Chapter 20: On the First Day of Enrollment, a Status Window Opened (4)
“Filtered and filtered again……3, is it.”
It had taken 3 days to reason this far. Ivan pressed his stiffened eyes and rose.
The filtering criteria were as follows.
Figures who abruptly distinguished themselves, figures whose temperament or disposition changed sharply, figures displaying strange speech or conduct.
This was information that would have been impossible without the Counterintelligence Command’s support. Because it meant digging directly into the House of Lords.
“If there’s a problem…… it’s these fellows.”
One was an orphan. Admitted through the practical-skills scholarship program.
The other 2 were of the House of Lords. That is, figures of the Crown Prince’s faction.
Awkward to touch. However much Ivan’s employment was a cover, following the roots upward would inevitably connect to Counterintelligence Command personnel.
And the Counterintelligence Command is Elizaveta’s right arm. Provoke the House of Lords carelessly and get caught by the collar, and it would wound Elizaveta’s political influence.
“So abducting all 3 is out of the question……”
Ivan tapped the table while saying something that would have made Dmitri foam at the mouth (and Elizaveta foam alongside him).
One was the new student of the hour, admitted on a full scholarship. This one was an orphan, yet already a talent that institutions in every field had their eye on. Provoke her carelessly and it wouldn’t end well.
The remaining 2 noble children were both from upper-house Families of the House of Lords. Naturally he couldn’t simply abduct them.
If they were truly “possessors” he’d act more boldly, but as yet he had only circumstantial suspicion; no firm physical proof had been confirmed.
Accordingly.
“Let’s mark these 3 and observe for a while.”
Killing could be done at any time.
Even abduction wasn’t difficult.
But to steer the situation as cleanly as possible, without aftereffects, preparation would be needed.
And so, after 3 days, Ivan decided to report to work at the academy.
From that day, a ghost story began to spread at St. Yansk University about a freak appearing on the grounds.
***
For Esidis, who through some incomprehensible malice of fate had fallen into the yoke of being an outcast, few options remained.
Fortunately the term had only just begun. However much first impressions are final impressions, there had to be any number of ways to reverse the situation.
For instance, seeking out a figure “even Uncle would be uneasy about touching” ranked among them.
Dad’s friend’s daughter……!
Whether by a promise between parents or through astonishing coincidence, weren’t the Hero’s Party’s children clustered together in the same year?
However thoughtless Uncle might be, he wouldn’t dare approach a Hero’s child carelessly.
That was the result that produced this lunch gathering.
“A pleasure to meet you. Miss Einarsdottir……? Would it be all right…… to call you that?”
“Ah, that just means my father’s daughter. Among ourselves, please just call me Esidis.”
“Mmm…… even so, that’s…… you’re a princess, aren’t you?”
“Ahaha, a princess, she says. I’ve truly never been treated this way before, it’s honestly bringing me to tears……”
Esidis shook this pretty girl’s hand vigorously, eyes brimming.
“Ah, I was a bit rude just now, wasn’t I……? I’m sorry. I’ve been acquainted with Isabelle…… you’re a Knight Faculty new student, correct? Might I ask your name……?”
“I’m Yuri Frank, Miss Esidis. Please just call me Yuri.” “Esi, stop fawning and back off. She’s a very distinguished personage, this one?”
“I’m so sorry! I don’t know the roster of Krasilov court nobility……!”
“No, what on earth are you saying……! I’m not! A noble, of all things! Don’t say such alarming things!”
Isabelle chuckled and gave Esidis a nudge. As if there were any bloodline more distinguished than royalty, why is she carrying on like this.
When Esidis, not grasping the situation, hesitated for a moment, Yuri flushed and said:
“I’m just an orphan. Even the surname Frank…… honestly isn’t my real father’s surname either.”
“And Yuri is a man’s name.”
“But on the streets it’s hard to survive with a girl’s name attached.”
Yuri answered with an easy, good-natured laugh. Isabelle snorted and turned to Esidis.
“She’s our faculty’s full scholarship student. She really is good with a blade.”
“Wow, better than you, Isabelle?”
“Better than me, obviously, and better than Oscar too. Honestly, I was surprised. Where did a girl like this come from?”
“You flatter me. I was just lucky.”
“If you beat us on luck, that’s skill.”
Esidis felt her heart warming and unclenching.
Yes, this. This is right.
A lively spring, warm sunlight, praising one another’s skill over a shared meal, competing in good faith, this romance……
Without meaning to, she sniffled, and forced from her mind the image of Uncle, who was presumably at this very moment loitering among the Knight Faculty undergraduates.
***
Isabelle and Esidis, and a new student.
Ivan sat atop a tree looking down at them as they chatted, and turned a page of his notes.
He hadn’t approached to within voice range. But he could employ a Lip-Reading Art at a highly accurate level.
Conversation exchanged: ordinary. The name is either Yuri or Yulie.
Both were names on the new student roster, but if it was a name on his “suspect list,” Yuri was the likelier possibility.
In which case a problem arises. Of all things, the “suspect” is in contact with the Hero’s Party. And on top of that, the name happens to be “Yuri.”
Naturally, in the Krasilov cultural sphere that is a man’s name.
But in Korea, and broadening the scope a little, in the “Northeast Asian” cultural sphere, it is used as a woman’s name.
If there is a woman using the name Yuri, the possibility of a “possessor” is high.
He drew a single red underline on the list of suspects.
***
“What is that bastard doing.”
Enrique, wearing a wide-brimmed hat, was gazing blankly at her disciple.
Ordinarily he was sharp enough that closing to this distance would be difficult, yet however deeply he was concentrating, he hadn’t even registered her approach.
She turned her gaze in the direction Ivan was watching. Far off, several new students could be seen chattering on a bench.
An ordinary sight.
“Mmm…… is that Isabelle……? And that looks like Esidis…… those two were always close…… I don’t know who that one is, though.”
The Counterintelligence Command had begged and pleaded, so she’d thought she might drop by briefly, and instead she’d run into the sight of him tailing new students as though he’d become a field agent.
“Doesn’t look like he’s gone off. Was it just fussing?”
Emotionless gaze, near-perfect concealment even while off guard. This is the usual Ivan. Attentive to his own bearing to the point of paranoia.
Enrique shrugged and hid herself behind a shadow.
***
“Yevgeny! Wait up! What are you taking this afternoon? I, I’m going to the orientation for Biblical Hermeneutics!”
“I’ve got Gospel Source-Language Reading. Sorry.”
“Ah, that’s fine! See you…… see you later! Enjoy your class!”
After sending off with a smile a student whose name he couldn’t even remember, the youth called Yevgeny hardened his face and walked down the lecture hall corridor.
A nuisance. And on top of that, confusing.
Had he known there would be this much to learn, he’d never have chosen the theology department…… but at the time it had been the best option.
I can’t do work that involves the body.
An obvious conclusion. He’d never so much as held a kitchen knife in his life, and there was no way he could start trading blades with monsters or demonfolk now.
But choosing a track entirely excluded from combat was equally problematic. He had to select an occupational category that at least went out and operated in the field.
Hence the theology department. Go through the priest track and you can learn not only every sort of buff and healing skill but Holy Smite-class spells as well.
And on top of that, this body has a grounding in swordsmanship.
Yujin, the protagonist of The Northern Grand Duke Family’s Good-for-Nothing Sword Genius, is a genius of the blade. This has been clearly proven by the system as well.
While every new student around him showed a feeble growth curve between levels 8 and 10, with combat skills amounting to nothing worth mentioning, this body had established the magnificent achievement of [Sword Mastery Lv5] from the very first day of possession.
That’s roughly one step below the 1st-year instructors of the academy, Yansk University’s Knight Faculty. Which is to say, he’d already passed new-student level.
But if there was a problem, it was that possessing swordsmanship in the technical sense and using it to butcher a human being are entirely different matters.
For a modern Korean who had never once wrung a chicken’s neck, this was far too difficult……
“Which is why priest is best……”
A rear-line role with no need to step to the front, a simple occupational category where you’re done once you’ve sprinkled some heals, and if he could also swing a blade better than average, that’s a picture-perfect munchkin entrance.
They’ve said since ancient times to make what you’re truly good at your side job. Isn’t it obvious that an idol who can act draws more popularity than an actor who can act?
The only 2 problems arising here were:
One, that St. Yansk University’s theology curriculum is brutal enough to hold its own against modern Korea’s.
Two, that a stone-throwing Santa Claus with mad eyes is chasing him.
What in the world is that guy……!
There was no such event in the original novel. In fact, this world is entirely different from the original novel. The original had no vaguely commie empire like this, and no Demon King or Hero’s Party appeared in it either.
It was just an ordinary “great-Family story” about fighting an evil Mage Family across roughly 1,000 chapters……!
The only things this world and that novel had in common were a familiar skill tree, a familiar status window, and roughly familiar circumstances within the Family.
Northern Grand Duke……? This country called “Krasilov” is itself in the north, so how could a Northern Grand Duke even exist!
And why can’t I see his level……!
He knows that once a level gap exceeds the ordinary range, the displayed grade changes to “???”
But there are limits even to that. Why is an academy gardener’s level in that state? He despaired further, recalling that even his own Family Head’s level was 59.
At the edge of the vision he’d forced away, the bearded freak with wide-open eyes was glaring down at him from atop a tree.
None of those around him seemed to have registered it, so he’d been forcing himself to ignore it, but he could see it faintly, at that distance, through [Expanded Intuition Lv3].
***
“He’s tailing 3 people in total.”
Enrique was certain. At first she’d meant to let it go, assuming he’d been ordered to protect the Hero’s Party’s children, but something felt off, so she’d followed and this was the result.
If there was a problem…… it was that those 3 shared no commonality whatsoever.
One is theology, one is the Knight Department, the other is the Magic Studies Department.
By status: a Duke Family’s son, an orphan, a Viscount Family’s youngest daughter. It simply doesn’t match up.
And on top of that, that killing intent.
Growling and glaring like a tiger crouched in the brush, exactly as though looking at some mortal enemy……
“Aren’t those ones off-limits?”
The orphan kid apparently practically broke down the scholarship system’s door getting in and is fielding overtures from all directions.
The 2 noble children are from the House of Lords. Figures plainly belonging to the Crown Prince’s faction. There’s nothing to gain by touching them, and of all things they happen to be in the Magic Studies Department and the theology department. If there’s a commonality between the two, it’s that neither department head is a Krasilov national.
Theology is of course headed by the Saintess, and Magic Studies is handled by Kalion’s Elves. Which is to say, attack an undergraduate and the problem grows large.
“Oh, surely not. Come on. Surely not even he would go that far?”
Even as Enrique snorted, inwardly she was thinking that a lunatic like that might well do it for some reason of his own.
The Hero’s Party’s Thief, the vampire who had reigned over Prichenkaya’s back alleys for a century, was stalking the student-stalker while readying herself to intervene at any emergency.
***
He met my eyes.
He’d been tailing from a fair distance from the theology main building, and that fellow had registered him.
Ivan was glaring with arid eyes at the youth on the “suspect list.”
Yevgeny Novikov Karamzin.
Yevgeny is an ordinary name. Nothing special about it.
But the name Yevgeny is also used in the Asian cultural sphere as the name Yujin. Naturally that carries a different meaning from the Catholic saint Eugenios.
Which is to say, it’s a personal name current in both Asia and Europe.
Accordingly, this fellow recorded on the list is likewise highly likely to be a “possessor.”
Ivan drew 2 red underlines. Detected concealment. Movements suspicious. Name suspicious.
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