Welcome to Polaris Academy (1)

"...What is this, exactly?"

"The Holy Sword."

The Saintess of the Solion Holy Kingdom said it with a benevolent smile. The sword in her hand blazed, bright and brilliant, as though she had plucked a star straight out of the sky.

"It is the most powerful holy relic in all our Holy Kingdom. None may wield it but the Hero chosen by our oracle."

The thirteenth Saintess, Corpe Lilac, let go of the Holy Sword and reached both hands out toward me. At a glance, she looked like a merciful god made manifest, drawing a young lamb into her arms.

"O Princess Knight of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Failon, hero of the Demon War."

And yet, for some reason I could not name—

"I have a proposal I wish to offer you."

—that same sight, to my eyes—

—was every bit the image of a demon, tempting humankind.

One month ago.

The entrance ceremony of Polaris Academy was finally barreling toward its end. With the banquet that would follow hard upon it, dishes so lavish they dazzled the eye were being laid, one after another, across the tables where the students already sat.

They were meant for the banquet. A warning had gone out beforehand that until the ceremony itself was finished, no one was to lay a hand on them. The more seasoned students held out with something like patience, but the freshmen, helpless against the temptation, sat swallowing spit and waiting for the whole affair to end.

In those bright, glittering eyes, not a scrap of pride at being students of Polaris Academy remained. All that lived there was appetite.

This year's ceremony, however, was not like those of years past. Between the address of the freshman representative—the one who had posted the highest marks on the entrance exam—and the closing rites that would normally follow at once, some strange extra procedure had been wedged in.

No point hiding it. I was the centerpiece of that procedure: one of the many heroes who had kept humanity alive through the Demon War, a war foretold as capable of driving humankind, or at the very least the kingdom and the Holy Kingdom, to the brink of annihilation. A special address had been arranged to mark the invited enrollment of Evangeline Failondia, Princess Knight of Failon.

Watching Third Imperial Prince Oscar read out the scheduled freshman greeting from the dais, a thought struck me out of nowhere.

If I walk out in front of them, I'm getting stoned to death, aren't I?

The need to do something about it, and quickly, came over me with desperate clarity. Carefully, I whispered to the old man seated beside me.

"...Um, Headmaster?"

"What is it, Princess Evangeline?"

The headmaster of Polaris Academy—said to be turning eighty this year, his luxuriant white hair impossible to miss—smiled a kindly smile. His temperament, too, was apparently free and gentle in a way that hardly suited a man of eighty. The brief speech I'd heard from him near the start of the ceremony had been enough to tell me that.

Trusting in it, I steeled myself and offered him a single request.

"...Would it be all right if I asked just one favor?"

As before, applause erupted, loud enough to leave the ears ringing. Not a single cheer was mixed into it. I'd half expected as much, if I'm honest. I supposed I ought to count it a mercy that no one threw a rock.

"...Er. I hope you're well?"

I spoke into the microphone on the dais—heavier than it looked—and a voice cracked and rasping, nothing like a princess's, rolled through the hall. A murmur moved among the students. They clearly hadn't imagined a highborn princess could sound this rough. There was a reason for it, though. Bellow in every direction through a war, and your throat doesn't get a choice about being ruined.

"Ahem."

The sound came out awkward. I let my gaze travel over the floor below the dais. The ceremony was in its last stretch, and the dishes for the entrance banquet had already been laid out, flawless, upon the tables.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"I've just come from receiving the Headmaster's permission."

I let a beat pass.

"In light of the hour, the entrance banquet will begin now."

At that, a restless stir rose here and there among the students.

"Please keep the hall orderly. You may, however, listen while you eat what has been set before you."

Thunderous applause broke loose, and with it a cheer so fierce it seemed the whole building might lift off its foundations.

That day, I became the star of the Academy.

Three days ago.

Unlike the ordinary entrants, I had been admitted by invitation, in a form all my own—Polaris Academy's very first special student. Some understanding must have passed between the royal house and the Academy, because even with the new term on the verge of beginning, my assigned faculty still had not been decided.

The Academy had said it would be enough to inform them before the entrance ceremony, so until the day before the ceremony's eve I was agonizing over which faculty I ought to complete.

Unexpectedly, I was leaning not toward the Knight Faculty or the Military Faculty, but toward Theology. The Knight and Military Faculties had the obvious merit of familiarity, and that was precisely the sort of familiarity I wanted nothing to do with. Whether I ought to call it being sick to death of it, or wanting to get as far from it as I could—I'd thought that studying religion in the Theology Faculty might settle my mind a little instead.

"Absolutely not."

Delphina shut it down, fixing me with a glare sharp as an axe.

"Princess, you're thinking of the Theology Faculty as the sort of place where you mumble a prayer and read some scripture, aren't you?"

"I'm not?"

"Of course you're not! Heavens!"

Delphina gasped, aghast, and shook her head.

"The Theology Faculty is brutal, Princess. Fucking brutal. How brutal? So. Fucking. Brutal."

"Th-that bad?"

"Princess. Do you know what the Theology Faculty covers at the most basic level?"

"Why are you trying to scare me...?"

"Denying the existence of God."

At that, I couldn't keep my mouth from falling open. In theology? In the study of God and religion, they denied that God existed?

"Is that even allowed? It's religious study. That's the whole point of it."

"It's religious study, which is exactly why—and of course it doesn't end there. You take every ground for the argument that God does not exist, tear them open one by one as if you were dissecting them, study them, and then you turn around and refute each of those ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠grounds, one at a time."

"Ah... uh-huh..."

"That is how you temper your faith all the more deeply. You reject blind belief in God, and come to hold a faith that is truly devout."

Delphina nodded as she went on.

"Negation of negation. That is the heart of theology."

I couldn't muster a word.

"There's a great deal of other heavy material besides. Logical readings of the plain surface meaning of the scriptures against the inner sense of each verse. Historical study, so you can understand the age that required those exact lines in order to carry that meaning. There's an absurd amount of work—far more than you could imagine."

"R-right. I see."

"If all you need is something to rest your heart against... then theology, of all things, is not what you should choose."

Delphina's last words landed strangely heavy, muffled, as if they'd struck somewhere dull. Even so, one thing had come through clearly enough. Theology was out.

"Then what would be good...?"

"Hard to say. I'm completing the Theology ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Faculty and the Knight Faculty at the same time, so I can't answer you about anything beyond those."

At that, I sank back into thought.

First of all, the Magic Faculty was out. Magic formulae, enchantments, combinations between spells—just calling any of it to mind made my head ache.

Right after my reincarnation, I had tried to learn magic. A light little thought: it was a fantasy world anyway, so surely I could stand to learn a spell or two at least once.

To give the conclusion first, there was no way that ridiculous stunt—kindling fire and conjuring water out of empty air—was simply going to work. Magic in this world was a discipline more complicated, more difficult, and more likely to split your skull than I had ever imagined.

Even firing a single simple Fireball took an outrageous amount of effort.

First you had to construct the spell formula, the basic preparation required merely to make the magic called Fireball succeed at all. Then you had to regulate mana output and control. Slip up there, and the fireball swelled to a monstrous size and exploded mid-cast, or else smoked, crumpled in on itself, and vanished. You also had to sort mana by attribute and construct that part separately. Botch it, and what came out was a Waterball instead of a fireball, or water-attribute mana bled in among the mana forming the fireball and the spell burst apart in a cloud of smoke. And then, to set the spell's path, you had to build an entirely separate trajectory formula on top of all the rest. Skip that step, and the fireball you had gone to such trouble to create exploded right in front of your face.

They were the sorts of details that made a head feel ready to burst just from hearing them listed. And if you asked whether each of those formulae was at least simple on its own—no. Not particularly. It was absolutely not a difficulty you could crunch out as mental arithmetic on a battlefield, with an arrow skimming right over your skull.

The mages who brushed through every one of those steps as mental math and cast spell after spell in real time were, without exception, geniuses the world had never seen the like of. And the one who had taken first place in a Department of Magic crawling with freaks of that order was Third Imperial Prince Oscar.

Thinking about it now only made it more astonishing—astonishing to the point that I couldn't understand why someone of that caliber was obsessed with me. And he used magic I couldn't even cast.

I'd already meant to rule the Magic Faculty out for the simple fact that he was there. Somehow, I could feel myself starting to hate him even more.

"Annoying."

"What's that about, all of a sudden...?"

I set Delphina's uneasy question aside and sank into thought again.

So what would be good? The Literature Faculty? No. Not for me. Memorizing books and composing poetry wasn't to my taste. There were probably geniuses of the literary sort who found some peace of mind in that kind of thing, but if I tried to imitate them, peace of mind would be the last thing I got. My head would explode. I was thinking I might write a book of my own someday, mind you. Whatever.

Or the Faculty of Politics and Diplomacy? Forget it. What business did I have shoving my head into a political fight? I wasn't going to be king anyway, and what use was politics to someone who meant to live and die a knight?

If not that, then the Faculty of Cultural Anthropology? That one might actually be all right. Though what did they even study there—the culture and history of each country, something along those lines? I couldn't say. It just didn't draw me in. Nothing about it caught.

What else was there, then. I was still groaning over the application for my intended faculty, set out in front of me even on the day before the entrance ceremony, when Delphina spoke up, offering it lightly.

"...Princess. What about a method like this?"