A Returner’s Magic Should Be Special - Chapter 9

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 9. Academy Life (2)

Romantica’s fingers slipped several times before she finally managed to break the letter’s seal. The moment she read its contents, everything stopped.

The reason Romantica Eru had been assigned to Beta Class.

With each passing second, her pulse quickened. When she reached the final sentence, the letter crumpled with a sharp, angry sound.
Wide, stunned eyes met composed ones in the empty air between them. Contrasting gazes, each searching the depths of the other.
“Ready to talk now?”
Romantica’s expression betrayed far too much for her to deny it. She lowered her voice to barely a whisper, as though afraid someone might overhear.
“How did you… How do you know this?”
“I have no reason to tell you.”
The upper hand had shifted entirely to Dezir.
Romantica felt her lips burn.
“Have you told anyone else?”
“I haven’t. But there are several professors who know. Otherwise, why would you have been placed here?”
“But… but this place is thousands of kilometers away from the Prilechia Kingdom!”
“You underestimated Hebrion Academy’s intelligence.”
Romantica’s assignment to Beta Class was no clerical error, as Doneta had suggested.
The academy’s entrance evaluation was conducted with meticulous thoroughness. No matter how carefully one buried the past, it always came to light. The only difference was that the general student body remained ignorant of such facts.
And that secret was precisely this.
“A merchant family that made a fortune through trade in the Prilechia Kingdom. Born as commoners, they purchased nobility through a destitute baron’s coffers and took the name Von Eru. You were four years old when that happened, weren’t you?”
“…”
“Your family bought the title of baron with money. No matter how much you insist you’re nobility, the fact that you’re commoner-born never changes.”
“You…!”
“You yourself come from commoner stock, and yet you don’t want to form a Party with commoners because you think you’ve become nobility? That’s incredibly selfish, don’t you think?”
“That’s…!”
Dezir knew Romantica’s secret.
It was only natural. She was one of the Beta Class members who had endured six years in the Shadow Labyrinth, one of his comrades.
She had always shared stories about herself.
Romantica Eru.
Daughter of Baron Eru, whose title had been purchased with gold.
When fate itself was uncertain, when death could come at any moment, they all wanted to leave themselves behind in someone’s memory, even if they fell.
United in this desire, they listened to each other’s tales.
Dezir was no different.
He remembered their names. He remembered their faces. He remembered their stories.
It was hardly surprising that Dezir knew Romantica so well.
“The Blue Moon Party’s faculty advisor is Professor Pergman. He’s one of the few professors who knows you’re commoner-born, and he despises commoners. If you ever try to join that Party, he’ll never let it pass.”
“…Doneta would protect me.”
“If you’d seen how he looks at commoners, you couldn’t be so certain of that.”
Dezir had already seen through Romantica’s state of mind.
Romantica, commoner-born, had not forgotten the look Doneta cast upon those of low birth.
A contemptuous gaze, as though watching inferior livestock.
How terrified she’d been every time he turned his head, fearing her true identity might be exposed and that same disdain would fall upon her.
Until moments ago, she had thought such fears were baseless imagination.
But that was no longer the case.
That hypothetical was now becoming reality, materializing before her eyes.
“So what will you do?”
Dezir waved the letter before her.
“Did you really think a Party built on coercion would function properly?”
“That’s… a fair point.”
Dezir spoke again.
“Fine. I’ll add one condition. I’m giving you a month. Try it for a month, and if you still hate it, you’re free to leave whenever you want.”
A month.
Romantica thought it wasn’t a bad offer. She could stay for a month and leave if it didn’t suit her. It seemed like a reasonable condition, and as she reached for Dezir’s hand, something suddenly occurred to her.
‘Wait—I thought this was a better deal because there was no time limit, but compared to being forced to join his Party permanently, isn’t this just… forcing me to join for a month instead?’
Perhaps he’d calculated that too.
Dezir extended his hand, and watching the expression on his face—utterly devoid of ulterior motive—Romantica felt a sigh rise up from somewhere deep inside her chest.
“You know what? You’ve been incredibly annoying ever since the entrance exam.”
“I’m aware.”
The cunning bastard.
Thinking this, Romantica took his hand.

* * *

The food was absolutely terrible.
There were only two items: bread hard as stone and thin mutton broth.
Confronted with this shockingly sparse fare, Romantica found herself at a loss for words. And then understanding dawned on her.
This was Beta Class.
She hadn’t enrolled at Hebrion Academy to be treated like this. This was too much.
They said the difference in treatment between Beta Class and Alpha Class was night and day, but this was absolutely beyond the pale.
When Romantica heard that Alpha Class students received three gourmet buffet meals a day, rage boiled up inside her—but survival left her no choice but to eat what she was given.
Romantica broke the bread in two with both hands. A dull, heavy crack echoed through the dining hall.
She momentarily panicked, wondering if they’d actually served her stone instead of bread.
But Dezir had already proven otherwise—he’d finished his meal long ago.
Romantica asked, bewildered.
“How are you even swallowing this?”
Dezir simply shrugged his shoulders. He pointed alternately at the bread and broth in front of her.
“If it’s too hard to eat, try soaking the bread in the broth.”
Romantica followed his advice, and the bread softened enough that she could manage to get it down.
As she ate and observed Dezir sitting across from her, the reality of being in the same Party finally struck her.
‘Really…….’
To be precise, they would be in the same Party.
Their Party hadn’t actually been established yet in any formal sense.
‘A Party requires a minimum of three members. And right now, it’s just that guy and me…….’
They hadn’t even found a supervising professor to authorize the Party yet.
A worthless Party with nothing going for it.
And she’d actually joined it.
“I’m done eating.”
Clink.
Her appetite suddenly vanished, Romantica set down her spoon.
When they left the dining hall, dusk was settling over the academy. Romantica walked three paces behind Dezir.
“Don’t worry. There’s no problem with establishing the Party.”
Dezir spoke, but the shadow hadn’t lifted from Romantica’s face.
“Do you even understand how difficult Party establishment is?”
Party establishment came with two requirements.
Three members—the minimum for any Party—and authorization from a supervising professor.
Either way, to get authorization, they had to meet the three-member minimum. And for that, their Party needed more people.
“There are already some strong Parties in Beta Class. All the new students want to join them, don’t they? They won’t even look twice at some half-baked startup like this.”
…….
“Say something!”
“You…….”
Dezir opened his mouth.
“At first you complained like crazy that this Party was worthless, and now you’re worried about it too…… You’ve really become a true Party member.”
“What, what, what are you—!? I’m not— Look, if this Party falls apart, I’ll be stuck running errands for a month, so…… this is just advice I’m giving for myself, entirely for my own sake!”
Romantica’s embarrassed flare-up over something trivial made her look endearingly childish.
“I already told you—there’s no problem. I know a professor who can authorize the Party, so that’s settled. And for members, I’ve already got my eye on someone who hasn’t joined a Party yet. We just need to convince that person.”
At this, Romantica puffed out her cheeks like a balloon.
“Why didn’t you just say that from the beginning!”
Romantica sensed she was being toyed with by the way he spoke so casually about it.
Sometimes talking with him felt like dealing with a schemer.
They veered off the path to the dining hall and turned onto the road leading to the Sparring Ground.
The path suddenly widened.
Romantica caught up with Dezir and walked alongside him before asking.
“So who’s this person you’ve got your eye on?”
Dezir answered.
“Fram Schneider.”

* * *

The sun bore down mercilessly.
A murmur of voices rose from the crowd.
The weathered Sparring Ground of Beta Class writhed with bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder.
The wooden bleachers gaped with more than five holes, and one of the support pillars had collapsed entirely—requiring hasty magical repairs to make the structure even barely usable.
Everything about this Sparring Ground was old and broken.
Yet it was packed with an extraordinary number of people.
Today was a rare occasion: Alpha Class and Beta Class held their combat drills simultaneously.
Once the lesson began, students scattered across the grounds, each seeking an opponent for their bout.
The crowd split cleanly into two groups. The first consisted of Beta Class students—plain-faced, dressed in unremarkable garb. They were the Sparring Ground’s usual inhabitants.
For them, this sight was perfectly ordinary.
But for the other group, such poor facilities were entirely foreign.
Those students stood out unmistakably: Alpha Class members draped in expensive, flamboyant clothing, adorned with every conceivable luxury good.
“This place is absolutely revolting.”
“The facilities are abysmal.”
They wrinkled their noses as though the air reeked, their faces twisted with disgust as they surveyed their surroundings and hurled insults.
“I share your sentiments about this place.”
Romantica spoke from the bleachers beside Dezir, her voice level.
They were waiting their turn.
With more students than available slots, everyone had to queue to use the grounds.
“No grass, no protective enchantments, poor upkeep—everything’s caked in mud, and the space is cramped, so we have to rotate. That’s one reason I’m determined to advance to Alpha Class.”
She knew perfectly well, even as she spoke, that complaining changed nothing.
The noon sun beat down relentlessly on her skin. She shaded her eyes with her palm and scanned the crowd on the grounds.
“You said our new Party member was here? What was his name again?”
“Fram Schneider.”
Dezir held that name clearly in his memory.

Fram Schneider.
A swordsman who survived nine years in the Shadow Labyrinth.
His specialty was thrusting—exploiting the sharpness and speed of the Twin Swords. He had devoted himself entirely to perfecting that single technique with the Twin Swords, training relentlessly. His natural talent for the blade, honed through extreme discipline, had forged a thrust of devastating power.

“An exceptional swordsman. Probably the strongest in Beta Class.”
“Hmm, I’d like to see him in action.”
“There he is, actually.”
Dezir gestured toward one section of the grounds.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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