Magic Academy's Bastard Instructor

Chapter 227: Un Deux Trois [2]

Friedrich Glade despised his son.

Though Sigmund was his heir and the only remnant left of his late wife, the boy had been the one to steal her from him. Helene had died shortly after giving birth, and while Friedrich knew it was unfair to blame the child, feelings could not be dictated by reason.

Convictions might be shaped through experience, but the heart remained stubborn.

Yet when Sigmund died, Friedrich realized that he had lost his wife all over again.

“….”

On the surface, the boy’s death appeared to be the work of the Thunderbird, or so Vanitas Astrea had phrased it. But for Friedrich, the explanation was insufficient.

Vanitas Astrea, a Great Power capable of dismantling three fellow Great Powers at once, would not have struggled to keep a Thunderbird from getting near his son.

And more than that, there was the greater inconsistency.

Thunderbirds, born of pure mana, feasted only on mana.

Sigmund was a Crusader, not a knight.

There had been no reason for the beast to target him.

“A third party….” Friedrich muttered to himself.

By conjecture alone, he was convinced there had been foul play. Someone else had been involved. Perhaps even someone close. Perhaps even Vanitas himself.

For the time being, Friedrich sought to investigate while concealing his suspicions with indifference. If there truly was a third party, he could not afford to alert them, not until he was certain.

And so, to the mass gathered in the north, he behaved as if his son’s death meant nothing.

* * *

“Are you certain of this?” Friedrich asked.

“Yes, my lord,” one of the Glade Chasers replied. “It is with certainty that this piece of cloth matches the fabric of the maid’s dress belonging to the Astrea Marquisate faction.”

The investigation had borne fruit. As part of their hospitality, the Glade Duchy had extended its laundry service to the guests. Friedrich had seized the opportunity, ensuring that the garments of Vanitas, Margaret, and the maid were all handled by the Duchy’s servants.

From there, it had been easy. Fibers were collected, cross-checked, and compared until the results matched.

“…So it truly is linked to them.”

A clue so damning. And enough to give justification to the suspicion at the back of his mind that the Astrea Marquisate was entangled in his son’s death, one way or another.

“Do you believe the Marquess is aware of this?” Friedrich asked coldly. “Or has he, perhaps unknowingly, allowed an assassin into his own faction?”

“One cannot say for certain, Lord Glade,” the Chaser replied. “But it is best to assume all possibilities.”

Friedrich’s gaze hardened as he contemplated the implications. If Vanitas Astrea was unaware, it meant incompetence. But if he was aware and complicit, then it meant betrayal.

Neither possibility sat well with the Wolf of the North.

And yet, because Vanitas was a Great Power, no matter how damning the evidence, politics and law would never bind him.

But Friedrich, too, was a Great Power. Only one such as he could hold another accountable. If the day came when their factions clashed, it would be decided through personal war where no outside force could intervene.

“Continue the surveillance discreetly,” Friedrich ordered at last. “I want no hint of suspicion to fall back on us. If there is rot festering within the Astrea faction, I will see it exposed, whether the Marquess wills it or not.”

* * *

In just four days, reports piled onto Friedrich’s desk with each one confirming the same suspicion. The maid moved strangely. Night after night, she wandered the halls of the Duchy as if searching for something, unaware that every step was being watched.

“It’s unwise to roam at such late hours,” Friedrich said one evening, deliberately crossing her path after leaving his office. “The cold here does not forgive those who neglect rest.”

“O-Oh! D-Duke Glade, my apologies…” The maid nearly stumbled into a bow.

“Rise,” Friedrich commanded. “Tell me, what business takes you through these halls this late?”

“I-I… couldn’t sleep, my lord,” the maid stammered. “The unfamiliarity of this place unsettles me. Moreover, the cold stings in a way that’s… uncomfortable.”

“Therefore?”

“Therefore, to resolve these issues, I’ve been… exercising… every night…”

“Exercising?”

“…Yes.”

The girl swallowed nervously and nodded. To counter both her sleeplessness and the cold, she claimed to have taken to exercise. On the surface, it was a practical answer. Accelerated body heat to fight the chill, and fatigue to usher in rest.

Friedrich’s silence was colder than the winter air. Then, at last, he stepped past her, moving toward the darkened corridor.

“Return to your quarters,” he said flatly. “Do not let me find you wandering again. A servant’s duty begins at dawn, not at midnight.”

“Yes, Duke Glade!” she blurted, bowing quickly before scurrying away.

That brief exchange had been enough to confirm his suspicions.

The so-called maid who had arrived under the banner of the Astrea Marquisate, presented as Margaret Illenia’s attendant, was not who she claimed to be.

It was a disguise, without question.

The proof lay in the constant flickering in her eyes, the way her tone shifted too unnaturally, and the way her expressions were never fully consistent.

She was a mask layered over another mask, and to Friedrich Glade, the truth was obvious.

Whoever she was, she had entered his Duchy under false pretenses.

* * *

It was a private bath. Alone, Vanitas leaned back, his gaze turning upward as steam curled into the air.

Truth be told, it was relaxing. Strange, almost wrong, to feel at ease in a place like this. Every day, more scholars vanished. Every night, screams echoed through the halls. Each morning, fewer and fewer scholars showed up.

They no longer even bothered to blame him aloud for leading them into this death trap.

And yet, here he was, submerged in warmth, able to breathe for once.

All this time, there had been no chance to rest. But now, having lost everything, having nothing left but his own life, Vanitas found that he could finally let go.

A man with nothing left to lose… could afford to relax.

——You seem even more at peace today, Vanitas.

Of course, that voice. No, not merely a voice, but the presence of a certain woman, seated across from him in the bath, draped only in a towel, just as he was.

“And you are as beautiful as ever, Empress Julia.”

——My, the same compliment as yesterday. Can you not think of anything to praise besides my beauty?

“That is all I can ever compliment you on.”

Even as he spoke, his heart grew restless. Fear, longing, yearning, love, admiration, betrayal, heartbreak, all colliding at once, yet in the end, it was the amalgamation of his peace.

“Because I wish nothing to do with you anymore.”

Because Vanitas Astrea—or rather, Chae Eunwoo—was forever shackled by the very existence of Kim Minjeong.

——Oh? And yet, didn’t you say you loved me?

“I do.”

——Even though I am a married woman, with three children?

“Even if you were a married woman with three children.”

——How absurd. You are aware, yet pretend not to be. You deceive not only me, but even yourself. And still, you know the truth of my existence. Do you choose the lie deliberately?

“It is proof that I exist. Proof that I am Vanitas Astrea.”

Vanitas knew full well this was nothing more than the work of a phantom, an illusion crafted from the fragments of his own mind. A reflection of Julia Barielle from memories he understood and memories he could not grasp, pieced together into a single imitation.

Therefore, the woman before him was Julia Barielle.

——Your heart is complicated.

“Would it not be? One woman keeps running from me, only to reappear under new faces. And now, that very woman wants my head, whether it is truly her or not.”

Vanitas didn’t even glance at the phantom of Julia.

“Even I know how to read between the lines. My heart may ache, it may break, but there are times when I should know when to let go.”

At last, he turned his gaze upon her.

“Her very existence had dragged me into the bottomless abyss, then, and even now. For in her death, I came to understand there is no such thing as kindness in this world.”

Vanitas rose, water streaming from his body as he stepped closer to Julia’s phantom.

“She has always been… and will always be… the beginning of my end. And the end of my beginning.”

Julia’s phantom tilted her head, a grin creeping up her lips.

——So you blame me for your ruin?

“I don’t blame you,” Vanitas replied. “I blame myself for loving you beyond reason. For letting your words sway me when I should have let go. If I had jumped that day, if our paths had never crossed, none of this would have happened.”

The phantom leaned in until her breath ghosted across his lips.

——Yes, if you hadn’t loved her… she wouldn’t have had to die.

Vanitas’s eyes narrowed. “It seems you aren’t fully autonomous after all.”

——And you aren’t as free from sin as you pretend.

“You misunderstand me,” he said. “I’ve never thought myself free of sin. No one on this continent—no, in this world—is as steeped in it as Vanitas Astrea. To even deny my sins would be yet another sin in itself.”

The phantom’s smile curved. Through the hazy bath, her form faded at the edges as though the illusion struggled to hold together.

——If you truly believe that, then tell me… when the time comes, will you let your sins drag you down? Or will you drag the world down with you?

The atmosphere grew silent. Vanitas did not answer. He simply turned and stepped out of the bath, water sliding down his body.

“I thank you,” he said at last. “It seems this hotel truly offers every amenity one could ask for. If I hadn’t come here, if I hadn’t dragged my colleagues into their deaths, I would never have seen it so clearly.”

——Seen what?

“My true purpose here.”

From the signs engraved into its foundations and the magical currents inscribed across its walls, Vanitas understood its construct. The phantoms feasted on the living.

“In this world.”

Without prey, the Lily of the Valley would wither. For in the end, no matter how refined the façade, it was still a hotel.

And a hotel could not operate without its guests.

Vanitas wiped himself down and dressed, leaving the towel draped loosely around his neck as he stepped into the hall.

The silence was much more evident than before. Less than half of the scholars who had entered the Lily of the Valley remained.

In the end, their pursuit of discovery had been nothing more than a farce. What they discovered was not knowledge, but the depths of their own regret and sorrow that had bottled up within the human heart.

And still, the Lily of the Valley consumed.

Vanitas turned back to the bathhouse entrance, where the door had yet to close fully. Through the steam, a woman remained submerged in the waters, her eyes fixed on him with a knowing look.

“Is it fun to keep taking, Lily of the Valley?”

* * *

Selena bolted down the corridor. The moment the eyes fixed on her were alarmed, shadows chased.

Margaret, quick to notice the hostile presences, narrowed her gaze and placed a hand on her blade.

“You still haven’t explained anything!” she demanded, matching Selena’s pace.

“They’re after my head. That’s all there is to it!” Selena cried.

“That makes no sense!” Margaret snapped back. “Why would the Duke’s men target you specifically?”

“I don’t understand it either!” Selena’s voice cracked/ “But please, Grand Knight, just this once, defy the Marquess’s orders for my sake!”

Margaret found herself caught between duty and instinct. Vanitas’s command had been absolute. Yet the desperation in Selena’s plea, the frantic look in her eyes…

However, Vanitas’s orders defied any absolute authority, for, to Margaret, it was the ultimate authority in itself. Even if it were the very Gods themselves, Margaret would see Vanitas’s orders see through until the end like a pragmatic stone that refused to move.

“No.”

Selena’s eyes widened. “Y-Yes?!”

“If the Duke truly seeks your head, then it must be a misunderstanding,” Margaret said evenly. Her hand hovered near her blade. “And if it is not… then I will protect you.”

The words rang with weight, for they were not spoken out of kindness, but out of duty. Duty entrusted to her by Vanitas himself.

To guard the Saintess was her mandate.

“Even if I must face the Great Power, the Wolf of the North himself,” Margaret continued, “then so be it.”

Selena’s breath hitched. “Be reasonable, Grand Knight Illenia!”

But reason held no place in Margaret’s conviction.

———!

The next instant, the Glade Chasers lunged to seize Selena, dead or alive.

Margaret moved before they could even blink. Her blade never left its sheath, yet limbs bent where they shouldn’t, bones cracked, and the screams of trained personnel echoed across the courtyard like the cries of beasts brought low.

Snow scattered due to the force of her movements. In a matter of seconds, the Duke’s men lay sprawled on the ground, groaning in agony.

Margaret stood above them, her lavender eyes sharp and cold.

“Speak,” she commanded. “Is this the Duke’s will? Why target her? Do you fools have any idea who she even is?”

One of the fallen forced himself upright despite his injuries.

“I-It seems you’re still as ignorant as ever… Illenia.”

Margaret’s eyes narrowed, recognition flashing across her face. “…Dante?”

A bitter smile tugged at his bloodied lips. “It’s been a while… but that’s not the point. That woman… she isn’t the maid she claims to be.”

For the briefest instant, Margaret’s expression hardened. Her gut twisted. Had they uncovered her identity? That shouldn’t have been possible.

“Look at her,” Dante pressed, his eyes flicking toward Selena, who shrank back. “Cowering like a cornered cat. Only the guilty try to run when accused. That woman, she murdered the Duke’s son!”

Margaret froze, her eyes widening. “…What?”

At the same time, Selena’s face contorted in sheer confusion.

“Huh?”