“Emily Earning. Let us talk for a moment.”
At my words, the classroom fell silent as though cold water had been thrown over it.
“Emily Earning.”
I called Emily once more.
Most of the seniors filling the classroom stared stiffly toward one side of the room.
As though they were afraid of something.
“This year’s freshmen are quite bold. Calling a senior by name so freely.”
One person alone remained relaxed, separate from that atmosphere, while receiving the seniors’ gazes.
“I think I know who you are. Lawrence Reed, correct?”
The girl with abundant blonde hair wore a strangely twisted smile.
“So you are Emily Earning.”
I returned her smile.
The air Emily gave off was exactly what I had imagined after hearing Media’s story.
An arrogant, vicious tyrant of the classroom.
“Rumors about you are everywhere. A reincarnator whose supposed Privilege is nothing but a few parlor tricks. You finally enter the academy and play at being a merchant, yet you scatter money around you. One cannot tell whether you even want to make money.”
From Emily’s mouth came the academy’s assessment of me.
I had not expected much, but it was not a particularly good thing to hear.
Not the natural admiration that followed other reincarnators, but suspicion and contempt.
There was no value in listening to the judgment of people who could not even understand that I was investing, not wasting money.
“So why has someone like Lawrence come looking for me? Do you have something you want to sell?”
As expected of a reincarnator.
Unlike the other students, who were ultimately nothing more than innocent children despite being born into good families, Emily was clearly wary of me from the beginning.
Or perhaps my somewhat rude behavior had offended her.
Hmm. It was probably the latter.
However, going in with a humble attitude toward someone like Emily, who was used to ruling from above, was no different from placing myself in a disadvantageous position.
I did not know whether she was weak before the strong, but she was certainly strong before the weak.
To begin a negotiation, I first needed to stand on equal footing.
“I came to protest your interference with my business.”
I stated my purpose without preamble.
“Interference with your business?”
“I heard that you spread false information about my products and threatened my customers. This could cause me financial losses, so I would like to request that you restrain yourself.”
Emily blinked quietly after hearing my words.
I had used businesslike wording to avoid turning it into an emotional dispute, but it seemed that the meaning had not been properly conveyed.
To put it in a way that was easier to understand....
“Quit sabotaging someone else’s thriving business and do your own work.”
Oops. Did a little emotion slip in?
“What are you talking about?!”
“Lawrence! You are going too far!”
“Enough, Junior!”
Some seniors hurriedly rushed out to stop me.
The rejected Snakes of this classroom.
They were customers who had received gifts from me at least once or bought products from me.
Everyone clearly looked worried about me.
“...Pfft.”
Emily’s body shook.
“hahahah. I wondered what you were going to say.”
Her laughter was exaggerated. But her eyes were not laughing.
“What will you do if I do not listen to you?”
There was a reason Emily could act so confidently.
My sales within the academy did not take place under laws or regulations.
The headmaster had merely permitted my commercial activities. Even if someone interfered with my business, I could not file a report or demand compensation.
All I could rely on was... my own ability.
“Then I will have to interfere with what you do as well.”
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
“If you want to keep ruling this classroom, you should behave yourself.”
If she took away the profits I could earn by selling my goods smoothly, I had no choice but to take away the authority she enjoyed.
“...That sounds like you are claiming that you can bring me down.”
Even the false smile vanished from Emily’s face.
She was now a third-year, so she had spent a little over two years at the academy.
Unlike the first-years, where several reincarnators created a rough balance, there was only one reincarnator among the third-years. I had heard that the Department of Martial Arts did not even dare think of competing with the Department of Magic.
Within her year, there was no one to compare her to.
A singular existence.
A king.
She had probably never worried about her position collapsing, or even shaking.
But....
“Of course. The world I lived in was that kind of world.”
I had searched for many things after entering the academy, but there was no information about Earth. There were probably few reincarnators from Earth, if any.
Well, if the people of this world learned about Earth’s history, they would not believe it.
Kings were dragged down and executed. In countries without kings, presidents were brought down as well.
Even dictators who wielded absolute power suddenly fell from power.
No one could rest easy simply because they had risen to the position of a nation’s leader.
In any case, it was a world that tore down anything that could be torn down, so a mere king of a classroom was laughable.
“Try it. If you can.”
However, my sincerity did not reach Emily.
She seemed to have taken everything I said as nothing more than empty bravado.
“You will regret this. It will be troublesome for me, too.”
Being able to do something did not mean it was easy to do.
Emily had spent years firmly establishing her position. She would not fall easily just because I touched her.
I would have to accept some expense on my side as well.
Really, it would be better for both of us to settle this peacefully.
“Why? Have you lost your confidence?”
Emily seemed to mistake my reaction for being frightened and backing down.
Provoking me in this situation.
It seemed that any further conversation was meaningless.
“I warned you.”
I loved peace and conversation, and I wanted to resolve every matter gently. I only wanted to make money comfortably.
But, like Kyle, there were always people who made things unnecessarily complicated and forced me to use harsher methods.
I closed my eyes for a moment and ran calculations through my head.
Minimum expenditure, maximum effect.
And I reminded myself that sometimes, there were products that had to be sold at a loss.
I opened my eyes, walked forward, and stood before the teacher’s desk.
It was a position where I could see the entire classroom at a glance.
“Good day, Seniors. I am Lawrence Reed, newly enrolled this year. Those of you who know already know this, but I am a reincarnator.”
I addressed the seniors other than Emily.
The seniors looked at me with strange expressions as I suddenly gave a formal introduction.
“I engage in merchant-like activities, selling various useful items to Seniors. If you visit the first-year Department of Magic classroom, I can sell you anything you want faster than anyone else and at reasonable prices, so please make frequent use of my services.”
As examples, I bought assorted items from the Shop and spread them across the teacher’s desk.
Until now, only the Snake-marked seniors had bought items from me.
They made up less than one-fifth of the class. I needed to expand my customer base to include the ordinary seniors as well.
I almost never had reason to come to the third-year classroom, so I might as well advertise while I was here.
The classroom was silent.
The seniors were too busy watching Emily, who was glaring at me.
“Wow, what a cold response. My explanation was a little boring, right?”
I smiled and pushed the items I had placed on the teacher’s desk.
Because no one was speaking, the sounds of the items falling from the desk rang especially sharp and loud.
“I expected this! I have also prepared a special product just for our third-year Seniors. A very, very special product only for you.”
I cleared my throat.
As brightly and comically as possible.
If necessary, I had to become a clown.
“Has a reincarnator in your class been bullying you and making life difficult? They are your peer, but are you uncomfortable because you have to watch their mood? Then this is the product I recommend to you!”
I bought paper and a pen from the Shop, then quickly scrawled words onto the paper.
“A Duel Proxy Request Form. It can only be used when Emily Earning is your opponent. For the low price of one Gold Coin, I will fight Emily Earning in your place!”
It was a joke of a piece of paper without even a proper form.
A hastily improvised product no matter how one looked at it.
The more trivial it seemed, the better.
It had to sell cheaply for Emily’s authority to fall to the ground.
“...What do you think you are doing?”
Emily rose from her seat.
Her face had reddened in patches because she could not fully hide the anger surging within her.
“I am keeping my word.”
There was only one reason why the third-years had accepted Emily’s rule.
Fear.
No one in the third-year class had any means of resisting Emily.
Like a natural disaster, they could only bow their heads and avoid her.
Fear born from helplessness.
Conversely, that meant that if they had power, this level of fear could naturally be swept away.
What I was selling was ‘the right to insult Emily Earning.’
“Do you seriously think someone will buy something like that?”
“Who knows? Someone who holds a grudge against you might.”
What mattered was not who bought it or how many people bought it, but the fact that they could buy it.
I was placing a trigger in the hands of every third-year that could bring Emily, a being above the heavens, crashing down to the ground.
The others, who had only received one-sided threats from Emily until now, would gain a means to fight back.
The difference was enormous.
“Someone who holds a grudge?”
Emily sharply turned her head and glared at Media.
She had not even begun selling it yet, but she already seemed certain of her first customer.
From what I could see, someone other than timid Media would probably be first.
A guilty conscience made one jump. Emily must have done quite a lot to Media.
“So you will duel me in exchange for only one Gold Coin? Do you think I am a joke?”
Emily’s gaze returned to me.
“I am a merchant with a conscience.”
I simply smiled.
One Gold Coin.
In truth, if I considered profit and loss, this was a product that created a loss every time it was sold.
I could not know exactly how skilled Emily Earning was, but considering that she was a third-year, she would be far more troublesome than someone like Kyle.
Since the amount of money I had to spend to win increased the stronger my opponent was, it would be impossible to win by spending only one Gold Coin.
Even so, I had set the sale price low because it only had meaning if everyone could afford it.
If it were needlessly expensive, people struggling financially like Lucia would have to keep fearing Emily.
To bring Emily all the way down, I could not charge any more than this.
“It seems that no one has yet said they would like to buy this Duel Proxy Request Form.”
The seniors looked interested in this attractive product, but they did not readily decide to buy it.
Apparently, they did not have enough information to feel certain.
“Right. Some of you may doubt my ability. What if you request a proxy duel and I lose? Would you not be wasting one Gold Coin? What if you only earn Emily’s hatred and have to deal with the consequences afterward? I will erase those worries right now.”
There was a simple way to prove a product’s quality.
Show its actual performance before their eyes.
I suddenly tore a button from my uniform sleeve and threw it at Emily.
“Emily Earning. A duel.”