Top Instructor of a Third-Rate Academy

188

The senior knights kept glancing toward the Academy even as they trained.

Because three hours had passed since Chamson had been summoned by the Duke, and he had not returned.

A beginner knight who had just awakened Aura and could not handle it properly.

And yet that man had been specifically called for by the Duke himself.

It was inevitable that it would weigh on their minds.

"Is he receiving private tutoring or something?"

"Oh, come on. He may have awakened Aura, but that does not make him anything special. Honestly, is there anyone here worse with the sword than him?"

"Well, that is true."

Chamson was on the younger side among the knights.

With his short combat experience, a raw, unpolished quality showed in every aspect of his swordsmanship.

Actually, his Aura awakening this time could practically be called miraculous.

"Is he being taught Advanced Swordsmanship or something? The younger you are, the higher the chance."

"Oh please, there are younger people than him. Our genius knight."

The knights' eyes briefly turned to Julian, the knight standing at the very back of the group.

Julian was a nineteen-year-old knight who had graduated the Imperial Royal Academy early.

He had been assigned to the frontline only a year ago, but he had awakened Aura far faster than anyone else.

Given that he came from a good background and had great skill too, the knights did not dismiss Julian as a newbie.

No — rather, they walked on eggshells around him.

It was obvious to anyone that Julian would become the next dominant force leading the Crownhardt Ducal House.

From now on, to get into his good graces, they did small favors quietly.

And that made Julian's nature arrogant.

"......"

Julian's expression sharpened as he listened to the conversation.

Surely they would not actually grant such preferential treatment to a knight with no pedigree, and older to boot.

But what if they really were?

Just as that complex thought tangled up his mind.

"It is Chamson!"

Chamson was walking toward them from far away.

He looked as though he had just come from training, soaked in sweat all over, but his expression was dazed.

Beside him walked Latrine, who had come to fetch him.

The knights stopped their training and leaned casually as they waited for Chamson.

'Was he really given special training?'

That question stirred up the knights' hearts.

'But why is his face like that?'

As Chamson drew closer, his expression came into clearer view.

Chamson's face was as if his spirit had drained out of him.

His eyes faced empty air, his mouth clamped shut as though he had seen something terrifying.

His arms hung slack, swaying in a manner unbecoming of a well-trained knight.

"Hey, posture."

"Enough."

When one of the senior knights tried to correct Chamson, Latrine stopped him.

Latrine was the number-two figure of the Crownhardt Ducal territory.

The knights immediately snapped to attention and waited for her next words.

"Sir Chamson is excused from today's training. He trained separately with the Duke."

"......!"

The knights stared at Chamson in shock.

Why on earth?

What was so charming or special about that man, who could not even handle his energy yet, that he was a training target?

And meeting separately with the Duke at that?

Glances of such jealousy passed among them.

Latrine was well aware of those glances.

Normally she would have shut down those glances immediately, but —

'What on earth did I witness?'

Despite her composed exterior, her heart was churning too.

Three hours.

It seemed like a lot of time, but in terms of training, it was merely a fleeting span.

No genius could grow dynamically from three hours of training.

Training was like snowflakes piling on a tree branch, or water filling a cup.

Until one crossed the critical threshold, one had to pour in unconditional effort through the drudging process.

And then at the moment that threshold was crossed, it would explode and manifest as growth.

But Cassian, that fellow.

"Do not ask Sir Chamson unnecessary questions. You all will experience it yourselves one day."

If that was truly Akarind Academy's curriculum, then this school's formidableness was understandable.

Students here took that class for six straight years, from first year to their sixth-year graduation.

If they applied for asylum at Akarind Academy and it was granted.

The Empire's finest army could become the world's finest army.

'Terrifying.'

Latrine looked over the knights.

However much she told them not to ask questions, not to torment Chamson, they would not listen.

In the first place, the military was a place where, in places the superiors could not see, all sorts of history was written among subordinates.

If you did not get caught, you could do anything — it was a place where countless sacred rites for "making it work when it could not" were passed down.

So there would probably be a fight.

'And they will feel it too.'

A few hours ago, had she not also vented frustration at the Duke over being disrespected in such a backwater place?

And in just three hours, her thinking had changed.

Just seeing it had been enough — how much more for those who would directly experience it?

'The faster the delusion breaks, the faster they can grow.'

With that expectation, Latrine slowly withdrew.

And sure enough, a crowd immediately gathered around Chamson.

"Hey, Chamson. What on earth happened?"

"Did the Duke personally instruct you?"

"A-ah, no...... it was not the Duke. From what I was told, it was an instructor at this Academy......"

"An instructor?"

"Yes, uh — it did not seem to be swordsmanship, some kind of career counseling instructor, no, philosophy? Anyway, it was a scholarly-looking man, but...... uh, he told me to swing my sword......"

Chamson could not properly answer what state he was in or what he had done, and rambled on incoherently.

The surrounding knights wore exasperated expressions.

"So did you learn the sword or not? You are drenched in sweat."

"I-I did learn, but — can you even call it 'learning'? No, whether what I was swinging was even a sword, that......"

"Ah, hell, this is frustrating. Just spar with him! Then we will know!"

The knights said this and pointed at the training ground.

As it happened, Julian was just beginning his training there.

Unlike the other knights, Julian was swinging his sword as though he had no interest in Chamson at all.

A violent purple-toned Aura rippled along his blade.

A well-refined Aura that rippled within a range of about a palm's width off the sword.

Chamson stared at it blankly.

"What, oh? So you got some confidence after special training with the Duke? Want to try your hand against Julian?"

"Seriously, Chamson! You enlisted before Julian — want to settle the pecking order?"

"Heh, challenging a genius? Daring youth throwing down against a nineteen-year-old Aura user! Yes! That is how young men should be!"

Seizing the opportunity, the knights' eyes sparkled as they egged Chamson on.

"Ah, no. Uh......"

One knight grabbed Chamson's arm, still lacking his wits, and pushed him toward the training ground.

Then the knights, swept up in the atmosphere, encircled the training ground, snickering.

Only one knight hesitated.

The very one who had grabbed Chamson's arm and pushed him in.

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"Huh?"

He looked at his own hand.

Chamson's arm had certainly been soaked in sweat.

But that sweat was not the salty sweat produced by training.

It was more like —

'Cold sweat?'

What on earth had he seen?

In the meantime, Chamson stood in one corner of the training ground.

He still looked reluctant, not having collected himself, with a vacant expression.

That attitude seemed to irk Julian.

"If you climbed all the way up here, at least focus."

Whatever the reason, if he had come up here, he had to fight.

That was just how the battlefield worked.

Why you were standing there did not matter.

Why your opponent was there did not matter.

If you received an order, you fought.

That was what it meant to be a frontier knight and soldier.

And yet such a dazed attitude.

"Ah......"

Chamson, seemingly aware of his situation, slowly drew his sword.

His stance was subtly different — strangely relaxed, as though stripped of force and fighting spirit, limp like water poured into water, liquor mixed with liquor.

That laid-back and thoughtless attitude did not sit well with Julian.

As a senior who had awakened Aura first, he felt he needed to make something clear.

So this was not personal revenge.

But a public lesson.

"Hraap!"

Aura blazed fiercely on Julian's blade.

He dashed forward swiftly, and his sword stabbed in a straight line from the lower left, drawing a purple trajectory.

And Chamson.

Tuk.

Cut the opponent's sword in half, just like that.

Along with the Aura.

"......Huh?"

A sound like air escaping came from Julian's mouth.

And that was the end of it.

"I will be heading in."

As though that outcome were only natural.

Chamson sheathed his sword, stepped down from the training ground, and began trudging toward his quarters.

His gait looked as if a defeated man were fleeing.

"Uh, uh. Yeah."

"Y-yeah. Go rest."

"Do not be late for training tomorrow, you know? You know, right?"

The senior knights each opened their mouths, but whatever they said was nothing more than empty words — none of them knew what to say.

The knights recalled that final trajectory of the sword.

It was a sword technique they had never once seen from Chamson's blade.

Yet somehow, it felt more like Chamson than anything else.

On that blade, Aura compressed to a very small unit had been flowing quietly.

Not a single ripple.

No violent energy leaking outward.

In its most stable form.

***

"A shame."

"What is?"

"Missing out on you."

I gave an awkward smile in reply to the Duke's words.

In truth, that point was indisputably my own fault.

A noble house — a Ducal house at that — had decided to take me on as an officer, and I had personally cancelled the commission.

"I can hardly believe it even though I saw it with my own eyes."

"Did you experience it too, Your Grace?"

At my words, Crownhardt clenched and unclenched his fist repeatedly.

"Which is why I find it even harder to believe. Because it overturns the concept of the sword I have wielded all my life. The textbooks I had studied were nothing more than toys, it turns out."

"It is the same in every field of study. Textbooks are written in accessible language so that those who know nothing can enter. Scholarship is always deeper and vaster than textbooks."

"So in the end, what is needed is a teacher who can properly convey the scholarship."

That was a bit much for me to answer with my own mouth.

The Duke drew the sword he had planted in the ground once more.

Immediately, orange-toned Aura began to ripple along his blade.

It was a far more refined form of energy than before.

Whereas the prior energy had manifested in disorder from brute force without any purpose, the shape of this energy itself resembled Duke Crownhardt.

That must be the Duke's Sword Intent.

"So, what do you think? Can you teach all our soldiers?"

I recalled the knight who had just come and gone.

Chamson, was it?

And there were about three hundred such knights.

"A month should be sufficient."

"I see."

Duke Crownhardt gave a small nod.

A small hint of satisfaction surfaced in his expression.

"Then what about you? Did you gain something from instructing Sir Chamson? How long would it take for you?"

How long, huh.

I organized the thoughts floating around in my head.

"Tomorrow should do."