Night of the Full Moon (3)
Night of the Full Moon (3)
Median House was a mid-tier dormitory at Lichten Academy.
Sharon Pierce had stepped inside intending only to finish her business and leave. As a resident of Grant Hall, the academy's top dormitory, setting foot in such a modest building was hardly a comfortable experience.
"Rina Rosewell. I'll just get her confirmation and leave."
She would align their testimonies before the disciplinary committee for Ian Blackangus convened.
It was no great undertaking. A simple task. In fact, coming here in person was the strange part. She had never formally met Rina Rosewell or exchanged greetings. Their only point of contact was the occasional chat on the Kirtos anonymous network.
So why had she come seeking Rina Rosewell, someone with no real connection to her?
'There was simply no other choice.'
No readily available method existed. The problem had started a few days ago. The communication network maintained through Kirtos had gone completely silent on Rina's end. Not just no replies—she hadn't even logged in. With no other way to reach her, coming in person had become her only option.
— Hasn't Rina been in bad shape lately?
— I saw her by chance the other day. She looked incredibly gloomy. Her complexion was really dark.
— I heard she broke up with a secret boyfriend she'd been hiding.
— No way.
Rumors had been spreading that Rina Rosewell's condition had seriously deteriorated recently. She had become utterly worn down. That was a significant problem. The disciplinary committee for Ian Blackangus was just around the corner. To secure his punishment, everyone's testimony needed to align perfectly.
Ian Blackangus. To Sharon Pierce, he was nothing short of a mortal enemy. His lechery, his constant scheming, the inexplicable curse... Now, Sharon loathed her past self for having accepted his various sponsorships without knowing his true nature, and she utterly detested Ian. The disciplinary committee was a chance to systematically and decisively bring him down. Sharon Pierce's personality could not tolerate any variable disrupting this plan.
Thus, checking on Rina Rosewell—a potential variable—was a necessary task.
But.
"... What is this?"
The sight that greeted her inside the dormitory was nothing like she expected. Even for a building housing low-tier nobles and a few commoners, it was never this chaotic. The massive tremor had already passed, but the crimson light beaming from outside the windows dyed the interior blood-red, making the atmosphere more volatile than ever.
— Step. Step. Step.
The sharp, cold sound of footsteps echoed down the hallway. Amid the sporadic screams, Sharon placed her hand on the hilt of her sword.
"......." She rounded the corner and stopped short at the scene in the dormitory lounge. Students lay strewn across the floor. Sharon knelt down beside one. The rough tears in the blouse and the bite marks etched into the pale skin beneath made it clear what had happened to her.
She placed a hand on the student. She was still breathing.
But.
A significant amount of mana and life force had already been drained. Her weak breathing and faint heartbeat showed she was far from well.
A building surrounded by a crimson barrier. People drained of their blood. It was obvious who was responsible.
"... The Blood Rock Sect."
These were the traces left by newly converted followers of the sect.
Sharon bit her lower lip hard.
Sharon Pierce. The eldest daughter of a famous swordsmanship family, one that rivaled the best. She seemed to have grown up in an environment of wealth and happiness, but her past had been anything but. It wasn't just because of her father, who constantly pushed her to her limits.
The root of all her misfortune was her mother's death. The Blood Rock Sect was the enemy that had taken her mother.
— Grind.
A chilling aura rose from Sharon as she gritted her teeth. Her composure shattered, her mana spiraling out of control.
But there was no need to hold it back. At the end of the hallway, a Blood Rock student had just spotted her.
— Shiiing.
Sharon drew her sword. The thin, elegant blade gleamed crimson in the moonlight.
"Ehehehe! You look delicious!"
The Blood Rock student charged, sensing Sharon's mana. Its speed and presence were enough to challenge even seasoned experts. Its blood-stained fingertips shot toward Sharon's throat like lightning.
— Slice.
A sharp cutting sound rang out.
"... Huh?"
— Thud.
The Blood Rock student belatedly stared at its severed hand. The cross-section was coated in white frost. Its eyes turned pitch black. The prelude to Blackening.
"Grrrrr! A mere student dares to think they can defeat me, blessed by the Blood Demon...!"
But the student never finished its sentence.
— Slice.
A vertical line traced itself down the center of its body. The cultist simply froze in place.
— Splurt!
Unable to withstand the pressure, blood erupted from the parting seam.
Sharon stepped past that elegant arc, moving on.
◆
'... Good grief.'
Watching Sharon butcher the Blood Rock student from a distance, I shook my head.
Sharon's martial prowess was on a completely different level from the other heroines. A life dedicated solely to the sword—to the pursuit of raw power. Whether she was rotting on the inside or not, that monstrous ability was all that mattered.
'She must be around 4.5-stars by now.' Considering Fanta X Aca's official growth limit was 5 stars, and the average student was stuck at 3 stars while an Aether-class average hovered around 4 stars, her strength was truly overwhelming.
The silver lining was that, in this situation, I could use Sharon Pierce. Having witnessed the cultists, she would definitely move to eliminate them. It meant I didn't have to struggle against Blood Rock followers buffed by ability absorption and Blackening. The first clear condition—"Eliminate the Blood Rock followers occupying the 1st and 2nd floors"—would resolve itself.
So I'd quietly slipped out into the central garden. The square-shaped structure of Median House had an open garden at its center. Bathed in the distorted crimson light of the full moon through the barrier, it was an eerily desolate place. Was it thanks to that atmosphere? No other student had thought to escape here. I was alone.
"Lucky me."
Special materials that only appeared under a full moon existed here—a garden full of various plants and flowers. Even if the red moon made it hard to tell them apart, after rummaging through with the aid of mana detection, I found a flower blooming alone in the moonlight.
'Tears of Selene.' The name of an item classified as a type of moonflower that only blossoms under a full moon. There was a character who could only be awakened with this. 'I'd been agonizing over how to get my hands on it... Lucky me.' In the game, this was a special event you had to control the heroine to find. For Ian, hated by all of them, it was a pipe dream. In a way, I was almost glad the scenario was unfolding right here in Median House. I managed to snag plenty of other useful botanical items besides the Tears of Selene.
"This should be enough."
I closed my stuffed pockets with satisfaction. The loot from this area was sufficiently secured. Nothing in Fanta X Aca ever came for free.
It was time to shift my focus back to the main scenario.
"Is the first floor mostly cleared out by now?" If the Blood Rock students had been draining blood for over an hour, it definitely would've been tough. But since Sharon moved immediately, the cleanup shouldn't have been too difficult.
What worried me more was this. "Why did Sharon even come here?" Coming to a dormitory meant she was here to meet someone. But Sharon's personality was cold and sharp. The type you'd take one look at and think, "Throwing your weight around just because you're pretty?" This meant she'd come to see Rina Rosewell...
"Wait. No."
A chill ran down my spine.
Until now, I'd been planning to intervene in the final boss phase at the right moment. If I just cleared the scenario neatly, everything would be solved. But what if it wasn't that simple? 'Another problem I have to solve...' Finding the culprit. I needed to expose whoever pushed Pongpongi. In such a situation, what if Sharon Pierce and Rina Rosewell ended up in a vicious fight, and one of them died?
I'd assumed the heroines wouldn't kill each other. But let's think from the non-virgin heroine's perspective. Just as she'd tried to benefit from Pongpongi's death, the culprit might see another heroine's death as a gain too. 'Dead men tell no tales, after all.' In a situation where we couldn't properly interrogate anyone... If one heroine died, even if she was the culprit, I'd only find out after interrogating the remaining three. And if she wasn't the culprit, and the real culprit simply pinned all the crimes on the dead...?
"... The difficulty would spike like crazy." I knew I had to extract a confession using every possible method before any heroine died. But the premise that they wouldn't kill each other... that premise had been wrong.
I looked up at the dormitory. The third floor, where the final boss—Rina Rosewell—was located. As she walked toward it, Sharon's eyes were glowing with a cold, chilling light.