The Extra’s Academy Survival Guide - Chapter 98

Ziggs Eiffelstein has always lived by following his intuition.

It wasn’t a realistic or rational judgment, but rather a wild and instinctive intuition that had saved his life’s many times out in the wild, where dying at any moment wasn’t uncommon.

It was the opposite of Lortel, who had always lived in an orderly system, only making rational judgements. That was also why Ziggs was now facing a one-on-one confrontation with her.

He lived his life full of experiences that a bird trapped in a cage could never even imagine.

It was a near daily occurrence to hide and run away from the wild beasts out in the grasslands. It wasn’t an usual feeling for him to have his life threatened every day.

That was why Ziggs was rarely ever afraid, nor did he feel a sense of fear or panic.

However, at the moment he couldn’t help but swallow harshly.

A feeling of crisis that he hadn’t felt in a while. A feeling of fear, which made his back stiff and breath short, swept over him.

“Ughh… I’m going to catch a cold like this.”

In front of him was Yennekar, who had run through the rain without taking a break.

And the eerily still Lortel, who was standing in the way of the exit.

Ziggs Eiffelstein was someone who was well versed in the relationships of Ed Rothstaylor while he was alive. That was why he was able to quickly understand the situation.

He already knew that Lortel was half out of her mind because of the news regarding Ed.

He still had an uncomfortable feeling not knowing her hidden intentions, but in any case, in a one-on-one battle Ziggs would never lose to her.

However, with the inclusion of Yennekar Palerover, who had just arrived… that was a variable that scared the life out of him.

Anyhow, as if Ed Rothstaylor had saved a country in his previous life, she was one of the females close to him that was particularly strange.

There were many women that followed him around, so there wasn’t much to say about his ability. Out in the wild, it wouldn’t be surprising for a handsome male to have several females. However, in a civilized world that was too complicated a question.

Either way, that wasn’t a good variable in the current situation.

Above all else, Yennekar Palerover… was one of Ed’s most devoted acquaintances.

Lortel was already surrounded by a cold anger to such a degree that there was no way that the more emotional Yennekar wouldn’t be affected by it.

At least from Ziggs’ common sense, he was sure that Yennekar wasn’t the type of person to sit still upon hearing the news of Ed’s death.

That being the case…

“I found you, Tanya.”

Hearing Yennekar’s words… he couldn’t help but swallow hard.

Ziggs glanced back at Tanya, loosening his grip on his sword.

Tanya was already trembling, backed up in the corner of the wall.

Lortel’s cold anger had a dangerous feeling that made people have goosebumps.

However, it seemed as if Yennekar was much more normal than he had thought.

Even so, Tanya already had bad memories regarding Yennekar… so she was crying and

Ziggs also imagined just how scary the situation must be in Tanya’s shoes. It must have felt like hanging off the side of a cliff by a rope.

With things panning out as they were, it seemed reckless to still take Tanya’s side. But still, Ziggs was determined to trust his intuition. Ziggs had been watching over both Ed and Tanya. That was why he was certain that Tanya didn’t have any direct intentions of actually killing her brother.

No matter how strong Ziggs was, it was still too much to face off against both Yennekar and Lortel at the same time.

Ziggs was a master of dueling. His experience and skills, alongside his innate sense of combat, were not even comparable to those in school.

However, that didn’t mean he was without weakness. Even his prediction ability, which was close to foresight, his incredible agility, and sense of combat were all ultimately… difficult to utilize in the face of overwhelming firepower.

If his opponent were one who that was only ‘a subject of a duel’ that utilized swordsmanship and magic, he would never be defeated. But against, Yennekar who fought with the quantity and firepower with numerous spirits on her side, it was extremely disadvantageous.

“I have something to tell you about Ed—”

And then, when Yennekar was telling her story, he had no choice but to go through with his last move that he had been trying to avoid.

Boom!

Ziggs’ magic, which was as fast as light, broke down a wall of the hallway. Ziggs didn’t want to cause damage to the building as much as he could avoid it. But with the situation turning into something that would be difficult to manage, he didn’t have a choice.

“Waaaah?!”

“Keuk!”

Yennekar stumbled back from the sudden violent wind and dust that erupted.

In that brief movement, Ziggs wrapped his waist around Tanya’s as he threw himself out of the collapsed wall.

The rain had nearly stopped.

A gust of wind blew by as the remaining drops of rain covered them.

The sound of the collar flapping in the wind and the feeling of falling in the air injected Tanya with another fear.

Thud!

Although he had wrapped himself around with wind magic, the impact of the landing wasn’t completely alleviated.

Landing by the back gate, barely able to stop himself from falling over, he let go of Tanya and put her down. Taking the trail behind Ophelis Hall and running off to the western part of the commercial district, they should have been able to find someplace to hide.

Ziggs then stood up straight as he looked around Ophelis Hall.

He didn’t have a choice but to take a deep breath.

An enormous fire lizard wrapped itself around the outer wall. All around, there were all sorts of spirits floating in the air. There was even a wolf the size of a house that was leaning against the window. As for the low-ranking spirits, there were nearly a hundred of them.

Calling such an enormous number of spirits all at once was a crazy sight to behold, no matter how many times one saw it. It seemed as if the spirits were wandering around together in search of someone.

It went without saying that it was Tanya Rothstaylor.

And that fact… Tanya seemed to have realized it herself. The speed at which her teeth trembled grew even more.

“Get a grip on yourself, Tanya Rothstaylor.”

Ziggs wiped his face a few times to get rid of the rain as he then swung the robe he was wearing around Tanya.

“Run down the trail back there, and when you come to a fork in the road go west. If you run like crazy, you’ll be able to make it to the commercial district. Once you get there, make sure to hide in the middle of the district. The more complex the roads get, the harder it will be for them to find you. Once you feel like you’re not being chased anymore, find a place to call for help. Since you’re the heir to House Rothstaylor, it will be best for you to find someone with imperial power or a close noble acquaintance.”

The heir to House Rothstaylor. For such a person to be in debt to you, there was a high chance that it could raise one’s social position or even political reasoning. Tanya’s life itself was a good bargaining chip.

“Th-Then, what about you, Ziggs…?”

“I will do my best to block them as much as I can so that they can’t chase after you. It will be impossible to take down Yennekar and Lortel, though… But I can at least do my best to block them and run away when the time is right.”

“Wh-Why are you doing so much…?”

“I wouldn’t have done this if you weren’t Ed’s younger sister. You should just think that you got lucky.”

Ziggs then pulled a magically engineered item from his pocket. It was four red marbles embedded into a stone slab.

‘Hellgo’s Winged Shoes’. An item that temporarily made one’s body more agile.

Ziggs used the leather strap to tie the magically engineered item to her waist. He then grabbed Tanya’s shoulder as he swung her body around, shoving her forward.

Unable to do anything, Tanya took a few steps forward before stopping and looking back.

Ziggs was no longer paying attention to Tanya and was already looking up at Ophelis Hall, which was filled with spirits.

Tanya hesitated for a moment before clenching her teeth, closing her eyes tightly she ran straight forward through the trail.

“Phew…”

Ziggs took a deep breath as he drew his sword.With his other hand he checked the flow of magic power.

Yennekar was slower than he thought chasing after her. Since the spirits had already seen Tanya run off, chasing after them shouldn’t have been difficult… There was no way to know why she wasn’t.

Presumably, it was probably because she was talking to Lortel.

But were they really just having a nice conversation when the person they were chasing after ran away, right under their noses? From his knowledge, in the first place the two of them didn’t even get along very well.

However, Ziggs immediately shook his head. What was the use of worrying about any of that since they both came here after hearing news of Ed’s death? The two of them must have been like vengeful ghosts that were trapped by grief and sorrow.

It wouldn’t be easy to deal with the two of them, but at the very least he could buy enough time for Tanya to get far enough away and escape himself. Doing that much was possible. However, even though he knew that fact, he couldn’t stop himself from breaking out in a cold sweat.

Then, from the broken outer wall, the elementalist showed herself.

Her clothes were completely soaked, with a few strands of her hair stuck to her cheek. She looked extremely exhausted.

Riding a huge hawk that was made of water, all the fluid spirits around her followed her to the ground.

It was like the arrival of a monarch. She was like a queen of spirits that slowly descended on the ground while holding a long oak wand in one hand.

Ziggs took a fighting stance, looking straight at her as she slowly landed on the ground.

Clenching his teeth, he shouted at her as she jumped onto the ground.

“You won’t listen to anything I say now, Yennekar. I know that already.”

Pointing his sword toward her, Ziggs spoke with an intimidating posture.

“However, people can believe in different things. Even if all the evidence points to that girl as the culprit, I still decided to live by my gut. If you can’t understand that, then it can’t be helped! That’s… my way of life….!! I’ve been like that my entire life!”

However, Ziggs didn’t say that while not understanding how Yennekar felt. He also had someone he loved with all his heart, Elka Islam.

That was why Ziggs was able to cry out sincerely to Yennekar, who had a broken heart, more than anyone else. He didn’t look down on the pain she felt insincerely.

“I know because I’m in love with someone, too. Just imagining it, the pain is too unbearable… I fully understand that. If I lost her, I would resent the entire world. The rest of my life would become futile, and if an opportunity for revenge presented itself my whole body would burn in anger. I wouldn’t be able to do anything else. Because I love her! And because for you, Yennekar, who loved Ed more than anyone else…!”

“Wh-What…”

Unfortunately, there was no way for Ziggs to know that he was the only one having a heartfelt moment.

An inevitable situation. And truly an unfortunate one.

From Yennekar’s point of view, already knowing about the ongoing situation, hearing him say such a thing she couldn’t help but have her face burn up.

“Even though Ed has already passed away, I don’t know what else I can tell you, Yennekar. How heartbreaking it must be for you, who loved Ed so sincerely…!!”

“N-No….! Don’t talk about such a thing so loudly…!!”

“That wound on your heart won’t heal so easily…but I firmly believe that there is still value in that love you have. Even if it’s now a lost love, I strongly believe that your enthusiastic heart, which admired Ed, will forever remain a part of you anddddddddddd!”

Boom! Boom!

A fire spirit’s flame exploded as Ziggs was directly hit by the unexpected attack, falling over.

Even the cruelest forces of evil would still patiently wait in between transformations and serious monologuing scenes…

He didn’t expect that the kind Yennekar would suddenly attack him midway through his serious speech.

As for Yennekar, her ears were bright red and her eyes started to tear up as she trembled in place, stabbing Ziggs with her wand.

“Ed didn’t die! He is still alive! So please, stop…!!”

***

Sniffing, the sweet scent of grass had calmed her down making her feel comfortable once more.

Sometimes, that same grassy smell would come from the haystacks piled up on the side of the cabin.

Lucy didn’t particularly hate that smell, so sometimes she would roll around in it.

However, the maids of Ophelis Hall hated the smell of grass so much that they would spray perfume on Lucy, lecturing at her and telling her to maintain her class.

The fragrant smell of a Freesia flower that she would sometimes smell while being carried in the arms of a maid.

The smell was quite pleasant, even to Lucy’s nose, who was not particularly interested in luxury products. But still, she wondered if she should really spray such a thing on her body to get rid of the grassy smell.

Saying such a thought, the words the maids spoke back to Lucy were quite amazing.

By repeatedly spraying yourself with such a scent over and over again, it would eventually settle into your own body, even turning into one’s own body odor in many cases.

It was said that the body of a person that smoked tobacco every day would always smell of tobacco. And a girl that grew up playing in a peach field as a child would always have the scene of a fragrant peach in her hair. Lucy tilted her head, but the maids were very serious.

So, what is important was the ‘initial response’.

It was very difficult to change one’s body odor once they became aware of their own scent.

Though, it was possible to change one’s body odor little by little when a smell first started to emit off one’s body.

“There is a lot to do. First off, I should gather all the people that were involved and explain what happened. We’re tight on time… Soon, the school’s faculty will come…”

As she was trying to figure out why such useless memory suddenly came to mind, Ed wiped his face as he spoke.

He wasn’t saying anything particularly interesting. However, as Ed’s heavy voice went into her ears, Lucy’s spine seemed to burn.

It was hard for her to look at him, so she pressed down on her hat. Lucy felt a great, strange sense as her chest burned. It was only natural, as it was the first time that she had felt such a way.

“Now that things have ended up like this, I should explain my circumstances… But it’s still going to be troublesome if I say too much… Hmm… First off, Clevius and Elvira… Plus Ziggs and Lortel should be informed. Yennekar went to find Tanya… Alright. For now, let’s just go inside to get away from the rain.”

“Uh…”

Finally, her voice started to come out as Lucy asked a question.

“Wh-What…?”

“…Were you not listening? Anyway, I had a bit of a situation, so I’ll have to explain it. Let’s just gather everyone and I’ll talk about it. And if we can at least all be on the same page, then it should be easier to deal with the aftermath… There’s going to be the disciplinary committee for you to deal with. And…Clevius and Elvira look pretty injured, so you should apologize.”

“A-Apologize…?”

“Yeah, because they got hurt trying to stop you. It looks like Elvira lost nearly all of the magically engineered products she had been working so hard on for a long time. And Clevius spilled blood all over the place, like a waterfall.”

“Th-That’s… because of me…”

Though, it wasn’t like Lucy was completely with ill intentions.

Although she was half out of her mind, she still tried to subdue all those that stood in her way as mildly as possible.

Of course, since Lucy’s magic power was ridiculously strong, being one of the people trying to stop her it might not have felt like that… Either way, she still ended up hurting Elvia and Clevius quite a bit.

Lucy didn’t think much of it, but Elvira had brought all of her magically engineered products only to have them explode. And Clevius even stabbed himself in order to perform the Blood Sword Technique.

From Lucy’s stance, all she did was ‘deal with their attacks…’

But that was all from Lucy’s stance alone.

“No matter what happened, it doesn’t change the fact that people got hurt because of you. Even though I didn’t want things to end up like this either, I should also take some responsibility for how things turned out as well. We can go tell them together.”

“But still…”

Trying to refute the words, Lucy’s voice only ended up crawling back.

It was because she looked straight at Ed’s face, who let out a sigh. It wasn’t much of a reaction, and from Ed’s point of view, it was normal… But to Lucy it felt like a thunderbolt in her chest.

He hates me. He will treat me like I’m a pathetic person. Ed Rothstaylor is disappointed.

As soon as she suddenly had such thoughts, her spine grew hot.

Was that really Lucy Mayreel, who normally ignored other’s opinions and impressions of her? The girl that would lay down anywhere, just to take a peaceful nap?

However, seeing Ed’s expression… It felt as if she was getting clogged up. She quickly grabbed the brim of her hat as she responded.

“Okay. I-I’ll apologize.”

“…Oh, alright. How great of you.”

Even though she was a girl whose incredible magic power could pierce through mountains, and the magic she wielded even makes the elder professors stick out their tongues in awe.

Lucy couldn’t understand why Ed Rothstaylor’s words meant so much to her.

Did she need time to organize her thoughts? But the conclusion was already there, wasn’t it?

If the identity of those feelings was truly love, then she was left with the question of how she ended up with such feelings towards him.

Then, Lucy started to have a flashback about the regrets she built up over a long time. The incident was a disaster, all because her heart had been beating like crazy.

She and Ed had lived together for quite a long time. In fact, she didn’t even realize that was the case before.

Because from the start, Ed’s camp was just one of the best places to take a nap in.

Ed Rothstaylor was just a guy that was nothing more than a manager of sorts, taking care of the camp. There shouldn’t have been any reason for her to be so upset.

But thinking back over the past year living in the camp together, what types of romantic acts even took place between the two?

She would walk in and out of Ed’s cabin as if it were her own house. In the same bed he slept in every night, she would cover herself in his blanket and take a nap.

She would cling to him when he was reading his book or would crawl into his lap.

On his shoulder, he would carry her all the way to the wooden shelter as she kicked her feet around. They would also sit by the warmth of the campfire, staring up at the starry sky with their backs together. And sometimes, they could even sit next to each other as they ate their meals.

In a relationship like she had with the old magician Glockt, the meaning of those acts was completely different. An old teacher and a young pupil. A grandfather and granddaughter. Whatever relationship you compared it to, she could somehow come to understand it.

However, if you reconsidered those memories and didn’t feel any sense of disharmony, then there was a big mistake being made.

As soon as the subject had become Ed and the relationship between the two became that of a man and woman, blood started to rush in Lucy’s head.

The heat rushed to her head, but at that point she couldn’t do anything about it. She could change the future with her own hands, but what had already passed was set in stone.

They said that initial responses were the most important when it came to controlling one’s body odor well.

However, there was no way that Lucy, who was always inattentive and insensitive, could react with such a sensible initial response.

If you were already conscious of a scent, wasn’t it already ingrained in your body?

It was a pity that love was the same. Lucy… she had already gone too far.

Although it was unknown when that change of heart began, from her hair to her collar to her hat, that characteristically grassy smell from Ed had already started to bloom from her.

By the time you became aware of the change in your heart, you would have already missed the golden time to change it. Most of the methods of initial response lost their meaning if the timing had been missed.

Then, for the remaining methodology… She had no choice but to find a way to somehow control her burning heart over time.

“Looking at you, it doesn’t look like you got hurt. I guess that would be the case. Anyway, we don’t have much time, so let’s hurry inside.”

If she got careless, then she would lose her breath once more, since all her feelings had gathered and built up all at once. The timing might have been bad, but that was really bad.

“No… Uhm…”

“Even so, Yennekar must be struggling to find Tanya. Now that I’m indebted to you again, I have to hurry up and do something to take care of all of this.”

As soon as Yennekar Palerover’s name came up, Lucy took an action that even she didn’t understand.

“……?”

Ed quickly turned to head towards Ophelis Hall. Then, the way she grabbed at the sleeve of his clothes… it was like she was whining.

“……??”

It was obvious that Ed would be confused, but Lucy—who was holding his sleeve—had trembling eyes.

Only then did the girl begin to open her eyes to the idea of monopoly.

“D-Do you have to go now?”

It was a complete mess.

***

“Huff… Huff…!!”

As Tanya ran through the forest, she tripped over a jagged stone, falling heavily. After rolling a few times on the muddy ground, she was able to stop herself.

“I-If I keep going… Then I’ll reach… The commercial district…”

With a tearful face, after wiping off the mud a few times she took another deep breath and stood back up.

“I-I don’t have the slightest clue how things ended up like this… B-But first… I need to live… I need to survive…!”

Tanya clenched her teeth as she held back her tears, moving her legs once more.

“First… I need a place to ask for help… A place that can contact House Rothstaylor…”

Right now, surviving was the most important thing.

The first place that came to mind… was the royal residence. As House Rothstaylor produced many key officials for the Empire, they also had a deep connection with the Imperial family. Right now, the head of the house Krepin Rothstaylor should have been Emperor Kroel’s closest confidant.

The imperial family might be able to help her. Of course, there would be a great debt. Still, there wasn’t anywhere else that she could lean on right now.

“First… I have to move my legs…! I can’t rest… I’m sure… They will be chasing me… If I’m caught… I can’t get caught…”

It was a shame, but… in reality, no one was chasing after Tanya…

“And then… the murder charges against my older brother… that too… I need to escape from it… I have to find the truth… Huff… Huff…!”

Again, it was really a shame, but… the murder charges against her had already been lifted…!

“Never… I can never get caught…!”

It really was tragic and quite a shame to say, but… It was all just shadow boxing…!!

However, there was no way for Tanya to discover that.

In the end, there was only one thing to say to her.

Just be strong… Tanya Rothstaylor…