08. The Five Pillars
The sun is bright.
The air is refreshing.
Today’s weather was very nice, as if to celebrate the new semester at the academy.
But I want to sleep.
Now, as a habit, I wake up early every morning without anyone waking me up, but when I wake up, I always think about wanting to sleep more.
While grumbling so much, his body was already sweating profusely in an empty lot near the dormitory in light sportswear.
It is a daily routine that has been running for over 10 years.
Wake up naturally before dawn, get ready, warm up, and prepare for the day.
There are times when I really don’t want to get up, but after I move my body properly and wash up, I feel good for the day.
It can be seen as similar to preheating the engine.
After moving my body frantically for about an hour and a half, I turned my head to go back to the dormitory, and I felt a presence.
“You..”
I made eye contact with River Seymour, who, like me, was wearing a tracksuit.
A few strands of sweat clung to his hair like gold threads on River’s face, who flushed with heavy breathing, as if he had been running just a while ago.
“Did you do morning exercise too?”
“Oh, I’m done now, so let’s go back.”
I was a bit embarrassed when I met you like this, so I tried to leave quickly.
“Wait a minute, they play pretty hard in the morning… Do you do this every day?”
Where did you start?
It seems that he was so absorbed that he didn’t pay attention to his surroundings..
“I do this every day.”
“I see… Where did you learn the sword?”
I also saw him cutting with
…. I watched it for at least 30 minutes…
Seeing that you’re sweating, it looks like you’ve been exercising before.
“I learned while being beaten up by my tiger-like parents. What am I supposed to do when I ask such a thing?”
“The basic skills are very solid, so if you have that level of skill, you wonder where you learned it.”
I’m not sure where I saw it, but I’m glad I did it lightly to warm up in the morning.
If I had started training in earnest, I would have been exposed to River before the semester started and I would have entered.
For a while, it was because I liked what looked like a beginning sword expert at best.
However, at most the beginning of the sword expert is the current state of the river.
As I turned to go back to the dorm, River grabbed my hand.
“I am River, River Seymour.”
A faint smile crept across River’s face as he said his name.
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Yesterday, he treated me so harshly, and after seeing him wake up early and exercise, he seems to have developed a crush on him again.
“Tell me your name. I’ve seen you since yesterday, and I’ll see you often in the future. It’s okay if I know your name, right?”
“That’s right… It’s Atlas Nemea.”
“Atlas Nemea…”
River chewed on my name and then said something.
“Can you play sparring with me?”
“I don’t like it”
I heard something strange, so I hurriedly ran out and went back to the dormitory.
How did the children of this generation become to start sword fighting as soon as they heard the name?
Starting tomorrow, I’ll have to find a place other than here.
In the first place, when I exercise, I can’t concentrate when other people see me.
——————————-
It is the day when the new semester begins in earnest.
What is a proper school year, making friends, doing stupid things, laughing a lot and having a lot of good experiences to remember?
It seems that I haven’t had a proper school days yet in this life.
It’s a bit unreasonable to say that the apprenticeship days were proper school days.
After spending my teens full of the smell of blood and sweat in the Knights, and now in my 20s… Even before the possession, the mental age is already in the 40s…
Let’s not think like an old man. The important thing is the age of the body.
I am still in my early twenties.
Let’s have a good school life now that we have an opportunity for the first time in a while.
As I was moving to the academy with that thought in mind, I started to hear whispers from somewhere.
“Ohh.. Five pillars..”
“They…?”
“I’ve never seen the Five Pillars…”
As the crowd parted like Moses parting the Red Sea, five students wearing freshman brooches walked as they drew everyone’s attention.
The Five Pillars are Lemnos of the Flame, Russell of the Rock, Albion of the Rain, Ferda of the Forest, and Phrygia of Gold, the pinnacle of the imperial nobility consisting of the five families.
Are they a family of meritorious subjects who have made great contributions since the empire was born, or they are masters of the tightrope, sharing history and doing useless nonsense to the extent that they do not offend the eyes of the emperor, and they enjoy enormous power to this day.
The academy is a microcosm of society, and those who already have the senses will do anything to be in the eyes of the five pillars.
Because joining their faction, a family of meritorious subjects, means riding the current.
‘It deserves to be targeted first by the devil.’
Therefore, the empire described in the novel where they all died was a crucible of chaos.
An infighting breaks out in a faction to try to seize power, and demons use the infighting to destroy the empire in earnest.
They self-destructed as the oppressed nobles pushed their desires just a little bit.
Edgar Ramnos, the most arrogant-looking muscular man with auburn hair, leads, followed by long blue-haired man with a cold look and man with dark green hair, Zeke Albion and Nivas Ferda.
Shaara Phrygia, who boasts long golden silky hair just like her family’s nickname, followed.
All of them had a dignified appearance as if it was natural for them to respect themselves, but there was only one person among them who showed a sign of being very uncomfortable.
It was Lucia Russell.
‘Lucia… I must have met them for the first time yesterday or today.’
It seemed that she was just expressionless and not saying anything, but I could feel that Lucia was very uncomfortable.
Lucia’s past has something in common with Atlas’s.
She Also, when she was young, she couldn’t even go out of her house and she just had to practice her practice.
In my case, she ran out of the house and joined the Imperial Knights and lived a different group life, but she is not Lucia.
For Lucia, who was confined to her house, her academy must be a very confusing place.
As a definite example of how she is not adapting properly even in her current five pillars, you can see that Lucia is chasing the most behind her group.
Praised as the heaviest sword in the empire, Russell is originally a prestigious family that competes for the 1st and 2nd ranks like Lemnos, so he should be at the forefront like Lemnos.
I want to get into class quickly, but I can’t even go properly because the crowd is divided in the center. Lucia and her eyes meet.
‘I’m watching a lot..’
I’m staring at this side so hard that I wonder if it’s going to break through.
“Hey!!!”
At that time, a clear voice that could be heard from afar caught my ear.
I wondered if he was talking to me, so let’s look back. River, who had the same expression as when we met on the first day… No, much more angry than then, grinned and ran towards me.
“You… Why are you running away!!”
“No, why are you chasing me?”
When I came to my senses, I was also running frantically to avoid getting caught by River.
Ah, yes, it was like this, I’m sorry, Andy-senpai.
After running a little further, our chase stopped only when we reached a place where the freshmen could not be seen.
Because at some point, I wondered why the hell I was running like this.
“Ha… That’s really fast… Let’s try sparring once?”
“Ha… Why am I doing that… Anyway, after taking classes, there will be a chance to compete once or twice.
“How do you feel when you practice like that every morning?”
River did not give up easily.
You wouldn’t have seen all of me flirting with a wooden sword in the morning.
However, I had no intention of accepting River’s request on my own.
“You learned the family’s swordsmanship, too. It’s so difficult to sparring once? Or do you have any complaints about me?”
“… I didn’t learn such grandiose things.”
It’s kind of hard to tell the truth.
I want to live like a regular student for a while, but then I have to deliberately lose by the edge in sparring or something.
But I have no intention of losing on purpose.
How can I say that because I am sorry that I will scratch my ego by smashing into a dog.
It’s better not to do it at all.
——————————
The freshmen were divided into five classes.
Looking at the roster, it seems that the five pillars were put into each class to adjust the balance.
My class is… This is Lucia Russell.
Amy and River are also in the same class.
‘Senior worked hard.’
As I told Andy yesterday, I have been assigned to a class.
I told you in advance because it would be difficult to focus mark if you became a different class, but it worked.
Being in the same class as Lucia is all at the checkout.
Of the five pillars, Lucia has the best personality.
The five pillars all have flaws in their personalities… If you have an addiction to armpits, a single general, a gumilbokgeom, and a communication disorder among psychopaths, you belong to the cutest axis.
As soon as he entered the class, his red hair stood out.
“You’re in the same class as Amy. Please take good care of me.”
“Yes… yes… “
Amy was greeted by her and stood upright in a nearby seat.
Sit not right next to me, but two seats away.
What happened?
I thought I had narrowed the distance at the cafe yesterday, but I feel a sense of distance again.