The Graduate Student Wants to Assassinate the Professor - Chapter 85

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

Chapter 85

A familiar voice answered Leoryna’s call instead, and with a swift kick, sent the Red-Haired Woman flying far away.
Leoryna watched the scene with a dumbfounded expression before snapping back to her senses and rushing toward the woman who had been sent sprawling.
“Master!”
But someone grabbed her by the scruff of her neck. Since her body was that of a child and her assailant was massive, resistance proved futile.
“Who are you?!”
“Who else? Your master.”
“What?”
Leoryna uttered a vacant sound and slowly examined the person holding her.
The figure she called master possessed striking crimson hair, and his sharp violet eyes captivated attention more than anyone else’s.
Roabel Sailtos—once hailed as a hero who saved the nation. A woman of formidable strength and beauty who could rightfully be called the strongest.
In Leoryna’s life, there was no one else deserving of the title “master” but her. Yet the large man standing before her now claimed to be her master.
Leoryna scrutinized him from head to toe.
“Who are you?”
Khalid crouched down to meet Leoryna’s eye level, which barely reached his waist.
“I told you—your master.”
“But my master is…”
Leoryna looked toward Roabel, whom Khalid had kicked away. Roabel writhed on the ground before slowly rising.
“Leor…yna…”
“That person over there…”
As Leoryna murmured, Khalid let out a scoff and spoke.
“That mangled pizza dough of a man is your master?”
Roabel’s appearance had become grotesquely distorted. Her mouth was torn wide open, stretching to her ear, and her neck was bent at an unnatural angle. It bore no resemblance to the strong and dignified Roabel.
“Eek…!”
Leoryna instinctively stepped back. Khalid grabbed her shoulders and turned her away as if telling her not to look.
“Your master is me. Khalid.”
“Khalid…”
Leoryna blinked repeatedly, meeting his gaze. Khalid grinned and reached up to ruffle her hair.
“You’re cute when you’re small. Let’s dispose of that wretch first, then get out of here.”
Leoryna, displeased with her disheveled hair, smoothed it back down and eyed Khalid suspiciously as he conjured a massive cleaver in his hand.
“You… how dare you!”
Roabel’s form vanished from sight. The Rat-like Man lunged at Khalid.
At the sight, Leoryna’s shoulders tensed involuntarily. Facing the person who had murdered her parents was still a painful ordeal. Then something soft brushed against her leg.
“It’s alright, Leoryna.”
Looking down, she found a Talking Rabbit beside her.
“Khalid will protect you. So it’s alright.”
“Protect me…?”
Leoryna turned back to Khalid. He was severing the man’s neck with his cleaver.
“Kieeeek!”
Crash!
The man vanished with a strange cry, and the sound of shattering glass echoed from somewhere. Then the surrounding scenery shifted to the center of the Banquet Hall.
Leoryna jolted awake from the dream and looked down at her body, realizing she had returned to her original form.
Leoryna stared blankly at Khalid, who was swinging a large cleaver and methodically shattering mirrors one by one.
The figure that had just seduced her had unmistakably worn the appearance of Roabel, her mentor.
Leoryna held deep trust and affection for Roabel, but she didn’t think her desire for recognition or possessiveness ran that deep. Yet within the illusion, she had yearned for Roabel. Somehow it felt necessary, and she craved her absolute support.
‘Perhaps it’s because I haven’t cultivated a truly close relationship with anyone.’
As Leoryna tilted her head in contemplation, Khalid, having shattered all the mirrors, suddenly stood before her. His expression was oddly wistful and deeply moved.
“Why… why are you looking at me like that?”
Leoryna sensed something ominous. In that moment, Khalid’s eyes gleamed as he spoke.
“You called me mentor, not professor.”
“Ah, um, yes?”
“I see. The title ‘professor’ felt too stiff between us.”
“I don’t think it’s stiff at all…”
“Professor is merely a title. Mentor is different. Mentor denotes the nature of our relationship.”
“But…?”
“Your sincere desire to focus more on our relationship came through to me clearly, Leoryna.”
Leoryna screamed silently within.
‘Should I hit him?! What is he misunderstanding?! Relationship?! A more advanced relationship?! I have no interest in that with you!’
“Yes, feel free to call me mentor.”
Khalid spoke with bashful delight, wiping beneath his nose, but Leoryna’s expression grew increasingly darkened.
‘My only mentor is Roabel!’
Leoryna scratched her arms, which had broken out in goosebumps, searching for words to refute him when Pongko tugged at her collar and asked.
“More importantly, where is that person?”
“Who?”
“Who else! The one who attacked us! Wasn’t he with Leoryna?”
“Ah! Talamans!”
Leoryna belatedly recalled his existence and looked around, but Talamans was nowhere to be seen.
“Professor, when you were breaking the mirrors, did you happen to see a Demon Race with four horns?”
“What? Four… horns? What are you talking about?”
Leoryna explained Talamans to the bewildered Khalid.
There was a Demon Race who collected the horns of other Demon Races, and that creature had targeted Philiamone’s horns, controlling Demon Beasts to attack them. And…
“He said that your horns remain in this castle. He came here because his goal is to obtain your horns…”
“What?!”
Khalid’s eyes narrowed.
“Where did he hear such a thing?”
“It seems he came after hearing rumors. He didn’t sound entirely certain about it.”
Leoryna laughed incredulously, but wrinkles of concern remained etched on Khalid’s brow.
“So where is that creature now?”
“I wouldn’t know. Since he’s nowhere to be found, it seems he’s fled somewhere. Though I’m not certain it’s wise to simply leave him be.”
Khalid fell silent in thought before speaking to Leoryna.
“Let’s head back for now. By this point, Zigzagel should have retrieved Philiamone and her group. As for that Talamans or whatever his name is, I’ll track him down and deal with him myself. You rejoin Zigzagel and return to Base Camp. I’ll escort you there.”
“What? You’re only taking me back, and then you’re coming here again?”
“It’s too dangerous to bring you along. Come on.”
“There’s no real need to hunt him down again….”
“What if I leave him be and he goes around stabbing random Demon Races?”
“I suppose that’s true. Are you really sure about this?”
Leoryna kept asking, but Khalid simply nodded silently in response.
‘Well, if he’s going to insist like that, I have no reason to stop him….’
Leoryna harbored a vague, unspoken worry about whether Talamans could actually kill Khalid. Talamans was certainly a villain, but if that creature were to kill Khalid for her, it would be genuinely welcome news.
Leoryna cleared her throat awkwardly, then, though she didn’t particularly want to, she forced herself to say what human decency demanded.
“Thank you.”
Khalid blinked rapidly, and Leoryna, laying on the charm as thick as she could, continued.
“For pulling me out of the Illusion. I’m grateful, truly. Goodness, if it weren’t for you, Professor, things could have gone very badly.”
She laughed with a forced cheerfulness. But Khalid gave no response. Sensing something amiss, she cautiously studied his expression, and just as his mouth began to open, he suddenly raised his hand and flicked her forehead sharply.
“Ow!”
“Do you have any idea how worried I was? Who told you to do something so reckless?!”
Khalid began scolding Leoryna belatedly.
“Philiamone barely survived, and you—someone who can barely do anything—thought you could recklessly sacrifice yourself to save everyone?! How presumptuous!”
To Khalid, Leoryna was merely a fourth-circle mage, a fragile, delicate girl who spent her days confined to the Research Laboratory and had never seen the world beyond it.
The notion that such a Leoryna would deliberately become bait and lure Talamans to Huaderica Castle struck Khalid as utterly absurd and reckless. It would have been far more natural to assume she was dead.
But that was Khalid’s perspective. Leoryna, for her part, felt genuinely wronged.
Who do you think I am?!

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