On My First Day Undercover, the Organization Collapsed - Chapter 382

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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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First Day of Infiltration, The Organization Was Destroyed — Episode 382
Festa Preparations (5)
“So how are you deciding on masquerade partners?”
“Random, of course! That’s what makes it fun!”
“Shouldn’t people find their partners beforehand?”
“No way—that ruins it. What’s the point of a masked ball if you run into people you already know?”
The second-year students were deep in their Festa preparations.
Especially heated were the discussions around the masquerade ball.
With Celia leading the charge, the female students’ opinions came fast and fierce.
“The masks have to be elaborate and beautiful!”
“Absolutely.”
“Could we ask Professor Emeric to help with voice modulation or something?”
“Why not? Let’s ask him.”
Delev and the other male students found themselves with no choice but to make masks.
“Delev, aren’t we supposed to do something too?”
“Don’t tell me you only came to see Celia.”
“What are you talking about?”
Delev’s expression hardened.
‘A masked ball.’
He’d attended a few with his father, but never participated while actually wearing a mask himself.
Ultimately, what mattered most for any event was its success.
The masquerade was scheduled for the final day of the Festa, when excitement would be at its peak.
“What should we give people for participating?”
“Give them what?”
“A scholarship…?”
……
Kus placed a hand on Delev’s shoulder.
“Friend, romance is all well and good, but right now we need scholarship money more than love.”
“That’s not it!”
“Sure, sure. I understand—you want to be helpful to someone you care about, right?”
“Who said anything about liking someone?”
“You know you do.”
Kus bolted, sensing mortal danger, though not without cackling at his friend’s embarrassment as he fled.
In any case, the real problem was the concept.
‘Handing out prizes or prize money is fine, but what actually makes it interesting?’
Delev thought back to the essence of a masked ball.
The appeal ultimately came from not knowing who the other person was.
Though when he’d attended masked balls with his father, those without masks actually seemed to be the outsiders.
Everyone wore them but knew exactly who everyone else was anyway.
“…What if we made it so people truly didn’t recognize each other?”
“Hm?”
“What if everyone was completely disguised, and then afterward they had to figure out who was who?”
Delev’s eyes flicked toward Celia, struck by the sudden inspiration.
He walked toward her without hesitation.
Every female student’s gaze snapped to him in an instant.
Delev faltered.
There was nothing more lethal than the look in those girls’ eyes.
But he gathered his nerve and approached anyway.
“Celia, I have an idea.”
“What is it?”
The unspoken message was clear: if this was nonsense, she wouldn’t let him off easy.
The female students had been debating for a while, but they hadn’t arrived at any real conclusion yet.
“…Everyone wears a full-face mask so it’s absolutely impossible to identify anyone?”
“And voice modulation too!”
“Then what?”
“Um… then you play a game trying to figure out who’s who.”
Celia folded her arms.
‘Did I just bomb?’
Delev tensed his legs.
Ready to run for his life.
If I get caught by Celia when she’s in a mood like that, I’m done for.
“It’s fine, isn’t it? What do you think?”
“Seriously. Delev, did you hit your head somewhere?”
“Huh?”
“No, I’m saying—for an idea from Delev, it’s actually decent. Why don’t we do it this way? We were going to decorate the Auditorium anyway, but not everyone can even fit inside.”
“You’re right. It’d be way more fun if we just did it ourselves. We can tell the people upstairs to go ahead and look at something else.”
“Hmm. Yeah, that’s probably better. Building a massive set would be cool, but… this feels like it’d be way more fun, you know?”
That was exactly what Celia had been wrestling with.
So what would they actually do after gathering students from the Sword School and Arcane School?
Most of them didn’t even know each other to begin with, and wearing masks on top of that meant there’d be nothing natural to talk about.
Not like they’d be discussing international politics or power struggles.
“Let’s just play amongst ourselves. That’ll be more fun.”
“I agree. Since we all know each other anyway, it’d be way more fun if we tried to hide from each other and then guess who’s who.”
“So we’d have to act as much as possible?”
“Should we ask Professor Emeric or Zephyros to make masks that change your voice? Like, completely random voices!”
And so the concept for the masked ball was decided.
Everyone in the same mask.
Everyone in the same outfit.
Everyone in the same hood.
Complete uniformity so no one could be identified by hair color!
“But Quantus is definitely going to get caught.”
“Yeah. He’s an exception.”
Unfortunately, there was one student whose elimination was assured within the first second, but what could they do.
‘So we’d distinguish people by how they speak and act?’
“We could have fun guessing by swordsmanship sparring too.”
“That’s good. Since we’re the Sword School anyway.”
“Swordsmanship at a ball…? I love it!”
The finer rules could be decided later.
As long as everyone showed interest and enthusiasm, the concept was locked in.
“Delev, you came up with a pretty good idea.”
“I thought you just tagged along after Celia.”
“What…? What are you talking about?!”
Celia was just as flustered.
The masked ball had its concept finalized.
And as for the Maze…
“W-wait, we have to break through this? Or rather, the guests do?”
“…Feels like everyone’s just going to be trapped and can’t leave until the Festa ends?”
Faced with a blueprint for a Maze designed with impressive complexity according to Quantus’s unwavering vision, they all found themselves at a loss for words.
“Quantus, is this really right?”
“If the Maze is easy, it’s not a Maze!”
“Still, people should at least be able to break through it…”
“That’s why I put it in. The beginner’s course.”
“That one looks incredibly hard too!”
“That’s why it’s a Maze!”
There was fierce debate, but Quantus ultimately won out.
It was because Ziel, watching from the sidelines, offered a single comment.
“This sounds entertaining.”
“See! Even the teacher thinks it’s fun!”
“Teacher! This is incredibly difficult!”
“Difficulty breeds the desire to challenge. This should be entertaining.”
Now the others turned their gaze to Ann.
But Ann had already given up.
“No way. I’m out this time.”
“Huh.”
“And who knows? If it’s complicated like the teacher says, it might actually spark people’s competitive spirit.”
She even went so far as to agree with Quantus’s view!
“Ann, you’re the only one who really gets me!”
“I don’t want to get stuck with that image, so just drop it.”
“Okay…”
In any case, the Maze was also roughly settled.
In the midst of this, Maris put forward a good suggestion.
“If we’re going to make it this demanding, why not make the prizes equally enticing? Can we work it into our budget?”
“It’s possible. Since the Arcane School students are involved too, what if we offer a fine sword and an expensive Magical Tool—one of each—and let them choose?”
The detailed rules were still being established.
In any case, now that the direction had been set—a complex and difficult Maze—there was no reason to hesitate.
“But how do we set the traps?”
“Wouldn’t what we learned from the Teacher be enough? Since the Second Years aren’t participating, we can use techniques unfamiliar to the other grades.”
Then one person passing by offered an opinion.
“G-g-ghosts!”
“Yes?”
“G-g-ghost Illusions!”
It was Kelvin.
The man who feared ghosts more than anything in the world, yet possessed an enormous frame and was called the Mercenary King!
“Ghosts…… You want to make ghosts appear?”
Maris, catching on instantly, nodded.
“This is good. But how do we make the ghosts appear?”
“I-Illusions!”
“Illusions……?”
What Kelvin was referring to was precisely the Magical Tool used in the fear-overcoming training he had endured!
“M-mister Zephyros!”
“You’re saying we should go find Zephyros……?”
While the Maze project proceeded steadily, there was one event progressing with surprisingly few obstacles.
Ice sculpture.
Nearly thirty people working together on the delicate art of ice carving!
“Surprisingly, it seems I have a knack for this sort of thing?”
Leading this effort was Karen.
At first, Yurio, who had suggested the idea, had taken the lead, but it was discovered that Karen possessed unexpected manual skill.
“What we usually call ‘talent,’ I suppose, Miss Karen Aswan.”
Mortis too nodded with satisfaction.
Mortis had only taught the fundamentals of sculpture.
Even so, it had been considerable help, yet no student demonstrated the level of skill Karen did.
“The touch, the way you translate the concept into execution, and these meticulous finishing details…… Excellent, Miss Karen Aswan. Your latent artistry has truly awakened at last!”
Mortis marveled without exaggeration, again and again!
Karen was delighted.
Being praised for Swordsmanship felt good, but to discover she had talent beyond that!
She had thought throughout her life that Swordsmanship was her only way forward!
“Wow, Karen. You don’t even need to join the Knight Order. Do this after graduation.”
So why did she feel annoyed when Yurio said that?
“Shut up, Yurio.”
“What, why?”
Karen returned her focus to the sculpture.
The way her hands carved through the ice was delicate and beautiful to anyone watching.
Mortis was so moved that he pressed his hands to his chest and sighed with wonder.
“Talent truly reveals itself one way or another…… This too is art!”
Coveted.
Quantus coveted her talent, but Mortis coveted it even more.
While Quantus coveted her as a model, Mortis wanted to take her as a disciple!
“Miss Karen Aswan, would you perhaps consider working part-time at our Boutique during the break period?”
“A part-time job……”
“Oh! Don’t worry at all. You can keep Swordsmanship as your career path and pursue sculpture as a hobby instead. Having more skills only makes life better, don’t you think?”
“That sounds wonderful!”
“Truly excellent. To display such talent in sculpture……!”
A talent discovered, and the event preparations proceeding smoothly!
With ice being maintained through magic, all three originally planned events were progressing well.
And watching over it all, Ziel nodded with satisfaction.
“You’re all doing splendidly.”
A Festa prepared by the students themselves!
This was exactly the kind of process suited to it.
If things went poorly, Ziel could always step in, but this time he intended to hold back as much as possible.
The Maze, the sculpture, the Masked Ball preparations—everyone was handling it well on their own.
Now there was only one thing Ziel needed to concern himself with.
The inter-academy exchange with Telvir Academy.
This particular exchange would proceed in a somewhat unusual format.
“Boss, but it seems Telvir has made preparations too. They’re so anxious to beat us, aren’t they?” Gilbert remarked.
He was right.
Telvir hadn’t simply proposed a standard swordsmanship tournament.
There were individual one-on-one contests, certainly, but Telvir had proposed two additional special events beyond that.
“A territorial occupation battle, a destruction battle… and flag capture too. It seems they’re suggesting that swordsmanship alone won’t be enough, doesn’t it?”
Precisely.
Telvir was desperate to win.
So rather than a pure test of swordsmanship, they’d proposed several special themed contests.
Edelwein Academy had accepted them all.
There was no reason to refuse, after all.
The rules were already settled.
“We’ll win anyway.”
But Ziel’s conviction was unshakeable.
They would win regardless.
Still, to ensure that, proper preparation was essential.
“Gilbert, starting tomorrow, prepare exchange tournament training with Kelvin. Each of you take one event. I’ll handle the other two.”
“Understood, Boss. Which ones will you be taking?”
Ziel had selected the two events that looked most promising.
“The territorial occupation battle and the flag capture.”
“Right.”
“Both should prove to be entertaining contests.”
Three weeks until the Festa.
Time passed swiftly, and now the eve festival was drawing near.

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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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