Chapter 48. Preparing for the Midterms (2)
The librarian broke up our fight and sat us down at a desk nearby.
She turned to Drener and asked,
“What’s the absolute rule of the library?”
“Do not cause a disturbance. Do not damage the books.”
“And yet you two were brawling, huh?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Well, I get it—boys at your age are bound to have scuffles. I thought you’d stop after a bit of roughhousing, but drawing your sword? And you started it?”
“I’m sorry……”
The librarian scolded in a low, controlled voice, but her anger still hadn’t cooled. She pressed her fingers against her forehead and let out a heavy sigh.
Drener cautiously spoke up.
“Um… I know this isn’t really the time to say this, but… why am I the only one getting scolded, when he was fighting too?”
“Because he’s the Empire’s number one troublemaker. Do you think he’d listen to me if I scolded him? Or do you want to start acting like a delinquent too?”
“No, ma’am……”
While Drener was getting chewed out, I stood a step behind, quietly smiling at the scene. The librarian shot me a glare.
“Are you laughing?”
“No, ma’am. Librarian, I wasn’t laughing.”
She looked like she was about to scold me too, but instead she sighed again and asked us both,
“So, why were you two fighting?”
“I found the book The Structure of Creation first, but he tricked me and—”
“Nonsense. I asked the librarian first and found it properly.”
“Ridiculous.”
Seeing us about to start bickering again, she let out another deep sigh.
“So, basically, you were fighting over one book?”
“If you put it that way… yes.”
“Enough.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She set the book down between us.
“As punishment, neither of you may check this book out. If you want to read it, do it here together. And if I catch you fighting again, you’re both banned from the library for a month. Understood?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
After the librarian left, we immediately glared at each other again.
For me, being banned from the library would be a huge loss. Aside from fire magic, I had to study everything in secret by self-teaching through books in the library.
Drener must have thought the same—it would be a loss for him too. We quietly opened the book.
We began taking notes, summarizing the important parts onto our own notebooks.
When I finished summarizing one page and tried to turn it, Drener stopped me.
“I’m not done yet.”
“Why are you so slow?”
“You’re just unusually fast.”
While writing, Drener asked me,
“So, why did you come to the library?”
“What do you mean? To study, obviously.”
“Don’t lie. You came to follow me, didn’t you?”
“Why are you making me into a stalker? And you keep saying everything I say is a lie—do you have any proof?”
“I have my suspicions.”
Wait, seriously?
“Like what?”
“First, you joined Ceres’s study group.”
Did I do something suspicious there?
“Even though you could already use 3rd-circle magic, you pretended to learn it from scratch.”
“No, I really didn’t know before.”
“When someone first uses a higher-circle spell, it causes pain. That’s because you’re engraving a new concept into your mana pathways. But when you first tried 3rd-circle magic, you showed no pain—you cast it smoothly, as if you’d always been able to.”
There was a detail like that?
Maybe because I got the skill first, I skipped the pain? Still, I couldn’t say that out loud.
“But Ceres didn’t seem to mind.”
“Don’t put Ceres in the same category as us. Geniuses like him are on a different level.”
“Then maybe I’m pretty talented at magic too.”
“You? Aren’t you the Empire’s biggest delinquent, and supposedly hopeless at magic?”
Oh, right—that was my “character setting.”
“That’s… because I’m a slow starter.”
“A… slow starter?”
“Yeah. I grow slowly at first, but once I hit a certain point, I grow rapidly. That kind of thing. Honestly, 1st and 2nd-circle spells didn’t hurt much either.”
“…I see.”
He looked doubtful but eventually nodded.
“Fine, let’s say that explains the first part. But the second, you can’t explain away.”
“What do you mean…?”
“During the dungeon raid tournament, when Professor Hazen appeared, we escaped with Ceres’s help. Afterward, I noticed someone passing by. I sent the others ahead and followed the trace alone. And in the middle of the forest… I saw you standing there.”
Oh, crap.
“Why were you there?”
The day of the dungeon raid tournament.
Drener’s team was in danger after Lidipin collapsed, but survived thanks to Hazen’s sudden appearance.
Just as Hazen instructed, they left the dungeon immediately, and after reuniting with Ceres’s team, they were teleported to the surface.
While Sonia and Ceres were talking, Drener sensed something.
His newly unlocked skill, I Shall Not Miss Evil (non āmítto mălum), let him detect traces of mana. Following his instincts, he left the others behind to investigate.
The aura he sensed wasn’t overwhelming, but strong enough to concern him. He approached cautiously and saw—
Van Astraea, leaning on his sword like a cane.
Not wanting to admit he’d used an aura-sensing skill, Drener adjusted his account when retelling it.
Hearing this, Van thought nervously, Did he really unlock [I Shall Not Miss Evil] already?
That skill was incredibly efficient at tracking mana, and with mastery, it could even analyze magic circles of lower levels. But since Drener was still a “newbie,” Van doubted it.
Still, the important part was that Drener had seen him near the crime scene.
Did he see me in disguise? Van wondered, then dismissed it—if Drener had, he would’ve asked why Van was disguised.
So, Van decided to mix truth with lies.
“After calling Professor Hazen, I went to help you all, but I felt something moving quickly deeper in the dungeon. I thought maybe the professor had missed something, so I went to check. There, a man in black robes had already defeated the intruder.”
“A man in black robes…”
Drener couldn’t confirm the truth, so he had no choice but to accept it.
“He left shortly after I arrived.”
Suspicion lingered in Drener’s eyes, but eventually he closed them and nodded.
“I see.”
Van finally felt relieved.
Still, Drener added awkwardly,
“Anyway… whether you knew it or not, I owe you my life. So… if you ever need help, tell me.”
Despite his brashness, Drener’s sincerity made Van laugh.
What a softhearted idiot.
Later, Van tried to tease him:
“Then during the joint tactics exam, go easy on us.”
“…If it were just me, I would. But that exam’s different. I can’t.”
“So you were just bluffing, saying you’d do anything.”
“Not bluffing. I’ll give in for any other exam—just not that one.”
They bickered again until Van finally said,
“Fine. Then just promise me one thing. Someday, if I ask, follow my lead without questioning it. Just once.”
Drener gave a wry smile.
“I’ll… try to do that.”
“Great. Then for now, go sit farther away. You’re disturbing my studying.”
“You little—!”
The two of them kept snapping at each other until they heard the librarian approaching. They immediately fell silent and went back to reading the book.
