Chapter 18
Chapter 18
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 18
Chapter Title: Rift
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“What… is that?”
I wanted to get up and check outside the window, but I couldn’t move rashly because Shirley had already fallen asleep with her head on my lap.
I tried to get as close to the window as possible but stopped, concluding that I had no choice but to wait for a doctor or nurse to come.
‘She must not have slept properly for a week.’
Shirley was usually carefree, but she wasn’t someone who didn’t know manners.
For her to pass out like this without a care for appearances meant she hadn’t left my side while I was in a coma.
‘Tsk tsk. How did she end up tangled with me?’
Perhaps because she was lying face down, I could hear her snoring softly, like dripping water.
I decided not to wake Shirley, who was already asleep, despite the uncomfortable position.
I was dying to know how the window, boarded up with planks, had ended up like that, but there was no way to find out right now.
Instead, I looked around the hospital room.
‘Vase…? Doesn’t seem like Judith’s taste.’
The first thing that caught my eye on the table to the left of my head was a porcelain vase with a single carefully chosen white lily.
Judging by the note written below it, Theodore had sent the vase and flower.
Around the vase, in a basket, were several fruits polished to a shine, and from the well-cleaned fruit knife and the pattern on the plate, it was clearly something Shirley had brought.
And to the right were my holster and gun, along with ten bullets officially permitted by the Chancellor, all neatly arranged in their storage case.
This excessively cold preparation was undoubtedly Judith’s doing.
At some point, whenever Judith deemed there was a problem with my safety or hers, she prepared weapons like this or braced for attacks.
‘Even during that hunting festival, where did she get those knives from?’
I thought she had come empty-handed, but she had brought not only her own knives but also ones for me, which surprised me.
Finally, in front of the case holding the gun was a small book lavishly decorated with gold and silver leaf, which appeared to be an adventure novel about an ordinary village boy defeating a dragon.
‘By process of elimination, the remaining one is Arthur Usher.’
Just as I was thinking he had a surprisingly lively taste, the doctor Shirley had called before falling asleep arrived.
The doctor simply had me slowly open and close my eyes, asked for my name, age, and the name of Shirley sleeping beside me, then let out a small sigh.
“There will be scars on your face for a while. But there’s no helping it. It’s best to let the body heal the wounds as much as possible first, then use healing magic afterward for better recovery.”
Healing magic…
“I suppose there’s no choice. But I heard I was hit by a stone—is that true?”
“Yes, well… You should have a consultation about it. I can’t treat mental trauma.”
“Understood. If possible, could I check the wound?”
“Of course.”
I had no memory right after being hit by the stone, but I clearly remembered what I saw before collapsing.
The shattered glass fragments, and amid them, a fleeting glimpse of a black silhouette.
‘The problem is that seeing a silhouette doesn’t make sense.’
My room was on the third floor, so if I claimed to have seen a silhouette outside the window, it inevitably brought to mind that lame ghost story from my lower years, whispering under the covers.
The one about making eye contact with someone passing by the window, only to realize your room wasn’t on the first floor.
While lost in thought, the doctor unwound the bandages and brought a mirror.
“Hmm.”
“The wound looks severe but isn’t deep. All the embedded glass shards have been removed, so rest easy.”
“Yes.”
No wonder they had wrapped the bandages so thickly—the injured area was wider than I thought.
The long gash crossing my eyebrow and eye all the way to nearly my ear looked just like a child scribbling over a photo with a pen.
“You were lucky. The cornea is completely unharmed.”
With cracks all over my face, an intact cornea was practically a blessing.
I nodded.
Even if healing magic mended the wound, the trauma of a corneal injury wouldn’t fade easily.
“How long do I have to stay like this?”
“About a week. After that, a priest will treat you, so don’t worry. Um, but this person…”
“Ah, just leave her. She must be tired from nursing me.”
The doctor seemed concerned about Shirley, still sprawled on the bed.
I waved my hand to dissuade him.
The doctor, unable to erase his perplexed expression, glanced between Shirley and me, seemingly debating whether to insist or let it go.
“It’ll disturb your rest.”
“It’s fine. Is the examination over?”
“No major issues. Call me immediately if you feel dizzy or nauseous.”
“Yes.”
The doctor replaced the old bandages with new ones, packed his medical bag, and quietly left the room.
Given that the academy gathered vigorous young people of all ages, there was a resident doctor on staff like this.
“Get up now.”
I slightly lifted my knee, shaking Shirley, who had been pretending to sleep while face down.
On the blanket where she had lifted her face, two clear circular wet spots remained.
“Uwaaaah~ Senior~! From today, just sleep with me. I’ll protect you~!”
“Please come to your senses.”
It was a problematic statement.
I wanted no more scandals.
With the doctor gone and nothing to hold her back, Shirley wailed loudly for another ten minutes or so.
I had known she woke up ages ago, but I hadn’t expected her to sob until the blanket was soaked.
“I can’t believe there’s a lunatic in the academy throwing stones at people…”
“Yeah, it’s crazy.”
But even if Shirley, Judith, or Arthur had been there, my accident would have been unavoidable.
I was certain it would have happened at another time, in another way—not with a stone, but something else.
Judging by the dream I had while unconscious, this violent incident likely involved intervention not from a person, but something else.
“Ah, anyway, let me ask one thing. What the hell happened to that?”
I changed the subject, partly because if I left her alone, she’d cry until she was dehydrated.
Shirley looked where my finger pointed—at the window boarded up with planks—and let out a small “Ah.”
“The day you collapsed, quite a few people discovered the scene. It was the middle of the night, and someone threw a stone through the window, so of course. That’s how your incident spread quickly.”
“Everyone must have been shocked. I’ll have to go apologize later.”
“You? Why apologize? Anyway… So Makina came to handle the scene, and you were brought here for treatment right away. Then we three, whose names were listed as your guarantors, got contacted.”
Talk about a bolt from the blue—poor Theodore, getting news in the dead of night that a senior he barely knew had been hit in the head with a stone.
“And then?”
“Judith senior and I arrived first, then Theodore and Arthur. But the weird thing is…”
“Weird?”
“I didn’t know rumors spread this fast here. By morning, the whole academy was talking about you.”
Putting Shirley’s story together:
The rumor that I had been hit by a stone and fallen into a coma spread rapidly, starting from the Wooden Cross Class and reaching the adjacent Thorn Crown Class, eventually covering the entire academy.
“The strange part starts there. A ton of people skipped lectures that day.”
“…Why?”
“They haven’t even caught the killer of Kyle Ace, and then on the day of the student trial, you get hit like that. Everyone took it seriously.”
“I get it if it’s people close to me, but how does it spread like that?”
Shirley just shrugged at my question.
But it was odd.
Maybe because the academy was geographically isolated, the cadets’ herd mentality was intense.
Once it boiled over, they immersed themselves fanatically, but it also fizzled out in an instant.
“After some skipped the first lecture, they must’ve thought it was okay, because by afternoon classes, less than half showed up.”
“So they one by one holed up?”
“Yes. Every class except Black Lily Class did it. The weirdos in Thorn Crown House seemed half-joking, though.”
The Black Lily Class studied theology, and it was also the student council’s base.
So they probably couldn’t afford to join the commotion recklessly.
“This happened on the first day, and from the next day, we heard hammering. It was so noisy I went out and saw a pale-faced cadet hammering on a first-floor dormitory window. That’s how it started.”
“And the result of that hammering…”
“Is that. The boards over the windows. The cadets wouldn’t come out of their rooms, so the academy declared temporary suspension of classes.”
In the end, the hysterical reaction, once started, spread uncontrollably, leading to every window being boarded up.
‘Those planks were issued for boarding windows during typhoons…’
I had no idea how to react to this chain of events.
“Not expecting much, but the culprit? Caught?”
“No. No traces at all. And apparently Arthur Usher was there too? If even he couldn’t sense their presence, well, they weren’t human.”
“Arthur Usher’s testimony fueled the confirmation bias.”
“Yeah. Every room with a bed is like this now. Is this a spider’s web or a place humans live in?”
According to Shirley, the string of unsolved incidents against cadets had turned the Aegis Academy cadets into spider-like humans, a tragedy.
Anyway, it was clear that during the week I was out, the cadets’ stress response had reached its peak.
“What about Chancellor Makina? What did she say?”
“Just, you know. Act normal. Judith senior chased her down and pressed, but she didn’t bat an eye. Instead, some new rules until the situation calms.”
“What rules?”
“Basically, move in pairs or trios. No going out after curfew, which is student council patrol time.”
Even if it was to prevent more victims, it felt excessive.
It was like mutual surveillance for every action outside sleep.
“The situation was bound to overheat, but the atmosphere shifting so suddenly is disorienting. You have no idea how tense it is outside now.”
“I can imagine. So how are you here alone?”
“……”
Shirley shut her mouth at an awkward timing to my question.
“…How are you here alone?”
“…Specialty cadets with physical combat majors or skills deemed ‘dangerous’ have this ‘protection measure’—which is basically surveillance—assigned to them.”
“You’re under surveillance right now?”
It hadn’t bothered me until now, but the moment I heard that, it felt like sparks were flying before my eyes.