Heroine-Saving System: Reborn In A Third-Rate Manga As The Protagonist-Chapter 58: Attack On Academy

"Pftt..." Koya chuckled while Renji stared at him in horror. "Nice joke."

"Joke?" Renji muttered, eyes dropping to the table. Koya didn’t even sound concerned... he sounded like he was mocking him.

"Kisawa-chan would never do something like that." He imitated the same dreamy voice Renji had used on the first day they met. "Let me guess... she’s one of the assassins sent to kill you?"

He kept his voice low enough that only Renji could hear, and his friend visibly shrank into the chair.

"Y-yes... I showed her my real face and told her what I did... and she tried to kill me." Renji said. "I managed to escape but she said the real hunt starts today."

"And you didn’t run?" Koya raised a brow, genuinely surprised. Victoria shifted on his shoulder and leaned in... this was getting interesting.

’Well this is happening earlier than in the manga... I guess this would make it a main manga event. Attack on Academy has a nice ring to it.’ He thought.

Renji was cool and all, but apart from that, Koya didn’t see the need to genuinely risk his life for the guy... unless he had something to offer, even if they were friends.

His gaze drifted to Mio. She was surely one of the Order’s assassins, so was she going to join in the attack or not?

When would it start? How would it happen? These people were assassins but Renji had called it a hunt.

Victoria glanced at Koya. Her husband was trying very hard to look indifferent, but she could feel the excitement radiating off him.

’I’ll make sure you don’t get hurt, hubby... believe it.’ She thought.

As for the hubby part... she had found something on Koya’s phone while they were sleeping. A browser he had left open. She searched for husband, it showed her synonyms, and that was how she found the word.

She liked the way it fit in her mouth, and she liked even more the way his expression shifted the first time she used it that morning.

"Sure, if you want protection... pay up, weakling." Koya said. "I’ll charge you 50,000 IP, give or take."

Renji’s breath stopped. He turned to Koya with his hand clutched to his chest, a look of pure betrayal carved into his face.

"I thought we were bros..." He muttered.

Koya rolled his eyes.

"Bros show each other their real faces." He shot back, though he wasn’t actually offended... if anything he was a little intrigued. "Must be because you’re ugly."

Renji put a hand flat on the table.

"Oi. I’d have you know that I’m easily just as handsome as—" He looked directly at Koya’s face and the words died in his throat.

Who was he kidding? Just as handsome as Koya? That was delusional coping. "...Is there going to be a bro discount?"

"50k on the dot." Koya said. "You’re living with your roommate, right? Both of you can share supplies, but if you truly valued your safety, you’d pay it completely. You know four-liners are worth much more, right?"

"Fine, fine..." Renji muttered, pulling out his phone. Koya loaded his QR code on the IP app and held it out. Renji scanned and transferred without another word.

Koya needed a lot of Individual Points right now. Like Misora had told him, you could buy anything with IP as long as you were in ALI... and with that in mind, he was going to plan the biggest heist in Academy history.

’Have you saved the plan in case I forget?’ He thought, and the screen materialized in front of him.

「Affirmative Host, Project: [Make It Out Of The Hood] is a go...」

「Estimated IP cost: 120,000 / 500,000 IP」

As long as this went as planned, he was going to net an enormous amount from it but that was for another time.

"Okay, you’re safe. Probably." He turned back to face the front. "I can always decide to let them kill you now and claim the rest of your IP."

Renji went pale. "What—"

"Just kidding."

The bells rang and the stragglers outside filtered in. After a few moments, Saki stepped through the door.

The professor looked as lively as ever, though her eyes carried a guarded edge that Koya caught before it vanished.

She moved to the front, picked up the Holo-cane, and her expression smoothed out into professionalism.

"Like I told all of you... Koya-kun has returned, and it appears he’s jumped two ranks in two days. The rank-ups we’ve had here don’t quite compare to that." Saki said.

Koya glanced around the room. Misora and Mio had ranked up. So had that large guy... the merchant’s son, Koya couldn’t actually remember his name.

Misora’s was obviously fake, that was because he had manga knowledge but Mio was the one that kept pulling his attention.

The woman had been terrifyingly fast and she only carried one line. Did that mean she was even faster now...

’No, she’s not.’

He turned to Victoria on his shoulder. She gave him a small, almost sheepish smile.

’You can speak directly in my head?’

She laughed and he heard it in his skull, it was slightly smug.

’Yes, hubby. It comes with the second stage of the Blood Contract. I just remembered I could do it.... I saw you focusing on the assassin so I wanted to tell you, the black crest on her face is fake. She has a single red line hidden beneath a high-level cloaking magic around her stomach area meaning she’s a physical crest user.’

Koya blinked once. It made sense and that confirmed that she was probably the Pale Sword.

’Is it greedy that I want to pull her to my side?’ He thought.

Though that was wishful thinking... Assassins of the Order were trained from the bone upward... they didn’t defect, and if they tried, they got hunted for the rest of their lives.

He was pretty sure he’d read that on a reddit thread once.

"I hope you had a good break, Koya-kun, because you’re behind in classes. We’re starting Mana Convergence to—"

"ATTENTION!"

The shout cracked through every intercom in the Academy at once and the class went rigid.

"PLEASE REMAIN SEATED IN YOUR CLASSES AND PERFORM CORE-PO1! THE ACADEMY IS UNDER ATTACK. I REPEAT, THE ACADEMY IS UNDER—"

The voice cut off. There was the wet sound of a blade, then the thud of a body hitting the floor. A moment of static, and then a new voice filled the intercoms... making Mio go completely still in her seat.

"Testing... testing..."

A laugh that came out low and amused.

"Oh, they can hear me? That’s good. Well, fuckers... my name is Numb, and I’m the right hand of the owner of the Order. Remember the name. Our original mission here and the reason we infiltrated this Academy in the first place... was under commission from a Great Clan. Find and kill a boy who had the nerve to flirt with Shion."

"Renji Kusaba. Don’t think we ever let you go. However, I’ve decided to say... forget the commission. You might think you have security here, but all you have are a few blue and red crest professors scattered around. You won’t be able to do much against someone like me. The founder and the stronger professors also happen to... coincidentally be off Academy grounds right now, so we’ll have our fun. Great Clan heirs, all of you will make your way to the main Office. Line up nicely. I want to see the beautiful women we have here, and if anyone dares resist... I’ll kill you. We at the Order take commissions, but we do not bow to Great Clans."

The longer Numb spoke, the more Koya wanted to press his palm directly into his own face.

Literally everything was playing out like it was lifted straight from the manga pages. How had a hunt on weak little Renji escalated into a full Academy siege? He had wanted to fight assassins at his level... not one of the Order’s top ranks walking into his classroom.

’I swear it’s the 「Fate」trait...’ He thought.

Though on the other hand, this wasn’t necessarily bad. If he contributed meaningfully against the Order’s attack, there would almost certainly be IP rewards waiting for him after this was over.

"And as for you... Pale Sword..."

That name made every person in the class stiffen. Possibly every person in the Academy. Nobody knew much about Numb, but Pale Sword was a name that spread without help.

"I know you’re still playing the student game. Lucky for you I don’t know which class you’re hiding in or I’d have outed you already. Come up as well. We have a score to settle." Another pause. "And I forgot to mention... we’ve surrounded the Academy and cut off your outside network. That means no calls are going out and no police too. Come now, Professors. Students."

"Come play the Assassin Games."

The intercom cut dead and then the screaming started.

Saki raised her voice over the class, trying to hold the room together, and that was when she caught it... a shadow under Renji’s chair and it was moving wrong.

Sliding out from beneath him, stretching upward into the shape of a woman in Order uniform with a blade already raised above her head.

Saki threw her hand out to cast but Koya was already moving. His fist connected and the assassin left the floor entirely, hit the wall, and her head came apart against it with a sound that silenced the room completely.

Blood spread across the back wall in a wide arc and Koya looked down at his fist and pressed it open and closed once.

’Did I punch too hard?’

’Yes, hubby. You most definitely did.’ Victoria replied, exhaling through her nose but the trouble wasn’t gone. A beeping sound was coming from what remained of the woman, and the screaming in the class died off as everyone unconsciously held their breath to listen.

That was exactly the wrong thing to do.

"Enter Mana Mode and brace yourselves!" Saki shouted.

The body detonated.

The entire side of the Class 5 building blew outward and students were thrown into open air, some of them already burning before they hit the ground.

Saki landed hard on the courtyard below, rolled, and came up just in time to feel the air split beside her... a sickle was coming crazily fast from her right.

She threw up a mana barrier and the blade screamed against it, then pulled back.

A red-haired man in Order uniform stood a few meters away, already flipping backward into a loose stance.

Around them, the campus had erupted. Class 4’s building was a ruin on the far side of the grounds. Students and assassins spilled across every open space in sight.

"The Creation Mage." The man said, a genuine smile on his face. "I never expected to find you out here like this. What a pleasant surprise."

"You know me?" Saki kept her attention split... her students were taking hits behind her and there was almost nothing she could do about it right now, which made her chest tight in a way she didn’t let reach her face.

"How could I not? Your abilities are specific enough that everyone in the Order gets a Bingo book with your details included." He said. "Tanzaki Saki. Age twenty-six. Currently single. Creation Magic... highly formidable, but carrying two key limitations: mental power dependency and the cost of overuse." He tilted his head.

"The custom uniform work you did for every student during Orientation was a direct extension of your magic. We counted it and calculated your limits then ordered several of those uniforms and accessories in advance last night... all the creations we knew had come from you, specifically to exhaust your mental capacity before we moved. I’m a hundred percent certain your reserves are empty right now. Otherwise I’d already be dead."

Saki’s mouth opened but she said nothing.

’I should have been more careful. They know too much about me...? Is this how it feels to be left naked in front of your enemy?’

The barrier she had thrown up cracked and fell apart. With her mental power gone, her Creation Magic was down entirely and her regular mana output had gone unstable along with it. She had nothing clean to work with.

The man with four lines on his face stepped forward and raised his weapon.

"I could keep you alive, if you just spread your le—"

"That’s enough."

Koya walked between them at a completely normal pace with his hands loose at his sides and Saki stared at him.

"What are you doing?"

"What does it look like?" He glanced back at her briefly. "You’re down right now, so I’m keeping you upright. In return, please handle the rest of the class... and Renji too."

From somewhere behind them, Renji’s screaming echoed across the courtyard as he dodged another blade. He was running for his life since Koya had abandoned him.

Saki held his gaze for a moment, then turned.

"I’ll pay you back later, Koya-kun." She was already moving toward her students.

Koya turned back to the four-liner and looked at him with a small smile on his lips.

"Assistant Squad Captain." He said. "That’s your position, isn’t it?"

The man’s eyes narrowed. "How do you know our rank structure—" 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

"You’re not the only one who can read a file." Koya said and a sword appeared in his hand. "You have a lot of FP sitting on your head and I’m ready to collect."

"What is F—"

He never finished. His eyes shot wide as something blurred through the space in front of him and he threw himself backward but Koya had already been through him.

The man landed in a crouch and felt the heat spreading across his chest before he looked down. A clean diagonal cut ran from his left shoulder to below his ribs with blood already soaking through in a wide sheet.

He straightened himself on instinct, then felt his stomach lurch... something green came up his throat and he coughed it onto the ground.

He looked up.

"You—"

"Poisoned you?" Koya said, looking down at him without any particular emotion. "Yes. What did you think... that we’d have a fair fight?"

He let the silence sit for a moment.

"All’s fair in war, my friend."