Chapter 70: Snow Ball (3)
The next morning.
When I came to my senses, Iona was in front of me.
“Hello! Hello! Did you enjoy last night?”
“???”
Why was the Professor lying on the same bed as me?
A cascade of crimson hair. Intricate facial features. A playful voice.
No matter how I looked at it, the person lying next to me was Iona.
I rubbed my eyes, wondering if I was still half-asleep, and opened them again.
“What is this…?”
The fact that Iona was in front of me remained unchanged.
Despite my voice laden with astonishment, Iona nonchalantly assumed a familiar pose.
Both arms flung up high, and her body leaning forward… the pose she always made when entering the classroom.
The momentarily embarrassing sight of her prominent chest pressed forward was soon overshadowed by her familiar line ringing in my ears.
“Iona enters!”
“No, Professor, you shouldn’t be making your entrance here.”
Despite my consternation, Iona chuckled and responded assertively.
“Ahem! Ahem! I’m a kind Professor! I came to visit a sick student!”
“Since when did visiting mean sharing the same bed?”
Moreover, I was sure that I fell asleep while caressing Carla…?
Glancing around, I quickly found Carla nearby, looking sullenly in my direction.
Her expression instantly brightened when our eyes met.
“Did you wake up, Master? Are you thirsty? Should I get you some water? Or do you need to use the restroom…?”
Carla eagerly asked me various things, as if she had been waiting.
Her demeanor seemed desperately intent on getting me out of bed.
“So, she took my spot?”
“…Yes. The Professor said she had something important and asked me to get up for a while, and then she just lied down.”
Carla spoke with a slight pout.
Iona, who had suddenly become a Professor keen on lying beside her student, jumped up.
“That’s so mean! So mean! Carla is spiteful! I lied down with good intentions!”
“Was it not with ill intentions?”
“Really! And the one with ill intentions isn’t me; it’s Yandel! I know you just glanced at my chest!”
“Well…”
It was a natural reaction when a part, created solely to enthrall the opposite sex due to vampire traits, came close to my nose, right?
“Anyway. Professor Iona seems to treat Carla very casually. Everyone else is awkward seeing a slave return suddenly.”
“Hehe! How old do you think I am, Yandel?”
“372 years old.”
“…Eh? Uhmm. Right. How did you know?”
“You’re a very famous Professor, after all.”
I casually answered, but in reality, I saw it in a character profile organized in the H&A café.
Iona was a character with unusually high popularity, so various information circulated about her, even though she couldn’t be played.
I answered without thinking, but Iona seemed a bit taken aback and eventually continued.
“Ahem. Knowing so much, you catch on quickly! When one reaches this age, one tends to be indifferent to the rise and fall of others! There were more than a few students who had to drop out due to family issues over the 300 years!”
Um… The Great War ended roughly 300 years ago. The academy was established right after, so rounding it up—it wasn’t incorrect…
Feeling the reality of Iona’s age was something else.
Was it the difference between the age known from the settings and the age experienced in front of me?
But now I know that Iona will treat Carla as normally as before.
Whether I should be happy or not about this, I looked at Iona with a mixed expression.
Before I knew it, Iona, who had changed her expression completely, continued speaking with a bright smile.
“Anyway, anyway! There is a separate reason why I was lying next to Yandel! I know all your wounds have healed, but your vitality might still be weak, right? If so, I was thinking of sharing a bit of my Pure Blood Crystal… but it seems there’s no need for that now!”
“Your Pure Blood Crystal, Professor…?”
“Yes! It seems like your recovery is quick, perhaps because you are young!”
Pure Blood Crystal of vampires was a special crystal made by refining their blood.
It was essentially a quasi-elixir that eliminated various miscellaneous energies and concentrated pure vitality.
It was hard to produce, and unless a vampire was of a certain level, they couldn’t even create it.
Ah, there was no worry about becoming a vampire by consuming Pure Blood Crystal.
There were many other prerequisites for creating a new vampire.
More than anything, Iona had no intention of increasing her kind.
And more importantly, now is not the time to worry about the reproduction methods of vampires.
“So… you were going to give me Pure Blood Crystal?”
“Hmm? Right?”
She quickly bowed her head and started to groan.
“Ouch! My head… my stomach…! I feel like I should eat something good when suddenly feeling pain… specifically something that maximizes natural healing…!”
“…Uhm?”
“Aaah! My broken bones…! It hurts just to breathe… Potions won’t heal this kind of thing… If only there’s a strong, pretty, and kind professor-like vampire who would give some Pure Blood Crystal….”
While continuing my awkward acting sneakily, Iona, with a cautious expression, took out a bright red bead.
“I intended to give it if needed from the beginning…”
“Thank you, Professor!”
Before Iona could change her mind, I swiftly accepted the crystallized Pure Blood Crystal.
I would use it later to make an elixir with a whitened magic herb.
Blending vitality and magic increases the quality of the elixir.
If messed up, it would become useless, but with Faye’s skills, it would be well-balanced.
I chuckled as I put the Pure Blood Crystal into the inventory. Then Iona finally rose from the bed.
“It’s a bit… just a bit like that! Anyway, it’s good to see you being energetic! Now, let’s move on to the second main point! Do you know the current situation, Yandel?”
“I roughly heard it from Carla. However, it’s just what happened approximately after I fainted.”
“Aha? Then let me fill you in more! While you were unconscious, the academy had quite a stir. I took the freshmen chicks for practical training, and we almost got annihilated by the cultists, remember?”
I had already roughly heard from Carla about the commotion in the academy and the uproar from the students’ families and other professors.
“But at first, there were blames on Yandel, you know? There were groundless rumors saying that it was Yandel’s fault, who held the merit of the Church of Tainted Unity. Other students were also attacked and should be punished for it.”
“Well, how many would stay sane when their children are dead or nearly dead… You’re not taking that seriously, are you?”
“Of course not! Initially, it was because you killed a bishop before entering the academy! What’s the problem with becoming enemies with cultists in a fight? Every cultist is essentially an enemy.”
Her voice was chilly for a moment. Iona’s resentment toward the cultists was palpable in her sarcastic attitude.
I knew this in my head, but it felt a bit shocking when said outright.
Did she notice my reaction? Iona laughed and continued in her usual tone.
“So, so! I was going to say something, you know? But the righteous priests of Righteous Radiance spoke before me. They wanted to expel Yandel and leave him defenseless, claiming you might be the real cultist!”
“Wow…”
The priests in this world were fundamentally good.
As soon as they were corrupted, they would lose their divine power, and sometimes they would receive divine condemnation and be cursed at saying,
“That damn bastard!”
It was normal.
It was a kind of convergent evolution.
Evil priests were all dead, leaving only the good ones.
Anyway, when such priests were saying,
“Are you a cultist?”
It was quite unusual, even for the aggressive Church of Righteous Radiance.
I understood why.
I received a considerable blessing from the Sun God, and wielded sacred objects against the cultists.
The Church of Righteous Radiance, afraid of the cultists, would naturally gather around me.
Even if not to the extent of the Church of Righteous Radiance, disdain for the heretics was practically a passive trait of the religious order, so I would have been shielded elsewhere as well.
While I was nodding to myself, Iona chuckled and continued speaking.
“Anyway, anyway! The talk eventually turned to the point where people said that a reward should be given to Yandel instead! I think the same! It’s quite incredible that a first-year would bring down an Archbishop-level cultist!”
The political motives might have gotten stronger, but the ultimate goal of the academy was to finish what the first hero, Rahimi, couldn’t complete.
That was to clear all the dungeons and subdue the cultists and monsters.
Now I understand the boast of the academy I saw in the system window, and the words that I was a noble of the religious orders.
So, the situation has unfolded like this.
“So, so! Need anything? If you want, you can exchange it for points!”
“Oh. That sounds tempting.”
I didn’t know how much could be exchanged, but with this semester’s grades included, I should be able to buy quite a lot from the achievement store.
However, there was nothing I needed urgently.
Unless it was the most expensive item, the Dragon Heart Fragment, the rest would be better acquired according to the growth plan I had set earlier rather than forcing it.
Here, it was always about that.
“I would like the academy to accommodate some of my conveniences.”
“Convenience? You are already an A-class student. What more do you need here?”
“It’s nothing major… be it practical training, classes, or whatever it is. Please allow Carla to accompany me wherever I go.”
“It’s not difficult… But are you sure? It’s good that you care for Carla, but it can be dangerous.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. Carla?”
“Yes!”
When I called her name, Carla ran swiftly to me.
I extended one hand to Carla and spoke.
“Left hand.”
“Yes!”
“Right hand.”
“Here!”
“Fireball.”
“Blaze up. Disperse. Fireball.”
Fwoosh.
The magic unfolded at a speed incomparable to mine.
I smirked at Iona, who was blankly staring at the flame ball appearing in the air.
“I have to bring her because it’s dangerous.”
For reference, the most dangerous one was the person on my side.
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