The World Is Mine For The Taking-Chapter 1258 - 193 - The End Of Normal Days (3)

Gaspard’s POV

"You useless bastards! You should have captured him, even if it meant dying in the process!"

My voice tore through the chamber like a blade. The torches lining the stone walls flickered from the force of my mana surging with my anger. The knights before me flinched.

The captain stood at the front, rigid as a statue. His jaw was tight. His eyes were fixed somewhere slightly above my shoulder, as if staring at me directly might get him vaporized on the spot.

Smart man.

For a long moment, he said nothing. The silence stretched. I could hear the faint clink of armor shifting as someone swallowed nervously in the back.

Then, finally, he spoke.

"You witnessed his power yourself, Sir Gaspard," he said, steady but careful. Not defiant. It was just stating a fact. "There wasn’t anything we could have done. Even the Vice Commander of the Magic Knights couldn’t stand against him. How are we supposed to compare to someone like that?"

His tone almost annoyed me more than if he had argued.

That didn’t matter.

Of course I had seen it. I had watched that man in the tournament with my own eyes. Every spell, every movement, it was precise, effortless, and even terrifying. The way mana bent around him like it wanted to obey him. The crowd had been in awe.

So had I.

And that was the problem.

Because awe easily turned into fear. And fear... fear was something I had not felt in a very long time.

Antagonizing him was reckless. I knew that. I wasn’t blind to my own situation. Poking a monster and hoping it politely ignores you is not strategy, it’s suicide.

But what choice did I have?

He stood on the Princess’s side.

And the Princess—Gods bless her naive heart—was attempting to shove aside a century of tradition like it was an outdated decoration. She wanted the academy to be "more flexible." To allow cadets to graduate into Magic Knights without enduring the pressure of the Gold Class structure.

Flexible. Elastic.

As if we were talking about tailoring uniforms, not shaping warriors.

She didn’t understand. Or maybe she refused to.

A Magic Knight wasn’t meant to be comfortable. The Gold Class wasn’t there for prestige alone—it was a crucible. Pressure refined ability. It filtered out the weak and sharpened the strong. If someone couldn’t endure that environment, then they had no business wearing the title.

Destroy that system, and everything blends together. Standards blur. Meaning dissolves. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

Yes, there would still be prerequisites. Tests. Evaluations. Formalities. But it would silence the essence of what being a Magic Knight truly meant. It would reduce it to paperwork.

A lot of this kingdom’s ancestors built this academy with blood, with discipline, with an understanding that power must be forged, not handed out.

And now she was gaining traction.

Momentum.

One proposal after another. More administrators leaning toward her side. The line behind her growing longer with each passing week.

And now that man was digging.

He was looking for something. For dirt. For weakness. For a crack in my armor that he could pry open and widen until I fell from my position.

Because I had blocked her.

Every time she brought a proposal forward, I rejected it. Calmly at first. Firmly after that. And now openly.

And she escalated, by involving the Commander herself.

That alone made my temples throb.

Nearly two hundred years of life. Wars. Political games. Internal betrayals. External threats. I had navigated them all without losing sleep.

And yet now?

My head ached like I was a novice mage who had overcast a spell.

"Do you know what’s worse than all of this?" I muttered, more to myself than to them. "He might unearth my secret. The one I buried fifty years ago. If that comes to light..."

I didn’t finish the sentence right away.

Because the truth of it sat heavy in my chest.

"I’d be finished."

That was the polite version.

I would be executed.

Not stripped of title. Not exiled.

Executed.

"If you fail to act against him, then it’s not just me who falls," I continued, my gaze sharpening. "You’re tied to this as well. Do you truly believe you’ll walk away clean if I’m dragged down? Don’t delude yourselves. If my secret surfaces, yours won’t stay buried either."

"You have a stake in this. So unless you want your own sins paraded in the open, I suggest you move." I continued.

The captain exhaled slowly. A tired sound.

"Understood," he said at last. "I’ll do everything I can."

He saluted. Turned. And then left.

The door closed with a dull thud.

And then—

"It seems you’re quite on edge, Sir Gaspard. Should I be worried you’ll croak from all this stress?"

The voice was light and amused.

I spun.

A naked woman stood several paces away.

Just... there.

There was no mana ripple as well as any spatial distortion. There wasn’t even a sound of movement.

She hadn’t entered.

She had simply existed.

"You—! Who are you?!" I snapped.

Magic circles ignited around me in an instant. Layer upon layer. Defensive barriers. Binding spells. Offensive arrays that hummed with restrained destruction. They aligned around her like a constellation aimed to kill.

She didn’t flinch.

"There’s no need to panic," she said, as if we were discussing tea arrangements. "What could one naked lady possibly do against a great wizard like you?"

Her smile was playful. Mocking, almost.

But that wasn’t what unsettled me.

It was the fact that I hadn’t sensed her at all.

In two centuries, no one had approached me without my awareness.

Until now.

"What do you want?" I demanded, keeping my spells primed.

"Your cooperation, Sir Gaspard." She tilted her head slightly. "The Princess has momentum. It’s obvious she’s going to win eventually. And when she does... well."

She lifted her hand and made a sharp slicing motion across the back of her neck.

"Chop. Offy with your heady~!"

She even added a little lilt at the end.

Under different circumstances, I might have commented on the absurdity of it. A naked woman casually miming my execution in my own office. Life had truly become interesting.

"This woman..." I muttered under my breath.

She knew too much.

"Kuh... What exactly are you proposing?" I asked, forcing control back into my tone.

"As I said—your cooperation." Her eyes gleamed. "Become our ally. In return, we’ll ensure that the man digging into your past... stops digging."

"And why," I said slowly, "would I trust you?"

She stepped slightly closer—not enough to trigger my spells, but enough to test my composure.

"You can trust me," she replied smoothly. "After all... who do you think sent you that letter warning you he was investigating your secret?"

She winked.