What They Call an Academy
The diving eagle began to spin its body at high speed. With those blade-sharp talons thrust forward, the whirling form looked exactly like the blades of a blender—anything that so much as brushed against it would be torn open in an instant.
As if timed to perfection, flocks of swallows charged in from every direction, and in the blink of an eye the enemy was completely surrounded.
“...!”
Echidna did not panic. She moved with calm precision.
In that fleeting moment she calculated the optimal way to break the encirclement, and her mana began to heat. A faint crimson aura erupted from her body and flowed into the arm that gripped her mace. Without hesitation she slammed the weapon straight into the ground.
KWA-AAAANG!!
Shattered floating stones ricocheted and scattered in every direction. Dust billowed up, and Echidna’s figure vanished in an instant. The monsters, startled yet still aggressive, aimed their attacks at the last place they had seen her.
Whoosh!
But Echidna was already gone. Their strikes carved empty air. Instinctively they beat their wings to climb, scattering the dust that had blinded them.
And as if she had been waiting for exactly that, pink mana bloomed from within the swirling cloud.
The mace in her hand now blazed with mana so dense that the once-pale crimson light had deepened into a vivid scarlet.
“...Kieek!?”
The eagle spotted her and tried to climb higher, but in that brief span she had not only dodged their assault—she had already gathered power and set her counterattack. Evading it was impossible.
KWA-DEUDEUGEUK!
It had no choice but to meet the blow head-on. Its beak crumpled and shattered against the flat of the descending mace. That was the last thing the eagle-type monster ever saw.
Puh-geok!
No technique, no finesse—just overwhelming force crushing down. The eagle’s body literally exploded. Blood sprayed like rain, yet Echidna never slowed. She welcomed the falling droplets and charged straight at the swallow monsters that had targeted her.
“Kieeek..!”
Covered in gore yet still smiling, she lunged. The swallows panicked and scattered in every direction, their earlier disciplined formation nowhere to be found.
Thud
From the fights so far Echidna already understood she lacked the speed to chase the tiny birds. She stamped the ground hard, launching the chunks of floating stone she herself had shattered into the air.
She was exploiting the stones’ property of rising when touched by mana. Aiming at the hovering rocks, she swung her mace like a baseball bat.
KAAANG!
Puck!!
The flying boulder punched clean through one swallow and kept going, smashing the wing of the owl-type monster that had been preparing a spell behind it.
The moment that single swallow died, the rest vanished like a mirage. Their main body—the one sustaining the clones—was gone.
Kwajik!
She finished by crushing the owl’s skull as it plummeted to the ground. The battle was over.
“...”
She savored the afterglow for a moment, then shook herself like a wet animal, flinging blood from her body. When she brushed a wound she frowned, quietly clasped her hands, and began to pray.
Apparently bored of simply waiting, Lee Se-rin had whispered something into Echidna’s ear during the fight, and ever since then the girl had been acting this way. When I asked what she had said, Se-rin brushed it off with “girl talk.”
Not much of an answer, but I had planned to raise her as a priestess or cleric anyway. With looks like hers the whole scene looked like a painting, so I left her to it.
Every little action like that heavily influenced her evolution options, after all.
Maybe she had already sensed what I wanted and was working toward it in her own way.
As if answering my expectations, I fed her mana. Watching the wounds knit closed at once, I crushed the skull of the thrashing creature under my foot.
Eujik!
<Echidna>'s level has increased.
<Echidna>'s level has increased.
<Echidna>'s skill Lesser Devil has leveled up.
Intelligence stat has increased by 1.
<Kallion>'s level has increased.
<Growl>'s level has increased.
Consecutive victories over higher-tier enemies had pushed the levels up in one go. Looking after Echidna and still touching the monsters must have counted as contribution too.
With that, Echidna’s level hit 7.
Her leveling speed was faster than expected, yet her skill proficiency lagged far behind. Growth itself was rapid, but the balance was clearly off.
Level mattered, of course, but skills needed to grow and raise stats for the real potential to show. Their side was finished, so it was time I wrapped mine up as well.
“Kak, kuaaararak...”
I turned my gaze behind me. There it was—the creature tangled helplessly in the shadow net I had woven with Trap Installation.
It resembled a prehistoric pterosaur. Where wing membranes should have been, only tattered bone frames remained. Its neck hung half-broken and dangling, yet it was still alive.
I compressed the shadows as if wringing it dry. The massive body instantly became a cocoon, but residual resistance pushed back. It was squeezing out the last of its strength.
I ignored it and poured in more mana.
Kwak!!
I clenched the mana-linked hand tight. The shadow cocoon squeezed, and blood spurted out in a thick gush. When the characteristic micro-movements of a living thing vanished, I released the shadows.
Named [Cloud Dragon of the Firmament] has been slain.
Dark clouds begin to gather in the clear sky.
All that remained was a cloud mass already dissolving like mist and a mana stone larger and more luminous than the ordinary ones.
Summoner's class level has increased.
Through repeated mastery, skill Escort has been acquired.
Skill Torture has leveled up.
Dexterity stat has increased by 1.
Skill Blunt Weapon has leveled up.
Strength stat has increased by 1.
Skill Throwing has leveled up.
Dexterity stat has increased by 1.
Being a C-rank dungeon’s named monster, the experience was delicious. Hunting it while essentially guarding Echidna had even granted me a new skill that gave bonuses when protecting someone.
I opened the status window at once and allocated the points from the level-ups. Kallion and I put ours into Intelligence, Growl into Strength. For Echidna I raised Strength to 10 and dumped the rest into Luck.
With her current skill set she couldn’t generate Strength on her own, so investing there was correct.
The Luck investment was pure gut feeling. Normally Intelligence would be better, but every time Self-Faith leveled up her Luck rose as well. That suggested some connection between priest/cleric paths and Luck, so I went with it.
“Huu.”
Finished, I lifted my head and looked ahead. Hidden among the floating stones, at an angle that made it almost invisible at a glance, stood a stone gate.
The monsters I had just killed had appeared the moment we approached that gate. The last one I finished had been something like the leader of the pack.
The named marker had popped up, so I guessed it was a gimmick-type named that always spawned. When slain it left only a mana stone instead of a corpse, so it was probably a regenerating system that respawned to block anyone who got too close.
True to the name Cloud Dragon, it had wrapped itself in clouds and used bizarre attacks—rain, hail, lightning bolts.
Not that it mattered. Growl and I, with me riding on his back, had cleaned it up without Kallion even needing to step in.
Growl had drawn on the experience from the Gladiator's Arena, where he had run across floating stones, and this time he danced across the aerial floating stones with acrobatic flair, quickly seizing the rear of the Cloud Dragon that swam through the sky.
Thanks to that I never even needed to ride Kallion.
I turned to Lee Se-rin, pointed a thumb toward the stone gate, and spoke.
“Looks like a progress point.”
“It’s the crest of the ancient Pargea Empire. Most of it’s broken and worn, so I can’t make out the words, but it’s clear this was built to store something.”
As if answering me, Se-rin started dumping information. I nodded, quickly scanned the characters, recorded them with Record, and added the annotation “ancient Pargea Empire.”
This sort of thing would only give me a headache later if I didn’t investigate properly. Storage or not, nothing truly important would be here. High archaeological value, maybe, but little else.
If something crucial had been inside, even with this hellish environment the place wouldn’t have stayed so obscure, right?
Anywhere people would have turned half into a research institute just to study it already had its value fully mined out.
“Kallion and Growl, wait outside. We’re going in.”
I had to step inside at least to get a rough idea of what was there.
“...!!”
“Yeees~”
Echidna nodded with infinite positivity, while Se-rin stretched the end of her words like an elementary schooler and answered loudly. My brow furrowed on its own.
I paid attention to Echidna because she was my summon and a tool I would use from now on. That was only natural. It was no different from starting with raw materials and forging a weapon. Se-rin was sulking over that and deliberately lowering her mental age.
Did she really want to act like that?
Watching an old woman who had long since finished growing act spoiled like this made a sigh escape me. Ignore her. That was the answer.
The inside is cleaner than I expected.
The outer gate was completely dilapidated, so I had assumed the interior would be similar or at least thick with dust. Yet somewhere air still circulated; it wasn’t as filthy as a house abandoned for years.
The same characters from outside lined the walls, but Se-rin showed no interest in checking them. She strolled around at a leisurely museum-goer’s pace, making me wonder for a moment whether this was even a dungeon.
Not that it was completely empty of enemies. Bat-shaped monsters clung to the walls like gum, camouflaged, then lunged at us. I snatched one out of the air and half-broke its neck with my bare hand.
“Here.”
Just in case, I roughly bound it with shadows and tossed it backward. Echidna was already swinging her mace to finish it off, as if she had been waiting.
Even for C-rank trash mobs, the reason we could handle them more easily than goblins was purely the maxed-out effect of Subjugator from continuous combat.
It raised not only my stats but those of everyone bound to me. Even Echidna, the weakest among us, now sat at 400 total stats. Pure strength alone would let her solo any named monster in this place with room to spare.
The farther we went, the more the light faded. I had packed food into the shadows but no lantern, so I reinforced my eyesight with mana.
Normally that technique was for seeing farther, but used this way it could also adapt the eyes to darkness. A temporary measure, yet with stats like mine, brute-forcing it with mana was enough to keep moving forward.
Still, spotting enemies remained difficult, so I sent Hive ahead with orders to scout and assassinate.
Whether it was a trait of Guild Raven or common to avian magical beasts, Hive moved freely in the dark while I could barely see a few steps ahead.
This was why competent subordinates were worth having.
Not the best solution, but a solid second-best. Ideal would be a night-vision or dark-sight skill. When I had time I needed to train my eyes for darkness as well.
I’d leave it as a shared homework assignment with the Resistance Faction.
“...That’s the end.”
After a stretch of clearing enemies, light appeared. Not artificial—sunlight filtering thinly through gaps in the broken floating stones.
Nothing important waited where the light fell either.
A vast hall reminiscent of some egg chamber, faint traces that someone had once lived there, and then, where a throne should have stood, a single weathered tombstone gleaming softly in the light.
Combined with the dust motes sparkling in the sunbeams, the scene was surprisingly beautiful.
Whoever built this space clearly possessed both aesthetic sense and architectural skill. Creating such a landscape naturally was nearly impossible.
The angle of the sunlight, the composition and placement of objects—all calculated with the passage of ages in mind.
In other words, this was no mere storage vault. It was a place for the one who slept beneath that tombstone. A tomb and a graveyard—an artistic mausoleum built for a single person.
You have discovered the ancient hidden form and its true intent.
Progress: 20%
The system confirmed it with approval.
One discovery jumping progress by 20 meant there were probably four more like it. Maybe more, but considering this was only a C-rank dungeon, the odds were low.
“It’s pretty.”
“It’s still just a tomb.”
“Even so. If I could meet my end in a place like this, it wouldn’t be so bad.”
She spoke with rare calm. I opened my mouth to say something, then simply closed it again.
Live long enough and sudden existential dread hits; you want to wallow in every scrap of self-pity and spout nonsense you don’t even mean.
At times like that the best thing is to leave them alone. Half-baked advice or concern only makes it more irritating and hollow.
“...You’re not going to comfort me?”
“My emotions are too precious to waste on cheap pity.”
“Hmph. You know acting that expensive makes you unpopular with girls, right? Personally I’m glad the bugs don’t swarm, but it’d be nice if you were a little gentler with me~ or something?”
“Shut up.”
See? Back to normal operations as if nothing had happened. People don’t change that easily. Even with a catalyst, dramatic transformation is rare.
Especially for someone who has lived that way for so long. So she could keep living however she liked with the survival techniques she had built for herself.
“Let’s go.”
I needed to get Echidna to level 10 quickly. Play with her just enough to be satisfied, then head back. I didn’t particularly want to leave, but the freshman welcome party was on Sunday, so I wanted to return before evening at least.
We retraced our steps. Outside, Growl, who had been lying on the ground, rose to greet us.
Beside him, monsters half-dead—limbs broken, flesh torn, missing pieces—were piled inside the magic circle of Force, experience stockpiled for Echidna to claim.
Quite a few had gathered in that short time.
“Ah..?”
“Huh?”
The problem was that it wasn’t only monsters. Unconscious people lay collapsed among them. Seeing that, my voice and Se-rin’s overlapped perfectly—though the emotions inside were polar opposites.
“What the hell is this now...”
Somehow I already felt like I had been dragged into something annoying. Instinctive revulsion twisted my brow, and Growl and Kallion started watching my expression carefully.
Hive had long since hidden in the shadows. Se-rin’s eyes sparkled beside me, eager to watch something fun. I should have known my luck was too good after being dragged around by this woman. Of course it would twist like this. Fuck.
“...?”
Only Echidna, still unfamiliar with my temper, tilted her head yet seemed to read my mood; she looked anxious and unsure what to do.
Yeah, none of this is your fault. I ordered her to deliver the finishing blows to the captured monsters first.
“...”
She nodded and accepted the order, but her eyes kept flicking between me and the monsters, full of ambiguity and incomplete understanding.
She probably understood the reason with her head but couldn’t accept it with her heart.
Every fight she had experienced so far had been fierce. Being spoon-fed like this was a first, so it felt awkward.
Compare it to the difference between battle and slaughter. This was a good chance to make her understand that difference clearly. Only then could she properly separate public and private.
I didn’t mind her smiling, blood boiling and flesh trembling with the thrill of a real fight.
But trampling things that existed far below her was not joy—it was “work” that had to be endured with annoyance and discomfort.
If she started laughing while casually smashing skulls with her mace at any time, she wouldn’t be a battle maniac; she’d just be a legendary murderer and complete psychopath.
I transmitted those thoughts without filter. The Intelligence I had raised earlier must have shone, because the now-wise girl nodded, wiped every trace of playfulness from her face, and began swinging her mace with a plain, cold expression.
Puck! Puck!
Work that simply filled a quota without reward or satisfaction was something she clearly didn’t want. With each swing the power drained from her mace, and the light in Echidna’s eyes died a little more. That was fine.
Anyone who claims work is fun and invigorating is usually either insane or hiding something far worse. Same mental state as the guy who sings cheerful songs about loving Mondays until he goes crazy.
Funny when you see it on a screen, but if you met that type in a real company you’d march straight to the boss’s office and quit on the spot.
Puck!!
<Echidna>'s level has increased.
<Echidna>'s skill Lesser Devil has leveled up.
<Echidna>'s skill Self-Faith has leveled up.
Intelligence and Luck stats have each increased by 1.
Thinking it was the last one, Echidna crushed the final skull a little harder, then approached me with an exhausted yet refreshed expression. She neatly clasped both hands and gazed up at me as if offering a fervent prayer.
“...?”
Those pitiful yet sparkling eyes somehow reminded me of a certain Puss in Boots.
...Yeah. If you work, there should be a reward. Talking a hundred times is useless until you experience it yourself. Some things you only learn on site.
With that philosophy of mine, this was an unavoidable choice. I patted her head in praise and passed her mana.
“...!!”
Watching her brighten so visibly and her complexion improve made my chest prickle for some reason. What? Looking down, I found Lee Se-rin physically stabbing my chest with a fingernail.
“Do you know the word ‘guilty conscience’? You didn’t seem to feel it, so I decided to make you feel it for me.”
How is it? The moment she said that, her eyes curved prettily and she licked her lips. The atmosphere flipped in an instant, and her sticky hand movements made me feel contaminated just by contact. I slapped the hand away with a shadow.
Tak!
“...Get off.”
“Kyaang~ Date violence~♡”
She fled with that ridiculous act. I glared after her and sighed.
This kind of thing would only happen once or twice. Once the academy started in earnest I planned to throw her into fights whether she liked it or not, so guilt or whatever was unnecessary.
I hadn’t aimed for it, but now that I had a humanoid summon it was only natural to put her to use accordingly. There’s a reason the phrase “right person for the right job” exists.
“The problem is these guys...”
How do I deal with them? I looked down at the unconscious people with cold eyes and started turning the gears in my head.