The Alchemist's Gaze
On my way to the classroom for the next period, a sharp gaze stabbed into my back.
I turned my head on instinct.
Among the crowd of students, one girl was quietly watching me.
Violet eyes. White hair. A leather book bag hung from her hand, and the neck of a small bottle peeked from inside her coat.
Elise Lapellacia.
The Lapellacia Ducal House. A renowned lineage of alchemists. The wealthiest family in Tera, operators of the continent's largest trading company.
And yet, for all that staggering pedigree… her social skills were a little…
No. Extremely lacking.
So why was she staring at me like that?
Her gaze was startlingly tenacious — as if she were trying to figure something out.
The moment our eyes met, she flinched and hurriedly looked away.
But wait… was this what I thought it was?
You've got to be kidding me. Why is she still like that?!
We were in the same Class A, and yet her catastrophically low presence meant I was only just now noticing. That was on me. The second I returned to the Academy, I should have checked on her first.
When Tales of Eteraxia first launched, Elise Lapellacia was so cold and closed-off that most players never even tried to approach her. She was a character who sharply divided opinion.
And then… the nightmare of the early game.
She had slipped through Dorothy's surveillance net, triggered a Contamination outbreak, and plunged the entire Academy into danger. Dozens of students were critically injured. Consumed by Contamination and twisted into a monstrous form, she appeared as the early-game final boss and left a searing impression.
Underequipped and underleveled, players had to fight her — burning through nearly every item and potion they'd scraped together just to barely scrape out a win.
Naturally, the gaming community tore into her as a traitor.
But as the story progressed, the truth came out. Behind every one of those incidents was a conspiracy by the Cultists of Contamination.
Elise had been cursed and mind-controlled by them. And the truth the Akashic Records revealed about her was devastating.
Even as her consciousness fractured, she had clung to herself until the very end — thrashing and struggling to protect the Academy's students. Even through terror and agony, she had refused to let the curse fully claim her.
And because of that — because she had weakened herself from within — players were able to defeat an early boss that should have been completely impossible for students to take down.
Once they learned the truth, players wept. They fell for her completely. Communities everywhere erupted with demands for a route that would let her live. In the end, they won. After the survival route was patched in, Elise officially joined the roster as a playable character.
The problem was how the game treated her afterward. Plenty of people spoke up in her defense, so her punishment ended up light — but the mere association with Contamination meant the other students quietly ostracized her. And all of that only twisted her already fragile social skills even further out of shape.
As one of the players who had cried over her truth, I couldn't just stand by and watch her suffer. I used the Evil God's authority to strip away the curse that had been controlling her. And while I was at it — partly to gather Faith of Malice — I took the resulting chaos and hatred onto myself.
That was what I had done.
So where the hell did she pick up another curse this time?!
Elise Lapellacia. The curse on her body was Contamination-based, same as before — but it felt different. Those bastards, the Cultists of Contamination, had to be behind it again.
I pictured the shadow hanging over her back, my thoughts a tangled mess, and kept walking toward the next class.
Close Combat.
In the first year, there were no fixed majors — every subject was taught broad and shallow, so students could find the path that suited them. In my case, I was going to have to solve everything with my body eventually, so Close Combat was a critically important class.
When I arrived at the classroom, the students were already buzzing.
"Wasn't Close Combat supposed to be Professor Brandon?"
"No way. She's coming in as a professor?"
The moment I checked the faculty list, I understood why.
Professor: Bella Staren
Bella — the same senior who had been clinging to me and crying just a little while ago — was listed as the instructor.
I hadn't really registered it while she was holding me, but thinking about it now, my face felt a little warm.
A graduate of the Hero's personal knight order, the White Silver Fang. A genius who had reached the upper edge of Level 6 at only twenty-five. Her every move made the news often enough that she was practically a celebrity.
Okay, fine. She's… pretty cool.
It wasn't just that her looks were my type. When she'd saved me from those monsters, I'd honestly come close to falling for her.
The kids who'd been harassing me earlier clearly didn't want to get on the famous Bella's bad side — they ignored me completely and waited quietly for class to start.
A moment later, the bell rang and the classroom door opened. A familiar silhouette stepped inside.
"Wooooaaah—!"
The second she took her place at the lectern, the students erupted into applause as if they'd rehearsed it. A legendary Academy graduate. A hero who'd been active on the front lines. And she was gorgeous on top of it all — her popularity among the students was practically stratospheric.
Bella surveyed the class with no particular change in expression, as stolid as ever in the face of the applause. Then she spoke in a low, even voice.
"I am Bella Staren. I will be in charge of Close Combat for this semester."
She drew a short breath and added,
"It's good to meet you."
It was a stiff, businesslike greeting, but the students still couldn't contain their excitement, murmuring among themselves.
Bella waited for the noise to settle, then spoke again. This time it was a simple announcement.
"One more thing. Regarding the professor who was teaching you the History of Tera this morning—"
Huh?
No way.
"—due to personal circumstances, they will no longer be able to continue teaching this semester. A replacement will be arranged shortly. Take note."
"…!"
My eyes went wide before I could stop them.
Personal circumstances? Just like that?
Don't tell me… because of me?
My thoughts tangled. It wouldn't have been Bella… so it had to be Master, right?
Ugh… maybe I shouldn't have done something so pointless.
Behind the pleasure I'd felt when that professor hit me, a bitter guilt came flooding in. I didn't feel great about it. It felt like my little "hobby" had caused trouble for someone else.
I should talk to Master about this later, separately.
After the brief announcement, Bella began the lesson. The first class was theory-heavy — dull, but useful enough in its own way.
Then Bella closed the board and said,
"For a change of pace, I'll take questions. Anything related to real combat is fine."
She closed her book and finished with a neat, composed posture. Her speech was still rigid, but her eyes were soft. The tension in the room gradually eased.
Hands went up all over the classroom.
"When fighting monsters, what do you do if the front line gets broken through?"
"Once the line collapses, the priority is reorganization. Rather than running far, secure a flank or a blind spot and establish a temporary defensive line first. Most of the damage from a broken front comes not from the monsters' charge, but from the chaos within your own ranks. Maintaining composure is the key."
The students nodded and scribbled notes furiously. Another hand shot up almost immediately.
"What was your most dangerous real combat situation? Like, when you genuinely almost died!"
"There was a moment I thought… This is it. I'm going to die here."
Bella glanced in my direction and smiled faintly.
"The only reason I survived was… pure luck, really. That's what a battlefield is. A place where anyone dying wouldn't be strange — where that kind of thing repeats itself like daily routine. So train diligently."
The mood dipped a little, but the questions kept coming. True to Class A, they were fairly sophisticated for first-years.
Not all of them, of course — but these were students who had enrolled here intending to fight to protect people. It was only natural that someone like me would be shunned among them.
Bella answered every question diligently. Her delivery was still mechanical and stiff, but underneath it was raw, practical combat experience that would actually help them.
She's kind, after all.
I folded my arms without thinking and nodded along.
Then a male student raised his hand.
"Professor… what's the most powerful martial art, then? If you had to pick just one."
A small stir ran through the classroom.
Hmm… okay, I'm a little curious about that myself.
There was almost no disagreement about who the strongest mage was — but martial arts were a different story.
Bella paused, then looked over the students again.
"A fairly meaningless question."
Eyes widened.
"Among the Six Heavens, three wield martial arts."
"The Dreamer. The Martial God. And the War God."
Those names. Even in the game, they were only ever mentioned indirectly — legends whose existence was barely confirmed. Back in the old game communities, people used to spend entire days arguing over which of them was strongest based on scraps of information that barely existed…
The Dreamer — the one I suspected had brought me here. The Martial God — disciple of the first Martial God, who originally created martial arts. And the War God — about whom almost nothing was known, save the legend that the founder of House Bennet had reached Level 9 by creating a sword style that mimicked her movements.
Bella continued.
"Do you think learning their martial arts would make you strong?"
Then she added,
"What matters more than what you use is who uses it. So stop wasting time on pointless thoughts and focus on raising your level."
Black hair. A skirt that fell all the way to the floor. Long socks that covered her calves.
A silhouette both familiar and strange.
Elise found her gaze locking onto it before she even realized.
It was her.
To Elise, that girl's presence stood out with almost painful clarity.
And in that instant — Yeon turned her head and looked this way.
Their eyes met.
Elise's heart plummeted.
Did she notice?
Panicked, she whipped her head away. Her fingertips trembled.
She still didn't know. What was true and what was false. Like a terrible nightmare, everything was vivid and tangled all at once.
"Yeon Bennet got locked up in prison. On charges of spreading Contamination."
But the one who had tried to spread Contamination through the Academy that day… had been her. Herself. Under someone else's control.