Chapter 25
Seria had recently begun to think there was something strange about herself.
It had started a little while ago. Mainly when she was with Senior Ian, Seria felt a strange sense of security—an emotion she had never experienced before.
Other people had always been difficult for her to deal with. Human relationships were even more difficult than the academy’s baffling exam questions.
She had been unable to properly express her emotions or opinions since childhood. Even when she did, she was too honest and often made verbal blunders.
So she either said nothing at all or, whenever she did speak, was judged to be “rude.” She already knew all too well that people called her “Yurdina’s rude brat.”
She thought it didn’t matter. After all, the only thing that made her a Yurdina was the sword.
Before she knew it, Seria had begun to feel uncomfortable and afraid whenever she was with other people. Her growing isolation had been inevitable. Even so, along with a little loneliness, she had also felt a subtle sense of comfort in that situation.
Then, one day, a man strode into her daily life. It was Senior Ian.
Under normal circumstances, she would never have summoned such courage. His first impression had been terrifying, to say the least. Even now, whenever she thought of the merciless violence she had suffered that day, Seria’s body trembled.
But that was precisely why she could trust him all the more. He was a man as sharp as a blade, yet at times capable of showing a gentle spirit of mercy. Perhaps he could help her.
Help her seize her last chance to defeat her half-sister at the fast-approaching Hunting Festival.
To be honest, Ian had not surpassed her expectations.
He was an excellent swordsman, but by the academy’s standards, his skill was merely middle-of-the-pack. And they had spent little time together. He had not been able to give her any useful advice about swordsmanship.
However, he had given her plenty of other advice.
How to train, how to rest, how to talk to others, and how to express her emotions.
He freely told her countless things for her sake, and even when she said something rude or hesitated, he never said a word.
He simply waited patiently. He never even got angry.
For the first time, Seria felt that someone on equal footing with her understood her. And what had truly made her start thinking about him was swordsmanship practice.
When she was paired with him and heard him call her a “friend,” she had not really understood what it meant.
But when Ian took up his sword and rushed off in her place, and when she saw him battered and broken on Professor Derek’s back, she thought about it.
That was probably what a “friend” was. A relationship that transcended logic and reason.
To Seria, that relationship felt somewhat romantic. At the very least, the resolve Ian had shown that day had possessed such an aspect.
The sight of Ian battling desperately for her without caring whether he lived or died.
He had expected nothing in return, simply being prepared to die for her. It was the first time in her life that Seria had ever been treated that way. That was why her heart had begun to pound.
Somehow, Ian had started to occupy her thoughts. When she woke up in the morning, when she swung her sword, and even when she lay in bed at night trying to fall asleep.
Ian would occasionally come to mind. Was he safe? Was he in pain? Did he resent her?
She looked forward to seeing him, yet she was also afraid. She was worried that Ian might be angry.
She had lost count of how many times she had fidgeted in front of the temple. She wanted to see Senior Ian right away, but every time, she had to face someone else.
A beautiful girl with black hair. She had heard that she was Senior Ian’s closest friend.
Her name was Selin, if Seria remembered correctly. She went in and out of Ian’s hospital room several times a day.
And whenever she encountered Seria, her reaction was always the same.
She would scowl deeply and pass Seria with an icy expression.
It felt like a preview of how Ian might react to her, and Seria grew afraid for no reason.
The reason she had finally been able to gather her courage was entirely thanks to another man’s help.
That day, too, Seria was lingering in front of the temple when she encountered Selin. Selin reacted as she always did. But another person was standing beside her.
His brown hair suited his green eyes, and he had a somewhat pale complexion. Was he from the Department of Magic?
He had been laughing and chatting with Selin, but when he saw her expression suddenly change, he shifted his gaze to Seria. Without thinking, Seria lowered her head to avoid his eyes.
She was afraid. She was afraid he might react negatively toward her as well. Perhaps he was another one of Senior Ian’s friends.
However, the brown-haired man’s reaction was unexpectedly favorable.
“Hey, pretty lady over there.”
Seria had been biting her lips with her head lowered and did not realize he was calling her. It was only when she sensed someone approaching that she abruptly raised her head.
Seeing her reaction, the man chuckled and stroked his chin.
“Why do you loiter in front of the temple every day? I’ve seen you do it at least eight times.”
“Leto, ignore her and let’s go.”
Leto. That seemed to be the man’s name.
Perhaps Selin disliked the fact that he was showing interest in Seria, because she repeatedly tugged at the man’s coat.
But Leto did not budge. Seria fidgeted before finally managing to open her mouth.
“Ah, um, I… I mean……”
But those were words she could barely get out even under normal circumstances. There was no way Seria possessed the ability to respond to such a sudden situation. Her face grew hot with embarrassment.
Leto stared at Seria for a moment, then casually turned his gaze toward the distance.
“Come to think of it, are you ‘Seria’? Ian was waiting for a young lady by that name.”
“Hey, Leto!”
Selin suddenly shouted as though she could no longer stand it. Leto pretended to cover his ears with both hands and whistled. Seria stared at him with slightly startled eyes.
Selin’s body trembled. Grinding her teeth, she said,
“You… This is betrayal……”
“What do you mean, betrayal? And hey, don’t you feel sorry for Ian if he ends up with you? He deserves to have a choice too.”
“Ah, seriously!”
Selin and Leto bickered as they walked away, but Seria could not decipher the full meaning of their exchange. Only one thing remained in her mind.
Senior Ian had been waiting for her. Those words made Seria’s heart swell.
And when she met Senior Ian, he was as kind as ever.
For some reason, Seria could not bring herself to look him directly in the face. When he took her hand, her heart began to pound, and she thought she might have come down with an illness.
A soft, floating sensation. Yes, was this “friendship”?
It was a feeling she had never experienced before. Seria thought that perhaps having a “friend” was better than she had imagined. She was glad that she had met Senior Ian, even if it was only now.
Of course, not everything that had happened to her during that time had been good.
For reasons she did not understand, her image among the academy’s students had already worsened. Even the harassment that had once been discreet was becoming increasingly overt.
Then, one day, the harassment directed at her suddenly grew extreme.
As though she were sliding down a slide.
“Hey, that’s her. Her.”
“Oh, the second-year top student? But I heard she ran away disgracefully when she faced a magical beast.”
“You know Senior Ian, right? I heard he risked his life to protect her. Apparently he’s the real expert, while she’s just a useless screwup, a total screwup.”
They were jeers thrown out as though meant for her to hear, accusations that followed her like shadows whenever she passed by.
That much did not bother her. No matter how much they belittled her, it did not make Seria any less skilled. And, privately, there was a part of her that agreed with them.
Senior Ian’s skill was genuine. She had not realized it during their training, but the number of magical beasts he had dealt with that day made it obvious. He was far stronger in actual combat.
Seria tried to soothe herself by telling herself that she had to learn from him. For the sake of the Senior Ian she admired, she could endure any amount of criticism.
However, every now and then, even she was subjected to insults she could not bear.
“Hey, Yurdina’s rude brat is passing by.”
“Oh, the one who grew up without a mother?”
Seria’s steps came to an abrupt halt. Her eyes turned toward the source of the voice. A well-built man with golden hair and copper-colored skin stood there.
The voices of the other assorted riffraff chattered around him. Seria’s eyes sank into a chilly stillness.
It was in the dining hall. Seria had been carrying her tray to a table when he had thrown out the taunt beside her as though he wanted her to hear it. And he had chosen the most painful subject of all: her mother.
The emotion surging up within Seria was unmistakable hostility. But the copper-skinned man—Tean, a native of the Southern Kingdoms—merely curled the corner of his mouth in mockery.
“What’s wrong, Miss Yurdina? We’re just talking among ourselves. Is there something you want to say?”
Anyone could tell the mockery was aimed at her, but with no clear evidence, Seria had no choice but to bite her lips.
She spun around. She had decided that engaging with them would only cost her.
Seria’s mother was considered a disgrace even by House Yurdina. It was obvious that the family would deliberately ignore such mockery even if it heard it. Treating her mother as though she had never existed was precisely what House Yurdina wanted.
It filled Seria with an unbearably miserable feeling. Her body trembled faintly.
The giggling continued. Tean said sarcastically,
“Yeah, keep ignoring guys like us, just like you always do, okay? Oops.”
As he said that, he casually bumped Seria’s shoulder while passing by. Her tray nearly spilled.
Seria was startled and tightened her grip on the tray, but Tean’s group passed by one after another, each of them jostling her as they went. There was no way she could endure it. In the end, the tray overturned completely.
Seria shot Tean and his group a sharp glare. If only she had her sword, they would not even be worth her time.
But Seria was alone, and as soon as the overturned tray came into view, mocking laughter followed. It was not only the men. Recently, even the girls had joined in ridiculing Seria.
In the end, Seria could only grind her teeth and clean up the overturned tray. Fighting was forbidden inside the academy except during a duel. Any quarrel that could be dismissed as a mere “accident” had to be handled on her own somehow.
But Seria did not possess the ability to do that. The only thing she knew how to do was swing a sword.
This was the ecosystem of the academy, a jungle in its own way. It was a place where any weak creature, in one sense or another, was destined to be weeded out and cast aside.
It would not be wrong to call it a training institution wearing the disguise of an educational institution. Seria could do nothing but endure that miserable feeling.
But even that was different when she was with him.
At some point, the laughter mocking her abruptly stopped. The gazes watching her scattered in a hurry. As Seria stood there bewildered, a voice came from somewhere.
“Seria, long time no see. I’ve been discharged— What? Did you overturn your tray?”
Black hair, golden eyes, and even that calm voice.
It was Senior Ian. The moment he appeared, everyone stopped paying attention to Seria as though nothing had happened. More precisely, they were watching Senior Ian’s reaction.
The news of Ian smashing apart the magical beasts in the forest spread throughout the academy under the name of the “South Forest Magical Beast Massacre.”
As the story grew more exaggerated, Ian came to be known as a cold-blooded man who would not even blink if he decided to stab someone. Of course, that was because it had undergone a chemical reaction with the rumor known as the “Yurdina’s Rude Brat Half-Death Incident,” but Seria did not know those finer details.
She merely breathed a sigh of relief inwardly. Even the miserable feeling she had endured through gritted teeth melted away the moment she saw Ian.
As long as Senior Ian was there, surely everything would be all right. When he was present, all mockery and criticism directed at her vanished at once.
Ian naturally joined Seria in cleaning up the tray. As they gathered the spilled food, he asked her with worried eyes,
“Nothing’s going on with you lately, is there? No matter how you look at it, how does a swordsman lose her balance that badly?”
“……No, nothing’s wrong.”
To be precise, it was only because Ian had arrived.
Seria did not want to make Ian worry, so that was all she could say.
That was Seria’s ordinary daily life these days.
**
Giggling echoed through an alley. It was a mixed group of men and women. They all wore delighted expressions, as though they had recently found an entertaining target.
“So, hey, did you see that rude brat of Yurdina? She couldn’t say a word.”
“She can’t afford to make a fuss, that bitch… I told you, since she’s an illegitimate daughter, she won’t dare step forward if we bring up her mother. House Yurdina probably wants to pretend she doesn’t exist at all.”
“But it’s still House Yurdina. Is this really okay? What if that fourth-year Yurdina senior comes back……”
They had been giggling among themselves when one of the men cautiously raised the question. The woman who appeared to be the leader of the group shook her head as if to say there was nothing to worry about.
“Don’t worry. We can enjoy ourselves until then. To be honest, that Yurdina senior might secretly agree with us. A motherless bitch, acting as though she’s our equal despite her low birth……”
The painfully thin man standing beside the woman chimed in as though he agreed. He snickered.
“Yeah, actually, it’d be more frightening if it reached that third-year Senior Ian instead of Yurdina senior……”
“More?”
“More frightening! Haven’t you heard the rumors about him? They say he tears apart nobles and commoners alike. He’s so terrifying that he beat down ten high-ranking magical beasts… H-hieeek!”
The man had been excitedly continuing when a voice from behind forced him to let out a scream.
The faces of the group listening to him suddenly turned deathly pale, and they pointed behind him with frantic glances.
Standing behind them was a man with black hair and golden eyes. There was no one who did not know who he was.
He had recently become the hottest topic at the academy.
Ian Percus, one of the academy’s most notorious mad dogs.
The thin man’s eyes shook violently.
“Tell me in detail. What was it you said about Seria?”
“Ah, I-I, I, um, th-that……”
The group that had been chatting so cheerfully only moments ago all turned pale and looked away. They desperately avoided Ian’s gaze.
But that was not enough to make Ian stop questioning them. He merely crossed his arms and let his golden eyes sink into a profound chill.
It seemed another problem had arisen.