Chapter 112. You’ll Have to Draw Your Sword
Piiiik! Piik!
Breakfast No. 1, seen after a long time, had put on a lot of weight.
“I heard it from the Third. So—you dealt with Destrow, did you?”
Headmaster sunbae looked quite gaunt.
I looked back and forth between Breakfast No. 1, whose scruff I had in my grip, and Headmaster sunbae, and then suddenly had this thought.
Could it be that familiars live by sucking down their master’s vitality?
Otherwise, there’s no way Breakfast No. 1 would have gotten this fat.
I let go of Breakfast No. 1—who was as plump as a chicken raised at home—and sat down on the sofa.
Bwek! Bwek!
Breakfast No. 1 glared and pecked at me with dagger eyes, but it was ridiculous.
Peck all you want. Like you can pierce my barrier.
Of course, it wasn’t like it wasn’t annoying, so I flicked its forehead hard with my finger.
Kkwaek!
Leaving Breakfast No. 1 sprawled on its back, I looked at sunbae.
“Yes, what was that again?”
“…….”
Sunbae’s eyes went dim.
Breakfast No. 1’s eyes went dim, too.
In the middle of this, the only one still clear was me, so in a way, I was the strongest one here.
Anyway—
“…I heard it from the Third. That you dealt with Destrow.”
“Ah, yes.”
The “Third” seemed to mean the Grand Duchess.
“Right.”
“Yes.”
“…….”
“…….”
An awkward silence flowed between us.
What is it with this guy? He sends Breakfast No. 1 to summon me, and now he’s quiet like a sack of barley set down somewhere.
“Uh, ahem. Hm. But it looked like you had companions?”
“Did you hear that from the Grand Duchess too?”
“No. I saw.”
Headmaster sunbae glanced sideways at Breakfast No. 1. Only then did I remember that Breakfast No. 1 was Headmaster sunbae’s familiar.
“People you met in the great forest?”
“Yes. I picked them up.”
“…Picked them up?”
“One I picked up, one I reeled in.”
The one I picked up was Shine. The one I reeled in was Raileigh.
But since Headmaster sunbae didn’t know the whole story, he blinked both eyes like he couldn’t quite understand my words.
Ah, and for the record, I dropped those two off at a decent inn before meeting Headmaster sunbae. Bringing two people over the wall would’ve been a bit much.
But why is it?
Another awkward silence. This time, I was the one who spoke first.
“You’ve got something you want to say, don’t you?”
“Hm?”
“Stop circling around it, and if you’ve got something to say, say it cleanly. It’s obvious your mind is somewhere else.”
“Grrh… is it that obvious?”
It was.
The Headmaster sunbae I’d figured out was a lunatic, but he hadn’t lost his conscience.
Even when I left for the Hamelin Great Forest, look—
Those two eyes, rippling with mania, were worried—seriously… even mixed with a spoonful of guilt. Total chaos.
But now, with a junior who came back in one piece, he doesn’t even say “good work,” and keeps talking in circles—how could I not know?
“It’s just that… hoo.”
Headmaster sunbae let out a long sigh and put a cigarette to his lips.
Pajik. With a spark, smoke fluttered up. As the dull shimmer of fatigue wavered around his eyes, Headmaster sunbae opened his mouth not long after.
Even his gaze changed.
How should I put it?
Like our first meeting. You know—when he barged in out of nowhere and started talking about killing me and letting me live.
Headmaster sunbae, putting on a heavy air, lowered his voice and spoke.
“Junior. Let me ask you just one thing, honestly.”
“Are you only going to ask one thing?”
“…….”
I could see it. A thin streak of fluster in the flashing eyes. Tiny cracks spreading crick-crack through the seriousness pressed down everywhere.
But sunbae didn’t back down.
At this point, I couldn’t treat it lightly either.
“It’s not just one, but… there’s something I need to make sure we’re clear on.”
“Go ahead.”
“I heard it from the Third. I mean—what she saw when you faced Destrow.”
Sunbae’s serious voice again. When I met that gaze, I realized today’s conversation was an extension of that first day.
“By the Third’s account… she said it was a realm that far surpassed her.”
Yeah. It probably was.
I didn’t know from which part the Grand Duchess had watched the battle, but that day I reached transcendence (超越). Even so, the reason she held the heart to kill me and erase all evidence… was probably because she knew what state my body was in at the time.
Anyway.
I could even predict what sunbae’s next question would be.
The doubt about my existence that he’d kept slipping past until now.
‘So in the end… you can’t just let it pass?’
It was a moment I’d vaguely thought about, too.
Oberon and Riheim sunbae. And the Grand Duchess. I’d concealed my identity from those three, but Headmaster sunbae could still glimpse me through their testimony.
In fact, it was something I’d predicted from the moment I left for the Hamelin Great Forest that day.
“The Hall of Trials… I thought it was possible. I thought you were either an extraordinary genius, or you had your own circumstances. Your hand was cruel, but it was within a level I could accept.”
Yeah. It probably was.
“The realm you had in our first meeting… yes, I could understand it. And the magic you showed on the day you left for the great forest—I could understand that too.”
Yeah. It probably was.
The Hall of Trials.
If he made a hundred concessions, he could’ve let it pass. He hadn’t seen it with his own eyes—he’d only glimpsed traces.
The Hongok (紅玉) I unfolded for him the first time would’ve been the same.
But—
“Hoo…….”
Headmaster sunbae breathed out thick smoke. Or rather, it was closer to a sigh than smoke.
“But this time, I can’t let it pass without asking.”
His sunk gaze flashed.
“Who are you?”
“…….”
A faint smile formed at the corner of my mouth.
Schwartz stared hard at the boy sitting in front of him.
“…….”
There was no answer. Only silence. He said nothing, with a faint smile laid across his lips.
It was the opposite of their first meeting. No—Aster, as Schwartz had seen him, couldn’t be compared to any other time.
A bitter smile hanging at the edge of his mouth.
As stillness settled, Aster stored the half-mask he’d been wearing into Subspace.
But when his hand came back out of Subspace, it held a different mask.
The Sakwol Insignia.
“…….”
Aster held out the Sakwol Insignia.
Then his hand went back into Subspace again, came out holding the Semi-Royal Ticket.
Schwartz said nothing.
He only took in every bit of it.
His eyes were complicated.
Aster had called that gaze “the same as when we first met,” but in essence, it was different.
At their first meeting, Schwartz had tried to kill Aster. There hadn’t been a single coin’s worth of falsehood mixed in. But now?
The cigarette burning down—dull and pale, like white ash.
Hesitation.
In those wavering eyes, Aster’s faint smile flickered.
Aster looked at himself reflected in those eyes, then slowly erased his smile.
Schwartz’s suspicion was understandable.
Schwartz wouldn’t feel at ease. A junior who’d just returned from the jaws of death—after Schwartz himself had asked him for help—and now Schwartz was prying into his identity.
But this was Aster’s free will, purely.
Schwartz’s reward? The Lafiter Library? The desperate heart of a friend worried for another?
None of that moved Aster.
It was only the resonance of the Fire Seal (Hwain / 火印). That was what led Aster to the Hamelin Great Forest.
And as he’d already thought, it wasn’t like he hadn’t expected a situation like this.
Up until now, what he’d shown could be forced into the bounds of common sense one way or another—but what he’d displayed in the great forest couldn’t be forced to fit.
Defeating the Master of the Swamp, driving back Destrow—
No matter how unprecedented a genius, there was no one who had shown feats like that at Aster’s age. No—there were a few who could.
But those were all within the fence of prestigious houses (名家)—a blessed minority who built their realm through inherited bloodlines and overwhelming support.
In that sense, Schwartz’s suspicion was natural.
‘Maybe…’
Was it something raised systematically by some organization? Like an assassination weapon meticulously molded for some purpose.
The age he appeared to be? In the shadows, all kinds of bizarre magic rolled around—what would a mere outward appearance matter?
Of course, emotion said that couldn’t be.
The way he’d charged in ready to die right in front of him. The Hall of Trials. The shadow that somehow fell over his eyes whenever he mentioned that time. The ridiculous things he’d babbled at high tension about opening a library.
But what if—if there was even one suspicion in a hundred thousand?
Schwartz couldn’t just let it pass.
…And within Aster’s shadow.
Crimson eyes, like Hongok, shone with light.
“This stupid old man—has he gone senile?”
“…!”
Shine burst out from under the shadow.
Schwartz was startled. Aster wasn’t. Shine, eyes sharp as axes, glared at Schwartz.
“What? ‘Who are you’? Is that what you spit at the benefactor who saved your friend?”
I was going to let it go, but the more I thought about it, the more my blood boiled—I couldn’t just let it slide.
This crafty thing—what was she sneaking along to do again, following without being noticed—only to end up hearing this kind of nonsense and collapsing into it?
And that expression, too.
‘Like a headless dullahan…….’
That bitter smile.
“Y-you are…?”
Shine, dignified to the point of absurdity, planted one leg up on the table and spoke like she was making a proclamation.
“You asked about this body? I am Shine von Lehmann. The last descendant of House Lehmann (家), and the lord of the noble vampire lineage. Anyway, that’s not what matters.”
Having traveled together in the Hamelin Great Forest, Shine broadly understood why Aster had come there.
“Did you not send this one?”
“…….”
That way of talking—this bastard, that bastard. Who was “this one” and who was “that one” was obvious without saying it.
But Schwartz seemed dumbfounded and couldn’t open his mouth.
No—there was no chance to speak even if he tried.
“And then what—what did you say? You ask ‘who are you’ to someone who fought by burning up his own life and just came back?”
Rage surged up.
“Is that something you say to the benefactor who saved your friend? Truly—what you plant is what you reap; master and disciple alike are the same breed of wretches!”
That Grand Duchess with her rotten manners had been the same. So arrogantly overbearing. Like the whole world was nothing but her. If it were in my younger days, I would’ve torn her throat out in one go and taught her with her own body how wide the world truly is.
“That pathetic Destrow—huh? If this body were at that crafty bastard’s age, with one stroke—well, not one stroke, but anyway! Not knowing how wide the world is, and yet! How can you believe the world you see is everything!”
It was a truly majestic sight.
A twenty-year-old that had been twenty for two hundred years lecturing a fresh, white-haired old man about the world.
“What you should be saying to this crafty bastard isn’t ‘who are you’ and the like. You ought to bow your head and thank him and still not have done enough!”
And yet—what? What is it? How did it go?
Who? Whooo?
Cheng!
Shine’s sword revealed itself from its sheath. The tip aimed at Schwartz.
“I’ll give you one last chance. Offer this one a sincere apology and thanks. If you do not…….”
Killing intent (殺氣) stretched out sharp and pointed. Before that razor edge of momentum, Shine poured out a grand, roaring presence and finished her words.
“…Then you, too, will have to draw your sword.”
At that boldness, Aster stared at Shine as if bewitched.
Eyes trembling in tiny shakes. Emotion rippled. His mouth felt itchy, like words were crawling up his throat.
But Aster, with superhuman patience, swallowed the one line that had risen to the tip of his chin.
‘…Petty bastard.’
Telling a mage to draw a sword.
It was, truly, a magnificent state of mind.
