Chapter 4: Chapter 3: Verner’s Going Off Course
Aaaaaaaargh, I can't take this anymore! Why're they all so motivated to get themselves killed?! I was pretty clear, wasn't I? You're a bunch of weaklings, so it doesn't really matter if you jump to your death or not! It won't change a single thing! Why don't you get it?!
The best they could do was yell and moan before dropping dead in the background while the main character and his party did the actual fighting. They'd be more useful hiding out in the countryside and focusing on farming or something.
I'd even been nice enough to sugarcoat everything and talk about their families and having babies to contribute to society and stuff. So how come not even a single one of them went home?!
Give me a break, you nameless mob!
At the end of the day, knights were nothing more than human shields for the saint. It just so happened that I did not need any.
You guys know I can fly, right?! How the hell do you even intend to protect me like that?! By running around uselessly on the ground while I'm in the air? You'll just be a hindrance! Damn, this is so depressing.
Despite being a piece of shit, I still felt a little guilty at the idea of sending hundreds of people to their death for no reason. Somewhere deep, deep down, I'd feel...a bit bad about it. Probably.
Nah, okay, I lied. I probably wouldn't give a shit.
It'd most likely be the same as hearing that some random people I'd never met had died in some random accident in some random prefecture halfway across the country. I'd think, "oh no, that's sad" for like two seconds, then go on with my life without even remembering their names. By the following day, I'd probably forget it happened altogether.
Yeah, I pretty much felt the same about all these nameless, wannabe knights, which made their inevitable death even more sad. They'd become cannon fodder for someone who couldn't even be bothered to remember them. What a waste.
Either way, I couldn't just keep on moping in a corner. There were plenty of events waiting to be triggered inside the academy.
Even if I were to just stay put, Verner would handle most of them in the blink of an eye. He'd get all the heroines to fall for him. There were a few events I couldn't just ignore. Depending on the main character's choices, some heroines would meet a grim end—they'd become unhappy, or worse, lose their lives.
Then again, I guess even if you only pick good options, people tend to drop like flies in this game.
I wouldn't have needed to intervene if Verner could manage to fix everything on his own, but some of the answers were just completely illogical; no one in their right mind would pick them on their first run. Some options were even hidden until your later runs and couldn't be picked at all! That meant that some girls were just doomed from the start—at least in the first run.
Yes, I'm talking about you, Eterna.
No matter how you played, Eterna was bound to become the last boss in the first playthrough. This being said, she still died in the good ending of her route anyway.
Isn't my baby super pitiful? There were also other girls who died no matter what, unless you were on their route. Like the witch, or...the witch...or...only the witch, I guess.
Speaking about characters who were bound to die, Farah—a hot teacher with huge melons—also always died on the first run. For some reason, she'd try to assassinate Eterna, so Verner would have to step in. After their fight, she'd suddenly have a change of heart, apologize, and jump off a cliff.
If you played the game a second time, you'd have the option of taking Eterna with you to go confront Farah (the first time around, Verner insisted it wasn't a good idea since Eterna was her target). Thanks to Eterna's powers, you'd then discover that Farah was just a poor victim that had been brainwashed by the witch, and she'd undo the spell.
If you went through this sequence of events, the characters would also discover much faster that Eterna had been the real saint all along, and they get a chance to drag Ellize down. That was how you avoided Eterna's eventual fall into despair later on.
All in all, the event was crucial. If everything went well, Farah wouldn't have to die, and Eterna wouldn't join the dark side.
Hang on... I just realized something. If the witch is targeting Eterna this early on, it must mean that she knows she's the true saint, right? I guess it makes sense for the witch to notice—she's also fated to face the saint, after all. Then again, everyone probably should've noticed much faster considering Ellize's behavior...
For the time being, it'd be better if I assumed that the witch knew I wasn't the real deal. Farah's brainwashing incident would soon break the news to everyone else, but I figured it wouldn't be an issue. I wasn't Ellize, and I hadn't been going around doing horrible things. If anything, I'd done nothing but good deeds to make sure Eterna's reputation would be safe. At this point, I was fairly sure no one would end up attacking her village in retaliation after she regained her rightful place.
Still, I'd keep an eye out for dumbasses planning attacks just in case.
The good thing was that I knew when Farah would try to attack Eterna. I'd just have to step in and inform everyone that Farah was being controlled to save the day!
HA HA HA! Easy as pie. I can go enjoy a nice bath now.
All right, so, after I'd enjoyed a lovely bath and thought it over once again... I realized that the situation might've been a liiiiittle more desperate than I'd initially assumed. I know it was sudden, but I'd finally noticed that there were critical flaws in my "play matchmaker for Verner and Eterna and watch my girl get the happy ending she deserves" plan.
First, I wasn't a student at the magic academy. Most of the events would take place there, which meant I couldn't observe them in real time.
I mean... It seemed obvious in hindsight. The magic academy was a place to foster magic knights to serve the saint. There was no way the saint—or, uh, the fake one in my case—could just study there too!
You might've been wondering...how I was supposed to learn stuff, then? One-on-one lessons with a renowned private teacher, obviously! Actually, my lessons weren't really one-on-one. Dozens of teachers dedicated most of their time to me.
The saint was even more important than royalty in this world!
Before a new saint was born, a shady prophet would make a divination and warn the elites. They'd start getting all hyped up, pinpoint the expecting family, and prepare to steal the baby—I mean, uh...convince the family to give them the child for the greater good.
They usually threw huge sums at the families, so most didn't fight too hard to keep their newborn child.
You might've been thinking it was heartless of them to give up their baby for money, but many families in this world were still desperate to have one less mouth to feed. They'd abandon or sell babies if they had to, so very few people would refuse large sums when offered them.
I also had no idea where Ellize's parents were or what they were doing. According to the official booklet, they never felt guilty for giving Ellize up and spent their days enjoying their wealth.
The apple never falls far from the tree...
After being taken away from her parents, the saint would be raised like a sheltered little princess in the saint's castle, which was situated at the border between the most powerful countries. All of this was done to avoid a single country from gaining too much influence over the saint.
Every country would send their knights, teachers, and servants to take care of the saint and raise her. I did think it was a bit sad that saints never had proper parent figures, but I supposed it had to do with the way the people regarded them. They had a very religious approach to it all, and viewed the saint as a figure who had descended again with a different appearance, rather than a newborn human who also happened to be the saint. As such, the saint was never really treated like a child, and her words held more power than those of any king or queen.
All in all, it was completely impossible for me to just enter the academy. The best I could do was to time my visits well and pretend I wanted to "observe" the students for a while... Which led me to my second issue: I had a general idea of the timing of the game's events, but I didn't know the exact dates.
There was a precise dating system in Kuon no Sanka which, conveniently enough, was almost the exact same as the Gregorian calendar.
C'mon, staff, that's too lazy!
The only difference was that the days of the week were named after seven of the eight attributes of this world. Starting with Sunday, which was Lightday, the days were as follows: Iceday, Fireday, Waterday, Windday, Thunderday, and finally Earthday.
Poor darkness, it must've been so sad to be left out.
Darkness was very much linked to the witch in everyone's collective psyche. They probably avoided using it for that reason.
You might've been thinking, "Gee! Given there's a mighty convenient dating system and all, why don't you know the dates of any events?!" Well, the thing was...events could be pushed back or pulled forward depending on Verner's actions.
Kuon no Sanka was a game in which you trained Verner daily through school activities. Events were sprinkled in here and there based on your stats and choice of activity. For instance, an event that happened on May 2 could very well fall on May 4 in another playthrough because you did something differently. If you wasted too much time on something completely irrelevant plot-wise, the events could end up being pushed back by literal weeks.
So, in conclusion... I had no way of knowing when Verner would trigger the events.
My original plan was to step in right as Farah tried to attack Eterna so I could save both of them, but I couldn't know when that would happen exactly.
The worst-case scenario would be Verner spending all of his time training alone, resulting in nothing ever happening at all.
Each day was separated into five segments—morning, noon, afternoon, evening, and night. That meant you had to pick actions—independent training, studying, talking to one of the girls, etc.—to fill these slots. No matter what you picked, the flow of time would be the same.
So if you decided to mess around and filled each slot every day with training and never talked to anyone, you'd eventually end up with a solo ending.
I was pretty sure Verner wouldn't do something that random, though.
Since I'd taken over Ellize, it might've been possible to avoid Eterna joining the dark side even if Farah ended up dying. After all, Ellize was always the main reason why Eterna's life became so messed up. While Farah's event served to hasten Ellize's fall, it didn't have any real influence on Eterna herself.
Still, I wanted Farah to survive if I could do anything about it. She was an importit character in the game—and one with a great rack at that. It'd be a shame for them to disappear into oblivion.
Farah was a beautiful twenty-four-year-old woman with wavy brown hair. Her features were somewhat sharp and...oh yeah, did I mention her impressive F cups? Total. Bombshell.
She was one of the girls I wanted to save—no, scratch "wanted." I was going to save her. That way, I could continue to enjoy looking at the beautiful sights.
Even without knowing when the event would start, I still had a way out. I'd just have to investigate! I'd go to the academy to observe and ask the teachers about Verner and Eterna.
I had played Kuon no Sanka over and over again and cleared every single route. I could gauge where Verner was in the game by his attitude in class, what he'd been up to recently, the way people spoke about him, or even the amount of people who knew about him. I didn't even need to check out the guides to know the heroines' affection level, so I would definitely manage.
All righties! Now that everything's settled, time for another relaxing bath!
Uh oh... I'm in deep shit.
I'd gone to the academy under the premise that I wanted to observe the students, but after I'd had a little chat with the teachers, I realized all over again that life wasn't easy.
The situation was just unfathomable.
Besides Eterna, all of the other heroine's affection levels were at zero. ZERO! And even Eterna was still at the initial default value! Verner hadn't triggered any events yet. NOT A SINGLE ONE! The sub heroines didn't even know Verner's name yet!
All Verner had spent his days doing was training. Morning? Training! Noon? Training! Afternoon? Still training! Evening and night? More. Freaking. Training!
What the hell is he doing?! I can't believe this! What's wrong with you, Verner?! How the hell did you manage to avoid triggering any events?! Do you never talk to anyone?! Daaaaamn iiit! He just spends all of his free time doing independent training! My boy's speedrunning the solo ending! No way!
Wait, wait. Let's calm down for a minute, here. Look, Verner, I know you're not aware of the situation, but Kuon no Sanka is a dating sim, all right? You're supposed to DATE PEOPLE!
Sure, the gaming system allowed you to train and join battles, but that was only an added bonus to spice up the game a little. The main point was to actually date the girls.
I wanted him to go with the Eterna route—actually, I wasn't about to let him do anything else—but I just couldn't believe he simply hadn't talked to anyone, let alone gotten any of the other girls to like him.
What kind of dating sim protagonist spends his time training 24-7, followed by an extra side of training?! You're gonna end up alone before you know it, I'm telling you!
The last illustration of his solo ending had a muscular Verner surrounded by a bunch of brawny men with a caption that read, "No need for women when I can dominate the world with my might!" Everyone referred to it as the bodybuilding♂ ending. What a joke.
By the way, on the topic of speedrunning...this ending was the fastest one to get, so most of the people who tried RTA—real-time attack—went with it. There were plenty of videos online. I remembered having a blast watching them.
It was fun watching them on my screen, but I'm not letting this fly here. Don't fuck with me, Verner. Why are you trying to get the freaking bodybuilding♂ ending?! Are you a speedrunner at heart, huh?! Is that it?! Were you possessed by some weird spirit? Did you reincarnate like me? Are you trying to clear the game and go home?!
Either way, I was in a pickle. If Verner didn't make a move, nothing would happen.
Aaah... I really don't wanna do this, but it doesn't look like I have any choice, do I? I need to talk to him directly to understand why he's goofing around.
◇
Verner had a dream.
One day, he wanted to stand by the saint—the one who had brought light into his life when he was at his lowest, who had saved him from his own darkness.
That was why he'd decided to walk the same path as her. He believed that by going down the very same path of light, he could repay his debt. And, to do so, he couldn't afford to make any detours. He didn't have time to waste on meaningless things!
Every single second of every day, he was devoted to bettering himself for the sole sake of his goal. He wouldn't allow himself to waver.
"One thousand four hundred five! One thousand four hundred six! One thousand four hundred seven! One thousand four hundred eight! One thousand four hundred nine! One thousand four hundred ten!"
Verner was inside the room that had been allocated to him by the academy, doing sit-ups by suspending his upper-half over the upper level of the triple bunk bed.
A knight needed a strong body, so he was working on building his core muscles. If you gave the same sword to a scrawny boy and a built man, the latter would obviously do more damage.
Muscles never betrayed you.
Right now, Verner was alone inside his room. He did share it with others, but they were busy frolicking with girls or hanging out with their friends.
"One thousand four hundred eleven! One thousand four hundred twelve! One thousand four hundred thirteen! One thousand four hundred fourteen! One thousand four hundred fifteen! One thousand four hundred sixteen!"
Time was very much finite, and Verner had a lot to do in that incredibly limited time. He had to build up his strength, practice his swordsmanship and magic, and much, much more.
Unless he became truly strong, he'd never get to stand by her side.
Eterna had been nagging him to open up to other things from time to time, but he was hellbent on following his path.
While he was immersed in his training, he suddenly heard someone knock softly at the door.
Who could it be? Eterna? No, she'd bang at the door without any reservations.
Verner had no choice but to take a break. He wiped off his sweat with a towel, put on a tank top, and opened the door. As soon as he did, though, he froze on the spot.
"Hmm... We met once a long time ago, do you remember me?" the person on the other side of the door asked.
WHAAAAAAT?!
Every nerve in Verner's body was screaming.
In front of him was the saint—the very person he'd dreamed about seeing again for so long! Verner was at a loss. He was only wearing his uniform pants and a tank top! He never would've expected the saint to show up at his door like this—not even in his wildest dreams—so he'd opened the door in his sloppy get-up. If he'd known, he would've groomed himself properly!
"L-Lady Ellize! O-Of course I remember! I've never forgotten you! Not even for a moment!" Verner's voice was a bit shaky, but he managed to speak nonetheless.
Was his voice too high-pitched because he was nervous? Oh no, it definitely was! He was in the middle of training...did he smell like sweat? He definitely did, didn't he? He just wanted to die on the spot.
Two opposite feelings waged war inside him. He was overjoyed to finally talk to Ellize again, but at the same time, he couldn't forgive himself for showing her such an unsightly appearance.
"H-H-How come you're here, Lady Ellize?!"
"I came to inspect the academy, and while I was speaking with the teachers, I learned that the boy I'd met a few years ago was now a student here. I couldn't help but wonder how you were doing these days. Am I bothering you?"
"O-Of course not!"
Bothering him?! Absolutely not! She was more than welcome. The only issue was that he'd been in the middle of training. Verner really wished he could've somehow predicted this! If he'd known, he would've groomed himself properly!
Ah, I just thought the exact same thing a minute ago, didn't I?
Verner was very much aware that his brain was utterly confused and cycling through a loop.
"I'm glad to hear that," Ellize said. "If I may, how have your powers been since then? I hope they didn't give you trouble again."
"N-No. Thanks to you, my powers have been stable, Lady Ellize. They've been acting up a little recently, but I've learned to control them... Really, it's all thanks to you. I'm only alive and well because you were there to help me that day," Verner said, looking down at the saint.
She hadn't grown one bit since the last time he'd met her, but he had. None of that could change his feelings, though. He still thought that her very existence was precious. If anything, he might've liked her even more than before.
Verner was hit by a sudden realization. I exist for her sake. Nothing can ever change that.
"Is that so?" Ellize answered with a soft smile. "Coming here today was very meaningful. I'm glad I got to see you."
She looked up at Verner, and he couldn't help but notice she seemed a little worried.
"You know," she started again, "I heard you spend all of your time cooped up in your room engrossed in training. Training is good, but I believe you should open yourself to the world a little more and try to make friends. There are limits to what someone can do alone."
"Limits to what I can do alone..." Verner repeated, looking at his own hands.
She was right—he only ever focused on himself. How could he hope to help others like that? The very reason he was here was to ensure the saint wouldn't fight alone anymore. He'd stand by her side and fight with her.
If he continued training by himself like he had been, he'd be absolutely useless at working with others. A man like that wouldn't be of any use to the saint.
"You're right," he said after a pause. "I thought everything would be fine if I just pushed forward in a straight line, but it looks like I was mistaken. I almost went down the wrong path once more."
Verner obediently reflected on his mistakes before clenching his fists. Once again, she had shown him the right path. It was just like that time when he'd been about to go down the path of darkness, and she'd come to him. She'd cast her endless light on his path and showed him what he needed to do.
The boy remained silent, trying to take in everything she'd just said and appreciating his luck. Just as he thought, she was his light. He wasn't scared of the darkness anymore. No matter what happened, she'd show him the way.
He'd never be able to protect anything if he grew complacent and happy with his own strength. Building up muscle for his own sake wouldn't help save anyone else; it'd be like putting on a meaningless show.
"Oh, I see you're still wearing the pendant I gave you," Ellize noted.
"Indeed. It's very precious to me. It's the symbol of my resolve, in a way," he answered, clutching his pendant like it was worth the world to him.
He leaned over to look Ellize in the eyes. Their reunion today had been completely unexpected. But now, everything was crystal clear for Verner—he knew what was precious to him and what he wanted to protect.
But he couldn't put it into words. Not yet... He was too weak and didn't deserve to.
He knew that, as he was, he was far from being a man worthy of her, so he decided to make a promise instead.
"Lady Ellize, you... On that day you saved my life and soul, so I'll use them to protect what's truly important to me. I'll become stronger. Strong enough to shield you one day..."
"What determination! I'm sure you'll be able to make every wish of yours come true," she answered with a smile. "Oh my, it looks like the others will be back soon. I should take my leave."
"I hope to see you again, Lady Ellize..."
Verner looked at her walking away.
I found my saint. No, I guess I never had to search for her in the first place—I already knew it was her from the moment we met. I'll become a man worthy of standing by her side, worthy of protecting her.
Verner was more determined than ever and ready to grow stronger.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone