Chapter 67

Chapter 67. Identifying the Culprit

Leaving the bewildered Piar behind, I turned and walked toward the back of the hall.

Then I stood in front of one person and spoke.

“I feel terribly unwell. Please guide me to the infirmary.”

I clutched my stomach and looked at her, asking for help.

Piar looked at the two people leaving the hall with a puzzled expression.

The son of a ducal house had suddenly appeared, greeted him, and immediately left. The person who went outside with him was the female teacher who had been guiding people.

He could not understand what was happening at all.

However, the fact that he had come to this academy and the fact that he would be taking the new-student pledge were both full of things he found strange, so perhaps he could simply think of this matter in the same way and let it pass.

“As Master said, I only need to keep myself centered.”

He did not know where his master was from or where he was now, but just as his master had said, he had come to stand shoulder to shoulder with nobles like this. All he could do was trust his words and move forward.

It was his master who had awakened him and his cousin, who had been ordinary commoners. It was also his master who had taught them how to use their abilities.

It was his master who had told him about this academy, and it was his master who had taught him how to deal with nobles and other people.

Thanks to that, even after coming to the academy, he had been able to take the new-student pledge as the commoner representative.

Of course, after coming here, he had learned that not only nobles but also some commoners could awaken. Even so, he could not forget the grace of the master who had awakened him and his cousin.

‘He told us to keep the fact that he awakened us an absolute secret.’

After telling them that if other nobles discovered it, not only his master but even they themselves might be in danger, his master had left the village.

Naturally, both Piar and his cousin intended to strictly obey their master’s words.

After coming here, he had realized once again just how remarkable awakening was.

Even if his master had not said so, he intended to keep the secret no matter what.

‘But why did the son of a duke come looking for me?’

While Piar tilted his head over that question, the student sitting beside him was caught up in a different question and muttering to himself.

“Was there someone named Alex among Duke Gresia’s children?”

Unfortunately, because the entrance ceremony began immediately afterward, his muttering scattered futilely into the air.

---

“Is your stomach feeling very bad?”

“I am sorry. It is a little difficult to endure.”

“If it is that bad, you should receive healing from the priest at the infirmary. You will feel better quickly.”

The faculty member—no, the female teacher—who was taking me to the infirmary looked just as unwell as I did.

To be honest, I was feigning illness, so of course I was perfectly fine even now.

However, unless she was a kind teacher worried about me, there was no reason for her expression to look that bad.

Her uneasy, wavering eyes, and the way she kept looking back toward the entrance ceremony hall.

No matter how I looked at it, she was not worried about me.

However, since I had figured out the reason through my previous death, I had no intention of saying anything.

“Urgh, by the way, what is your name, Teacher?”

“Ah, your name is Alex, right? I am Isidora. I am a lecturer in the Liberal Arts Department.”

The female teacher, who looked like an ordinary woman in her early thirties, answered my question.

A commoner. And not an official teacher, but a lecturer.

This female teacher was the person who had detonated Piar just moments ago.

When Piar exploded once again in the destroyed entrance ceremony hall, I had observed every person present there.

When the hall had exploded, there were too many people, so I could not check all of them. However, during the explosion just moments ago, there had been almost no one nearby.

There had only been the priest and priestesses, a few faculty members, and the wounded.

And the female teacher now walking beside me.

She had left the hall right before it exploded, and after the incident occurred, she had gone back into the hall.

Her body was covered in black ash, but there did not seem to be a single injury anywhere on her.

Of course, at the time, I had not suspected her at all.

Since she had been at the back of the hall, she could have gone out first, and as a teacher, it was only natural for her to rush back to save people after the terror attack occurred.

Even the way she moved around searching for survivors afterward had not seemed strange to me at all at the time.

However, the moment Piar arrived, my eyes and senses, which had been examining the surroundings, caught sight of her looking different from the others.

She checked Piar before anyone else, and once he appeared, she looked around and moved away from the scene.

That made me pay attention to her, and the moment she was some distance away from the scene, I felt mana briefly rise from her body.

At the same time, mana surged from Piar’s body, and he exploded again.

And so, I died once more.

If there had been many people, or if she had not moved far away, I would never have been able to notice that change.

I also discovered why everyone who had inherited abilities had died.

The instant Piar exploded, I had felt the mana I had raised vanish momentarily.

No, perhaps it would be better to say it had been sucked into Piar. It seemed Piar’s ability was likely one that detonated not only his own mana, but all the mana in his surroundings.

It was truly a terrifying ability.

The more people with powerful mana there were, the greater the explosion became, and the ability users themselves could not even block the explosion because their mana vanished.

Moreover, ordinary people had no way to block it in the first place.

An inherited ability designed to target ability users, wielded by someone who did not even know he was a bomb.

Inherited abilities were far more varied and frightening than I had imagined.

After exchanging a few words as we walked, the infirmary building was soon right in front of us.

“I have to go back to the entrance ceremony, so I do not think I can stay beside you. I will tell the priests about you, so rest well. If you feel better, come back to the entrance ceremony hall. Otherwise, I will come find you after it ends.”

Oh dear, that would be a little troublesome.

I examined the surroundings and saw that there were almost no people on the path. No one was looking this way either.

Okay.

“T-Teacher, p-please wait a moment.”

I groaned and grabbed the teacher’s arm.

“Are you all right?”

The startled teacher caught my body, and I gasped for breath as I pulled her toward me.

“Huh?”

The teacher looked at me with startled eyes, and I placed my hand on her stomach as she was pulled close.

THUD.

Mana bursting from my hand struck the teacher’s stomach.

FWOOOSH.

My mana swept through the female teacher’s body.

“Why……?”

Teacher Isidora looked at me with shocked eyes. However, as she looked at me, her eyes immediately closed.

She had not died. She had merely fainted.

She was not an ordinary commoner lecturer in the Liberal Arts Department, but an ability user with an inherited ability.

However, unless she was a physical ability user who handled mana, there was no way she could withstand a surprise attack from someone with the body of a knight who had trained for a long time.

The mana I had trained through several deaths stirred up her insides in a complete mess, and she could not withstand the shock.

“You should not have let your guard down.”

I whispered that absurd advice into the ear of the unconscious woman. After that, I supported her and entered the infirmary building.

As I went inside the building, I shouted.

“Over here! Teacher is ill.”

The startled priestesses and middle-aged priest approached.

I had been watching priests’ healing arts since I was a baby.

As I was poisoned, injured, and brought close to death, I came to know the abilities of this world’s priests better than anyone.

The abilities of priests in this world were not divine power received from a god, nor were they the result of faith.

They were merely inherited abilities, just like those of nobles.

Although they had not inherited them from their parents like nobles did, they had inherited the ability of the Hero who had used healing abilities during the Great War.

Their ability to treat injuries was among the more remarkable types, but they had failed to notice the poisoning of a baby that even an alchemist had recognized.

Nor did they recognize fainting caused by a mana collision.

After we laid her down in the infirmary, the priest immediately placed his hand on her body and used his healing ability, but she did not wake up.

“What happened?”

“She suddenly said she felt unwell. She said she wanted to rest for a moment. I happened to be nearby, so I came with her. But she fainted right in front of here.”

“……You are a kind student.”

The priest looked at me with a puzzled expression.

Perhaps he found it difficult to understand that a teacher had been supported by a student from the entrance ceremony hall because she felt unwell.

However, there was probably no way for him to confirm it here.

And although the method was different, I was certainly a kind student.

“Her breathing seems stable, and I do not see anything else wrong with her. What should we do……?”

It seemed the priests did understand that their healing abilities were not omnipotent.

“You must also go back to the entrance ceremony hall, so you should first…….”

“I will bring another faculty member.”

I cut off the priest’s words and took the initiative.

“……That would be best.”

After hesitating for a moment, the priest nodded.

It seemed he found it awkward to go to the entrance ceremony hall himself because of the relationship with the academy.

I placed my hand on her shoulder with a worried expression.

“Then please rest here.”

After confirming once more that her mana was tangled, I removed my hand from her shoulder and left the infirmary.

Then I headed toward the entrance ceremony building. I quickly entered the building and checked the people standing at the back of the hall.

The entrance ceremony had begun, and the people were absorbed in watching it.

When I entered the hall, someone who looked like a faculty member approached me.

“Where is Teacher Isidora, who went with you?”

I looked at the faculty member who had spoken. He was an ordinary man in his twenties.

Was he simply a faculty member who had seen her go with me? Or was he someone who had joined her in carrying out this incident?

I could not know for now.

I only knew that he did not have mana. He was an ordinary person, not someone with an inherited ability.

I did not answer his question.

“I am sorry. There is something else I must do first.”

Instead, I asked for his understanding and walked toward someone else.

“May I speak with you for a moment?”

At my words, the senior knight of the royal family who had come with the princess looked at me with a puzzled expression.

However, he did not ignore me.

He was one of the senior knights of the royal knight order, and one of the pillars of the Queen’s faction, whom I had been introduced to by Queen Ria, the princess’s mother.

There was no way the request to help the princess while I attended the academy had ended as mere words.

Naturally, I had been introduced to the butler who attended the princess and the knights who would guard her. Finally, I had also greeted Noaro, the senior knight who formed one pillar of her armed force.

And at first glance, he had recognized roughly how skilled I was. He was indeed worthy of being a senior knight of the royal family.

“What is it?”

After moving slightly into a corner, he asked me in a low voice.

His voice hummed and echoed around my ears.

I could barely hear the proceedings of the entrance ceremony that had been coming from the front.

It was because he had blocked the sound with mana.

“There is a suspected terrorist.”

At my words, his expression stiffened.

“Do you mean the teacher who went out with you?”

As expected, it seemed he had not neglected to observe the surroundings.

To think even someone like this had been wiped out along with the others…….

“Yes. It is Lecturer Isidora. She seems to be connected to the incident with the Marquess of Hierro’s House. I had some doubts, so I used my pain as an excuse to go to the infirmary with her and questioned her lightly, and she took the bait. I knocked her unconscious and laid her down in the infirmary.”

She was probably completely unrelated to the marquess’s house, but honestly, it was difficult to come up with any other excuse.