Chapter 130 - The Academy’s Weapon Replicator

Chapter 41: School Trip (2)

The day of the school trip arrived.

A fleet of buses stood lined up on Constel’s athletic field, ready and waiting.

They had to take the sky train to reach Kropol, but first they needed buses to get to the train platform. Constel’s students boarded in order, class by class.

“... Pardon?”

Aten stopped halfway onto the bus and turned around. Behind her, Frondier was waving, with Kora standing beside him.

“The next bus?”

“Yes. We’re traveling separately for community service.”

Aten turned to Professor Jane beside her. Jane nodded as well.

“Frondier will wait for the next bus and travel with the other professors. Remember what I told you? You probably won’t see much of him during the trip.”

“But still...”

“Go on and get aboard, Aten. We have quite a busy schedule before we reach Kropol.”

Feeling practically pushed along, Aten reluctantly boarded the bus. Even then, she glanced back at Frondier with an anxious expression. He was still smiling and waving.

“Don’t worry. They say the next bus will be here soon.”

“... All right.”

As though resigning herself to the inevitable, Aten turned and went inside.

Watching the bus pull slowly away with the others, Frondier let out a light breath through his nose.

Meanwhile...

“Aster, look at this! We’re on Wizerview!”

On Class Two’s bus, Runia excitedly showed her Sagephone screen to Aster, who sat beside her.

Just as she said, Constel’s school trip had been making headlines day after day. Her eyes shone as she looked at the screen.

“Since Constel students are so likely to become famous professionals or hold high-ranking positions someday, apparently everyone’s really interested in the place chosen for their trip.”

“Come to think of it, I think an upperclassman I know mentioned something like that.”

Aster looked at the phone screen with her. As he said, Constel’s school trip drew considerable attention throughout the Empire every year. Interest was especially high in the first-years, who would be making their first public appearance representing Constel. Not just the news, but all sorts of media were covering them.

“Oh, what’s this? Ahaha! They’re talking about you too, Aster!”

“Ugh.”

Discussion of Constel had spread to online communities as well, and Aster was a popular subject of gossip. With his exceptional skills and talent, not to mention his striking looks, there was no reason people wouldn’t talk about him.

A little embarrassed, he looked away.

“There’s Elodie too, and—oh, Lady Aten. What, nothing about me? Hmm...”

Pouting, Runia tapped and swiped around the screen in search of a mention of herself.

“... Oh?”

Then she noticed something odd, and her fingers paused.

“What? Did you find something about yourself?”

Runia shook her head at Aster’s question.

“No, but there’s stuff about Frondier.”

“Huh?”

“Quite a lot of it, too.”

Aster looked at her phone again. Frondier’s name, face, personal details such as his height and weight, and even his family were all laid out there. Most of the posts praised him, with some bordering on outright adulation.

Runia pouted.

“What? Since when was he so popular in Kropol?”

“... Something’s strange.”

“Huh?”

After studying Runia’s phone for a while, Aster apparently decided that wasn’t enough and took out his own to browse.

There certainly were plenty of posts about Frondier. In terms of frequency, he came just behind Aster and Elodie. And although they were uniformly complimentary, the praise was indiscriminate, with almost no real information about him.

Photos of Frondier from the front, side, and back, taken from every conceivable angle, and a strangely excessive number of mentions of his name.

“Elodie, Frondier’s...”

“Yes. I saw it too.”

Seated diagonally behind him, Elodie nodded. She happened to be checking the posts herself.

This sudden release of information about Frondier was clearly unnatural, even if none of it was anything he had particularly kept secret.

‘Does someone want the people of Kropol to remember Frondier?’

... But more to the point.

“... Aster.”

“Yes?”

“Why are you telling me about Frondier? If you want to hear about him, Selena’s here too.”

Elodie narrowed her eyes at him. Aster tilted his head and scratched his cheek.

“... Good point. Why did I do that?”

Somehow, Elodie disliked that reaction even more than she would have disliked a definite answer.

* * *

A few days earlier.

Constel was buzzing with excitement over the upcoming school trip. For students perpetually exhausted by lessons and training, it promised a proper rest. Constel’s school trips, after all, were firmly focused on “leisure.”

Preparations proceeded steadily. The students’ spirits rose with them, and their anticipation seemed to make Constel positively dazzling.

Even so, it was always dark beneath the lights that illuminated their bright everyday lives.

“Let us begin.”

A serious meeting was being held in a Constel conference room. As Ospreet called it to order, blue light shone above the central table. The light intertwined in bundles of lines, gradually revealing a map stretching from Constel to the resort city of Kropol.

Everyone was standing for this meeting so that they could consult the map and pool their ideas into a plan.

“You’re unusually proactive today, President.”

Jane smiled warmly.

Ospreet replied,

“I dislike cockroaches.”

It was a metaphor, but his meaning was clear.

He raised his head and looked at Frondier.

“Before we begin, as I mentioned beforehand, Frondier de Roach will be participating in this operation. He has a very important role to play.”

Frondier bowed at the introduction. In a room otherwise filled with professors, he looked distinctly out of place in his school uniform.

His mother, Malia, glanced at him.

“Wouldn’t it be dangerous to involve a student?”

“It will be fine. Frondier will be somewhere very safe.”

That reassured her somewhat.

Jane spoke next.

“President, do you really think Indus will make a move during this school trip?”

“The likelihood is quite high. Most of Constel’s students and faculty will be away from the capital. Indus is certain to react in some way. Whether that reaction will be violent or mild remains to be seen.”

Pascal nodded, then spoke.

“In that case... this would be our most vulnerable point.”

He pointed to a spot on the map. Everyone frowned as they looked at it.

“The sky train...”

Sheer cliffs, a precipice dropping into darkness with no end in sight, and a railway suspended in the air across that vast gap.

If Indus intended to attack Constel, the students would be most vulnerable while traveling aboard that train.

“We have to use the aerial railway to reach Kropol. Can we cover every eventuality?”

“The defensive spells are all in place. An ordinary attack won’t leave so much as a scratch.”

“Of course, precautions for the tracks as well—”

The professors exchanged opinions, working to ensure they could deal with any outside attack during the crossing.

Ospreet, who had been listening quietly, spoke.

“Now, Frondier.”

At his sudden summons, everyone turned toward Frondier.

“What do you think?”

This was surprising. They had thought Frondier would merely participate, but Ospreet had personally invited him to speak.

Frondier began slowly.

“We certainly need thorough precautions. However...”

“However?”

“Nothing will happen on the sky train.”

Everyone was taken aback by his words. Professor Isamaya asked,

“Nothing will happen? You mean they’ll simply watch Constel’s students pass through in peace?”

“That’s what I believe.”

“Huh.” Isamaya tilted his head, unable to understand.

Pascal asked,

“Why do you think that?”

“They don’t want Constel’s students to die. Ultimately, they would prefer the students to kill someone else.”

“... Constel students killing other people?”

“They currently have an item that might make that possible.”

Everyone’s eyes widened.

“The business cards!”

Frondier nodded.

“Kraken went to all the trouble of infiltrating Constel to obtain them. They’ll definitely use them. But the only command available to them now is ‘Kill Frondier.’ Besides, Constel’s students are extremely wary of those cards after the recent incident. They probably won’t work on the students anymore.”

“Then how?”

“They’ll reverse it. Instead of handing the cards to students, they’ll distribute them to Kropol’s citizens. They’ll have to familiarize the citizens with my face first, of course. But there are plenty of ways to do that. We live in a world where everyone carries a Sagephone.”

“... Come to think of it, quite a few posts about you have appeared recently,” Pascal said.

For the cards to work, the recipients had to know who Frondier was. Of course, the fleeting impressions created by spreading information through phones wouldn’t last long, but a few days would be enough.

“Once the students arrive in Kropol, the citizens who received cards will try to attack me. Some citizens could get hurt as we defend against them. There will also be agitators denouncing us for excessive force. But that isn’t what really matters.”

“Right. What matters is that the students will be tied down.”

Frondier nodded at Malia’s words.

“The other students and I will be occupied trying to subdue the citizens without hurting them, and the professors will step in to resolve the situation. In those few seconds, or minutes at most, they’ll try to accomplish their real objective.”

“Their real objective?”

“I’m not certain. But probably...”

Frondier raised his head as he spoke. He was debating whether to say it now. Whether this was the right moment.

It was obvious that Indus would move toward its revolution sooner than it had in the game. Since Armel’s capture, they had fewer ways to cover up their actions.

With Indus’s plans altered, Frondier could no longer know every detail, but he could follow the logic behind their actions based on the information he had.

Following that logic, the first stepping stone toward Indus’s revolution probably remained unchanged.

“They’ll target the President.”

“...!”

A heavy silence settled over the conference room.

Targeting President Ospreet, a Zodiac.

If what Frondier said was true, Indus was far more unhinged than any of them had imagined.

“... How exactly do they intend to target the President? How dare the likes of them even try?”

Isamaya’s voice sharpened. Everyone at Constel supported and trusted Ospreet absolutely.

Frondier knew that, but deliberately kept his voice cold.

“... They have a Zodiac too.”