novelraw Chapter 98 : School Event (5)
Chapter 98 : School Event (5)
School Event (5)
Pusshuk!-
Everyone present was startled by the sudden strange sound.
Because it was clearly the sound of flesh being pierced, the Crown Prince turned his head toward the direction the sound came from.
The dark mages also turned their gazes with high alert.
"What was that just now?"
However, there was no one there.
They all heard the sound, but they were confused as they saw that no one was actually standing there.
"Did we just imagine it? Why is there no one?"
"Yeah, really odd. It's like a ghost did it."
Meanwhile, Louis, who was the real culprit of that commotion, was hiding among the dark mages, pretending to share their confusion.
"Huh?"
At that moment, one of the dark mages frowned as he spotted Louis.
"You're a face I haven't seen before."
"...."
Getting questioned again, Louis was shocked inside.
He hadn't predicted that so many members of the organization would remember each other's faces.
So, he had just killed the one who was suspecting him and hid the body so that no one would notice.
After living four years in the 7th Legion, he had easily mastered assassination.
"I'm a new recruit."
The dark mage who heard Louis's answer stared at him even more suspiciously.
Facing suspicion for a second time, Louis was just about to stab him again.
"What's the matter all of a sudden?"
Just then, the Crown Prince barged in and asked sternly.
When the dark mage saw the Crown Prince, he pointed at Louis's face and explained the suspicious part.
"He's someone I've never seen before. None of us have a face like this."
The Crown Prince scrutinized Louis's face.
At first, it seemed like he was suspicious, but he only looked for exactly five seconds before stopping.
"What's supposed to be suspicious?"
"What? Even at a glance, he's a stranger..."
"It's about time we moved on to the plan. Stop worrying about nonsense and get ready for the ritual!"
The Crown Prince drew a clear line, and the dark mage bit his lips.
So far, he'd acted like a leader when he couldn't even remember their faces.
If not for being the vessel for the Great Devil, they would have killed him long ago.
"I'll ask the Refilica brothers. Did you handle the task Elaine gave you?"
"Pardon?"
"Well, um..."
Alio and Selion, startled by the Crown Prince's question, hesitated to speak.
"I heard about it as well. That you worked together with that Saber, or whatever her name is—Elaine."
"Yes... That's right."
When Selion replied affirmatively, their mother, Lisele, gazed at her sons with an emotional expression.
"How wonderful! Not only did you rank first in swordsmanship at the academy, contributing to the family, now you're even taking on important work to help save the family!"
"I-it's too much praise, mother."
"And Alio, you're helping your brother too—truly amazing! I must have good fortune in my children!"
"Thank you... so much."
With excessive praise, she hugged the brothers tightly.
Though they had heard such words often, the brothers wore strangely uneasy expressions.
"Anyway, sounds like the preparations went well. Right now, it's certain Elaine is at the ritual's focal point, right?"
"The focal point, meaning...?"
"To avoid becoming a sacrifice to open the rift connected to the Great Devil, you allies must be at that very spot. Didn't Elaine instruct you to stay at the focal point?"
Of course, the brothers remembered those instructions.
Upon meeting Elaine, they followed her guidance to ensure the Crown Prince's plan succeeded.
Thanks to that, they learned how to discreetly place spells across the city.
"O-of course."
"For the sake of our family, that's the least we can do..."
"I see."
The Crown Prince smiled, satisfied with their answer.
According to them, Elaine was now fully prepared and waiting at the ritual's focal point.
"Then let's start right away."
At the Crown Prince's command, the dark mages moved as planned and activated the spell.
A massive magic array formed with the Crown Prince at its center.
The ominous black array began to emit a dark glow, as if to summon a forbidden being.
"Marks of magic engraved throughout the academy, unite as one and summon the great being!"
As the Crown Prince shouted his incantation, the magic array started to expand toward the city ahead.
However, just as it was expanding, the array suddenly stopped and trembled as if it was malfunctioning, then vanished as if something was wrong.
"What's going on?"
The Crown Prince was taken aback when the ritual suddenly went wrong.
The dark mages also started to wear puzzled expressions.
"Why did the ritual fail?"
"That's the reaction you get when the spell wasn't set up in advance."
"They said everything was properly prepared—so why is this happening?"
With growing frustration, the dark mages' eyes naturally turned to the Crown Prince and the Refilica brothers.
They were in charge of setting up the spells across the city.
"What happened here?!"
"Could it be... Did you set it up correctly?"
As the dark mages interrogated him, the Crown Prince in turn pressed the brothers for answers.
"If you set it up properly, this wouldn't happen! Explain yourselves!"
"...."
"...."
The brothers looked on the verge of tears.
Of course—they were the most wronged in this situation.
As they remained silent, the Crown Prince lost his temper.
"Will you bastards explain immediately?!"
He shouted with such force that it seemed to shake the forest, and the brothers cowered at the sound.
Sensing the crisis her sons were in, Lisele quickly stepped in to shield them, protesting.
"Please calm yourself, Your Highness the Crown Prince! Surely there must be some explanation..."
"Then hurry and explain yourselves!!"
"...."
Lisele, like her sons, was deflated.
From the Crown Prince's perspective, it was infuriating that his painstaking preparations were about to go to waste.
"Did you disobey Elaine's instructions?"
At the Crown Prince's fury-laced question, the brothers opened and closed their mouths as if to speak.
But they couldn't utter a word.
They really had carried out Elaine's instructions.
However, the problem was that Elaine had been manipulated by Louis all along.
Thanks to that, instead of setting up the spell, they helped build useless shelters.
"You worthless bastards!!"
At that moment, a boy mixed in with the dark mages threatened them.
"You failed to carry out the work Lady Elaine of Saber ordered!!"
Lisele shuddered in shock when she saw the boy.
He was the student who had stood beside the female teacher who'd broken her hand just a while ago.
"Why are you here...!"
"You fools! Are you not even afraid of His Highness the Crown Prince, who will soon reclaim his place among the royal family!?"
"What nonsense..."
"Explain yourselves! Do you know how much we dark mages looked forward to this plan? Explain now!!"
Louis ignored Lisele's words and shouted over them.
Riled up by Louis's yells, the dark mages began to boo and jeer at the brothers and their mother.
"What have you been doing until now?!"
"Explain yourselves!!"
"Are you mocking the Great Devil's summoning ritual?!"
"You useless garbage!!"
With the dark mages' verbal abuse, the brothers eventually began to weep.
It was their first time being driven into a corner by a crowd.
Louis even fueled the fire more by making up nonsense.
"What did you even do at the academy?! Don't tell me you ignored Lady Elaine's orders and just fooled around?!"
At that, Selion and Alio thought,
What the hell is he talking about?
"What are you saying! The real culprit is you...!"
The brothers also recognized Louis right away and tried to point him out.
But...
"You bullied and threatened the other students every chance you got! And you neglected your real tasks by repeating that vile behavior!!"
Once again, the volume of Louis's voice buried the words of the brothers.
Was that sound really something a human throat could make?
It was enough to make them wonder—Louis's body couldn't even be called human, since his throat could withstand such abuse without issue.
"Explain yourselves at once!! You trash who do nothing but cause trouble!!"
Ignoring Elaine's orders, and now being accused of such things?
That was absolutely not true!
The reason everything ended up like this was Louis Dexter. That guy...
"Explain!!"
"Explain yourselves right now!!"
The brothers wanted to speak, but the dark mages, swept up in the agitation, wouldn't listen to their side.
Their mother Lisele also wanted to say something, but her words were drowned out in the jeers.
As the brothers fumed in helplessness at the impossibility of the situation, Louis leaned in and whispered to them.
"Isn't it unfair getting blamed when you did nothing wrong? This is what you've been doing to others all this time."
At Louis's whisper, the brothers truly felt the pain of helplessness.
"Silence, everyone!!!"
At that moment, the Crown Prince shouted, and the dark mages fell silent.
Only once things had settled down did the Crown Prince speak.
"Elaine is one of my most loyal subordinates! There's no way she'd give these two a pointless task."
Saber, including her, truly lived and died for the Crown Prince.
There was no way they would ever ignore his commands.
"If you'd disobeyed her, she would have dealt with you herself already."
"But we haven't received any follow-up from Lady Elaine, have we? That's why we felt assured and came to the academy for the plan."
As the dark mage said, because Elaine was routinely reporting, the Crown Prince had felt relieved.
It was because he was relieved that he had come here himself.
"Yes, that's right. I set foot in this academy based on her reports. That's what makes this all so strange."
"What do you mean?"
Looking at Louis's face, the Crown Prince continued.
"Now that I think about it, you... said you were a new recruit, right?"
"Yes...."
"But why don't the other dark mages recognize your face?"
"...."
Catching the oddity, the Crown Prince showed a horrified expression.
At the same time, Louis heard the rustling sound of the Crown Prince quietly drawing a self-defense sword from behind his back.
"Ah...."
Louis muttered with a very disappointed expression.
"It was just getting so much fun."
With that, Louis smiled and swung his hand at the dark mage standing next to him.
In an instant, a human head fell to the floor and rolled.
"T-that bastard!"
Because his voice had been so loud, the dark mages had found Louis suspicious, but still fell for his incitement.
Realizing their own foolishness, the dark mages flew into a rage and tried to attack Louis.
But Louis's hand drawing a sword from his waist was much faster.
Swish!-
Multiple dark mage heads fell to the ground.
Over half of them were cut down in a split second, causing cold sweat to break out among the rest.
Even though they hadn't tried to counterattack yet, their bodies screamed that they didn't stand a chance.
"You're pretty sharp, huh? So you didn't become Crown Prince by playing around."
"You... Who the hell are you?!"
"Oh, now that I think about it, this is our first meeting, isn't it?"
It was his first time laying eyes on the famous Crown Prince, but Louis instantly knew he was a member of the royal family.
"Hey, thanks for all your hard work so far."
Louis spoke to the brothers, who were trembling after watching the dark mages get butchered.
"It must have been tough doing whatever I told you to?"
"You monster...!"
Even Lisele, who had been shielding the brothers, flinched at the sight of Louis.
To cut down so many dark mages in an instant would be difficult even for her.
"And Your Highness the Crown Prince, thank you too. It was all for nothing, but you even came all the way to this academy."
"Then you're the one...!"
Realizing that Louis was the one who ruined his plan, the Crown Prince bit his lips.
But now, having not yet contracted with the Great Devil, he no longer had the strength he once did.
"So, I think it's about time..."
As Louis started to approach to capture the Crown Prince, he suddenly stopped.
Sensing something, Louis quickly leaped back, and from beneath his feet, tree roots began to sprout.
"...!!"
At the same time, an enormous number of screams rang out from the city, and identical trees grew, towering higher than buildings.
The trees that appeared in an instant transformed the entire city into a forest.
Louis touched the roots growing beneath his feet and frowned.
They were a bit different, but it was a plant that grew only in the demon realm.