The crowd always demands it.
That a hero proves himself.
Once-glorious deeds are quickly dismissed as the past. Emotional fervor cools like tea in a cup.
Thus, the exceptional must ceaselessly prove their own brilliance.
Fail to do so, and one must be ready to be scorned for having dared to raise expectations—ready to be blamed for even the smallest flaw.
In Professor Dante's case, he was no hero. But he was being treated as something close.
His evasion of assassination on the first day. The Marina-Elize incident. The defeat of the proxy assassin. The murder of Professor Hakon. All of it had turned him into a sort of star professor.
That was why some cadets began to question his teaching.
Okay, he's strong. Got it.
But is he even qualified to teach?
Does someone like you truly have the right to handle a course like “Twelve Supernatural Systems,” so broad and advanced?
That doubt had grown, slowly, as he dragged out the dry “History of Supernatural Arts” class for over two weeks—and now, it had come to a head.
And in the midst of that doubt and expectation—
Inside the lecture hall, all eyes on him—
“How can one kill a person─”
That was how Professor Dante began the lecture.
“It began long ago, with an older brother jealous of his younger.”
His voice was calm, but weighty.
“The gods favored the younger. Overwhelmed with jealousy, one day the elder decided to kill him. A place where no one would see would be best. So he said, ‘My brother. Come out to the fields with me.’”
Dante grabbed the wrist of his dazed assistant and stepped off the podium. “...Oh my.”
“And he looked around. Just in time, he found a suitable tool.”
Suddenly, a ‘sharp rock’ appeared in midair.
To the cadets, it was a surprising [illusion].
It had appeared without any ‘mana flicker’ whatsoever.
“In humanity’s first assassination, it’s said the younger’s blood soaked the fields. The weapon must’ve been a club or a rock.”
Dante mimed striking Adele with it. “Eek.” When Adele dropped into her seat, laughter broke out among the cadets.
“......But as a first murder weapon, a club or a rock wasn’t ideal. The younger didn’t die in one blow. The elder had to chase him down to finish the job. And when he screamed, the parents heard. That was the problem. It wasn’t discreet.”
Suddenly, the floor of the classroom shifted. “Whoa.” A desolate field stretched out before them, stained with the blood flowing from Adele.
Every cadet doubted their own eyes. It was a shockingly intricate [illusion].
‘Holy crap. What...?’
‘No way, that’s an illusion...?’
To fill a space that vast, with that much detail, without even a flicker of mana?
At a cadet’s level, even conjuring a matchstick without a visible trace of mana was difficult.
‘.......’
At the same time, a look of shock crossed Luine’s face as well.
“The brother, after that, lived his life haunted by the fear that someone else would come to kill him.”
Even while showing a level of [illusion] they could never hope to reach even in a lifetime, Professor Dante continued speaking as if it were nothing.
“Even though he was a killer, he feared being killed. He must have regretted it. If only he’d killed his brother a little more discreetly... so that neither his father, nor his mother, nor even the gods would ever know...”
And from that moment, humanity’s obsession with ‘assassination’ began.
Dante then swiftly traced through the development of the “Twelve Supernatural Systems.”
To kill someone with a sword [Combat System], they had to use a bow or shuriken [Projectile System].
To kill someone with a bow [Projectile System], they had to move in close, hence Movement Arts [Footwork System].
To kill before Movement Arts [Footwork System] took effect, guns were invented [Sniper System].
To counter guns [Sniper System], magic was developed [Magic System].
“In the era of magic, no one attempted assassination with just one method anymore.”
When they could no longer reach the target, [Stealth System] was born.
To cripple a moving target, [Trap System].
When traps couldn’t kill, poisons [Poison System] to turn small wounds lethal.
When they couldn’t carry weapons inside a target location, they learned to make them there—[Alchemy] and [Totems].
Assassination evolved that way.
“In modern times, humanity began to reflect on the essence of assassination. And at the end of that thought process, our predecessors found surprising potential in what had once been a magician’s perverted toy.”
He said it was [Illusion].
Until then, [Illusion]—a technique for manipulating perception—was used purely for the depraved amusements of nobles.
But once it fell into the hands of assassins, everything changed.
“The foundation of [Illusion] is the distortion of sensation. Making one see what isn’t there. Hear what can’t be heard. That’s its purpose. And at its peak, it can go beyond the five senses and mana—to warp existence itself.”
Dante snapped his fingers.
Snap—
And suddenly, five attractive, well-built men appeared around Adele, who sat in her chair.
“Oh my...”
Each was a hallucinated archetype: a possessive obsessive, a big loyal dog type, a clueless puppy, a middle-aged gentleman, and a cold-eyed cat-type tragic male lead.
They leaned in, arms around Adele, gazing at her with smoldering eyes.
“Oh... oh my god...”
Adele, blushing bright red, quickly covered her face and looked around in panic.
“How do you feel, Adele? Being surrounded by fake men.”
“What do you take me for...? ...I like it.”
Laughter erupted among the cadets again.
“Assassination is the blending of murder and deception. And when deception is elevated to its highest form—that’s [Illusion].”
“To distort someone’s senses, the most important thing is to know what they want to sense. Humans always perceive what they wish to perceive. And once you know that, the next step is—”
Snap—
Dante snapped again, and the five men drew knives and pointed them at Adele.
She panicked and tried to escape—but in vain. The men’s arms and legs were tangled like serpents around ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) her.
A tableau, like the poster of a sultry thriller, just before the kill.
“......Save me, Professor.”
When Adele raised her hands in surrender, the cadets burst out laughing again.
“Assistants should be careful around handsome men.”
“Yes, sir...”
Only when Dante dismissed the illusions did Adele breathe a sigh of relief, saying she nearly died.
By now, every single cadet was completely absorbed in the lecture.
Luine and her friends, too.
‘He’s insane. Seriously...’
‘What kind of new professor has powers like this...?’
Every last doubt they’d had about Dante was shattered.
And all the posturing about evaluating his teaching was gone, without a trace.
From the history of murder to the rise of [Illusion], and a practical display of how destructive it could be... His lecture was nearly perfect.
Now, everyone in the room was hanging onto his every word.
***
However, even as every cadet was utterly absorbed in his lecture—
Someone’s thoughts were drifting elsewhere.
That someone was none other than the cadet from Dormant Dragon Institute—Elize Xikos.
‘......??’
With a pencil balanced against her philtrum, lips puffed out in a (ㅇ3ㅇ) shape as she dazedly listened to the lecture, she suddenly raised her hand high with a puzzled look.
“Professor. I have a question.”
Dante gestured calmly.
“Ask.”
The other cadets turned to the two of them with curiosity in their eyes.
Come to think of it, Elize and Dante’s classes were diametrically opposed.
While Dante specialized in [Illusion] that “reveals”—
Elize, daughter of the “Invisible Throne○,” excelled in “disappearing.”
“Is [Illusion] really necessary for assassination?”
“Clarify.”
“Ah, um... Assassination’s about killing someone discreetly, right? Can’t you just stab them while hiding?”
As expected, a fundamental question—one the cadets had anticipated—came flying out.
“Disappearing” was a core principle of assassination.
And Elize disappeared better than anyone.
Her family, after all, was hailed across Hiaka as the continent’s finest assassins—surpassing even White Saber—based solely on their mastery of vanishing.
‘Whoa. What’s the professor going to say to that?’
‘That’s a tough one...’
‘How do you explain to Elize that revealing can be just as important as disappearing?’
The cadets held their breath, waiting for the answer. But Dante, unfazed, opened his mouth and spoke.
“Elize. Do you know how to hide a tree?”
“Hide a tree?”
Snap!
With a flick of Dante’s fingers, a tree appeared right in front of Elize.
She stared at it blankly for a moment, then reached out to touch it.
“Hmmm, like this...”
And then something astonishing happened—the illusory tree faded and vanished, turning completely invisible.
The cadets were shocked—Elize had used [Stealth] on a hallucination conjured by someone else’s mana.
‘Insane. She cloaked a hallucination she’s never seen before?’
‘What the hell is she? Even for Dormant Dragon, how is that...’
Even professors would struggle to pull that off. But Dante merely nodded.
“Well done. But there is no reason to say that only disappearing qualifies as ‘hidden.’”
“Then what does?”
At Dante’s gesture, the tree that Elize had concealed reappeared.
Snap!
And with another snap of his fingers—a violent gust of wind swept through the room.
Whoooooosh—!
When the cadets opened their eyes again, they saw not one, but over a dozen identical illusory trees had appeared.
None of them emitted any visible mana flickers, once again shocking the cadets. Then Dante posed his question.
“Tell me. Where is the original tree?”
Elize, along with the other cadets, widened their eyes.
“......!”
A dozen identical trees stood together in the same spot—making it impossible to tell which one was real.
“...I don’t know.”
Elize blinked and admitted defeat. Dante followed up.
“Then would you say the tree is ‘hidden’?”
“...Yes.”
“Indeed. So, another way to hide a tree... is to place it in a forest.”
And with that, the cadets finally understood. Why “revealing” could be just as vital as “disappearing.”
That “hiding” is not a solo trick, but something that emerges in interaction with the background.
‘Ah, so that’s why a sniper in a crowd is harder to find...’
‘And that case, where someone assassinated royalty by disguising themselves among the guards...’
Realization began to settle over the class.
“......Starting with today’s lecture, you’ll begin learning the basics of [Illusion] from me.”
The rest of the class flowed like a dream, drifting through a veil of hallucinations.
The cadets learned basic [Illusion] under Dante’s guidance. For those already proficient, he offered more advanced instruction.
Everyone immersed themselves in the lesson with joy.
Then Professor Dante shattered their happiness.
“There will be homework assigned today. Not a large amount, so don’t worry.”
But the moment they flipped through the two-page assignment packet, their faces began to turn pale.
There was a lot.
Not just a lot—too much. Way too much.
‘Uh, is this real...?’
‘How are we supposed to finish all this by next week...?’
The cadets were frozen in mute horror. But Dante, who wasn’t always consulting the 【Script】, had casually assigned the work based on his standards.
“If you concentrate, it’ll take fifteen minutes.”
The cadets blinked in disbelief.
‘What the hell are you talking about, you bastard.’
And thus the lecture ended... in shock and fear.
***
After class, once Professor Dante had left the hall—
Elize began circling among the cadets, casually striking up conversation.
“So, what’d you think of today’s class?”
She was asking to help explain it to Gray, repeating the same question over and over.
The first cadet she stopped was Luine.
“H-huh?”
“What’d you think of the professor’s lecture? I don’t know much about [Illusion], see.”
Her lips parted as if to say more—then twisted into a bitter smile.
Whatever annoyance she’d felt before was completely gone.
Luine exhaled and gave her answer like a sigh.
“......It was incredible.”