How to Live as a Knight After the Ending

Chapter 127: District 45 (1)

Terence subdued Professor Albert with an enchanted rope and rummaged in his arms.

‘A man like this, who prioritizes his own self-interest, must have something in store.’

Finding an unbroken potion vial in his arms, Terence used it on Slaine.

It worked better than he expected, stopping Slaine’s bleeding and healing the wound in his abdomen.

He was still dazed from the blood loss, but with the fire out, he should be fine.

Terence looked at Osian.

This one still put up a fight, but there was no such thing.

Just a few swings of the sword with overwhelming force and it was over.

Something about the way he looked made him feel unnecessarily vulnerable, but Terence decided to focus on getting information.

“Answer me. Where did you come from?”

“Kkhkh. Just kill me.”

The man with both arms and legs severed laughed like a man possessed, as if he felt no pain.

The blood dripping from the severed sections was purple.

“You’re not going to talk?”

Osian applied pressure to the leg pressed against the man’s chest.

It was enough to crack and break his sternum, but he didn’t seem to mind.

“This must not be the usual strong drug.”

Terence looked at the blood. The cross-sectional wound had healed and was no longer bleeding, its vitality boosted by the drug.

“It won’t do any good to interrogate him, his senses are completely destroyed. He won’t feel any pain.”

“Right. That clever fellow knows well. It’s useless to inflict pain on me now, so it won’t be easy to hear anything from me.”

Osian looked at the man, then back at Albert.

“But not from him.”

Terence understood what Osian was trying to say.

They approached Albert. Aside from being restrained after a blow to the head, Albert seemed to be in better shape.

Albert’s trembling eyes turned to Terence and Osian.

“Terence Progenen, to allow such a lowly outsider in this sacred academy.”

Terence and Osian looked at each other.

It was one thing to be an asshole, but who the hell said anything about letting outsiders in?

Terence didn’t bother to point it out, so he cut to the chase.

“Professor Albert. It’s all over. Why don’t you just come clean and tell me everything?”

“Be honest? What are you talking about?”

“Are you really going to come out like this? I have a way of doing things.”

At Terence’s threat, Albert let out a hollow laugh.

“Pooh, for a subject who just barely subdued me without killing me. If you’re going to scare me, do it right. Have you ever tortured a man before?”

“Not me.”

Terence shrugged and gave way to Osian.

Osian stood in front of Albert.

“No matter what you do, you’ll never hear what you want…… ugh!”

As if he didn’t want to hear it, Osian ripped off the hem of Terence’s robe, bunched it up, and shoved it into his mouth.

“Don’t worry about it. I don’t need to hear it right now either.”

“Ew! Ew!”

Osian yanked Albert’s hair roughly from his face.

“Any minute now, you’ll be begging us to let you tell us everything.”

Albert’s eyes, so full of confidence, fluttered like an earthquake.

*

When the dust settled, Osian and Terence sat down separately to talk.

“I didn’t realize he was actually connected to the outside world.”

“Hah. It’s disturbing to hear it firsthand.”

Terence ran a hand through his hair out of habit. It was something he did whenever he felt unnecessarily frustrated and irritated.

Albert was hired by an outside organization to manufacture drugs inside the Academy.

And to his surprise, the test subjects were Academy students who were just beginning to learn magic.

“Maybe it’s not a criminal organization.”

“Really?”

“No matter how big the criminal organization is, there’s no way they’d do something this big in an academy that was built with the consent of the Magic Tower. Albert is no exception. A professor and the head of the research building, would he take such a risk?”

“You mean, there’s something else?”

“He blew everything else, but he never blew the whistle on who he was trying to deal with. It wasn’t because he was in a lot of pain.”

“So he was afraid of the people he was trading with…….”

“This is not normal. You need to get out of here.”

“What? No, wait. You’re telling me to leave now, and you’re not?”

“Of course I’m going to keep going. I’ve been asked to do this, so I’ll do what I can.”

Terence thought about it, and then made his intentions clear.

“I don’t intend to stop here, either.”

“It’s dangerous.”

“You don’t think I don’t know that? Look at this. An Academy professor is involved in this, and you expect me to look the other way and do nothing? No, I can’t.”

Terence’s eyes burned with anger.

Given his personality, he would not sleep well tonight.

“I won’t stop you if that’s what you want. But if you’re going to do it, do it the other way.”

“Another way?”

“I assume you’ve recovered the drugs they were trying to trade?”

“Yeah. I got it.”

“Analyze it. Where it came from, what ingredients it was made with, how it was processed. That alone could help us solve the case.”

“……I was going to do that.”

He hadn’t thought of that, judging by the slight delay in his answer but Osian didn’t bother to point it out, he just gave him the right advice.

“Besides, you’ll have to take responsibility for cleaning up after this. I’ll do my own research, and we can exchange information sooner or later.”

“Ha. I see.”

Terence finally agreed to Osian’s terms.

“I’ll leave you to clean up the mess, then.”

As he turned to leave, Terence called out to Osian from behind.

“Hey!”

“What’s wrong?”

“He, he…….”

Terence stuttered for a moment, hesitating.

He didn’t know if he should say it, and then he narrowed his eyes to see if his pride wouldn’t allow him to say it.

“Thank you!”

“…….”

Osian looked at Terence in surprise.

Terence blushed, as if embarrassed that he’d said it.

“What, why!”

“No, no. I didn’t think you’d say that.”

“I’m grateful, I’m grateful! Damn it, I didn’t want to say it, but I owe you my life, so I can’t help it!”

Ah. Osian wondered what he’s referring to, and then he realized he’s talking about the first time they were ambushed.

Osian didn’t save him with the intention of being thanked for it, but he brought it up anyway.

“Instead, you’ll never say that again, you’ll just have to wait and see!”

Osian smirked.

What the hell was he going to wait and see?

“I’ll look forward to you saving me someday.”

*

A few days passed after I finished my work at the Academy.

After all that had happened inside, things were still quiet outside.

‘Maybe they’re trying to blow this off inside the Academy.’

It would be a disgrace to the Grand Cloister if it was discovered that one of the heads of the research wing had done such a dangerous thing.

Wizards place a great deal of importance on that sort of thing, which is probably why they’re trying to cover it up so thoroughly.

‘At least there were no other victims.’

In Slaine’s case, he was the brave student who saw the incident and tried to report it, but was injured, rather than the buyer who tried to use the drugs.

This undoubtedly improved his reputation within the academy.

Even Raymond, who usually bullied him, now runs for the hills whenever he sees Slaine.

‘Hopefully he’s not broken after what he’s been through.’

For now, he’s resting in his hospital room, so we’ll have to wait and see.

Just then, Osian’s beacon pinged.

It was the one Terence had handed him, asking him to meet him later.

‘It’s about time.’

Osian emerged from his residence.

He’d arranged to meet Terence at the Grand Cloister, in the 30th District.

It was a deserted café outside the Academy.

When he arrived, Terence was there first, waiting for him.

Osian casually sat down across from him.

“You’re here?”

“Yes.”

Osian asked, studying Terence’s complexion.

“Judging by your reaction, you’re not happy with the results.”

Terence’s face scrunched up at the blatant point, except it wasn’t anger at Osian.

“Damn it. I’ve bitten off more than I can chew.”

“What happened?”

“Like you said, I had the Academy forensically examine the drugs. I thought they’d figure it out quickly.”

Terence remembered what had happened to him.

“I thought the results would be quick, it couldn’t be that hard, so I thought it was all over, and then!”

A fist slammed down on the table.

A staff member approached to ask what was wrong, but Osian waved him away, saying he was fine.

It was a good thing there were no customers, or it would have drawn too much attention.

“I checked later and found out that the drugs I handed over were stolen.”

“Stolen? Was the security really that lax?”

“It couldn’t have been lax. I was careful, just in case, but it just disappeared.”

Osian closed his eyes and crossed his arms.

Listening to Terence’s story, he could see where this was going.

“So this is another insider’s work. If he’s the kind of backer who can hire Professor Albert, it wouldn’t be a big deal to have other people destroy the evidence.”

“Exactly. They’re gone, except for the evidence, and I don’t think they’re trying to mess with me right now…….”

“Of course not. You’re the most famous of the Academy’s students.”

“I……didn’t realize the Grand Cloister was this rotten.”

This was why Terence was angry.

The betrayal of knowing that the darkness of the Academy, the place he had taken so much pride in, contained such filth.

He didn’t notice it when he didn’t know, but once he did, he realized it’s everywhere.

“It’s like that in any organization, the bigger you get, the deeper the shadows.”

“……I’m sorry, I promised I could do it, and I failed.”

Terence bowed his head to Osian.

The loss of the clue he’d just gotten so close to must be burning him up inside more than out.

Osian looked at him, then thrust the papers in front of him.

“This?”

“Read it.”

Terence took the papers from Osian.

His eyes widened as he read the first page, and his face grew serious.

Terence used his magic. A wall of sound erected around them, and their figures became blurred from the outside.

“Where did you get this?”

The papers Osian handed him listed the ingredients for the drug they’d confiscated from Albert that day.

How it was made, how it was manufactured, everything.

“I had a specialized forensics team examine it.”

“How the hell did you……?”

Instead of answering, Osian flashed a faint smile.

Terrence’s eyes widened when he recognized it.

“You, at that time……did you sneak it out?”

“I didn’t steal it, I just moved it to my pocket.”

“That’s what it is.”

Terence’s shoulders sagged in anger, then he let out a wry laugh.

The clue he’d thought he’d blown it was right back in front of him.

“This is the right one, right?”

“Yes, it is. I paid good money for it, so it can’t be wrong.”

“Ha, I’m going back. Why here and not somewhere else?”

As expected of a drug that causes magical powers to run wild, the ingredients that went into it were by no means common.

Some of them contained quite dangerous toxic substances, but he remembered where most of them were distributed.

“District 45, that’s where…….”

Terence swallowed hard.

I could tell what he meant by District 45 from the way he stuttered.

It made sense, considering how districts above 40 were perceived in Tirna.

“This isn’t just any gang, this is a mega-gang that covers the entire district.”

No, it wasn’t even a gang.

Underneath it all, they maintained their own social system.

Terence scratched his head roughly with his hand in irritation.

Osian pointed out.

“You’re pulling your hair out.”

Normally, he would have shrugged it off and done it again, but Terence shuddered.

It was a strange reaction that hit home.

Osian narrowed his eyes.

“You can’t be…….”

“Oh, no!”

Terence hastened to defend himself.

Osian gave him a pitying look.

“Oh, no.”