Nanomancer Rising: Divine Alchemist Reborn as Academy's Worst Teacher
Chapter 106: Cover-up

Chapter 106: Cover-up

The headmaster’s spell that somehow broke the laws of physics and withheld the passage of time within the area around him didn’t just vanish outright, returning everything to normalcy.

Instead, it started to lose its effectiveness with time, making all the frozen people around move extremely slowly, then a little bit faster and faster...

"There’s a great fight going on, one that it is still too early for you to learn about," the headmaster spoke, proving that even after dropping the bombshell that he did just now, he still wasn’t done speaking. "That’s why, I’m not going to stop you if you will try to leave the academy. But it is only within those grounds that I will ever bother to shield you from that fight."

Theo’s trip to seek inspiration turned into a great discovery when he first heard about the auction of materia prima. It then turned into a horror and, following that, a thriller, when the attack began, ending up in a gory showcase of power that then led to a massive plot twist next.

And now?

Now, the headmaster’s words forced Theo to re-evaluate everything he thought he knew and understood about his new life.

He wasn’t free to peacefully grow at a slow yet steady rate while gradually taking bigger and bigger advantage of his information advantage to overtake his peers.

No, he only had for as long as the forces of this world needed to overtake the headmaster, rendering his protection null and void, thus setting Theo to fight for his survival all on his own.

He wasn’t free to explore this foreign world, to become merely a tourist out to experience all there was in this foreign place where the common sense he knew from his original life no longer applied.

And by all means, he was nowhere close to having the slightest clue of what the fuck was going on!

’To a degree, I could try to guess it, but...’

Theo stared at the headmaster’s narrow back only for the man to then turn into an elegant gazelle, making it hard for Theo to stare at anything but its rear.

’But even if I could guess the truth to some degree, I wouldn’t be able to know what degree of my guess is true or on point anyway.’

By all means, this was a turning point.

From the confident approach based on the powers he already obtained and the powers that were well within his reach, Theo had to switch to a different mindset, the kind that he hated with every last bone in his body.

Right now, it was in his own best interest to stay low-key and hide his strengths, drawing as little attention to himself as possible, all in a bid to not drag even more attention to his current protector.

’And that’s all with the assumption that what this man said is actually true, though,’ Theo thought, his eyes still lingering on the headmaster’s shapeshifting back.

"For now, just go along with my story. It’s best if people don’t attribute this fight to you," the headmaster then spoke again as he took a glance at where the attackers fell to the ground, with only the bodies of the last four remaining. "I don’t even want to imagine the mess this event would turn into if people were to spread rumors on how you can absorb the bodies of your enemies to keep on fighting," he added while tiredly shaking his head.

’Well, at least on this point we can agree,’ Theo thought, gulping his saliva down and nodding his head as he pictured such a scenario.

A world where people saw him literally dismantle his opponents and turn them into his own power. In other words, a world where he could turn other people into resources for his own growth.

Or, in much simpler terms, when it would be only a matter of time before everyone around would come to desire to burn him at a stake like some kind of a heretical monster out for everyone’s blood.

"On that, we can agree," Theo spoke his thoughts out loud, nodding his head even harder than before as he dismissed the vision of the stake, the bonds binding him to it and the flames creeping up the straw bottom to set the logs of the main construction alight.

"Good," the headmaster nodded his own head, stopping his slow stroll at the edge of the stage only to then turn his back to the people currently moving at a snail’s pace, still far-off from freeing themselves from the influence of his spell. "Now, are you ready?"

Theo merely nodded his head, putting on a labored look on his face and even leaning slightly forward before resting his hands against his knees and then taking deep breaths in, making himself look like he was panting heavily, struggling to catch a breath.

The headmaster only gave Theo a look of mild approval before snapping his fingers and finally breaking the spell holding the proper flow of time hostage.

Whoosh!

For a moment, Theo felt as if all the air in the world suddenly rushed straight past his ears, only for the notion to then vanish as if it never happened, instantly replaced by the choir of screams, shouts and cries uttered by all those who just happened to witness the whole fight from back in the stands.

"THEO!"

Out of all the noise that rose up the moment the headmaster broke his spell, Celeste’s shout was the loudest.

Or maybe it wasn’t, but due to her being the closest to Theo it was the one thing he heard?

"Everyone, calm down," the headmaster spoke, turning away from Theo and back to the crowd even though he turned his back to them just before breaking the spell.

’Nice theatrics,’ Theo thought, watching how the way the man’s robes flew on the air, leaving most of the panicked crowd speechless.

"First, as the one responsible for this unpleasant event, I would like to extend my heartfelt apologies for scaring you all," despite his position as the very head of the entire academy, the headmaster then lowered his head and bowed it down in an apology. "I’ve been made aware of the plot against the stability and safety of this place, a plot I couldn’t really uncover without ruffling too many feathers at once, I had no other choice but to allow this attack to happen..."

The headmaster held his voice for a moment.

"In a controlled manner!" he then added, as if dropping the major hint designed to let everyone on the now public secret.

His hand then moved up and ended up pointing at Theo.

"Knowing they were going to try to erase the tracks of their wrongdoings, I’ve decided to arm teacher Theo with spells and artifacts necessary for him to survive this ordeal while focusing all of the enmity upon himself!"

Standing slightly to the back, Theo raised his eyebrow.

’So that’s the story he’s going to go with?’ he thought while crossing his arms over his chest, only to then glance down and to the side, where Celeste simply refused to look at the headmaster, pinning her eyes on Theo’s own face instead.

’What’s her problem, now?’

"Master!"

With the headmaster still speaking out loud to the whole of the crowd, Tesh rushed down from the audience and jumped directly to the stage, her face a mix of panic, worry, respect and pride.

"Master! Are you alright?! Who were they? Why did they attack? What did you do? Are you hurt? Shouldn’t you hide?!"

Before Theo would have the chance to answer one question of hers, she already followed with two more, flooding his ears with more and more rapid-fire questions than he could ever hope to answer... or memorize.

"Calm down, girl," Theo reached out his hands and grabbed Tesh by her shoulders, holding her still while staring down right into her eyes.

At first, Tesh froze, her whole body growing nigh perfectly still.

She simply... stared back into Theo’s eyes, only for her cheeks to then cover with blush right as her entire frame suddenly softened up with her whole body growing meek and submissive all out of nowhere.

"Teacher!" following just a few steps behind his co-disciple, Lukas joined the group on the stage, sharing the same look at Tesh while somehow keeping himself on the leash when it came to his actions.

"For now, let’s all keep silent and just go along with the obvious truth that the headmaster is spitting, alright?"

With this prolonged look, Theo could tell.

None of those three were going to believe the bullshit the headmaster was spitting.

Even though their relationship effectively only started a few days ago, they spent too much time in his orbit since then not to know Theo never really went to have any sort of meeting with the headmaster.

As such, just when could the moment of passing those skills that the headmaster spoke about take place?

No.

Those three could tell that the massacre they all saw happen on the stage was all Theo’s doing. And yet...

Even after watching him get his hands covered in blood in ways that would easily make the crowd believe he was a heretic if not outright a monster in a human disguise, they didn’t look back at Theo as if he was some kind of a freak of a nature.

Instead, his disciples looked up to Theo with clear reverence, while Celeste’s eyes filled with fresh respect.

"That’s why, to compensate for your trouble, the academy will pay out a total of two tokens each as a compensation, for as long as we can all agree to keep what happened here under wraps!" the headmaster announced, throwing the bait big enough to shock anyone present... and effectively seal their lips with a seal tighter than any sort of threat or request could.

"Okay," meanwhile, Celeste merely nodded her head, strange intensity brimming in her eyes, as she agreed with Theo’s request. "Where do we go from here, though?"