“…You don’t have to add ‘Lord.’ We’re professor and student.”
“I see. Well then, I look forward to working with you, Young Lord Karbaldr.”
Since I won’t be attending the swordsmanship lectures, I’ll hardly ever run into her from now on.
So, if I had to guess, I think Hiyaltin said that meaning she was entrusting Vigdis to me.
Even though Hiyaltin’s period working as Vigdis’s escort wasn’t that long.
‘She seems to dote on Vigdis quite a bit.’
Vigdis must have followed Hiyaltin around a lot when she was young.
After all, even now she’s looking at Hiyaltin with eyes full of admiration, sparkling brightly.
Even without a past connection, it wouldn’t be easy not to dote on a student like that as a teacher.
‘But seeing how she’s being pretty favorable toward me…
It seems like Vigdis didn’t tell her about what happened in the first semester of the first year.
There’s no need to go all the way back to chapter 17 and check out the incident where the former swordsmanship professor, who’s already been kicked out, picked a fight with me.
Even though Reisir went beyond just vigorously defending me and tried to instill the ‘Karbaldr = Tsundere’ ideology.
And even though I even saved Hailga on graduation day.
Just thinking about chapters 162 and 163, where Dyuf was wary of me and tested me this way and that, is enough to know the truth.
I wonder if her attitude toward me will change when she finds out that Karbaldr was obsessed with Vigdis.
Just like Skadi did in the [12. Qualification] chapter.
‘Facing a reaction like “I didn’t know he was that kind of person”… is a bit… hard…!’
But it’s not like Hiyaltin directly said ‘Please take care of Vigdis’ just now.
I can’t just randomly start a conversation with ‘I’m not a very good fiancé’ and talk about the possession body’s misdeeds.
That would be an extremely out-of-context remark.
And I can’t exactly call Vigdis out separately and tell her to explain the past events to Professor Hiyaltin.
Even setting aside that calling her out would violate clause 4 of the disengagement contract.
If Hiyaltin, upon hearing the explanation, shows me hostility, Vigdis would inevitably try hard to defend me.
She might even downplay the facts rather than telling them exactly as they are.
‘Knowing this, telling Vigdis to explain Karbaldr’s obsession to Hiyaltin…
is basically telling the victim to cover for the perpetrator, isn’t it?’
Let’s just let it slide that Reisir held Hailga and Dyuf back and defended Karbaldr, because he did it of his own accord.
Even if I told him not to, he would have tried to defend me anyway because he wanted to.
“Ah, yes…”
In the end, unable to come up with a proper response, I ended the [Character Analysis] skill and gave a somewhat insincere reply.
Since meals are only provided here during the suspension period, we’ll inevitably keep running into each other.
But once the Academy resumes normal operations, I’ll hardly ever encounter Hiyaltin at all.
It’ll probably be fine.
“Anyway, Reisir.”
As if sensing Hiyaltin was about to continue our conversation, I quickly turned my head and spoke to the person sitting next to me.
Then this protagonist of another novel.
“Why~?”
Grinning, he replied, drawing out his words.
I have no idea why his reaction is like this.
So, feeling quite displeased, I had to continue speaking.
“No, well… Hailga and I are scheduled to receive instruction from Professor Skadi, and Vigdis will receive help from Professor Hiyaltin, right?”
“Yeah, that’s right?”
“But it seems like there’s no professor here to take charge of your education… So I called you to ask what you plan to do…”
For reference, I didn’t mention Dyuf because he’s not a combat-type professor.
Even though he did his part in the demonic realm, he’s not skilled enough in combat to teach someone how to fight.
He probably just stayed here because it would be lonely going back to an empty house without Hailga and Reisir.
“Aha~! Is that so~?”
“…Why is your smile getting wider?”
“Just, because it seems like you really do have a lot of interest in me?”
“What in the world makes it ‘seem like’ that?!
As I keep saying, you’re the strongest among us.
I’m only saying this because it would be a problem if your skills stagnated.
It’s not because I have a lot of interest in you, but for my own safety!”
“Yeah, yeah. I know very well.
How much you rely on me.”
“……”
It seems like it was a mistake to talk to a protagonist of another novel just to change the subject.
Anyway, my goal was to cut off the flow of conversation so Hiyaltin couldn’t talk to me, and that was already achieved.
I decided to stop caring about the protagonist of another novel’s business and just eat my food.
So, just as I picked up a piece of tteokbokki coated in mala rose sauce with my chopsticks.
“Oh my, am I last place?”
Someone entered the dormitory lobby, drawing everyone’s attention with their voice.
Naturally, heads turned toward the sound, and a familiar figure came into view.
“Professor Bjorn…? Are you the one who will be in charge of my education during the suspension period?”
“That’s how it turned out.
Except for Wednesdays.
I heard some marquis is coming that day.”
Bjorn answered Reisir’s question as he sauntered over.
The ‘Marquis’ he mentioned must refer to ‘Marquis Caldrun Isvald,’ who was in charge of the ‘Practical Combat Techniques’ lecture.
Caldrun is a high-ranking figure with many tasks, so even if he didn’t come to the Academy during the suspension period, even Fjodra wouldn’t be able to say anything.
But the fact that he’s making time suggests he must have taken a liking to Reisir.
‘He must have recognized the original protagonist’s talent and judged that if he teaches him well, he’ll soon become a great sparring partner.’
Anyway, this clarifies who will be learning from whom during the suspension period.
After the scene change marker, I’ll shift the time frame and continue the narration.
While I was stretching and warming up by swinging my whip around, Skadi held Hailga back, gave her self-study assignments, and demonstrated.
Then she looked at my posture, gave me advice, and also gave me a demonstration and self-study assignments.
Then she went back to Hailga, asked about what she was struggling with, continued teaching by suggesting solutions, and when she saw some progress, told her to try on her own.
Then she came back to me and helped me in the same way, and then went back to Hailga again…
I’ll skip the repetition.
Since Hailga’s and my main weapons are different, it must have been really hectic for the teacher.
Nevertheless, Skadi never lost her smile or her praise.
Even when Hailga and I were resting because we were exhausted, she wouldn’t stay still.
She told us to observe her movements while we sat and rested, showing us how she manipulated her wires or swung her whip.
She also ran around busily setting up targets for training.
And these targets weren’t prepared just for Hailga and me.
It’s because Yor asked to increase the precision of his attacks.
Like a wise baby dragon, he realized on his own that a brute force offensive doesn’t always work.
So when Yor started his training, Skadi occasionally gave advice to that baby dragon too.
In that sense, it was a huge relief that Pret wasn’t here.
If there were four people to teach, Skadi would be busier, and the time we could receive direct instruction would decrease proportionally.
“You both worked really hard~!
Since we have to train hard again tomorrow, just rest after dinner~!
You can’t push yourselves and get sick~!”
Hailga probably also wants to use the suspension period to maximize her skills.
But neither Hailga nor I objected to Skadi’s words.
Compared to Hailga, I’m in a slightly better situation, but neither of us is healthy enough to be fine no matter how much we push ourselves.
We could actually end up bedridden.
“~!”
“Then I’ll wash up and go eat dinner~!
See you later in the dormitory lobby~!”
For this reason, Skadi left.
As I, Yor, and Hailga walked toward the dormitory.
“I think I’ll skip the dawn training tomorrow too, like the Young Lord…
It was fine when I was just standing still and manipulating the wire with Aether…
But actually throwing the wire with a weight attached to the end, and even having to run around avoiding obstacles, it was really killing me…”
Hailga trudged along, muttering complaints.
Sharing grievances and forming a bond isn’t really in line with Karbaldr’s personality, and she didn’t seem to be expecting an answer anyway, so I decided to just ignore it.
So, just 2 or 3 minutes of walking in silence passed.
“Aren’t you tired, Young Lord Karbaldr?”
This time, a remark that couldn’t be dismissed as muttering came my way.
“Do I look fine?”
“You don’t look completely fine, but you don’t seem like you can barely walk straight like me.
Watching you train earlier, you moved way more than I did…
Do you have amazing stamina despite your appearance…?”
If I were truly fine because of great stamina, that would have been great, but the reality was far from it.
My whole body’s muscles were aching and screaming, and I was just holding on with mental strength.
My depleted stamina was temporarily supplemented through buffs.
Was it that I was too lazy to explain all this in detail?
Or that I just didn’t want to waste energy by moving my mouth when I was already exhausted?
And to kill two birds with one stone, I decided to raise my skill proficiency.
So, I used the [Encourage] skill on Hailga with the keyword ‘my acquaintance.’
“Oh?
I suddenly feel a bit stronger??”
“That’s because I used a buff skill.”
“Didn’t you have to shout loudly to activate that?”
“It’s less efficient, but it’s not completely unusable.”
…Rather than that, I just used a buff skill that doesn’t require shouting out loud.
But I don’t want her to know about the [Encourage] skill, so I glossed over it with a lie.
‘Come to think of it, even though a new line was added to the keyword list, the effect hasn’t changed.’
It seems the amount of stat increase doesn’t go up every time a keyword target increases by one.
I expected this, so I wasn’t too disappointed.
Without any lingering attachment, I closed the description window of the [Encourage] skill and focused on maintaining good posture as I walked.
And so, we arrived at the dormitory lobby.
Amidst the extras busily preparing for catering, the protagonist of another novel lying sprawled out on the sofa caught my eye.
REYSIR GA SHINDAAAA!!!!