The results were in.
▶ January 21st, 502 — Monthly Assassination Daily Cover Model Gray Habanero & Amulet Carolina, Day 10 Sales:
– 157,215 copies
A jackpot.
No, a massive jackpot!
A moderate hit was 50,000. A jackpot was 100,000. The department and I had both expected around 80,000 copies.
When Trashy first brought the news, I wondered if we might barely break 100,000—but 157,000?
The faculty lounge erupted into mayhem.
Elize jumped up and down, grabbed Gray, and kissed her on the cheek. For some reason, Kendreik also started hopping and howling, “Uwahhh!”
Quan and Balmung suddenly started groaning and howling together. I had no idea why.
Balmung, realizing something, clutched his head and kept staring at the numbers projected from the Crystal Orb, as if they couldn’t be real.
Even Rebecca smiled—a rare sight. She nodded calmly, and thanks to her eye makeup, the smile looked soft and radiant.
And every last bit of it was caught on the Camera Orb.
There was one issue. Kendreik had jumped too high. He was already 2.2 meters tall, and as soon as he started bouncing, the flooring started to dip.
And just when I thought, “He’s staying in the air a little too long...”
Balmung screamed.
“Uwah! Uwah! Wait—!”
Too late.
Kendreik’s head pierced straight through the ceiling. According to his profile, the guy weighed 165 kilograms of pure muscle—basically a wild boar launched into the sky.
The ceiling cracked crookedly, and then the chandelier gave out and crashed down.
Right above Rebecca.
Even as it fell, she remained expressionless, legs crossed... until Cheongru dove in and swatted the chandelier away.
Crash!
One side of the living room was totaled. The chandelier embedded itself in the fireplace.
Moments ago, it had been a hall of celebration. Now it was complete wreckage.
A brief silence followed—then Gray suddenly burst into laughter.
......Because Kendreik’s wig cap had flipped inside out!!
And with that, everyone exploded with laughter.
Elize poked at it, intrigued.
“Was your rooster comb fake?”
“Ugh...”
Even through his daze, Kendreik realized something was wrong and bolted out of the lounge.
Balmung shook his head slowly. He had done his best to keep the secret... But at least he wasn’t to blame. He had protected it as long as he could.
Afterward, the cadets hoisted Gray up and tossed her in the air amidst the shattered debris.
The interview that followed?
A disaster.
Q. Are you satisfied with the sales numbers?
A. Yeeeah. Thank you. Sooo much... I love you...
Q. Any message for Cadet Amulet, your co-model?
A. Just know it was thanks to me, okay? (laughs)
Q. Were you nervous before the announcement?
A. Not at all? (shows snaggletooth)
Q. Right, you seemed a bit tense at first, then suddenly totally fine. Same thing happened last time during the shoot. Are you naturally good in real situations? Got any mental tricks you use?
A. ......
Gray glanced at me in the lounge mirror and smiled.
A. Is there really such a thing? I just endure it on my own, that’s all. Haha. (snaggletooth)
I thought to myself:
Ah, is that so.
⋮
Then came the party.
“157K! Cheers—!”
With Elize’s shout—
Clink!
All the glasses collided.
How did I even end up here? Originally, I was going to leave right after the shoot.
But as I was heading out, Gray grabbed me and asked where I thought I was going.
I was glad I stayed. The place was full of energy. Gray was the one being celebrated, but everyone there had shared in the tension. Loud conversations, drinks down the throat, nonstop chatter and laughter.
Elize was so excited she kept picking Gray up and trying to give her a piggyback ride. Gray kept punching her until Elize’s head swelled with bruises.
“Professor, cheers.”
She came up beside me, face red from the punches.
Ting!
We clinked glasses.
“I applied for a second-year club.”
“A club?”
Oh no.
Please don’t be that club.
“The travel club.”
Phew.
“But they said I need to find a supervising professor. Can I write your name?”
“Sure.”
Elize smiled radiantly.
Then I got curious and asked what the club name was.
“Walk Club!”
Somehow, that fit Elize perfectly.
“Walk, huh.”
At that moment, someone flinched—Balmung.
He flinched, then looked puzzled at himself, as if wondering why he did it.
Soon after, he brushed it off and returned to what he was doing.
What was he doing?
Actually, throughout the party, Balmung had been keeping a sharp eye on me. My glass was never empty. The moment it got even slightly low, he’d refill it to the brim.
He even peeled the shell off a marinated shrimp and held it out to me like a gift.
“Hey, Balmung.”
“Yes?”
“Eat it yourself.”
“Yes, sir.”
The guy ate like he was seated at a perfect right angle.
Meanwhile, Kendreik looked unusually depressed.
“Ugh...”
His rooster comb was fine now. Apparently, Balmung had done a little repair job afterward.
From his perspective, he probably had no clue about Gray or the sales. All that stuck in his mind was that his secret had been exposed.
I could relate. Sure, I looked fine now thanks to good genes, but I once lost all my hair during chemotherapy. It had been a deeply humiliating memory.
So I gave him all my meat.
“Ughuh.”
And Kendreik... became happy.
Don’t underestimate big guys with muscles.
His weight was on par with Dean Shaman’s.
And his appetite? He made Dominic look like a child.
“By the way, Quan didn’t show up?”
To my question, Elize nodded.
“Quan usually doesn’t come to gatherings like this.”
“Why not?”
“No idea. He hangs out with the guys sometimes, but...”
I looked at Balmung.
“He does hang out with us here and there... But it always feels like he shows up on his own terms. I don’t think he ever joins anything. No one really knows what he’s up to. He barely scrapes by on attendance.”
Come to think of it—
I had some kind of connection to every Dormant Dragon cadet. But for some reason, never once with Quan.
We hadn’t even crossed paths in the hallway.
That’s why I hadn’t recruited him for the assassination unit either. It would’ve been weird to ask a complete stranger.
Strange.
You’d think that with seven of them, at least one would slip through the cracks—but in this [Hell Difficulty] world, the bond between professors and Dormant Dragons was being forcibly woven into global causality.
Something didn’t add up.
Just then, Balmung quietly leaned in and bowed.
Then spoke in a low voice.
“Would you like me to gather intel on his private hobbies or questionable lifestyle?”
“No. That’s fine.”
“If you change your mind, shall I bring him to you? Ten minutes. That’s all I need.”
“No. That’s really fine.”
“Yes, sir.”
Balmung bowed and stepped back.
Then came back again.
“I secretly saved the meat from the king crab shell. Shall I mix it with rice and serve it?”
No...
“Ah! Aah—it’s overflowing!”
“Huh? Oh no, what a waste!”
Lucy had accidentally brought in a shaken beer bottle. The moment it started spraying, Elize rushed in and tried to catch it with her mouth.
She gulped and gulped—her cheeks ballooned up, tension rising to its limit—and just as every eye turned toward her—
She gave a thumbs-up.
Gray poked her side.
“Pfffft—!”
“Kyaaa! Ahahaha!”
“Hey! Don’t spray the professor!”
“Ughh...”
It was chaos.
Just one of those nights.
***
After the drinking party ended, I gathered four people separately.
Aside from the maid, it just so happened that only my assassination squad members had stayed behind.
I gathered them in the lounge.
All of them had flushed cheeks from drinking.
It felt a little strange.
It felt like just yesterday I first came here—dragged in by Gray against my will. I nearly died that day.
Assassination is the art of the weak killing the strong. And I’m still not entirely free from that threat. One slip, and I could be injured—or killed.
Even so, things have changed since then. I’ve grown stronger. And my relationship with these people has evolved dramatically. It hasn’t even been half a year, and so much has happened.
I’ve survived numerous assassination attempts by fellow professors. I’ve formed ties with the Dormant Dragon cadets. I met the princess.
......Hmm...
I got dragged into the recruitment war between Black Abyss and White Saber, killed Toxin, a hornless demon. Fought Jinksythe in Error Space. Endured betrayal and institutional collapse. Created Cain Tree. And scored a glorious win in Assassination Daily.
After all that, I was back here, sitting among them again.
“Umm. Professor, that’s the Princess’s seat.”
“It’s alright, Professor. You can sit there.”
It was another accident, but oh well.
I crossed my legs and leaned back.
What are you gonna do about it, you little brats?
I’ve come a long way.
And this is only the beginning.
There are still many places to go. Many things to do.
“Attention.”
All eyes turned to me.
“You are now officially members of my assassination squad.”
I had already gotten Gray and Balmung’s signatures ahead of time.
Their expressions grew serious.
“From now on, under my supervision, you’ll be assigned to numerous trainings, assassinations, missions, dungeons, labyrinths, defenses and sieges—anything that comes.”
“You have no right to refuse my commands as tools. In return, I, as your owner, bear the responsibility of raising you into excellent tools.”
There is one ritual every assassination squad must go through.
The act of giving up one’s humanity.
The Declaration of Abandoning Dreams.
“I, Dante Hiakapo, dreamed of happiness. As of today, I relinquish that dream.”
But I had no reason to fully immerse myself in this assassin identity.
So instead, I decided to check their dreams.
Gray spoke first.
“I, Gray Habanero, dreamed of establishing 『Glass Butterfly』 as a recognized school of illusion across the continent. As of today, I relinquish that dream.”
This wasn’t a casual ‘maybe I’ll tell someone’ kind of goal.
In a world governed by Newtonian physics, the arrival of quantum mechanics flipped theoretical paradigms. What Gray desires is a shift of that magnitude.
And I believe that the tail-end of 『Glass Butterfly』 holds such potential. Something that can rival even 『World Forgery』.
It’s Gray’s job to discover and reveal that.
“I, Balmung Nibelung, dreamed of killing the Black Star⚉. As of today, I relinquish that dream.”
A far rougher dream than expected. As he spoke, killing intent flickered in Balmung’s eyes.
A son desiring to kill his mother. Has that ever been a theme in any story? To me, that was a foreign mindset.
But if the Great Mother ever becomes a threat to humanity, interferes with the Demon King War—I’ll kill her too.
“...Do I... go now?”
“Do it.”
“Umm, uhh... I, Elize Xikos, dreamed of... of seeing my dad again. As of today, I relinquish that dream.”
Softer than expected. But her heart is likely anything but soft.
Rebecca must have once ordered a similar declaration. If you’re capable of assassinating an emperor, then establishing a school like 『Glass Butterfly』, killing the Black Star⚉, or finding the lost Shadowless Star○ wouldn’t be difficult. That’s what she probably argued.
Kendreik, meanwhile, was muttering “Ughhh, urghh,” in a daze, so I simply nodded and said, “Got it.”
And with that, the declarations were done.
“This year, let’s each accomplish something great.”
At my words, mixed emotions passed across their faces.
It might have been solemnity. Or excitement.
“I’m off.”
That was supposed to be the end of our meeting.
But—
“Ehhh? Wait, Professor!”
“What now.”
“Aren’t we doing a ‘let’s go team!’ chant or something?”
Elize blurted that out.
Come on. What kind of assassin squad does a ‘let’s go team!’ chant...
“Let’s do it! Okay? Let’s do it. Gray, come here.”
“Ugh... What kind of nonsense...”
“Why not~ Let’s do it. Balmung! Get over here!”
Elize hooked her arms at her sides and issued the order. Balmung grimaced but approached.
He wouldn’t admit it, but Elize clearly thought she outranked him. The guy looked embarrassed out of his mind.
I gave up and held out my hand. He immediately placed his on top of it. Like he was pressing a button labeled, “This button exists, so I’m pushing it.”
“Chicken!”
“Ughhh.”
And thus entered Kendreik 2.0, the “I’ll just copy what everyone else is doing” edition. His hand was so large it had to go on the bottom. If ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) that’s a chicken, maybe it’s a Rekorn or something.
“...Is this kindergarten?”
After a long, pitiful look, Gray flashed her snaggletooth and reluctantly placed her hand on top.
And so, with five hands stacked together—someone’s thumb lightly scraped the back of mine with their nail. I glanced at Gray. She met my eyes with a look that said “??” You’re the one doing it.
Regardless of the childish antics, the mood wasn’t bad.
Something was beginning.
I looked at the stack of hands above and below mine.
From now on, these hands will overturn the world.
“Alright!”
Elize beamed as she shouted:
“Dante Assassination Squad! Let’s go, let’s go—!”
And the others followed:
“Fighting──!!” (Ughhh)