What Is a Pushover?

"Hey."

After Yeon had gone, Camilla jerked her chin toward one of the followers who stood at her side like a shadow.

Her voice was as devoid of feeling as ever.

"What does 'pushover' mean?"

The sudden question left not only the girl she'd called on but every other follower nearby momentarily flustered. They traded nervous glances, none of them daring to answer their lady at once, and Camilla's brow tightened ever so slightly.

Before she could ask again, the sharpest-looking of the girls carefully opened her mouth.

"Pushover, my lady? Th-that is… well, it's slang for someone who's easy to take advantage of."

"Be more specific."

At Camilla's icy tone, another follower rushed to add,

"Yes! It also refers to someone who's so excessively kind they can't refuse other people's requests… or who keeps making irrational sacrifices for others at the expense of their own interests."

"That's right! And… people with abnormally low self-esteem who get pushed around easily, too."

Terrified of displeasing her, the followers took turns desperately explaining the definition of a pushover.

Excessively kind. Unable to refuse. Irrational self-sacrifice. Low self-esteem…

"Hmm…"

Camilla folded her arms and sank into thought for a moment.

The traits of a "pushover" her followers had just described were a concept she knew perfectly well. No—she knew it far too well. Those were precisely the type of people House Medici preferred most, and found easiest to use.

Which made it all the more impossible to accept.

Five colossal pillars moved the continent of Tera: the Five Great Ducal Houses.

Among them, House Medici was known for a peculiar standing and an even stranger structure. Their power did not spring from vast territories or overwhelming military might.

The true foundation of Medici authority—and their very identity—was information.

It lay in a rare ability that surfaced only sparingly across the ages: the Librarian.

The Librarian ability went beyond merely reading the records of the Akashic Records. It granted its bearer a special kind of eye. The form differed with each Awakened, but all of them shared one power: the ability to pierce a single piece of hidden information that never appeared on an ordinary status window.

In Camilla's case, the eye she had awakened was the Mind's Eye.

It revealed the disposition seated in the deepest place of a person's heart—the one the System itself assessed. In other words, it let her glimpse that person's Disposition stat.

To Camilla, who possessed such an ability, the world was something like an open book. Of course, she could not read every page in exhaustive detail. She was still only a Level 4 Librarian, so she could not freely view another person's entire status window without conditions…

But even that single fragment of information—the Disposition stat—had already won her a great deal.

In a noble society as treacherous and labyrinthine as any political arena, grasping an opponent's most essential desire or weakness meant absolute advantage.

When she had once discerned that a notoriously exacting central bureaucrat's disposition was Lust for Honor, Camilla had quietly used her family's influence to arrange an opportunity for him to claim a highly visible public achievement. In exchange, House Medici had effortlessly secured the exclusive trade-route rights that had long been a cherished ambition of the house—and that bureaucrat had become one of Camilla's long-term pieces.

On another occasion, when she had read Inferiority Complex in the promising heir of a high noble who had become a thorn in her family's side, she had amplified his insecurity through cunning praise and carefully chosen comparisons until he walked himself down the path to ruin.

But this formidable ability came with a clear limitation.

Camilla's Mind's Eye, still not fully bloomed, could be used only once a month—and then only under the strictest constraints. A single use meant waiting until the following month for another chance, so the target had to be chosen with ruthless calculation.

When Camilla decided to spend that precious monthly use on Yeon Bennet—the figure who had lately set the entire Academy buzzing—she had hesitated more than a little.

Was a girl abandoned and ruined by her own house really worth an ability she would have to wait a full month to use again?

But Camilla had already resolved to thoroughly subjugate Yeon and put her to use. Investigating the person you intended to exploit was essential if you didn't want a knife in the back. On top of that, the family had issued an order to secure Yeon's person. So, after that final hesitation, Camilla had used the ability on her.

Tera's worst villainess. The deranged young lady who had supposedly dabbled in Contamination and driven everyone around her to ruin.

The disposition that occupied the largest share of that girl's inner self would surely be something like Cruelty, or Malice.

That was only natural.

Camilla had focused the Mind's Eye.

Spending the single opportunity she would not regain for another month, she had tried to pierce through to the girl's essence.

What appeared before her eyes, however, was a word so absurd it obliterated every one of her certainties, every ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scrap of her experience—and even that precious use of her ability.

"…What?"

For an instant Camilla doubted her own eyes. Convinced she must have misread it, she focused again—but the result was identical.

Two characters floating in stark, dark-crimson letters.

Pushover.

Was that even possible?

Yeon Bennet?

A woman infamous for every kind of outrage and villainy… was nothing more than a pushover?

Had she wasted an ability she could use only once a month on a result this ridiculous?

Her mind was in chaos.

And after watching Yeon refuse to yield an inch under her own threats and harassment—after watching the girl turn around and cheerfully propose every manner of horrific torture instead—the result became even harder to believe.

The gulf between the Yeon Bennet she knew and the answer the Mind's Eye displayed was simply too vast.

And yet…

Perhaps…

Perhaps the result was not entirely beyond belief.

Camilla recalled how, for the briefest moment before Yeon Bennet's bizarre provocation, she had felt fear despite herself. The unpleasantness and fluster of that instant. It was the side of herself she despised most of all.

"Status Window."

At Camilla's quiet command, a translucent information panel rose before her.

Camilla stared coldly at the final entry on her own status window—the word Fragile.

Her innate nature had always been soft and weak. She startled easily at the smallest threat… and in the past she had shrunk before anyone stronger than herself.

Camilla loathed that version of herself with a bone-deep hatred. So she had put on a mask.

The cold, composed, calculating young lady.

The figure who cut through high society with razor insight, built her own faction, and showed her enemies no mercy whatsoever.

That was the Camilla people knew—and the "Camilla Medici" she herself had desperately performed.

Perhaps Yeon Bennet was the same.

Perhaps beneath that mask of villainess—or of raving madwoman—she was hiding an artless, easily wounded nature called pushover.

The thought brought with it a faint, strange sense of kinship toward the existence known as Yeon Bennet.

But the feeling curdled at once into self-loathing.

To feel kinship with a creature like that.

Even the fact that she had flinched, however briefly, before the girl's bluff made her feel pathetic.

Camilla ordered her thoughts.

If Yeon's true nature was "pushover," then she had to crush her without the slightest mercy. If only so that she would never again be shaken by the girl's acting.

Whatever mask Yeon wore, Camilla would tear even that mask to shreds and force the true nature underneath into the open.

Easing the harassment or trying to coax her would be nothing more than an admission of her own weakness.

She would keep going until Yeon could no longer hide that "pushover" nature—until she screamed and collapsed.

Yes. Perhaps even those horrific things Yeon herself had asked for.

Flaying the skin. Holding her underwater. Cutting off her fingers.

If her true nature really was "pushover," how would she react in the face of that kind of pain? The mere thought was fascinating.

Fine. Let's take this all the way to the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠end.

The corner of Camilla's mouth curved into a cruel arc. There was no longer any confusion or hesitation in the smile.

Besides, the monsters had been quiet lately, hadn't they? The front lines were in a lull, and word had even come that the Calamity-class monster Envia had been annihilated.

Even if one of the Five Great Ducal Houses weakened a little, it would not immediately plunge all of Tera into crisis. If anything, having a more capable, better-prepared house fill that vacancy would be ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the right thing for Tera as a whole.

And that seat, of course, would simply belong to House Medici.

Camilla smiled, cold and thin.

Spending a precious once-a-month ability still stung—but perhaps she had reaped a larger harvest than she had expected.

So she's a pushover, is she. All the better, then.

She pictured Yeon Bennet's face once ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠more.

That face no longer looked like an unpredictable threat. It looked like a useful piece already resting in the palm of her hand.