The Academy’s Ankle Reaper – Chapter 400

After pondering for a while, the Snow Country Exploration Team decided to go with a small elite group.

Since this time I would be using my teleportation to quickly hit and run, I figured just a little help would be enough.

There were various candidates, but in the end, only one was selected.

“This is… the ruins beyond the Snow Country. I never expected it would be this easy to get in.”

“Well, it’s because it’s me. If you tried to come in the honest way, you’d have to brave the fierce snowstorm of the Snow Country and navigate a maze just to get in.”

“How glorious!”

The one glorious enough to be selected as the elite was none other than Amy.

No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t imagine anyone else but Amy.

While Bella and Hoenheim might actually be more helpful with excavation work, overall, Amy was much more suitable.

Having traversed various dungeons and ruins to gather artifacts, Amy’s foundation was solid and her knowledge was quite substantial.

The most decisive factor was the strong fate that still existed for Amy.

There was an unfounded belief that being with Amy would surely help find what I desired.

If I looked over the others who merely made the list but didn’t make the cut, Bella wouldn’t be that helpful outside of finding her grandfather’s journal, and Hoenheim was tainted by previous remarks I overheard, leading to a general lack of trust.

For this reason, the final candidate Amy continued to look around in wonder at the ruins.

“It looks like a very… cold civilization.”

“It’s because there are no people around.”

I knew exactly why Amy felt that way.

The ruins of the Snow Country were incredibly angular overall.

This civilization, which bore a resemblance to modern designs I often saw in my first life, certainly wouldn’t fall short compared to today’s Department of Magical Engineering.

Having flourished such a civilization but perished unbeknownst to anyone, we were about to go and uncover the tragic fate of this ruined civilization.

As we descended into the ruins, I said to Amy, “Do you remember the precautions?”

“Yes.”

As soon as it was decided, we quickly gathered gear and teleport to Snow Country, where we first went over the precautions we must heed.

While there were threats hidden that even I didn’t fully know, I primarily focused on reminding her of the basic strategies confirmed from the last exploration of the Snow Country.

“If you sense a presence from afar, ignore it. Keep track of each other’s locations, and if you hear voices from elsewhere, ignore them.”

“Right, that’s it.”

At first glance, it sounded like some ghost stories, but these were really essential precautions.

The security system still guarding these ruins takes very malicious measures to dismantle intruders.

“It’s best to keep talking about useless things inside the ruins. If a pair turns into a trio while talking, that’s when they’re approaching, so just respond accordingly.”

As I finished speaking, I pulled out a flashlight from my waist to illuminate the front.

In the dark darkness, the footprints left by me and the exploration team scattered chaotically.

On top of those footprints were large ones that looked distinctly non-human.

“Looks like they’re still on the move.”

“Is that what we need to watch out for?”

“Yeah. At least at the expert level of skill.”

While they wouldn’t stand a chance against me head-on, the issue with these creatures was that they could silently pick people off one by one.

In a moment of carelessness, one would just vanish without a trace.

Bella’s grandfather, who had reached the ruins first, said he started with seven but returned with only two.

Having heard that experience, the Snow Country Exploration Team set several rules to ensure we got through without losses.

“Atlas. Since we’re on this topic, I want to ask you something.”

“What is it?”

Having to keep talking for that reason, Amy started the conversation first.

“Why do you hate demons so much?”

A pretty standard question, but did she really need to ask it like that?

“Is there any reason to like demons?”

“That’s not it.”

It seemed my answer wasn’t to her liking.

“Demons act very secretly. Most people, unless they’ve been directly harmed like me, doubt their existence. But… Atlas isn’t like that. I heard from McKinto. Before he even became a master, you were the first to step up and eliminate demons.”

“I was just doing what needed to be done.”

“That’s weird. I’ve heard it many times, but there wasn’t any room for demons in your life. So, why do you hunt them so obsessively?”

That was a perfectly reasonable question.

The fact that the Demon Church used to have a formidable power was a story long gone, and the people of the world have forgotten about demons.

They think it’s common to project their own unclean feelings as demons, as preached by the church.

The truth is I know very well what would happen if they were left to silently lurk in the shadows, quietly waiting for their opportunity to grow.

For example, take the research facility of the Demon Church where Casey was rescued.

Had I not personally gone there and smashed it, Casey would have become an unnamed test subject, one of the sharpest blades in the Demon Church’s arsenal.

Or like the summoning ritual of a demon that occurred in Parker’s territory; while I interrupted the actual summoning, had I not been there, three neighboring territories might have been destroyed, and an additional thousand soldiers of the imperial army would have been slaughtered.

I wasn’t so idle that I couldn’t have turned a blind eye, but every time I tried to, they kept surfacing, making it impossible to ignore.

Knowing too much is a blessing but also a curse.

But I couldn’t just share that openly.

Since I had awakened to the truth of this world and knew the future, it would be suspicious to say I hunted demons for that reason, so I had no choice but to dodge the question.

“Um… then let me put it this way. The demons I think of are… like cockroaches?”

“Cockroaches…?”

Amy was taken aback by such a nasty analogy.

“Yeah, they like dark places and usually seem invisible, but when you see one, there are hundreds hiding. If you don’t know they’re there, you can live without any worries, but once you find out there are a ton of them where you live, it gets concerning.”

“Is that so?”

“Exactly.”

“Got it.”

After listening to my story, Amy gave me a skeptical look.

Wait, didn’t something just feel wrong?

“Did you just answer that twice?”

There was an additional voice that popped up in the middle.

While Amy looked confused as to what I was saying, my hand was already on Squirette.

– Whoosh!

With a brilliant aura bursting forth, I slashed through the surrounding space, creating an opening.

“Whoa! What was that?”

“Look over there.”

It seemed like nothing had been cut, but a red wound appeared in mid-air.

“Gack…!”

Immediately after, something resembling a human collapsed suddenly.

“Is this the defense system we were warned about in the ruins?”

“It’s just a basic type.”

The creature’s skin changed to blend in with the surrounding scenery like an optical camouflage, and it was morphing into a form similar to Amy.

A reinforced doppelganger, one of the defense systems of the ruins.

It approaches without anyone noticing, captures someone, then takes their place with just enough words to make it easier to tell them apart, and if it says nothing at all, it comes close without making any sound, making it even harder to recognize.

“To use a doppelganger for base defense is truly malicious, isn’t it?”

“Especially since they’re artificially cultivated doppelgangers, it’s all the more twisted.”

“Found it.”

“Is that what you were looking for?”

While wandering through the ruins, Amy discovered something.

She picked it up, which had been roaming around without any security system, and when she fitted it into the hourglass, it seemed they were indeed originally one, making a click as they combined into one.

It took on a gyroscope-like structure surrounding the simple hourglass.

“Finding this first… what effect does that have?”

“I’m not exactly sure, but it used to allow instant travel to where it was located a day ago, so it might extend it to a week?”

Amy seemed eager to test out the artifact’s effect immediately but noticed the limitation that it could only be used once a day and decided not to use it right now, just in case we might need it to escape from here later.

“I wonder when I’ll find what I’m looking for.”

“It’ll definitely show up.”