Chapter 226
''Blood golem~ Blood golem~''
Simon couldn''t get the excitement of learning to create blood golems out of his head.
His joy continued into the next day. When he woke up in the morning, he was disappointed that it wasn''t next week yet. But he was willing to wait with bated breath.
"Please stop it already."
On the way to the restaurant, Rick said in a fed-up tone.
"That damned ''blood golem, blood golem'' tune you''ve been humming. Do you realize you''ve been doing it nonstop sincest night?"
"I-I have?"
Feeling a sudden rush of embarrassment, Simon yed innocent.
"Yeah! You did! With this much repetition, even someone with no sense of rhythm or pitch could y it perfectly on a piano! Blood golem~ Blood golem~"
"Seems like you''re also addicted to it."
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"Gaaaah!"
Simon burst intoughter at Rick''s pained cry.
It didn''t matter if someone got mad or if he got criticized or anything. Because he was going to learn to create blood golems.
"Anyway! From now on, every time you say ''blood golem'', I''ll flick your forehe"
<em>Meow~</em>
The sudden sound of a cat made the two of them stop walking.
Near the stone wall beside them was a girl with bat wings crouched down and facing away from them.
''It''s Cami.''
He recognized her in a heartbeat. She was ying with kittens.
One was white and the other was ck.
Camibarez smiled and held out her finger, and the kittens pounced at it with their tiny paws.
"So cute~"
Simon and Rick quietly approached her.
"Cami?"
"Kyaaaah!"
Seemingly surprised to be spoken to so suddenly, the wings on her back jerked upright.
She nervously pressed her back against the stone wall, but when she recognized the two of them, she let out a sigh of relief.
"Y-You guys startled me!"
"What are you doing here?"
"Oh, you see"
<em>Meow. Meow.</em>
The ck kitten climbed onto Camibarez''p and nuzzled her leg. It purred as she stroked the cat''s soft head.
"Ah, you aren''t supposed to go in there!"
Camibarez grabbed the white cat that was trying to get into her skirt and lifted it onto herp.
"Hm."
Rick''s face turned serious.
"That might not be a cat, actually."
Simon ignored Rick''s joke and joined in ying with the cat.
"Looks like they were only recently born."
When the kittens saw Simoning, they arced their backs and hissed.
But when he offered his finger and wagged it slowly from side to side, they were as excited as ever, nipping at it with their small teeth.
"Oh, that looks fun!"
Rick joined in. But as soon as he leaned down to y, one of the kittens scratched him across the face.
Simon howled withughter, and Camibarez pulled back the kittens into a motherly hug.
"Y-You shouldn''t do that! Rick, are you alright?"
"That hurts!"
Rick rubbed his face and red at the kittens in Camibarez'' arms.
"Seriously, that might not be a cat."
"That joke isn''t funny."
"No, I''m not joking. I ampletely serious! It could be a baby monster! Look at that! Although small, they have a horn in the middle of their heads!"
"A horn?"
Simon turned serious and touched the cat''s head.
Sure enough, he could feel something sticking out. A tiny horn was hidden in the fur.
"Th-That can''t be right! Whitey and ckey aren''t monsters!"
Eximed Camibarez as she hugged the two kittens tighter. Looks like she already named them.
Rick shrugged.
"And what makes you think they''re not monsters?''
"They can''t be monsters when they''re this sweet and cute!"
"Don''t let your emotions cloud your reason, dammit."
"Hey, you bastards!!"
A sharp cry came from behind them, and a bucketload of water flew at Rick.
Right on time, as Rick looked back at the noise, the water hit him right where he''d been cut and knocked him to the ground.
"Urk!"
"You guys told me to wait at the academy restaurant!"
Meilyn was quickly walking toward them, her light blue hair fluttering with every step.
"It''s been twenty minutes! Twenty fucking minutes! Do you know how embarrassing it is to sit in a crowded restaurant alone? Others were whispering every time they passed by my empty table!"
Rick rubbed the spot where he''d been punched by kilos of water. It was even half-frozen from Meilyn''s ice.
"While you''re at it, why don''t you take a moment to reflect on why you don''t have any friends to eat with besides us?"
"I have a lot of friends!!"
Shouted Meilyn, her face already red from embarrassment now getting even redder from anger.
"Shut up! If you guys werete for something stupid, I''m going to Ah!"
Meilyn spotted the kittens in Camibarez'' arms.
Her furious expression melted like snow, and a smile spread across her face.
"So cute!!"
"Right, right?"
The two of them were mesmerized by the cuteness of the kittens. Every slight twitch of a paw was enough to make them go crazy.
Simon stood up, and Rick pulled out his notebook and looked at it.
"Ahem I guess I gotta contact the keepers~ There are wild monsters in Kizen, so they gotta eliminate them."
Meilyn red at Rick.
Camibarez hugged the kittens tightly, frightened.
"P-Please don''t do that, Rick! I''ll take care of them!"
As her purple eyes filled with tears, Rick panicked and said,
"No, you''re not the problem, but!"
"You really are a bitch. Can you really say things like that about these cute little babies? I swear, if you call the staff, I''ll make hell exist purely so I can drag you down there."
"Guys."
Simon quickly intervened.
"I''m not in favor of killing them, but Rick has a point. If they''re on campus, and if they really are monsters and an ident urs, we''ll be in trouble. We need to do something about them."
"Hm."
Meilyn pondered for a moment, then decided,
"I''ll go to the girls'' dormitory and have some of the servants I know take care of them. I''ll also get someone to identify if they''re actually monsters. Is that alright?"
Simon quickly nodded. Rick also nodded but scratched his head in confusion.
"Beats me. Do you really have to go through all that trouble? Just leave them alone and their mom will probably find them."
"Did you forget that this is a necromancer school? What if they get caught by some weirdos and be subjects of cruel experiments?"
"Oh, I didn''t think of that."
And so, they were all in agreement. The four picked up the kittens and headed for the girls'' dorms.
* * *
* * *
"Mwahaha! Hello!"
Rick made his presence felt, grinning from ear to ear as he entered a ce off-limits to men. Meilyn gave him a dirty look, but he was already talking to one of the servants he knew.
"U-Uhm!"
Camibarez, hugging the kittens to her chest, approached the dormitory storage manager. She exined the situation and asked if she could keep them in the girls'' dormitory yard for a while.
"Some girls do this like once a year."
The servant sighed heavily.
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"Miss. I feel sorry for the kittens, but we have our own jobs and can''t take care of them forever."
Camibarez offered to do all the feeding and work, begging for her to let them stay here until their parents were found, but it was useless.
"Ahem."
From behind Camibarez, Meilyn cleared her throat.
"I''ve heard that the price of mana stones in Roke Ind has risen quite a lot as ofte. Or, that it''s going to."
The servant froze.
Simon let out a bitter smile.
"Meilyn, don''t use your power for times like this."
"Did I say anything?"
She smiled with the confidence of someone who had absolute power here.
"I''m just worried about intion."
The servant couldn''t make the Ivory Tower an enemy just because she didn''t want to take care of a pet.
In the end, the servant gave them two months. She allowed the kittens to stay in the warehouse for that long and that long only, whether they turned out to be monsters or not.
"Thank you so much!"
Camibarez bowed repeatedly.
The freed kittens wandered around, and when they recognized the person who would feed them, they trotted up to the storage manager and began nuzzling her legs.
Seeing this, shepletely melted, but she coughed and tried topose herself as she remembered there were still students watching.
"You four should leave now. Next ss is starting soon."
"Yeah!"
"We''re counting on you."
Things went better than they expected. As the three of them walked out of the girls'' dorms, Rickwho had been talking to another servantcame running up, panting for breath.
"Bwahaha! It''s big news, big news!"
Information streamed out of Rick''s mouth in poorly contained excitement.
"Swords, spears, maces, bows, you name it. Kizen is sweeping up every weapon they can get their hands on in Rochest! And it doesn''t stop there. We''ve got word that they''re procuring even more directly from Langerstine!"
Simon''s eyes shed.
"I assume this has something to do with the theme of the next exam?"
"Right? I think so, too."
Camibarez tilted her head.
"Th-That''s odd. They''re testing our dark magic, right. Weapons seem a bit out of ce."
"Maybe it''s something like this?"
Meilyn quickly came up with an idea.
"They might let the students pick a weapon and have them fight each other in the colosseum!"
"Oh, please."
Said Rick, shaking his head.
"Most of the weapons that Kizen are buying are cheap. You''d usebat dark magic any day instead of those."
Kizen was buying weapons. It wasn''t enough to determine the theme of the test, but it was surely an important hint.
''Weapons, huh.''
Simon''s thoughts were getting more and moreplicated.
* * *
The afternoon sses were over, and it was getting dark.
Simon snuck out of Kizen again today. He nned to stop by Pier''s ruins and discuss his newfound power, the Cloud, with him.
He looked up at the sky as he strolled through the forbidden forest.
''The moon is so bright tonight.''
It was colder than usual, so he huddled up and hurried down the path. It was the same path he took all the time, so it felt familiar now.
''Huh?''
Until it became unfamiliar.
Surprised, he quickly crouched down, looking at the ground
There were footprints.
''I made sure to avoid the Keeper''s scouting day. Is this an irregr scout?''
Upon closer inspection, the footprints weren''t human. The shape and stride were inconsistent. It could be a monster, but no monsters in the Forbidden Forest had footprints like this.
Simon crouched down even lower and carefully followed the footprints.
"!"
A shiver ran up his spine. He quickly ducked behind a tree before peeking his head out to look ahead.
<em>[Squelch. Squelch.]</em>
A strange ck creature was seen scanning the ground with its tentacles. It resembled a walking squid. Its body looked squishy, like a slime.
Its skin was as ck as the night sky, and its head had no eyes or other facial features typical of beasts, just horns on each side.
A mouth-like organ protruded from its face, scanning the ground. It was liked it was looking for something.
''What the hell is that?''
A creature Simon hasn''t seen all semester was scouring the Forbidden Forest. Judging by the jet-ck emanating from its body, it was undead, but no matter how much Simon thought about it, it wasn''t one of Kizen''s undead.
<em>[Krrrrrr.]</em>
Simon ducked to the ground in surprise.
''That startled me.''
One of Elizabeth''s corpse spiders was gesturing at him, trying to tell him something before hopping away. It wiggled its butt as if telling Simon to follow.
Simon took onest look at the creature, then ran after the corpse spider. Then, he saw a tall skeleton waiting a short distance away.
"Pier!"
Pier waspletely armed, wearing his shapeless cape and holding the Greatsword of Destruction.
"Did you see that, Pier? Over there was!"
[I saw it.]
A dark fury could be felt in Pier''s thoughts.
[Dammit! I didn''t expect him to move this fast.]
"That means"
[Yeah, it''s an Ancient Undead sent by Magnus.]
Simon bit his lip. Apparently, he sent a scout in after detecting Pier that once.
[The Ancient Undead ''Thhze''. Him and his clones, making up a total of seven undead, were found.]
Pier shouldered the Greatsword of Destruction that had been stuck in the ground and frowned.
[For now, Elizabeth is weaving a web barrier to keep the creatures from leaving the Forbidden Forest. Still, it is only a matter of time before they reach the ruins.]
"...Hm, what do you think we should do?"
[Magnus sensed <em>my</em> thoughts. I''ll lure them out of Roke Ind.]
At that, Simon shook his head.
"I cannot allow that, Pier."
Pier was the Marshall, the most important person in the Legion. Even if he was the one Magnus is tracking, Simon couldn''t send him out.
"You said that even a Commander can''t enter Roke Ind, as it is protected by Nefthis, right? Then it''d be best for you to stay here, Pier."
[What will you do, then? If Magnus discovers the Seventh Legion, everything will be in vain.]
After a moment of silence and serious consideration, Simon finally spoke up.
"If it doesn''t matter where we run, I''ll dly ept this provocation and destroy Magnus'' Ancient Undead."
[Hey now.]
"Magnus took my father''s undead, so I have no intention of being friendly with him."
Like father, like son Pier wasn''t sure if he should be d that his new master was the same or disappointed.
But it was Pier''s role to offer wise counsel to the young Commander.
[Thze''s abilities are special. He isn''t necessarily specialized inbat and destruction, but he''s been strengthened by Magnus'' power. If he gets away, it''ll be all-out war between Legions!]
"We can do it. It''s not like we''ve only been ying around until now, have we?"
Simon took a notebook out of subspace. Then, he quickly scribbled something in cursive and held it out to the corpse spider.
"Send this note to Kajann in the boys'' dormitory, room 409. He knows about our situation and will be happy to help."
<em>[Kieeeeee!]</em>
The corpse spider took the paper from Simon. It used its web to attach the paper to its body, then quickly left the forest.
"Now."
Simon looked back at Pier.
"In the end, we just have to destroy Thze here to make sure it won''t report to Magnus, so tell me its abilities, Pier."
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There was no falling back now.
The battle of the Legions was imminent.