I Broke Off My Engagement and Got a Job at the Academy

86. Coping

It was a room with nothing else but a white round table. Around that round table, people wearing black robes were talking.

“Have you heard about this incident?”

“Oh, of course. It seems the Emperor is in a lot of trouble. It’s quite a sight to behold. Don’t you think so?”

“That’s not the point. The relationship between Architelos and Eden Cainus has become quite close.”

“Ha, that Prime Minister, that idiot who only finds weak methods while wagging his tail at other countries, has achieved some results this time.”

“Hmm, the more I look at it, the more I want it.”

“what?”

“Eden Cainus. The magic that guy created. It’s not just any magic. It’s the kind of magic that ‘breaks the laws of the world.’”

“Then what do we do? We have no way to use it.”

“Stop talking nonsense. Even if it were just an artifact, or rather a scroll, it would be a magic with infinite uses. Especially in that it could completely destroy the palace’s magic system.”

Eden Cainus, who created the ‘Gourmet’, intended it for warfare, and the Emperor wanted to use it on the battlefield. The Prime Minister of the Mines saw it as a means to protect the nation, and now they saw in the Gourmet the potential for overthrowing the nation.

A poisoned chalice that had the potential to change the world in so many ways. That was the assessment of the Devourer.

“Isn’t there any way to persuade that guy?”

“Speak reasonable. Not only is this not someone you can persuade, but you’ve already had conflicts with him many times.”

“Oh, come to think of it, that human woman… I think she was the one who killed Irbel.”

“Yes. To be exact, it’s not certain yet, but it’s highly likely. There aren’t many people who have infiltrated the church… It’s a shame.”

“Then there is only one way.”

“Yes. But, one thing you should keep in mind in advance is that… the ‘Moonlight Knights’ will also be after that. The Emperor would never be the type of person to sit still after such an insult. In short, we are in a position where we have to compete with those guys.”

“Ha, what can the Emperor’s hunting dogs do? Those guys are just fools who can’t do anything without the Emperor’s orders. What do you fear from a mere human knight order?”

“They are not just a mere order of human knights. Do you think of the Moonlight Knights as mere vassals of a noble? You are the one who thinks like an idiot.”

“Yes. Don’t you know that the one who fought us the most and caused us the most damage was the Moonlight Knight?”

“Instead, we killed countless of those b*stards too?”

“Even so, it’s useless. The number of Moonlight Knights is replenished quickly. They’ll probably die more often than Daylight Knights, so their training method will probably be different.”

“You have to speak properly. The Sunlight Knights are all guys with a lot of stuff, so it doesn’t matter if the Moonlight Knights die more than the Sunlight Knights.”

“That’s it. In any case, the Moonlight Knight is not someone to be underestimated. Those young humans have shown off some kind of talent, but their combat experience is ridiculous. Because security is tight, we couldn’t even touch their training method.”

“Still, I guess he brought it up because there was a way to get rid of the Moonlight Knight. Surely he didn’t just want to destroy the morale.”

“Of course. First of all, the opportunity you should aim for is the Academy’s final evaluation.”

“It’s a final exam… Yeah, I think it was an evaluation that was done outside of the academy.”

“Yes. At that time, the Moonlight Knights will probably also try to target Eden Cainus. For now, let’s give up on a head-on confrontation.”

“Yeah… It’ll be hard to confront it head on. I didn’t expect that in the first place. Then?”

“We need to create a chaotic situation. We need to make it so that the Academy and the Moonlight Knights can’t come to their senses.”

“How?”

“Look at this.”

“…You are the daughter of the Duke of Irkali.”

“If we use this year, we can make things easier.”

“Hmm… That’s an interesting story. She’s a b*tch I was going to get rid of anyway, so if I could just write like that before I kill her… .”

“If it were possible, that is.”

“Even so, just wait for the next opportunity. It’s a very simple story. But if you succeed, the reward will be sweeter than anything else. Who would have thought that the successor to the Duke’s family… would die ‘in that manner’ during the final evaluation?”

“Okay… Okay. I guess I should prepare the curse.”

…

I suddenly opened my eyes. Somewhere, I felt like I was having a bad dream.

A strangely ominous feeling enveloped me, but I tried to ignore it and got out of bed.

Then, I moved my body, stretched, and took out the newspaper placed in front of my room.

After my work in the Imperial Capital was over, I returned to the Academy.

In a way, it was natural, because there was nothing more for me to do there.

[The divided aristocracy… Where is the ship called Empire without a captain headed?]

Anyway, the biggest thing I gained after finishing my work is this. The fact that cursing the emperor with my existence has changed from a one-time thing to a long-term thing.

Just as a small snowball can quickly grow, anxiety grew among the nobles of the Emperor’s faction who saw the concentrated fire from the media, and the media in turn increased their anxiety. After this repeated several times, public opinion of the Emperor had already gone astray.

If the throne were to be passed on to the next generation, the emperor would be considered one of the five emperors with the worst final years in the empire, and would be practically a neighborhood brat.

[Voices spread among the citizens… ‘It’s all the Emperor’s fault!’]

The problem was that there was no one who could help the emperor. The media realized that biting the emperor was a good reaction, so they wanted to taste the emperor’s blood even more, and the emperor’s faction was in chaos, unable to do anything.

And, the most unexpected thing was… one of my enemies.

[The Duke of Irkali announces his intention to resign as Prime Minister.]

It seemed that he realized that the situation was not smiling on the Emperor, so he resigned from his position as prime minister and decided to ally with the nobles.

The problem is the allied opponents.

[Cielline holding the hand of the Duke of Irkali.]

It was Ariel. Ariel, through the Duke of Irkali, brought in the moderate nobles to pressure the Emperor, and as a result, there was a significant defection among the Emperor’s supporters.

It could be said that this was the worst situation for the Emperor. On the other hand, it could be said that this was the best situation for me, except that I was allied with the Duke of Irkali, who Ariel would not be satisfied with even if she chewed him up.

However, I continue to feel uneasy.

I’m not the type of person to sit still and endure a situation like this, so why am I still quiet?

Didn’t he blow up my family line without even thinking about the aftermath because he couldn’t control his temper and didn’t even handle it cleanly, which is why it ended up like this? Surely he’s not learning self-restraint now.

In short, it meant that there was a high probability that he would pretend not to do anything on the outside while plotting something behind the scenes.

And that ‘something’ that’s being decorated is probably…

‘It must be the Moonlight Knights.’

Unlike the Knights of Daylight, the most prestigious of the Empire’s knightly orders, not much is known about the Knights of Moonlight. There are only a few rumors that circulate like urban legends.

However, what is certain is that they are the Emperor’s loyal servants who will carry out any order they receive without question, and that they are the dark secret agents who take charge of all the dark affairs of the Imperial Family.

Come to think of it, the Emperor had been threatening me from the beginning. He told me to either hand over the magic obediently or to take a confession pill and be tortured before handing it over.

‘There’s no way there’s a idiot who would just surrender to his enemy.’

I thought to myself and picked up my cane.

Yes. I have to admit it. To be honest, there is no way I can defeat the Imperial Knights head-on.

Even if there are greedy people, the Moonlight Knights’ ability to control magic power is not that easy, and they will use all kinds of tricks to capture me.

If that’s the case, then we need to come up with some way to do it here too.

I made up my mind and moved my magic.

… I already have a rough blueprint in my head. So, of course, I have to find a way by physically trying it out.

Yeah. Well, there’s nothing I can do about it. It looks like the lab is finally going to live up to its original purpose.

“I need to create a new magic.”

Is there anyone else like me who has to create magic for fear of being stabbed to death by an imperial knight? I couldn’t help but laugh out loud at the ridiculous situation.

This is real survival magic. Of course.

“The name… shall we call it something like Thorn of Absorption?”

There may be a better name, but what can I do? The name Devourer is not a very well-received one in the first place. Professor Cordelia may vomit blood, but a magical name is not that important to me.

So, I started to seriously practice closing exercises… no, I started to develop closing exercises.