Vol 2. Chapter 30: The Stereotype Shattered

In the previous timeline—her past life—the blue-haired boy standing before her now had been her murderer.

Ever since coming into contact with Vinny, Aesphyra had constantly warned herself never to let her guard down.

Even now, with Vinny’s personality seemingly transformed, Aesphyra still couldn’t fully believe that this Vinny—this timeline’s Vinny—had genuinely changed. To her, he still had a criminal record. A blood-stained history.

Whether it was helping the orphanage, abstaining from dark Soul Armaments, or the personal transformation he seemed to embody—any of it could have been nothing more than a crafted persona meant to mask his true intent. Perhaps this timeline’s Vinny was simply more cunning than the last. That was all.

It was only natural. Expecting her to completely trust a man who had once brutally killed her? Impossible. Especially when she already carried a deep-rooted mistrust toward men in general.

That’s why she’d been keeping close tabs on Vinny from the very beginning. But ever since entering the Academy, his every move had been so... mundane. So ordinary that he seemed to have seamlessly merged into his new role. So much so that, for a while, Aesphyra had actually begun to think—

Maybe this Vinny really is different.

But then, just recently, the familiar crisis of the Carillian Academy began looming on the horizon—the same one she remembered vividly from her past life. She had reviewed that disaster in detail after reincarnating, especially the Bronze Blood cult's infiltration, and one fact stood out:

Vinny was almost certainly involved.

There was no other way to explain how, in the original timeline, he had suddenly gained such monstrous power during the chaos. Power that had ultimately led to her own downfall at the hands of someone she’d always considered a petty villain, a wretched clown.

Aesphyra suspected that Vinny had taken advantage of the cult invasion to kill off isolated first-year students, absorbing their power to skyrocket in strength.

The Soul Armament he used back then was of the dark kind, known to grow rapidly through the consumption of blood and flesh. Especially that of exceptionally gifted transcendents. The Carillian Academy had been the perfect hunting ground—brimming with top-quality prey.

Aesphyra didn’t know how Vinny had managed to conceal that dark Soul Armament in this life, but if he harbored malicious intent, it would surface eventually.

Time revealed all. No one could wear a mask forever—unless they wore it for life. But by then, even if they wanted to take it off, they couldn’t.

In truth, Aesphyra had already started doubting him back during the incident at Reismir, when Mirexia was attacked by Bronze Blood. That event had never occurred in the original timeline.

She hadn’t been present, and didn’t know exactly what happened. But from the investigation reports and Mirexia’s own account, it seemed Vinny had stumbled upon the scene by accident... and rescued her.

That alone made no sense.

What ability did Vinny possibly have that Mirexia would need his help? Even if she’d been poisoned and her combat power severely weakened, she still wouldn’t need him of all people to save her.

At the time, Aesphyra considered two possibilities.

The first: that both Vinny and Mirexia had intentionally concealed parts of the truth.

But that seemed unlikely. While they had grown up together, they weren’t close enough to protect each other with such secrecy. And neither of them had a clear motive to do so.

What secret could Mirexia possibly need to keep from her?

Aesphyra couldn’t make sense of it.

The second possibility, however, made far more sense:

That Vinny had been secretly colluding with Bronze Blood, and the incident had been orchestrated entirely by him and the cult. A performance designed to win Mirexia’s trust and affection.

And sure enough, after that event, Mirexia’s favorability toward Vinny had skyrocketed. So much so that Aesphyra began seeing him in the Student Council room nearly every time she visited. Their private relationship had also grown significantly more intimate.

Never mind that the “prey” she had her eye on was being toyed with by such a vile scumbag—that was infuriating enough on its own. But what troubled Aesphyra more was Mirexia’s tendency to offer unconditional trust to her friends—especially to those who had once helped or saved her.

Which meant she’d completely lowered her guard around Vinny.

If her suspicion was correct—if Vinny truly had orchestrated the attack to gain Mirexia’s trust—then there was no way Aesphyra would let him off the hook. Such vile, opportunistic, and despicable schemers had no place in this world.

It would be a chance to settle both the grudge from her past life and the injustice of this one.

And if Vinny really was working with Bronze Blood, it would also explain how he managed to slip past the Soul Armament inspection during admission.

With the help of the Alchemical Demon God, Elrunas, hiding a dark Soul Armament would be child’s play.

But something... something still felt off.

Maybe things weren’t exactly how she imagined them to be.

The moment that thought surfaced in her mind, even Aesphyra herself was shocked.

Why was she instinctively making excuses for Vinny? Why did a part of her believe that this Vinny, deep down, wasn’t the same as the one who had murdered her?

Maybe it was all just a more elaborate act. These kinds of degenerates were masters of deception, weren’t they?

The Vinny from her past life probably didn’t even have the intelligence for this level of trickery. Maybe this one was just a better liar.

Wasn’t that... a good thing? If she could get revenge without emotional baggage? And Mirexia’s circle would be free from the buzzing fly trying to snatch at her?

And yet—she remembered Vinny stepping forward at the entrance banquet. She remembered their frequent squabbles, the constant back-and-forth bickering between them.

Maybe... without even realizing it... sparring with Vinny, getting under his skin, watching him lose his temper—maybe that had become a part of her daily life.

To cut that part away so suddenly... felt strangely unsettling.

Fine. She had to admit it: she didn’t feel as eager for revenge as she used to. In fact, she now hoped it had all been a misunderstanding. That this Vinny really was the same idiot inside and out.

So—for now—she shifted her attention away from him.

There was something more urgent: the incoming Bronze Blood invasion.

In her previous life, after the event, she had learned how the cult coordinated their actions. So, she suppressed her presence and waited near the old school building that night.

As expected, a figure in a black robe arrived shortly after and crouched beneath a great tree, digging at its roots.

Rather than risking alerting them, Aesphyra chose not to strike.

She wanted to catch them all in one net.

So she used a secret ability of the ancient imperial Carillian bloodline—Divine Favor—to halt time itself. Then, stepping through the frozen moment, she peeled back the figure’s hood.

Under the moonlight, she saw the face clearly... and closed her eyes.

Unexpected—yet completely within reason.

“...You really never fail to ‘disappoint’ me, do you, Vinny Varelis?”

She had once thought he might truly change. But no—he had only changed tactics.

With a sigh of mockery, the silver-haired girl turned away and released Divine Favor.

After that, she had done something completely out of character.

She invited Vinny to dinner.

And at the table, she kept “reminding” him. Pressuring him.

Even she didn’t understand why. By then, she was certain Vinny was the same as before. He was in league with Bronze Blood. The only difference was that this time, he was smarter, better at hiding, and far more dangerous.

To pull out the poisonous thorn hidden deep in his flesh, she would have to fish with a long line.

And yet, even Aesphyra herself couldn’t explain why she hadn’t simply let Vinny continue on his path to self-destruction. If she’d allowed him to go too far and then taken him down at the peak of his downfall, she could have easily avenged her past life and removed a romantic rival in the process.

So then... why had she sat across the table from him, offering thinly veiled reminders? Why had it felt like she didn’t want to see him fall any further?

She’d even warned Vinny multiple times after that. She’d told him, for instance, that the wind passing through the bell tower where the Sacred Bell resided could carry across the entire Carillian Academy.

Why?

Because in the previous timeline, someone had shattered a vial of alchemical toxin atop that very tower at night, letting the wind carry it through the school.

If the one responsible had been Vinny, then that bell—once a symbol of divine grace and salvation—would have become an ouroboros, a snake devouring its own tail. What would the Goddess and the Saintesses have thought, knowing that the Sacred Bell was used by a follower of the Demon God Pillar to poison their children?

And yet, Vinny had ignored her warnings.

He had continued to make contact with Bronze Blood.

The person stationed at the old school building for each handoff had always been him.

That was why Aesphyra had once told him, “Even the Goddess and the Saintesses can’t redeem you.”

Of course, the alchemical poison in question had major limitations. Its toxicity couldn’t be too severe—it needed to stay beneath the Academy’s radar. So its main effect was to induce mild flu-like symptoms and obscure the ability to distinguish water by color.

Aesphyra had figured out that the poison specifically targeted students with low affinity for water-element magic. A wide-scale illness would draw too much attention, so the cult had designed it to quietly debilitate a select few. These afflicted students would have their water affinity reduced even further, making it impossible for them to identify contaminated liquids—and that would set the stage for the cult’s real plan.

But that plan would never succeed.

Because the alchemical agents Aesphyra had been crafting recently were all tailored to counter this next, critical stage of the cult’s scheme.

She was laying the groundwork to expose the rotten seeds in broad daylight, to catch them in the act and drag them before the tribunal.

And to do that, she couldn’t afford to act rashly.

She had prepared everything to make sure that when this disaster struck, there would be no casualties.

Now, all that remained... was to follow Vinny in secret tonight.

She needed to see with her own eyes whether he would, like last time, sneak off amid the chaos to slaughter other students and feed his Soul Armament—then frame the crimes on Bronze Blood.

At the banquet, Aesphyra had been watching Vinny so closely that she hadn’t even noticed where the explosion came from.

But it was clearly different from what had happened in the previous life.

After the commotion began in the cathedral, Vinny hadn’t taken the opportunity to slip away, nor had he panicked like the others.

Instead, he dove under a table.

She had been watching, confused—wondering what he was doing—when the table suddenly split apart, and Vinny emerged cradling that silver-haired elf... presumably his roommate.

That had thrown Aesphyra even further off.

They were right on the cusp of Bronze Blood’s next move. What use was there in keeping up appearances now?

When a statue threatened to crash down on them, she had secretly intervened to save them.

After leaving the cathedral, Vinny had suddenly bolted, as if chasing after something. He followed a male student to the Radiant Sanctum.

Little did he know, Aesphyra had been tailing him the entire time.

When she heard what he said to the student—and saw the immediate fight that broke out afterward—Aesphyra could only shake her head in the shadows.

Whatever her personal feelings, she knew what she had to do now.

She had to cut off this danger with her own hands.

Her vengeance was finally within reach.

But... was she more pleased—or more disappointed?

Just as she prepared to intervene, another male student appeared. A harmless, innocent fool.

And then—shockingly—it was that student who got attacked by the one she’d never suspected.

Vinny—whom she had long condemned as irredeemable, a Demon God Pillar cultist through and through—stepped forward and saved him.

That stunned Aesphyra.

That this self-centered, vile, disgraceful scoundrel from her past life would, in such a crucial moment, give up his advantage and risk his own life to save a stranger?

That... couldn’t be an act.

Helping an orphanage could be a front. Turning down dark Soul Armaments could be part of a persona. But in a moment like this, when no one was watching, when no one would ever know, he had still abandoned the upper hand just to save someone.

That couldn’t be faked.

And in that instant, every lingering stereotype she still clung to shattered.

Then, before her eyes, the male student Vinny had been fighting transformed—into a servant of the Demon God Pillar.

Everything had gone far beyond what Aesphyra had anticipated. She had been so sure that Vinny would reveal his dark Soul Armament here. That this would be the moment he tore off the mask.

But no—Vinny was telling the truth.

This enemy wasn’t someone he’d framed to justify a human sacrifice. This was a real cultist, a Fanatic, and Vinny had risked his life to fight him.

No cultist would do that.

The entire situation flipped on its head.

Aesphyra realized, too late, that she—the one who had thought herself the omniscient observer—had been in the dark all along.

Watching Vinny being overpowered by the Fanatic, Aesphyra didn’t need to understand his entire plan. She didn’t need to grasp what he was thinking.

Because now, she knew one thing for sure—

Vinny wasn’t a Bronze Blood cultist. He didn’t have a dark Soul Armament. He was... just a normal person.

And so, she stepped out from the shadows.

With a flash of gold, she knocked the charging Fanatic away and stood between them—poised atop the crossguard of the Holy Sword.