As they walked, Mellaina posed a question.
"Professor, have you ever felt like no matter how hard you try, you're just not good enough? Like no matter how many times you reach, you can never quite grasp the light at the end of the tunnel?"
Her question made Damian pause for a moment.
He pondered about whether or not to tell her the truth, and after a lengthy debate with himself.
"Yes, I have. Plenty of times..."
"Hm, that's surprising."
"How so?"
Mellaina smiled as she walked close to a dying rose. She gathered a bit of magical energy through her fingers and touched it. After a while, her magic enveloped the rose, breathing life into it and returning it to its beautiful form once more.
"You never seemed to be the type..."
"With all due respect, you've only known me for twenty minutes, Miss Mellaina. I don't think we're close enough for you to just say that."
"Ufufu, so you've been counting your moments with me? My, oh my, you're making me blush~."
"Please don't change the subject."
She breathed more magical energy into the rose until many more flowers began to grow alongside it. Soon a cascade of vibrant colors began to bloom, and as the breeze of the night blew at them, the petals flew into the sky creating a sight for sore eyes.
"You know, I've always had a conundrum throughout my whole life, professor. I want to be able to preserve the beautiful flowers that I so love for all eternity, but no matter how many times I try, they always seem to die on me."
"Hm, I never thought I'd hear an elf say that..."
Elves were creatures that had a strong bond and connection with nature. It was even said that they were created by the goddess for that sole purpose alone. Their entire reason was to protect nature from all harm... despite this though, they respect the natural cycle of the forest.
Whatever blooms shall fall.
Whatever breathes will soon be in the dirt.
And all shall return to the Yggdrasil tree.
That was the code that they believed in. One that they would fight to the death for.
"You aren't the first one to tell me that, professor. Our elders would usually scold me for believing such heretical thoughts. But is it really so wrong to not want to see something you love wither away into nothingness?"
Saying this, she looked directly into Damian's eyes.
"What do you think, professor? Surely, you've had someone in your life that made you think that way?"
"..."
Of course, he did.
At a certain point in his life, all he ever wanted was to be with Nova. Their relationship may be twisted in the eyes of others, but if he were granted a wish, then he'd choose to walk the path of bloodshed with her for all eternity.
But...
"What is destined to die would inevitably die, Miss Mellaina. Even with the most powerful of spells, it's impossible to defy fate, that is just how the world goes. In my opinion, you should follow the advice of your elders and erase such thoughts..."
As if on cue, the magical energy that was enveloping the flowers slowly began to dim, and the life that was blossoming from them earlier began to slowly die out.
"Fufu, as expected. I knew you'd say the same thing. But I've tried way too many times already to stop, professor."
Letting out a chuckle, she reached for her pockets and took out a familiar dagger.
Seeing it immediately sent Damian on guard...
"While I was strolling through the slums of the Island a couple of days back, I found this really nice dagger on my way. It seemed to be Imperial made, and since you were also once a soldier, I figured to give this to you as a gift..."
Her smile made it clear she knew more than she let on, which confused Damian. There was no way anyone could have sensed him at that moment. Yet, by handing him the dagger, she was clearly mocking him...
"...Thanks."
His thoughts began to race as he slowly reached for it.
And it crossed his mind.
"Should I kill her?"
Despite her power, Damian felt confident that he could eliminate her right here and now. The problem was that suspicion would immediately fall upon him the moment he did so. He thought about doing it another time and setting up a plan so he'd be left off the hook, but...
"This girl is giving me the creeps... I dunno what she'd do by then."
There's a possibility that she would jeopardize his mission at that point. It'd be good if he could nip things in the bud right now...
He looked at his cold reflection in the dagger before looking back at her.
She was already walking ahead without a care in the world. All he needed was to put his back into it, and he could pierce even her barrier and stab her head...
"Professor..."
"Hm?"
Mellaina stopped in her tracks and looked back at him. A glint of happiness sparkled in her eyes as she held the withering rose in her hands.
"I will always be by your side. No matter what."
"..."
He was speechless.
For some reason, her gaze immediately erased all thoughts of hostility. It wasn't a magical spell or anything, it's just that her words seemed to carry so much weight and promise that Damian instinctively knew that she was telling the truth. But at this point, it only raised more questions than answers for him...
The rest of the walk toward her dorms was silent.
Even as they arrived, Mellaina only sent him off with a thanks and a smile before heading in.
"Mellaina... just who in the hell are you..."
Damian muttered as he began heading back to his room.
"-?"
Out of the corner of his eyes though, he saw a shadow that was looming in the distance. Judging from how they were able to skillfully conceal their mana and what had just happened earlier, it's quite possible that it was Sayaka.
He couldn't help but be impressed, not even he was that good at sneaking around when he was at her age. She's most likely plotting her revenge for her mistress, but Damian wasn't necessarily worried about it at the moment.
Her family was well-renowned in the underworld for their cautious nature and meticulous preparation when it came to doing their work. She wouldn't strike now unless she was practically assured of her victory.
"Haaa... what a pain."
He knew that he had to come up with a way to smooth things over fast, or else things would get really messy from here...
.
.
.
[---]
The second day had arrived, and the atmosphere of the classroom wasn't any better.
As much as everyone tried to ignore it, the tense atmosphere between Saika and Mellaina was still very much clear in the air. He already had a few ideas to put a stop to it, but he was still ironing out the fine details, so they were still forced to sit through class with it.
Putting that aside though, Damian was impressed that out of all the people, Mellaina was the only one not bothered by it.
"Alright folks, just as I explained yesterday, please make sure to complete your course schedule and submit it to me this week. If you don't complete it in time, then I'll have to randomly assign it for you, and trust me, you don't want that happening."
He took a sip from his cup of tea before continuing.
"If you have any problems, please come to me."
As he said this, a large shadow was cast over him.
He looked up and saw Sigrid looking at him with a proud smile.
"Teacher, me finish with the schedule."
"That's good, now you did make sure to include some of the required courses, right?"
"Yes!"
"Cool, just let me see if it's all good..."
It was, in fact, not good.
"...Sigrid, you can't just take physical and combat training courses for the entire semester, that's not how it works."
"Why? Everything besides combat boring! Sigrid like to throw hands. Sigrid like hunting and killing!"
"I get that, but you can't have it be your entire schedule. Tell you what, you can keep the combat training course with Professor Elise as well as another one of these, but you need to pick and change the others with some of the ones on this paper, okay?"
"Sigrid don't understand, but will try my best!"
"Good lad..."
He was honestly expecting him to punch his face through the wall after telling him something he couldn't do, but thankfully Sigrid was way more tame compared to the other beastkin that he'd met.
"Hello, hello, Professor Damian! How are ya?" Luna came in next with her schedule sheet.
"Good, good. What about you?"
"Eh, not too bad. So I've heard that the head dean talked to you yesterday about that little incident... how did it go?"
"Honestly, it went better than expected."
"That's good, that's good. Anyway, I learned a new trick today, professor. Look here."
She showed a card containing a king of hearts, and after flipping it back on her fingers, it became a joker...
"Pretty cool, right?"
"Hm, yeah, it's not bad. Your misdirection could use some work, but it was pretty nice."
"Hehe, I knew you'd appreciate it. Richard was a bit stingy when he saw it, I mean could you believe he called it-"
"Denied."
"Eh?"
Damian gave him a bright smile as he returned her schedule.
"You do remember me saying that you need to take at least one physical improvement course per semester, right?"
"Oh come on, this is such baloney! This has to be an infringement of my human rights or something!"
"No, you read and signed the terms and conditions when you signed up here."
"Look at me, professor. This is the body of a delicate princess that'll be crushed if I join a physical improvement course!"
"So now you're playing the princess card? Anyways, you still need to change some of it and take physical courses."
"Kgh... alright, fine..."
Luna took the paper and seemed to scribble something on it before placing it back on his desk.
It still had the same courses as before, the only difference was that there was a silver coin at the top of the paper...
"What do you think, professor? Surely it must be all good now, is it?" she said as she gave a wink.
Damian looked around the classroom for a moment before slowly taking the coin and putting it in his pocket.
"Hehe, thank you so much for understanding, professor-"
"Change your schedule please."
"...Can I at least have my coin bac-"
"No."
Luna ended up scurrying back to Richard in defeat.