Chapter 75
Chapter 75
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 75
Chapter Title: The Storm Comes (2)
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-Rattle, rattle!
The sky darkened in an instant, and as if it had been waiting, the storm began to rage.
The boards blocking the windows rattled as if they might fall off at any moment. Each time they did, Cookie buried his head anxiously between his legs and whimpered.
“Cookie. Don’t stay there—come here.”
“Whine…”
The weather was cold, and Cookie always holed up in the bathroom.
It felt wrong to forcibly drag out the reluctant dog, so I paced in front of the door until Theodore, who had slept in late, poked his head out.
“Oh, hold on a sec. Don’t worry about it—I’ll take him out.”
“…It’s fine…”
Theodore wedged the sprawled-out Cookie between his legs and slowly lowered his body as if mounting him.
Only when they were nearly lying down together did Theodore stop, hug the dejected Cookie, and whisper a few words as if talking in his sleep.
‘Good thing he doesn’t seem to hate it.’
I’d been worried that these two from another class—who weren’t originally part of the plan—might feel inconvenienced by the unplanned dog, but fortunately, their reactions weren’t bad.
A short while later, Theodore emerged from the bathroom with a much brighter expression.
As a bonus, he’d coaxed out Cookie, who had been shut in there doing nothing.
“Arthur. Doesn’t Cookie look just like Ginger?”
“Yeah.”
No wonder he seemed so used to handling dogs—they’d raised one before, just like me. Ginger must have been its name.
-Kaboom!
Meanwhile, a massive thunderclap echoed from outside, and Cookie, whom he’d barely lured out of the bathroom, scampered right back in.
In the end, I forcibly dragged Cookie out and shut the bathroom door.
“Ah. The thunder’s bad this year.”
Only after I made him a little hideaway where he could catch his breath did Cookie stop holing up in the bathroom.
We spent the morning sitting by the stove, warming ourselves, reading books, or sharpening weapons.
Every now and then, embers popped from the stove, leaving soot on the edge of the blanket or pant hems, but it was minor damage not worth giving up this cozy spot.
-Ding-dong, ding-dong.
Right on cue, the bell rang to signal mealtime.
During storms too fierce for Aegis Academy to control, they rang the bell like this to announce meals if supplies allowed.
“It’s blowing pretty hard, but not enough to skip eating. What do you think?”
“I’m tired, so I’ll just eat what’s here.”
“Alright? Theodore, what about you?”
“I’ll go.”
So Arthur and I grabbed an umbrella and robes before heading to the cafeteria.
“It’s dark.”
“Feels like night.”
Theodore said that as he pulled a long, glass-shaped lamp from inside his robe.
It looked like an ordinary candle lamp at a glance, but it was actually a magic tool powered by a magic stone.
“—Light.”
In the old days, carrying a lamp through rain like this would’ve been nearly impossible.
The fierce wind would shake it and snuff out the candle in no time, and even if you managed to protect the flame, the light wasn’t bright enough to satisfy.
Just last month, we’d had to navigate the academy plunged into darkness without so much as a light, but now that magic tools were permitted, it was different.
“Amazing.”
“What is?”
“Even if the magic ban’s lifted, I can’t use magic anyway. And magic tools that run on mana? I can’t use those either. You guys actually seem like wizards now.”
“We were wizards to begin with…”
-Shwaaa…
Our conversation broke off sporadically amid the pounding rain.
The storm’s swirling winds and rain rendered our umbrellas useless.
“That’s Arma Cruise ahead…”
“Is the rumor about her being Aegis’s enforcer true?”
Even amid all that, several cadets who recognized me whispered from afar.
‘Please, just change my nickname already…’
I wasn’t the one claiming to be Aegis’s enforcer, but my face burned anyway.
I ignored the ones trying to act familiar as much as possible and headed to the cafeteria.
.
.
.
Mealtime was, as always, a grueling ordeal of silently enduring the embarrassment.
—Aegis’s enforcer…
—She did penance because she’s Aegis’s apostle…
The fanaticism that had once stormed right up to our dorm had died down somewhat, but a group still idolized me.
‘Ugh.’
To drown out the awkward murmurs around me, I resorted to small talk.
Theodore didn’t initiate conversation while eating, but he dutifully followed my topics, and by the end of the meal, the timing was right to ask what I’d really wanted to know.
“Theo. Remember what happened two days ago?”
“Two days ago? Oh. The day I suddenly collapsed and woke up.”
I declined the servant’s offer of more water and asked them to clear the empty plates from the table.
Theodore finished eating too, aligning his fork and knife in a row to signal he was done.
It didn’t take long for the two servants watching us from afar to swiftly clear the dishes and lay a fresh tablecloth, leaving us to talk freely.
Once it was quiet all around, Theodore spoke again.
“I don’t remember much from that day. I’ve barely slept these past few days—must’ve dozed off standing up. Next thing I knew, I was in my room.”
“…Right.”
Theodore paused at my response before continuing.
“I know I went to the Wooden Cross House.”
“How?”
“Dillon the squad leader left a note.”
I’d thought maybe he’d deduced it from sand or plant bits on his shoe sole like last time, but the answer was simpler than that.
Theodore sat perfectly still, eyes meekly downcast just like when we first met.
Why had that caught my eye back then?
It wasn’t just because he wore an eyepatch, unlike the dream version.
Both then and now, Theodore sat quietly amid the silence, looking lost and confused, as if he’d wandered into a maze.
“There’s something from that day I wanted to ask about, but if you don’t remember, nothing to be done.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing big. You said you remembered nothing and wandered around a bit.”
“As expected, I caused trouble again.”
Theodore’s tone was calm, but he didn’t seem pleased.
I figured the fatigue building up in him lately was largely due to that sleepwalking.
“Does my sleepwalking have something to do with the truth Arma Cruise wants to know?”
“It might. Or it might not.”
Theodore slightly raised his downcast eyes.
His gaze wasn’t on my face but lower, on the magic circle he must have inscribed.
I hadn’t told Theodore he needed to destroy it.
On the day of the literature club’s summoning ritual, the Theodore who came to me had said this magic circle was unnecessary and needed to be erased…
‘What truth mustn’t Theodore remember? I have to know it.’
Shirley had said all this started over because Theodore lost his memories.
Theodore had carved a “Remember no matter what” magic circle into my chest, but when we met again later, he’d asked me to tell her to destroy it.
‘Meaning Theodore unintentionally broke his promise with Shirley when he lost his memories…’
If so, everything hinged on Theodore’s memories.
If I had to clash with the guardian angel somehow, and the key to that fight lay in Theodore’s lost memories, then I desperately wanted to know them.
“In that case, should I try forcing the memories up?”
It was the wrong thing to say.
Having the current Theodore realize he wasn’t just the “guardian angel” but something more fundamental—the “existence of Yvon”—was dangerous.
The moment Theodore learned the guardian angel’s true nature was Yvon’s existence, it could gain far greater power than now.
Right now, I was the only one aware of it, but if two or more people fully grasped that the guardian angel was really “Yvon’s existence”…
I didn’t even want to imagine what would become of our future.
“Nah, no need. It’d just embarrass you if you remembered.”
“Embarrass me how?”
“Feels like you accidentally read my diary from a moody dawn writing session.”
“Oh dear.”
Nothing I said was a lie.
It was just that the diary’s contents were shocking.
Through the events happening to me and my diary entries, I’d already become aware of Yvon’s existence—and to it, that seemed like a hugely important event.
‘If I hadn’t become aware of it, could all this be undone?’
As my thoughts reached that point, another occurred to me.
What if I disappeared?
If the guardian angel had appeared because of my awareness, and I—the only one who knew—vanished?
‘Huh. Wouldn’t that actually make things easier than expected?’
A world where everyone’s death was predestined by some evil, primal existence.
In that world, I was the one strengthening—or weakening—awareness of that “evil, primal existence.”
If I took it down with me in mutual destruction, wouldn’t that be—
“Arma Cruise.”
My mind had spiraled through intense thoughts to an extreme conclusion.
Debating whether to go through with mutual destruction or not—it was Theodore who stopped me.
“Time to head back.”
Few cadets remained in the cafeteria.
The storm had made it dark since morning, but now the windows outside were pitch black beyond comparison.
“—Ah. The storm…”
“If we go now, we won’t be able to leave the dorm for a while. We should grab some food for Arthur.”
Saying that, Theodore abruptly stood and, uncharacteristically flustered, tugged my arm.
Urged by him, I finally got up.
Aegis Academy, now fully in the typhoon’s grip, felt swallowed by darkness.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
We left the cafeteria.
By the time we headed to the dorms, clutching a bundle of bread handed to us by a quick-witted servant who’d overheard Theodore, about an hour had passed.
-Whoooosh…
-Rumble!
‘Cookie must be freaking out. Hope Arthur’s calming him down.’
Thunder and lightning alternated strikes.
I hurried after Theodore, who held the lamp.
But suddenly, Theodore stopped.
In the rain, the moment our footsteps cut off, the downpour swallowed all other sounds.
“Theodore?”
“That—was that Arma Cruise’s doing?”
“Huh? What?”
I looked where Theodore’s lamp pointed.
It was the central entrance to the dorms—the largest, tallest wooden door.
And once I saw it, I couldn’t help but be stunned.
Black ribbons haphazardly blocked the entrance, draped with feathers, nails, silver cutlery, and other odd props of unknown purpose, as if to bar our way.