“Hmm… Your master. She’s rather cute.”
Ive murmured softly, her chin propped in her hand.
At the end of her gaze, the heavy door opened, and Yustia walked out.
“Mr. Taesan! You came?”
A faint glow of delight spread across Yustia’s face when she spotted me, but the moment she noticed the uninvited guest standing beside me, that smile froze cold.
It seemed that, with only the explanation she had heard from Yurika last night, she had immediately grasped who the person before her was.
“You must be Senior Ive.”
Yustia’s voice was as cold as midwinter frost.
“That’s right. Nice to meet you, Princess of Rosenhart.”
Unbothered by Yustia’s sharp attitude, Ive instead took a step closer with her characteristic languid smile.
“Don’t be so wary. I’m different from the other Imperial kids.”
She added with a shrug.
Yustia approached with quick steps and stood beside me.
Standing close enough for her arm to brush mine, her gaze remained fixed on Ive, upright and keen-edged.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Hmm… You refused Imperial’s invitation, didn’t you? So the others are firmly holding a grudge and have marked you as a target. But I’m not like that. I don’t particularly care whether someone joins or not.”
Ive answered smoothly, shrugging her shoulders with easy charm.
At the languid voice slipping from between those red lips, I felt the tension in Yustia’s shoulders ease ever so slightly.
“Still, I do have a certain standing within Imperial, and since you knocked Lucian down in one blow like that… He was a cute junior I’d been keeping an eye on, so his face has been utterly ruined. Which means I’m not exactly in a position to just sit back and watch.”
Ive let out an exaggerated sigh.
“You could call it an unfortunate situation where I have to properly humiliate you in front of everyone at least once.”
“What?”
Yustia’s eyes wavered.
The wariness that had softened just a moment ago sharpened again in an instant.
“Sorry. It can’t be helped. Still, don’t hate me too much.”
Ive burst into cheerful laughter.
“What is it you want?”
Yustia’s voice sank lower.
Her straight shoulders still held a keen tension, but her eyes flashed coldly, as if trying to discern the true intent behind Ive’s blatant provocation.
“Who knows? I don’t want anything from you.”
Ive shrugged fluidly.
“I’m simply moving for the sake of my own honor. If you bear the Rosenhart name, you understand what I mean, don’t you?”
For an instant, a heavy force entered her languid voice.
Honor. The face of the vast organization called Imperial, and the price for trampling on a junior she had cherished.
Yustia seemed to instinctively sense the cruelty contained in those words as well.
“Even so, there was no need for you to come all this way and explain it personally…”
When Yustia bit her lip and asked back, Ive’s eyes took on an amused gleam.
“Hmm… True, isn’t it? Still, let’s call it special treatment.”
Ive lightly waved a hand and smiled at ease.
“Hmm… True, isn’t it? Still, let’s call it the bare minimum courtesy as someone from a noble house.”
Ive gave one supple shrug, then turned lightly, her hair scattering behind her.
“Then I’ll see you next time. I’ll be looking forward to it.”
Click, click. Her high heels split the floor in a steady rhythm, leaving her path behind with distinct clarity.
“What does that mean?”
Watching her silhouette grow smaller and smaller, I muttered under my breath.
“It probably means exactly what she said. Since she even brought up nobility…”
Yustia’s cold voice reached my ear.
A sharp tension still lingered around her upright shoulders.
“Honor. It means that if I bear the Rosenhart name, there’s no way I wouldn’t understand its weight. I don’t know what family she’s from, but it’s a warning that, for the sake of saving face, she’ll make sure to trample me thoroughly on an official stage.”
Yustia began moving quickly.
The sound of her heels rang through the corridor with unusual sharpness.
“Please follow me, Mr. Taesan.”
“Where are we going?”
At my question, Yustia turned her head halfway back.
“The library. You said she attacked you in the park last night and then even treated you afterward, didn’t you? That’s a characteristic of spiritists who use poison. They call it setting a trap.”
Anxiety was mixed into her chilly voice.
“Before an official battle, they test whether their poison works on the opponent’s summoned beast. And by treating them perfectly afterward, they thoroughly conceal what kind of poison they use. We need information on the spirit that senior uses.”
Yustia’s eyes were already meticulously calculating the variables of the situation to come.
As if she had no intention from the start of dancing to the shallow trap her opponent had set, her steps headed toward the library without hesitation.
***
On the way to the library, Yustia suddenly came to a stop.
“Why? What is it?”
At my question, her gaze turned to the building on the right.
“The building on the right. As far as I know, that’s where the first-year poison-attribute professor is. We may be able to get help.”
“But is it all right to just visit him like that?”
When Yurika asked cautiously, a faint smile spread across Yustia’s lips.
“There isn’t a professor who dislikes a student with a strong desire to learn.”
I followed after Yustia as she strode forward.
Her confident steps cut through the cool air of the right-hand building’s corridor and stopped directly in front of a door.
Knock, knock—
The firm, regular sound of knocking rang through the hallway.
“Who is it?”
A dry, businesslike voice came from beyond the door.
“Good day, Professor. I am Yustia Rosenhart, a first-year student of the special class.”
Yustia’s voice was courteous and unwavering.
“Yes. Come in.”
Click. The doorknob turned, and through the gap of the opening door poured a space of pure white that seemed to sting the eyes.
The inside of the professor’s office was covered entirely in white.
From the floor to the ceiling, the desk and chairs, even the frames of the small pictures hanging on the wall.
In that glossy, smooth space, there was not a single speck of dust, not even one strand of hair.
Like an operating room where time had stopped, it was a space of fastidious purity where even breathing felt like something to be careful about.
“Lady Rosenhart. What brings you here?”
The professor in a white coat asked indifferently without taking his eyes off his documents.
On his desk, transparent glass bottles of unknown contents were lined up with not the slightest deviation.
“I would like to request a battle with you this Friday, Professor.”
At Yustia’s words, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut.
“W-wait. Is that allowed?”
When I asked from behind in confusion, the professor lifted his head from the documents for the first time and gave a faint smile.
“It is. In a way, it is the most natural and universal method. Students simply don’t come to me often, perhaps because of some pride of theirs.”
Unlike his stiff tone at first, a faint vitality now circulated in the professor’s voice.
“What are you curious about?”
“I would like your advice on the timing for deploying common defensive magic to counter your poison, as well as methods of turning the flow of mana against itself.”
Yustia continued her question naturally, her demeanor perfectly composed, as if she truly were a student preparing for a battle on Friday.
But beneath that question lay careful calculations meant to break through the unknown poison whose traces Ive had left behind.
“Hmm…”
The professor’s smile dimmed slightly.
“Isn’t that something you could ask Professor Raven? It is a common question with an answer, one already covered in class.”
As if his expectations had not been met, a slight disappointment colored the professor’s voice.
Just like his almost obsessively spotless space, his academic curiosity seemed to apply a sensitive and exacting standard.
“Yes. However, my summoned beast has an unusual constitution in which he possesses no mana whatsoever.”
With that answer, Yustia lightly pushed my back forward.
“Uh…?”
At her sudden action, a flustered sound escaped me before I knew it.
“Pardon?”
The professor, too, asked back as if he had not expected it, withdrawing his gaze from where it had been lingering over the documents and raising his head toward me.
His gaze slowly swept me from head to toe.
“Ah, so this is the famous human summoned beast.”
A subtle ripple stirred in his dry voice.
“You are more sturdily built than I had heard.”
The professor showed an interested smile, not a bitter one.
The academic ennui that had lingered in his eyes vanished without a trace, and curiosity toward a new variable took its place.
“I have heard that you possess absolutely no mana, but if that is true, then the very concept of ordinary defensive magic would not apply.”
He tapped one of the glass bottles neatly occupying his desk with a finger and adjusted his posture.
“Very well. If we are speaking of methods to slow the penetration of poison in a state devoid of mana, or to suppress it by using the body’s metabolic rate, then that is a different matter. The quality of the question has changed, Lady Rosenhart.”
The professor’s gaze was now fixed entirely on me, not Yustia.
Under that blatant, probing stare, the corners of Yustia’s lips lifted in a satisfied smile.
“A human susceptible to ordinary poison.”
The professor’s low voice, beneath his white coat, cut through the silence of the office.
His finger slowly stroked one of the transparent glass bottles on the desk as he continued, as if reciting a careful experiment.
“The moment it enters the bloodstream through the respiratory tract or the skin, the speed at which the body’s immune system collapses is beyond imagination. If he is a pure human with no mana, then he cannot form even the most minimal barrier to delay the poison’s progress. He would simply die defenselessly.”
The professor gazed indifferently at the clear liquid swaying inside the glass bottle, then turned his head back toward Yustia.
“Of course, knowledge regarding antidotes already overflows in the library and the apothecary. However, while such knowledge may save a person’s life, it cannot win a battle, can it?”
A strange, flashing light passed through the professor’s eyes.
He opened a drawer and, with a careful hand, took out a small herb.
It was a peculiar plant, with a fine silver powder held between leaf veins tinged with blue.
“This is Silvermoon Grass. It has the unusual property of preventing instantaneous poisoning and temporarily coagulating the spread of toxins absorbed into the body.”