The unassuming-looking examiner’s skill was nothing compared to Sir Tom’s. The trajectory of his thrusting spear was simple, the speed slow enough to be visible, and the weight so light that I could deflect it or even counter it. Thanks to this, I was able to gain the upper hand with ease.
The exam I had prepared for over the past five years, sacrificing body and soul, was finally over. Looking at the western sky with a lightened heart, I could see it turning reddish.
There were no questions I didn’t know. If I made no mistakes, my theoretical exam scores should be quite good. For swordsmanship, I couldn’t see other candidates’ matches, so I didn’t know how my skills compared.
But spear technique was different. The spear I received for the exam was shorter and lighter than what I usually handled, but I quickly became accustomed to it and was able to wield it as if it had been mine from the beginning.
Planning to use a public carriage for the return journey, I grinned as I went outside the exam venue where carriages would be waiting.
Even as the spear-wielding Bliss, I hadn’t thought I would be able to face off against an examiner with just five years of training. Seeing the examiner’s surprised eyes, it seemed this wasn’t a common occurrence. Maybe when I return to my world, I’ll learn spear techniques or swordsmanship.
I could have returned directly to the mansion, but I didn’t. After finishing the exam, I finally felt a sense of liberation. Just for today, I wanted to take it easy and buy some necessary items as Jerry had suggested.
I don’t plan to spend much. After all, I can get almost anything I need by asking the butler. Still, there are things I want to see and purchase with my own eyes.
I really hope I can attend as a work-study student. Even if not, I hope I’m not so substandard that I need to enter through a donation. At the very least, I don’t want to share a room with that Demon King guy.
I look around for a moment. Strange. I was planning to take a carriage to the bustling area, but I’m not actually thinking about getting on a carriage. I find it odd that I’m lingering and looking around.
Then suddenly, I spot black hair clearly visible from a dozen meters away. Yes. I finally found it and stare at it.
My stomach aches.
I see. I wasn’t lingering because I wanted to go out. The anxiety that had been twisting my stomach since morning wasn’t due to the exam after all. I had been looking for that. Even while looking outside from the carriage this morning, even when entering the exam venue.
Long, black hair spreading in all directions like a lion’s mane. Tall stature, a head higher than the surrounding examinees, with a large and solid body that the uniform couldn’t conceal. Even from a distance, his aura was so fierce and violent that no examinee dared approach him.
A monster who, even with just a glance, seems ominous, coloring his surroundings with a physiological fear that makes you not want to approach.
His name is Pellen Exa Drozen. An illegitimate son of the Drozen family, and the monster who later becomes the min-maxing Demon King.
There’s no benefit to me in making contact with the Demon King protégé. In this situation, the best thing would be to ignore him. I know this, but it’s hard to take my eyes off him. Like standing before an unleashed beast, all my nerves are focused on him, making it difficult to even take a step.
It’s not that he’s emitting a terrifying killing intent or showing hostility toward me. Yet look at me. Cold sweat runs down my spine, the breathing technique the old man taught me is disrupted, and I’m no different from a frightened puppy with its tail tucked.
‘Let’s kill him.’
I know my desperate mind is making an extreme judgment. I need to think rationally. There are too many witnesses here. And even if I killed him here, the only outcome would be me becoming a murderer. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in prison.
‘Then kill him secretly or create a reason to kill him.’
The murky survival instinct that festered in the back alleys whispers to me. Take him to a deserted place. And slit his throat. Make him drop his guard. Like when we set a trap door behind the bakery.
‘When that monster steps on the trapdoor and loses balance, rush in. And cut his muscles.’
My eyes grow hot with the violent and base impulse. No. I distort my flushed eyes and turn my head.
Let’s get on a carriage. And go home. It’s stupid to deliberately touch a bomb when the fuse isn’t lit. If you can’t handle it safely, it’s best to ignore it. Driven by an incomprehensible, terrible impulse, I quickly raise my arm and bite my forearm hard.
Bright red blood rises from where my teeth have deeply scored. I cover the throbbing forearm by pulling down my sleeve. As the pain floods in, I come back to my senses a bit.
Not here. Find a way to kill him where witnesses or evidence can’t be found. If you act without thinking, a mage employed by the authorities will track down evidence.
I need to get on a carriage, but my feet won’t move. In the end, I turn my gaze and glance at him again.
He stands without taking a single step from where he first stood, looking at the main road where carriages come. Is he waiting for a carriage to come for him? Sighing, I give up on taking a carriage and lean against the academy wall with my arms crossed.
I need to see him leave my sight first. Only then will I not rush at him with extreme impulses and ruin my future.
Eventually, the sun sets. Street lamps as tall as roadside trees light up simultaneously. The imperial capital is a city that never sleeps. One by one, examinees pass by and the streets become quiet.
There were a few who recognized the distinctive spear emblem that fastened the cape around my shoulders and lingered nearby, but perhaps my aura was quite menacing, as they left without even attempting to speak to me.
The last carriage asked if he and I wanted to board, but I silently shook my head in refusal. He did the same. Even after the carriage left, he still stood there blankly, looking at the main road.
His violent and vicious aura remains. Like a frog before a snake or a mouse before a cat, the physiological fear is hard to erase.
This is a matter of instinct. The demonic blood flowing in his veins is at odds with humans. I grip my bitten forearm strongly with my other hand and focus on the pain. Let’s not attack him.
He glances and looks at me. I meet his gaze with an indifferent expression. I don’t particularly want to attract his attention, but I also don’t want to flee in a cowardly manner.
My instinct, honed for nearly 10 years in back alleys and 5 years in the Bliss household, was whispering that I could take him on now. What madness. I’ve never distrusted my instincts as much as today.
And then he approached me.
I clench my molars and tense my lower body. Having stood in one position for hours, my muscles are slightly numb, but my physical condition isn’t bad for fighting.
Alright. Let’s handle this. Or kill him if necessary. I’ll let him throw the first punch. In exchange, I’ll take your life.
By this point, it feels like two voices are ringing simultaneously in my head, so I didn’t properly understand his first question and asked him to repeat it.
“Do you have no money?”
“…What.”
“I’m asking if you have no money to hire a carriage.”
My thoughts freeze. I close my mouth without asking what he means. Thanks to Daibel’s lessons in social skills. When you don’t understand what the other person is saying, it’s better to keep quiet. Don’t show your cards first in a conversation with unclear intentions.
However he interpreted my silence, he rummages through his pocket and pulls out two silver coins and one copper coin. The three small coins on his palm, which is as big as my face, looked incongruous, like a scene from an absurdist play.
“No, I…”
“It’s okay. With this, you won’t have to sleep outside.”
“Actually… I’m waiting for a carriage.”
He furrows his brow and looks at me. What, is he trying to pick a fight?
No. If he wanted to pick a fight, he wouldn’t have offered what seems like his last bit of money, telling me not to sleep outdoors.
Or maybe it is a provocation. His tone, at best, is as stiff and awkward as a novice reading a script for the first time. I don’t know if it’s because I don’t know the character of the Demon King that I don’t understand, but judging by his manner of speaking, he doesn’t seem sociable enough to talk to someone he’s just met.
“I see. I’ve been rude. I am Pellen.”
“…Zaher.”
He apologizes readily and withdraws the coins. I unconsciously gave my name and regret it immediately, closing my mouth. Reading my wariness, he takes a step back. As my stiffened mind begins to function again, I sense a leisurely air from him, like a monster facing a weaker being.
What the hell. Is this guy pitying me? Still, it’s an opportunity to ask him. I asked him why he’s lingering here.
“Are you, are you also waiting for a carriage?”
“Yes. But as expected, it seems it won’t come.”
The sun has set, but the night isn’t deep yet. I breathe slowly, waiting for my mind to clear. Even though he suspected the carriage wouldn’t come, he still waited for it. If you wait that long and it doesn’t come, it just doesn’t come, so why did you wait until now?
I don’t know if he’s stupid or stubborn, but I could recall that he had been subjected to envy and oppression within the Drozen kingdom. After silently looking at the road for a moment, he spoke to me again.
“Are you an examinee?”
“Yes. Are you… too?”
Did they meet like this in the side story? I’m not sure. How could I perfectly remember a novel I read once about 10 years ago? I did encrypt the novel’s content, but since it’s based on my memory, I’m not even sure if I wrote it correctly.
But this is certain: the Demon King bastard hated Zaher Bliss enough to dismember him. Well, maybe he didn’t hate him from the beginning. I don’t know. I only know that the Zaher bastard kept bothering the Demon King and later died. I wonder what made him seem worth flirting with.
The conversation stopped. The guy seemed used to silence, and I had no reason to speak to him either.
I should have just taken any carriage and returned to the mansion. Why did I have to create this mess by trying to observe him for confirmation?
But with an enemy right in front of me, should I tuck my tail and run?! While reason and instinct were fiercely arguing, a carriage was rapidly approaching from a distance.
Before I could see the Bliss family crest, I noticed Jerry sticking his head out of the carriage window and waving his arms.
“Oh, young master! Why are you still here!”
Welcome, Jerry. Thank you, Jerry. For resolving this awkward and strange standoff with the Demon King guy. Thank you. But still.
“Young master, you don’t know how to hire a public carriage, right? No, I didn’t think you’d still be here, unable to even ask.”
“…No, that’s not it.”
“What would you have done if I hadn’t come? I had to persuade Butler Noah, who kept saying there’s no way you couldn’t manage to take a carriage, and persuaded him again and again to come here. That’s why I told you to go out. Talk to people, make friends. I told you to socialize.”
“I think you’ve misunderstood something.”
“All day long, either in the library or the training ground. Then back to the library. Studying to death. No wonder you don’t know how to hire a carriage.”
“…Jerry, stop.”
Alright. Zaher Bliss is dead. Cause of death: shame, and the culprit is his attendant, Jerry Merton.
“You haven’t had dinner, right? The chef prepared a feast to congratulate you on finishing your exam. Let’s go quickly.”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
