WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 17: The Status Window Opened on My First Day of School (1)

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At the end of February, the streets around Saint Yansk University were packed with people.

The finest educational institution established after the war by order of the late king was finally holding its entrance ceremony. The entrance examinations had been held last November, so the students had waited quite a long time.

It was also the season when Pritchenkaya merchants conspired to empty the pockets of new students and their families from distant lands, while pickpocketing and every other kind of “traditional pastime” ran rampant.

Despite the biting chill of an early spring morning, excited and happy new students passed through Saint Yansk University’s gates in a steady stream, followed by undergraduates who watched them with pitying eyes.

“What’s that?”

That was how it had been until someone pointed to the sky and cried out in alarm.

One by one, more people began pointing upward.

Then a long shadow blotted out the morning glow and fell across the university grounds.

“A ship...?”

“An aerial... battleship...?”

“Damn it! Isn’t that Kallion’s national emblem?!”

The crowds gathered before the campus fell into panic.

“Y-Your Excellency! There’s a Kallion warship in the skies over Pritchenkaya...!”

“Sir, I have eyes as well.”

A silver-haired Lord Chamberlain tore at his hair and ground his teeth.

“...Did Elphihara not say she would travel overland through Tilles?”

“Well... Ahaha! She did! They even used a concealment barrier above the clouds, so...”

“Yes. The weather has been poor lately. Naturally, we could not determine whether Kallion’s guest was coming by land or crossing our airspace aboard an armed warship. Perfectly reasonable.”

“No, sir. How were we supposed to plant agents in Kallion? It’s the land of the elves... How were we supposed to plant humans there...? We’d be discovered immediately...”

As an intelligence officer broke out in a cold sweat and kept muttering, “I’m fucked when I report to headquarters,”

in an age where peace had become a vulgar joke,

a warship descended from the sky.

It was early spring.

Ep. 6. The Status Window Opened on My First Day of School.

Elizaveta had better not kill any elves.

Ignoring the people still caught in their panic, Ivan walked on as he thought.

Their thoughts were probably obvious.

-What, only the Hero Party’s children get singled out for terrorist attacks?

-How badly managed are your borders for this to happen?

-Elphihara is the treasure of our archipelago. How could we trust you with her? We’ll protect our own children from now on. Good work, and we look forward to your cooperation.

It was difficult to argue with them. Isabelle and Aesidis had been caught in a train derailment, and the fact that all of them had survived was practically a miracle.

Elizaveta had even received Ivan’s warning beforehand. Still, who would dare provoke Krasilov at this point in time?

Krasilov, trapped in chaos as the princess and crown prince fiercely fought for power, yet had managed to preserve nearly all of its military strength after the war. Would an outside enemy dare provoke it?

Not unless they wanted to die.

Elizaveta must have felt wronged. She probably had not expected there to be people crazy enough to do it. In any case, this incident would likely be dismissed as a minor disturbance. The elves of Kallion would not commit a diplomatic offense beyond this show of force.

‘If I told her there would be countless terrorist attacks at the academy in the future, she’d be devastated.’

The thought of seeing Iron-Blooded Liza cry again was somewhat tempting, but he refrained from further insulting a superior officer.

He did not particularly want to see Elizaveta to begin with. Their relationship was somewhat awkward, after all.

‘Hm.’

Elizaveta had written him letters quite often, and Ivan had neatly returned every one of them. The biggest reason was that he had not wanted to speak to a superior officer for personal reasons, and the second was that he had not wanted to get involved with royalty.

Had he known she would become his superior officer a few years later, he should have behaved more carefully. It was something to reflect on.

She had only been fourteen when she first wrote to him. How could he have expected her to become an Annihilation Unit officer in just five years? At the time, he had even been part of the late king’s Royal Guard Division.

If anyone had seen him having a private conversation with the princess, he could have been caught in a political attack.

He had needed to avoid any misunderstanding that the great late king had secretly sent someone to support Elizaveta...

“Huh? Mister?”

“...Hm?”

As he walked, lost in thought, a familiar voice suddenly called out.

Someone came running over and tried to smack his shoulder. Ivan lightly twisted away and reached for his waist. His hand found nothing.

Only then did he remember that he had left his axe in the director’s office.

“What’s with that killing intent? I can’t even say hello? You’re going to scare me to death!”

“It seems Tilles’s manner of greeting has changed quite a bit.”

“I saw you reaching for your waist. Is that how you return a greeting in Krasilov, by chopping people with an axe? Hm? Is that any way to treat a comrade who faced death with you?”

It was Isabelle. Grinning brightly, she approached him without any attendants.

“You don’t look like you’re going to school. Are you an instructor? A professor? Not in the Knight Department, right? You don’t look like someone who would become a knight. Ah, don’t tell me. I’ll guess.”

“I don’t recall you having this kind of personality.”

“You told me to live with a smile.”

Isabelle smiled brightly.

Her expression resembled her father’s so closely that Ivan found himself smiling back.

“Even if I still don’t like Sir August, and I hate fake-smiling people with a passion. Hm. Right, right. I can just become fake myself, can’t I?”

“Excellent.”

Ivan sincerely thought so. She had been like a poorly socialized puppy from the start.

The kind that barked at anyone and showed its teeth whenever it got a little scared.

She had changed her personality in just one night, so Ivan assessed that he possessed more talent as an educator than he had thought. For Isabelle, who had seen roughly eighty citizens slaughtered that night and had fought demonfolk desperately to save around ten survivors, it was a somewhat bewildering assessment.

“Anyway! Mister, no. Hm. With your skills, you must be a professor, right? What department are you in? Physical education department. It has to be the physical education department. It can’t be the Knight Department, and... Hmm, does Saint Yansk University have an assassination curriculum?”

“Think about whether an educational institution that teaches such things would be useful in this world.”

“It’s good to learn anything! Except magic. That was really too hard.”

“It’s a little troublesome if a Hero cannot use magic.”

“Ahaha, I told you, I’m in the Knight Department!”

Ivan walked beside the cheerfully chattering Isabelle for a while. As she prattled on, another group approached from the distance.

“My lady!”

“Eek.”

Isabelle’s expression turned cold, then she regained control of it in an instant.

After clearing her throat and glancing at Ivan, she composed herself and answered brightly.

“Oh my, Young Lord! I see you everywhere!”

“I told you to speak comfortably, my lady. Please call me Oscar.”

“Sure, next time!”

Oscar.

Ivan’s eyes sharpened.

A remarkably handsome blond young man, surrounded by a group of female students, approached him with a bright smile.

Good heavens. This boy looked exactly like his father.

Ivan was impressed. Not only his looks, but even that expression of someone delighted by his own greatness. The only difference was probably the crowd around him.

Gilles Ver had been remarkably discreet about his womanizing.

Back then, it had not exactly been easy to meet women anywhere.

The only women in the party had been the Saintess and the thief. Patricia had only just been a girl in her mid-teens, while Enrika had been a vampire over a hundred years old.

“Hmm. It is a pleasure to meet you. I am Oscar de Sation of Tilles. And you are?”

“Ivan Petrovich.”

“Forgive me, but what is your relationship with my lady...? Ah, my apologies. You may not know, but my lady is a state guest of our country, so I have no choice but to risk being somewhat rude.”

Anyone would have such thoughts upon seeing a suspicious, bearded stranger walking beside the Hero’s daughter.

Ivan did not agree with the assessment, but that was how it appeared from Oscar’s point of view. This man was suspicious. It became even more suspicious when one remembered the train terrorist attack Isabelle had suffered.

Oscar had departed three days after Isabelle. She had rather die than travel with him.

Then news of Isabelle’s accident reached Tilles.

-Advance! To Pritchenkaya!

-Let’s tear apart the paws of those Krasilov bears!

-A nation that forgets history has no future! People of Tilles, do not forget the Hero’s sacred achievements!

The streets of Saint Matilene had been filled with citizens carrying placards like those. The Hero’s daughter had not simply suffered an accident abroad. She had vanished after becoming caught in a terrorist attack. How could that not cause a public uproar?

Fortunately, urgent news soon arrived that Isabelle had returned without a single injury, and the protesters dispersed. Still, Tilles’s wariness and distrust had soared sky-high.

On top of that, he had just received a severe lecture from his father, Gilles Ver, the Defender Duke.

‘Once you enter the academy, protect Isabelle no matter what. Do not let a single hair on her head be harmed.’

‘Even if I die?’

‘No matter how I think about it, her life is more precious than yours.’

‘That’s incredible. Why didn’t you trade me for her? You said you were close to the Hero.’

‘If I could have, I would have done it twenty years ago, son. Yulia and I wanted a daughter.’

‘Wow. That’s genuinely terrifying.’

Oscar frowned as he recalled the stern instruction of Gilles Ver, the great Defender Duke and model of Tilles’s knights, then quickly smoothed his expression.

“I am a staff member of Saint Yansk University.”

“I have been quite rude. There have been many unfortunate incidents recently. Please forgive my discourtesy.”

“Hm.”

“May I ask which department you oversee...? I do not recall seeing your name on the faculty list.”

At that, Isabelle’s ears perked up. He was not a professor?

“I’m a gardener.”

“Eek.”

“...Hm...?”

With those skills, he was what? A gardener?

Isabelle stared at him with shocked eyes.

His deep eyes still revealed nothing of what he was thinking, and his thick beard hid every trace of expression.

I really want to shave that off, she thought without meaning to, then suddenly realized something.

“...Aha?”

A strange smile appeared on her face as she punched Ivan’s side. He reflexively reached for his waist, then remembered he had no axe and casually lowered his hand.

‘You’re a government agent, right? Some kind of secret agent? Wow, university life is really making my heart race. What on earth are they hiding here that they would station a government agent?’

After whispering that, Isabelle cleared her throat and composed herself.

‘This stays between us, all right? You can’t go telling anyone else.’

‘If it is a secret between us, I think you need to watch your mouth more carefully.’

‘What’s with you? I’m the Hero’s daughter. Solemnity, secrecy, justice.’

‘Did the Hero say that?’

As their whispering continued, Oscar’s expression grew strange.

“My lady?”

“Ah, yes. Young Lord. Ahem. Mr. Petrovich? Thank you for showing me around. Wow, the campus is so large that I almost got lost! Goodbye!”

Did Saint Yansk University’s Department of Arts have an acting major? Ivan seriously decided he should recommend a course on acting theory for Isabelle’s liberal arts classes as he left.

* * *

At that moment, in the grand auditorium where preparations for Saint Yansk University’s entrance ceremony were in full swing, someone stared blankly into empty air.

“What is this? A Status... Window?”

[Congratulations!]

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Footnotes:

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