NOVPUBKrolro Febius broke into a cold sweat as he looked at the man in front of him.
At first, he thought the man was an assassin sent to kill him.
Of course, the idea that someone would commit such a bold act in broad daylight, and at Seorn of all places, was absurd. But backed into a corner, Krolro couldn’t think of any other possibility.
So he struck first, before he could be taken down.
But the one who was overpowered... was him.
He had been subdued in the blink of an eye, without even the chance to put up a real resistance.
‘W-What the hell is he...?’
He had thought himself fairly competent with magic.
He had even been the one to launch the first spell.
In a battle between mages, initiating the first strike was supposed to be the most crucial advantage.
But it was blocked. So easily.
And what about the second spell he cast?
That one wasn’t even blocked—it was simply dodged.
He was certain the opponent was a mage, but the way he moved... it felt like watching a black beast prowling through a jungle at night.
Until the man spoke, Krolro had been seeing the illusion of a massive predator.
Only after regaining his senses did he realize it was just a hallucination. Only then could he see the intruder’s true appearance.
A sharply-eyed young man with black hair.
The man, who introduced himself as a new instructor at the academy, casually pulled up a chair and sat down.
Then he said he wanted to talk.
Krolro was dumbfounded.
“Talk? Get out. Get the hell out right now! Do you even know where you are...?!”
There was nothing to discuss with him. Krolro had not even a grain of calm left in him.
That monster could appear at any moment.
The terrifying demon who had already burned everything he had built could very well come back to burn him to death at any time—and this man wanted to talk?
Krolro, pushed to his limits, didn’t have the capacity to care about anything else.
Ludger noticed his mental state and glanced around the room.
The place was a wreck. Everything inside was broken by Krolro himself in fits of fear and compulsion.
“If you don’t, you’ll regret it.”
“Heh... Regret? You dare say such nonsense in front of me?! I am Krolro Febius! The Duke of Febius!”
Ludger closed his eyes for a moment and sighed.
Bloodshot eyes, sunken cheeks, and the overwhelming smell of alcohol on his breath with every shout.
This was not someone who could be reasoned with.
Having reached a conclusion, Ludger stood up from his chair.
“If you understand, then get the hell—!”
Crack!
Ludger grabbed Krolro by the collar with his right hand and forcibly pulled him up.
“I think you misunderstood what I said earlier.”
“W-What are you doing?!”
“I wasn’t asking if you’d like to talk. I said we’d talk. You can’t tell the difference?”
Krolro thrashed, trying to pry Ludger’s hand off his collar, but Ludger didn’t budge.
‘What kind of mage has this kind of grip...?!’
It was just one hand against both of his, and yet it was like iron had been driven into his neck—completely unmoving.
And Ludger hadn’t even enhanced his body with mana.
Just then, Krolro heard Ludger’s voice, his teeth clenched.
“Krolro Febius. Even after starting the Great Fire of Roteng, you somehow managed to shamelessly survive.”
“Y-You...!”
Krolro’s eyes bulged—clearly, he hadn’t expected that to come up here.
“Who are you...? D-Don’t tell me... were you sent by that demon to kill me?”
“If that demon had sent me—”
Ludger slammed Krolro down onto the floor.
“Guhk!”
Krolro hunched over, coughing dryly from the impact on his back.
“You would’ve died a few minutes ago.”
“Cough! T-Then who the hell are you...?”
“I’ve been investigating several recent incidents. Strange patterns began to emerge.”
At this point, it was impossible to keep up the façade of being a fellow instructor.
Rather than play the role weakly, it was better to go in stronger—more brazenly.
“After the Great Fire of Roteng, the Febius family fell. They say the former head and all the elders were burned alive—divine punishment, wasn’t it?”
“H-How do you know that...?”
“You’re surprised already? It’s too early for that. Afterward, the family members scattered to survive—but they all died.”
Krolro shut his mouth.
He was pretending not to care, but his body trembled like a leaf.
“All of them died in fire. One by one. In the end, the Febius family was wiped out.”
“N-No. No....”
“Ah, not completely wiped out. There’s still one survivor—the current head of Febius, right here. Still alive and well. But for how long?”
“Y-You... Who are you really...?”
It was only then that Krolro realized Ludger was no ordinary teacher.
Ludger sat back down, loosening his tight collar ever so slightly.
“Now you understand our level of intelligence.”
“W-Who are you?”
“No need to know. Krolro Febius.”
“Y-Yes!”
Beaten down by Ludger’s presence, Krolro answered obediently.
“You’re being hunted by something terrifying.”
“Y-Yes, that’s right.”
Krolro submitted to Ludger’s overwhelming pressure.
He instinctively felt it—amidst his trembling, moments away from death, someone had thrown him a lifeline.
And now, with his life hanging by a thread, he finally understood.
That the name Duke of Febius he had clung to meant absolutely nothing now.
“T-The demon. The demon of fire... she’s coming to kill me. She even showed up that night... at the banquet!”
“So it was her.”
The reason Quasimodo appeared at the banquet was because Krolro had been there.
Until then, Krolro hadn’t really thought anything of it. But the moment he saw Quasimodo, he realized just how dire the situation was—and had lived like a shell of a man ever since.
Ludger finally understood Esmeralda’s true motive.
‘Her goal was revenge.’
She had come to Seorn for one reason: to kill the man in front of him.
But why hadn’t she killed him outright?
It didn’t seem like she had been interrupted. Her movements had been cautious and calculated.
Ludger arrived at a conclusion.
‘She’s trying to kill him slowly.’
He was prey being left alive until the end.
She wanted him to feel all the pain she had endured—for as long as possible.
‘Corner him little by little. Wait until he’s completely broken, mentally and physically.’
That would be the moment when her final revenge would be complete.
Had Ludger been watching from the sidelines, uninvolved, he wouldn’t have objected to her actions.
But he had become entangled with the Black Dawn Society.
If he left Esmeralda alone, his life would be the one at risk.
He didn’t intend to preach about justice or morality when it came to someone else’s revenge.
He wasn’t exactly innocent himself.
He was stepping in for one reason only—to stay alive.
“So, who is she?”
“S-She?”
“The fire demon who’s after your life. I’m asking what her name is, and what she looks like.”
“H-Her name... I... I don’t really remember.”
“What?”
Ludger stared at him like he couldn’t believe such an idiot existed.
He couldn’t even remember the name of the person coming to kill him?
And this was the woman he once whispered sweet nothings to, trying to use her?
‘Should I just let him die?’
While Ludger seriously debated that in his head, Krolro, sensing something, hurriedly crawled over and grabbed the hem of Ludger’s pants.
“N-No! I can remember! I-I can remember!”
“Let’s put the name aside. What about any distinctive traits?”
“She... she’s pretty. And she has black hair.”
“And?”
“She looks... maybe mid-twenties now, I think....”
Mid-twenties?
Ludger recalled the appearance of Joanna Lovett.
Since she had enrolled as a student, Joanna didn’t look much different from the others.
A little more mature, perhaps—but would that really pass for mid-twenties?
‘No. Considering that mages and knights often look younger than their actual age, it’s not impossible.’
Ludger stared at Krolro, silently telling him to keep going.
Krolro opened his mouth to speak, but then quickly changed the subject—likely realizing he had nothing else to add.
“T-Then... who are you affiliated with...? Are you from some secret imperial agency?”
The Empire’s Security Bureau was well-known—even Krolro knew about it.
The Nightcrawler Knights, the Bureau’s attached knight order, were feared as nightmares among criminals.
And Shadow Fang, one of the Bureau’s elite investigative units, was a team of skilled mages and mercenaries.
Krolro asked the question assuming that, if this man belonged to such a secretive organization, he’d surely have some kind of proof of identity.
Was he trying to test Ludger even now?
Ludger sighed internally. He had expected the man to spill everything if sufficiently intimidated, but rotten nobility was still cunning after all.
“Do you happen to have... anything to prove your identity...?”
As Krolro cautiously asked with a suspicious look, Ludger reached into his inner pocket and pulled something out.
It was a dog tag, coated in black metal.
“T-That’s...”
“Is this not enough?”
Krolro quickly bowed his head in denial.
Many organizations had their own identification tags, but the black-coated kind—those were used by only one place.
The military! And from an ultra-secret unit at that!
Seeing that Krolro’s doubts had completely vanished, Ludger clicked his tongue inwardly.
‘Good thing I brought this just {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} in case.’
The dog tag of Team Black Ops.
It was one of the few things he had kept from his time in the field.
If Krolro had been more informed about such things, he might’ve found the tag suspicious.
Because that particular Black Ops unit no longer existed.
But Krolro’s half-baked knowledge had worked against him.
“Y-Yes, of course!”
That was probably why—
Krolro now pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from his inner coat pocket.
“What’s that?”
“T-The letter... the demon sent me.”
He’d had this, even with his life on the line? Was he shrewd, or just an idiot?
Still, it was fortunate he was showing it now.
Ludger took the letter and narrowed his eyes at the writing within.
‘Not a bad find at all.’
The letter contained a short, elegant line written in ink:
[On the final day of the festival. I’ll come for you.]
Ludger stroked his chin.
‘The sentence is concise and unadorned. But in that restraint, I see inescapable hatred.’
Regardless of anything else, learning when Esmeralda intended to act was a major gain.
If she had sent such an open warning, then she would certainly make her move as the letter declared—on the final day of the festival.
Given her patterns so far, she wouldn’t suddenly go berserk without warning.
Taking his eyes off the letter, Ludger cast a half-lidded gaze at Krolro.
Krolro forced a smile and chuckled awkwardly.
“H-How about it? That should be helpful... right?”
“This isn’t enough.”
“Wh-What?”
Ludger tossed the letter onto the floor.
Krolro’s face instantly turned to despair.
“The festival preparations are underway. The Seorn Festival—Magia Festiva—lasts five days.”
Five days until the festival began.
And five days of the festival itself.
Krolro had just ten days left.
“You’re asking me to deal with someone who commands a monster like that in ten days?”
“T-Then... what if we ask Seorn for help!”
“You fool. You think telling the Headmaster will change anything? Were the people who already died just idiots, then?”
He couldn’t allow it to be reported to the Headmaster.
Or if it was reported, at least it couldn’t lead back to him.
But with the state Krolro was in now, it looked like he was ready to spill everything—including Ludger’s own identity.
Fortunately, at the moment, Krolro trusted Ludger implicitly.
He would use that.
“T-Then what should I do...?”
“For now, wait.”
“W-What? What do you mean...?”
“She gave a date. That means, until that date, no matter what you do, you’re safe. She won’t strike before then.”
“S-So in the meantime, I should prepare...?”
“But do you really think she won’t be secretly watching you during that time?”
At Ludger’s remark, Krolro fell silent.
“If you go flailing about and spreading rumors everywhere, do you think she’ll patiently wait until the appointed date?”
“T-Then what should I do...?”
“Do nothing. Act like everything is normal. Like none of it matters. No—act like you’re perfectly fine.”
Esmeralda wanted to see Krolro fall into despair and ruin.
If he acted like nothing was wrong, her plan wouldn’t go as expected—and Ludger calculated that would enrage her even more.
“Doing nothing—that’s your role.”
Ludger intended to use Krolro to the fullest.
* * *
The five days of preparation flew by, and soon, the festival season arrived at Seorn.
Normally closed tight, the academy’s wide front gates were thrown open, and a line of carriages formed to enter the grounds.
The once-quiet campus was now bustling with people, and tents had been set up where students gathered in groups.
It was the day of the grand opening of Seorn’s historic and prestigious festival—
The Magia Festiva.
