Chapter 222
The infamous and chaotic Toxicology class had finally ended.
Belya, who had shown both the best and worst sides of the world’s top elites on the very first day, stretched with satisfaction as she walked out of the Toxicology building.
“Professor!”
Just then, a long-haired woman came running breathlessly after Belya. She was the head teaching assistant, the one who had succeeded Francesca.
Belya grinned, revealing her jagged, triangular teeth.
“Ohhh, good work today.”
“Professor, um… it’s just that…”
After hesitating for a moment, the head TA cautiously asked,
“Will you be teaching the same lesson to the other class tomorrow?”
“Of course!”
“Th-then for the second class session…”
“I obviously have to feed them a new poison! Didn’t I say that?”
The head TA started sweating.
What were they supposed to do with this person?
She had taken them in when they had nowhere else to go, so they couldn’t defy her. But pushing ahead with this insane class plan would definitely cause a major backlash from the students.
And these weren’t ordinary students. They were children of the heads of prestigious families, grand generals, prime ministers, people of the highest authority.
If word got out that Keyzen was feeding poison to the treasured children they had raised like royal jade and gold, how would the parents react?
After much internal struggle, the head TA made up her mind to speak earnestly.
“I understand your intent and purpose behind the lesson, Professor. But they’re still first-years who don’t know anything yet! On top of that, there are students who don’t even normally use toxicology. Even if this is a semi-war curriculum, wouldn’t it be better to conduct this kind of training once they’ve grown a bit more…”
Hahahahaha!
Suddenly, thunderous laughter erupted. Each time Belya’s shoulders shook, colorful grains of sand fell from her body. The TA quickly took a step back.
“You said you understood the intent and purpose?”
“Y-yes.”
“Then that’s all that matters, isn’t it? I get why you’re all worried, but if you’re always watching the higher-ups’ reactions, you’ll never get anything done. I’ll take full responsibility, so just trust me and follow along.”
Belya grinned as she placed a hand on the TA’s shoulder.
“Got it?”
“…Yes.”
Giving her shoulder a light pat, Belya turned and walked off again.
Exactly thirty seconds after she disappeared, other teaching assistants who had been hiding came rushing over.
“What happened, unni?”
“Is she calling it off?”
At their questions, the head TA shook her head. Sighs and groans broke out all around.
“…Haaah, is this class cursed or what?”
A male TA, with sunken eyes, leaned against the wall and pulled out a cigar.
“The first professor died, the second was a saint, and now the third is a savage.”
“Oppa. Smoking’s not allowed on campus.”
“Do I look like I care right now? What did we do to deserve being stuck with people like this?”
Morale among the assistants was at rock bottom. That’s when the head TA spoke in a serious voice.
“Put it away.”
The male TA flinched, then sheepishly returned the cigar to his pocket with a muttered “Yes, ma’am.”
The head TA looked around at everyone and began.
“If those are the professor’s instructions, we don’t have a choice. We follow them. But we need to act as lubricant, easing the students’ complaints as much as we can.”
“What do you mean by easing their complaints?”
“What are we supposed to do?”
To her juniors’ questions, the head TA spoke with a determined expression.
“We either suggest lowering the dosage of the poison or reduce the number of sets per class. We need to create the impression that the professor is adjusting things with the students in mind. I’ll go see her again tomorrow.”
The TAs nodded.
* * *
All classes for the day were over.
Simon wasn’t feeling great, but since he had promised to visit the Mutant Clubroom with Toto and greet the seniors, he had to follow through.
‘This place looks just as shabby as ever.’
A piece of paper with the word Mutant written in crooked handwriting was stuck to the door of the clubroom.
It was so tattered and about to fall off that he gently pressed it down with his palm before knocking.
“This is Simon Follentia.”
But for some reason, there was a commotion inside.
Thinking something must’ve happened again, he carefully opened the door.
“Hey, it’s escaping!”
“Get it!”
Sure enough, there was an incident in progress.
A pitch-black skeleton was rampaging, trying to escape. Toto lunged to grab it, only to be kicked in the face by the skeleton. Blood gushed from both his nostrils as he was sent flying into the wall.
“Aaagh! Stop right there!”
Chasing after it was a girl with cream-colored hair, her face covered in coal-like black dust.
It was Benya Vanilla, a second-year, granddaughter of the chairman of the giant undead corporation Vanilla Group, and president of the Mutant club.
Spotting Simon, she shouted with a relieved look,
“Hey, comrade! Stop that thing, quick!”
The rampaging skeleton was recklessly swinging twin axes in the air. With one swing, a nearby tank shattered, releasing a stream of yellow fluid.
The fluid poured directly into the mouth of the collapsed Toto.
“Ugh!”
Clatter! Clatter-clatter!
The skeleton, now making a break for the open door, charged at Simon. Simon assumed a combat stance and asked,
“Senior, can I break this thing?”
“No way! That guy’s a critical step toward world domination! Subdue it with minimal damage!”
“?”
Toto, who had gotten up while spitting yellow liquid, looked dumbfounded.
Was she serious? That thing didn’t look like it could be subdued without damage.
“Understood.”
Simon extended his right arm, and six Overlord tentacles shot out with a whipping sound.
Before the skeleton could swing its axes, two blades slid precisely between its arm joints and severed them.
The remaining tentacles slashed cleanly through the joints of its legs, chest, and neck. The skeleton collapsed into a pile of bones.
Clatter-clatter-clatter!
Simon jumped into the shower of bones and caught the most important piece—the skull—in his arms.
“Here.”
“Oh, thank you!”
Benya eagerly took the skull and tapped the magic circle inside it. The skull, which had been thrashing as if ready to bite her fingers off, instantly went still as if a tranquilizer had been administered.
“Phew. That was close. Thank you, thank you~”
Benya chirped as she placed the skull down on the table. Toto, having watched Simon’s performance up close, was speechless.
‘His Overlord control’s gotten way cleaner than before. More than that, how can he stay so calm in an emergency like that? We’re the same age, but he’s on a totally different level of experience!’
Feeling awkward under Toto’s sparkling gaze, Simon pretended not to notice and started picking up the fallen bones.
Once all the bones had been placed on the table, Benya said:
“Could you help me reassemble the bones?”
Simon quickly looked up.
“Oh, really? Am I allowed to touch it?”
“Of course! You’ll be contributing to world domination too, comrade!”
‘…She still hasn’t given up on that dream.’
For reference, Club President Benya’s life goal was World Domination Through Undead.
The two of them began reassembling the skeleton in earnest. Benya didn’t even need assembly diagrams, she matched the bones purely by instinct, and Simon’s skill in assisting her was equally impressive.
“Number 8, and number 14.”
Each time she called out a bone, he found it and handed it over without delay. Once he got the hang of it, he even began preparing bones in advance, passing them to her before she asked. Eventually, when Benya completed the right leg, Simon mirrored it and built the left one himself.
“Hey, aren’t numbers 75 and 76 in the wrong order?”
“Oh! You’re right! Sorry, sorry~”
He even spotted a mistake made by the heir of the Vanilla Group.
With impeccable coordination, the two of them reconstructed the black skeleton.
“It’s done! You’re really good at support too, comrade!”
“Thank you, senior.”
Once everything was cleaned up, Toto joined them and the three of them took a short break while sipping juice.
As they chatted, Benya explained that the new skeleton they were developing had a tendency to go berserk at the slightest provocation.
“This skeleton isn’t available on the market, right?”
“Of course not! It’s not mass-producible, so it’s not for sale. I was making it for personal use… but it’s got a nasty temper. Still, I’ve made a lot of progress.”
Benya seemed to be in a good mood. As thanks for helping her out of the mess, she said Simon could ask her for anything.
“If it’s okay with you, I’d like to have a personal skeleton too. Could you take a look at a material I have?”
“Oh, really? Go ahead, show me.”
Simon glanced at the black skeleton, then quickly pulled a skull out of his subspace.
“W-what is this!”
Benya jumped up as she lifted the skull.
“I can feel it! This was an incredibly powerful undead!”
She was right.
This skull came from the skeleton of the swordmaster Magnus, whom Simon had fought during his time in the Deathlands.
“But the Core and soul fragments are completely gone.”
She peered inside the skull as she spoke.
“As it is now, it’s just an empty shell. I don’t know exactly what kind of undead this was, but it’s probably impossible for it to fully recover the power and memories it had in life. That said, there’s definitely potential to make use of it. Hmm.”
She thought for a moment, then set the skull down.
“If you’re okay with it, I could send this to the main Vanilla branch for research. If it turns out well, you’ll get your own skeleton, and if it fails, we’ll still pay you a research fee. How’s that sound?”
There was no reason to refuse a proposal from the best company in the field.
More importantly, Simon had been carrying the skull around without making any progress. From here on, it was clearly a job for experts.
“I’d really appreciate that. But… how long will it take?”
“No one knows~ This is a seriously high-level undead. If things go slow, it might take a year or two.”
Simon winced. At that rate, it would be more like a graduation gift.
Still, he’d fought the swordmaster skeleton firsthand and knew how powerful it was. If Vanilla couldn’t manage it, no one could.
“Alright, let’s go with that. Please take good care of it, senior!”
“Leave it to me!”
The next morning, Simon woke up with a pale, haggard face.
‘…Ugh, my head.’
He’d felt fine back at the clubroom, but once he returned to the dorm and went to sleep, the poison had started to spread again. Simon ended up vomiting and suffering from diarrhea several times in the bathroom. He spent the whole night groaning, unable to sleep properly.
‘Let’s pull myself together.’
Lying in bed, Simon began mana breathing, circulating Darkness through his body to recover. After about thirty minutes, he started feeling a bit better.
The clock showed it was still early dawn, and Dick and Kajan were both asleep.
‘No way I’m going back to sleep now.’
His mind was wide awake. So, Simon got up, washed up in the bathroom, changed into his Keyzen uniform, and stepped outside the dormitory at dawn.
His destination was the library. Servants were cleaning in preparation for opening.
As Simon lingered uncertainly, one of the servants kindly told him the archives were already cleaned and he was welcome to enter.
Without hesitation, Simon headed to the archive.
— Yona. When you return to Keyzen, search for that name.
The reason for visiting the library was to investigate his father Richard’s activities during his time as a legion commander.
After politely asking the servants for permission, Simon began sifting through books.
There weren’t any titles that had Yona in them.
So he grabbed every book related to legion commanders, stacked them on an empty desk, and sat down. He started from the one on top.
The History of the Legion.
And the moment he opened the book, he saw the name Yona in the subheading.
‘Found it.’
With his heart pounding, Simon turned the page.
Superb.
When are we getting more free chapters?
Thanks for the new chapters