Kapitel 9: Chapter 8: Beyond His Wildest Dreams
Good morniiiiiiiiiiiiiing! Your most-despicable idol, Ellize, is back for another show! I'll rise toward the sky like a mighty mountain of turds and fill the hearts of all my lovely haters with enough love...that they'll explode! Are you ready? Teehee!
Damn... I'd gone with the flow and greeted my imaginary audience, but it was so extra that I ended up making myself want to puke. I needed to stop doing this sort of stuff even when I was in a good mood in the morning. Actually, I needed to stop doing it, period. What if someone walked in on me? I'd have to off myself on the spot.
It was probably a needless worry, though, since no one ever entered my room without my permission. I always cast a barrier before going to bed, and even the members of my guard couldn't get in while I was asleep. Needless to say, my barrier also blocked sounds perfectly.
Why did I bother doing that? Well, the answer was simple: even if I was doing a great job at this whole being-a-cute-girl business, I was still a man inside. And I had no way of controlling what I did or said while I was sleeping. What if I blurted out stuff like, "come on, suck it, baby!" or "yes, tiddies!" in my sleep? I wouldn't even know I'd said it!
Anyway, that was why I always made sure to set up a barrier. It was one of the first spells I'd worked on—a few days of crunch time had been enough to master it.
My morning routine was always the same. First, I checked my appearance in the mirror. My hair was silky smooth, and my skin supple and unblemished thanks to my magic. I also made sure my body stayed in perfect shape.
The next step was to further enhance my looks with some more magic. I made my hair shine by having it reflect light in an ethereal way. I made it look like a halo was always sparkling at the top of my head. I also made my skin glow—literally.
Since I was a man inside, I had to make sure that my appearance remained cute enough to trick everyone. And boy, was it hard work!
I'd been pretending to be the saint for twelve years now, and it was starting to get really old. I was sure I'd eventually slip up. I couldn't wait for Eterna to reclaim her rightful position so I could make my exit.
Ideally, when the time came, I wanted to go hide in some woods deep in the mountains. I'd build a little log house and live the rest of my life taking it easy, surrounded by nature.
But I'd have to put that off for now. If I wanted to see everyone's happy ending with my own two eyes before I retired, I'd have to meticulously craft the perfect plan.
First, I had to save the heroines that would pass away unless Verner picked their routes...which he obviously wasn't going to do.
There were three of them in the academy.
The first was the witch. I honestly didn't give a shit about her, and I had no qualms about her dying off miserably. She was everyone else's sworn enemy anyway.
I needed to save the other two, though.
One of them was a sickly girl, so I could most likely help her myself. Not to brag, but my healing magic was much stronger than pretty much every type of medicine in this world. I had yet to come across an ailment I couldn't cure. As long as I got to see her, it wouldn't be hard to save her.
The other girl was called Aina Fox, a redhead that always styled her hair in pig tails. She came from a fallen viscount house. In the original game, her family had fallen to ruin before the start of the main story because of... Wait for it... Yes! Ellize!
Aina's parents had tried to advise Ellize against resorting to violence as often as she did. Naturally, she hadn't been too happy about being called out, so she'd retaliated, destroying their house and social standing. That still hadn't been enough for Ellize, though. She'd relentlessly continued to harass the family until she'd successfully driven everyone to their death. Well... Everyone but Aina. She was the only one to survive, thanks to her parents' friends taking her in.
The original Ellize was never up to any good, was she?
Obviously, Aina hated Ellize's guts. She'd entered the academy with the sole purpose of assassinating the fake saint. Her goal had been to get good enough grades to join the saint's guard, then wait for the perfect opportunity to strike.
However, as I'd already mentioned before, Ellize often visited the academy to scheme and bully the students.
This pushed Aina to discard her carefully crafted plan, and she ended up trying to murder Ellize out of the blue instead. Oh yeah! I remembered Ellize squealing like a pig in fear. Ha ha ha ha! Good times.
Anyway, Layla was protecting Ellize at the time, so she'd easily overpowered Aina. The would-be murderer was taken away, thrown in jail, and sentenced to death the following day.
The whole affair ended up having wide repercussions on the story, though.
To begin with, Layla suffered from knowing that a promising young girl had to die because she'd arrested her. She felt like she was indirectly responsible for her death.
The biggest issue of all, though, was that Aina's blade had managed to cut Ellize. The saint—who should've been invincible unless the witch was involved—had been hurt. It should've been an impossible scenario, and it was what had eventually led to Ellize finally being exposed as the fake she was.
After that, Layla betrayed Ellize, publishing the documents she'd carefully gathered to prove her evil deeds. The scar Aina had left on her, in addition to Layla's evidence, left little room for doubt. Soon, everyone came to believe that Ellize was indeed a fake.
All in all, Aina did the most work to expose Ellize before dying.
On every route other than her own, that was all we knew of her. She hadn't done much otherwise, so the player only remembered her as "that one girl who attacked Ellize."
The first half of her route was pretty much the same, but since Verner liked her, he decided to join her attack on Ellize, and a fight against Layla would be triggered. If you managed to win that fight, you'd be able to wound Ellize and expose her without letting Aina die.
After that event, Aina and Verner would be on the run for a while to avoid prosecution for attacking the saint. However, Layla would soon betray Ellize and she'd fall to her ruin. Aina and Verner would then be free to return to the academy.
Now, the main question was... Would Aina attack me at all? I hadn't done anything to the Fox family, so she shouldn't have had any reason to hate me.
Despite that, the core principles of the game might've been set in stone; maybe she'd still start to despise me just because she was supposed to and attack me out of the blue. I couldn't really do much to prevent that if that was just how the world worked.
Even if she did attack me, I was confident I could easily stop her without getting hurt; then I'd just have to insist she shouldn't be sentenced to death.
I guess Aina's case is also pretty much settled.
Was there anything else I needed to pay attention to? Hmm... The witch-related events, I guess.
In the game, the witch had realized pretty early on that Eterna was the real saint and had sometimes launched attacks using monsters to try to get to her. There had always been a few casualties during those events.
The thing was...the witch here obviously hadn't noticed I was a fake. Farah'd had Eterna in her grasp. The teacher could've easily killed her if she wanted to, but she'd only used her as a hostage to draw me out.
Could the witch be...much dumber than I thought? How could she not tell who the true saint was?
I could understand the case for regular people, but the witch was supposed to be fated to fight the saint. She should've noticed the difference immediately, right?
Her stupidity did give me an advantage, though.
To be honest, her carelessness meant I could kill the witch at any time.
I knew exactly where she was hiding, and I was pretty confident that I was stronger than her. While I wouldn't do as much damage without the saint's magic, I could get to her with the dark magic I'd absorbed from Verner. On the other hand, I had a feeling the witch wouldn't be able to do much to me.
In the game, you could defeat her with Verner alone once he'd reached level 70. And if you had Eterna in your party, being level 40 was already more than enough.
As for me, well...if what I saw in that video was anything to go by, my current strength easily exceeded Verner's, even at level 99. I'd easily erased monsters that he would've struggled to fight.
I was fairly confident that if I were to fight the witch, she wouldn't even be able to reach me as long as I used a barrier. Sure, I'd have to deal with a huge damage penalty, but I'd still be able to hurt her. She, on the other hand, wouldn't even be able to land a scratch on me. Even if it took me a little longer than with regular monsters, I'd eventually finish her. I simply couldn't lose.
Imagine a level 99 Fire-type fighting a level 5 Water-type.
That said, I couldn't go kill the witch right now. Even if I were the one to do it, I had to wait until after Eterna got her happy ending.
If the witch herself came out to attack people, I'd just drive her away.
Anyway, that meant I was pretty much done deciding my next course of action.
First, I'd look for the sick girl and heal her as soon as possible. As for Aina Fox, I'd ask Layla to look into her and wait for her to make the first move. If she came to kill me, I'd handle it somehow.
That's a good plan, if I dare say so myself! Guess it's time to dispel my barrier.
Layla entered my room after knocking on the door. "Good morning, Lady Ellize."
She'd followed me to the academy to keep me safe. As always, she was put-together and looked both dignified and elegant.
What kind of idiot would dare to call such a beauty Scotterbrain? Ah, wait... It's me. I'm the idiot.
Anyway, mean nicknames aside, Scotterbrain accompanied me to my classroom. As I walked through the corridors, students and teachers alike stopped to stare at me and whispered among themselves.
I'm starting to feel like a celebrity. Yes, good! Lower your heads! Bow down to me, peasants! Wait, most students here are nobles. If anything, I'm the peasant... I got it. I'll lower my own head, sorry.
Jokes aside, it did feel good to be the center of attention—like I was some big shot or something. I was starting to understand how Ellize had turned out the way she had, given all the attention she'd been lavished with from the start. I didn't intend to make excuses for her, though—she was still a piece of trash.
Still, it got me wondering—would Eterna have grown into such a compassionate person if she had been in Ellize's shoes? Maybe she would've turned out just as selfish and violent as Ellize...
I believed that everyone was born pure and good, just like a blank sheet of paper. The environment which people grew up in determined what kind of colors would be added. Using that philosophy, though...maybe the original Ellize had been nothing but a victim in the end.
Oh, are you wondering what color I am? My sheet of paper was pitch-black from the start, baby! You could add as much color as you wanted to it, but it'd still be black! That was why I was still the same piece of shit even after I was reincarnated.
Anyway, I finally arrived in front of my classroom. Now I just had to walk in, but...there was some guy kneeling in front of the door and blocking the way!
Who the hell's this weirdo?!
"How dare you obstruct Lady Ellize's way!" Scotterbrain cried.
She tried to confront the man, but I stopped her in a hurry.
What're you doing, Scotterbrain?! Everyone's gonna think I'm an arrogant villainess! What were you planning to do next—stab him for having the gall to block my path? Are you trying to set me up so that everyone believes I'm a scoundrel, huh?! Is that it?
"Ah, you're even more beautiful up close... I was awaiting your arrival. What an honor to welcome you to our academy..." the man said emotionally.
Okay, but who are you, dude?
I took a closer look, but I still had no clue who he could've been. Well, not that I remembered a whole lot of male characters in the first place, but yeah...
He seemed to be...in his midtwenties, I guess? He had such an elegant face that it pissed me off—slanted eyes, a nice high-bridged nose, and a delicate, oval bone structure. His long, jet-black hair was tied in a low ponytail, and his bangs were swept back, save for one lone strand that fell over his forehead. A pair of modern glasses were resting on his nose—which made little sense considering the settings of this world, but sure—and gave him the air of an intellectual.
He looked like the kind of dude that befriended the hero only to betray him later on.
Was he in the game? I have a feeling he was... But then again, maybe he wasn't...
I had no choice. I'd have to rely on my secret method—ask Scotterbrain!
I shot a glance her way, and she immediately understood me. She cleared her throat before introducing the mystery man.
"This is the teacher, Mr. Supple Ment."
Oh, I remember him now. He's one of the bad guys.
Image here:
Supple Ment, the twenty-five-year-old teacher. The person in charge of writing him couldn't think of any good names, so he'd casually named him that after seeing a bottle of supplements on his desk.
The players had nicknamed him "Four-Eyed Pervert." He ended up facing the player as an enemy on every single route, though honestly, he wasn't really an important villain.
He was a fervent supporter of the saint and always tried to push his fantasies and delusions onto others. He'd noticed pretty early on that Ellize wasn't the real deal and had never worshiped her, reasoning that someone like her simply couldn't be the glorious saint.
I mean, he ended up being right, but...
He became relevant to the plot after Ellize had been taken care of. Once it became clear that Ellize had lied to everyone, he set out on a quest to find the real saint, the one that would be worthy of his worship.
At that point, he'd stalk, kidnap, and proselytize whichever heroine had the highest affection level with Verner. The man was, in a nutshell, an annoying creep.
Either way, his ideal saint only existed inside his head. Regardless of who he ended up abducting, he was never satisfied.
He'd grumble things like, "The saint would never say something like that," or, "the saint wouldn't act this way," before trying to force the girl he'd abducted to act like the figure he idolized. By the way, that exact storyline unfolded even if he kidnapped Eterna—the actual saint. Even the real deal couldn't compare to whatever image he'd conjured in his head and placed on a pedestal.
After a while, Verner would come to rescue his girl and beat the weirdo up. Supple Ment would be forced to leave the academy forever.
To think they let such a bastard be a teacher... What's the world coming to? Whatever, he's no big deal anyway. I'll keep an eye on him; that should be more than enough.
I'd drive him out of the story the moment he started acting funny.
◇
She was beyond his wildest dreams.
Supple Ment worshiped the saint. She was everything to him, and he considered himself her most zealous supporter.
When he was a child, the world had been a living hell. Monsters had been everywhere, and people had died by the thousands. Those who'd been "lucky" enough to survive lost their humanity and reason, leading them to act like crazed demons even lower than the beasts.
Those were the beings that had really terrified them. After all, when a beast attacked a person, there was no ill will behind it. When they attacked, there was always a reason for their actions, whether it was to eat, to protect themselves—or their territories, their young. Regardless, there was always something that drove them, either through needs or fear.
However, the people who lost their humanity and their reason weren't like that. They didn't need a rational cause to hurt others, and even worse than that, they took pleasure in others' suffering.
They were evil beasts, nothing but monsters.
As fate would have it, Supple's home had been attacked by those very monsters.
The Ment house was a baron family, but they weren't particularly well-off—they simply ruled over a domain. When they were attacked by an angry mob after an uprising, they naturally didn't have the means to hire enough soldiers or mercenaries to defend themselves.
Their mansion had been turned upside down, the servants had run away, and young Supple had witnessed his father and brother's murders and his mother and sister's rapes.
Beasts... These people are beasts, the boy had thought. There was no way they could be human like himself—they were simply wearing men's skins.
Supple had managed to narrowly escape the angry mob, but his spirit had never recovered.
While he hadn't had a lavish upbringing, he still hailed from a noble house. He'd never seen the ugliness of the world before that day. It had been enough to break him.
Justice, love, compassion, moderation, kindness, sympathy, responsibility, courage... All of the virtues that had been so diligently instilled into him now sounded like empty lies. After all, those people had oh-so-easily turned into those hideous creatures—no, hideous monsters. They'd been quick to discard their values and reveal their true nature, smiling only to conceal the ugliness of their souls.
The person who had finally righted his twisted world was the saint of that era, who had defeated the witch and had brought back the light.
Supple had been astonished to see the once-monstrous people suddenly recover their reason and put on their masks of humanity again.
He had never met the saint, but a statement had immediately struck him—the saint was the only one who could illuminate the world and right every wrong!
The saint was light, and with that light came all of the virtues of the world! Justice, love, compassion, moderation, kindness, sympathy, responsibility, courage... The saint embodied all of these at once! No, the saint was virtue itself!
Since he'd never seen the saint, he tried imagining her. She was probably the most beautiful woman in the world. No, not probably—he was certain of it! She had to be the most beautiful and the most precious, both inside and out. She couldn't possibly be tainted by any ugliness.
In the heart of the young broken boy, his twisted conclusions had made perfect sense. Anyone would have thought Supple's thoughts were selfish. Who was he to decide what the saint had to be like? However, no one ever corrected his twisted thoughts... Or rather, no one ever noticed them. Why? Well, the answer was rather simple: no one understood how to wear a mask better than him.
If there was anything Supple had learned from the hideous monsters of his childhood, it was how to conceal his true self. He knew how to make himself look good, how to convince everyone he was a gentle person. And he didn't hesitate to wear that facade.
A few years passed like that until once again, as always, another witch appeared.
The cycle was always the same. No one knew why, but a saint and a witch would appear without fail every generation. Each time the saint defeated the witch, she would disappear without leaving so much as a corpse behind. Then, about five years later, another witch would appear to replace her, and the saint would follow a few years after that. They never appeared at the exact same time.
While the witch always appeared as an adult, the saint was reborn as a baby. Although they technically appeared at around the same time, it would take the saint at least fifteen years to be ready to face her fated opponent.
As a result, there was no one to stop the witch until the saint was fully grown, so she was free to do as she pleased during that time.
That meant that each time the cycle completed, people had a mere five years of peace before the witch went on a rampage again. Then they'd have to wait for another saint to rise up against the witch and bring about another short-lived peace. Thus it continued endlessly—a mere five years of peace followed by at least fifteen years of terror under the witch's rule.
There was one exception, however: when the saint failed to defeat the witch and died. The saint did not always triumph over the witch—far from it.
While the saint couldn't be hurt by regular means, the witch was very much capable of killing her if she wasn't strong enough to kill the witch first. There were also a few cases in which the saints hadn't been able to withstand the pressure of their position and had killed themselves. Others had been corrupted by the witch's powers and became her servants. Finally, some had simply been killed by monsters sent by the witch.
When such things happened, the rule of the witch would be prolonged, and many would fall into depravity.
In fact, before the world had been saved when Supple was a child—two saints before Ellize's generation, in other words—that exact scenario had happened. The saint of the time had been slain by a monster without even being able to reach the witch.
That was why the saint was such a precious being, why everyone held her so dear to their hearts.
While the saint from two generations ago had been a failure, the complete reverse had happened in this generation. Ellize, the greatest saint in history, had appeared.
By the time she was five, she was fully conscious of her duties, and by the time she was ten, she'd already started her work. She hunted monsters, saved whoever she could reach, and broke through the darkness like no one else had before her.
The witch had gone into hiding, and her powers had grown noticeably weaker. Everyone assumed that the witch—the greatest symbol of fear—was actually scared of Ellize instead.
For once, the witch era had been cut short. Ever since Ellize had started making her move, peace had returned to the land, and the situation remained surprisingly stable.
Supple had once gone out of his way in hopes of witnessing her glorious figure. He'd headed to an area where monsters tended to appear and just as he'd wished, he'd seen her fight.
She was perfect—no, beyond perfect. She'd far surpassed any image his lacking, feeble brain could've ever imagined. She was truly beyond his wildest dreams.
Supple's selfish ideals had vanished in an instant, and for the first time in many years, he willingly looked at reality instead of his delusions.
The world he'd long thought beyond saving didn't look ugly anymore—it was beautiful and full of light.
A strong light finally cleared his sight. People who'd once looked like monsters in his eyes suddenly seemed different, he realized. In fact, he had the epiphany that his twisted heart, which had been overrun by dark emotions, had been the true source of the bleakness he saw everywhere. His heart felt light, as if a pleasant breeze was dancing inside his chest.
He didn't need to run away anymore, nor was he the kind of man he'd once been who'd lost himself in his ideals. Instead, he'd been replaced by a man who was ready to face the world for what it truly was and walk the path of righteousness.
"I'm Ellize. Exceptional circumstances have led me to enroll in the academy. I will only be here for a rather short time, but I do hope we'll all get along nicely."
Her appearance was a bolt out of the blue. If Supple's everyday life had been a rainy day, then Ellize's arrival at the academy was like a flash of lightning that had suddenly cleared the stormy clouds and revealed a clear blue sky.
Supple had been overjoyed at the news. The saint...studying at the academy! He'd get to see her! He'd get to exist in the same space as she did!
Now that he'd gotten to see her up close, he realized all over again just how much better she was compared to the "perfect" saint he'd spent all of those years carefully constructing in his head.
In fact, she'd even healed a sickly girl she hadn't known after passing her by once in the corridors.
"Excuse me... Are you feeling sick? Your face looks a little pale... Here you go, you should feel better now. What did you say? You wish to thank me? There's no need—your gratitude is more than enough. I healed you simply because I wanted to, so you don't owe me anything. Really."
Supple had recognized the student.
While her grades for written tests were decent, she was absolutely hopeless when it came to practical exams. He'd heard that the girl suffered from a heart ailment. Whenever she overexerted herself, she had to rest for a long time, unable to move. Despite her huge handicap, she'd managed to successfully enter this school. That alone showed how much potential she had, and Supple couldn't help but think it was a pity for such a promising student to be unable to perform well because of her health.
Healing magic usually was powerless to cure heart ailments. Only a very valuable medicine—made of mandragora, dragon scales, and griffin feathers—could do anything against such illness. The ingredients were very difficult to come by, and as a result, it was both expensive and also incredibly scarce. After all, no one could make it if no one managed to find the ingredients in the first place.
Supple often wondered if the girl was trying to become strong in the hopes that she'd find these ingredients herself one day. Was she devoting whatever was left of her life to this quest?
Sadly...he knew she'd never survive long enough to succeed. Even if she did hold on until she became a knight, the medicine ingredients weren't easy to gather, even for full-fledged knights...let alone a newcomer.
However, the saint had easily cured her serious illness as if it had been nothing more than a mere cold.
The girl had been overcome with emotion. She'd almost fallen to her knees, trembling and sobbing, but the saint had simply gathered her in her arms and held her. The green-haired student was taller than the saint, but she looked like a child in her comforting embrace.
"How precious..." the man whispered to himself before feeling his mind turn blank.
When he'd finally come back to his senses, the saint had long left. Supple regretted not being able to gaze upon her longer. Actually, it was more that he felt so moved that he didn't know what to do with himself.
Ah! Ah! How beautiful the world is! How full of light!
Reality truly had surpassed his ideals.
Supple didn't know why the saint had decided to come to this school, but he was certain she had a very important reason for her actions.
Then I'll support her with everything I have! I'll do everything I can to help her fulfill her goal! Supple Ment vowed in his heart.
He gazed up at the sky and began to pray with a frenzied expression on his face. Needless to say, it wasn't a flattering look—he came off kind of gross—and the students that passed him by in the corridor took great care to avoid him.
Wöchentlicher Energiestatus
-- Power-
Rangliste 
-- Power-
Stein