold — the catlike beastman ears rising from her head, and the pair of horns framing her face that looked for all the world like a goat's. On top of all that, a composure far beyond her years refused to be buried under those features and stood out as a character of its own.
"Well now, if it isn't Miss Irushi, perfect scorer on the entrance exam. Have a seat."
Luke inclined his head with polite grace at the invitation and sat. His gaze swept once across the nameplate on the desk.
Zenpei Saradib, Principal.
While Luke read the plate, the dwarf rose and toddled — his height left no more dignified word for it — across to the chair opposite Luke, then dropped into it with a solid thump. The seat was a touch small; once he settled in, he filled it completely. Arms folded as best his short limbs allowed, legs crossed with some effort, the whole picture ought to have looked ridiculous. He rather enjoyed the amused stares of children who thought so.
This child, however, did not seem to find it funny at all.
Does she have no feelings, I wonder?
"Well then, Irushi. You said you had something to say. Speak."
As if at last granted the floor, Luke began, the faint smile never leaving his face.
"I express my gratitude that you have agreed to hear me out, Principal Zenpei. That braided beard of yours is kept most meticulously."
"Hahaha! Worth all that daily grooming, then!"
Zenpei broke into a hearty laugh, thoroughly pleased by the sudden compliment. No dwarf alive disliked praise for his beard.
Luke, for his part, was simply relieved it had gone as expected.
So even after all these millennia, dwarves still tend their beards every day.
Finding something that had not changed with the ages was a quiet joy. Only then did Luke let his expression ease into a genuine, soft smile.
Even with the centuries gone by, a dwarf's nature had not shifted much. Elves had left the forests, spirits had withdrawn from sight, beastmen had melted into human society, and the gods themselves had vanished — and still the dwarves managed their beards. Luke found the fact rather amusing.
Truly, how very dwarf of them.
In the past, too, the dwarves had been the most stubborn of races. In matters of craft they had always been right, and outside of craft and coin they had cared for little else. The most progressive people when it came to advancing technology, yet the most conservative in temperament — an irony, that. Perhaps it had been some god's private joke.
There were no gods left to ask now, in any case.
Seeing Luke smile at last, Zenpei nodded to himself. Good, the child is loosening up a little. He had never wanted to loom over a ten-year-old with a high-handed air.
"Fine. Greetings received. Now say what you came to say."
Luke answered without preamble.
"I wish to inquire about the graduation examination. May I sit it now?"
"Ho. The graduation exam?"
Zenpei stroked his chin and raised one eyebrow. An unexpected request, that expression said.
"Hmm. Miss Irushi, are you after an early graduation?"
Luke nodded.
Zenpei adjusted his spectacles.
"I see. I've heard you are having trouble settling into school life."
He had seen it often enough — students so gifted they struggled to fit in. Teag Academy was a prestigious institution that turned out the finest students in the country, after all. Early graduation by a few years was not uncommon. But this child was simply too young, was she not?
And besides—
"You have not even been enrolled a full month."
Luke nodded as if he had expected exactly that objection.
"Yet an education truly barren of learning only exhausts both teacher and pupil, Zenpei."
I understand the point well enough, but does she put on that way of speaking on purpose? Well — a child's quirks are a child's quirks.
"Hmm. An academy is not merely a place where one sits through lectures, you know."
"…Even so, this environment is exceedingly uncomfortable for me."
Luke offered a bitter smile and looked away from Zenpei's gaze.
To be packed in among children and treated as one of them — he had never once sought that out, even in the past. The academy he had envisioned was nothing like this mass institution that herded students through a single system. It had been far more personal, far more tailored. Circle magic, in particular, had always required few pupils and instruction fitted to each one.
And now? This was most certainly not the way Luke wanted.
An old man such as himself was meant to set the path for those who came after — not walk beside them on the same road. To have awakened in a body this young, of all things… this body was truly…
Why it had to be this body felt uncomfortably urgent today.
As Luke sat in silence with a darkened expression, Zenpei let out a long breath.
"Hmm."
The papers Zenpei had been reviewing were, in fact, the personal records Luke had submitted upon enrollment. What they revealed…
The child before him was neither beastman nor mixed-blood, but human. No parents — only a temporary guardian.
He was not a dwarf short on imagination. The situations that sprang at once to mind…
Zenpei shot Luke a sidelong look, then shook his head firmly. Better to stop imagining. Sitting across from a child and entertaining such thoughts would only sour his face.
So relationships with people are difficult for her, then.
If so, forcing school life on a child with that kind of past was no kindness either. She had said this environment was entirely new to her; of course it would be hard. And her grades were quite good — no, remarkably good. That much was fact.
"If you wish it, I will allow you to sit the graduation examination."
"Then I ask it of you."
Luke's voice even carried a note of earnestness.
But Zenpei shook his head.
"Even so, this is far too unprecedented, Luke Irushi."
He went on.
"Handing an academy diploma to a ten-year-old is something we must approach with care."
True enough — whatever lay inside, Luke's outward form and legal standing were those of a ten-year-old girl. A Teag Academy diploma did not signify academic standing alone. It also meant the student possessed the cultivation and knowledge befitting a graduate of Teag Academy.
"We do not yet know you. The world does not yet know you."
Granting early graduation to a ten-year-old child was, for Teag Academy, nothing short of a gamble. Insurance was required. The child would have to demonstrate, on her own, that she was qualified to claim that early diploma.
Zenpei stroked his beard.
"Which is why we will need a record of external awards from you."
"External awards?"
"Yes. External award credentials. With those in hand, we will review your case and permit you to sit the year-end graduation examination."
"…That sounds to me rather like telling me to attend this academy for another year."
Academy life, as it stood, was a long way from enjoyable for Luke. No learning. No thrill. Well — mealtimes were something to look forward to, a little. But to come to an academy for the meals alone was absurd. If that were the goal, one ought to go to a restaurant, not a school.
Luke even considered whether withdrawal might be better. Yerna had said there were surely ways to have one's academic standing recognized even after leaving.
But Zenpei continued in a tone meant to set him at ease.
"Our academy has no wish to lose a prodigy like you either. So I will make you a proposal."
"What sort?"
"I will grant you autonomous attendance. How does that sound?"
"Autonomous attendance…?"
Luke sat inside a cardboard box with an uncommonly pleasant expression, happily reading a fairy tale about Arinseia.
Yes. This sense of security. A feeling one could never find in a crowded place.
Hmm… Perhaps this aversion to large groups is an instinct built into this body.
Cats were solitary creatures, after all. Even at school, cat beastmen tended to keep to one or two companions and never formed large packs. Had simply following that instinct made things easier?
He felt better than usual. The soft smile he wore while reading was enough to lift Yerna's spirits just from watching him. Luke smiled at Yerna often enough in ordinary times, but if one asked whether those smiles held real feeling — well, not particularly.
"Lu, is it that nice?"
"Hmm. Merely that matters have resolved themselves well, and so my mood is light."
"I see, I see."
Marching off alone to bargain with the principal and walking away with autonomous attendance. Not very ten-year-old of him — but very Luke.
He really is something else.
This arrangement was far better for Luke's future than dropping out. And he could always go back to school whenever he felt like it. How wonderful was that?
External awards, though…
She would need to look into those herself. For now, it was mealtime, so food first.
"Luke, it's time to eat. Come get ready."
"Haha… Very well."
Luke set the book aside and rose from the box. What appeared before him with a soft thud was, once again, salad and canned goods. Not that he particularly disliked the menu — but having once tasted proper school lunches, the prospect of surviving three meals a day on salad and cans had begun to lose its appeal.
The world was full of delicious new things that could make a person happy just by eating them. Why should he have to give up even one of those pleasures? In the past he had never placed much weight on meals, but where food was concerned, Luke had already been thoroughly conquered by the modern age.
"Yerna, what would you say to my preparing my own meals from tomorrow onward?"
"Hm?"
And besides — he was growing curious about the cooking of this era.