Joyful, the Savior Has Come (3)
"Are you all right, Professor…?"
When Lina asked worriedly, I smiled and shook my head.
"Yeah, I'm fine. It was just a dream. Don't worry about it, everyone."
I'd just seen the invitation to the Tatanok Village event, so of course I'd go and have a dream like that. Once the scalp massage was finished, my hair actually looked pretty decent.
"Oh my goodness!!"
Lina clasped her hands together and made a tremendous fuss at the sight of me.
"You should have cut it like this ages ago! It looks so, so, so, so, so good! Right, Anna?"
"Ah, yes…."
Anna stole a glance at me, then hurriedly dropped her gaze and mumbled.
It wasn't wartime anymore, and there was a salon right next door — I ought to come more often. The salon owner was over the moon at those words.
"I'll take personal charge of the Chief Professor myself. You will come back, won't you?"
"Yes, yes. Thank you."
When we stepped outside, students who'd come to the shopping district for after-hours free time shrieked and swarmed toward us.
"It's the Chief Professor!"
"Professor Dian!"
The kids' momentum was so overwhelming that Anna and Lina were swept away in the tide and vanished off in the other direction.
"Your hair looks amazing!"
"You're so handsome!"
"When are you going to put me down for private lessons!?"
"Secret Imperial Prince!!"
Teenagers in their prime — they were deafeningly loud. And Secret Imperial Prince, of all things. So there were still kids who believed that ridiculous rumor.
I gave them some halfhearted replies as I headed toward the faculty district, when something caught my eye. It was Kirlin, hiding around a corner of the shopping district, peeking at me. If I had to guess, she'd come to invite me to dinner tonight, then lost her chance when the kids swarmed in.
I waved, and Kirlin vanished in an instant.
"Hmm, I wonder…."
After being forcibly separated from Dian, Professor Lina walked along, lost in thought.
"Hmmmmm, what was that…."
"What's the matter, Professor…?"
Anna, walking beside her, asked in her gloomy way, and Lina stopped and whipped around to face her.
"You heard the Chief Professor talking in his sleep just now, right?"
"Well…. I didn't catch it clearly…. He shouted so suddenly…."
"I distinctly heard 'Linus' and 'horn-head.' Hmm…. What was that about…."
"Is that really such a big deal…? I don't really get it…."
As Lina kept turning it over, Anna mumbled hesitantly.
"It was just sleep-talking…. There's no one who doesn't know Sir Linus… and the Professor is a war veteran… He probably just dreamed he was fighting alongside Sir Linus…."
"Is that all it was…. Hmmmmmmm…."
But Lina couldn't dismiss it as easily as Anna. She had always believed that what Professor Dian had done in the past wasn't particularly important now. The sudden cry from Professor Dian as he dozed off during the scalp massage, however, had been far too vivid.
"Where are you two coming from? Oh? Anna, you got a haircut?"
Just then Professor Pelemiya greeted them from the other direction, and Lina ran over to her.
"Professor! You used psychological warfare on the Chief Professor last time, didn't you?"
"What? Uh… no…?"
Pelemiya adjusted her glasses and averted her gaze.
"You did, didn't you? That's why you ended up on your knees throwing up, right?"
"That was just… because I drank too much?"
"Excuse me? Professor! Don't tell me you think I wouldn't have noticed you using psychological warfare?"
At a loss for words, Pelemiya hurriedly gathered her cloak and stepped back.
"Fine. I did attempt psychological warfare. I failed. So what?"
"That's not the point. Earlier at the salon, the Chief Professor was talking strangely in his sleep."
After Lina recounted what had happened at the salon, Pelemiya shook her head as if she had no idea.
"I wouldn't know. It was just sleep-talking. Why are you reading so much into it?"
"Is that so…. But if you'd heard it yourself, Professor Pelemiya, I'm sure you'd have been suspicious too."
"Suspicious of what…. Anyway, rest well, both of you."
"Goodbye."
Pelemiya strode quickly away from Lina and Anna, heading for the dormitory.
Ever since she had seen Dian reunite with his fellow veterans at Ivronik Castle, Pelemiya had resolved never to reveal his true identity to anyone. To expose the truth against Dian's will would be tantamount to an insult against a hero who had made a noble sacrifice. And so she had stonewalled Lina's questions completely….
Unlike her seemingly cheerful exterior, Professor Lina possessed remarkably sharp intuition and keen judgment. She had even noticed that Pelemiya had used psychological warfare on Dian at the tavern that day, and from a single line of sleep-talk she had driven right up to the edge of the truth in an instant. But that did not mean Pelemiya could step forward to defend Dian, either.
Still, she was not worried. Professor Dian was one of the heroes who had saved the continent alongside Sir Linus. He was not someone Professor Lina could handle out of mere curiosity.
"Is this how you originally looked?"
Olicia said, looking at me in a suit, her expression proud.
"It would be so wonderful if you dressed like this every day."
Right now I was wearing a suit Olicia had bought from a ready-made clothing shop in town, along with a pair of gleaming dress shoes. Today was the day of the Tatanok Village Reconstruction Day event.
"Ohhh, yes, yes. A Combat Chief Professor of the Imperial Special Duty Academy ought to look at least this distinguished, after all."
Olicia patted my shoulders and beamed with satisfaction.
"I'll be off, then."
I left the faculty district and walked toward the main gate. Linus had promised to send a carriage there.
"Hi, Anna."
"Huh…? Who are you…?"
Anna, who was heading to the stables with her arms full of something, stared at me with a vacant expression.
"It's me. Me."
"Ch-Chief Professor…?"
"What are you doing this weekend? Going to see the kids?"
"Uh, yes…. But your clothes today… uh…."
After stammering something unintelligible, Anna hurriedly fled in the other direction.
I kept walking toward the main gate, where a crowd of students had gathered up ahead — kids heading out for weekend leave.
"Huh?! It's Professor Dian!!"
I tried to slip around them, but someone spotted me and screamed.
"Where, where?!"
At that cry, the students came pouring over like a flock of sheep.
"Professor Dian!! You look so cool!"
"Where are you going!!"
"Mm. Off to marry a dragon."
It wasn't even a particularly funny joke, but the kids burst into shrieks and giggles all the same. There was, however, one child wearing an expression of utter horror.
"W-what do you mean…. Marry a dragon…!?"
None other than the pink-haired white dragon, Hindrastar. Did that one even study properly, or did she just go out and play every day?
"If it's a dragon… there's only me…."
Hindrastar was trembling, muttering insane things to herself.
"No, no…. I am NEVER mating with the likes of you!!!!!!"
The shriek was almost a Dragon Roar, and the students jumped and turned to look at Hindrastar.
"Last time you beat the crap out of me, and now you're thinking of raping me?! No! I'd rather die! Just kill me!!"
"Sophie, why are you acting like that all by yourself…?!"
The lower-ranked students who practically worshipped Hindrastar as a god grew worried, and Hindrastar burst into tears and started running.
"Waaaaaah! Somebody save me!!"
"Where are you going! Aren't you going out!?"
The lower-ranked students chased after Hindrastar as she fled toward the dormitory.
Ugh, that crazy dragon. Tsk tsk.
"Looking sharp."
As I watched Hindrastar vanish at lightning speed, Nightly appeared, shoving students aside.
"You heading out too?"
"Yes. Where are you going, though?"
"I told you. Off to marry a dragon."
"Ha. I see. If you're heading into town, shall we go together? We're going the same way."
"I'll get there on my own."
"I already called a carriage. Come on, let's just go together."
Nightly pointed with her chin at a carriage standing at the main gate. Hold on a second. That carriage…
"You lot take a different one."
Nightly, who had been opening the carriage door, turned to her followers with the coldest look in the world.
"This carriage is for me and the Chief Professor."
"Uh, okay…."
Once her followers backed off, Nightly snorted and climbed into the carriage first. Then, halfway into her seat, she froze in an awkward crouch.
"Huh…?"
"Looks like you got the wrong carriage."
"Uh…."
Nightly's eyes nearly popped out of her head as she stared at Linus sitting across from her. Oh boy. This was the carriage Linus had arrived in.
"Uh, um… so…."
Nightly, who was always so icy and sarcastic, was scratching her head like an idiot, astonishingly enough.
"So… Sir Linus…?"
"Move it, kid. This isn't your carriage."
I prodded her from behind, and Nightly fidgeted her way back down the steps in reverse.
"You seem extraordinarily popular at the Academy, Dian."
Linus closed the door as I boarded, laughing quietly.
"A student hopping into a carriage with the Chief Professor without a second thought."
"That's just because that one has no manners whatsoever. That's Nightly Toulouse, the girl I mentioned last time."
"Ah, right. The young lady of House Toulouse. She's bold — she'll be someone important someday."
"Hard to say. I'll give her this, though — she's exceptionally capable. An ordinary student would've given up after following even half of what I put her through."
"Blood will tell, I suppose. Anyway."
Linus looked me up and down.
"You've dressed up quite splendidly."
"Olicia threw a fit. Said it would be rude otherwise."
"Good. The villagers will appreciate it."
Would they, though? I wasn't so sure. But was Nightly going to be all right? Of course she would. Go ahead and blab that Sir Linus showed up at the Academy gate in a carriage and picked up Professor Dian. Who was going to believe that?
"Nightly. Nightly!"
"Yes…?"
At Professor Lina's call, Nightly blinked as if waking from a dream.
"What are you doing standing here in a daze?"
Lina had been heading into town on an errand when she found Nightly standing by the roadside like an idiot. Nightly looked at Professor Lina for a moment, then finally managed to open her mouth.
"Professor…. Sir Linus…."
"Hm?"
"I met Sir Linus…. Just now…."
"What are you talking about? Sir Linus?"
"He was in that carriage over there…."
Nightly pointed at the carriage receding down the boulevard.
"Professor Dian got in with him, and they left together…."
"The Chief Professor…?"
In that instant, Lina recalled the sleep-talk Professor Dian had done at the salon yesterday.
"P-Professor? Where are you going? Wait?! That's the carriage I called!?"
"Follow that carriage!"
Lina jumped into a carriage that had just pulled up at the gate and gave chase to the one disappearing into the distance.