The World of this Fantasy Novel is in Crisis

The teacher told Satin to get close to Cain. That it might be helpful.

What exactly did he mean by that? Satin assumed the teacher had chosen Cain as a subject for some magical experiment, but in truth, the teacher had never said anything of the sort.

As Satin’s thoughts dragged on, Cain seemed to grow bored and got up from his seat.

“Why are you getting up?”

“Going to wash up.”

“Ah, okay…”

“Nothing else to say anyway.”

Cain, ever blunt, grabbed a change of clothes and left the room. Satin lay back down where he was.

Could Cain end up siding with the teacher?

Satin had tried not to think about how things unfolded in Dark Age, but now that the situation was upon him, those thoughts surfaced on their own.

In the novel, Cain narrowly escapes becoming a test subject for a cruel dark mage. The dark mage appears only in flashbacks and never shows up in the main storyline. His name isn’t even mentioned.

There wasn’t any mention of him appearing in Part 2 or 3 either.

In other words, the dark mage is more of a backdrop than a character—an embodiment of foundational evil used to establish the protagonist’s identity. There’s no room for reinterpretation or evolution; he’s a static presence.

That might not hold true for everyone, but for Cain, it did.

If those two joined forces, it would rewrite Cain’s entire character setup.

Of course, the original plot had already been disrupted by Satin’s involvement…

Still, I just can’t picture it.

Despite seeing Cain’s gruff and curt attitude every day, maybe Satin had still trusted him on some subconscious level. He just couldn’t picture Cain making a truly bad choice.

***

Rogers sometimes drifted into delusions. You could call it imagination, but he himself chose to call it a delusion—because even he thought it made no sense.

Maybe the kids who supposedly ran away… never actually did.

A lot of children here were orphans from the start, but Rogers had lived with his family until he was ten. That alone probably made him one of the luckier ones.

Back then, Rogers had been too young and immature to grasp what was happening around him. What he did understand was that his father had been betrayed by a friend, and his mother and relatives had gotten caught up in it, leaving the entire family in ruins.

Rogers barely survived. He made it through one winter on the streets, and just as he was facing his second, convinced he would die for sure this time, he met the teacher.

If the teacher hadn’t found me, I would’ve frozen to death out there.

At first, he thought this place was heaven. And now? Well, he didn’t think it was bad even now. But every so often, he felt an odd, creeping sense of unease he couldn’t shake.

Did they really run away?

Running into the forest was impossible. He hadn’t heard about wild beasts, but even without them, that forest was dangerous. People in Cloverland and the nearby areas all knew about it. Everyone said the same thing—that once someone entered, they never came back out.

Would the kids have tried to escape into a place like that, knowing full well the risk? They had enough common sense for that, didn’t they?

And if not the forest, then they would have had to pass through the village. But the teacher said he hadn’t found any trace of them there.

That just doesn’t make sense.

The kids accepted what the teacher said without question. Maybe it wasn’t that they didn’t doubt it—but that they didn’t want to.

Rogers didn’t want to doubt it either. But no matter how hard he tried, the delusions kept creeping in.

What if the kids didn’t run away at all…

“What are you doing here?”

Rogers flinched and snapped out of his thoughts. It was the teacher’s voice. Not from nearby—things were just quiet enough that the sound carried clearly from afar.

“On your way to wash up, I see.”

“As you can see.”

He immediately recognized the voice that responded to the teacher. It was Cain. Most of the other kids hadn’t gone through puberty yet, so their voices were still hard to tell apart, but Cain’s stood out. Not only was his voice deep, but his tone was so cold and dry, it was unmistakable.

In contrast, Satin’s is kind of sticky.

His mature voice, paired with his gentle tone, gave off a strange impression. And when the things he said got weird, his voice only made it feel more unsettling.

In any case, now wasn’t the time to be rating people’s voices.

Rogers was on his way back from the archive, and the teacher and Cain were standing farther up the stairs. From that distance, they likely hadn’t noticed him.

“Have you given it any thought?”

Rogers had also witnessed the two of them running into each other by chance the last time. It seemed that conversation hadn’t ended yet. Curious about how Cain would respond, Rogers held his breath and listened closely.

Cain soon replied—not an answer, more like a retort.

“That’s what I don’t get.”

“What isn’t clear to you?”

“You never paid me any mind until now…”

To say something like that despite living, eating, and dressing with the teacher’s support—Rogers couldn’t help but be impressed by Cain’s personality all over again. Was it guts or just plain ingratitude?

“Hearing you say that, it seems I wasn’t entirely indifferent after all.”

“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious.”

“In that case…”

The teacher’s voice gradually faded into the distance. Though they couldn’t be seen from below, it was clear the two of them had moved. Since they hadn’t come downstairs, they had probably entered the hallway.

Did they go to the teacher’s study?

When the teacher spoke with the other children, he used the office. But with Satin, he often met in the study. The lab was only used when there was actual research to be done—not for talking.

Would Cain soon end up entering the lab too?

Then what about Satin?

Could he end up like the children who’d vanished?

Damn these delusions.

He didn’t even know what had happened to those kids.

***

For the first time, Satin saw the children fighting.

This is normal.

It was strange they hadn’t fought before now. Spending all day together—whether they were kids or adults—was bound to lead to conflict eventually.

“I-It’s mine…”

“If you didn’t want anyone to eat it, you shouldn’t have left it there.”

“That’s my spot!”

“Says who? Seats go to whoever sits first.”

“I always sit there!”

“Whatever. I saw it, so I ate it. Take it back if you want—ahhh.”

The one on the verge of tears, crying out in frustration, was Karen. The smug one taunting her while sticking out a candy in her mouth was Robin. The two hadn’t been particularly close nor antagonistic, at least from what Satin had observed.

That might change now—they were probably going to be enemies from here on.

Is that the same candy from before?

There was nowhere nearby where kids could get candy. Satin had never seen Rufus hand any out either. In fact, he’d only seen candy once since coming here—when a carriage driver who had brought food gave some to Robin.

Apparently, Robin wasn’t the only one who’d gotten candy back then.

Just a piece of candy. That might not sound like much, but not in this place. Maybe in the city things were different, but here at the school, candy was a precious thing. Worth screaming over in a fight.

Still… the atmosphere’s weird.

The other kids were one thing, but Heather—who was close to Karen—was strangely quiet. You’d expect a friend to take sides, regardless of who was right or wrong.

The other kids are too calm, too…

None of them tried to stop the fight, or egg it on either. They just watched like it had nothing to do with them.

Satin tilted his head in confusion—only to suddenly lock eyes with Cain. Cain seemed uninterested in the fight, yawning as he turned to look out the window.

Soon after, the teacher entered the classroom. Karen and Robin immediately stopped fighting and returned to their seats. The teacher didn’t seem to notice the strange tension in the air at all as he began the lesson. Today’s subject was classical literature.

Is he really unaware… or just pretending not to know?

As the teacher wrote lines from an old epic onto the chalkboard, Satin rested his chin on his hand. The kids quickly adopted their usual glazed-over expressions, but Satin actually enjoyed the classics class. Literature from a completely unknown world felt similar to genre fiction for him.

“Demon King, you have no place here. The one who made the pact is dead and gone—so too must you return.”

Hearing the teacher recite the lines aloud, Satin let out a small snort. Demon Kings, pacts—weren’t those fantasy clichés?

Standard webnovel fare counts as classics too, huh.

A story just like that appeared in Dark Age.

When Satin summoned the Demon King to avenge his master, Cain killed Satin—but the summoning didn’t stop. It seemed that, in this world, once the summoning of a Demon King began, it couldn’t be canceled.

Well, it’s not like the Demon King’s some open-market item you can just return.

If you did want to return him, you’d probably have to pay a fee.

After class, the fight between Karen and Robin didn’t resume. It seemed settled for now, though the atmosphere would probably stay chilly for a while.

Satin slipped out of the classroom without getting involved or offering unsolicited advice.

Cain, who had left earlier, was heading toward the kitchen—but Satin figured his real destination was probably the library. He thought about following him, but gave up on the idea. They didn’t have anything to talk about at the moment.

Just then, a voice called out from behind him.

“Satin.”

It was Rogers. Satin quickly stepped aside, thinking he’d been called for blocking the doorway—but that didn’t seem to be it. Rogers hesitated, then opened his mouth.

“Can we talk for a bit?”

“Talk?”

He was probably asking because he wanted to speak somewhere out of earshot of the other kids. Satin gave a small nod.

“Wanna head to the library?”

He only suggested it since Rogers usually spent time there, but Rogers quickly shook his head.

“No, let’s go outside.”

“Alright, sure.”

Satin agreed without much suspicion. After all, he’d just seen Cain heading to the library—so if this was a secret conversation, somewhere else might be better.

The two of them walked around the school building, looking for a suitable spot, and eventually stopped behind the bathhouse. Satin glanced around. Maybe because they were near the baths and toilets, there was a faint smell of stagnant water in the air. It didn’t seem like a place any kids would bother coming to for fun.

“Rogers, is this spot okay?”

“Yeah.”

Rogers seemed oddly tense. After checking the surroundings once more, he finally nodded.

Satin started to lean against the wall but stopped, thinking it might be damp. Just standing there felt awkward, so he folded his arms.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”