The Genius Professor Wants An Easy Life - Chapter 48

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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 48
The Witch of Cruelty.
It was the epithet of a Level 7 sorceress who once reigned through terror across the Eastern Continent.
That she, a duchess, hailed from the Abyss—that gathering place of great evils—was an open secret.
“Nonsense. No matter that Catherine cast her forth without a shred of affection, there’s no reason he’d tolerate her being harmed.”
“Then what about disposing of the half-breed? She keeps getting in the way. Hasn’t all of Catherine’s recent prominence come from that half-breed?”
“You’ll bring greater ruin upon us. Have you forgotten where Ban’s Clan stands?”
“My lord, I never suggested we strike directly. I merely meant we might apply subtle pressure to have her expelled from the Academy.”
“That’s already been tasked to Balas. But he’s proving… insufficient.”
“Balas—of course it failed, given that fool. This sort of work requires strategy, not brute force.”
“Strategy?”
The duchess showed interest, and her younger brother, Conrad, twisted his mouth into a smile.
“There’s an old saying: to fell a strong knight, aim for the horse. Leave this to me. My son has just entered Rubines Academy as a freshman—I’ll lay the groundwork myself.”
* * *
The Academy grounds thrummed with vitality.
The freshmen’s faces especially glowed with anticipation and excitement, fresh as spring shoots.
Real classes hadn’t begun yet, so there was little burden on them; they were absorbed in forming friendships, and their expressions held nothing but joy.
Yet there were two.
Two who stood apart from this atmosphere entirely.
Catherine and Rivel.
“I’m going to the library.”
“Uh… okay.”
“Don’t follow me. I don’t want to be around you.”
“Yeah, fine. I don’t like you either.”
Catherine had always been accustomed to solitude.
She’d been treated as a nonentity, a shadow in her own house her entire life.
So she walked alone without complaint, unbothered by it.
Rivel, though, was different.
‘I wish I had friends.’
Rivel watched his classmates laughing and talking together with envious eyes.
‘When I left that place, I wanted to try making real friends.’
It wasn’t that Rivel had never spent time with peers before.
There were those called his ‘brothers.’
But they had only ever been competitors.
The vicious kind.
It wasn’t rare to kill someone you’d been laughing with the day before, so there had never been any real connection between them.
‘It’s all right. I have Professor Ban.’
Rivel clutched the New Clothes Ban had given him tightly.
It was the first gift he’d ever received, and he treasured it too much to wear.
‘But I can’t rely only on Professor Ban. Eventually, he’ll grow to dislike me too.’
It was as Rivel sank into these dark thoughts that—
“Are you Rivel?”
“Uh… yes. Who are you?”
“Nice to meet you! I’m Montero. Conrad is my father.”
“Oh… a noble. P-pleased to meet you.”
Rivel stammered his courtesy, just as Ban had warned him to do.
“We’re classmates—no need for that formality. You’re the top of the Magic Department, right? I was hoping we could get to know each other. Do you have a moment?”
“Huh? Oh… sure.”
Rivel’s eyes widened.
This was a friend event straight out of a novel!
‘But… why does this feel wrong?’
Rivel, who was sensitive to others’ emotions, found himself troubled by what he sensed from the boy who called himself Montero.
He smiled, but beneath that smile lay pure hostility.
Yet Rivel, lacking the common sense to understand such things, reasoned differently.
‘Maybe people always hate each other like this. Maybe that’s what friendship is too?’
In the ‘place’ Rivel had come from, the hostility between people was far more chilling than this.
The boy who introduced himself as Montero led Rivel to a secluded corner behind the Academy.
More than five other boys and girls were waiting there.
“Wow, he actually came.”
“The top student, huh? Isn’t he just an idiot?”
Rivel tilted his head as he watched them snicker at him.
“So… these people are becoming friends with me too?”
“Friends?”
Montero let out a smirk.
“You’re more entertaining than I thought.”
“Huh? I’m… entertaining?”
“Yeah, you are.”
“Then you’ll be my friend?”
Montero nodded.
“Sure, but there’s a condition. Do me a favor.”
“…What kind of favor?”
‘I’m not good at anything.’
Rivel’s confidence crumbled.
The only thing Rivel excelled at was killing other people.
‘W-well, I’m a bit good at torture too. I hope they ask me to do something I can actually do.’
But then.
“Insult the Half-breed professor right in front of us.”
…….
Rivel’s face went rigid.
More precisely, it turned cold and still.
Montero, oblivious to the shift, continued whispering like a serpent.
“Call Professor Ban a pathetic mutt. Do that, and we’ll be your friends.”
* * *
I sat in my assigned research office.
Though calling it an office was generous—it was little more than a cramped storage closet.
‘…Balas and Kansir got much nicer offices. Isn’t this discrimination a bit too obvious?’
Petty as it was, the winner of the Temporary Professor Position competition would be me in the end.
Once those fools were driven out, I’d claim the best office for myself.
Still, the baby dragon seemed delighted with the cramped space, zipping around cheerfully.
-Squee!
‘That’s right, fly around all you want here. Once we’re home, you’ll have to be quiet as an ant because of noise complaints.’
Though what should I name this little thing? Happy? No—it’s a dragon, so something more dignified like Patrash?
As I indulged these silly thoughts, I exhaled a long sigh.
“…What am I supposed to do about this Invitation Letter.”
Given how deep my bad history with Ban ran, I wasn’t eager to meet them.
‘No matter how much of a former sales master I am, this isn’t someone I can handle lightly.’
It was a matter of personality compatibility.
‘There’s a reason they call me the natural enemy of half-breeds.’
Their background was also formidable—almost equal to Ban’s.
“…For now, I should focus on my magical research first. As a professor, my duties come before any private meetings.”
I needed to figure out how to utilize the Chaos I’d obtained recently.
Just then, the door to my cramped office—or rather, my research closet—burst open.
“Professor Ban, we have a crisis!”
“What’s the emergency?”
At the words that followed, my face went stiff.
“Catherine is beating up the students!”
* * *
I hurried to the Rector’s office, where Catherine and the injured students had supposedly been called.
‘Why would Catherine…?’
For all her rough edges, Catherine wasn’t the type to throw punches without cause.
The answer became clear soon enough.
‘Rivel.’
I swallowed hard.
Rivel stood in the corner with his face a battered mess.
‘She saw Rivel getting beaten and stepped in.’
The injured students.
Or rather, the students who had assaulted Rivel—they protested indignantly.
“That beggar hit us first!”
“We’re the victims here!”
“No… I, I didn’t hit anyone.”
Rivel stammered as he spoke.
It’s probably the truth.
Rivel’s too innocent to lie much.
“A beggar spouting lies!”
“Princess Catherine, apologize to us! Or are you taking the side of a filthy half-breed beggar because of your own tainted blood?!”
Catherine’s teeth ground together.
She was angry enough that curses half-spilled out, mixing with the formal courtesies she usually wore like habit.
“Montero, you bastard. I saw you pressuring Professor Ban to insult him.”
“Hmph. Got proof?”
Montero—the instigator—is a student I know all too well.
The son of Count Conrad, and like his father, wicked to the bone.
“A princess beneath the station of commoners.”
Montero and his cronies erupted in snickering laughter.
“I won’t let this slide.”
Catherine was about to snap back when—
“Oh dear, oh dear. This is quite the predicament. Violence between students is a grave offense that can result in expulsion.”
It was Karak, the Academy Chancellor.
He surveyed the students, stroking his chin, then delivered his thunderbolt.
“Ahem, I’ve heard the gist of it. Student Catherine will face indefinite suspension or expulsion, and Student Rivel shall receive at least a short-term suspension.”
It made no sense.
“…But the initial aggressors were these students—”
“Is there evidence? They can appeal to the Board if they feel wronged, but the Board will reach the same conclusion.”
Evidence wasn’t the point.
These were noble children.
Rivel was, needless to say, a half-breed. And Catherine had fallen out of favor with her ducal house.
“However, the probationary period hasn’t ended yet, and I’m hesitant to impose such harsh punishment immediately. What do you think, Professor Ban?”
Chancellor Karak smiled.
He was giving me a chance to save them both.
And at the same time, testing me.
To see what I’d do in a situation like this.
……
In that moment, fury welled up inside me.
But I swallowed it.
First and foremost, I had to prevent Catherine and Rivel from facing discipline.
“I will take full responsibility as the supervising professor.”
“How do you intend to take responsibility?”
“I stake my name as Mariam Ecclesia and promise to handle this ‘thoroughly’—to make a ‘complete’ resolution. Please show them mercy.”
Hmm.
Chancellor Karak fixed me with a long stare, and I met his gaze without flinching.
Did he read something in the darkened depths of my eyes?
A heavy silence settled in.
“Hehe, I understand. Since Professor Ban speaks so earnestly, I’ll hold off on disciplining the two of them.”
“Thank you.”
“Think nothing of it. But you must see this through ‘completely.’ I look forward to it.”
Chancellor Karak departed with a meaningful smile, and the perpetrators swaggered away, feeling emboldened.
Only I, Catherine, and Rivel remained.
“I—I’m so sorry.”
“Rivel, what exactly are you apologizing for?”
“I… it’s all because of me….”
I let out a sigh.
“Why didn’t you fight back?”
“B-because you told me to stay calm if a fight broke out. I didn’t want to cause you trouble.”
……
When I fell silent, Rivel became uneasy.
“B-but I did hold back as much as I could. It didn’t hurt that much. I’m pretty used to taking a beating….”
His body was battered, yet Rivel’s face showed he truly considered this nothing serious.
Knowing Rivel’s past, something like this would indeed be trivial.
“O-of course, I wasn’t planning to just endure it. I was going to repay them… in my own way.”
Rivel’s way.
It wouldn’t be anything as simple as fisticuffs among children.
‘One of the Bad Endings is when Rivel cripples a student and gets expelled for it.’
I exhaled slowly.
“Enough. Leave the rest to me.”
“…What are you going to do?”
“Aren’t you two wronged?”
……
Both of them fell silent.
“I’m wronged. And angry.”
“But there’s nothing we can do about it. We don’t have the power.”
“You don’t. But I do.”
They stared at me blankly.
“Remember this: you are my students, and I am your professor. So long as you stand in my shadow, no one will lay a hand on you.”
Though they were ones I should have kept my distance from, I found I’d grown fond of them somewhere along the way.
The anger I felt now was proof enough.
So I did something I wouldn’t normally do.
“They will pay a price.”
Back in my study, I wrote a reply to the invitation letter from the mayor of the Free City that I’d been putting off.
As it happened, the mayor’s name written on the invitation was as follows.
—Mariam Ecclesia
Ban’s sister.

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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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