Chapter 4. And so their story begins. (9)
4.5 Their Story
[3] Harnel Rel Cia: If you think you can run, just try it.
“Ah…”
He left.
That was the only thing I could think of when I came back to my senses.
I had never thought of failing from the start. Teacher was the most talented and detailed person I knew about, but apart from that, he was weaker than the average person.
That was… what teacher was like.
Because he was better than no one, he had to be better than everyone,
And because he was better than no one, he had to think more than anyone.
Because of that, he always strove to make the best situation for himself at all times.
But I thought that as long as I could dig into his weaknesses, I would be able to render him powerless.
Because of that, I did not think that I would lose.
“…You’re always above me.”
Who would’ve thought? Who would’ve thought that the tool of pain would’ve transformed into an armor? Who would’ve thought that that armor would be able to use magic?
With that, I understood. Teacher was never thinking of the “best situation” for himself in the first place. No, he had been always thinking of the worst situation. He was always thinking of a battlefield where he could never win nor survive.
And he thought of methods to survive in such a place.
Did the teacher know that his escape path was discovered from the start? No, he probably expected something like this to happen.
Did the teacher never think about fighting long-ranged attackers? No. Since they were his greatest weakness, he probably thought about them the most.
That was who he was. He was someone who was always one step ahead, someone who always went for your weaknesses.
“…The damage?”
“…Those who were struck are still unable to move, and the rest are casualties from our own troops. Two are heavily injured, and twenty are paralyzed from our arrows… By the way, what in the world was that?”
“…The unknown.”
“What?”
“It is the unknown. It is something we cannot comprehend.”
“…The unknown, is it.”
“Yes.”
I could not understand it from the start. I could not take it from the start.
After all, teacher was the person who taught me, who thought I could take anything in this world, that something known as the unknown existed.
“Those who can move will take the injured with them. Those who have fainted… Just beat them till they wake up. They won’t die from just a single hit from that thing.”
“…I think death would be a better option.”
“I got beat for an hour because of that thing.”
“…He beat an unconscious woman…?”
“Nope. When you get hit by that thing, you come back to life. Fainting? That would be a heavenly blessing. Honestly, that thing isn’t too painful. Just a little bit more painful than the wooden bat?”
Everyone looked at me with a sick face, but they didn’t know. After all, I didn’t know before I experienced it myself.
“What’s the wooden bat…?”
“…The unknown.”
“That’s the unknown as well…?”
This particular subordinate usually had a very straight face, but he was showing me a variety of expressions today. Was this the power of the teacher as well?
“Anyway… we’re going back.”
“Back… where?”
“The Imperial Palace.”
His eyes widened once I said this. Hah, he really is showing me all kinds of faces today…
“I thought the princess betrayed us?”
“The princess? You think we have the time for her?”
“…You mean…”
“Right. Since the matters at Howling are all sorted out, we’re going back.”
“…Does the emperor know?”
“Nope. But I have enough power in my hands to do something like this.”
There is something that even the teacher doesn’t know about.
The reason why the Organization fell so fast. Teacher’s calculations were perfect. If he knew about all the variables involved, everything would have gone as he had expected.
“There’s a lot of things we need to clean up.”
“…Right.”
The one thing that the teacher didn’t know about was the fact that the Empire was the one that supported the Organization. This was something that not even the boss of the organization knew about. The Empire thought that it would be good to have an evil force they could control, especially when they knew that there would always have to be evil in the face of good. In essence, this Organization was only there to help the Empire detect and destroy corrupt nobles and officials.
Well… all that only half-succeeded because of the teacher’s Utopia project.
“…Things will get busy again.”
“Because we need to start from scratch?”
“If the Empire’s going to create a new evil organization, it’d be better to be under the emperor.”
“But he was talking about killing teacher? Do you even know how fragile teacher is?”
“…The definition of ‘fragility’ in my head must be slightly skewed.”
When I glared at him, he shut up. Wasn’t he usually the silent type? When’d he get so loud… ah.
“By the way, I’m going to go on a vacation?”
“…There’s a lot of work.”
“Work hard.”
“…Miss!”
“Shut up. I’m going on a vacation. Haven’t gone on any in a long, long time.”
“We don’t get vacations…”
“The laws regarding the people who work for the Empire are really nice, ha.”
“We don’t get included in those laws… No, in the first place, we’re in a secret organization.”
“…Go on a strike or something, then.”
I made a small pout, and walked out while blocking my ears. I think someone’s shouting behind me, but… I can’t hear~
But in any case…
“If you think you can run away, just try it.”
Try it if you can.