Class Reunion

The shocked looks on their faces were priceless. It seems they hadn’t forgotten me. I also remembered them clearly, along with each of their cheat skills. One of the girls was startled enough to fall to the ground. Her glasses slid down her nose, teetering on the edge of falling off.

“Susami, is that you?” Miss Reiden asked as she stepped forward from behind two heavily armoured students.

“Sorry, miss, but it’s Lark now.”

As their weapons began to dip, Kenji spoke up. “Don’t lower your weapons, don’t forget we are dealing with the Accursed Captain Lark.”

I guess it was only natural for Kenji to become the leader of the class.

“But he’s…” Miss Reiden began.

“I know,” Kenji replied, looking conflicted. “But even if Captain Lark is Susami, don’t forget he also killed Elder Rudolf.” His next words were directed at me. “Don’t resist and come with us!”

“Now, how do you suppose I do that?” I held up my hands, which were still bound by the wooden handcuffs. “As you can see, I can’t really resist.”

Several students took a step forward.

“Stop!” Yoshihara Mina screamed.

She was as pale as a ghost, and her whole body was trembling. The fear on her face was evident by the visible tears in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Kenji asked, panic in his voice.

She was pointing her finger at me, still shaking.

“Those… those… twisted skills. The System is screaming to run, that you are a danger.” She suddenly turned around and vomited again before fainting. Two other girls in the class ran to check on her.

Kenji’s eyes glowed yellow before he dropped to one knee and covered his mouth.

“I see why Mina was so concerned. Your skills are warped and corrupted. It's as if thousands of angry spirits possess you.”

“Oh yeah, I would advise against any detection skills on me. On another note, you seemed to find me pretty quickly. How did you even know about my pirate life?”

“I’m pretty sure you’ll understand if I say the Raven Guild has means of getting information,” Kaguya smugly commented.

I stared blankly at her, then looked over to the other class members. They all seemed to have a knowing face.

“Sorry, never heard of them,” I responded honestly.

“You haven’t heard of the Raven Guild? Only the most famous guild that specialises in information gathering and assassinations!” Kaguya exclaimed.

“Why are you hanging around with assassins? It sounds like you all fell in with the wrong crowd. Miss Reiden, you might want to have a word with your students.”

“You’re the last person who should be saying that! You are literally a pirate,” Miss Reiden snapped back, clearly flustered.

“Don’t fall into his banter,” Kenji commented. He signalled over his shoulder, his blade still raised. “Come on, Susami, let’s go.”

I followed them up the banks of the shore, and they led me to a horse-drawn wooden carriage. They tossed me into the back of the cart, and the girls climbed in after.

Honestly, there were worse places to be than a carriage full of curious girls. However, I suspected that mentioning it would result in losing this privilege.

The cart began to move, and the moment it did, the curious females began asking their questions.

“So what happened to you after you disappeared?”

“Tell us about your eye, the curses, your hand.”

“I want to know how you became a notorious pirate?”

“And your body.”

Several of the girls nodded in agreement.

“You’re like a completely different person,” Kaguya jokingly added.

“Ladies, please, no need to rush with your questions. I am not going anywhere.” I held up the wooden cuffs.

I proceeded to tell them my adventures. I wasn’t foolish enough to tell them everything. I especially avoided mentioning anything about the system or administrators, but I told them enough to explain my injuries. Additionally, I clarified that I was not involved in Elder Rudolf's death, though I don’t think they believed me.

“So yeah, lost my hand and eye to a big lizard and had to get cauterised since it wouldn’t heal.”

“Thank goodness it happened in this world and not our old world. I couldn’t imagine an injury without pain nullification.”

I gritted my teeth and swallowed the rage that was building.

“Pain nullification?” I asked, through gritted teeth, making sure I heard correctly.

“You know, pain nullification…”

It seemed she finally caught on to why I was querying it.

She hesitated before adding. “Do you not have even basic skills?”

I looked up at her. The look on my face must have scared her because she let out a scream. The horse carriage suddenly stopped and opened. The blades of several of the male classmates were pointed at me.

“Relax,” Kaguya reassured the boys. “We were just surprised by something Susami said.”

“Lark,” I corrected, although they didn’t seem to care.

Kaguya’s reassurance seemed to work because they closed up the carriage, and we began to move once more.

“Why are they so jumpy?”

“It’s been tough for them. Like us, they miss their families and their old way of life. It seems you’ve been through a lot as well. Rather than being a pirate, you should be helping us defeat the Demon Lord so we can get back home. We might be able to get you a lesser sentence.”

“What, you believe that crap about the Demon Lord?”

“It may be the only way to get home!”

“Why is that my issue? I have no reason to return.”

“You don’t want to?”

“There is nothing in our old world I care for, and in this one, I have my dear crew.”

“If your crew is so good, why did they chain you up and leave you?”

I sighed.

“It was all a misunderstanding involving me accidentally groping someone’s boobs.”

There was silence.

I looked up, and the girls all had a look of disgust on their faces and shuffled further away from me. All the headway I made in charming the ladies seemed to disappear in that moment.

A short time later, we reached the halfway point, and the boys and girls switched places. Whilst the girls were happy to chat, the boys were far less accommodating and just sat in silence, giving me death stares. Given how bored I was, I decided to have some fun.

“Are we there yet?” I asked over and over again.

Finally, after several minutes, one of them snapped.

“Shut up, if you ask me one more time, I swear I will kill you!”

“Damn, I was kind of hoping you’d say if I asked again, you’d turn the carriage around, and that we wouldn’t be going to Reicalth.”

“You can’t honestly have expected that would work?” Kenji replied, although it looked like he was trying to hold in a laugh.

“No, but it’s better than staying silent and doing nothing. In the odd chance it worked, I would be a free man.”

“You have changed, you used to be withdrawn and quiet,” Kenji commented as he looked at me with a serious expression.

“Almost dying so many times tends to do that to a person,” I replied as I stared blankly up at the carriage's ceiling.

▪──── X ────▪

End of chapter 34