Nanomancer Rising: Divine Alchemist Reborn as Academy's Worst Teacher
Chapter 112: Overwhelming freedom / Nate’s Crashout

Chapter 112: Overwhelming freedom / Nate’s Crashout

’What am I even supposed to do now?’

Tesh wandered pointlessly through the academy streets, her face revealing the big emptiness in both her head and her heart.

She never had this kind of a problem before.

Back in her family home, she would be too busy studying all the materials her parents prepared for her, and a whole crowd of the hired tutors would constantly nag her to learn. From the basics of mana theory, through practical magic application, bits of high society etiquette, noble customs, even as far as cooking or how to be efficient with one’s cleaning...

Those early formative years of her life were marked with constant study, constant practice, and constant lack of something that was extremely foreign for her - free time and freedom to do whatever she wanted.

Then, came the academy where, for the first two years, Tesh was the perfect student.

Always on time for the classes, always with her homework completed in extreme detail.

It wouldn’t be until the middle of her third year in the youth division that she first tasted the forbidden fruit of... living her own life for herself.

A random meeting with a person she never learned the name of and whose face or even gender has long since vanished into the abyss of time. A short exchange that forced her to question her own daily routine and the sense it supposedly carried.

This first doubt soon sprouted into a considerable change that turned her from the perfect student that all the teachers adored and respected... to one that was still perfect, but not to the same degree as before.

She would still bring her homework on time, but now only completed it in a simple way. Rather than going into great and often unnecessary detail, rather than explaining every step of the process and every definition she used... she did what all the other students did and gave up on all that extra and realistically unnecessary effort.

The peak of this change happened during Tesh’s last year at the academy’s youth division, when the progressive degree to which she rebelled against her family’s rules coincided with the girl entering her most rebellious age - an age at which, as she later learned, all children were biologically conditioned to challenge authority, establish boundaries, and question the truths they’ve never questioned before.

A process that some scholars believed to be one of the chief reasons behind the success of the human race, forcing them to constantly diversify, change, adapt.

For Tesh, this process culminated with the greatest transgression she ever allowed herself to commit while at the academy, one that was later witnessed by her entire extended family during the graduation ceremony. Originally, it was nothing more but a good-faith gesture from her parents, hoping to show off their perfect girl to their entire extended family.

But as a result...?

Tesh’s entire lineage was there to witness her slipping for the first time, and receiving - God, have mercy - a grade just below the perfect one!

In all seven of the compulsory subjects, Tesh excelled and easily reached the perfect grade. But in one of the four selective subjects, three of which she was forced to practice by her parents despite never showing any interest in them... her grade only went as high as "perfectly satisfactory"!

Oh, the shame, humiliation, bucket of cold water poured on the heads of her parents!

Even to this day, Tesh could remember the look of horror she saw on her mother’s face and, even worse, the look of disappointment in her father’s eyes!

But to Tesh’s own horror, that wasn’t even the worst part.

Already fourteen by then, she couldn’t care less about the mixed looks of her extended family, where some expressed great pride and awe while others looked at her as if she was a rag used to wipe someone’s vomit from the floor.

What she did care about, however, was the look she received from her little sister - the existence of which she learned on that very day - and a single sentence of her own mother that she managed to hear.

"Even if she failed, you won’t fail mommy and will become the perfect student, won’t you?"

Crack.

Up until that very moment, Tesh followed her parents’ teachings, even if not to their full degree.

Life at the academy taught her just how impossible and simply outrageous her parents’ methods were, giving her the confidence to oppose those teachings in the very slightest of ways, merely optimizing her studying process rather than giving up on any of her goals.

That day, a phantom thief of the academy was born, even if it would still take Tesh three more years to bring that name to the peak of its fame. And ever since then, the rules, teachings, and habits that Tesh’s parents worked so hard to engrave upon her very soul, they’ve all become meaningless.

It wouldn’t be until Tesh herself grew bored with her progressively more and more intense stunts that the legend of the phantom thief would come to an end, with her activities while she hid underneath her mask and later the headmaster-gifted crown no longer providing her with the sense of respite and relief she so desperately sought.

Barely sixteen, Tesh tasted the greatest degree of freedom she could’ve ever imagined. She could enter any room, any chamber, any secret meeting spot, take whatever she fancied, and then just leave. It didn’t matter that, quite often, her loot would be limited to perfectly random items, more of a memento than an actual loot.

After three years of increasing the intensity of her stunts further and further away, she was finally caught. And without even the hint of effort on the other party’s end.

It was a day when the headmaster, the very man who caught her as she tried to sneak into his office, gifted her the crown. But, in all honesty, this wasn’t the only gift she received back then. For the young and lost girl, it was the gift of an honest, hours-long talk that she had with the man that was infinitely more precious than the priceless artifact she received in acknowledgment of her past exploits.

A talk that set her back on the straight path of seeking true freedom, not its illusion created by robbing others and taking whatever it was that she laid her hands on. And ever since that day, Tesh could finally lay her traumatic past to rest, coming to terms with the harm her parents caused her while also learning how to appreciate the very freedom the academy’s headmaster personally taught her about - the freedom to walk the streets without fear of losing her head to a random, passing mage in a foul mood.

A freedom to enjoy a piece of cake with her hard-earned money, even though it offered no health benefits at all. But also the freedom of living through the consequences of eating that cake, even if it left her stuck in the toilet for hours on end.

All of that was precisely why, at this very moment, Tesh was at one hell of a loss.

"It’s only been a few days since I’ve managed to become his disciple," she muttered to herself, her face visibly brightening up at the mere thought of her master. "So, why is it that I have no idea what to do with myself now that I have an entire day just for myself?"

For three years, Tesh lived like a free building, going wherever she pleased. Then, for almost two more years, she continued to do so although within the more civilized limits, always free to do with her time as she desired, pushed ahead by nothing but her own goals and ambitions.

And now, only about a week after willingly joining Theo’s side and then following the frantic schedule he imposed on her, she suddenly felt lost in the vastness of the academy, not sure what she was even supposed to do with all the time she had on her hands!

A problem that Tesh struggled with for quite a while as she strolled through the random streets of the academy, hoping to just... encounter some inspiration that would give her an idea on how to better make use of her time.

"Tesh?"

Hearing her name called out, she turned her head towards its source only to then freeze on the spot.

Down in the side-alley’s gutter lay no one else but Nate, her loyal follower and cousin... who she totally forgot about given the absolute lack of any breathing room she had for the last week!

’Don’t tell me,’ Tesh’s eyes opened wide as she considered the possibility that Nate’s current, downtrodden state was her own responsibility, a consequence of suddenly abandoning him to his own devices.

"Nate!"

Worried to no end, Tesh rushed over and picked the younger student up by his arms, his body appearing impossibly feeble as she helped him to stand up, only to then quickly catch him as he attempted to take a step only to stumble and crumble in on himself, unable to properly support his own weight.

His gaze was cloudy, his eyes unfocused, even his voice appeared uncertain, as if he couldn’t tell for sure whether or not the girl helping him out was actually his cousin or not.

"Ugh..." For one more, terribly long moment, Nate continued with his struggle, hanging off Tesh’s arm...

Only to then lean over her side, pushing his mouth as far away from her clean clothes as he could, only for his entire body to tense up... and then relax as all the stinky content of his stomach shot out from the wrong end of his digestive tract, pouring directly onto the alley’s cobblestone and just half an inch away from Tesh’s feet.

For the next several moments, all Tesh could do was pat her cousin’s back as he continued to vomit over and over again, emptying his stomach out only to attempt to take a breath to regain his bearings... a breath that instantly carried the stink of his own vomit up his nose, leading to another round of unpleasant noises and convulsions.

It wasn’t until there wasn’t even a drop of anything left in his stomach that Nate finally managed to recover, powerless to do anything but allow Tesh to drag him away from the mess he made and then set him down quite a lot deeper down the alley, where no one would connect the feeble Nate with the huge pool of vomit he left behind.

"Are you okay?"

With the worry about what happened now moving to the back of Tesh’s head, she focused on nothing else but her cousin’s well-being, all her worry from before replaced with the newfound worry for the kid she effectively abandoned on the day she decided to follow in Theo’s footsteps.

And so, regardless of how much she wanted to ask the simple ’what happened,’ she forcefully bit down on her lips and kept the question to herself, waiting for her cousin to reveal what he was willing to freely let her know.

"Ugh..." Nate puffed out his cheeks, but with his stomach now completely empty, all that he could vomit out was a stinky breath. "As you can see, s0-s0..." he struggled to speak, attempting to stand up for a moment only to then give it up and remain seated by the wall, taking his sweet time to recover. "What happened?" he then asked, as if Tesh, somehow, could have any idea about it at all. "The last thing I remember was drinking with that cute girl and..."

Nate squinted his eyes... only for his head to bob as another convulsion shook his body.

"And then?" Rather than asking, Tesh attempted to guide her cousin’s memories towards the goal, as curious to find out what happened as the man himself.

"Nothing..." Nate muttered as all the strength left his body, but not before he brought his hands up to his eyes and shielded them from the light of the sun reflected by the windows of the buildings enclosing the alley. "I can’t remember anything beyond that point," he spoke, only for his face to then twist in an ugly grimace, "but can you please turn off this damned light? My head is killing me! Oh," Nate almost jumped, "please, I beg of you," his voice quickly turned desperate, "can you get me some water?"