“My Lady, an urgent message has arrived from the main family.”
Sabel Ellimore, who had been practicing swordsmanship with a rapier in her private training room, stopped at her attendant’s words.
Sharp sword marks covered the walls of the room, clearly displaying just how formidable her skill was.
Without so much as disturbing her breathing, she sheathed her rapier and stared at the seal on the envelope her attendant handed her.
A phoenix.
The emblem of House Ellimore.
‘They say the family was granted this emblem directly by the Twelfth Emperor because, like a phoenix, House Ellimore has accompanied the Empire through every rise and fall without ever collapsing.’
She remembered her father explaining that with an indifferent expression, as though he did not find it particularly worthy of pride.
The memory threatened to sour her mood.
Sabel snatched the envelope from her attendant, broke the seal immediately, and read its contents.
“Ha. So it was true?”
The message appeared to have been urgently dispatched to every member of the Ellimore bloodline.
Its contents were simple.
Gilbert Ellimore, the eldest son, had suffered some kind of condition requiring long-term recuperation.
As a result, all candidates for the position of next family head were being summoned back to the estate immediately.
‘So he really was not lying?’
Then was Ghost truly that extraordinary a mage?
Or perhaps... a dragon?
She had considered the possibility.
Of course, she had never seriously believed it.
But now that things had turned out this way, it was difficult to dismiss everything Ghost had said as lies.
If there was even the slightest chance that Ghost truly belonged to the dragon race as he claimed, Sabel had to maintain her connection with him somehow.
Preferably on good terms.
‘His personality is absolute garbage, but if I can bring him over to my side, he could become an enormous source of power for the rest of my life.’
Sabel tore the Ellimore message into pieces on the spot and scattered them across the training room floor.
Then she irritably addressed her attendant.
“What happened with the matter I mentioned before?”
“Yes, My Lady. It took longer than expected, but it has been completed.”
“The source?”
“A shaman from the Shadow Group operating in the underworld.”
The Shadow Group.
Sabel had heard of them.
They were a secret organization that researched various powers forbidden across the continent.
Rather than using mana, they relied entirely on mental strength and contracts with mysterious beings from nature.
Their supernatural abilities could not be detected through mana and were highly effective, which made them useful for illegal activities.
They were absurdly expensive, though.
“How effective is it?”
“Not particularly satisfactory. The time you allowed was too short, so the shaman said it would not demonstrate exceptional performance.”
“As long as it works, that is enough. What happened to the shaman?”
“He was quietly disposed of.”
“Good.”
Sabel’s attendant reached inside his clothes and handed her a small leather pouch.
When she loosened the cord, a tiny silver pendulum appeared inside.
“Hmm.”
Sabel took the handle with mild curiosity toward the unfamiliar mystical tool and let the pointed weight fall.
At first, the pendulum dropped straight down under gravity.
Then it swayed briefly before turning with unmistakable purpose toward a particular direction.
“It seems to work well enough. Heinz.”
“Yes, My Lady.”
“In three days, I must return to the main family. Before then, uncover Ghost’s identity.”
“As you command.”
Sabel placed the pendulum back inside the leather pouch and tossed it to Heinz.
Then she drew her rapier once more.
Perhaps she was more excited than she cared to admit.
Suppressing the smile that kept threatening to escape, Sabel began striking the training room wall with her rapier again.
***
“Why are we suddenly having a meeting?”
“I know, right? But is this not exciting, Young Master? It is our first class meeting of the year!”
That was exactly the problem.
As far as I knew, the other classes held meetings once every two weeks, or at least once a month, to revise internal rules and discuss matters they wanted brought before the Student Council.
Yet somehow, White Class never skipped its predawn training while apparently having no interest whatsoever in holding class meetings.
This was our first one, despite nearly two months having passed since enrollment.
“Is everyone here?”
Our class representative, a girl with short blue hair, stumbled into the White Class cadet lounge looking like a complete wreck.
The moment she entered, the smell of alcohol filled the room.
One glance was enough to tell that she had spent last night drinking heavily.
Haa.
And that was our class representative.
“So... today’s agenda is... what was it again?”
“The Sports Festival.”
“Ah, right. Yes. The Sports Festival.”
She was clearly still hungover.
The fact that she even had to ask the bearded vice representative what today’s meeting was about did absolutely nothing to reassure me.
I really had been assigned to the wrong class.
“One month from now, the Inter-Class Sports Festival will be held. It is the largest event on campus. Red Class has won for three consecutive years, but this year will be our turn.”
She spoke as though victory were already an established fact.
No one knew what she was basing that confidence on.
The only thing I had learned after watching our class representative for two months was that she had an extremely eccentric personality.
“If we fail to win this time, none of you will get dinner for a month.”
Wait a second.
Why are you messing with our food?
That sounds like something you would tell slaves.
“Um, Class Representative.”
“What?”
“Then what do we get if we win?”
“Hmm....”
Apparently, she had never considered that part.
She rubbed her chin and sank into thought.
A moment later, she snapped her fingers as though a brilliant idea had struck her.
“If we win, I will give you a kiss!”
“....”
The cadets were instantly consumed by shock and horror.
No one uttered a sound.
The atmosphere became so solemn that it felt as though someone had cast an area-wide Silence spell.
“You bastards!”
Apparently offended by our reaction, the class representative grabbed a chair as though she intended to throw it.
The vice representatives scrambled to stop her, plunging the room into chaos for a while.
Once she finally regained some semblance of reason, she changed the reward.
“It is not worth as much as one of my kisses, but I will give one week of leave to the three cadets who contribute the most to our victory.”
That reward did wonders for morale.
The White Class cadets immediately became excited.
A week of leave.
Just hearing those words made the heart race.
While everyone else was sweating through training so brutal that merely breathing made you want to curse, I could wander wherever I pleased and enjoy my youth.
“All right, shut up now. We need to decide the competitors.”
The class representative looked around.
“I am warning you in advance. Anyone who participates in one event cannot participate in another. Therefore, every cadet must take part in the selection trials for every event.”
After that came explanations of the individual events and information about dangerous competitors from the other classes.
Haa.
A Sports Festival.
It was just some childish Academy event.
I could participate casually.
Even if I earned the leave, I would not have anything to do with it anyway.
I stared disinterestedly out the window and waited for time to pass.
Nice weather.
***
“Ruben! Today we have pork cutlets!”
“Yeah, yeah. But how can you even eat right now?”
“Of course I can! We only did a little warm-up this morning. Lunch tastes even better after exercise. If you do not want yours, I will eat some.”
“No.”
A little warm-up?
This morning’s lesson had been on Footwork Techniques, and my lower body felt like it had been torn apart.
Footwork, lower-body stability, and balanced movement were the foundation of all Martial Arts.
For a beginner like me, who had only recently started learning the sword, it was brutally demanding.
Apparently, for the daughter of House Camil, it counted as nothing more than warming up.
As a result, I barely had enough appetite left to eat lunch.
And when I thought about having to practice the same Footwork Techniques inside Admuasil’s Space tonight, I felt like closing my eyes and never opening them again.
“By the way, the first semester will be almost over once the Sports Festival ends, right? We have to choose our specializations starting in the second semester. You are going with swordsmanship, right, Ruben?”
“Probably. It is the safest choice, and swordsmanship has developed in so many different directions that it gives me plenty of options.”
“Hehe. That is good. You can have mine too. Eat plenty.”
Ah.
Why did I like Anna so much whenever she shared her food with me?
It was not like I had grown up starving.
“But if you are specializing in the sword, you should start preparing your weapon soon. Have you thought about what you want?”
“My weapon? Preparing one?”
“Yeah. Cadets from commoner families usually have the Academy make ordinary iron weapons for them, but nobles like us generally put more effort into it. We either have weapons made by our families or receive something that has been passed down through the family.”
“Really?”
That was news to me.
We had only used wooden swords until now, so I had no idea we were expected to prepare real weapons for the second semester.
Come to think of it, I did have a real sword my family had given me before I left for the Academy....
But that cheap thing was never going to satisfy me.
A sword....
What was the best sword I knew?
***
“Haa... haa....”
Locke’s breathing was rough.
He had lost far too much blood, and his face had gone pale.
This time, he really did seem to be in danger.
“Ruben.... I genuinely thought I was going to die this time.”
“Do not relax yet. You are still in a condition where dying would not exactly be surprising.”
Blood continued to seep from the deep wound in his side.
I had hurriedly bandaged it and was using Telekinesis to keep the injury from worsening as much as possible, but at this rate Locke would not last much longer.
“Sepia will be here soon.”
“Yeah, probably.”
Locke sighed.
“More importantly, what am I supposed to do about my sword? Haa.... Do you think Sepia can restore a sword too?”
Even while barely clinging to life, Locke seemed more upset about his broken weapon than his own condition.
The Demonic Sword Chiron.
One of the Five Great Demonic Swords of the Continent, capable of stealing the life force of its victims, had been broken cleanly in two.
“You sacrificed one Demonic Sword to defeat the Ghoul King. The trade was worth it.”
“Haa. You damned mage. You do not understand anything.”
Locke looked close to tears.
“You have no idea how important a sword is to people like us. I would not trade it even for a hundred kings of ugly monsters.”
Seeing his expression, I could tell how devastated he truly was.
Locke openly expressed most emotions, but sadness was something he almost never showed.
This time, he looked as though he might genuinely cry.
“Who knows? If we go back to where you found it, there might be some way to restore it.”
Locke’s eyes lit up despite his condition.
“Really? It might be repairable?”
“We would have to go there to know. Where did you find it?”
“Brevin’s Lair.”
Brevin?
Ancient Dragon Brevin?
Normally, when you get something from a place like that, you do not describe it as ‘finding’ it.
“Ruben! Is Locke all right?!”
At that moment, Sepia appeared in the distance, flying toward us.
Our conversation ended there.
***
“Brevin’s Lair....”
“Hm? What are you talking about?”
Anna tilted her head at my strange muttering.
Rather than answering her, I focused on thinking.
If I could obtain the Demonic Sword Chiron, it would undoubtedly be an enormous help in my life as a warrior.
With that sword’s ability, Locke had been capable of fighting enormous numbers of enemies.
Every time he killed one, his own vitality was restored.
The problem was Brevin.
Even as a 10th-Circle Archmage, confronting an Ancient Dragon was not something I could do without risking my life.
There was a lot I would have to prepare....
At minimum, I would need a week.
Wait.
A week?
“Anna.”
“Yeah?”
“I absolutely have to win this Sports Festival.”
“Huh? Why all of a sudden?”
Yeah.
All of a sudden.
I had found yet another thing I needed to do.
Locke.
How the hell did you become the strongest warrior when there was this much crap to deal with?
“Let’s do this!”
All I could do was fire myself up.