“The shadow that does not exist in this world, burned away and completely vanished—that is the ending you deserve!”
At the moment the Light Sphere struck Shadow Burial, there was no intense flash, nor the sound of Magic exploding. The Light Sphere simply sank into the darkness as if swallowed by shadow.
Shadow Burial raised the scissors high toward Liakade’s shadow.
However, after raising the scissors, Shadow Burial froze like a puppet whose spring had snapped.
Her movements were locked in place.
Then, the deep, dark silhouette began to dissolve, bit by bit, from the center outward.
The black faded away quietly, like a stain being washed off.
No extra sound, no fluctuation of Magic power—as if this shadow had never existed in the world to begin with.
“Defeated…?”
Field stared at the scene in surprise.
It looked as if Shadow Burial had been defeated by a single blow from Alice, but Field seemed unable to process the reality.
After all, when Darkness was struck by Alice’s attack earlier, she hadn’t taken such heavy damage.
And now, Shadow Burial—created by Darkness through sacrificing her life and Soul to unleash Ultimate Magic—had been annihilated by a single, light strike from Alice.
“It seems so.”
Liakade nodded.
She was a little surprised as well, but upon reflection, it was actually reasonable.
After Darkness completely transformed into Shadow Burial, her attacks became silent, able to ignore defenses and dull even the sense of pain.
Her offensive power was overwhelming, but if she also possessed extremely high mobility and defense, she would be an invincible existence.
In other words, Shadow Burial exchanged her speed and defense for incredible offensive power.
She could hide behind others’ shadows and couldn’t be illuminated by Alice to reveal her position—but she was extremely fragile.
If struck directly by Light Sphere, her last shadow would immediately dissipate.
So, while it was abrupt, Liakade quickly accepted the fact that Darkness had been utterly defeated by them.
“What exactly happened?”
Seeing Darkness had been completely dealt with, Fianna turned her gaze back to Liakade, hoping to hear the truth and an explanation of the series of events.
“It’s a long story—it starts back during the Cultural Festival.”
With the crisis resolved, Liakade let out a long breath, preparing to explain everything to Teacher Fianna.
“This shadow Monster’s name is Darkness. After the Cultural Festival, she suddenly approached us, taking on a student’s appearance and commissioned the Yorozuya to retrieve a lost item from the Dungeon.”
“When we arrived, we found it was a trap. The lost item never existed. That’s when we realized something was wrong with Darkness. When we returned to the Academy, we discovered there was no such person.”
“Also, I found some Monsters she had kept on the Academy’s back mountain earlier, which led us to conclude that a member of the Demon Race had infiltrated the Academy.”
“We speculated that her goal was to kill Alice—but that was probably just one of her many objectives. She had been disguising herself as someone else all along.”
“During the Midterm Exam at Bibo Gorge, she finally revealed her true form and tried to kill us. We defeated her, but she escaped. We managed to track down her real identity and, just as we were about to eliminate her, she used that Magic—and then, Teacher, we encountered you.”
“Wha-what? So that’s how it was?”
Fianna listened in shock.
A shadow Monster had been hiding within the Academy, right under her nose, and she had never even noticed.
But after the shock faded, Fianna became stern and scolded the three before her.
“If you discovered that a Demon Race member had infiltrated the Academy, you should have reported it immediately! Wouldn’t it have been safer to let the Academy investigate?”
“The three of you are the future hope against the Demon King! To pursue a high-level Demon Race on your own—what if something happened to you?”
“We wanted to report it, but she was already disguised as someone else. If we reported it and she found out, wouldn’t that just alert her?”
Liakade explained helplessly.
She had suspected Darkness was hiding within the Academy leadership, thanks in part to having played the game in her previous life, but such things were hard to explain, so she glossed over the details.
“Who was she disguised as?”
Fianna asked in confusion.
She knew all the Teachers at the Academy well, but with so many students, she couldn’t keep track of them all.
It seemed Darkness had disguised herself as a student to blend in.
“She… disguised herself as the Grade Director.”
“Impossible!?”
Hearing this, Fianna stared at Liakade in disbelief.
Disguising as a student or Teacher was still within the realm of possibility—but the Grade Director?
That was something Fianna had never considered.
She had never sensed anything amiss with the Grade Director.
Five years ago, when she joined the Academy, it was the Grade Director who guided her, helped her acclimate, and taught her how to teach.
There was never any change in his personality—how could he have been replaced?
“Impossible! I’ve seen him use Magic, and in the five years we’ve worked together, his personality has never changed. If his habits or character had shifted, I would have noticed!”
“Really?”
Liakade was now confused as well.
She exchanged glances with Field and Alice beside her.
What they saw and detected was indeed the Grade Director—the gray-haired, bearded old man.
And Darkness did emerge from the Grade Director’s body.
He must have been replaced by Darkness.
But Darkness’ disguise was so perfect that even Fianna hadn’t noticed.
To what terrifying extent had her learning and imitation of humans reached?
“Maybe she only occasionally took on the Grade Director’s appearance to approach you?”
“No, impossible. If that were the case, there would have been two Grade Directors in the Academy at the same time—that would be easy to notice.”
Fianna considered another possibility: that the Grade Director had betrayed humanity and cooperated with Darkness.
But this idea was even harder for Fianna to accept.
The Grade Director had always been good to her.
She couldn’t believe someone like him would betray humanity.
However, Liakade and the others were already caught in a certain line of thinking.
Since, for five years, the Grade Director hadn’t changed in Fianna’s eyes, wasn’t it possible that as early as five years ago—before Fianna joined the Academy—the Grade Director had already ceased to be himself?