"It's dangerous here. Get out, now," Aaron repeated.
"P-Professor!"
With that, Aaron leaped through the shattered window after Magnus. Below, Magnus stood amidst the debris, completely unharmed. Aaron landed a short distance away, and the two men faced each other.
"It's been years, Professor Aaron," Magnus said, a lazy smile playing on his lips. "You used to be such a passionate, fledgling professor. Your demeanor is quite different now." "You're as much of a problem now as you were back then, Magnus Alban." A deep-seated enmity smoldered in Aaron's eyes.
"The crime of a student murdering a Kizen professor can never be washed away. How dare you set foot on this island after what you did."
"How dull." Magnus sneered, his eyes turbid. "A professor weaker than his student deserves to die."
Aaron's mouth twitched, but he seemed to decide that arguing was a waste of time. He raised his arm. "Why did you return to Kizen?"
From beyond the roof of the men's dormitory, two massive warships constructed of bone emerged, their forms blotting out the stars. Hatches on their undersides opened, and a torrent of red skeletons began to pour out.
"Undead warships, is it?" Magnus mused, glancing at the sky. "You're using advanced Hive magic to manage your undead, distributing your commands to the lower units. Artificially increasing the number of undead you can control... Something like this is truly..." Magnus's lips parted into a grin. "Horribly dull."
Countless shadows, teeming with eyes and teeth, began to pour from under his feet.
"A necromancer with a limited number of units? What's the difference between that and a chef with no arms? I'm amazed you can trudge through your tedious life without being overcome with self-loathing."
'A Legion,' Aaron thought grimly, and gave the attack command.
An endless stream of winged, red skeletons poured from the warships, diving toward Magnus. In response, the shadows at his feet surged upward, their jaws snapping wide to swallow the skeletons or bat them out of the air.
"Try harder," Magnus scoffed, watching the wreckage of crimson bones litter the ground. "How much does one of those skeletons cost? It looks like several days' salary has already gone up in smoke."
Aaron waved his arm through the air.
Magnus's pupils widened slightly. In addition to the two existing warships, new ones were approaching from behind him.
"Except for you Legion Commanders, every human faces a limit to their numbers," Aaron declared as the gates of all four warships opened. "That is why we struggle to overcome those limits."
A flood of red skeletons poured down, staining the sky crimson like a swarm of locusts.
"And in that process, we endlessly evolve."
The flying skeletons began to spin around Magnus, forming a massive, crimson tornado.
Magnus's tongue twitched. "It's a rare sight, I'll admit, but what do you plan to do with these small fry?"
Just then, the skeletons creating the vortex halted in unison. As Magnus glanced around, wondering what was happening, the real event was unfolding beyond him. The warships began to open like four-petaled flower buds, revealing super-massive magic circles within, each one pulsing with an immense amount of Jet-Black.
'The warship itself was a single magic circle!' Magnus realized.
From the four cardinal directions, beams of pure destruction surged toward him. Magnus unleashed his shadow monsters, wrapping them around his body like a defensive wall.
"This is a little surprising."
While Magnus focused on defending his position, the motionless red skeletons all ascended. Each body scattered into hundreds of bone fragments, which then began to attach, fit together, and connect, constructing an indescribably massive structure in the sky.
It was an inverted tower.
'Aaron Original – Tower of the Dead'
"Now, get lost," Aaron said, lowering his arm. "You damned student."
The inverted tower of bone descended directly upon Magnus, who was pinned to the ground. His shadows shot out by the hundreds, attempting to envelop the tower and tear it apart, but the structure simply ripped through them, crushed Magnus's head, split his chest, and slammed into the earth.
Half of the tower embedded itself in the ground, and a thick cloud of dust completely enveloped the area around the men's dormitory.
"Wow." Like the other students watching from the windows, Simon couldn't close his mouth.
[Hehehe! Quite impressive!] even Pier, who was usually stingy with praise, sounded awed. [To think a mere summoner, not even a Legion Commander, could do something like that!]
Soon, all the skeletons returned to the undead warships. Aaron created a gust of wind to clear the dust and walked toward Magnus's mangled form. He touched the crumbling torso and stood for a moment, lost in thought.
"Professor!" Simon called out, having already leaped from the window. "Are you alright?"
"I believe I told you to stay back." The Bone Armor enveloping Aaron receded, revealing his usual shorts and slippers. His scruffy beard and spiky leg hair were on full display. The strange contrast made Simon smile.
"You took care of it, Professor. What about Magnus?"
"That thing was a fake," Aaron said flatly. "A kind of biological clone."
"Th-That was a clone?" Simon's jaw dropped. It was strong enough to defeat Kajan, and it was just a clone?
"I heard that a versatile Ancient Undead named Alaje belongs to the 5th Legion," Aaron explained, standing up. "If Alaje and Magnus combined their powers, something like this wouldn't be difficult. In any case, don't ever think of Legion Commanders as beings that operate on common sense."
Simon was left speechless.
Just then, Aaron came over and placed a hand on Simon's shoulder. "Do you have any idea why Magnus was targeting you?"
Simon flinched inwardly.
"Magnus is an extremely dangerous individual. He's an eccentric who operates outside the control of the Dark Alliance and Kizen Headquarters, and no one knows for sure where he is. Why did you get involved with someone so dangerous?"
"I-I don't know either," Simon stammered, putting on the terrified expression of a normal student. "It was my first time ever seeing him." Which was true.
"What did he say?"
"He said something about the wavelength of an undead, but it was too complicated for me to understand."
"And the student who was bleeding earlier?"
"The dormitory staff took him to the infirmary. I was just about to go check on him."
"I see." Aaron spread a magic circle and collected the fragments of Magnus, then trudged away. "I'll report to Lady Nephthys. Get some rest."
In the Demon King's Castle on the Washburn Mountain Peak, an undead entered the vast bathhouse located inside the castle. A zombie dressed in a butler's uniform let out a deep sigh.
[The bath is a mess again, my lord.]
Inside the tub, a long-haired man was bleeding, his head thrown back. The sulfur spring he was soaking in had turned into a sea of blood, fouled by the black and crimson chunks of flesh oozing from the magic circle on his chest and stomach.
"It was fun, so it's fine," Magnus replied in a languid voice as he stood up. His lean body was stained crimson. "Clean it up."
Undead holding cleaning tools swarmed in, draining the water and clearing away the fleshy debris. Magnus slipped on a gown and took a sip of water.
[Was there any sort of achievement?] the butler inquired.
"Other than reuniting with my old teacher, nothing I'd call an achievement. I was interrupted before I could even exchange a few words with that Simon kid." The corner of Magnus's mouth lifted. "Still, I have a hunch."
[A hunch?]
He was recalling his first encounter with Simon.
It had been impressive. The moment the boy saw him, he had burned with pure rage. He had leaped past any bewilderment about the situation, any questions about who had attacked his roommate, and simply erupted in fury. Magnus found that unnatural.
"Lorraine Archbold was probably a bluff cooked up by the Witch of Death. The 7th Legion Commander is Simon Polentia."
[You're certain, my lord.]
"Almost."
The zombie butler adjusted his glasses and closed his eyes. [But your actions this time were too rash. The Witch of Death will likely find and dispose of our collaborators inside Kizen Headquarters, one way or another.]
"Oof. Are you blaming me?"
The zombie butler let out a hollow laugh. [How long have I been with you, my lord? Of course not. I was merely reporting the consequences of your actions.]
Dripping water, Magnus walked over and sat on the skull throne. The zombie butler handed him a towel.
[How did it feel to return to your alma mater?]
"It was decent entertainment," Magnus said with a smirk. "But..."
[My lord?]
"It seems there's someone else besides me preparing something at Kizen."
[Is that so?]
Magnus rested his chin on his hand. "It looks like they're trying to pull off something big. It'll be worth looking forward to."
The Magnus incident was, for the time being, resolved. It was a huge relief that so few students had been in the dormitory. Kizen Headquarters issued a summons for Magnus for an investigation. Of course, he was unlikely to comply, and it seemed they would mobilize the Crows to find him. Now that Kizen's watchful eye would be officially fixed on Magnus, it wasn't a bad thing for Simon.
Meanwhile, Simon went to the hospital ward to visit Kajan.
"Kajan has already been discharged," a staff member informed him.
"What?"
It was unexpected. The Kizen hospital was famous for stubbornly holding on to injured students, yet they had discharged Kajan immediately. Simon headed to the duty office of the first-year men's dormitory, where he was told Kajan had returned.
"Ah, Kajan," the duty officer said. "He said he needed a place to bathe."
"Bathe?" Simon repeated, bewildered. Covered in that much blood, and he wanted to bathe? It probably wasn't a real bath; he must have gone to pour that strange potion on himself. Kajan always used a potion that emitted steam whenever he was injured.
"The hot water isn't working in the men's dormitory right now, so I told him to try the staff bathhouse in the second-year women's dormitory."
Simon's expression twitched. "The women's bathhouse?"
"Yes. An order came down from above to cooperate with Kajan in every way possible."
As expected of one of Nephthys's aides. Understanding, Simon immediately headed for the second-year women's dormitory.
Indeed, when he arrived in front of the women's staff bathhouse, he could hear the sound of running water. For a moment, Simon wavered in front of the 'Women's Bath' sign, a flicker of moral hesitation, but he figured it would be fine as long as no one was there. Steeling himself, he knocked lightly on the door.
"Kajan? Are you in there?"
There was no way he could be heard over the water. Just in case, Simon opened the door a crack and peeked his head in. The bathhouse was small, meant only for staff, not students. There were no separate lockers; as soon as he opened the door, he was met with a wall of thick steam. There was only one tub.
And in the steam, a gray-haired man was pouring a potion over his body. It was Kajan.
"Is that you, Simon?" he asked, his voice laced with fatigue. The floor was a mess of water, blood, and potion.
"Are you okay, Kajan?"
"Yeah."
"I'm coming in." Since he was already here, Simon decided he might as well wash up too. He took off his clothes, placed them in a basket like Kajan's, and approached. "I'm sorry, Kajan. You got caught up in this because of me."
"Why are you apologizing?" Kajan scratched at the new wound next to his eye. "Protecting you is part of my mission. Getting injured during a mission is a given, so there's no need to apologize."
Simon helped pour the potion over Kajan's body. As the liquid touched the gaping wounds, steam rose, and the flesh began to knit itself back together. However, like the long scar already on Kajan's face, the healed wounds left new marks. His body was a tapestry of scars.
After Kajan finished, he slipped into the hot tub. Simon found some cleaning tools and began to scrub the bathroom floor, which was slick with blood and potion. He felt bad enough for borrowing the women's bath; the least he could do was clean it.
As he wiped the potion stains off the floor with a squeegee, Simon spoke casually. "Kajan."
Kajan, soaking in the warm water, nodded.s
"I feel like you've been avoiding me since the second semester started."
Kajan fell silent.
He had barely spoken to Kajan recently. Whenever he entered Room 409, Kajan was always asleep. During the first semester, Kajan had gone out every night because of the Saintess incident, but he was still going out even after that was resolved.
"I'm not intentionally avoiding you," Kajan replied. "I'm on a mission."
"But there aren't any Priests on Roc Island anymore. What other mission could there be?"
"What kind of fool divulges mission details to an outsider?"
An outsider. The word stung, and Simon's expression fell. "We're roommates. And we're comrades who fought the Saintess together."
"Official business is official business. Private life is private life."
Simon put a hand to his forehead and let out a deep sigh. This blunt senior... How was he ever supposed to get close to him?
"Rather, I'm the one who wants to ask," Kajan said suddenly. "You're the same, aren't you? Hiding something and worrying about it."

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