Surviving the Assassin Academy as a Genius Professor - Chapter 126

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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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Chapter 126
EP28 – How We Came to Rule (3)

— There’s no need for concern, Earl. This is no crisis at all.

The voice lingered in Modrio’s mind—that soothing tone which had quieted the anxious Earl’s Household moments before.

— The black sphere that appeared in the sky is merely the caprice of a star that enjoys watching humans squabble. No response is necessary.
— The wall that blocks the territory is just for intimidation. They hope to see us cower and turn against ourselves. Ignore it.
— The destruction of the Communication Tower actually means our victory. The stars grow petulant because we hold firm, so they lash out.

A voice that resonated through the mind.
His words had never been wrong before.
The Earl and all his retainers absorbed each utterance with vacant expressions.

This was not a crisis.
This was not warfare.

And besides,

— Dante Hiaka is nothing to fear.
— Simply cede a fortress or two.
— Pay it no mind.

……That man before him was nothing either.

But unlike the voice heard days ago, Professor Dante had now come to rule more than twenty fortresses across the first and second layers, and at that scale, dismissing him as insignificant became impossible.

Yet it didn’t matter.

“Dante Hiaka—!”

Modrio could not hide himself in his own voice.

“Have you been sharpening your neck waiting for this? You reckless madman!”

Because though his opponent was nothing, he possessed something far greater—a “magnificent friend.”
Kaiser Truman.
A man who, in his youth, had conquered the southern reaches of the neighboring Lewian Duchy and unified countless fringe organizations of the Black Path.
Yet the Kaiser he had actually met was not a man to be appraised by mere “such accomplishments.”

“Why do you not answer? Professor Dante Hiaka! Have you lost your nerve?”

That shocking first meeting—a single word, and then, without even a trace of magical presence, a vast meteor streaked down and detonated. The tremor nearly drove him to his knees. He remembered those eyes looking down upon him in that moment.

Of course, the Earl’s Household had claimed the meteor came from that sphere in the sky—but what would such fools know?

He had such a man as his “friend.” It felt as secure as having a dragon at his back.
Now he would drive out this foreign professor and seize the power of the first and second layers, standing against his brother as an equal.

This was what he had expected.

“Professor Dante! Crawl forward at once and bow your head, and I’ll spare you execution! Where does a mere teacher dare defy the Earldom—”

A Cane thrust toward his neck.
Modrio spun around in alarm.
Kaiser had turned stern.
……Why?
Had he made some mistake?

“Modrio.”

The heavy voice snapped him back to awareness.

“Y-yes, why are you—”
“Leave us.”
“I—?”
“I won’t say it twice.”

All the knights and retainers who had accompanied Modrio stood bewildered, but Kaiser spoke with crystalline resolve.

“Out.”

Modrio bowed his head and withdrew at once—he had no desire to test the patience of that dragon-like creature.
But as he reached the threshold to leave.
He saw it.
A sight that shattered his composure.

‘……!!’

That crippled colossus—towering in his perception like a giant, perhaps even more imposing than the elder brother he had feared his whole life—was kneeling.
Kneeling before Professor Dante, head bowed.

‘That… what in the…!!’

* * *

“…Professor. It is an honor to see you again.”

It might have been a touching reunion of separated family, had not Modrio’s retinue been watching through the crack in the door.

“The floor is filthy. Kaiser. Rise.”

Gravitas was as much Kaiser’s passive nature as it was mine, and even as he performed a deep bow, he kept the light in his eyes undiminished.
Walking parallel lives of hardship as we were, I had always wanted to ask Kaiser what had transpired during our separation, to listen carefully to how he had survived.
Yet with so many eyes upon us, that was impossible.
And besides, this was neither the time nor the place.

“We have much to discuss. But now is not the moment.”
“…Indeed.”

First, we shared what we knew.
I asked why Kaiser had come here, and informed him that I had come to capture Vomittekka—that it was watching us from the sky even now. At that, Kaiser’s eyes narrowed as he laid out the information he possessed.
The revelations came like a torrent.

“Moong is here?”
“Yes.”
“That man… he was a legend of the Department of Warfare.”
“He has been in seclusion for many years. By my investigation, he is confirmed to reside in this third layer region.”

Moong was a great professor. In this world, only he possessed a ninth-level ability that no other soul could wield.

‘Moong. And the hero.’

Until now, I had been fumbling my way toward command, yet privately my doubts gnawed at me.
‘Can the Earldom truly capture Vomittekka?’—that question had haunted me.
But now a card had emerged. A far more potent hand than I had dared to hope—one I could deploy for the coming battle.

“Additionally, there’s something I’d like to ask.”
“What is it.”
“On the 2nd Layer, I happened to discover traces of Zamryong Academy. Was it your intention for those students to tear through the fortress sections scattered throughout?”
“Half of it, yes.”
“…As I suspected.”

The truth was otherwise, but I decided to say it was.
I’d only just realized the truth of the matter myself—because of the one lurking in empty space beside the window, the one who’d followed Kaiser in.

● Zamryong Academy 1st Year, Quan

The 【Script】 isn’t visible, but the [Nameplate] is.

“Do you enjoy watching from the shadows.”

I spoke in passing.
At that, Quan scurried away like a cockroach, vanishing in a blur.
The boy was utterly impossible to pin down.

“……?”

Kaiser’s eyes held a question.
He clearly hadn’t noticed.

“…Who was that?”
“Quan.”
“Ah, that strange one….”

The fact that Quan suddenly appeared here meant one thing.
Zamryong Academy must have been summoned wholesale.
The four members of the Dante Assassination Team had been summoned together.

‘Now I understand.’

And for some reason, those students had been spreading my name around, laying waste to both the 1st and 2nd Layers. So I’d been credited with their accomplishments—the reason I’d received Star Fragments.

‘I’d thought I was at least senior professor level….’

But four of them shaking the entire Earldom?
Thanks to that, I’d gotten more than my fill of Star Fragments.
It was good.
And yet it also felt wrong.

‘…Will those four really be at the Vomittekka Fortress?’

If they were, that would mean four incredibly strong hands.
But there was a part of me that hoped they wouldn’t be.

And then came the truly shocking news.

“…Is it true? That Eimoun, the great commander, was discarded like a worn tool?”
“Yes. It was about three years ago.”
“Then who’s the strategist for the Earl’s Household now?”
“A man named Carlos. He’s a strategist who defected from the Black Path, and he brought along a knight of roughly Grandmaster Class.”

Somehow… every puzzle piece that had felt wrong, that had nagged at me, fell into place.
Moreover, I had the sudden certainty that this was the Demon Strategist Event—the one with a 0.5% probability of occurring during an Incursion.
The highest tier among demons, the kind that wielded mental curses or Illusion Magic—formless demons.
Without that, things couldn’t have been this absurdly, maddeningly lukewarm.

‘Moong, the Hero, Eimoun.’

I had to bring all three of them back.

After that, once we’d shared various intelligence, word came that Kaiser had already seized control of the third-layer Modrio, the Viscount. With that, layers one, two, and three were all in my hands and his.
Which meant my next move was remarkably straightforward.

“Would you perform the Sword Dance for me?”
“I shall.”

Overturn the Earl’s Household.

“Even with a Cane, if you’re able.”

* * *

After that, Viscount Modrio found himself dragged along in a current he couldn’t quite grasp, his head spinning.

Professor Dante encountered assassins wearing elephant masks and engaged them in conversation.

Boss Kaiser commanded his forces, and Modrio had no choice but to move as ordered.

Beneath those vertically-split pupils issuing commands, refusal was not an option. Resistance could lead to anything, and he didn’t want to know what.

Through it all, Modrio’s gaze remained fixed on Professor Dante.
There was the head of the Governing Council, ‘Kaiser’—a man who had displayed powers Modrio had never witnessed in his life—bowing his head like a servant before his master.

‘It doesn’t make sense.’

Among the nobility who had dealt with countless high officials since childhood, some developed an intuition for measuring a person’s capacity.
Though Modrio had been raised as that sort of aristocrat who cared only for money at his brother’s urging, he possessed such an instinct.

After two days with Kaiser, what Modrio felt was unmistakable: Kaiser’s vessel was larger even than the Earl’s.
If such a man served another as a master… then how vast must that master’s capacity truly be?

‘It makes no sense.’

He couldn’t reconcile it. How could such a being even exist? And if it did, why here—in this remote Earldom?

And besides,

‘…it contradicts everything the Earl’s Household said.’

The Earl’s Household had been brimming with confidence that Professor Dante was nothing remarkable—someone they could dispose of quickly.

‘Who first said such a thing?’

It was Carlos, the Earl’s new strategist.
A man who had appeared suddenly three years ago alongside Knight Bliop.
The Earl had granted him his full favor ever since.
His words had never been wrong.

– This Dante Hiaka character is of no consequence.
– You might as well hand over a fortress or two.
– There is no need for concern.

Again, his peculiar manner of speech—resonant as a bell ringing in the mind—brushed past Modrio’s ears. Everyone in the Earl’s Household had listened in that same daze.

It had certainly seemed that way, and yet this professor’s control was…

As dusk fell, Dante and Kaiser entered Earl’s Castle, accompanied by troops composed of all layers and four elephant assassins.

Kaiser deployed the assassins with spectral precision, and in the blink of an eye, the knights crumbled.

Yet the Earl possessed reserves of his own—Master Class, the highest tier. Bliop, the Earl’s Household’s mightiest knight, ranked 1,254th in the Empire, stepped forward with his Greatsword raised.

Even for a professor of Dante’s caliber, he could not recklessly pull the trigger with the Earl and Bliop standing before him.

As this delicate standoff stretched on, the Strategist Carlos cried out.

“Your Grace! You must kill the professor!”

That voice, which had always soothed everyone’s hearts,

“You must kill that worthless wretch of a professor at once!”

had now twisted into malice, torturing the minds of all who heard it.

“That creature is a lackey of the stars! An instrument designed to torment mankind!”
“If that monster lives, the attacks against us will never cease!”
“Kill him! Bliop! Strike him down—!!”

Even Modrio, witnessing all this unfold, felt his heart lurch with the thought: ‘Should we kill that professor…!?’

Yet Dante, standing at the center of the conflict, gazed at the Strategist with an expression of perfect calm.

Those who had learned of the situation from Kaiser, including Modrio, tensed.

According to Dante, the Earl’s Household must unite to battle the monster in the sky.
But to do so, they would have to fight the Strategist Carlos.
The Earl, however, cherished Carlos more than his own wife.
If they killed Carlos here, it would lead to total war between the Earl’s Household and Dante’s forces—and nothing but mutual ruin could follow.

“Kill him!! What are you doing, Bliop? Go! Kill that bastard!!”

As the Strategist Carlos, who had always sheltered everyone like a father and mother, roared his commands,
something extraordinary happened.

Dante walked forward alone.

“P-Professor!”
“Do not go!”

The alarmed fortress commanders cried out, but he did not stop.

“Stop there! Unless you want a hole in your skull!”

Even the Earl commanded him, but he did not stop.

Only his deliberate pace made everyone tense.
Something was beginning with his movement.

“How long do you think,”

At last, he spoke.

“you can deceive mankind?”

Dante posed the question to the Strategist Carlos.

“What barking is this! You whelps of the stars! How dare you insult our strategist—!!”

At the Earl’s desperate cry, a knight drew forth a massive greatsword with both hands—*Shink*—

“B-Bliop—!!”

Yet Dante remained unruffled.
As though that great knight were nothing at all.

“Earl Kale.”
“What!?”
“The human eye is imperfect, and thus laden with countless compensations. We experience visual illusions because we cannot perceive our subjects with precision.”
“…What—?”
“An eye fixated on color sees the wrong hue. An eye fixated on form exaggerates beyond reality. One who has gazed only inward cannot see the world beyond.”

His measured words burrowed into everyone’s ears and took root in their minds.

“……Now, it is time for your eyes to open.”

Open their eyes? Dante walked forward with an unhurried gait, and Bliop stepped to intercept him.

“Stop!!”

Whoosh!

As he thrust the massive sword forward, cries erupted from those around them. ‘Professor, watch out!’ ‘That knight is a high ranker!’ Yet Dante only replied with serene composure.

“Do you still see this man as a knight?”

What did he mean by that? Yet in that very moment, something extraordinary unfolded.
After Dante passed through his body, he emerged from behind him.

‘Wh—!!’
‘He went right through him!?’
‘That’s—what in the world—!!’

What one has long beheld grants faith. The human mind is constructed thus.
More than three years had passed in their company. All had gazed upon Knight Bliop and Carlos for so long. The space called the Earl’s Household was no different. Within that familiar, trustworthy place, only one thing stood as an anomaly.

Dante Hiaka.

When he raised his right hand, a ring began to pulse. Modrio, the junior marquis who had felt such vibrations only a handful of times across the Empire, understood at once.

It was the Sacred Mark of the Divine Reaper Omega. From the ring poured forth a vibration that shattered Illusion Magic, sweeping through the entire building.

After that ominous pulse shook the world, the Earl’s Castle collapsed inward.

―─┹─━–╈‒—━┲─―

The ceiling they had gazed upon for years, the walls, all that was so trustworthy—crumbled like shattered glass. In their place lay patterns filled with ominous crimson lines. They were the formulae of Curse magic.

Knight Bliop, whom Dante had passed through, scattered and disintegrated. There was nothing there. As though all along, he had never existed—and everyone was now perceiving this truth.

Strategist Carlos too; something burst forth from his sorrowful visage, revealing grotesquely twisted wrinkles. A mage among them understood. It was the aftermath of Prolonged Overload.

All of them sensed it instinctively.
That thing was not ‘human’.

‘This can’t be……!!’
‘What… what on earth is this……!!’

In that same moment, they recoiled in shock — both Modrio and the Earl. And from within that horror, Professor Dante Hiaka turned to the Earl and spoke.

“Do you see it now?”

Everyone in the Earl’s Household fell into shock.

The Earl crumbled at the realization that those he had trusted so long — his greatest achievement, the Strategist, the knight — were all fabrications.

Soon a battle broke out, but the false Strategist was subdued in an instant, and his head was severed.

‘Ah…….’

And so Modrio, the junior marquis, understood.

There was a question that had tormented him from the beginning until now.

What sort of man would have to be the master of that ‘Kaiser’?

Not even an Earl, not even a king, and though he had never seen one, surely not even an Emperor could be such a thing?

It was a doubt that had lingered in his mind all along, but now a perfect answer crystallized in his heart.

Any man can place a leash around something and affix a nameplate to rule it.

But to overwhelm strangers in a strange place and rule them without a leash — no one can do that.

……Unless a man were like that one.

‘Dante Hiaka.’

Only a man who displayed such dominion as this

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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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