Chapter 16 – There Was Never a Quiet Day (1)

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Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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By the time the thick dust filling the training grounds slowly began to thin, the traces of the carnage that had just occurred were laid bare in all their brutality.

Every gouged-out spot was filled with bright red pools of blood, and across the dirt ground, multiple lines were drawn like rippling patterns.

Seeing my face reflected in the blade, I clicked my tongue briefly. I always felt this way, but slicing up a person was an indescribably disgusting sensation. This was a knife made for gutting fish, and yet here I was, using it to carve up people…

If there was any consolation, it was that I still hadn’t actually cut a real person yet. Whether it was the Mao twins or Nox, now lying cold right in front of me, in the end all of it had happened inside subspace. To think I’d end up enjoying the special perks of a virtual space in a way like this.

Of course, even in reality, I planned to cut down anything that threatened me without hesitation, but I still wanted to avoid indiscriminate slaughter.

If I started swinging around however I pleased, it felt like before I knew it, I’d turn into some human butcher.

I gave the sashimi knife in my hand, still wet with red, a light flick once, then slid it back into the sheath. The blade rattled slightly.

Then again, in that brief instant I’d unleashed so many sashimi strikes it would have been hard to count, so even if it had a brand logo stamped on it, it would have been strange if the edge hadn’t taken damage. I let out a bitter little laugh.

Twenty-six seconds. The match had ended more quickly than I expected.

Nox was definitely strong. Just as Chloe had said, he had a wealth of real combat experience, and there had been a merciless lack of hesitation in his sword strikes.

Enough to make my skin crawl when I received the edge of his blade. And above all else, his battle sense was innate.

The cadets in the audience hadn’t noticed, but the moment he drew his sword, he activated the Blessing of the Crow and twisted the arcs of his slashes into irregular curves.

On top of that, adding speed so extraordinary it surpassed even Chloe’s made him extremely difficult to respond to.

When it came to combat, it was true that Nox had been born with exceptional talent. Still, he was a little clumsy in the battle of wits.

It was fine that he used stealth and drew curved sword paths, but because his sword aura carried such thick killing intent with it, I could predict where the next strike was coming from.

Of course, if he kept gaining experience from here and his potential fully blossomed, he would probably become the strongest assassin.

He really was strong.

Maybe because I had gotten used to manifesting the blessing by now, I seemed to have reached a level where I could manage my time with it somewhat.

Of course, even when I manifested the Blessing of Painlessness, the heavy, stiff sensation that settled around my eyes was still there.

Even so, compared to the first time I manifested the Blessing of the Sword God and went completely apeshit, it was something I could laugh off.

I pressed a hand against my neck and gently rubbed the nape, which had stiffened under tension. Meanwhile, the barrier of subspace was lifted, and the cadets’ murmuring reached my ears.

A heat mixed with many different emotions. I instinctively knew that my academy life was about to become exhausting. Letting out a short sigh, I muttered.

“…Nothing to do about it.”

In the end, this was the path I had chosen.

The only option was to endure it through grit and stubbornness.

* * *

The aftermath of the fierce battle between Kang Geom-ma and Nox shook the entire academy. From Star down to Ordinary, every class talked of nothing but that incident.

Once the rumor belatedly spread that he was from the family of order, Auditore, most people nodded at Nox’s strength.

Just as the saying went about an awl in a pocket, the fame of Auditore was not all that unfamiliar among the children of high-ranking noble families.

That was exactly why the question of who the male student opposing Nox had been became an even hotter topic. To be honest, even calling him an opponent felt meaningless when he had filleted Nox Auditore like raw sashimi. It had been a performance beyond mere shock.

And on top of that, he was only a lowly special advancement student. No rumors about him, and no truth behind him, had been uncovered. That fact alone was more than enough to make him a once-in-a-generation subject of gossip among teenagers with loose tongues.

Inside the Star Class classroom.

With no change in expression at all, Abel sat there with her arms crossed, sunk in thought. Bathed in the sunset-purple glow drifting in from outside the window, her appearance was as beautiful as ever. Yet the eyes that usually sparkled like yellow jade were strangely quiet today.

The face of a black-haired male student crossed Abel’s mind.

In the memory she had from the other day, he had seemed a little softer in impression, but in the eyes she had seen today, there had been a chill impossible to put into words.

When he traced a half-moon with his blade, one of Nox’s arms slipped off and fell away. It was as if it had already been severed from the start, without even the sound of cutting.

And the exchange that followed had been too swift for even Abel’s eyes to contain. More than anything, that unreal swordplay… merely seeing it had made her whole body twitch.

And that had been with nothing so special as two rose-pattern carving knives.

She even had the exact same knives stuck in the kitchen of her dormitory. The thought gave her an unpleasant shiver, enough to make her reluctant to use them for no good reason.

As someone with the blood of Nibelung and the granddaughter of the Sword Emperor, she had been proud that she possessed a discerning eye when it came to swords. But today, she felt that pride in her own judgment had been mercilessly shattered.

Abel gave a small shake of her head, trying to cast off the swarm of thoughts. Her long blue-jade hair swayed softly.

“His name is Kang Geom-ma…”

She murmured the name of the male student that had appeared on the training-ground screen in a low voice, as if savoring it. The classmate who had spoken to her in that glib way. To think this was how she would end up learning his name…

Then, as she traced back through her memories, the words she herself had once said to Kang Geom-ma came back to her.

Hm? Because you look weak. My family motto was, Be strict with the strong and merciful to the weak!

She remembered the unidentified top-ranked student that Sword Emperor Siegfried had spoken of with a darkened face. All of a sudden, a chilling feeling came over her that that student might be Kang Geom-ma.

No, given the circumstances, he all but had to be. The reason was… because Kang Geom-ma was overwhelmingly stronger than her, the runner-up. There was no way the sacred subspace grading would have overlooked something like that.

“……”

Abel let out a deep sigh and lowered her head heavily. Embarrassment surged up in her, and with her face turning bright red, she bit down on her lips.

Then, in the next instant, her clenched fist lightly thumped against the desk.

Kang Geom-ma, what was he even thinking while looking at me!?

The embarrassment born of shame instantly changed into a little burst of anger. The glib attitude he’d shown while dealing with Abel.

He must have known everything and reacted like that anyway. To think that the first person she’d opened up to and spoken honestly with after entering the academy had, in fact, turned out to be the leading candidate for the very top student who had effectively declared he would crush her.

The more she thought about it, the angrier it made her. Very much so. Even if she let it go a hundred times that he had hidden being the top student because he had his own reasons, Abel had laid her inner feelings bare while Kang Geom-ma had told her absolutely nothing. She had only even learned his name yesterday.

At that surge of emotion, her body sprang upright. Then the blonde girl with twin tails sitting beside her yawned and tapped at her mouth as she spoke.

“Mmnya, what’s wrong?”

“…Ah, it’s nothing, Rachel.”

Startled and flustered, Abel only opened and closed her mouth awkwardly. Rachel narrowed her eyes and looked her over.

Inside those heart-shaped eyes, a faint mischievousness like playful teasing swirled.

“Heeey, reeeally?”

“Yeah. I haven’t been able to exercise for the last few days, so my body feels kind of stiff.”

Abel forced an awkward smiling look toward Rachel. Her beautiful brows twitched faintly. Rachel, niece of the Spear Saint and the academy’s fourth seat.

To be honest, they were not actually all that close. To begin with, Abel had been reluctant to make friends because of the thick sense of elitism permeating Star Class.

But Rachel, with her characteristic shameless ease, kept trying to tear down the wall Abel had unconsciously built around herself.

“Abel, you’ve got yourself a man, don’t you?”

“N-no!”

The teasing voice tickled Abel’s ears.

Rachel straightened one finger and lightly traced circles against Abel’s slim side, tickling her. Abel gave a big start and quickly stumbled backward.

“So our Lady Abel is a proper woman after all? I thought you’d completely turned your back on romance.”

“I’m telling you, it’s really not like that!”

When Abel’s face turned red, Rachel propped up her chin and let out a giggling laugh.

“So who is it? If someone’s good enough to steal Abel’s maiden heart, he won’t be some ordinary nobody. Hmm, let’s see-”

Rachel turned her head as if pretending to look around the room. Then, with a small tilt of her chin, she pointed at Leon.

“Leon, is it him? Well, his face is handsome enough.”

“No.”

Abel erased all expression from her face and denied it at once. At that, Rachel tipped her head slightly and tossed out a remark.

“…Lady Abel is weirdly hostile toward Leon. Then was it that special advancement student from yesterday’s training grounds?”

“!?”

Bingo. Abel’s face turned bright red in an instant. At that reaction, a crooked smile spread across Rachel’s face. Then she rose lightly to her feet and grabbed Abel’s wrist.

“W-what are you doing?!”

“Let’s go, Lady Abel.”

“Go wheeere?!”

“Wolf Class!”

And just like that, Abel was dragged along helplessly by the strength of Rachel’s arm. Maybe it was because she came from a spear-bearing house, but her grip strength was absurd.

* * *

During the break between sixth period and seventh period.

Rattle.

The classroom door of Wolf Class opened.

At that moment, the noisy atmosphere quieted down. At the sudden appearance of two beautiful girls, the Wolf Class cadets lowered their voices and began whispering among themselves.

Rachel, smiling brightly, led the way in front, while Abel was pulled along behind her, stepping in hesitantly.

And to make it more unbelievable, they were Abel von Nibelung, ranked second in the academy this year, and Rachel de Muir, ranked fourth. Two girls leading the very top ranks inside Star Class.

Of course Abel’s beauty was so extraordinary it felt wasteful to confine it only to the eye, but the Rachel standing beside her was also a beautiful girl whose healthy charm stood out vividly.

When she gave a smiling look with her eyes, the male students clutched at their chests and collapsed backward. Abel let out a series of short sighs from behind and pressed at her brow.

Standing tall at the front of the class, Rachel narrowed her eyes and searched for black hair. She had seen his face at the training grounds yesterday, so she roughly knew it already. Since black hair was extremely rare, he should be easy enough to find.

After sweeping the room quickly once, an exclamation point seemed to pop over Rachel’s head.

Oh, found him! That unmistakable black. The unusual part was that the ended had gone faintly white.

By the window in the third row.

He was sleeping face-down with a thick history textbook as his pillow. Beside him, a cute red-haired girl was grinning as she stared fixedly at the way he slept.

His girlfriend? Rachel didn’t care. Other people’s rice cakes always look bigger. She had come here partly to tease Abel, but personally too, Rachel found that special advancement student rather interesting.

With a faint smile, Rachel undid the top two buttons of her uniform and walked over to Kang Geom-ma. Her bold stride left Abel no chance to stop her.

A provocative figure enough to disarm most men. It was the resolve of a woman entering combat mode. All eyes turned toward them.

Rachel softly blew warm air into Kang Geom-ma’s ear. At that, Chloe, who was sitting beside him, twisted her face into a fierce frown and shot Rachel a glare laced with killing intent.

Kang Geom-ma let out a short groan, then shook his head as though brushing away sleep. He must have been sleeping quite soundly, because the cheek that had been pressed down was dyed red.

With unfocused eyes, Kang Geom-ma slowly lifted the head that had been lowered and looked around.

And then, immediately, Kang Geom-ma’s dazed gaze met Rachel’s milky cleavage.

“…What?”

Brushing the hair by her temple behind her ear, she waved her hand lightly and whispered to Kang Geom-ma.

“You up?”

A delicate arc formed at the corner of Rachel’s mouth.