Volume 12, 4 - Demon King’s Burial Chamber

Volume 12, Chapter 4 - Demon King's Burial Chamber

Part 1

"...The Instructional School... destroyed?"

In Claire's room in the Raven Class dorms—

Listening to her, Kamito was muttering in shock.

The bed could be heard compressing where he was sitting.

"No way... That kind of thing..."

"—It's true."

However, Claire shook her head candidly.

According to her—

Four years ago, the Instructional School was destroyed due to a certain sealed spirit running amok. All the instructors were killed by spirits while the majority of orphans went into the Empire's custody.

After that, the facility was utterly destroyed by the Empire's knights and wiped off the map completely.

Literally, it became a place that no longer existed on the map.

...Unbelievable. Suddenly informed of this, Kamito found it utterly impossible to believe.

However—

(...She knows of the Instructional School's existence.)

That was absolutely impossible originally.

The Instructional School's existence was absolutely kept hidden from the outside world.

Even for the children of nobles, this was not information a mere student would be able to obtain.

Furthermore—

"This is proof—"

Saying that, Claire dumped a stack of materials on the table.

"These were taken from the library's materials room. Although I wasn't able to take out the most important secret documents, these should be enough."

"..."

Kamito read the materials ravenously.

He had no lack of doubts regarding the possibility that he had fallen into an elaborately disguised trap.

However, the large amount of information corroborated the veracity of her words.

These documents were real. They recorded information that only internal personnel would know—logs of combat operations and the names of the associated combatants.

(...To think that this type of document would be kept somewhere so easily within a student's reach.)

—Apart from that, the date was even more shocking.

(...This really happened four years ago.)

Currently, Kamito's remaining memories roughly covered from age five to twelve.

All memories dating before that period had been thoroughly wiped. Those that came after were also gone.

He already knew the fact of his amnesia. But even though he knew in his heart—

He never expected his last memory to be four years ago.

"I know you're confused but this is reality. See—"

Claire pointed at Kamito.

"Your body has grown in height."

"...Eh?"

Only after it was pointed out did he realize.

So that was why there was strange sense of dissonance ever since he woke up.

It felt like he could not move his body freely.

After realizing this fact, it felt quite incredible.

...He finally understood the reason behind it.

(...That's right, I've grown.)

His physique differed from what he remembered.

This was the physique of a fifteen or sixteen-year-old boy.

"I..."

In shock, Kamito looked down at his hands and feet.

Watching Kamito with eyes of pity, Claire spoke up:

"—Anyway, let me tell you what happened in these four years."

Part 2

While cautiously choosing her words—

Claire recounted Kamito's experiences to this date.

After the Instructional School was destroyed, wandering all over the place without anywhere he belonged to, Kamito was taken in by the Dusk Witch and enrolled into this Academy as the continent's one and only male elementalist. Then as a member of Team Scarlet, he had participated in the Blade Dance.

"...I entered the Blade Dance?"

Kamito muttered with an expression of disbelief.

It was the continent's biggest festival that was only held every few years or decades.

For an Instructional School's combatant living in the dark side, it was a completely foreign world.

"Undoubtedly. Thanks to you, Kamito, we obtained victory. However—"

During the Blade Dance's finale, Kamito was injured when engaging the Strongest Blade Dancer Ren Ashbell in blade dance, suffering damage to his memory.

"So that means that this contracted spirit also, at the time—"

Kamito's gaze fell upon his right hand.

Branded on the back of the hand was the spirit seal belonging to the sword spirit he had contracted in the underground cavern at this school.

The facility's instructors absolutely forbade Kamito from forming spirit contracts.

When the time is ripe, we'll give you the strongest spirit—That was what they had promised.

(The strongest spirit huh...)

Throb—

His head began to hurt again.

...Again. Again when thinking about spirits—

"Kamito, are you okay?"

"Yeah... Just a headache..."

Claire asked with worry at the sight of Kamito holding his temples.

"Maybe I said too much at once. Or perhaps when you tried to recall your memories, it caused a rejection reaction."

At this moment, she saw the seal on Kamito's hand.

"Eh?"

Claire showed a surprised expression.

"No way, this..."

"What's the problem?"

"No, nothing, nothing at all..."

Claire shook her head in denial.

(...What is she hiding?)

Although a bit concerned, Kamito did not press the matter much.

"Can this contracted spirit be summoned?"

Instead, he asked something else.

Having lost his memory, Kamito did not know how to summon a spirit. However, if Claire were to teach him, he might be able to recall the feeling and perform a successful summon.

"...Probably not. Est is currently in a materialized state and sealed underground at the Academy. Currently, we have to wait for the headmistress to authorize the unsealing."

"Why is the spirit underground?"

Unsummoned spirits were supposed to return to Astral Zero instead.

"That I'm not too sure about. But Est had been living in this place for the past few centuries. She's a special sealed spirit..."

"...Sealed spirit huh. So it's actually possible to contract with that kind of thing."

Spirits sealed in ancient artifacts had a tendency to be ill-tempered and would harm humans.

Unless overflowing with confidence, one would not make a move on them—

Kamito looked at the spirit seal on his right hand again.

Although the result was a runaway reaction—

(Sword spirit, do you really intend to protect me?)

At this moment, a meow was heard from within the room.

"...?"

Kamito turned his head to see a hell cat spirit in the kitchen heating a pot.

"Oh, the stew seems to be warmed up."

Claire stood up from the chair, her twintails swaying and hurried over to the kitchen.

Soon, she came back with a dish of stew.

...Kamito could smell a fragrant aroma. Beetroot stew with herbs scattered on top.

Kamito's throat gurgled.

"This is?"

"Borscht. A local dish from the Laurenfrost region. Rinslet... The girl who uses a wolf-shaped spirit taught me how to make it."

Kamito tried a mouthful of stew.

Thanks to the deadly cookie, Kamito was quite wary this time, however—

"......This is good."

Although the salt content seems to be wrong, it was good enough for an empty stomach.

"...!"

The twintails swayed happily.

"...Th-Thank goodness."

Then she breathed a sigh of relief.

"Actually, I was wondering if it would turn into charcoal."

"Ch-Charcoal?"

"Because until Nee-sama taught me how to use flames, I've never been able to control the intensity. All I knew was how to manipulate the power of flames to use for attack magic."

"Oh, so you have an older sister."

"Yes. Nee-sama was also saved by you, Kamito."

"...Sorry, I don't remember."

Kamito quietly put down the spoon.

"...Claire Rouge. What should I do next?"

He had no idea when his memory would recover.

Right now, all Kamito knew were the combat skills he had mastered at that facility.

What should his goal be next, to be honest, he had absolutely no idea.

"Life here isn't bad at all. Before your memory recovers, just relax and recuperate for now."

Part 3

"...So, how is Kamito-san's condition?"

With hair tied up, Rinslet asked with worry.

Late that night, Claire and the girls had gathered at the large communal bath to discuss how to proceed.

Due to how late it was, the bath was essentially monopolized by them.

On the other side of the steam, Fenrir was swimming leisurely.

"He's currently sleeping in my room, looking quite exhausted. I don't think he'll escape again."

"To think he even forgot Est..."

As Fianna sighed, her bosom quivered while floating on the water surface.

"Probably, the greater one's place in his heart, the greater the power causing memories to be forgotten. Otherwise, his mind would break..."

"Speaking of which, how did this morning's commotion end?"

Rinslet turned to Ellis and asked.

"The Knights have handled it appropriately. Actually, the incident should have been taken care of before a commotion happened. In the end, it became a huge mess."

Ellis murmured with a depressed look.

"...I-I might be hated by Kamito now."

"I did try to explain the truth of the incident. I don't think you need to worry."

It was possible that Kamito might not have a good impression of Ellis and the Sylphid Knights who were trying to capture him.

"U-Umm..."

Rinslet spoke up again.

"What?"

"I knew it, at this rate—this kind of thing, cannot be possible, right?"

...Hearing this, everyone fell silent.

They were probably all thinking the same thing.

(His memory must be recovered, I know this very well in my heart. But—)

If his amnesia persisted, perhaps Kamito could forget everything and live a peaceful life at the Academy.

"...That would require Kamito-kun's own decision."

Fianna murmured.

"No matter what..."

In any case, Claire coughed once.

"...All along, it was always Kamito who protected us."

She stood up from the bath and clenched her fist.

"Therefore, this time it's our turn to protect Kamito."

"Yes." "That's right." "Indeed!"

Everyone nodded vigorously.

...Yes, when a friend was in need, everyone would pitch in to help.

Like when all members of Team Scarlet fought victoriously throughout the Blade Dance.

However, one thing bothered Claire.

Just now, when she saw the seal on Kamito's right hand...

(That spirit seal, why...)

Instead of Terminus Est's emblem with the two intersecting swords—

Never seen before, the seal's emblem consisted of a sword and a moon intersecting.

Part 4

"—Thus concludes the report on Kamito, Headmistress."

In the headmistress' office where moonlight was streaming in—

Greyworth was listening to the report from Freya the teacher.

This was about Kamito's escape commotion that morning. Despite running low on stamina, he had unexpectedly sprang into action as soon as he woke up.

Thanks to that, there were even rumors of him peeking at girls changing.

"...What a lad who only causes trouble."

"Indeed that is so."

Facing the wryly smiling Greyworth, Freya sighed.

"Rumors of the king of lust's revival have already spread throughout the Academy. Not limited to the young ladies in his team, he even intends to devour all the girls in the Academy, seriously..."

"That would be troubling. Girls who have lost their purity are no longer fit to be elementalists."

"If that were to happen, this Academy would be ruined as a school."

Freya nodded without any change in expression.

(...Oh well, but through this, one thing is made clear.)

Greyworth shifted her sitting posture.

Unexpectedly—

Kamito did not cause any direct injuries to the Academy's girls.

Take for example, the two members of the Knights who collapsed in front of Kamito's room.

When Ellis discovered them, although they had lost consciousness, this was due to the phenomenon of divine power intoxication from being struck by a large amount of divine power. Physically, they had not suffered any harm at all.

Also, when discovered by the students, he had not taken combat measures.

An Instructional School's assassin would have murdered them without hesitation. Had Kamito tried to escape at all costs, by any means necessary, that could very well have happened.

(...The lad is subconsciously taking care not to harm students.)

Even having lost memories about Restia, the human heart she had conferred to him was not lost—Was that the case here?

(...Hmph, enviable darkness spirit.)

"Headmistress?"

"Ahhh, sorry. So, how's the lad?"

"Sleeping in Claire Rouge's room. Let's hope nothing wrong comes out of it."

"...Hmph, if only the lad had the talent to do wrong. Oh well, whatever. Just leave things to those girls for now."

Greyworth smiled wryly but her smile quickly vanished.

"—So, how about that Demon Slayer's situation?"

"Yes, just as you predicted, Headmistress, when the reconnaissance team attempted spirit vision, they observed a dimensional disturbance that was not supposed to exist in the underground cavern."

"...I see. As expected."

"Headmistress, what exactly is that dimension...?"

"The Burial Chamber—"

Greyworth whispered.

"...?"

"—Granted to the Demon King's legitimate successor, a legendary treasure vault."