Episode 25: The Great Academy Seduction Operation (2)
"But oppa.
Will people really find it interesting to watch school life at the academy?"
To write Volume 2 of [The Genius Wizard of the Slums] as an academy novel.
While touring the grounds of the Royal Academy for location scouting,
a question laced with such doubt suddenly came from beside me.
"I went out of my way to bring you here because you said you were curious about what the academy you'll be enrolling in looked like, and all you can spout is such discouraging nonsense.
Hey! If you're going to be like that, go home!"
"No, I'm sorry about that but...
Isn't that right? If it were me, I think I'd just find it boring watching someone else study."
The one who had asked such a deflating question was my annoying genealogy mate, Rena, who was touring the academy with me.
It seemed that after imagining the school life she would be living from now on,
she had grown doubtful whether it would really be interesting enough to read as a novel.
"Ha! Academy fiction isn't about ordinary school life!"
To such a foolish younger sister's question, I immediately snapped back with a sharp retort.
"Agh...! I told you not to do this outside!
What if someone hears?!
You could just talk normally."
"Think of it as punishment for your nonsense.
Even your older brother here was embarrassed about who might overhear that nonsense, so let's call it even."
"What are you even saying, seriously.
It's not like I said anything weird.
Honestly, I don't think other people's school life would be that interesting."
"Well, I suppose you could have such doubts.
If it's truly just a list of completely ordinary school life, as you said, it wouldn't be particularly curious or interesting."
However, there was one thing this girl Rena had forgotten.
"What I'm trying to write isn't a school life diary, it's an academy novel."
"Ah."
Academy fiction.
If expressed a bit more blatantly, this genre that could be called fantasy-style school fiction.
The setting may be a school, but it's not a genre that actually shows ordinary school life.
'What academy fiction shows is an extraordinary school life.
In other words, all sorts of opportunities and events represented by various clichés.'
A secret space hidden beneath the school, and the opportunities or monsters hidden within it.
A system that encourages competition between students to an excessive degree.
Various large-scale events that one wouldn't think could be held by a mere school.
And enemies lurking and targeting the academy with suspicious persistence!
If this were an actual school,
incidents and accidents of unprecedented scale—the kind that would be archived on Ssagesage or Triwiki—are exactly the core of academy fiction, you see.
'To be completely honest, these events are far more important and carry more weight than the academy's original purpose of education.'
Ah, the curriculum is important too.
Not for the purpose of learning, but to reveal and emphasize the protagonist's genius.
You really can't tell if this is a school you came to actually learn from or a special forces training camp,
but everyone wants to skip boring class time.
Because this is how you can highlight the protagonist's specialness.
The prime of youth! Who wouldn't want to be more special than anyone else at the peak of their life?
"Therefore, I shall satisfy that need.
Rather than ordinary school life, I'll be writing a school life filled with incredibly dynamic and special events."
At my explanation that she needn't worry about it being boring,
Rena nodded as if in agreement, but soon asked again with a complicated expression.
"Uh... if it's like you explained, I'm sure it would be interesting. It seems like it would be interesting, but..."
"But?"
"Then isn't this some kind of scam?
The plan was to show people the novel you wrote and make them want to come to the academy.
But if they actually come to the academy, those events don't actually exist.
Then everyone would be disappointed."
"Hmm, you've hit the mark quite well this time."
Unlike the nonsense from earlier,
Rena's question this time was quite reasonable.
If one enrolled in the academy after being impressed by the novel, yet couldn't see any of the events from the novel,
'Ninjas who use ninjutsu with chakra don't actually exist!'
'If you get hit by a truck, you go to the hospital, not another world!'
Like having taken the red pill.
Naturally, some people might feel it's a scam.
Especially since the people of this world, unlike my previous life, still retain quite a bit of innocence.
There's more than enough possibility they might carelessly believe the academy is really like that.
Of course, one could roughly gloss over it by saying a novel is just a novel,
but since there are many nobles among the prospective students being targeted, making them feel scammed and dissatisfied
wasn't a particularly good method in the long term.
If they learned the truth, they might not come to the academy, or might drop out midway.
"I knew it, right? How do you plan to solve that problem?"
Elated that her point was correct this time, Rena began to press the question with a triumphant expression.
But little sister, you've overlooked one thing.
"Ehehe. Is that so? You think it looks like a scam?"
"W-what's with that laugh.
Then this is a scam, what else?"
"How foolish, little sister.
Just when did you get the delusion that those events don't actually exist?"
"What...? I mean, even while walking around like this now, I haven't seen any signs of them... wait, oppa, don't tell me?!"
"Yes, exactly what you're thinking!"
That the events from the novel don't exist in the real academy?
"If they don't exist, I'll just make them!!!"
Why do you think I'm personally inspecting academy scenery that I could just write from imagination?
This is all so I can smoothly remodel and link them to the events in the novel, by checking things in advance!
"If you're going to do it, you might as well do it properly."
"Oppa, are you really crazy? How on earth are you going to remodel the academy like a novel?!"
"Well, it's not difficult."
Something like remodeling the academy, if I borrow sufficient money, power, and the strength of magic,
I've already finished estimating that it's perfectly possible.
"Wh-what about the traditions the academy has maintained all this time?!
If you remodel it, there will definitely be parts that conflict with existing traditions!"
"The academy's traditions? I don't know about such things.
I'm an outsider who has never attended the academy, after all.
If we create and maintain them starting now, wouldn't that soon become the new tradition?"
You think not?
'Yeah, none of my business.'
I'm busy with my writing activities anyway, so I have no chance to attend the academy, which is why I don't care.
It's Rena, not me, who will personally experience the changed academy.
Later at home, I'll just pick out the best parts of the new academy life that Rena experiences.
I'll let my younger sister experience new traditions too.
You won't find an oppa like me anywhere, right?
"Just where is the academy I imagined going..."
Well, Rena seemed a bit flustered at the news that the academy would change drastically,
but even if she's like this now, once she reads the finished novel, she'll quickly change her attitude and like it.
Didn't she herself say it would be interesting earlier?
"All sorts of permits and negotiations are already finished.
During the vacation period, I'll release the book to gather incoming students.
And the academy will begin its large-scale remodeling."
In other words, from today, the Royal Academy will break away from being a boring, ordinary school.
It will be reborn as a true combat-oriented academy!
"What on earth have I done...?"
Having belatedly realized that a single word she had uttered had returned as an enormous snowball, Rena muttered as if her soul had left her,
but it's too late, little sister!
Your school life has been replaced with academy fiction!
Be grateful always!
***
Something people who aren't interested wouldn't know.
The Royal Academy did not operate year-round.
Both professors and students are human, so they need rest.
Especially since many students' hometowns were far from the capital,
there was a separate vacation period when the academy was closed so they could visit home.
Once in summer, and once in winter.
Though vacations had always occurred regularly like that,
this year's winter vacation was a little different.
"Goodness. What in the world is all this.
Nothing happened during summer vacation, so why are they doing such large-scale construction in winter?"
Eric, a professor of basic magic classes at the academy, grumbled like that as he entered his office.
Unlike students who returned to their hometowns for vacation, professors usually came to the academy even during vacation periods for personal research or preparing classes for the next semester.
Because it was quite noisy since they had suddenly started construction in the cold winter that they hadn't even done in summer.
Naturally, since construction like this should be done in warm summer for faster progress,
Eric, who had doubts about why they insisted on doing it in winter, inquired at the academy.
"-For the purpose of remodeling the academy.
Please refer to Author Wei's [The Genius Wizard of the Slums] Volume 2, soon to be released, for further details.-"
He had merely received such a cryptic official document.
"Well, I was planning to read it anyway.
But what on earth does [The Genius Wizard of the Slums] Volume 2 have to do with this construction?"
Though it was an incomprehensible situation,
since he had planned to read it from the start,
Eric, who had obtained [The Genius Wizard of the Slums] Volume 2 immediately upon release while feeling puzzled, opened the book.
"-What?! A freshman smashed the mana measurement device?!
What foolishness?! That's an item that can withstand even the mana of a 7th-Circle magician!-"
At the sight of the protagonist, Tian, who upon enrolling at the academy smashed the mana measurement device to pieces,
"Huh?! The academy?"
sensing something ominous in the flow, he let out a bewildered shriek.