Chapter 14
Chapter 14
'Ah, here we go again.'
Those damn terminal-stage intellectual bastards.
The guys who mistook this for the time to show off their refinement started slithering out one by one.
One student raised a hand with a solemn expression.
"It comes from across the whole world! The rain from heaven, the energy of the earth, and the harmony of the cosmos come together……."
A philosophical approach.
Müller's brow furrowed.
"What kind of ghost-chasing nonsense is that? My class isn't a philosophy lecture. Stop reaching for clouds."
"Ah……."
The student's face turned beet red.
Then the bespectacled student beside him stepped forward as if he had seized the chance.
"It arises from supply and demand! Because necessity exists, life force dwells in that land and grows into an inevitable……."
An economics-based approach.
"My class isn't economics either. Didn't I just tell you to stop reaching for clouds?"
Instant shutdown.
The mood turned cold in an instant.
The students were struck speechless.
Neither philosophy nor economics? Then what on earth was the answer?
The students started avoiding Müller's gaze.
Of course, I had already hidden behind a pillar and was staring off into the distance.
'Whatever you guys are thinking, I doubt it's any of them.'
Just look at that professor's getup.
A leather apron and dirt-caked boots.
Is that the outfit of someone who'd enjoy exchanging riddles?
She's obviously the hands-on type.
"No one? Is this really all the Academy—the place where the Empire's elite gather—amounts to?"
Müller clicked her tongue, looking disappointed.
Her gaze swept over the students, beginning to hunt for prey.
While everyone else was bowing their heads and staring holes in the ground to avoid her gaze.
Of course, I was the first to look down at the ground.
That's basic.
Hector, Elysia, and the other image-conscious characters kept their heads held high.
Yeah, you guys handle the tanking.
"Well now, you've all gone mute."
Viscountess Müller tapped the brim of her hat with her leather-gloved hand.
Her gaze swept over the students like a beekeeper searching for hornets.
"There seems to be a very famous person in our class. I've heard rumors that there's a freshman as famous as the Imperial Princess, too. Who might that be?"
Swish.
The students' gazes all turned to one spot at once.
Damn it.
I got petty and it came right back on me.
I slowly raised my hand, cursing 'damn it' in my head.
If I pretended not to know and stayed quiet here, I'd only end up looking even more like an attention-seeker.
"It's me."
"Oh? So you're that famous one?"
Müller’s eyes sparkled with interest.
I heard muffled snickering beside me.
Glancing sideways, I saw Elysia covering her mouth behind her fan, her shoulders shaking.
That villainess must think my misfortune is some kind of stand-up comedy.
"What is your name?"
That disgusting professor habit of memorizing names.
"I'm Cassian del Farne."
"Good. Then let me ask you, student Cassian: where do medicinal herbs come from?"
Again, that question.
A question that reeked of a trap, still all riddle-like despite her saying it wasn't philosophy or economics.
The students were loading up their sneers, faces saying, 'What would that barbarian know?'
I clicked my tongue, looking down at the dirt floor.
Let's just give some answer and be done with it.
Wrong or not, it didn't matter. I'd already been humiliated beyond saving.
"From its own life force."
"……."
Silence.
The students' expressions all soured at once.
'What kind of middle-school edgelord line is that?'
'Life force? As expected of a barbarian, his way of thinking is simple and brutish.'
But Viscountess Müller asked another question.
"Life force, huh. Could you explain that in a little more detail?"
This is so fucking annoying, seriously.
I scratched the back of my neck and spilled it all out.
"Soil fertility isn't infinite. Most people don't know that, but what are medicinal herbs, really? They're basically things with absurd energy packed into their mass, which is why they produce such extreme medicinal effects, right?"
"That's right."
"There'd be no way that comes free. It's equivalent exchange. In fact, medicinal herbs suck up the soil's vitality that ordinary crops would slowly drain over three or four years, and gulp it all down in just half a year. They literally grow by gnawing away at the land's lifespan."
Murmur, murmur.
As my explanation went on, the students' sneers gradually turned to shock.
"Keep going."
Müller chimed in, sounding thrilled.
"That’s why wild medicinal herbs grow sparsely in the mountains, and if you want to farm them artificially, you have to dump in fertilizer and hire technicians to tear up the soil and raise hell. Otherwise the land dies and turns to stone."
"By that logic, couldn't you also say medicinal herb production ultimately comes from human labor?"
Müller teased as she asked the question back.
So you said it wasn't a philosophy question, and now you're slyly changing the wording?
She seemed determined to pin this on me and me alone.
"In the end, whether it's fertilizer or human technical skill, the focus is just on boosting the land's vitality."
I nudged the dirt with my toe.
"Those herb bastards are selfish, so as long as you give them vitality, they'll survive stubbornly on their own. There's no need to do anything special for herbs. Just set the table properly and they'll eat and grow by themselves."
A thoroughly realistic, farmer-like answer.
But to the noble students who had grown up like greenhouse flowers, it must have been a pretty shocking interpretation.
"Why does this barbarian know this?"
"Soil fertility? Fertilizer?"
Those are the things that go into your mouths, you idiots.
Ignorant fools who don't know the worth of farming. Tsk, tsk.
Then it happened.
"Hahahahaha!"
Viscountess Müller burst into hearty laughter from deep in her belly.
She clapped her leather-gloved hands.
Clap, clap, clap!
"I never thought there'd be a student who'd get the right answer before class even started. That question I just asked was actually the essay question on this semester's final exam."
"……What?"
"You've grasped the essence perfectly. That's right. The fundamentals of herbology start with understanding the soil, not the herbs."
Ah.
I did it again.
I should've just pretended not to know.
My mouth really is a jinx.
I swallowed a deep sigh and turned my head.
Please, just let this be the end of it.
I don't want any more attention.
But as if mocking my wish, Viscountess Müller drove the final nail in.
"I suppose I'll have to give Cassian an advantage."
Huh?
No, stop.
"An A+ for this semester is guaranteed."
Swoosh—
In an instant, the greenhouse air plunged below freezing.
'Ah.'
Murderous intent gushed from the students' eyes.
I was furious enough to go insane.
'No, I didn't ask for it! You gave it to me yourself, so why the hell are you taking it out on me!'
As the mood grew nasty, Viscountess Müller wiped the smile from her face and turned serious.
She let a chilly glint shine beneath the wide-brimmed hat.
"Do you think that's unfair?"
"……."
"Then let me ask you this. If I had given you this problem six months from now, do you think you would have been able to answer it by seeing through the essence like student Cassian did?"
The hall went so quiet it was as if cold water had been dumped over everyone.
"What I want to teach in this class isn't bookish nonsense, but living knowledge. If you've got a complaint, leave now. I won't stop you."
Viscountess Müller’s charisma, no, her sheer presence, overwhelmed the students.
That old lady really has insane presence.
She nodded in satisfaction, then winked at me.
"Next time, I'll make sure student Cassian gets a separate reward apart from the grade as well. I don't know what to give you, so I'll provide whatever you decide on."
"……."
Ah, damn it.
So I'm getting called in again.
A vampire professor who shows up all dolled up in full makeup in the morning, and a Seongsu-dong-style hipster professor in the afternoon.
"Yes, understood……."
Right after I answered.
Clunk, clunk!
From the far side of the greenhouse, I heard the heavy rumble of wheels.
Burly men who looked like Academy servants were groaning as they dragged in an old cart.
Along with that rough sound came a familiar smell that brushed my nose.
The smell of rain-soaked soil.
And the tang of rusted iron.
"……."
My pupils trembled as if an earthquake had hit.
Those beautiful forms jutting up from the cart.
A sharply honed plow, a shovel caked in dirt, a pitchfork and a hoe with polished, worn handles.
They were farming tools.
'Ah……'
To think I'd see this at the Academy.
The scent of home.
My chest swelled with a sense of grandeur.
At that moment, another fragment of the original novel sleeping in my head surfaced.
[Viscountess Müller.]
[The herbology professor, and the 'crazy old lady' who forced nobles to plow fields.]
Clang!
"Now, listen up."
She declared this to the students, who were panicking and buzzing in confusion.
"As I said, herbs come from the land. They don't grow just because you twirl a pen around at a desk."
She grinned.
"Therefore, there will be no classroom lectures for the entire semester."
"What?"
"Huh?"
"Every week at this time, you'll gather here and grow medicinal herbs yourselves. Don't you think touching soil and working up a sweat will give you at least some sense of where herbs come from?"
"That's ridiculous……."
"Us…… pretending to be farmers?"
The noble students' faces turned pale.
To young ladies who found getting dirt on their dresses horrifying, and young masters who had never lifted anything heavier than a sword, this was no different from a bolt of lightning out of a clear sky.
But Viscountess Müller was ruthless.
"I won't accept complaints. And we don't have time, so we'll get straight into group assignments. Pair up as I call your names."
She unfolded the roster.
"Group 1…… Group 2…… Group 3……."
Please.
Please, let me be paired with some ordinary extra #1.
Please.
"Group 4."
Viscountess Müller’s gaze skimmed past me.
"Cassian del Farne. And."
And?
"Elysia von Rosenberg."
'What the fuck?'
I nearly shouted the curse out loud.
The surroundings instantly went dead silent.
At the same time, a murderous aura was rising from far away.
It was Hector.
He looked like he was about to sprint to the cart, snatch up a shovel, and smash my head in with it any second now.
If you're that jealous because you like her, then just confess to her already.
You coward who can't even confess, why are you taking it out on me?
I didn't bribe anyone or rig this, so why are you blaming me?
I turned my head to look at Elysia.
She was covering her mouth with her fan, smiling at me with her eyes curved into crescents.
Twirl, twirl.
She looked like greenhouse practice was more fun than watching the circus.
I'm in goddamn agony.
What the hell is making her so happy?