The Benefactor (3)

A Special Talent Student? What was that supposed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to mean?

I stared at the Principal in blank bewilderment, but she only smiled — a small, knowing curve of the mouth — and idly turned the teacup before her between her fingers.

"Sit."

"...Don't you think that explanation leaves rather a lot out?"

I knew nothing. Nothing at all. And yet she was calling me a Special Talent Student. If I walked into the Academy like this... The Inhwa Family won't leave me alone. They would try to erase me all over again.

"Won't the Inhwa Family try to kill me a second time?"

To them, I was something worse than an enemy. I was the one who had appeared at the very height of the clan's glory and destroyed its two greatest pillars of strength. I had even heard it said that other families, jealous of the Inhwa Family's success, had laid a curse upon them simply to keep them in check. A mass of curses. Living filth. That had been my life until now. That had been my name.

I looked at the Principal in confusion, but she only gazed back as if what she saw pleased her, and those two red eyes caught the light. Eyes like living flame, set against skin of a white so cold it was nearly lethal — the contrast only made her presence stranger still.

"...There exists, at the Academy, a system known as the Special Talent Student."

The Exorcist Military Academy would take anyone with talent, status be damned. Most supernatural abilities were hereditary, and so the heirs of the world's powerful families were required by law to enroll. They still had to sit a simple entrance examination — and yet a child of a clan was admitted by obligation even with the lowest possible score, solely because of the supernatural power bound to their soul.

Those who were not of a clan were another matter. Ordinary people who happened to awaken a supernatural ability were granted admission only if they passed the exam. From that moment, they were acknowledged as the seeds of exorcists.

"A Special Talent Student is one whom the Principal has judged need not sit that examination. Admitted to the Academy with no test at all."

Not once in the Academy's history had a Special Talent Student ever appeared. The system had existed since the school was first raised, and yet not a single human being had ever received its benefit. Because of that, the system itself had never become known. Only the Principal, and those closest to her, had known it existed.

Then wasn't this even more dangerous? Commoners gnashed their teeth and staked their very lives for the chance to become exorcists, hurling themselves at the Academy, because the rewards were that great — standing, salary, connections. The children of the clans threw themselves at it with the seat of the next family head and the family name itself on the line, clawing for the highest marks, drawing the eyes of the exorcist world, aiming to become its next leaders.

In the eyes of people who had fought through that brutal competition to get in, what would a Special Talent Student look like — someone taken on talent alone?

"...A thorn in their side, wouldn't I?"

"......"

"I... don't have the kind of talent you're imagining."

Whatever gift this person had in mind, it did not dwell in me. The dregs of my parents' talent. That was the measure of my place. I blackened the family name just by breathing, and a curse settled over the house the moment I opened my mouth. I knew it wasn't true. But do you know what happens when everyone around you says it anyway, and tries to kill you for it? You come to believe the lie is the truth. Yes. That is the truth. How foolish I was, to have been even a little glad to have my life back.

I clenched both fists until they ached. And then—

"Why, even now, are you still shut inside that family?"

As she spoke, the Principal set fire to the Admission Certificate.

...!!!

"Don't worry. I'm not revoking your admission."

She grinned, nodded, and went on.

"I understand very well what it is you fear."

"......"

"The first Special Talent Student in history. Eyes will gather, certainly. And it hardly looks as though this old monster will be able to look after you properly, does it?"

"...I—I didn't go that far."

It was true that I couldn't wholly trust her, even after she had saved my life.

"You needn't trust me."

"......"

"As you yourself said, I'll scarcely involve myself in your life at the school."

The more she fussed over me and looked after me, she thought, the easier a target I would become — precisely because I was a Special Talent Student. I agreed. And yet...

"The Inhwa Family will not leave you be."

They wouldn't. They would find some way to kill me. A disgrace like me could not be allowed to show itself before the other families. My own feelings were a hopeless tangle, but the Principal only grinned and let out a long, slow breath.

"Do you imagine I made you a woman for no reason?"

It was true enough that someone who had died, appearing again as a woman, was not a story easily believed. But as the Admission Certificate itself had it written, not even my name had changed.

"When I enroll, I'll still be enrolling under my own name, won't I?"

A name so seldom spoken properly that I half suspected even the family had forgotten it. I asked with my nerves drawn tight, but the Principal only tilted her head, the most untroubled face in the world.

"I haven't the slightest idea what you mean."

"...Pardon?"

Still smiling, she held the Admission Certificate out toward me. My eyes followed it of their own accord, and there, where my gaze came to rest—

Only that. A single name, and nothing more.

"If it were up to me, I would give you my own surname... but that wouldn't quite do, either."

Her expression turned grave.

"Once your identity comes to light, I won't be able to interfere as I should. I've lived in hiding for a very long time now... and the Academy may move only when one of its enrolled cadets is involved."

That was her position. Between the person I had become — an entirely new identity — and the Inhwa Family, she could not step in.

"For now, however, before you enroll, you ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠aren't yet a cadet. Which means I may assist you from the side as much as I please."

...!!!

"At the very least, I'll see to it that you can protect yourself. This body, if nothing else."

She was saying she would take me as her disciple. I stared at her, startled, and she laughed as if to ask what on earth was so surprising, then stroked my hair.

"......"

Heat climbed through my chest and spilled over. The warmth passing through my hair — truly, truly, after so long — was more than enough to call the tears up. I, who almost never cried, came apart.

"...Thank you. Thank you."

I could only say that I was grateful, endlessly grateful, and I sobbed in the Principal's arms. No — in my master's.

At that moment, when Ryeong cast off her family name and became free, a girl was walking the city on a dark night after the rain had stopped, making for the alley where something ugly had happened that afternoon. There was no smell of blood. The rainwater seemed to have already carried it off. The girl — Inhwa Rang — kept walking forward, and with every step the memories she thought she had thrown away, and feelings very like them, swirled up around her.

"...No. No, that's not it."

This wasn't because of affection. She only wanted to confirm, for certain, the thing she herself had done. Yes. She had lied to Grandfather because she was afraid of being scolded. In the end, someone who found Ryeong later than she did must have taken care of it. She knew that in her position a mistake would not be tolerated — perhaps that was why they had covered for her like this. Even thinking so, she did ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠not stop walking.

The reason hardly mattered. She simply wanted to confirm it. That her work had been certain. That the fifteen years of filth clinging to the family had been washed away. She walked the dark alley this time with no weapon at all, and with every step one incident repeated in her mind with perfect clarity. Black eyes begging to be spared. Hair soaked by the rain and plastered to a face. The end of a human being who, for fifteen years, had been given nothing but pain played over and over inside her head.

She could not forget the sensation of it — the moment her sword pierced his heart, and the heart's convulsions traveled up the thin blade into her hand. She had learned, thoroughly, what it meant to kill a person. She had witnessed with her own two eyes how horrific it was: the light in those eyes flickering, going out, as the breath failed. For some reason, Rang's heart was pounding like mad.

"Hhk—!"

In the end, she broke into a run. Rain pooled on the ground splashed out in every direction with each stride, and the wet slap of it spread through the quiet alley. She didn't understand why she was running so urgently. And so, when she finally reached the end of the alley—

"...It's gone."

For some reason, there ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was no corpse. There wasn't even a bloodstain. This was not blood that rainwater could simply have rinsed away. Nor was there any trace that a supernatural ability had been used.

With a wet thud, Rang dropped to her knees where she stood. She didn't know why, but the strength had left her body. She would probably never understand the feeling of that moment, not until the day she died. She had thought she'd formed no attachment at all. But the girl had known — from a certain moment on.

That in front of the person called Ryeong, and only there, she had been able to be an ordinary girl. Just an ordinary girl, playing happily with someone her own age.

Only now did Rang realize it — that she had been able to worry, truly worry, for that person everyone called filth.

At last, she shed tears of regret.