Chapter 39
“Kim Hansol.”
“Yes.”
“Na Yeji.”
“Yes.”
“Noname.”
“...”
“Noname? Is there no student named Noname in this class?”
* * *
“Ha Jiwon.”
“Yes.”
Why aren't they calling my name?
Even after all twenty students had been called, my turn never came.
When I counted the children sitting in the classroom, there were twenty-one in total, including me. But there were supposed to be twenty students.
There were four classes, from Class A to Class D, so I had roughly figured that the class with the fewest people in the hallway was probably mine and gone in.
However, I hadn't considered that some students might still be returning from the restroom, so my guess had failed.
I raised my hand and decided to ask the homeroom teacher of Class D honestly.
“I think I came to the wrong class. Could you tell me which class I'm in?”
“What's your name?”
“Noname.”
“Let's see.”
The teacher checked the entire grade's roster on the electronic device connected to the lectern.
“You're not in Class A... or Class B. Then Class C... no, you're not here either. Student, what was your name again?”
“No. Na. Me.”
I pronounced it clearly again, one syllable at a time, but the teacher still tilted their head in confusion.
“That's strange... Is it a computer error? I can't find you no matter how I look. Do you happen to remember your examinee number from the entrance exam?”
“Entrance exam? I transferred here.”
What even was an examinee number?
“What grade are you in?”
“Second year... Isn't this the right classroom?”
“This is First-Year Class D.”
Silence fell.
I glanced at the girl beside me, who had been sniffling with a runny nose until just moments ago,
and then at the boy behind me, who had been hiding there and happily playing a game of eating eraser shavings by himself.
Yeah, this didn't make any sense.
These children were second-years like me?
I almost started missing Professor Cheon, with whom I had been discussing the consistency of the Peano axioms and Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory as recently as yesterday.
They were elites selected through a rigorous screening process, so perhaps I should be grateful that I didn't have to worry about the nation's future just yet.
I hurriedly shouldered my bag and asked which class I should have been assigned to in the first place.
“You're in Second-Year Class A. It's in the building across from here, so you'll have to head toward the skybridge. Can you find it by yourself?”
“Just tell me roughly how to get there.”
It was only natural that I was out of breath after climbing up and down stairs and running all over this building and that one in a body that was already lacking in stamina.
I sat on the stairs for a moment and moistened my throat with a sip from the potion I had carefully stored in my schoolbag.
“Ha.”
Was his name Sihoo?
Apparently, he had taken me for a first-year.
I was glad to help, but I had never imagined I would be put through this because of it.
[Second-Year Class A]
After an arduous journey, the sign marking the end of my search swayed in the wind.
The chilly March wind was sweeping through the hallway, so I closed the window.
I hope I got it right this time, at least.
Rattle, rattle. Rrrattle.
Why were electronic devices and transportation so cutting-edge while classroom doors were still sliding doors?
The creaking door began to open, then caught halfway and rattled.
My plan to quietly enter and take an empty seat vanished without a trace, and everyone's attention instantly focused on me.
“Student Noname?”
“Yes.”
“You're very late.”
“I'm sorry.”
“Go sit in an empty seat for now.”
Already fifteen minutes late, I didn't bother making excuses.
Though the delayed roll call in the first-year classroom had certainly contributed.
A familiar figure by the window waved toward me.
“Hey, hey! Hi, Name!”
Seori blinked her bright blue eyes, round and alert like a deer's.
She must have been very happy to see me again after so long.
But another child had already claimed the seat beside her, so I had no choice but to search for another empty seat.
* * *
“Hello?”
“Ah... yeah, hello.”
Sihoo answered Noname's greeting awkwardly.
Sihoo had thought that by arriving in class on time and not ignoring his junior's predicament, he had fulfilled the role of an exemplary senior.
[That's a name I've never heard before.]
[Noname? I guess that's the transfer student's name! She's in our class!]
[Oh, really?]
However, when her name came from the homeroom teacher's mouth, he realized the mistake he had made.
She wasn't a first-year, but a second-year like him.
By the time he saw her again fifteen minutes later, she looked even more haggard than before.
“Can you tell me what the announcements were?”
“Oh, I wrote them down here...”
“Okay, thanks.”
Sihoo showed her the notebook containing the notes he had taken.
While Noname copied them down, Sihoo furtively studied her with curiosity.
Before spring vacation began, Sihoo had been one of the people who had heard about the transfer student's identity from Seori.
He had heard that she had knocked down every upperclassman with a single wave of her hand, or that she had created a fourth-circle spell on the spot through direct casting instead of writing it out.
He was simply curious how much of those absurd rumors was actually true.
She looked so small and fragile, though.
Given Han Seori's personality, he honestly thought there was a ninety-percent chance it was all boasting—ninety-five percent, even.
A second-year elementary school student wielding a fourth-circle spell was just as ridiculous as the rumor that the transfer student was a spy raised by an anti-government criminal organization.
What century were they living in?
“Here, I'm done.”
Noname finished taking notes and returned the notebook to Sihoo.
There had been quite a lot to write, yet she had finished in no time.
“You write really fast.”
“Shorthand is a mage's life. A mage with slow hands is the first to die on the battlefield.”
“Isn't that a little extreme?”
Dying because your hands were slow.
Wasn't that far too unfair a cause of death to put on a gravestone?
“You really think so? I've seen it happen plenty of times.”
“...?”
“Do people usually draw magic circles with their fingers? The human field of vision is only 140 degrees. It's even narrower when you're concentrating, like when you're drawing a magic circle.”
“So?”
“If someone goes behind you and strangles you with a cord before you finish casting, it goes like this.”
With a cute little squawk, the girl's tongue shot out.
Sihoo dismissed her words as an absurd delusion.
“If a wizard thinks they're about to be attacked, they would stop casting too.”
“Then you just make the incomplete magic circle run wild. If it's third-circle or higher, it'll cause at least second-degree burns.”
Their face would pop and melt away.
What a creepy thing to say.
Sihoo decided to stop paying attention to the girl.
Nothing was more absurd than discussions about combat magic.
It was the field where practice and theory differed the most, so there was no particular benefit to talking about it like this.
The homeroom teacher was enthusiastically explaining the second-year class schedule.
Most of the important details, such as how textbooks would be distributed, where the lockers were, and the dates of the midterms and finals, were things he already knew.
In the first place, the subjects taught in second year still didn't go beyond elementary-school level, so there wouldn't be much difference from first-year life.
There were no proper magic-practice classes outside of creative activities or club time, after all.
However, perhaps the general announcements about academy life in the second year had bored Noname, because the sound of her tapping her notebook with a pencil was really starting to grate on him.
‘Is she doodling or something?’
His eyes drifted toward her notebook at the sound circling in his ears, and he could only doubt his own eyes.
[Academy Invasion Route]
Her hand was clearly circling the word ‘invasion,’
[Kidnapping]
and he couldn't ignore the word ‘kidnapping’ written beside it, either.
“Why?”
“No! Sorry.”
Sihoo hurriedly looked away from Noname's eyes.
‘Really? Was it true?’
Was this girl a spy for a criminal organization?
Or how else was he supposed to explain what he had just seen?
Invading the academy. Kidnapping someone.
A suspicion began to grow in him that even her seemingly weak appearance might be a disguise.
“And today, a transfer student has joined our Second-Year Class A. Noname, could you come to the front?”
Noname casually closed the notebook she had been doodling in and stood up.
Her steps were light.
No, more than that—there wasn't a sound from her feet.
Come to think of it, she was wearing dress shoes rather than sneakers, yet it was strange that they made no squeak or click whatsoever.
“Could you introduce yourself to your classmates in Class A?”
The homeroom teacher looked at Noname with a pleased expression.
The girl began to speak.
“Hello, my name is Noname, and I transferred here from Arabyeol Elementary School.”
After giving the class a brief sweep with her eyes, she said in an utterly calm voice,
“I hope we can have a fun school life together.”
* * *
‘Do I have to clear it by myself next time?’
While playing World of Arseria with Laura, the story suddenly got stuck. I eventually discovered that entering Nightmare difficulty imposed a minimum age restriction of fifteen.
I wasn't affected by the restriction because I had never used an officially registered account, but Laura was completely denied access to the story.
In other words, it meant we had to start from the beginning again.
‘Should I just clear all the main quests myself and enjoy the side quests with Laura?’
We hadn't started playing with the goal of clearing the game in the first place. We had started it so I could teach Laura magic.
But once we actually played, the story turned out to be quite interesting, so we had poked around everywhere without a plan. I hadn't expected to run into an obstacle like this.
“I guess it'll be better alone.”