THE next day, I woke up bright and early thanks to the birds, and I made breakfast and lunch in advance. After I enjoyed a quiet meal with Prince Rena, we headed for class. Ehr was already there and greeted me with the same high energy as always.
“Morning, Misha!”
“Good morning, Ehr.”
The topic quickly shifted to my private instructor.
“What kind of teacher are they?” Ehr asked.
“He’s a very young one at nineteen. He’s also a great teacher. He broke down difficult concepts for me so that they were easier to digest. I think I can keep up with today’s lessons!”
“That’s good to hear.” He slumped his shoulders a tad. “I was going to show you my notes in exchange for that bento…”
“Oh, I’d still like to see your notes. At least until the bell for class rings.”
“Seriously? Why?!”
“Instructors can teach the same subjects differently. It’s important to have different viewpoints to learn from, I think.”
“Oh, good point!” Ehr happily handed his notes over to me.
“Would you like me to lend you mine?” I offered.
“Then it won’t be a fair exchange for your bento.”
“If you say so…”
I took Ehr’s notes and read them carefully before homeroom. The first class of the day was general magic taught by Professor Girm. It was a subject that gave students a shallow yet vast understanding of the concept of magic, briefly touching upon all points he deemed important. For today’s lesson, we’d learn about how to find magic stones and use any remaining time in the lesson to actually search for some. This was the first time I’d have a class outside, and I was excited for it.
“Two students will form a pair to conduct the scavenger hunt,” Professor Girm said. “Students will draw lots for pairs. It’s one draw per student, so don’t take multiple.”
A box with lots circulated around the class, and I picked one when it reached me. Students who drew the same picture would form a pair.
“What picture did you get, Misha?” Ehr asked.
“A cat.” I showed him.
“Darn. I got a dog.”
“Aw… Such a pity.”
“Seems like a good chance for you, though. You want to make a hundred friends, right?” He smiled.
“Right.”
I peeled Gem from the wall and rolled it up into a sphere to carry under my arm. I nervously awaited my partner. The professor began reading a list of animals he’d written down.
“Next, students who drew cats!” he boomed.
“Here!” a dignified voice echoed.
I turned toward the voice and spotted Alice, the duke’s haughty daughter. I reluctantly replied as well, secretly regretting that I was paired with the worst person in class for me. I expected her to frown and grimace with displeasure when she found out I was her partner, but she approached me with indifference. She looked like she was in a daze, her face pale.
“Um, are you okay?” I asked.
“Pardon?” Alice replied.
“You look like you’ll faint any moment.”
“I’m okay.”
It was unlike her to give such a normal response. Usually, she’d glare at me as though the mere presence of a lesser noble offended her eyes, and her thorny remarks also pierced my heart. It was almost concerning to see her so neutral.
“Are you really okay?” I asked. “It’ll cause a scene if you faint during the outdoor exercise…”
“I’m fine. You’ve got nothing to worry about,” Alice insisted.
I couldn’t do anything more since she insisted that she was okay. Just to be safe, I also told the professor that Alice looked unwell. Professor Girm exchanged a few words with her, but ultimately, she was allowed to join without issue.
For this exercise, we would head to the forest—the school’s teleporting door would send us there. The door actually felt oddly familiar and reminded me of an anime that I’d watched when I was a kid.
“Anywhere…” I murmured.
“Is anything the matter?” Alice asked.
“Oh, uh, nothing.”
Back in my previous life, there was a cat robot who used a door similar to this, but making a parody of that wouldn’t earn a laugh from Alice, who obviously didn’t know about it. I chased away my old memories and quietly waited for our turn.
“Next, Team Cat,” the professor called.
“Yessir,” I replied.
The professor opened the door, and Alice and I held hands so that we wouldn’t get separated. The moment I stepped through, the scenery changed in a flash.
“Wow!”
This teleportation was more seamless than the scrolls or spells that I’d used before; at once, I was surrounded by a dense forest. When I turned around, the door I had come out of had already vanished.
“Alice, is this your first time using a door like this?” I asked.
“No, I’ve got one at home,” she replied.
“I see…”
Well, she is rich and powerful, I thought. I was certain that she lived a life of opulent luxury that I could only ever dream of. Gem had been nestled under my arm for the trip, and I placed it back on the ground, only for my familiar to take its usual spherical shape. When I asked it to follow me so that it wouldn’t get lost, it proudly bounced.
“Let’s search for the stone,” I said.
“Let’s,” Alice agreed.
“I’ll use the spell first. Could you handle the second half of this exercise, Alice?”
“Sure.”
I took out my wand and chanted a spell to sense nearby magical energy.
“Seek mana, Inspicere!” I chanted.
Light emanated from the tip of my wand like a fish finder and spread out all around me. If a magic stone were nearby, my spell would react to it. The professor had stated that he hid a magic stone in this forest, and I waved my wand left and right in search of any sort of signal. Gem, who rolled in front of me, suddenly flickered.
“Gem? Is something the matter?” I asked.
It turned around with a magic stone in its hand.
“Gem! Amazing work!” I cried. “You did it!”
We were instructed to use magic to find the stones, but there was no explicit rule prohibiting students from using familiars. I considered this a huge win, as we found the stone without issue.
“You’re so smart! You’re so good!” I praised emphatically.
My familiar squinted happily and flickered with delight. Since we only needed one stone per pair, our work was done. I smiled and turned around to face Alice, who walked behind me.
“We found the stone!” I reported.
“Huh? Oh. Well, that’s nice,” Alice muttered.
She was clearly dazed and not all there. I couldn’t watch her standoffish behavior any longer and voiced my concern.
“You’re acting odd,” I said. “Usually, you’d be annoyed that I found a stone before you.”
“That’s not true,” Alice replied. “You’ve been working very hard, so I’m not surprised.”
She was so kind and honest that it almost scared me. When I inspected her closely, I noticed her eyes were red and puffy—she’d been crying. She must not have rested well the night before.
“You should call it for today and head home,” I insisted.
“Why are you so worried about me?” Alice asked.
“We’re partners, aren’t we? We’re both on Team Cat.”
At once, tears rolled down Alice’s pale cheeks.
“Huh?! What?! Why?!” I gasped.
I wasn’t sure what to do, but Gem swiftly used its appendage to reach into my pocket and give me my handkerchief. I took it from my familiar and wiped her tears.
“Ugh… Ngh…” she sobbed.
What in the world happened to her? I gently rubbed her back, hoping to soothe her and stop her crying. She claimed that she wasn’t sick or anything, and though she looked pale and frail to me, she firmly denied that she was ill. She seemed like the type who tried to tough it out even if she was unwell, but she had no reason to do so against a professor; something else must’ve caused her to lose her usual gusto and energy. As she sobbed away, I rubbed her back and waited for her to regain her cool.
“What happened?” I asked.
“This…is my problem,” she muttered.
“That might be so, but you shouldn’t keep it all bottled up inside you. Talking about it might lead to some kind of solution.”
Alice pursed her lips at my soft words before she slowly but surely began to speak. “M-My familiar, Kitty, has been missing since last night…” she revealed.
“What?!” I gasped.
No wonder she cried when I mentioned that we were on Team Cat. It must’ve reminded her of her familiar.
“I’ve been brushing her every night, and I hug her when I sleep,” Alice said. “But my familiar vanished last night…” She reported it to her dorm parent and the prefect, and they all searched for Kitty, but she was nowhere to be found.
“Isn’t your familiar tied to your mana?” I asked.
It was like a leash on a pet. If we called for our familiar, they had to appear in front of us.
“I tried it, but Kitty wouldn’t answer my call,” Alice sniffed.
If the familiar was too far away, it was more difficult to summon it to us.