“I swore I would clean away any vermin that blocked my lord’s path.”
“You lowborn little bastard. How dare you put that person’s name in your filthy mouth?”
Shrrrng—! Kwang-kwa-gwang!
In an instant, the front plaza of the academy, Valhalla, became a miniature hell.
A blue Aura burst from the longsword of Ellara, the Empire’s youngest Sword Master, tearing through space as it shot forward,
while dozens of enormous ice spears summoned by Sylvia, the Witch of the North, drew arcs through the air as they rushed toward Lumen’s heart and throat.
“……!!”
The eyes of Lumen, the red-haired boy and protagonist of the original story, widened in horror.
No matter how much potential he possessed as the hero who would one day save the world, the current Lumen was nothing more than a greenhorn in his “growth period” who had just entered the academy.
It was impossible for him to block the combined attack of two already-complete, strongest-in-the-world-level monsters with his bare body.
‘Shit! They’re really trying to cut him down!!’
Standing with a cane instead of in a wheelchair, I felt a chill run down my spine.
If Lumen died here, who was going to defeat the Demon King later? The main story of this novel was in danger of evaporating in the plaza before even chapter one could begin.
On top of that, a bright red system window was flickering madly before my eyes.
[Warning! The flow of fate has been severely distorted!]
[A core character of the original story (Lumen) is in danger of dying. If he dies, this world’s sustaining force will decrease by half, and your survival probability will converge to 0%.]
[Condition: Control the situation while maintaining “the arrogance of a villain”!]
“Stop, you crazy bitches!!”
Squeezing the shout out of my ripping chest, I slammed the tip of my cane into the marble floor.
Taang—!!
The moment my hoarse voice rang through the plaza, Ellara’s longsword stopped a mere one centimeter from Lumen’s Adam’s apple.
Sylvia’s ice spears, too, froze in midair while surrounding Lumen’s entire body, trembling just shy of piercing his skin.
“Ku, huck……!”
Lumen couldn’t even breathe. Drenched in cold sweat from head to toe, he was on the verge of collapsing to his knees. If I had been even one step late, the protagonist’s head would have gone flying like a fountain.
“My lord?”
Without lowering her sword, Ellara looked back at me with a dissatisfied expression.
“Why do you command me to stop? He is a rat who insulted you, my lord. I should immediately tear out his tongue and make him lick the marble floor……”
“Ellara.”
Swallowing down the blood that had risen to my throat, I cut her off as low and coldly as I could.
Twisting my pale, blood-wiped lips upward, I cast a disdainful glance at Lumen.
“……I have no wish to dirty the fangs of my precious hound on trash like that.”
At my words, Ellara’s silver-gray eyes trembled violently.
“Precious hound.” With those single words, the delusion circuits in her head began to spin wildly once more.
(Ellara’s automatic brain translation)
‘Ah……! My lord does not even wish for my blade to be sullied by the blood of such a lowly creature.
He personally stopped me to prevent me from killing someone before this crowd, violating the academy’s rules, and receiving punishment!’
“……I shall keep that in mind.”
With an enraptured expression, Ellara withdrew her longsword and bowed deeply to me.
Next, I lifted my chin toward Sylvia, who still had ice spears suspended in the air.
“The same goes for you, Sylvia. The heir of the Kraus Magic Tower playing with ice against some commoner kicking up dust in the street? How undignified.”
“What? Playing?”
Sylvia frowned. But when she noticed my pale complexion and the fingertips that were trembling faintly because I had forced myself to shout, she soon bit her lip.
(Sylvia’s automatic brain translation)
‘You idiot. You’re pushing yourself again. Even after coughing up blood when the carriage shook,
you still forced your voice out just to stop us from causing trouble on the first day of the academy and falling out of the Imperial Family’s favor.
What am I supposed to do with this stupidly noble villain?’
“……Fine. If you hate the smell of blood that much, I’ll hold back just this once.”
When Sylvia snapped her fingers, the dozens of ice spears surrounding Lumen shattered like snowflakes and scattered into the air.
Only then did Lumen drop to his knees with a thud and gasp for breath.
“Haa, haa……!”
The hundreds of students filling the plaza were as silent as mice.
They had fallen into panic, unable to understand the bizarre situation that had just unfolded before their eyes.
Kylan, who under normal circumstances should have been at the very front tormenting and mocking Lumen, had instead stopped the sword dance of the two geniuses protecting him—Ellara and Sylvia?
And on top of that, those two arrogant, ice-cold women had withdrawn their killing intent obediently at a single word from Kylan, as if they were trained hunting dogs?
“Is… is that really Kylan……?”
“I heard he was half-dead from poison, but what on earth happened in the duke’s house? Why is that ice witch listening to Kylan?”
As the students’ murmurs grew louder, Lumen, who had been sitting on the ground, staggered back to his feet.
His red hair seemed to ripple with rage.
“……Kylan Del Rothschild.”
Lumen glared at me with bloodshot eyes and shouted.
“What kind of despicable trick did you use?! Senior Ellara, who once had noble pride, and Lady Kraus, the pride of the North……
What filthy magic are you using to control them?!”
This is driving me insane.
If I saved that bastard, he should be thanking me. Why was he suddenly treating me like some fallen Demon King who brainwashed his companions?
Before I even had a chance to answer, Sylvia snorted coldly.
“Control? I suppose that’s about the limit of a commoner’s brain. We are simply staying by my fiancé’s side of our own will. It’s not something a nobody like you has any right to babble about.”
Ellara, too, growled with her hand on the hilt of her sword.
“Do not insult my loyalty with such a filthy word. If you bare your teeth at my lord one more time,
I will tear your limbs off and hang them from the plaza fountain.”
Lumen’s face became stained with despair and deep hostility.
His gaze passed over the two women before finally fixing on me.
“You coward. From beginning to end, you’re trash who can’t do anything on your own. How long do you plan to keep hiding behind other people’s backs?!”
Lumen’s provocation.
If I remained silent here, I would be judged as a “pathetic villain hiding away,” and the system penalty would come flying.
Swallowing a sigh inwardly, I leaned on my cane and slowly approached Lumen until I was right in front of him.
Even as I walked, my heart ached as if it were burning up, but my face maintained a cold, perfect expressionlessness.
“……Hiding?”
I brought my face close to Lumen’s ear and whispered in a low, sinister voice.
“Do not misunderstand, brat.”
“……!”
“I am not hiding. I am merely watching. Watching how far you will crawl along the bottom of this academy and struggle.
Watching how miserably you will collapse on your own, without my toys even needing to step forward.”
I tapped Lumen’s shoulder with my cane and sneered.
“Be grateful you were lucky enough to keep your life. Until that paltry sense of justice of yours truly entertains me…… I will let you live for the time being.”
[Status: You have proven “the dignity of a true mastermind”! Penalty exempted.]
[Original protagonist “Lumen”’s hostility toward you has increased by 500%.]
Fuck, why are you telling me his hostility went up by 500%?!
After hearing my words, Lumen clenched his fists so tightly they began to bleed.
In his eyes were pure murderous intent toward me, and the fiery resolve unique to shounen manga protagonists—an oath to rescue the two women from my clutches(?) no matter what.
“I’ll make you regret this, Kylan. The day your arrogance is shattered into pieces will definitely come.”
“I shall look forward to it.”
As if it were of no concern to me, I turned away and gestured to Ellara and Sylvia.
“Let’s go. Listening to vermin squeal for too long is giving me a headache.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Fine, Kylan. Don’t overdo it.”
As hundreds of academy students parted like the Red Sea, I strode leisurely toward the academy’s main building, accompanied by two absolute beings.
Behind me, Lumen’s furious gaze stabbed into my back like a blade, but the relief that I had survived today was greater for the moment.
However, that relief of mine was smashed to pieces the moment I arrived at Dragon Hall, the academy’s highest-grade dormitory.
“What do you mean? The rooms on both sides of mine…… have already been assigned?”
The housemaster of the top-grade dormitory was sweating buckets as he alternated glances between me and the two women standing on either side of me.
“W-well……. Originally, the rooms on either side of Young Master Kylan’s were reserved for other high-ranking noble male students, but just now, Sir Ellara and Lady Sylvia…… forcibly changed the assignments.”
“What?”
When I turned my head in disbelief, Sylvia folded her arms and spoke proudly.
“There’s no law saying a fiancée can’t use the room next door just because it’s the male dormitory, right? I paid them ten times the room fee and drove them out, so there shouldn’t be any problem.”
“In order to protect my lord from assassins in the night, I, too, have been assigned the room on the left.
The dormitory wall appears somewhat thick, so if you wish, I intend to break it down and install a door so I may head directly into your room at any time.”
Ellara calmly announced her plan to commit sabotage against the dormitory.
“Hey, you insane……!”
Feeling dizzy, I pressed a hand to my forehead.
I had thought that if I came to the academy, they wouldn’t be able to monitor me the way they did at the duke’s estate. I thought I would at least be able to rest comfortably in the dormitory.
But these two guard dogs had smashed even the rules of the academy dormitory managed by the Imperial Family with money and force, then coiled themselves up on either side of me.
“Now, go in and rest, Kylan. I’ll come by at night to check your condition, so don’t lock the door.”
Sylvia patted my cheek and slipped into her own room.
“I shall also take my leave to prepare for guard duty. If anything happens, knock on the wall once. I will cut through it in a single stroke and come over.”
Ellara, too, gave a knightly salute and disappeared into the room next door.
Left standing there alone, I stared at the nameplate on the door to my dorm room.
This was not a dormitory.
The most extravagant and most suffocating “silver cage” in the world had been perfectly constructed in the middle of the academy.
Dragging my collapsing legs into my room, I quietly muttered,
“……Mom, I just want to go home.”
Day 1 of the terminally ill villain’s academy life.
Classes had not even started yet.