Chapter 55. The Second Game
“Hmm.”
For the first time in quite a while, Shane visited the Academy Library.
Ignoring the gazes directed at him from every direction, he found a particular book, took a seat, and opened it.
The book Shane had chosen was ‘History of the Empire.’
He wanted to review information about the northern region he would soon be visiting.
Since the founding of the Empire, there had been several incidents that shook the nation to its core.
Some, such as the Great War and the subjugation of the Black Mages, had thrown the entire continent into turmoil.
Others had threatened the Empire itself.
One such incident had occurred in Arunbida, the northern region of the Empire.
‘The invasion of the Orc Legion.’
An Orc army so vast that no one dared estimate its exact numbers had marched south toward the Imperial capital.
At the time, the Empire had lost seventy-five percent of its northern territory to the Orcs.
Naturally, the entire nation had fallen into chaos.
Until then, the Emperor and political nobles of the Empire had regarded Orcs with contempt.
Only after the invasion did they hurriedly mobilize their armies and drive the Orcs back.
The war itself had lasted an entire year.
Eradicating every trace of the Orcs from Imperial territory had taken more than three years.
Needless to say, rebuilding the devastated region had taken far longer.
Because of that incident, the Empire constructed a fortress called Biduron in the northern region of Arunbida.
It functioned as a forward stronghold.
Its purpose was not only to prevent a similar disaster from ever occurring again, but also to discover the location of the Orcs’ homeland.
Using the information gathered there, the Imperial Army launched several subjugation campaigns.
Every one of them failed.
Simply mobilizing an army through the enormous mountain range, where violent blizzards struck without warning, was an unreasonable undertaking.
On top of that, Orc forces attacked whenever they found an opportunity, leaving the humans helpless.
Worse still, the Orcs displayed far greater strength within the mountains than they had during their southward invasion.
Even maintaining supply lines was difficult.
In the end, several attempted subjugations collapsed, and the current situation had continued for roughly fifty years.
Even now, some humans occasionally recalled the terror the Orcs had inflicted half a century ago.
But—
‘Humans are creatures of forgetfulness.’
After fifty peaceful years without another major incident, humanity had forgotten the danger of those days.
According to Shane’s memories, a few years from now, the Orc Legion would once again march south.
And that was not all.
At precisely the same time, Jepher di Natasha Anastasia, the Second Imperial Princess responsible for the northern region, would launch a rebellion.
The Empire would be thrown into chaos once again.
‘The Rebel Princess.’
In truth, Shane did not know the details of what had happened in the north.
Nameless had never been involved in the incident, and the Organization had shown virtually no interest in the Empire’s northern territories.
‘They said there was no reason to concern themselves with that region.’
The northern region had always occupied an awkward position even from Nameless’s perspective.
It was not simply because the environment was so harsh that there was little worth taking.
Wherever monsters or Demi-Humans existed, Nameless had sought to bring them under the Organization’s control.
Ordinarily, Orcs should have been no exception.
And yet Nameless had deliberately avoided setting foot in the north.
The reason was simple.
The Orc race already had a master.
‘The Mountain King.’
A single existence that held the entire northern mountain range in its grasp had prevented Nameless from entering.
However, Shane in his previous life had never bothered researching a region even the Organization refused to touch.
He possessed only a rough understanding of it.
He merely knew that an entity known as the ‘Mountain King,’ whose existence supposedly stretched back beyond the ancient era into the Mythic Age, ruled over the Orc race for some unknown reason.
Fortunately, there was still a fair amount of time before Shane had to leave for his Dispatch Request.
He needed to gather more information before departing.
Shane spent a while longer inside the Academy Library.
Then someone approached him.
“Y-You were here.”
The stuttering genius—
Bernstein Auston—
Was standing behind him.
—
After entering the Department of Command and gathering teammates as their commander, Auston had recently been reading books concerning the dungeon his team had been assigned to clear.
The information was already completely stored inside his head.
But rather than sitting idle, Auston had a habit of reading while organizing his plans.
That day had been no different.
He had secluded himself in the library and spent the day reading.
It was late at night.
Auston was always the last Cadet to leave the library.
There was a reason people had nicknamed him the Library Stutterer.
Normally, this would have been around the time he put away whatever he was reading and returned to his dormitory.
‘Why am I here?’
The Academy’s VIP Room.
Auston rarely showed surprise, yet he found himself genuinely bewildered by the fact that he was sitting in a place he would ordinarily have no reason even to approach.
“Hmm…… Just as he said, you really are an interesting person.”
The woman possessed platinum-blond hair reminiscent of a field of barley and emerald eyes like a secret pond hidden deep within a forest.
Even while merely sitting there holding a teacup, she appeared dignified.
Despite her delicate appearance, she naturally radiated an unmistakable nobility.
‘……One of the Two Flowers of the Empire. Jepher di Arsha Olicia.’
Why had the First Imperial Princess, whose face was difficult to glimpse even at public functions, sought him out?
No.
Auston already understood the general reason.
The moment he met the Imperial Princess’s eyes, he had realized it.
This woman was the same kind of person he was.
Someone for whom changing between countless thick masks while analyzing other people had become part of everyday life.
And by now—
She had undoubtedly realized the same thing about him.
Yet understanding why she had come to recruit him was different from understanding how she had learned about him in the first place.
With faint wariness, Auston spoke.
“I-I am honored, Your Highness. B-But when you say ‘he’…… m-may I ask who you mean?”
“Hmm…… The eldest son of House Clayton. I happened to meet him separately, and he mentioned your name.”
“Ah.”
Only then did Auston feel as though something that had been blocking his thoughts suddenly disappeared.
‘He’s already busy enough. If he went out of his way to introduce me…… then something important must be happening.’
Since an Imperial Princess was involved, there was undoubtedly a political aspect to this.
But what political connection could Shane have with her?
Auston did not know that Shane and Aneis were engaged, since that information had yet to become public.
So he approached the question from another direction.
‘Come to think of it, the Imperial Guard Knight Order was supposedly annihilated during the Great Forest expedition.’
His thoughts reached that conclusion almost instantly.
As far as Auston knew, many Imperial Knight Orders had recently begun tacitly supporting the current Crown Prince.
There was a high probability that the Imperial Guard Knight Order had been among them.
If something had happened between Shane and the Imperial Guard Knight Order—
It could hardly have been pleasant.
Auston did not know everything about Shane.
But while the Imperial Guard Knight Order had been wiped out, every member of Shane’s own team had returned safely.
If their relationship had been friendly, surely matters would not have deteriorated to the point where the entire Imperial Guard Knight Order was annihilated.
‘Then Shane is positioned against the Crown Prince. Does he want me to support the First Imperial Princess through her?’
Whatever Shane’s intention might have been—
It was hardly a bad thing for Auston.
No matter what picture Shane was drawing, Auston found the Imperial Princess before him rather appealing.
Not romantically.
Rather—
He felt as though he had finally encountered another person similar to himself.
“He told me to look carefully beneath the shadows. He said valuable things people fail to notice often lie on the ground. And he advised me that you could help me with that.”
In a sense, the entire situation was absurd.
Shane and Auston were both still merely Cadets.
Imperial politics was hardly something so simple that one should act merely because a Cadet said a few words.
For anyone else, doing so would have been unbelievably foolish.
But things were different when the person acting upon those words was the First Imperial Princess, Olicia.
Whatever else might be true, she trusted her ability to judge people.
And from what she saw—
The Auston sitting before her was hardly an ordinary person.
“He described you as someone who can sit still and see the world a thousand li away. That is why I came to ask for your assistance.”
“I-I see. I do not know h-how much help I can be……”
Meanwhile, the moment Auston heard Olicia’s explanation, he understood what Shane had meant.
‘There is something connected to the Crown Prince inside the Underground City.’
If the matter involved an Imperial Princess, then it was undoubtedly politically sensitive.
‘The Underground City and the recent scandals…… Count Salier. Yes, him. He was said to have been dealing in Demi-Human slaves through the Underground City. And before Shane left for the Mezaia Great Forest, he took an Elf with him. An Elf missing several fingers…… Another noble was murdered immediately before that too.’
When Auston’s thoughts reached that point, he found himself wondering exactly what Shane had been doing.
A noble killer?
He could not conclude that Shane himself had committed the murders.
But Auston was convinced that Shane was involved somehow.
This was not merely dangerous.
It was catastrophically dangerous.
‘Interesting.’
And yet—
Auston felt his heart begin racing on its own.
“The U-Underground City’s slave market. I-I think if you investigate that area…… y-you may find something.”
“The Underground City’s…… slave market? Ah…….”
Olicia’s eyes lit up as though she had suddenly realized something.
‘You idiot!’
Only now did she remember that Count Salier had dealt in slaves.
And from there—
She reached the same conclusion Auston had.
At the same time, Olicia found herself considerably impressed by the young man before her.
They had exchanged only a few words.
Yet he had already produced advice like this?
Was this not precisely the kind of hidden jewel others had failed to notice?
Olicia briefly closed her eyes.
She needed to restrain the desire gleaming within them.
At the same time, an exhilarating sensation ran through her.
Shane had already become too famous.
Auston had not.
She felt as though she had finally discovered the kind of talent she had been searching for.
One day—
Auston would undoubtedly become one of Olicia’s sharpest blades.
Auston was looking at her with interest as well.
The Princess had apparently understood something immediately from the advice he offered.
Auston had always believed that people who were moderately foolish or moderately intelligent were the easiest to manipulate.
But someone who immediately understood what he meant?
This was the first time he had encountered such a person.
Even the teammates Auston had gathered for the sake of his grades needed half a day of explanation before they understood what he wanted.
What kind of result would emerge from this relationship between two people brought together by a single man?
Only one person knew the answer.
—
“I do not think there is any reason for you to continue pretending to stutter around me. We know each other well enough by now, do we not?”
At Shane’s words, Auston raised one corner of his mouth.
“……Considering that, we haven’t actually met very many times.”
“The number of times you meet someone is hardly important to you.”
“…….”
Shane looked at him with calm, almost arrogant eyes, as though he had known everything from the very beginning.
A smile appeared around Auston’s eyes.
“This is still rather embarrassing. It’s the first time I’ve shown this side of myself to anyone.”
“Naturally. You are an exceptionally cautious person.”
“Hmm…… Unless I am imagining things, you seem to know quite a lot about me.”
“You are not imagining it. I could confidently claim to understand the person called Bernstein Auston better than anyone else. Even better than the famous First Imperial Princess.”
“Haha. You really are fascinating in so many ways. No matter how many words we exchange, I still find it impossible to understand you.”
Auston studied Shane.
“It feels almost like…… mist. Yes. As though black mist is hiding you.”
“That is reasonably close.”
“Pardon?”
“Auston. Do you genuinely believe that you possess no Mana?”
“…….”
The question came without warning.
Auston nevertheless nodded.
Born Mana-Impaired, Auston had never been able to sense even the smallest trace of Mana, much less accumulate it.
“Yes. I have already searched every ancient text I could possibly find. My body is incapable of handling Mana.”
“I see. But perhaps you simply have not discovered the answer yet. Humans occasionally mistake the limits of what they understand for the limits of knowledge itself.”
“…….”
“If an opportunity arises, I will give you information about that as well. More importantly, how was your meeting with the Imperial Princess?”
“Interesting. She was the second most fascinating person I have ever met in my life, after you.”
It was not a lie.
The meeting with the Imperial Princess had been interesting enough that Auston genuinely looked forward to what might happen next.
Originally, he had intended to approach politics far more slowly, giving himself plenty of time.
Yet the meeting had been entertaining enough to change even that plan.
“Why did you introduce me to her?”
“For our second game.”
“Our second game……”
Come to think of it, Shane had mentioned something like that before.
Their first game had begun during the departmental exam—
A contest over whose paper would receive the higher evaluation.
In the end, Shane’s paper had caused far greater commotion, so Shane had been the victor.
“This game will be considerably more stimulating than the last one. We will be cutting away the rotten parts of the Empire.”
“……That sounds rather dangerous for a game.”
“That is precisely why you will find it interesting. There is a group within this Empire that even you do not know about. They are manipulating the Empire from behind the scenes.”
“……Is that so?”
“The Crown Prince is nothing more than a marionette they control. We need to prepare for them in advance.”
Anyone else hearing those words might have dismissed them as an absurd conspiracy.
A hidden group manipulating the greatest nation of the current era from behind the scenes?
But Auston did not react that way.
‘A conspiracy without evidence is merely delusion. But this man is different.’
Shane had already been connected to Count Salier.
He had also become entangled with the Imperial Knight Order during the Mezaia Great Forest expedition.
At the very least, to Auston’s extraordinarily sharp mind, Shane’s words did not sound like baseless fantasy.
“I will contact you occasionally. Whenever I do, something interesting will happen.”
“Understood. I will look forward to it.”
More than anything—
Merely watching Shane’s plans unfold seemed entertaining enough.
Without hesitation, Auston reached out and clasped Shane’s offered hand.
