135 - normal life

It was a miracle that the walls had only gotten lightly damaged as the cool air once again filled up the room. Serving its purpose well, I could feel my own anxiety fade away as my guard slowly loosen itself into its cold surroundings. I have been able to relax once more, ready to continue the lesson in a more appropriate state.

After an execution of the secret 'say your opponent's name in a cute voice' technique, an unexpected result surfaced. In the returned silence of this cool room used for combat purposes, a sickeningly sweet voice akin to a poison had seeped out of lone calm girl. While the others were in a perpetual state of fear and confusion, this high and sharp voice pierced and dripped through their ear drums before being received as signals into their minds.

And the result. A shiver like no other caresses their spine, it felt like the devil's contract had revealed a non-lethal morally corrupted curse that would haunt them for life and drive them into insanity. Of course, the residual effect of the previous taunt effect was the culprit behind this hyper exaggeration in everyone's minds.

The grass under their feet shook under the ventilation as they could soon hear their own individual breathing.

"Uhh- I'm sorry about earlier. Let's continue the lesson, please! I didn't mean to bewitch everyone with my charm."

"Huuuuuu?! Charmmm? What charm?" (Sakase)

"Humu, I was just trying to help but I feel strangely irritated now!"

"What a coincidence?! I feel the same!!" (Sakase). A miniature thud sound radiated around like a clap of thunder that filled the ears of all the people in the vicinity.

"Alright! Enough foiling around, you two! It's back onto lesson. Reinforcements have been sent to deal with the perpetrator. We can only pray that Ran rests in peace before he is sent to Zet-sama." (Kuraver)

With that, lectures continued on the techniques of manipulating mana, followed by the usual on-hand practice. Switching teachers for the next lessons, school went by as normal, albeit the second empty seat in our classroom. Deaths were quite rare in this prestigious environment, however they weren't non-existent. Every now and then, a student or 2 goes missing or dead. Unfortunate as it is, it didn't surprise anybody. No matter how much you step up security, you will have a dillema.

If the security guards protect the students, who will protect the security guards? The obvious answer is that they do not need any protection due to the nature of their job. However reality isn't so kind as to not poke this loophole, fill it with bullet holes, curses, stab wounds, slashes, and finally the sweet release of death. It peeks under the noses of any and every individual, it creeps out, exploits and causes chaos. Simply put, this world is way too chaotic and absurd for bodyguards to work.

You could have many weak security guards and they would all fall prey to 1 individual. You could have a few strong body guards and they would still lose if the gap in power was significant enough. Yes, this gap of combat ability is easily attainable depending on lifestyle, and in the end it is also easily exploitable. Conclusion, numbers in personnel will never work, and finding 1 indivual strong enough to protect you alone is near impossible. For if they had the strength, they wouldn't be a mere body guard, they would pursue a grander goal than that. A reliable security... That is something only attainable by the royal family considering their status as the highest, even then it would still be difficult to find a truly strong individual.

Levels could be easily bridged with skills. Skills could easily be thwarted with anti-skills. Anti-skills are easily overcomed with levels and physical prowess. Again, as unfortunate as it is, death will never become anomalous, it will always be a normal part of everyone's lives and society. Despite that, it's still normal to mourn. Grief. Despair. No matter what, humans will still be the same, in that they will be irrational to the very end.

That was why I will have my revenge. In order to make society a safer place for Cress, a safer place for myself, a place everyone can relax in, I will have to remove the cause of it all. [mana detection tier-4], enabling the identification of users just by their mana signature. A mana signature distinct enough to create it's own hue in multiple individuals. This was no mere cult, it was a group of puppeteered individuals created by a single person.

There were multiple divisions to mind control and puppeteering, the simplest option being to turn the vessel lifeless and force commands onto it. With that it brings great convenience in issuing complex commands, not only that, an absurd amount of commands and no matter how difficult they are, they can still be issued to the vessel. The drawback is the lifeless state of the vessels inactive phase when there are no commands being issued, it's eyes also resemble that of a corpse's, so trained eyes can identify a puppet.

The other more complex option was object guidance. Mere suggestions and artificial thoughts are implanted into the vessel to convince they are the vessel's own, so they act on their commands in a more natural way. Complex and difficult commands cannot be issued this way, however this prevents any way of detection by observation. The only way to check was to inspect their mana signature, a different hue would emerge from the inspection. Usually this does not reveal much, but if another mana signature has the same hue, there could only be 1 possibility.

Mana signature, Colourless in it's usual state, it is the unique way in which an individual's mana circulates in their body. This pattern is further summed up, refined and recreated in the brain in a miniature form, where commands are issued. This miniature recreation of the mana pattern in the brain is the mana signature, it takes in commands and acts on them in the outside world. How mind control works is that the perpetrator inserts a specific spell or skill into the victim's mana signature and send in commands or thoughts from there. Commands sent into the mana signature can also act on the body like body enhancement magic.

In any case, Kuraver-sensei didn't detect it, so it had to be the latter option. Otherwise it was the ancient technique of normal persuasion that convinced Daverl to join the cultists. Though the mana signature proved otherwise.

A few days later, news came back that Daverl was properly hunted down and defeated. The corpse had been burned to a crisp and had no hope of recovering. Though I would question the need to recover his corpse in the first place.

Classes resumed at a normal pace as all things in the syllabus were caught up to. My time was quite enjoyable in the safe confines of the classroom. No more fighting, only rest and learning. I had also learned the fact that Cress was the student council president, and that she was actually quite popular.