Chapter 23

“Do you have a death wish?”

A murderous line.

In New Valhalla City’s megacorp, an executive was no different from a medieval noble.

When someone of Aaron’s standing uttered such words, they became frighteningly realistic.

His one remark was nothing like the reckless death threats thrown around by the vagrants in Sector E. It was on a completely different level—almost a different dimension entirely.

“W-what, what are you saying…!?”

“Wait a moment, Aaron Stingray. Do you think this looks like a joke right now?”

Donovan, frightened by the Crown Prince’s threat, was shielded by Vladimir, who instead raised his voice in his defense.

“This is an official occasion, Aaron Stingray. If it were just the two of us in private, that’s different. But shouldn’t you be more careful with your words here?”

“Vladimir.”

Aaron shot him a glare.

“You’d better shut your mouth and stop provoking me any further. I’m starting to feel like killing you along with him.”

“…Are you being serious right now?”

“There’s no reason I wouldn’t be.”

At that moment—

A black glove wrapped over Aaron’s hand.

Militech’s side reacted quickly.

“…Damn it!”

Clack! Clack!

Militech’s aides all drew their guns in unison. They blocked Vladimir’s front, slowly increasing the distance between him and Aaron.

Aaron, however, didn’t change his expression in the slightest, only glaring at both Vladimir and Donovan.

Maria also kept her composure, moving Iri behind her.

A tense standoff.

The one who broke it was Vladimir.

Pushing aside the aides blocking him, he strode forward.

“Aaron Stingray! What the hell are you thinking? Do you want to start a war or something? What reason do you have to escalate things this far…!”

“This far? That’s amusing. Were you actually thinking something like ‘this looks doable’ with those little toys of yours?”

“W-what…?”

“Get your head straight, Vladimir. Do you even know who you’re dealing with right now? And who that brat next to you just insulted?”

“Wait a second…”

Aaron’s words left Vladimir visibly shocked.

“Don’t tell me you were thinking of taking that Fallen-sector brat and putting on a [Showcase]?”

“Watch your words. She’s not just some ‘Fallen-sector brat.’ She’s ‘with the Stingray Foundation.’”

“You’re serious right now…!”

Vladimir studied Aaron’s face, then his expression hardened. He barked an irritable order to his men.

“…Damn it. Lower your weapons! Now!”

“B-but, Young Master!”

“Shut up! Don’t you realize you’re making this worse?!”

At Vladimir’s command, Militech’s side reluctantly stood down. In response, the leather glove on Aaron’s hand melted away as if it had seeped into the air.

Just when it seemed the situation was over—

Smaaack—!

A sound that rang loud through the training room.

Vladimir was looking down at Donovan, who had collapsed to the floor, breathing heavily through gritted teeth.

He had just slapped Donovan across the face.

“…P-President?”

Donovan’s expression was one of complete confusion, as if he couldn’t understand why he’d just been struck.

To him, Vladimir shouted even louder.

“Speak clearly! Was what you said true?”

“W-what do you mean, sir?”

“I’m asking if there wasn’t any lie in your earlier statement!”

“Huh? Ah, th-that, well…”

“If there’s even a trace of a lie mixed in, I’ll punish you myself. So speak only the truth!”

Donovan’s eyes were full of fear.

He looked completely lost in the situation, but at least seemed to realize that telling another lie here would leave him with no way out.

“I-I’m sorry. I lied. I… I started the trouble first. B-but that woman—!”

“Shut up! That’s enough!”

Silencing Donovan, Vladimir turned to Aaron and bowed his head slightly.

“We’ll apologize for this one, Aaron Stingray. I’ll make sure to properly re-educate our students…”

“You really think that’s enough?”

Aaron cut him off.

Vladimir frowned, his tone turning sharper.

“…You’re really going to take it this far?”

“You know my personality well enough.”

“Too well for my own good, damn it.”

“If we end it like this, our side will take a considerable loss. Do you think I’ll just let that go?”

“So you really want to settle this to the end.”

At Aaron’s words, Vladimir bit his lip in frustration.

“Damn it!”

He spat a curse, then turned his back and strode away from the scene. Militech’s aides and Donovan hesitated for a moment, then hurried after him.

But then—he stopped.

Vladimir turned back to glare at Aaron and muttered,

“I hope that kid is worth it. You’ll have to take responsibility.”

“Of course. Let’s say in thirty minutes.”

“Then I’ll decide the [Showcase] format. Damn it, what a way to start the first day…”

With that, Vladimir finally left the training ground. Only after the uproar subsided did silence return.

Aaron let out a deep sigh and looked at Iri.

“…Iri Elisbell.”

“Huh? W-what is it?”

“It’s your turn now. Get ready.”

And just like that, Aaron turned and walked away.

My turn?

What on earth was that supposed to mean?

It felt like something big had just happened, but I couldn’t keep up with what was going on.

As I stood there blankly, confused, Maria grabbed my arm.

“Come with me, Miss Elisbell.”

“Huh? Wh-where are we going?”

“Don’t ask questions. Just follow me. Thirty minutes isn’t much time to prepare.”

With no choice, Iri let herself be dragged along by Maria.

She still had no idea what was going on, but her sharp instincts told her one thing for certain.

…It really seemed like I’d caused trouble.

And not just a little—something big.

The place Maria led me to was the girls’ locker room attached to the large indoor training hall, Room 147-A.

She sat me down on a bench between the lockers, then, holding a data cable that I had no idea where it had come from, approached me.

Looking closer, I realized the cable was actually extending from her wrist.

“First, I’ll check your biometric monitor, Miss Iri. I’ll connect it to the socket, so could you turn your head?”

“W-wait a second! Explain first! What on earth is going on right now? And what’s that [Showcase] thing?”

“You really don’t know anything, do you?”

“You’d have to explain it for me to know, wouldn’t you?!”

“……”

At Iri’s reply, Maria nodded and took a seat. Then she met Iri’s eyes directly and began to speak.

“[Showcase] is a kind of proxy battle.”

“P-proxy battle?”

“As the name suggests, ‘Showcase’ is a battle of pride between corporations. Think of it as a mock battle fought by students. It started long ago as a kind of bet the upper class made half out of curiosity, and it’s since become a tradition.”

In the middle of speaking, Maria’s eyes glimmered faintly—she must have received an email.

“The match format just came through. It seems the winner will be decided by the result of the final one-on-one mock battle.”

“So I’m going to be fighting that Donovan guy? Perfect!”

“Are you confident?”

“Why does that matter?”

What mattered was that I could officially stomp him without worrying about being expelled from the Academy.

Of course, I had no intention of losing, but even if I did, I’d be satisfied as long as I could land a few solid hits on him.

At Iri’s answer, Maria shook her head.

“I think you’re misunderstanding something. You have no room to back out, Miss Elisbell. If you lose, at the very least you’ll be stripped of your scholarship, and possibly expelled from the Academy entirely.”

“What? That’s ridiculous…!”

“Depending on the result, there’s also a possibility Stingray’s stock will plummet. In that case, responsibility must be taken. It could even become difficult for the Young Master to remain as chairman.”

“W-wait. We’re just talking about students brawling with each other, aren’t we? How could something like that cause a stock crash or the chairman losing his position—”

“Miss Elisbell.”

Haah.

Maria let out a short sigh.

“Do you know how much the sponsoring corporations invest over four years to raise a single Academy scholarship student?”

“Uh… well…”

“It varies greatly between students, but it’s roughly from a minimum of 100 million Credits to as much as 1 billion Credits.”

“O-one billion…!”

Iri’s eyes widened at the kind of figure she had never even heard before.

She suspected Maria might be exaggerating to scare her, but Maria didn’t look like she was lying.

“That’s direct costs like salary, meals, and clothing. Then there are indirect costs like personnel management and equipment and facility maintenance. And that’s excluding the cost of personal modular equipment.”

“It goes up from there?!”

“For fourth-years, the average cost of modules and personal gear per person is 50 million Credits. If high-level Arcane Modules are included in the modular setup, the price becomes meaningless to calculate.”

“Whoa…”

People often called Adaptees human weapons, but she’d had no idea they actually cost that much.

With that kind of money, each student really was worth about as much as a tank or a helicopter.

“The Adaptee industry is one of the most important sectors sustaining this society. Whether or not you have a single excellent Adaptee soldier can determine whether you can establish another production colony.”

“…Now I understand a bit more.”

Not just an ordinary student, but a tactical weapon.

Depending on individual talent, they could even display strategic-weapon-level skills. No wonder corporations reacted so sensitively to issues involving students.

“So I almost broke a walking bar of gold.”

“Likewise, Chairman Aaron wanted to prevent strange rumors from attaching to the scholarship student he personally selected.”

If word spread that a luxury handbag from a department store was made by Sector E junkies instead of a professional artisan, who would buy it?

It was the same here.

If rumors spread that a scholarship student handpicked by the foundation’s chairman came from the Fallen Sector, it would make people doubt the very judgment of the sponsoring corporation.

Naturally, the corporation’s entire image would drop with it.

“So in the end, it’s all about money…”

Are you hurt anywhere?

Aaron’s face as he asked that suddenly came to mind, then vanished like heat haze.

‘Well, that’s what it must’ve been.’

In the end, it was only to protect his corporation’s image. As if he’d really acted out of concern for me.

‘Nothing to be disappointed about.’

I hadn’t expected anything in the first place.

In New Valhalla City, it was common sense that Stingray people saw others only as ‘products.’

…So then, what was this?

This strange heaviness inside.

“……”

“What’s wrong?”

“No, anyway, the conclusion’s simple. I just have to win.”

If I lost, not only would I lose my scholarship, I might be expelled from the Academy. Aaron would probably also take responsibility and step down.

Throwing the match just to screw over someone with the Stingray name didn’t sound too bad.

But that would take me infinitely farther from my ‘true goal.’

“It can’t be helped. I spilled the water, so I have to wipe it up. Whatever the reason, the chairman did cover for me.”

“……”

Iri spoke.

Maria showed a strange reaction—her expression barely changed, but Iri didn’t miss it.

“Why? Is there some problem?”

“It’s nothing.”

“…?”

Iri tilted her head, but Maria didn’t answer. She simply fell silent, lost in thought.

“……”

She had talked to Iri about human weapons, but—

No matter how you looked at it, the fact remained that Academy students were still just young people around twenty years old.

Gather a bunch of hot-blooded youths together, and problems would arise almost every other day.

And when such problems occurred, they were usually handled by on-site staff according to regulations, giving punishments as prescribed.

From the start, if the highest authority in a sponsoring foundation personally stepped in with a [Showcase] every time students fought, the Academy could never function properly.

In other words—

Even if she was a scholarship student he personally selected, this time Aaron’s reaction could be called excessive.

‘Then why?’

Since a [Showcase] was an official mock battle, it was something both corporations found considerably burdensome.

A kind of betting gamble.

If you won, you could reap significant benefits in many ways, but if you lost, it could lead to fatal consequences. If you weren’t truly confident in winning, it was wise not to stake anything at all.

‘I can understand Militech’s confidence, but…’

Donovan von Delay was the son of a high-ranking executive in Militech’s Security Division. His skills went without saying, and because of Militech’s internal politics, he was a talent they could not simply discard.

In other words, a core prospect for Militech.

But Iri was different.

A troublemaker from the Fallen Sector. A hand they could throw away at any time if they wanted. Yet Aaron was holding on to her until the end.

Why was that?

Why was Aaron going so far as to hold a [Showcase] just to strip Iri of the ‘Fallen’ stigma?

What did he see in Iri that made him confident in her victory?

Did this girl Iri really have that much value?

It had to be confirmed with her own eyes.

“I think that’s enough explanation. May I check your biometric monitor now?”

“Ah, yes. Here.”

Iri turned her head without suspicion.

The back of her neck, hidden beneath her ash-grey hair, was exposed. In the center of her skin was a socket slot for inserting data chips and module chips.

Maria immediately connected the data cable there and, with Iri’s approval, began receiving her biometric data.

[Bio Check]

Nervous System: Very Healthy

Muscular System: Very Healthy

Endocrine System: Very Healthy

Respiratory System: Very Healthy

·

·

·

Digestive System: Caution Required (Overeating)

‘Nothing particularly unusual here.’

Gaining no special insight from the biometric data, Maria moved on to checking nanomachines and modules.

[Access Approved]

[Downloading Module Data]

[Download Complete]

At last, Iri’s modular setup information appeared in Maria’s view. A strange tension welled up in her, and she steadied herself to examine it closely—

‘W-what in the world…’

The moment she saw the first line.

Maria couldn’t help but be shocked.

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