Sword and Fist(2)

After finishing the morning assembly, I turned my feet towards my professor’s office, which had somehow become our meeting place.

And as I walked to the professor’s office, I fell into deep contemplation. It was about the field trip, as I had just mentioned during the morning assembly.

This field trip is literally an event where a quest that cannot avoid clashing with demons occurs.

Unlike the Sky Island quest where I knew in advance about the forced teleportation and that demon executives were in the central tower, so I could prevent contact between students and demon executives, this time I didn’t know when or where Idea would appear with elite demons, without any such foreknowledge.

Even I didn’t know this, and since we were going to the underwater kingdom under the pretext of a field trip this time, I, as a professor, had to stay in place along with Mu and the avatars I created as duplicates.

At best, what I could do was to notice Idea’s appearance as quickly as possible, deceive the academy’s eyes with my duplicates, and then stop Idea.

Although Idea’s final goal was said to be the library, I couldn’t be certain she wouldn’t attack the academy side before that, so I had to keep watch.

If there was a card I could use, it might be Morgan and Isolde, who were still registered as teaching assistants.

In case of emergency, there was also the option of leaving the control of the duplicates to Mu and moving myself, but if I did that, Mu, who needed to control the duplicates meticulously, would become incapacitated, so I had to think about a proper method more.

Of course, this wouldn’t have happened if I had captured Idea and Penscia during the Sky Island incident, so it was natural for me to take responsibility.

And since there was a high probability that students would directly clash with demons during this field trip, I had prepared today’s first class a little differently than usual.

“Are you ready? Mu!”

“Yes, Mother. It’s been a while since I’ve been in Aria Mother’s body, but I’ll do my best.”

Mu answered, nodding her reddish head, to me asking in a cheerful voice while fluttering my green hair.

Needless to say, we were transformed into Yujia and Aria’s avatars. The only difference from usual was that I was using Yujia’s avatar instead of Aria’s.

I headed to the main sports field for today’s first class along with Mu, who had transformed into Aria’s appearance instead of my usual self.

To start the joint class of swordsmanship and martial arts that I had prepared with Mira’s approval.

“Hey, I’m here too, you know…”

Of course, not forgetting Morgan, the swordsmanship class assistant.

I absolutely didn’t forget her.

---

Arin was currently in a very confusing situation.

The student council’s announcement delivered to students taking swordsmanship and martial arts classes right after finishing today’s first regular class, monster theory:

And what the student council delivered was none other than the news that today’s martial arts class, originally scheduled for after lunch, would be held jointly with today’s first practical class, swordsmanship.

Joint practical classes.

This unprecedented event was enough to bewilder the students taking the classes, and especially for Arin, who was taking both swordsmanship and martial arts classes, it was an incredibly awkward announcement.

After all, the schedule she had been faithfully following suddenly changed.

But once it had been unilaterally announced, there was no way to go against it.

Arin headed to the main sports field where the joint class would be held, along with Kana and Riana who were equally bewildered, and so time passed to reach the present.

“Oh, everyone’s here!”

“Hurry up and come in.”

As they approached the main sports field, Professor Aria and Professor Yujia came into view.

Seeing them welcoming the students coming to the main sports field while standing close as if they were close, Arin muttered loud enough for the two walking with her to hear.

“I didn’t know those two were close…”

“Well, they did say they were family.”

“But we’ve never seen them together before.”

Certainly, as Riana and Kana said, according to the known information, Aria and Yujia were family.

Since we had heard it from Aria’s own mouth, there was no room for rebuttal, but we had hardly ever seen these professors who were supposedly family standing together, so we had forgotten.

Honestly, what kind of family is so cold as to not even acknowledge each other?

Of course, I thought they didn’t acknowledge each other in the academy to focus on work, but seeing them like this, it seemed that wasn’t the case.

Having thought that far, Arin wondered if she should secretly follow them if she had time, but she soon shook her head and brushed off that thought.

“There’s no need to pry into others’ family matters…”

Judging by their current appearance and the behavior they showed with Professor Meiyel during yesterday’s audience with His Majesty the King, they didn’t seem to be on bad terms.

Thinking it was better to refrain from digging too deep, Arin completely removed the half-dismissed thought from her mind and started moving her stopped feet as Kana tugged on her sleeve.

“Let’s hurry, Arin. They might scold us if we’re late…”

“Kana is right. Let’s go quickly.”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Led by Kana’s hand, they entered the main sports field with quick steps, with Riana following behind.

Since it wasn’t far from where they had briefly stopped, they soon entered the main sports field after just a few steps.

Arin, Kana, and Riana who entered the main sports field walked behind the students gathered in front of Aria and Yujia, and stood at an appropriate distance from the students in front.

“Hm?”

“What’s wrong, Arin?”

And as they stood in place, Arin let out a questioning sound at the face of a woman she saw.

Earlier, she hadn’t been able to see properly because Aria and Yujia were blocking the view, but now that they had entered the sports field and stood, there was an unfamiliar woman standing in front of them.

At this, Arin carefully pointed at her and asked Kana who was inquiring beside her.

“Doesn’t she look unfamiliar?”

“Oh? Certainly…”

Snow-white long hair reaching down to her hips and very deep green eyes. Kana also tilted her head like Arin at the sight of the woman wearing quite form-fitting attractive attire.

They had seen many professors at the academy so far, but this was a woman they had never seen before.

The fact that she was present even for practical classes meant she was definitely a professor, not a student. So they should have seen her at least once, but there wasn’t even a vague memory.

And the answer to this deepening question came from Riana, who was quietly observing the woman beside them.

“Couldn’t she be the swordsmanship assistant?”

“Assistant?”

“Yes, didn’t Professor Isolde explain yesterday? She said there was another assistant besides herself.”

The morning assembly held by Vice Homeroom Teacher Isolde, who had substituted for Aria when she couldn’t come to the academy yesterday due to the audience with His Majesty the King.

In that morning assembly, Isolde had mentioned that there was another assistant besides herself.

“I think she said the class with that assistant was swordsmanship. The name started with Mo… I think.”

“Ah! Assistant Morgan!”

“That’s right! She said it was Assistant Morgan!”

Kana exclaimed as she remembered the name when Riana jogged her memory.

Morgan.

She was the new swordsmanship assistant that Isolde had said yesterday had come in along with herself.

Riana clapped her hands at finally remembering that name, and the next moment, Aria and Yujia who opened their mouths proved that their guess was correct.

“Well then, since everyone seems to be here, let’s start the class.”

“This joint class is a first for everyone, but there’s no need to worry! Everyone gathered here was originally doing swordsmanship, archery, or martial arts anyway, so there won’t be any problems.”

Aria and Yujia spoke alternately, having confirmed that no more students were coming from outside the sports field and seemingly having finished checking the number of students.

Looking around at their words that showed perfect coordination, there were indeed many familiar faces.

The archery students weren’t familiar, but all the others from swordsmanship and martial arts were faces she had seen at least once.

As Arin was nodding slightly in agreement, Aria, who had come down from the platform, pushed the white-haired woman standing below her.

“But before we start class, let me introduce someone to those taking swordsmanship. This is Morgan, who will be helping with swordsmanship classes from now on, as well as today.”

“Hee-hee~ Hello, children. I look forward to working with you?”

Morgan greeted them with an alluring smile, as if a witch were smiling.

Arin felt a slight chill at her inorganic eyes that somehow looked like they were viewing food on a plate, but before that emotion could be properly felt, Aria pushed Morgan back and continued speaking.

“I think everyone who came here today was probably curious. About why we suddenly decided to have a joint class.”

It was an accurate statement. This was probably something not only Arin, Kana, and Riana, but all the children who came here would have been curious about.

After all, how could one not be curious when having a joint class for the first time ever?

And the answer to this was given by Yujia, who had jumped down from the platform following Aria.

“Because you can’t prepare for every situation with just swords, fists, and bows. So the reason we called you all here today is to teach everyone a secret technique on this occasion. To be more precise…”

Yujia, who had been pointing at the weapons of the students standing in front of her one by one, trailed off as she slowly raised both hands.

Then magic began to gather in both of her hands. Yujia gathered magic slowly, as if to demonstrate.

The magic that started from her heart flowed through her arms, wrists, palms, fingers, and nails.

Yujia crammed as much magic as she could into her hands, as if stuffing it in, and the next moment, as Yujia’s two hands clapped together.

For an instant, vision flickered.

Piiiiing───

“Ugh…?”

“Urk…?!”

“Ugh, my ears…!”

Though it looked like she had just clapped, no sound could be heard. Or more precisely, when Yujia clapped, the sound couldn’t reach their ears.

Along with her clap, a storm of magic burst out like a wave, without giving time to block it.

The moment that magic storm, spreading faster than sound, touched them, their hearing lost its function.

And after a short while, they began to hear the sound of wind faintly along with a muffled sensation, and only after a few more seconds passed did sound properly enter their ears.

Perhaps realizing that their ears had properly returned, Yujia, who had been smiling, finally opened her mouth and said:

“I proposed this joint class to teach you this. I’ve adjusted it now so there’s no problem with your hearing, but I plan to teach you enough to use it in real combat. And since my sister Aria can do it too, she’ll teach you together.”

“More precisely, we’ll teach you when and how to use this while using your weapons. This is a technique for actual combat, after all.”

Aria shrugged as she clarified Yujia’s words, and Yujia chuckled at that, looking around at the students with narrowed eyes.

Those eyes that gave a very ominous feeling.

Of course, such bad feelings were always right.

“”Well then, since we’ve combined the time anyway, shall we try to learn it with doubled effort?””

The sentence spoken in unison by the two sounded like a devil’s harmony.