“Cover model?”
Even the village idiot, Elize, knew the Assassination Daily was trash-tier journalism. Half the content was nonsense.
But the cover model—that was different.
It was well-known, even to Elize, how ridiculously special it was to be on the cover of the Assassination Daily.
The Assassination Daily was an Imperial publication.
It published three types of magazines: weekly, monthly, and an annual edition. It was the only and largest assassination-focused periodical distributed across the entire continent.
So even just being a weekly cover model was a big deal. To be the monthly cover model? That was a dream spot for countless assassins and famous figures.
Assassins were supposed to stay hidden—yet the more famous they were, the higher their market value. Irony at its finest.
And the lucky one who grabbed that chance was none other than—
“...Me?”
Gray blinked slowly.
“W-Wait a sec...! Monthly cover model? Not Princess Rebecca, but me...?”
“Yesss! The princess was already featured last week on the weekly cover! Don’t you ever care about your friends?”
“I’m sick! I’ve been asleep the whole time—how the hell would I know—”
After her brief outburst, Gray suddenly went blank.
“...But why me?”
She was just too curious not to ask.
Maid Lucy glanced cautiously toward the door, then leaned close to Gray’s bed, whispering:
“You remember stopping that airship crash with your amazing [Illusion]?”
“Ah, yeah yeah.”
The memory was fuzzy, but she was sure she’d done it.
“If the landing hadn’t shifted, it would’ve smashed into the kindergarten building in Sector 1. All the kids were still inside.”
“I heard that last time.”
“The mood’s been real bad around the academy, you know? Everyone’s acting like it’s the end of the world... But after the princess’s interview, things lightened up. So now the Student Media Department paid the Assassination Daily to feature you next, to freshen up Hiaka’s image. Those Empire bastards love their money.”
“True... My face is refreshing enough to do that...”
Not to mention the story had a strong emotional arc: a cadet shedding blood through [Petrification], sprouting wings to protect children—how lovely and heroic (according to Gray). Even now, the Department of Assassination was pushing the narrative that the cursed arm (Jinksythe) had been the work of those vile bastards from Kreutz.
The image worked: cute, brave, and full of tragic charm.
“Hmmm...”
Gray scratched her cheek absentmindedly.
“...But is this really okay? I mean, I’m not royalty. I’m from the Habanero family, the very bloodline Hiaka’s trying to keep under wraps. Why would the department suddenly decide this...?”
Indeed.
The Habanero family was one of Hiaka’s few surviving genius bloodlines. Gray herself was classified as a national secret.
“That’s the thing...”
Lucy bit her lip again, glanced toward the door, then whispered even more quietly:
“Hey. You didn’t hear this from me.”
“What is it, what is it?”
“They might open the Department of Assassination to the Empire soon.”
“???”
Gray’s jaw slackened.
It was shocking.
Wasn’t Hiaka Academy the most isolationist institution on the entire continent? And now they were opening their gates?
Gray’s mental calculator kicked into overdrive—visions forming of a new era led by Hiaka, her own genius face on the front page, not those cocky bastards from Shadowless Star○ and Black Abyss Star⚉.
“Sis, this is huge, isn’t it...?!”
“Totally insane, you crazy bitch...!!”
Clap clap! Gray high-fived Lucy with a triple smack, then kicked her out of the room and lay back down for a nap.
But then, a sudden thought.
...But that thing—
The wings.
“......”
Was that really me who did that...?
***
Professor Dante said nothing.
He walked in silence. Balmung followed.
Come to think of it, when was the last time he’d followed behind an adult like this? He couldn’t remember. At some point, he’d only ever walked with his peers.
It was the dead of night.
The professor moved steadily toward the darker parts of the academy.
—An assassin must love the dark.
That’s what his mother used to say.
After all, she was the only one in the world chosen by the “Black Abyss Star⚉.”
Balmung’s home had always been shrouded in darkness. He hated the dark.
And yet, the professor continued walking into it. And despite his discomfort, Balmung could do nothing but follow.
As they went, Dante’s words and Balmung’s thoughts clashed in his mind.
The professor had said not to dwell on what was lost.
But all Balmung could think about were the things he’d lost.
Even now, on [Assassin Town], hundreds of withdrawal posts appeared daily. Others mocked them, saying, “What will failures like you even do if you quit?”
Balmung read those too, chewing his fingernails.
His thoughts sprawled out uncontrollably.
Why was I born into this kind of family?
Why was I born in this era?
Looking back at every moment in his life—pain. Nothing but pain.
They said thirty years ago, during his mother’s youth, the world was at peace.
Even just ten years ago, after the war, there had been a golden age. People had lived with hope.
So why the hell was he stuck with this broken time?
‘...Shit.’
It was happening again.
He was focusing on what he’d lost.
The clarity he’d felt from the professor earlier was fading. He rushed to open his mouth.
“Professor. Um, so...”
“......”
“We’re supposed to focus on what remains, right? Uh... yeah...”
“......”
“That thing you mentioned earlier. The 8 million Hika. That’s what we should focus on, right? Since the 2 million’s already gone...”
The professor said nothing and kept walking. The silence made Balmung more desperate.
“But... what if we end up losing that too? We’re always losing things. That’s what Hiaka is...”
“......”
“So what’s gonna change here, really? I mean—we had 20 million before. Then it went down to 10 million. Now it’s 8. That’s how it feels... But you’re probably right, Professor. We should just try to focus on that 8 million...”
“......”
“Professor...”
If Professor Dante had just said one word.
Any word at all—Balmung might have felt consoled.
But he didn’t say a thing.
With the same calm, unreadable face, he stepped deeper into the shadows.
That pushed Balmung’s anxiety even further.
“...It’s not just me, Professor. On, uh... Assassin Town—sorry for whining so much—but they’re saying it too...”
Balmung was unraveling.
“They say Hiaka’s finished... That we didn’t just lose the Assassination War to Kreutz, but that our whole country’s dying... That’s why that bastard Batalion left. That’s why the war blew up. That monster in the sky came out because everything’s falling apart...”
Thoughts he’d kept to himself until now, pretending they didn’t exist, came flooding out.
“It’s ridiculous, right? Just, fuck, ah—sorry... I mean, it’s all nonsense, but... I can’t stop thinking it. That maybe Hiaka’s already doomed. Just a ruin buried in the dark. I’m sorry. I know you said not to focus on what we’ve lost...”
No matter what he said—
The professor gave no answer.
Didn’t even look at him.
The urge burst up from Balmung’s throat.
“...Just where are you going!?”
By the time he came to, he’d stepped in front of Dante, blocking his path.
Half a beat later, reason caught up.
“Ah...!”
And then he froze—paralyzed in front of those emotionless, pale-pink eyes.
What the hell was he doing? What kind of madness was this?
“Ah, uh, I...”
Just as Balmung opened his mouth in a hurry to salvage the moment—
Finally, the professor spoke.
“Have you finished echoing?”
The low voice snapped Balmung’s mind back into focus.
“Huh? Ah, I, um...”
Balmung bowed deeply.
“I’m sorry, Professor. Really, I was just too—”
“And yet, you still don’t understand.”
“...Sorry?”
“Whether it’s 8 million, 800 thousand, or not a single damn coin, that’s not what matters.”
Balmung slowly raised his head.
“...Then what? If that’s not what matters...”
“I already told you. What matters is judgment.”
“......”
“You and I live in different worlds. In truth, all of humanity lives within as many worlds as there are minds... It seems I need to put it more simply for someone like you.”
The professor’s tone remained impassive—but it was gentle.
“Judgment is the world.”
One sentence—
Just one sentence sent ripples through Balmung’s mind.
Judgment is the world...?
“The more you judge, the wider or narrower your world becomes. Without judgment, the world does not exist.”
“...I don’t understand what you mean...”
“Do you even know where you are right now?”
At that, a strange confusion struck Balmung.
He had followed the professor for # Nоvеlight # maybe thirty minutes, maybe more than an hour... and yet he had no idea where they were.
Thinking back carefully, they had climbed for quite a while.
This was somewhere high up.
They had been walking upward.
“You don’t know where you are. You didn’t judge the ground beneath your feet. You didn’t judge the scenery before your eyes. You didn’t judge the direction you were heading. Like duckweed drifting on water, you simply floated until you happened to arrive somewhere.”
“......”
“Hiaka is ruined? That’s unfortunate—for the moment you judged it so, your Hiaka was ruined. Even if you ask me for advice, I have nothing to say. Because my Hiaka is not ruined.”
At that, Balmung felt a flash of indignation—but more than that, he wanted to ask:
Then what is your Hiaka?
What is this so-called Hiaka in your world that lets you speak so confidently, even while all the cadets say it's already fallen?
But even as the question rose, Balmung realized it was far too arrogant to demand such an answer—especially when he knew he wouldn’t be convinced by a few words.
He simply began to lower his head again.
“You’re curious about my Hiaka, aren’t you?”
But—
As if reading his mind, the ghost-like professor saw straight through his lowly thoughts.
“I’ll show you.”
“...You’ll show me?”
“Yes. I’ll show you my Hiaka. That’s why I brought you here to begin with.”
And with that, the professor began walking again.
From that moment on, Balmung followed him, almost as if possessed.
It was ahead.
Just ahead of them—
A world completely unlike his own.
A Hiaka that this aloof professor could declare without hesitation as “not ruined”—
Was supposedly just up ahead?
They hadn’t taken more than a few steps—
When Dante’s stride reached the end of the uphill path.
Moments later, Balmung stood beside him.
“Look. This is my Hiaka.”
Before them, the world opened up.
It was nothing more than a view from the back mountain, looking down from a cliffside.
Night had already fallen. Hiaka should have already been a ruin.
And yet, from the summit, looking down—
The world below shimmered with light.
There was light. Too much light to say it was ruined.
A living, writhing world sprawled out beneath Balmung’s feet.
“What do you see in the distance?”
Magic circles were glowing at various places—remnants of the Assassination War. The once-shattered beacon of “Peace Fortress☮” was shining again. Countless buildings had their lights on.
“What about the place we just came from?”
The glow of patrol officers’ cigarettes—who had held off the ghoul attack. The searchlights of medics trying to pull people from the rubble of a broken clock tower. The headlights of vehicles carrying the wounded.
All of it emitting light—each like desperate sparks of survival.
And wasn’t Balmung himself just down there? Struggling alongside them?
While he stood there, overwhelmed and speechless—
In that silence, where even breathing felt muted—
“You said it was a ruin buried in darkness, didn’t you?”
The professor spoke in a low voice.
“Then why is my Hiaka... so bright?”
At that moment, Balmung felt something inside his mind shatter—
A small, locked world cracking open.
Was it...?
Was it really...?
The professor was right.
Judgment was the world.
The moment he himself judged otherwise—this world began to feel different.
Others who still believed Hiaka shined were still shining themselves.
Inside this world he had arrogantly labeled a ruin—
“The department, including myself and the other professors, is preparing for the era ahead. When that time comes, Hiaka will place its bets. Whether we win those bets or not—I can’t say. But you will be part of that wager. You may well become the central figure of its revival.”
“......”
“What you must do now is reflect. Think, and understand for yourself. Then fill your mind with good echoes. When you are certain of what those echoes are—come find me again. If we’re looking at the same world then, I may have something more to say to you.”
With that, the professor turned and walked away.
He didn’t call for Balmung to follow.
And so, left alone, Balmung continued to stare down at Hiaka Academy.
For a very long time.