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243. We’re Under Attack! (4)

“Gah!”

In the 1st Star Hall of Aligieri Academy, a girl moaned in a luxuriously furnished dorm room.

Her shiny silver hair and ethereal looks were enough to capture the attention of every young man around.

However, her true uniqueness lay in the fox ears and nine tails adorning her head.

“Ugh… Why all of a sudden…!”

Saint Angela Greenwhite clutched her head while sitting at a large desk.

It was more than a simple headache; it felt like a sudden pain originating from her eyes.

As if thorns had lodged themselves in her sight, causing injury. At this rate, she couldn’t tackle the assignments laid out on her desk.

She lay on her bed and attempted to use sacred magic to detect her own body, but she found no clues at all.

Could it be that she was unable to heal herself?

In the end, Angela resorted to an option she wasn’t particularly fond of.

Calling on acquaintances early in the morning.

“There’s nothing wrong, but….”

“Huh?”

The individuals she called were Stella Vermillion and Nebia Chromag.

As a fellow saint, the kind professor agreed to help since they belonged to the cleric faction.

Thanks to the Archive, she could easily summon those within Aligieri.

“I’m not quite sure about the cause either.”

“Ah….”

However, even with Stella and Nebia’s presence, the symptoms remained unresolved.

They couldn’t pinpoint the cause of her affliction.

“Since when has this been happening?”

“Just a bit ago. It’s strange; why does my eye hurt so much?”

It was then that the two saints found themselves at a loss.

“Could it be because of resonance?”

“Resonance?”

“It’s a concept where those of the same kind can feel each other’s pain. When one suffers, others do too, you could say?”

A hypothesis came forth from Stella, who was a professional healer.

Considering that Angela had blood mixed from divine beasts and wasn’t purely human, it was indeed possible for her to respond to calls from other divine beasts.

“From what I know, divine beasts can communicate situations among their kin even from a distance. The more there are, the broader the range.”

“So, could it be that the other foxes are barking for help?”

“I can’t say for certain, but it wouldn’t resonate without a reason.”

Angela still felt pain, albeit it had weakened for now.

If it truly was resonance, what reason could there be for such a repeated calling? She pondered this question when—

-Help me.

She thought she heard a voice just now.

She tried to comb through her hair with her hands to hear it again, but she couldn’t.

Yet she clearly remembered what it was.

“Just now… someone asked for help….”

Knock, knock, knock—

At that moment, someone knocked and entered Angela’s room.

The intruder was none other than Princess Mirona, the girl now referred to as the former princess with red hair.

“Ah, Princess Mirona.”

“No need to call me princess anymore.”

“Right, but what brings you here?”

“Well, I heard that both saints are close to Senior Radon Crawler.”

At the mention of Radon, the saints perked up and listened intently to Mirona’s words.

Having regained memories from her past life, Mirona had grown close to Lyman without any embarrassment.

Although her curse would soon lead to her death, she didn’t give up.

She promised to break the curse and enjoy her original life alongside Lyman.

Thus, she naturally came to learn about the events that transpired until now.

Most of Lyman’s talk has been about the irregular named Radon Crawler.

“Are you talking about Brother Radon?”

“Yes, a huge crisis is facing him right now.”

“Crisis?”

Though she had relinquished her title of princess, Mirona was still the president of the student council.

With her experiences from her past life, she was navigating the student council with more expertise than ever.

At the terminal of Aligieri Town, a student discovered a certain flyer.

Since Mirona had checked it out first, she could quickly relay it to the two saints.

“Look at this.”

Mirona handed over the flyer she was holding.

Nebia and Angela gulped audibly upon reading its contents.

At the center of the flyer was Radon Crawler’s face plastered all over, with the following text below.

───────────────

Name: Radon Crawler

Age: 17

A reward of 10,000,000 credits will be given to those who capture this boy.

Alternatively, capturing his family will yield 8,000,000 credits.

───────────────

The flyer was so ridiculous that it elicited involuntary laughter.

They were framing a mere ordinary academy student as a wanted criminal, and it was too absurd to bear.

And the fact that it was issued by the Papias Kingdom made Angela frown.

She could understand why they would perform such outrageous acts.

Papias. A place where inhumane acts like human experimentation were conducted without a second thought.

To frame an innocent student as a criminal? They were definitely not of sound mind.

“Anyway, Senior Radon Crawler….”

“What’s happened to my brother?”

Suddenly an eerie voice chimed in.

It sounded like a ghostly presence coming from the window.

There was a male student stuck to the glass like a bug on a wall.

“Yikes!”

“Oh my gosh!”

“What are you doing?! Get down from there! That’s against the rules!”

The perverted student peeping through the window was Baimon Dreadnote.

It was strictly prohibited to sneak into dorms of the opposite gender according to school rules.

Such behavior often led to perverts wanting to gawk at changing students.

Baimon knew this but chose to break the rules anyway.

Hearing the warning about his proud “brother” in danger made his body react instinctively.

“I’ll take the punishment later.”

Baimon opened the window without a care and jumped into Angela’s room.

Stella, the professor, was flabbergasted by the sight of him entering through the window, shoes on, and not through the front door—the fact that it was a saint’s room made it even more shocking.

Just how many demerit points would he accumulate, or what kind of punishment would he face?

Why was the formerly well-behaved Baimon acting so recklessly?

It was when her mind was filled with unmanageable information.

“More importantly, is my brother in any danger?”

However, despite such escapades, Baimon’s expression appeared genuinely serious.

Although he should be reprimanding Baimon to leave immediately, all thoughts vanished once their eyes met.

“Here….”

Mirona reluctantly showed the flyer to Baimon.

Holding the paper in both hands, Baimon stared at it intently for a while.

And then….

“Hehe… Heheh….”

“Baimon?!”

“Hehehehehe….”

“Um….”

“Hahaha!!!”

Baimon suddenly burst into uncontrollable laughter, and the atmosphere grew icy.

His maniacal outburst resembled that of a haunted doll and sent shivers down their spines.

If a spirit of such frightening demeanor existed, the two saints felt they couldn’t possibly purify him by their own power.

“President.”

“Y-Yes….”

Baimon, still chuckling, suddenly spoke in a voice laced with sharp thorns.

Strangely, despite the smile on his face, a peculiar hostility emanated from him.

“The ones who spread this flyer… it wouldn’t be murder if I killed them, right?”

“We don’t need to go that far….”

“I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them! I’ll kill them!!!”

Communication was impossible.

It felt as if they were face-to-face with a mindless golem, moving without reason.

“I will protect my love, no matter what!!”

Those present in the room could hardly utter a word as they witnessed his rampage.

What would it feel like to invite an explosive time bomb into the room out of mere provocation?

That was the experience they were going through right now.

*

Numerous soldiers were entering the village of Ružeto, known as the land of death.

Though their scale and atmosphere felt like an entire village was being searched, the residents didn’t seem terribly worried.

Such mercenaries being dispatched was not a new occurrence, after all.

They were a bit surprised, though, that those soldiers hadn’t come to support them.

They were apparently searching for someone.

“Has a small boy entered here by any chance?”

“Well… I’m not sure?”

“Ah, I see. I thought you’d know since he was once a prince.”

The individuals storming Ružeto were soldiers of the Papias Kingdom.

They had tracked Prince Totema, who had escaped, all the way here.

“But why are you looking for this boy?”

At a villager’s inquiry, the man who seemed to lead the soldiers responded kindly.

“He possesses quite a good aptitude. He has the talent to control spirits or divine beasts.”

“Oh.”

“And there’s one more person looking for him.”

The commander of the soldiers pulled out a flyer. The paper he displayed prominently featured a boy’s face.

“Have you seen this boy?”

Name: Radon Crawler

Age: 17

The boy has brown hair and has a rather irritating face that looks like he’s hiding around sneakily like a scammer.

“I think I’ve seen him….”

“Do you know him?”

As the commander asked with wide eyes, the villager flinched and spoke.

“I think so. He was definitely seen hanging out with girls in school uniforms….”

“Girls, you say?”

“Yes. One had blue hair, and another was a cute girl with pink hair. Also, there was a fierce-looking girl with black hair and red eyes.”

“I see. Thank you for your cooperation.”

The soldiers continued their search.

They kept asking people, and the search range grew narrower as everyone they encountered reported having seen someone.

They even encountered knights from the Viole Family stationed at a passage.

They asked them as well, but the unexpected response came back.

“Well, we haven’t seen anything.”

It was said in a chilling and calm tone.

It felt as though they were being told to mind their own business and leave, or perhaps it was a strong suggestion to stop the search altogether.

Anyway, the investigation narrowed down as the soldiers finally began to raid the inn of the village.

At this late hour, any outsiders who had come to the village would have nowhere else to go.

Given that there were multiple eyewitness accounts, they would surely locate him rapidly.

‘This boy seems to have a huge bounty on his head for some reason….’

It was said to be a royal command. If they were to capture this boy somewhere in the Empire, a hefty reward would be given.

Radon Crawler. Could it be that this boy committed some kind of crime?

Or perhaps he’s just a thorn in someone’s side, and they intend to make his life miserable.

Yet whether the former or the latter, it felt odd.

‘There’s no solid proof that he committed any crime.’

A bounty needs a crime to establish it as just. Yet this warrant seemed to have been issued without any clear evidence.

The current King of Papias wasn’t the only one involved. The Viole family cooperated as well, along with other implicated nobles.

Many prominent nobles were so eager to catch this boy, as though they had nothing to lose. Did they feel they could disregard their embarrassment?

‘I hold no animosity toward this boy, but….’

It was unavoidable. A mercenary’s job was to resolve any requests that came their way.

After searching multiple rooms, he finally opened the last door.

Inside, just as the villagers described, three girls were sitting.

The girl with blue hair and the one with black hair glared at them warily.

They didn’t seem like ordinary girls.

Thus, the knight commander would handle them while the remaining soldiers continued to search the other rooms.

Meanwhile, amongst the soldiers moving from room to room, one boy stumbled upon a girl.

“Who are you?”

It was a room not yet checked. There, a rather beautiful girl with brown hair lay on the bed.

Seeing her terrified and shy demeanor nearly caused the soldiers to lighten the room.

Living as an academy scammer.

 

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