Ch.370370 – The Third Young Lady

<370 – The Third Lady>

The First and Second Ladies couldn’t bear their rich sensibilities and quickly perished, which must have troubled Jona greatly, as the Third Lady he brought had a distinctly different personality from the start.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 1.

*Implementing the long-term plan <Surviving at Gift Academy> proposed by the butler.

*Identifying movement routes and campus facilities.

*Initiating basic exchanges with roommates in the shared dormitory.

#Academy Stay Day 2.

*Discovered 0-point <Food Waste> at the school store.

*Result of food expense saving challenge: stomachache.

*Attempted natural healing by taking digestive herbs to save medical expenses.

#Academy Stay Day 3.

*Natural healing successful.

*Scouted by Alchemy/Chemistry Club while gathering information on the Foraging Club for efficient herb collection.

*Became a higher-grade member by sacrificing three roommates.

━━━

What the Third Lady left behind was an activity log disguised as letters.

She was an intellectual who maintained reason and logic.

Or perhaps an eccentric with excessive frugality.

‘Hmm. She reminds me of Oknodie. Though her dimwitted aspects seem more like Tito.’

However, the Third eccentric Lady was an inferior version of Oknodie in that not all her attempts were successful.

Still, compared to the other two ladies, her adaptability was terrifyingly fast.

Perhaps because of this, this lady with outstanding grades and confirmed advancement to the upper class began to show increasingly strange behaviors.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 32.

*Obtained information that points are needed for advancement in all grades.

*Implementing local procurement for efficient collection.

#Academy Stay Day 33.

*Learned point plundering method using the magic watch’s point transfer function from a club senior.

*Deliberately obstructing assignment submissions and material collection of students who refuse point requisition.

*Recruiting collaborators for more efficient suppression of forceful resistance.

#Academy Stay Day 34.

*Successfully recruited capable collaborator Valocassio.

*Confirmed interference levels that won’t trigger instructor intervention.

*Initiating more comprehensive collection using contracts.

━━━

Contract fraudster Valocassio.

The villain who led the exploitation of the 981st class freshmen, including Zhang, among the 980th class seniors.

That villain actually worked as the Third Lady’s associate.

Moreover, the severity was so serious that it made the current Valocassio’s actions seem like mere pranks.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 55.

*Successfully helped most factions pass the midterm exams with support from debtors.

*Some debtors used as consumables showed significantly poor performance. Need replacement with new parts.

#Academy Stay Day 56.

*Some debtors defected from the organization due to intervention by upper class freshman, White Paladin Roo.

*Need to recruit an opponent against Roo.

#Academy Stay Day 57.

*Recruited upper class student Deadcat as Roo’s opponent on condition of providing regular prey.

*Successfully repelled White Paladin Roo. Made an example of defected debtors by ensuring they failed follow-up exams.

━━━

Not only stealing points from fellow students and turning them into debtors to control, but also failing those who didn’t follow orders to make examples of them.

Even Oknodie, who disregards human life, simply fails to distinguish right from wrong, but generally refrains from doing things others advise against.

The Third Lady had no such mercy.

Someone with assassin qualities surpassing Oknodie or herself.

Her master, the life-stealing Master Ryung, once said:

The greatest assassin is one who has killed their own heart.

One who remains unmoved by anything.

One who lives in eternal apathy.

Perhaps that lady was infinitely close to such apathy.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 75.

*Meeting with the butler.

*Received reprimand regarding regular report contents.

*Instructed to cease aggressive expansion due to risk of exposing foundation scholarship student status.

*Received information about the existence and access method to <Secret Laboratory> to strengthen internal foundation.

#Academy Stay Day 76.

*Discovered <Letter Box> while analyzing laboratory structure.

*Recognized butler’s lady selection criteria.

*My method was right. The butler will soon realize it too.

#Academy Stay Day 77.

*Need to look beyond freshman year for long-term survival at the academy.

*Must establish counterstrategy against <Student Council>, which will become the greatest enemy.

*Large-scale plan conceptualization complete.

*Proceeding with plan by mobilizing all material and human resources.

━━━

It’s admirable that Jona’s butler skills could make even such a person crave recognition, but this flow seemed problematic no matter how one looked at it.

The ominous premonition finally became reality.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 84.

*If supplying resources to the student council and having competitors among classmates becomes an obstacle to survival, need to expel as many classmates as possible at once.

*Initiating ‘Classmate Reduction’ operation to replace aggressive expansion during final exam period.

━━━

The journal detailed what methods the Third Lady used to reduce the number of students, which plans were executed as scheduled, and how many students were eliminated.

The exceptionally strong unity among the 980th class students wasn’t solely due to the efforts of class valedictorian <Mandela Castella>.

It was because there was a powerful dangerous figure who forced them to unite in order to survive.

━━━

#Academy Stay Day 89.

*Mandela Castella’s wide-area ability forcibly removed hypnosis and brainwashing.

*Unable to proceed with plan to cause mass expulsion of students.

*Long-term confinement in the Great Prison confirmed.

*Unable to continue highest priority goal <Surviving at Gift Academy>.

*The butler is one who provides answers.

*One who grants new life in environments where survival is impossible.

*Need to meet with butler to reset goals.

*Triggering forced rampage of upper-class scholarship students using <Dark Mana> that works independently of hypnosis and brainwashing, to escape academy before imprisonment.

*This concludes my records at the academy.

━━━

The Third villain Lady’s journey ended like that.

Whether she met the butler after leaving the academy, what punishment she received.

The story afterward wasn’t written.

All that could be confirmed was that she never returned to the academy, and the journal ended there.

“…”

There was a bitter taste in her mouth.

Like after drinking bitter black coffee.

Following the lingering aftertaste, deep like the aroma of unpleasant yet rich coffee, her paused hand finally closed the journal.

‘It was almost the same. Like Oknodie’s way of thinking.’

This was the trace of a failed person who could have possibly become Oknodie’s story.

If Oknodie hadn’t had sufficient knowledge about the academy, if she had enrolled a year earlier, if she had been just a bit more ruthless.

And if she still had the desire for Jona’s recognition, she would certainly have been no different from the Third villain Lady.

Three ladies.

And the fourth lady, Oknodie.

Now it makes sense.

The true nature of Oknodie’s tremendous information from unknown sources.

It was Jona’s measure to prevent the lady’s unilateral actions.

The means he found through trial and error to protect his lady.

Indeed, with sufficient information to gain advantages and stay ahead, Oknodie never felt the need to ruthlessly check others.

The more Jona turns a blind eye to danger, the more unhappy the lady’s life becomes.

The more risks Jona takes, the happier the lady’s life becomes.

‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have read this.’

She should return it.

Her steps carrying the letter box out of the dormitory stopped in the middle of the hallway.

If she were to return it… to whom?

Her steps that had been heading toward Oknodie’s dormitory finally turned back.

In the late night.

The place she visited was Jona’s office.

He was standing there in the room where decorations around the lamp cast faint shadows like iron bars, as if he had known Zhang would come.

“I couldn’t fool you after all. Noticing through the deactivation of the soundproofing magic was just an excuse, wasn’t it? You had means to detect even advanced stealth techniques.”

“Regrettably, since this lady enjoys hide-and-seek, I as her butler felt the need to develop new techniques.”

A desolate office with no decorations except for the minimum necessary furniture.

The letter box placed on the table cast new shadows in the soft light of the lamp.

“The ladies’ letter box. You already knew about this too, right? The urgency of the situation when the last lady left her letter and the existence of letters in the box. To explain this discrepancy, I can only think that these letters, like other ‘materials,’ were classified as ‘collections’ of the metal rats.”

“I don’t understand why you’re discussing this fact before me instead of keeping it to yourself.”

“You knew about the box’s existence yet left it there, hoping Oknodie would discover it, right?”

“Did it not occur to you to simply return the item you took without permission? I don’t even feel like blaming you for the foolishness of your judgment in bringing it to me.”

“Where exactly is its proper place? Where the letter box was placed in that laboratory? Or… Oknodie’s room?”

Professor Jona, no, Butler Jona’s cold, sharp demeanor, honed like a sword, wavered for a moment.

Like a swordsman’s inner turmoil reveals itself in the trembling of their blade tip.

“A man of your caliber must understand what it means for Oknodie to see this letter. And surely the Foundation knows as well.”

Behind Zhang’s mask, a faint sadness crossed her face.

She pitied them.

The Foundation’s butler, and the ladies.

And her precious friend who might someday follow in their footsteps.

“The all-capable butler. My absolute ally who never betrays. Making such a butler unable to hide his flaws. That is the punishment the Foundation imposed on you and the chairman’s plan to tame Oknodie, isn’t it?”

This letter box was Pandora’s box, a seed of distrust that would fundamentally damage the relationship and trust between the two.