“……Was there really a cursed wizard in the basement of the annex?”

Allen’s face turned even bluer than the light blue shirt he was wearing.

“No way, right? Please, I’m begging you, don’t confuse people around with nonsense, Evans.”

“B-but Sid! You experienced it yourself!”

Allen screamed with a pale face.

“You fainted after being enchanted by a ghost on Valain’s Day, so why can’t you believe in a cursed wizard?”

“Why are you suddenly bringing that up? It has nothing to do with this incident.”

Allen and Sid, now fired up, glared at each other intensely.

‘They’ll kill each other fighting before the cursed wizard can get them.’

Nigel squeezed between the two exchanging passionate glares to mediate.

“I get that you’re both scared of the cursed wizard, but how about postponing the fight for now?”

“Who said I was scared?”

“I’m disappointed, Ars. Don’t tell me you think I’m chicken-hearted enough to believe unfounded rumors?”

As soon as Nigel finished speaking, Allen and Sid rushed to open their mouths.

“Then, go ahead and open it.”

Nigel pulled their hands and brought them to the door where light was clearly seeping through.

Just as the young masters’ delicate hands that had never known hardship were about to touch the doorknob, they both quickly withdrew them.

“……”

Nigel silently stared at their blushing faces.

“Ah, really! ……You could let it slide once.”

“……Now that you’ve shattered my flimsy pride, are you finally satisfied, Ars?”

“Yep. It’s very amusing.”

As if putting an end to the cowards’ incident, Noah, who had been quiet all along, couldn’t hold back his laughter and giggled.

“Don’t worry. I definitely sense a human presence beyond the door, so it’s not a ghost.”

“That’s sooo comforting, Noah.”

“Beselion. If you sensed it, you should have told us right away. Why did you just stand by and watch us get played by Ars?”

Meanwhile, their breath was in sync when it came to questioning others.

“And don’t you know it’s even worse if it’s human? You can’t identify a person’s occupation, appearance, or identity just by their presence, Lord Beselion.”

“N-no way… Could it be a vagrant who snuck into Sienna taking advantage of the relatively quiet vacation period?”

Pause.

For a moment, Nigel’s body froze as he was about to grab the doorknob.

Allen, who quickly noticed the change in his close friend, grinned and hooked his elbow on Nigel’s shoulder.

“Haha! Even you, Nigel, have something you’re afraid of!”

“……Shut up.”

Thwack!

Nigel coldly brushed off Allen’s arm and approached Noah.

“……!”

A vast amount of magical power passed through Noah’s shoulder.

“Just this once, let me ask a favor, Noah.”

Nigel removed his hand from Noah’s shoulder and smiled blandly.

Hearing the unfamiliar nickname and sweet smile for the first time made Noah’s head feel strange, so he coldly composed his expression and quickly passed by Nigel.

He felt pathetic for expecting something while knowing it was just a prank without any sincerity.

‘Why is he suddenly acting like that?’

‘How should I know?’

Nigel and Allen communicated through gestures and hand signals behind Noah’s back.

Unaware of the two’s actions, Noah diligently opened the door.

“Huh? I’m not mentally prepared ye-…?!”

Breaking the expectation of finding all kinds of toxic substances from illegal sources and forbidden magical formulas, the room beyond was full of lush green plants that were soothing to the eyes.

The varieties ranged from trees, flowers, and grass, and their sizes varied from potted plants to large trees.

In one corner of the room were farming tools like shovels and hoes, and mysterious medicine bottles were scattered chaotically on the floor.

“……They’ve really set up house here, haven’t they.”

Sid sighed deeply as he picked up a nearby medicine bottle. His attitude was full of a sense of ownership, as if he were the dean.

That’s when it happened.

“Aaagh!!”

Allen screamed.

Everyone looked at Allen. Then, the seemingly normal flower bud in the pot transformed into a rake covered with thorns top and bottom.

The sharp-tipped rake violently clashed its prongs as if about to devour Allen’s flesh.

“Allen! Take my hand!”

With Noah’s help, Allen was barely able to avoid the rake’s attack.

“……It’s a rake flower. A type of carnivorous magical plant that fills its magic power by consuming flesh.”

Nigel said as he examined the plant that looked exactly like an illustration from a book borrowed from the library.

“Ugh, I told you! It’s a cursed place……”

Allen whimpered, clutching his chubby thumb that had almost been swallowed by the flower bud.

“Who else but a mad wizard would sneak into a gloomy underground place where no one is around and grow strange plants?!”

Filled with anger, Allen naturally degraded the somewhat respectable title of cursed wizard to something vulgar.

“Let’s catch this mad wizard before he does weird things to other people!”

Allen’s anger finally transformed into resolve and exploded.

“Though the expression is harsh, he’s right. Although we’re in the position of being chased by seniors, it doesn’t sit well with me to leave someone who’s harming the academy unchecked.”

“That’s true. As nobles, we can’t ignore such a person.”

Sid said, subtly emphasizing the word ‘nobles’.

‘It seems they’ve already forgotten why they came here in the first place.’

Knowing that when the majority agrees, the minority’s opinion is as good as non-existent except for agreement, Nigel nodded without bothering to argue.

“Then let’s go protect Sienna from the mad wizard.”

So Nigel followed the three boys who had fallen into imitating Valain.

Noah, who had been leading the group at the front, carefully stopped in front of a door they had reached.

Then he nodded to his companions.

At that signal to open the door, someone could be heard gulping.

Creeak. The door opened, revealing a dimly lit room where nothing could be made out.

“Haah……”

Just as a sigh automatically escaped from between Sid’s plump lips, an animal cry unlike anything they had ever heard before came from nearby.

“Kieek! Keuak!”

Startled by the sudden sound, Sid almost tripped.

The beast’s howl instantly woke up all the animals in the vicinity.

‘……From plants to animals, huh.’

The beasts expressed their presence by making indescribable sounds in the darkness.

The noise grew louder and louder until it was almost unbearable to the naked ear. The group anxiously covered their ears with their hands.

That’s when it happened.

Piercing through the terrible screams, the room suddenly brightened, and something unidentifiable with dark green vines tangled messily popped out from the center of the room.

‘It wasn’t a beast but a magical creature.’

Confirming his thought, Nigel felt a strange sense of responsibility and quickly searched for a weapon.

Unable to use his own magic power in such a confined space where others might get hurt, the only thing left was ‘that’.

“I’ll borrow this for a moment.”

Nigel quickly muttered as he drew Noah’s longsword.

At this moment, vines that wouldn’t look out of place if they had just sprung from a dense jungle writhed about.

Nigel gripped the sword handle tightly and quickly assumed a stance.

‘Now I just need to swing this sword and cut down the magical creature…!’

Swoosh.

Just then, a large hand gently wrapped around Nigel’s hand.

Before he could recognize the owner of the hand, magical power moved from Nigel’s hand to the large hand.

And a low, gentle voice sounded in Nigel’s ear.

“Nigel, if you grip the longsword that tightly, you might hurt yourself rather than your opponent.”

Once again, the flow of magical power changed. At the same time, control of the sword was taken away.

“And that person is not a magical creature, but a human.”

“What……?”

Nigel stared intently at the suspected magical creature.

“Are you saying that’s really a person?”

Noah’s sword had already returned to its place.

“Yes.”

The remaining parts that hadn’t registered due to the visual shock slowly began to stand out.

The green mass that looked like solid vines could, if one had to say, correspond to hair on a human body.

And the ragged clothes that even the king of the slums would wave off in refusal, upon closer inspection, resembled a lab coat among human garments.

Decisively, parting the vines, a human face appeared with a pair of eyes, one nose, and one mouth in their proper places.

But without Noah’s words, it would have been considered a pitiful human devoured by a vine creature.

“Heave-ho!”

At this point, the human mouth functioned as intended and properly articulated language, then somehow managed to tie the thick hair up high on the head in one go.

And a hand with all five fingers intact fumbled around before putting on glasses in the correct position.

The two eyes that had been blinking continuously finally smiled brightly at Nigel and the others.

‘It’s definitely human.’

Only then could Nigel erase the hypothesis that the lifeform before him was a magical creature from his mind.

But that didn’t mean all his doubts were resolved. No, rather, he became even more suspicious.