The Graduate Student Wants to Assassinate the Professor - Chapter 123

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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 123

I tore at my hair again, consumed by anguish.
“Can’t you at least tell me why this won’t work?!”
“Did you get permission from the Holy Maiden?”
“No. She said it wouldn’t work.”
“Then I can’t either. The Holy Maiden is Petila’s channel of communication, and if she says it won’t work, then it won’t.”
I wanted to cry.
“Then at least tell me how long I have to keep doing this task.”
“Until a future is confirmed where the one-horned Demon Race doesn’t become the Demon King?”
“When will that be?”
“Petila knows that. I have no idea.”
I wanted to throw myself prostrate before Veronas, but I barely held back.
“But Sungha… I want to quit everything. Killing Khalid is too hard.”
“Should I tell you to kill him right now?”
“No.”
“Didn’t I tell you to empty your mind?”
“You did.”
“So did you empty it?”
….
I opened my eyes slightly.
Far from emptying my mind, I’d been thinking about Khalid constantly since morning until now, but this wasn’t something I could control just by wanting to. How could I stop thoughts that arose reflexively?
“If there’s nothing you can do right now, then let things flow naturally.”
I answered Veronas with a sullen expression.
“At this rate, I’ll probably end up getting my doctorate anyway?”
“That’s not a bad thing either.”
“Sungha!”
Veronas chuckled kindly, indifferent to whether my frustration would burst.
“You just need to live well. Since the Holy Maiden hasn’t said anything special, it seems we can think about what comes later when the time comes.”
My conversation with Veronas ended there.
Realizing there was nothing more to gain from him, I rose from my seat. Veronas saw me off to the Corridor entrance.
I had to return home with a gloomy expression.

* * *

“This is completely useless!”
As I made my way home, I kicked at a stone caught beneath my feet. Pongko bounded along behind me, hopping excitedly.
“How many days am I supposed to spend at the Graduate School? This is absolute slavery, slavery!”
“But you’ve succeeded in earning Khalid’s trust, just as Sungha and the Holy Maiden said. You’re doing your part correctly.”
“I thought this would be over in a month! I never imagined it would turn into such a long-term operation!”
“Leoryna. You’ve only been enrolled at the Graduate School for four months.”
“Only four months…? Did you just say ‘only’? You didn’t mean to say ‘as much as’ four months instead?”
As I blinked rapidly, Pongko averted his gaze.
“And I told you—I don’t want to kill Khalid! Damn it!”
I kicked at another stone that had come into view.
“How am I supposed to carry out an assassination with a heart like this?”
As I muttered miserably, Pongko spoke from beside me with a hopeful tone.
“But Leoryna, the Holy Maiden said there’s a way to change fate without killing Khalid. Doesn’t that mean you wouldn’t have to assassinate him?”
“…So how? Even the Holy Maiden doesn’t know the method—how would I?”
“Hmm…”
As I stared at Pongko with vacant eyes once more, he swallowed and closed his mouth.
“And on top of that, I’m starting to… I mean…”
After rubbing my face roughly and splashing imaginary water on it, tears suddenly welled up in my eyes.
“Why am I crying…? *sniff*…”
“Huh?! Leoryna, are you actually crying?”
Pongko panicked and circled around my feet anxiously.
I wiped my tears with my sleeve, sniffling.
“I don’t know—I’m so angry at this situation that tears just come out! *sniff*… I hate that I’m crying… *sob*!”
I couldn’t understand my own psychological state.
People say the world looks beautiful when you fall in love, but that wasn’t the case for me at all. Instead, I felt like I was sinking into a deep quagmire. There was no way I could confess these feelings to Laita and Veronas.
He was my assassination target, and I was the assassin. To harbor such feelings for Khalid was itself a betrayal of Yorken. It would be a lie to say I wasn’t terrified of that.
But what frustrated me even more was that the person I liked had to be… had to be! Of all people! Why did it have to be Khalid?
Let me recall the descriptors I’d used for him until now.
Scoundrel. Weirdo. Madman. Lunatic.
None of these terms contained anything resembling affection.
I wanted to bury my head in the ground.
“Why him?! Why?!”
I walked while wiping away my tears.
How long had I been walking? By now, I should have reached home, but it was nowhere in sight.
So focused on wiping away my tears that I’d walked wherever my feet took me, I finally looked around. I was on the path leading to the Magic Theory Research Building of Halderion Academy.
“Leoryna, why did you come here?”
At Pongko’s belated question, I clicked my tongue at my own servile nature. Having spent more time at the Research Building than at home, my homing instinct had malfunctioned without my realizing it.
I redirected my path toward home.
That was when it happened.
“Oh, isn’t that Leoryna?”
Brisk footsteps approached from behind, accompanied by a familiar voice, and the owner of that voice tapped Leoryna on the back.
“I told you to take the day off. What are you doing here…?”
Khalid’s expression, which had been beaming with a bright smile as he rushed over, turned cold the moment he saw Leoryna’s face.
“Why are you crying?”
Leoryna’s mood sank further at the sight of the one person she least wanted to encounter right now. She tried to push past him, but Khalid kept following her, asking repeatedly.
“Why are you crying?”
“That’s none of your concern, Professor.”
As Leoryna answered with a sniffle, Khalid flared up in anger.
“Who the hell made you cry?!”
‘You did.’
Pongko muttered this under his breath and regarded Khalid with disdain, but Khalid was too busy examining Leoryna’s complexion.
“You have to tell me so I can understand.”
“And what will you do with that information, Professor?”
“I’ll kill them for you.”
‘Yeah, why don’t you just kill yourself instead, you bastard.’
Leoryna muttered this inwardly and tried to evade Khalid.
“Just leave me alone.”
“How can I leave you alone?”
Khalid was fully determined not to leave Leoryna’s side until he discovered the reason for her tears.
Leoryna found Khalid increasingly irritating. The more she looked at him, the more exasperation welled up inside her, and fresh tears began to fall.
“I really hate you, Professor!”
“Huh?”
Leoryna shoved Khalid hard with both hands and quickened her pace toward home. Khalid silently softened his footsteps and stealthily followed her, grabbing Pongko by the scruff of his neck and asking.
“Hey, Pongko. Why is Leoryna acting like this?”
“I can’t say.”
“Is it something serious?”
“It’s… well, it could be considered serious…”
At Pongko’s words, Khalid’s expression darkened. Pongko quickly continued before he could do anything else.
“But there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s not a big deal.”
Khalid paid no attention to Pongko’s words. If it wasn’t a big deal, he just needed to humor her; if it was serious, that was a problem in itself.
He tossed Pongko aside and returned to Leoryna’s side.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. But don’t be alone.”
At Khalid’s meddling, Leoryna let out a sharp cry.
“Do you know how annoying you are every time you do this?!”
In truth, she wanted to unleash every curse word imaginable, but Leoryna exercised maximum restraint.
“I said I wanted to be alone! Why won’t you listen to me?! Is what I say so amusing to you?!”
Unfortunately for both of them, this was the extent of her restraint.
“Just… *sob*… just once, couldn’t you… couldn’t you do what I ask? *Waaah*…”
“Huh? But… you keep crying like this, so how can I leave you alone…?”
“I’m fine, I’m telling you! I’m fine! I’m telling you I’m fine!”
I stomped my feet against the ground with heavy, deliberate thuds. Passersby slowed their pace, regarding the spectacle with considerable suspicion.
Khalid belatedly realized that anyone observing us would draw the most unfortunate of conclusions.

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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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