39. Ghost Story (1)
Hong Biyeon and Eizel.
One symbolized blazing red fire, the other freezing blue ice. At first glance, they seemed completely incompatible, but if one tried to look for common ground between them, there was quite a lot to be found.
First, both of them deliberately carried themselves with excessive pride as a way of protecting themselves.
Second, once something piqued their curiosity, they would dig into it no matter what, all the way to the end.
Third, both of them held a deep interest in one particular person.
Their similarities overlapped in such a strange way that it almost erased the atmosphere of friction that naturally came from their opposing attributes, making them seem unexpectedly well-matched. So the sight of the two of them sitting in the library with their heads bent together over something felt deeply strange to the other students.
“Hey, hey, look over there.”
“The princess and that traitor’s—”
“Shh. Who even calls her that these days? Do you have no sense?”
“Oh, uh… right. True.”
Recently, because of Eizel, people’s perception of the Morf family had begun to change little by little. Even though she had been branded the child of a traitor and raised under hateful, mocking stares in horrific conditions, she had kept striving without pause and entered Stella with top-tier grades.
Not only that, but she had proposed a new possibility for Attribute Magic, reached 4-Class at the young age of seventeen, and no matter what incidents or accidents occurred, she always carried them through to the end with a sense of justice. She had become an example to many aspiring magic warriors.
In fact, among commoners and lower-ranked students who had never thought much one way or the other about the label of “Black Mage traitor,” she had gained enormous popularity.
After all, teenagers couldn’t help being drawn to a youthful shounen-manga-like rise-to-glory story about a star who had emerged without yielding even under the worst possible conditions.
Because of that,
even though the table where Eizel and Hong Biyeon sat was an eight-seater, no one approached it.
No, it would be more accurate to say they couldn’t.
The two of them had their heads together, and rather than an ordinary assignment, they had piled up thick books, were taking diligent notes, and discussing things in quiet tones. Who would dare intrude into that domain?
‘They aren’t doing after-school homework or anything. They’re researching some incredible kind of magic.’
‘Right. Those two are different from ordinary students like us.’
‘Shh. Let’s just walk by quietly.’
…And so, with the reverent and admiring gazes of the students gathering around them, what exactly was the topic the two girls were researching?
[What Is a Noble Soul?]
It was something utterly useless to the advancement of magic…
research into the soul, something whose existence had not even been properly proven.
No mage in the world had yet uncovered the true substance of the soul.
Because necromancy was considered the domain of Black Mages, that field had never been able to properly develop.
On top of that, since necromancy was not simply a field that could be solved through magical research alone but one in which philosophy intruded heavily, it had even earned the humiliating title of “Zero Contribution to the Advancement of Magic,” and no one touched it.
At best, a few students starving for credits would dip their toes into it, only to spend the entire class dozing off and end up lowering their average grades instead—a truly pitiful story.
[The human soul can never become noble.]
[Because at the moment of birth, it commits the sin of unfilial conduct by causing pain to its mother.]
[In order to purify a defiled soul, twice that amount of effort is required, but because humans accumulate countless karmic burdens before they even possess a sense of self, they cannot erase them even with a lifetime of effort.]
[If even restoring a sullied soul is difficult, then how could it possibly make sense to possess a noble soul?]
Research on the noble soul was filled with negative content from the very first page, but from there onward, countless examples from history were listed.
[And yet, surprisingly, there do exist a few great figures in history whose souls came close to nobility.]
[Their great and sublime deeds completely cleansed away the innumerable karmic stains they had accumulated in life.]
In other words, to summarize the conclusion,
humans cannot be noble, but if they contribute to the world or sacrifice themselves for it, they may come to possess a soul close to nobility.
That was the essence of it.
“…I’m not really understanding this.”
Since it was her first time studying a field like this, Hong Biyeon pressed firmly at her temples as though it all made little sense to her.
Eizel felt much the same, letting out low groans herself, but she explained the part she had managed to understand.
“If you look at the list of people in history whose souls came close to nobility, most of them were those called ‘saints’ or ‘saintesses.’”
Great figures who gave of themselves unstintingly, sacrificed for others, and fought desperately to wipe away other people’s tears even if it meant bleeding themselves.
Most of them had not even been able to use Holy Magic. According to testimonies from that time, the lowly had been deemed unworthy of learning Holy Magic.
And yet, without Holy Magic, they developed medicine in order to heal others, or led wars to victory in order to protect their people, or researched alchemy and developed potions, and some even went on to become great mages later.
Saints and saintesses…
in truly varied ways, they had made their own sense of justice a reality in the world.
They were completely different from the saints and saintesses arbitrarily designated by the current Holy Kingdom—true great figures whose names people could not help but speak with reverence.
Those were the ones who had come closest to a noble soul.
And that was where the problem lay.
“Even people like that only came close to a noble soul. They still didn’t actually possess a perfectly noble soul.”
“…Right.”
Humans could not possess a noble soul. That absolute proposition had never once been broken by anyone until now.
And yet…
Baek Yuseol had broken it.
It was truly astonishing, but sadly, because no one was interested in necromancy, no one understood just how incredible and how great that fact really was.
Thunk.
Hong Biyeon closed the book.
There was no need to research any longer or think any further.
Because the conclusion had already been reached.
“…I think I get the rough idea now.”
“So do I…”
Across the countless, truly countless regressions Baek Yuseol had undergone…
how many lives had he harmed?
Even that brief glimpse in the Star Archive had been enough to show that Baek Yuseol’s life had been drenched in blood, layered over with sins too deep to ever wash away.
Those innumerable karmic burdens should have been more than enough to stain his soul the deepest black imaginable.
And yet, for some reason, he possessed a soul so bright it was dazzling.
According to the book, the conclusion was simple.
Baek Yuseol had made countless sacrifices to save the world—far more than the weight of the sins he had committed—and as a result, he had finally come to possess a noble soul.
The girls couldn’t even begin to imagine the process that must have led to that.
All it did was make them realize, to the marrow, how young they themselves were.
What genius mage? What talent blessed by magic?
The Adolevit royal house? The Morf family?
Those who praised such hollow shells…
were fools who knew nothing.
Because the real thing existed elsewhere.
Because the one who truly bore the greatest name in the world
was living quietly, unseen.
Suddenly, Hong Biyeon became ashamed of the life she had lived until now.
All those days she had spent swaggering around as a princess of the Adolevit royal family.
All those behaviors of hers, looking down on everyone as equal beneath her—if she could erase them, she would have wanted to erase every last one of them.
After gathering the books together, Hong Biyeon rose silently, without even dragging her chair, and left her seat.
There was no greeting.
After all, they had only sat together to read the same book for a while, and things were still awkward between her and Eizel.
Eizel was the same. She neither stopped Hong Biyeon from leaving nor even looked at her.
She simply remained there and carefully finished reading the remaining pages to the very end.
“This is…”
There was no point in reading any further, but the girl’s curiosity was insatiable. Curiosity toward a realm she had never known before.
As Eizel dug deeper into it, she discovered something rather interesting.
[…If one were to name the most recent great figure whose soul came close to nobility, it would be ‘Abeline Starberg.’]
[Though he has now offered his soul to the hidden side of the world and chosen to become a Black Mage, he once made a name for himself as a graduate of Stella Academy…]
Abeline Starberg, the great mage from Stella who later became a Black Mage.
Eizel knew that name well. When she was little, her father had once told her about him.
‘That man was a complete eccentric. So much so that when he was attending Stella, he sent an entire main tower clean to the other side of the world.’
‘That’s incredible…’
‘Incredible is one way to put it. I heard even the headmaster couldn’t recover that vanished tower, so now it’s simply gone altogether. Back when this father of yours attended too, the 7th Main Tower didn’t exist anymore.’
Had that story been from more than half a century ago?
Now, because he had become a Black Mage, all of Stella’s history regarding Abeline Starberg had been completely erased.
Because Eltman Eltwin, who hated Black Mages with a vengeance, had buried everything in secrecy.
That was why, by the present day, the existence of the ‘7th Main Tower’ survived among the students only as a ghost story.
— Read only on MugenCodex —
‘Hmm…’
Eizel knew a fair amount of the truth behind that ghost story.
Because her father, who had gone through a major incident at Stella back then, had told her the story himself.
‘The 7th Main Tower…’
That was enough studying.
She promptly closed the book.
All her questions had been answered.
Stella Academy had countless ghost stories.
With a history of over a hundred years, countless unusual and extraordinary mages who could leave their marks on history had passed through it, and since the campus itself was as vast as a decent small city, it was practically impossible for ghost stories not to arise.
Some of those ghost stories were so absurd and unrealistic that they could be dismissed as pure nonsense, but if one were to count on one hand the few ghost stories students truly believed might be real, then one of the most representative would undoubtedly be the “7th Main Tower Ghost Story.”
※ There is no 7th Main Tower at this academy.
※ If, while passing through the corridor between one main tower and another, you accidentally enter a main tower marked with the number 9, immediately turn back and leave at your usual pace.
[In that case, even if you hear a female student calling you from behind, ignore it.]
※ If, in the corridor of the 4th Main Tower, a student in a white uniform walks ahead of you, do not follow. There is no white uniform at this academy.
※ Do not cross from the 6th Main Tower through the 3rd Main Tower at midnight.
[If, while passing through the 3rd Main Tower, you happen to find a stained mirror, avoid looking at it.]
[If by mistake you make eye contact with yourself in the mirror, close your eyes immediately, count to 100, and pass through. Nothing will happen.]
…Huu.
There were more than ten Napolitan-style ghost stories related to the 7th Main Tower alone, so it was obvious just how much interest the students had in them.
Naturally, none of them had ever been proven true. It was said that even when students who had grown up hearing the 7th Main Tower ghost stories while attending the academy became professors decades later, they still had never once seen the 7th Main Tower.
But every few years, there would be some student who claimed to have entered the 7th Main Tower, started spouting incomprehensible nonsense, and then dropped out, so the ghost story never showed any sign of disappearing and was reignited anew every year.
‘Could it really exist?’
‘No way. The headmaster publicly announced that it doesn’t.’
‘Right, but isn’t it even more suspicious that the professors keep telling people not to mention it?’
‘True.’
As was always the case with ghost stories, the topic would quickly shift and be forgotten without the truth ever being revealed.
But Flame paid attention to this 7th Main Tower ghost story, which had recently begun stirring up again. Because through the original romance-fantasy story, she already knew the truth behind that ghost story.
“It’s just a rumor…”
Anella looked at Flame, who was investigating the 7th Main Tower, with a deeply skeptical gaze. The frightening aura she had first shown was nowhere to be found, and watching her chase after ghost stories and rumors like this made her feel like nothing more than an ordinary girl.
…Though, whenever Flame manifested Radiance Magic, Anella’s legs still went weak, but that was that and this was this.
“Yeah, it’s just a rumor. But then why is it suddenly spreading like this lately?”
A week had passed since the interschool tournament ended, and now that it was summer, scary-story specials had become popular around the school.
So wouldn’t it be perfectly natural for one more Napolitan-style ghost story to become popular too?
But the 7th Main Tower ghost story was unusual in that its source was unnaturally distinct, and it had spread far too widely.
As if someone wanted the students to become interested in the 7th Main Tower.
Flame knew why, but she didn’t bother explaining it to Anella. Revealing the truth already would be like telling someone the ending before the “beginning” in the beginning-development-climax-conclusion structure had even started.
‘Still, it definitely exists.’
In the original romance-fantasy story, it was Professor Meizen Tiren who deliberately spread the rumors of the 7th Main Tower.
But with her gone now, there should have been no reason for those rumors to exist—and yet the story of the 7th Main Tower was thriving this strongly anyway…
which meant that there was, with one hundred percent certainty, someone else who had replaced Meizen Tiren.
So all they had to do was find that person.
Fortunately, Anella was with her, and since Anella could distinguish other Black Mages, even if the culprit was a Black Mage who had never appeared in the original romance-fantasy story, identifying them should still be possible.
They just had to narrow down the people who had spread the rumor, then have Anella confirm whether they were Black Mages or not.
If they could do that, game over.
They would be able to prevent one of the worst incidents—the ‘7th Main Tower Black Corrosion Incident’—before it even happened.
“…So you really think one of the professors is the culprit?”
“I’m not totally sure. But we’ll investigate first, and if it’s not them, we pass.”
There was nothing unusual about a student going to see a professor.
Flame was an outstanding student, and since she possessed knowledge in a wide range of fields, it wouldn’t be strange even if she went to visit professors whose classes she didn’t even take and asked them questions about their subjects.
There were a lot of suspicious candidates.
So Flame planned to narrow them down by going to meet them one by one.
It was an incredibly primitive method, but as a student, it was the surest thing she could do.
“Then, shall we go!”
When Flame strode off confidently toward one professor’s research office, Anella trailed after her with a dead-tired expression.
And then,
from the opposite side of the corridor, someone who had been secretly watching Flame from afar quietly moved.
He stared for a long time at the research office Flame had entered, then turned away with steps heavy with lingering attachment.
No trace remained in the place where someone had stood.
Only silent stillness hovered there.
