Nanomancer Rising: Divine Alchemist Reborn as Academy's Worst Teacher
Chapter 86: Teacher’s feelings

Chapter 86: Teacher’s feelings

"Now then, allow me to ask again," Theo turned to the head maid who somehow managed to stay still throughout the ordeal. "Who do you think is going to pay your wages now?"

Theo relaxed his hand, letting go of the magical sigil.

The moment the control structure of it dispersed in the air, the world’s mana controlled by it simply returned to its usual state, as if nothing ever happened.

The head maid swallowed hard, her face slightly sunken.

"It’s... you, sir...?"

Theo smiled and nodded his head.

"That’s right. Now, go get this whole place cleaned up. The farce is over."

Sweeping the cloth of his robe to the back, Theo turned on the spot before walking out of the room, leaving the stunned maid behind. Walking down the hallway, he had a moment to think, only to get straight back to work the moment he left the inner corridor.

"Where did my students go?" Stepping out, Theo asked, not directing his question towards anyone in particular.

And after waiting a second, he confirmed the staff had yet to learn of the news.

It would take time to patiently explain the situation. Effort to threaten someone specific.

Which is why Theo merely let a bit of his mana loose, shattering every other container of the carefully arranged scene.

What used to be a relatively tranquil, unmoving scene suddenly turned into a chaotic mess of sharp, chipped shards of wood shooting around in the rising mist of sawdust.

"I will ask again." Before anyone could shake off the shock of the unexpected, sudden chaos all around, Theo spoke. "Where are my students?"

There was no need for him to raise his voice or put on a stern voice. Just the obvious threat behind his display of power was enough to carry the meaning of Theo’s current mood.

Cooperate or get fucked.

Silence lingered for a moment in the air before a young butler became the first of the manor’s staff to smarten up.

"I’ve guided them to the restoration rooms," the young butler announced with a bow, magically appearing right by Theo’s side without any prior notice. "They are towards the back of the manor, in the middle of the inner courtyard."

The butler quickly pointed his hand in the direction he meant, helping Theo root the explanation with the reality surrounding him.

"Initially, Miss Celeste intended to just dump them at one of the bedrooms, but I suggested the use of the manor’s central formation out of concerns for our new master’s disciples!"

Theo’s eyebrow twitched a little. He wasn’t prepared for this level of quite the skillful asslicking. Sure, this was exactly why he was so decisive in doing away with Julius and then later making a scene out in the main hall, but to see his efforts bear fruit so quickly and so... effectively?

"Good thinking," Theo wasted no time to praise the eager butler, more than happy to reward loyalty, especially if its price was as cheap as a few words of praise. "Now, lead me to them."

The following stroll was a lot longer than Theo expected it to be, making him question just how did his disciples get to their resting area in the time he dealt with Julius. A question made stranger upon realization that the very butler who reported their whereabouts had to make the same trip but both ways!

’I guess they are not going to reveal some quirks of this place to me so easily, huh?’

Theo took a quick look at the back of the butler’s head, perfectly content with the young man guiding him... for now.

He was a patient man. But as soon as he were to judge that this trip grew longer and longer not because of the quirky layout of the manor but some shenanigans of his guide, he would have no qualms literally cutting the most direct path towards his disciples.

Who knew if this wasn’t all part of Julius’ elaborate plan to kidnap his disciples and then try to negotiate with Theo with this kind of a leverage?

’Honestly, remembering his stunts at the tribunes’ tower only makes it easier for me to believe he could do something like that,’ Theo thought, right as the limits of his patience magically decreased by half.

Thankfully for the young butler, it appeared as if it really was the issue with how the manor was laid out. Its quirks, great when it came to defending this place from a raid, also made it increasingly more difficult to move around, already prompting Theo to reconsider the idea of a total remodeling of the place.

Still, an idea like that was nothing more but a shadow on the wall, a potential Theo might or may not focus on in the future. For now, though, his prime worry was to confirm Tesh and Lukas’ safety.

Partially, it was because of his sense of responsibility. Practically, however, Theo didn’t want to deal with the aftermath of anything happening to the two of them, especially not right after he spent pretty much twenty hours trying to help them grow!

Soon, the butler brought Theo to the outside... or rather, the inner outside of the manor in the form of a huge, perfectly square courtyard marked with stones, flags, and all sorts of other effigies, all to induce an extremely mild flow of magic through it.

To an untrained eye, the mana in the area was no greater in density or potential than the mana on the outside. Even Theo, blessed with all the boons his hive and nanites provided, struggled to find anything special about the local formation, only grasping the idea behind it right as he stepped into the small, lone building located in the very middle of the courtyard.

Normally, given the existing layout of the manor, one would expect this place to house the staging tower, the last line of desperate defense to which everyone would retreat if all the other battlements failed. It would be a tower designed with nothing but long-term survival of its occupants.

In here, however, despite the heavily defensible, militaristic nature of the rest of the manor, the staging tower’s spot was occupied by just a simple shed, no bigger than what Theo could see in the documentaries about the schools of old in his past life. All that Theo had to do to uncover the mystery of this place, though, was step inside the shed in question.

In a way, the very walls of the shed were also an element of the formation covering the whole of the courtyard, concentrating all its effects within the building, squeezing the mana in while the walls of the shed ensured none of the gathered mana would leak out. And it was right in the middle of this small shed, where Theo finally saw Luke and Tesh peacefully resting under Celeste’s watchful eye.

"Teacher Theo," Celeste whispered softly, mindful not to disturb the tired students. "How did it go?"

For a moment, Theo withheld the answer, staring in silence at his two disciples.

He knew them only for a few days. Heck, he could count the hours he spent with those two and even when combined, they still wouldn’t take three digits to mark down!

He felt a sense of responsibility, as slight as it could be, over them. A sense of duty and, to a degree, a teacher’s calling. Most of all, though, he didn’t want them to become a source of a new wave of problems for him.

By no means should there be any room for sympathy of any kind. Not when Theo hardly knew those two and for the considerable part of the time he knew them, they were instrumental in stirring the former mess with the trial.

And yet... Just by looking down on their resting faces as they bravely faced the consequences of going ham on cultivation, Theo just couldn’t help but feel a distant sense of... pride? Accomplishment?

Fulfillment?

Theo heaved a long sigh, tired by the mere prospects of what those feelings could potentially mean for him and for his future.

"Things went as expected," he then finally answered Celeste’s question with a small, empty smile. "And as long as he’s not an idiot, Julius shouldn’t bother me anymore."

Theo then sighed again, sensing how those very few words raised quite the annoying flag.

"But I guess it would be too much for me to ask for people like him to know better, am I right?"