Chapter 173

The fifth Calamity, Blue Night.

In terms of importance to the story, it ranked among the top three events.

It was one of the Seven Calamities and the final hurdle before entering the last arc.

‘The continent was shaken badly in the original.’

The casualties began in the hundreds of thousands and eventually climbed into the millions.

It was the largest Calamity I had faced so far.

It was also the event that brought down Grandia Academy.

Blue Night unfolded across the entire continent.

The New Kingdom-Cultist Allied Forces targeted locations everywhere.

The academy was one of them, and countless faculty members and students lost their lives.

‘Javert and plenty of other named characters were killed...’

It was an event that absolutely had to be stopped for the sake of a happy ending.

That was why I was heading to the first location from the original story.

The land where Blue Night first began.

‘The sky island, Lusilion.’

It was a famous tourist destination.

A chunk of land floating like an island one kilometer above the ground.

Blended with the clouds, it was beautiful, with unusual ecosystems and scenery to admire.

‘It’s also an island fated to fall in one piece...’

Right after Blue Night began, Lusilion would lose its buoyancy and plummet.

An island fifty kilometers across would crash down onto the continent.

By the standards of my previous life, it was over three times the size of Seoul.

An island larger than Jeju would fall, and the continent beneath it would have to bear the impact.

‘I have to stop it.’

Again, the sky island was only the starting point.

If I failed to stop the New Kingdom-Cultist Allied Forces here, their forces would grow beyond the point of no return.

It was that serious.

I sank quietly into thought.

‘The timing is strange.’

Blue Night was originally supposed to break out when we were at least third-years.

Yet we had only just finished the first semester of our first year.

It had been pushed forward by over eighteen months.

I could only click my tongue inwardly.

‘It really is the butterfly effect...’

It seemed the story had finally begun to seriously go off track.

No, maybe it was a miracle that things had held out this long.

I calmly organized my thoughts.

I had prepared more thoroughly than anyone for the butterfly effect.

I had kept investigating and never overlooked a single anomaly occurring across the continent.

‘Thanks to that, I’m not late. Catching Blue Night before it even began is good news.’

Of course, it wasn't something I could have done alone.

I had made use of several connections, especially the Border Knight Order.

‘I really get a lot of use out of this connection.’

That was a connection I had made at the start of the semester, when the princess and I raided the New Kingdom’s Human Ranch.

I saved a man named Kantas, only to find out he was roughly the third-ranking member of the Order.

Thanks to that, I had continued to receive the Order’s cooperation over the past few months.

They were the ones who noticed signs of Blue Night and informed me this time.

I had asked the Border Knight Order to keep Lusilion under constant surveillance.

‘Good.’

Everything was meshing together like gears.

After Kantas's report, I headed straight for Lusilion.

“Wah...! We're running through the sky! The train is running through the sky!”

“Sit still, Lu, Lua... You might fall over when it shakes...”

It might have been obvious, but the others had come along too.

I told them it would be dangerous, yet they all insisted on coming.

We were aboard a tram bound for Lusilion.

Lua pressed her face against the window, her eyes sparkling.

The tram raced through the sky, making the continent beneath our feet look like a miniature.

“It’s so high, Dad!”

“Is it fascinating?”

“Yes!”

“Hehe, I'm glad you like it so much.”

Bounce, bounce.

Watching Lua flap her hands made a fond smile come naturally.

‘Bringing her along was the right choice.’

The Skytram.

It was transportation that ran from the continent's surface to the sky islands.

Looking out the window, I could see the tram flying without even touching the rails.

“The train is really spacious too!”

“Y-yeah... I can't believe a carriage this spacious is all for our group...”

“Mm. It’s spacious.”

Lua smiled brightly, Rin held her in her arms, and Alice stood beside them.

The three of them peered out the tram window and admired the sky spread before them like a painting.

They also didn't forget to look around the needlessly spacious, luxurious carriage.

‘At least I got my money's worth.’

I thought as I fiddled with the mask I had taken off.

Skytram tickets were absurdly expensive to begin with.

On top of that, we had booked the highest-tier private-room package, which rented out the entire carriage.

It was like first class in my previous life.

The interior was definitely luxurious, and it was as spacious as most lodgings.

“This... seems really expensive.”

“It was. Seriously expensive.”

Caitlin muttered from the seat beside me.

I answered calmly.

“I bought the most expensive tickets I could get.”

“Fuck, are we going on a trip? You said we were going because there was something to deal with.”

“There’s no harm in enjoying ourselves, is there? It’s vacation, after all.”

Honestly, the price of each ticket was enough to make my hands and feet tremble.

By the standards of my previous life, it would be around thirty million won per ticket.

“No... where did you even get seven tickets? Fine, suppose you got them, but how the hell did you pay for them?”

“It’s a secret.”

Caitlin looked at me with puzzled eyes.

I shrugged and pretended not to know.

It was a universal rule that transmigrators had plenty of ways to make money.

‘I spent hours playing the original game. Of course I already knew which stocks and items were about to skyrocket.’

So I had quietly built up a considerable fortune.

This expense was large, but it wasn't enough to ruin my life.

“I’m fairly rich, you know.”

Though it was embarrassing to show off here.

Aside from Alice and me, who were commoners, everyone came from impressive backgrounds: children of nobles, the eldest daughter of a ducal house, Grandia Academy's second-in-command, and even a princess.

That was why I felt a strange sense of kinship with Alice.

The woes of us poor commoners, caught among all these lofty people...

As I got all sentimental and cried, “Poor, poor,” to myself, Caitlin added a few more words.

“Did someone sponsor you or something? No matter how rich you are, those aren't tickets some commoner brat could get.”

“Miss Caitlin. Please refrain from such classist remarks.”

“I hate nobles just as much, so it’s fine.”

“Is there anything Miss Caitlin doesn't hate?”

As that random conversation continued, Carmilla and Javert sat across from us.

The two faced each other, exchanging silences and a few brief words.

“......”

“......”

A subtle tension hung in the air.

For the past few days, it had seemed like the two had been engaged in a quiet battle of wills.

“Hm.”

Carmilla was the first to break the silence.

She casually raised her right hand.

Then she rested her chin on it as though deliberately drawing attention to it.

Perhaps because of the angle, the ring on her ring finger was clearly visible.

“I see.”

It was an item I had once obtained from the twin spirits.

I had personally put it on the princess's finger.

She too wore an identical ring on her finger.

When her gaze met Javert's, Carmilla smiled gently.

“It seems you didn't receive one.”

“......”

A short remark.

Yet that alone seemed to make Javert's eyes turn cold.

“It’s all right.”

Javert was silent for a moment.

Her usual expressionless face didn't look like it would waver in the slightest.

She placed a hand over her heart and closed her eyes as if savoring its beat.

It was where the contract resided.

The place where our inner selves overlapped as one.

“Because I received something far deeper and warmer than a material thing.”

“......”

They weren't loud.

Their words weren't sharp or lengthy, either.

They had only exchanged a sentence at a time.

Even so, the air inside the tram seemed to grow as cold as winter.

““......””

Just as silence settled over us once more, someone suddenly cut between them.

“That’s kind of funny.”

“......?”

“......?”

It was Caitlin.

The bronze-skinned girl looked at the two with an indifferent expression.

“You two are already falling behind. Staring each other down like that isn't getting you anywhere.”

“M-Miss Caitlin...?”

Swoosh.

With a casual motion, she pulled Ranne from the seat beside her.

Then Caitlin dropped a bombshell on the two women staring at her in confusion.

“While you two were busy fighting, the well-behaved cat already got the cream, you know?”

“M-Miss Caitlin?! We a-agreed not to talk about that!”

“Look at her reaction. They had a steamy little encounter ages ago.”

“T-That’s not what happened, no matter how many times I say it...!”

Ranne was suddenly blindsided.

Her face flushed bright red as she covered Caitlin's mouth.

But the words that had already slipped out had reached the seats across from us.

“Just now...”

“What did you say...?”

It was the first time they had heard this.

Javert and Carmilla could only stare blankly at Ranne.

“Y-You promised you’d keep it a secret...!”

“You believed that? You really are innocent.”

Ranne was unusually flustered as she spoke in a resentful voice.

Caitlin laughed as though she were watching a fire from across the river.

She also didn't forget one final provocation.

“You two will be too late if all you do is keep each other in check.”

““......””

The two of them turned their eyes toward me.

Still reeling from the shock, they asked in trembling voices.

“V-Viktor...? What was that just now supposed to mean...?”

“A steamy encounter...?”

Good grief.

I turned toward the troll sitting beside me.

“Miss Caitlin?”

“I’m sleeping. Don’t wake me.”

“Miss Caitlin!!!”

She reclined her seat and shut her eyes without giving any explanation.

Even my desperate cry didn't seem to reach her.

I pressed a hand to my brow.

“Viktor.”

“Student Viktor.”

No.

This is really unfair...

===

Javert and Rin.

That was the shirt illustration.

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