Thinking logically, it made sense that their second task was easier. There simply weren’t as many personal belongings as there were documents.
“Oh, my centrifuge. It’s broken…”
Picking up a piece of equipment lying at his feet, Kunon sighed.
Indeed, the number of personal items was relatively small. It seemed like it wouldn’t take very long to complete the sorting itself. It was just that many of the items were damaged.
Desks, lab equipment, pens, inkpots. Small bits of rubble from Building 11 were scattered among them, though the larger pieces had been cleared out already.
Some of the students’ belongings were fine, but many were not.
This was their next trial. Soff, who had guided them to this second classroom, gestured toward one of the room’s corners.
“Things that might have become dangerous when mixed in with other items, like potions, catalysts, magic tools, and such, are divided up over here. Roughly speaking, mind you.”
Even a cursory presorting was very much appreciated; compared to the misery the students had just endured, the situation they now found themselves in would be a breeze.
“Bael, would you mind retrieving any Spell Vaults?”
“Can do.”
Everything in this classroom was someone’s personal property. None of it belonged to Bael, who didn’t work out of Building 11, so Kunon tasked him with collecting objects he would recognize.
“Now, then.”
Kunon’s lab, the empty classroom he had been renting, had contained quite a few of his belongings. He had kept a lot of lab equipment—like the broken centrifuge in his hands—in that room. Who knew how much of it had survived? If even half was still in working order, he’d consider himself lucky.
“If anyone finds a locked desk, please let me know! It might be mine,” Kunon announced to his fellow inmates.
A few scattered replies came back to him, so he figured the others would probably do as he’d asked.
If nothing else, Kunon had to get his money back.
Several months ago, development on the Spell Vault had begun. Constantly busy throughout that period, Kunon had fallen behind on paying his maid, Rinko, her salary.
It had just totally slipped his mind. And since she could tell at a glance that Kunon had a lot going on, Rinko had found the matter difficult to bring up with him.
He would come home exhausted, do the bare minimum of his end-of-day routine, and go straight to bed. Then, the next morning, he would return to school still weighed down with fatigue. Day after day, this continued.
On top of that, Rinko figured that it was extremely unlikely Kunon was simply trying to get out of paying her. Even if he was, all she would have to do was request her wages from the Gurion estate. That was why she had simply brushed off his tardiness.
Kunon was totally focused on magic, and Rinko had decided not to say anything that might trouble him.
Fortunately, she had set some funds aside before the project’s development began, so their living expenses were covered. Other than her own salary, they had more than enough to pay for what they needed. Other than her own salary, of course.
The very moment Kunon had cheerfully announced that the project was over, Rinko made her demand: It was time to settle accounts.
“There are quite a few desks…”
In order to pay his maid’s salary, Kunon had to recover the money he’d saved up in his lab. That was his number one priority. Without it, he was going to be served nothing but bitter vegetables for dinner from then on.
Rinko had even threatened to withhold his bacon for a while, so from Kunon’s perspective, it was a matter of life and death. In fact, in recent days, the bacon she did serve him was being sliced more and more thinly. It was like paper.
Rinko was just about fed up with waiting, it seemed.
Throughout the Spell Vault’s development, Kunon kept making money via his business operations. He had simply continued shoving it into his lab desk’s drawer. It had to be around here somewhere.
“This is more like cleaning than sorting,” Shilto said, and Kunon agreed.
The previous task had involved toiling away in a half-hunched position that was murder on one’s lower back. This, however, looked like it would take way more physical labor.
Shilto turned to face Soff. “Professor, if you happen to have time, would you mind helping us?”
“Hmm? Ah…right. It shouldn’t take long with this many people, so I’ll lend a hand, too.”
Supervisor Shilto had successfully captured a new prisoner. She was a capable jailer, indeed.
“Oh! My underwear!”
“Underwear…?! Wait, those aren’t for men, you idiot! Who the hell do they belong to?!”
“They’re mine!”
“Why do you wear such obscene undergarments?!”
“Oh, shut up! I like having clean panty lines!”
What an outrageous conversation, Kunon thought.
Words exchanged between men didn’t excite him at all. They did make him laugh, though.
Compared to their previous ordeal, this one was like paradise. He felt a newfound sense of freedom. Kunon was sure the rest of the students he had labored alongside felt the same.
“…Underwear that gives you clean panty lines…?”
Even the Saint, who was never perturbed by anything, reacted to the conversation.
Perhaps in her own way, she too was remembering the pain of their sorting nightmare and savoring their newfound liberation.
…Yes, that must be it.
After all, she couldn’t simply be curious about underwear. Right?
The sorting and cleaning were done by evening.
“The school will reimburse you for anything that was broken, so be sure to submit your applications. Doesn’t matter if you’re asking for the cost of repair or replacement.”
Soff, who had assisted them until the very end, made this announcement with a tired expression before leaving the classroom.
“It’s over…,” one of the other students commented.
The documents were sorted.
There were still things that they would have to do individually, like putting their papers in sequential order. However, they had overcome the most difficult task.
Then there were their personal effects. Quite a few of them were broken, but nothing was missing, and above all, there weren’t that many of them.
Dividing the items up by what was bound for the trash and what could be salvaged had taken hardly any time at all. The next step of the process would come after the reconstruction of Building 11. Once it was completed, their belongings would be moved in.
It had been a lot of hard work. Kunon had wanted to give up countless times, and some people had even attempted escape.
The nightmare had lasted for about two weeks, and it had brought together the students of Building 11, despite their having nothing else in common beyond being based out of the same building. Technically, Bael was there too. And Shilto.
Perhaps because of this shared experience, a curious sense of camaraderie was starting to emerge. The whole thing had been an awful, hideous, unbearable hell. So why did Kunon feel just a smidgen of sadness now that it was over?
Unless another freak accident like this took place, there was a chance this exact group of people would never again wind up together. Their magic attributes, research subjects, specialties, hobbies—even their taste in underwear—were all entirely different. In other circumstances, they might not have ever had anything to do with one another.
“Hey!”
Perhaps it wasn’t just Kunon that thought so—maybe they were all feeling it.
As if to prove this, he heard someone say, “Why don’t we celebrate now that it’s finally over?! Let’s get wild tonight!”
Everyone threw up their hands at the idea. It seemed they were in agreement.
Kunon headed home first and let his maid know that he would be attending an afterparty. Then he went out to enjoy Dirashik’s nightlife, in complete disregard of his curfew.
It was Kunon’s first evening out on the town.
In reality, they simply ate dinner, hung out for a little while, then broke up on the earlier side, so it was a bit too wholesome to be called a “night out.”
Even so, Kunon felt like he had grown up just a little.
Reyes was troubled.
Yes—troubled.
Because of her emotional deficiency, not much had troubled her in the past. But right now, she had a problem.
“For me,” said Jirni, “it would be alcohol.”
Jirni loved drinking, so alcohol was the perfect gift for her. In her case, the only question was how many bottles to get, and which brand.
“I think a bouquet of flowers would be fine,” replied Philea, her other maid. “Even better if you grew them yourself.”
That was probably a safe choice, Reyes thought. She had been giving flowers as presents since she was little. They took a little time and effort to acquire but didn’t cost anything.
While she lived at the Great Temple, Reyes had received neither an allowance nor a salary. A flower bouquet was an easy, low-cost gift.
In the past, she had simply gone along with whatever others suggested. But…
“I feel like doing something different.”
…now she didn’t think that was good enough.
Was merely going with the flow an acceptable way to convey a sentiment?
That wasn’t something she had spent much time contemplating before, but it weighed heavily on her mind at the moment. It just didn’t seem right.
And so she was troubled.