So I've Come to the Academy

I'd come to the academy.

"Do you know Mr. Hex?"

"Gah! What the—?!"

Ding.

They must have been buried awfully deep in their chatter. They hadn't noticed me at all. Their level is honestly terrible.

"Hey. You look like a kid. Don't go eavesdropping on grown-ups, and bring something that'll pass for a permit."

The man standing behind him said it bluntly, and my mood soured.

Excuse me, you were the ones chatting. Ugh. Still, what can you do. Generous as I am, I'll just endure it. By keeping my manners even in a moment like this, I prove that I am the far superior human being.

"It's not that. I was able to find my way here thanks to Mr. Hex."

"Hex...? That can't be."

The paper fluttered as I held up the academy admission certificate I'd been carrying, and I added,

"He helped me so I could come to Nertia Academy. So, if it's all right, I was hoping you might pass along my thanks."

"...!!"

The guards who heard that froze where they stood, then immediately started whispering among themselves.

Okay, enough already.

"What are we supposed to do about this?"

"What even is the situation..."

"Do we let her in for now?"

"Yeah. We'll think about it after."

I said enough. I was starting to get angry. There was a limit to courtesy.

"Um..."

A voice leaked out that sounded as if it were barely swallowing its anger, and one of the guards whipped around in a hurry.

"Right. You. What's your name?"

"It's Cecina."

"Is that so. All right, I'll see that your regards get passed along. We've checked the admission certificate, so go on in."

"Thank you."

I had come within a single step of my anger exploding when the situation was finally settled. In the end they'd said they would pass on my thanks, and I was being let inside, so it was fine. From now on, don't gossip while you're working.

I was thinking exactly that as I walked through, when whispering rose again from inside the checkpoint.

...Unbelievable.

Now that I'd finally arrived, Nertia Academy was absurdly vast. A grand plaza with an enormous fountain sat along the road that ran straight out from the main gate, and from that plaza six paths branched away. Buildings lined those roads, and beyond them still more forks stretched on, the academy seeming to continue all the way out into distances I couldn't even see.

Perhaps as a kindness to new students, a sign said the administrative office was in the building right beside the main gate.

"Knock, knock."

"Is anyone there?"

I opened the door and stepped into the office. A red-haired woman with a ponytail was at her work.

Hehe. She's pretty. I want to get to know her. Could I strike up a conversation?

Ahem. Ahem.

"Um... I brought my admission certificate..."

But I was too shy, and my voice crawled straight back down my throat. That's not it, you idiot!

Papers rustled. The clerk seemed so absorbed in her work that she hadn't noticed I'd come in. ...This is a little mortifying.

Too embarrassed to raise my voice, I reached out and tapped her on the shoulder.

"Oh?"

"I brought my admission certificate..."

"Ah, a new student? Welcome!"

She took the certificate I handed her and began checking this ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and that.

"Your name is... Cecina, and you came in on the Special Aptitude track, I see?"

"Yes..."

"Then your Aptitude Theory courses will be assigned automatically, and aside from those, you can choose whichever classes you'd like to take."

"Yes..."

"I'll give you the academy guidebook, so take your time and read through it. Oh, and dorm assignments take a while, so please move in a little later."

"...Thank you."

Swept along by the clerk's torrent of explanation, I did nothing but answer like a vending machine dispensing replies, and then the conversation was over. I'd wanted to get a little closer. There hadn't been a single gap to wedge myself into. As expected, is my way with words just not up to it? No matter how I look at it, the only answer is to show them something impressive.

I'd have to wait a bit before I could move into the dorms anyway, and the time was just sitting there empty, so maybe I ought to look around the academy. I was genuinely curious what it would look like.

"Thank you truly for coming, Sir Belont."

"Not at all, Headmaster. Fostering the next generation is service to the nation as well, is it not?"

The top floor of the academy's main building. In the room set deepest within, as befitted its importance, the academy's highest authority was offering her respect to a man.

A talent they had gone to great pains to invite. Belont, former commander of the Imperial Special Assault Unit, who had guarded the nation for long years on the Empire's farthest front. He had accepted an appointment as an instructor at the academy.

"There's no need to be modest, Sir Belont. I know perfectly well that if you wished it, any number of finer posts would be yours."

"Ho ho... You flatter me."

"Here is the information you requested on this year's promising students. I do hope they are to your liking."

"Ohh... These ones..."

When Headmaster Meriana handed him the documents, expectation kindled in Belont's eyes.

"Yuria Paulson, Selnia, Ellie Harmen. The ones worth immediate attention are these three. What do you make of them, sir?"

"None of them are bad."

Belont looked through the papers, a satisfied smile touching his mouth.

A rather fine impression.

"Beyond the names listed here, there are many who will bloom in ways no one expects. The academy is that sort of place."

"I am aware, Headmaster. I would be glad if many talents emerged who could be of service to the nation."

Considering the times ahead, talents capable of protecting hundreds of thousands will matter more than ever. It was still a fact known only to a handful within the Empire. Of late, the demons' movements had been anything but ordinary. Even the petty battles that had always flared up here and there were growing more frequent, and one could not help but assume the worst.

A Great Offensive.

A vicious calamity, the demons uniting as one to threaten humankind. In times such as these, brilliant talents had to be raised in great numbers. And if they could be brought into the Special Assault Unit...

"I have reviewed the materials with thanks, Headmaster. I will take my leave."

"Yes, Sir Belont. Allow me to thank you once more for coming to the academy."

"Ho ho... Then I'll be going."

The door creaked. As he stepped out of the headmaster's office, all manner of thoughts rose in his mind. How to teach those promising students at once, and how to win them over. How to draw the gems hidden in the mud out into the light and cut them. With so many notions crowding in, a walk seemed necessary if he was to sort them out.

Let me put them in order, slowly.

The academy was spacious, and the scenery fine besides; there could be no better place to settle his thoughts. He had heard the lake here was a truly splendid view. Perhaps he ought ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to stop by.

His footsteps fell, slow and heavy.

Just as I was told. A magnificent sight indeed.

It was nothing more than a path leading to the lake. Nothing more than that, and yet the lush greenery around it, the elegant sculptures, would not have suffered beside the garden of any great noble house. Simply walking the grounds seemed to sweep stray thoughts away and clear his head. Here, he felt he might set down the worries of the battlefield, if only for a little while.

Have I grown so old? To sink into ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this and that fancy, lost in a beautiful view. The man he had been when he stood on the battlefield would never have imagined such a thing. So this was how fleeting time could be...

"Excuse me, could I ask you for directions?"

What—?!

What was this? This girl—when in the world had she come so close?

"Who are you!!"

"Eep?!"

No matter how deeply he had sunk into reverie, there was no world in which he would fail to sense a presence nearby. Letting a surprise approach like this land was something that had happened only back when he was a snot-nosed child. High-order spatial magic? No. It hadn't felt like that. Then what in the world was she?

"You will state your identity. This instant!!"

"U-uh... uhhh..."

Something was wrong with this girl. Even now, face to face, in this very moment, he could not sense her presence at all.

Presence was, quite literally, one of the measures of strength. As a rule, the more mana stored in the body, and the higher one's abilities, the stronger the presence one gave off. Crude tricks like ambushes, therefore, worked only among greenhorns who had stored little mana and whose senses were dull. Now and then there was someone whose power was so meager that their presence was extremely faint. Even so, senses of his caliber could still catch it.

But this girl...

She had no presence at all?

Faced with a phenomenon he had never once seen, his wariness surged to the extreme.

"If you will not reveal who you are..."

Then there was no choice but to fight.

"W-wait, wait a moment!"

"What?"

"I'm just an incoming student at the academy!"

...What? An incoming student?

"I just turned in my enrollment application, and I had some time, so I was looking around the academy!"

"...Can you prove it?"

"Here!"

What the girl held out was the academy guidebook. An item given only to newly incoming students.

"It said in here that the academy lake was incredibly pretty, so I was on my way to find it. But the paths are so complicated..."

"Hmm..."

In that case, the circumstances did indicate she was a student of the academy. In all likelihood she had truly only meant to ask the way. But this presence, as if she might vanish at any moment—what was it...

Interesting.

"You. What is your name."

"...It's Cecina."

"I see. I shall be watching you from now on. I look forward to it."

"...Y-yes."

He could not tell what ability she possessed. But if it were properly studied, the uses might prove vast beyond measure. Truly, something no one had ever accomplished. It seemed he had found an uncut gem when he had not even been looking...

A thin smile tugged at his mouth. One more matter to ponder, then. His footsteps felt a shade lighter. And so, a single expectation held in his chest, he set off.

It was worth coming.

Today's walk would be quite satisfying.

Hm? He felt as though he had forgotten something. Was this the forgetfulness that came with age? Well, it couldn't have been anything important.

I'd been marked by some old man.

He'd just looked, at a glance, like someone with a tremendous amount of experience, so all I'd done was try to ask for directions. And somehow I'd been given a thorough scolding. Had I done something that went against etiquette? I didn't know the manners of another world, so I might have done something I shouldn't have.

And then those words about watching me from now on. From the look of him, he was a teacher at the academy. This was bad. The semester hadn't even started, and I'd already become a thorn in someone's side.

What if he goes out of his way to torment me? Grading homework with ridiculous strictness and humiliating me in front of the other students. Or else, by favoring me far too much on purpose, turning me into an outcast among them. A full-blown crisis. It felt as though a dark cloud had drifted, just a little, across my rose-colored future.

How had it come to this? Up until a moment ago I'd been in such a good mood. I'd hoped—on the off chance, the very off chance—that I might cross paths with a heroine out walking the way I was, and get an opportunity to become friends. It was good to try everything, after all. And instead the result was in the negative. A sense of injustice welled up in my chest.

Should I go back...

I'd just go back. I wanted to rest now. By this point the dorm assignment ought to be finished. If I rested properly in my room, my mood would sort itself out.

Is it here?

I went looking for the dorm listed in the guidebook and found, at the entrance, a nameplate with the room numbers written on it. A five-story building stretched long to the side. Befitting the Empire's foremost institution of learning, the scale of it was staggering.

My room is... Building B, number 316?

Just how many rooms did this place have? If they'd built a dormitory like this back in my original world, every landlord in the surrounding studio district would have descended on it in a mob. Walking on while feeling the difference between this world and the old one, I arrived in front of my door before I knew it.

A key was waiting in the lock of room 316. I opened the door, and the sight inside was nothing short of fantastical—a room splendid and cozy enough to stand beside the lodging that had taken me in the night before. For one thing, it was wide enough that ten people could have lain down in it without complaint. The bed in the corner felt as soft as if I'd climbed onto a cloud, and the neatly kept wooden desk and bookshelf gleamed with a polished sheen. And beyond the window lay the academy itself.

Wouldn't a seven-star hotel be just like this? It certainly felt like the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠treatment afforded to the Empire's most essential class of talent.

Unable to resist how soft it was, I threw myself onto the bed as I was.

I did walk a lot today. It felt as though the whole day's fatigue were coming clean undone.

"......"

Ah, what am I actually going to do?

I really thought I'd been well and truly marked. What had I even done wrong. Is asking for directions a crime?! A heap of ugly hypotheticals rose in my head. Surely he wouldn't actually turn me into an outcast? Even so, I didn't think a teacher would pull something underhanded on a student. But a nutcase turned up no matter where you went. There was no way to be sure, right this moment, whether that teacher was a normal person or not.

Still, if it was only a matter of humiliating me in front of the students or picking on me, that was at least bearable. Making friends would get much harder, but the people who were going to approach me would approach me all the same. If, however, he deliberately made a show of favoring me and me alone, that would be the vilest of the vile.

If the first was simply a man who, unable to swallow his wounded pride, couldn't separate public duty from private feeling, then the second was a calculating psychopath who would methodically send anyone he disliked straight to ruin. Everyone in the classroom, without a single exception, would go blind with jealousy and shut me out. It would be, quite literally, the worst possible obstacle to my harem plan.

For now, maybe I should avoid him as much as I can. They'd said I could take the classes I wanted, so I would steer clear of that teacher's classes if at all possible. The best outcome was simply never running into him. Right. Avoidance was the best policy.

...Come to think of it, I was pretty sure they'd said one class would be assigned automatically.

It couldn't be that teacher. Could it?

I shoved my trembling heart down behind me.

And there Cecina stayed, curled up on the bed, until the entrance ceremony that would come tomorrow.