Chapter 150 - Troublesome Girl

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Although she had set out full of confidence, Evelyn had no idea where to actually look to find her teacher.

The first place she tried was, of course, her own tower, but it didn't seem like she was inside. Evelyn even checked the tree and the lake, but there was no sign of the platinum blonde anywhere.

As her first guess had failed, Evelyn now had two choices.

First, she could go check the principal's quarters, where even if she failed to find Aurora, she would be able to get some inkling of her whereabouts.

And second, she could contact her directly using the emergency bead she had used during the conflict with Mantis.

Unfortunately, the second method had already failed to get her a response earlier, and she assumed the Aurora had kept the communication bead either in her tower or in a spatial storage artifact, and was simply unable to receive her signal.

The first method, on the other hand, came with a risk that Evelyn felt a little reluctant to take.

Professor Stonehardt — now headmaster — had already shown that he was somewhat hostile to Evelyn the first opportunity he got. Although his method wasn't as blatant and obvious as Dane's and the old lady in the elemental mastery class, that only made things worse.

After all, not only did he have ill intent, he also showed that he had the patience and the cunning to not give himself away.

Aurora had a certain way of doing things, and Evelyn knew that although she had protected her fiercely, she wouldn't expel a teacher for such 'minor' concerns.

And that had been before, when the Academy hadn't been lacking a pillar. Now that professor Stonehardt had become the headmaster, the situation was undoubtedly worse.

The pink haired girl shook her head. "Hopefully, this will mean he becomes busy with other stuff, and doesn't have the time to interfere in my matters directly."

In either case, with Aurora's whereabouts uncertain, a presumably hostile person like the new headmaster was certainly the last person she wanted to have a confrontation with. Unfortunately, delaying this matter was also something that made her uncomfortable, since she had no idea when Aurora would actually be back.

Based on her knowledge, she knew that certain ceremonies and rituals could last as long as decades or even more, and waiting so long would simply be foolish. Even if whatever Aurora was doing couldn't be interrupted, she would rather find out sooner and then decide how she should handle other matters on her own if given no other choice.

"Wait… there's one more place I haven't checked!"

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Making her way back to Aurora's pillar, Evelyn recalled that her teacher had once told her that one of the primary duties of a pillar was to protect the 'Tower of Solitude', which was why the four pillar towers surrounded it at their center.

Taking a rough measure of the two tower's locations, Evelyn started making her way around the area, and soon came across another tall tower, this one a little smaller than Aurora's, and green instead of white.

At the bottom of the tower was a single halberd wielding female guard, who immediately glared at her the moment she approached.

Evelyn could tell without even using her probe that this woman was a little below a junior professor's level.

Before the woman could point her weapon at her, Evelyn immediately took out the translucent raiment that Aurora had given her as a keepsake, and waved it in front of her arrogantly.

The guard lady froze, as expected, giving the conceited-looking pink haired girl a tight frown. "Don't wave that thing around! Do you even know what that is?"

Evelyn pretended to look ignorant as she turned her nose up. "Don't care. I'm looking for my teacher, I miss her a lot!"

"What does that have to do with me? This isn't a place you belong in, go back to class, or your room! Shoo!"

"Hmph. Since you recognize my teacher's keepsake, you must know something! I was sleeping when she disappeared, and her note just said I'll be back soon! AHHH, I really wanna hug her, it's been too long!"

The halberd wielding lady resisted the urge to lop off the spoiled brat's head. "T-There's a limit to your willfulness. Lady Aurora is a pillar, and they are busy with something very important. Go back to your room, she'll be back when she's done."

Evelyn peeked at the door behind the woman, who shifted to block her sight immediately. "Is she in there? She is, isn't she?"

"She's not!"

"Hmph. I'll go check for myself."

The halberd wielding lady almost jumped in fright when the girl tried to dart past her, barely managing to block her with her halberd's pole, though the girl jumped over it with shockingly high agility and speed.

'FUCK!'

Thinking about the horrendous death waiting for her if Aurora's spoiled little student went splat against the defensive array at the door, the guard woman immediately panicked. "They're not in there, really! They're at the other tower, that way!"

The pink haired girl grinned. "Well, why didn't you say so earlier?"

"Brat!"

"Okay, that's all I wanted to know. Byebye, aunty."

The guard lady just gritted her teeth and refused to speak.

Although Evelyn could bend the woman over and spank her if she wanted, and there would be nothing she could do to resist, there was no point in flaunting her strength like that, especially when there was nothing to gain. Now that she had already got what she wanted, Evelyn swiftly left in the direction the woman had pointed in.

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It didn't take her long to arrive at the tower the woman had pointed her towards, and Evelyn couldn't help but shake her head when she got there. "I should have just gone around the place once, and there would be no need to traumatize poor halberd aunty."

With the security of this place, anyone could tell that something important was going on inside.

Surrounding the tall black tower at the center, a total of twelve senior professors were seated in the inner circle of an array, and thirty-six junior professors were spread out on the outer circle.

A tertiary array of ten dozen guards was located in the outermost layer, and Evelyn could tell that just barging in might be difficult, even if she had ten times her current strength.

Tugging the translucent cloth in her hand, Evelyn couldn't help but hesitate. "S-Should I try it?"

Just as she was considering throwing caution to the wind, however, she heard a very familiar voice.

"Evelyn?!"

The pink haired girl turned her head in surprise as she saw the older girl walking towards her. "Eh? Eula?"

It didn't take the green haired girl long to jog to her side. "What are you doing all the way over here?"

Evelyn scratched her cheek in embarrassment. "I missed my teacher, so I came to look. I heard she's in there. Is it possible for me to take a look?"

Anyway, it was better to stick with one excuse, and she'd already used this one in front of the halberd lady.

The Aquan girl felt her eyes almost bug out of her head. This girl was a bit too affectionate, wasn't she? Thinking about the fact that the pink haired girl also had a huge crush on her, Eula could already feel a headache coming. 

Of course, she had already heard a little about how fiercely Aurora protected this little student of hers. In a way, the pink haired girl was actually quite lucky that the pillar was willing to spoil her so, or being overly affectionate would have surely landed her in a lot of trouble.

But her duty here was to keep any wandering students away, and she still had a job to do.

Eula couldn't help but feel a little complicated. "I'm sure she misses you too, but you can't just barge in there, okay? If you go any further, you'll make things very awkward for your teacher, understand?"

Evelyn bit her lip tightly as she gave the girl a distressed look. "I-I just want to take a look, then. Just let me see her, and I'll go back."

Of course, who would be able to stop her once she had Aurora's location confirmed?

Eula sighed. "I'm sure your teacher would say the same thing if she was here—"

Evelyn pouted petulantly as she waved Aurora's keepsake in front of the older girl's face. "Eula~ Look, my teacher gave me this, and told me no one can stop me as long as I have it! She'll definitely want to meet me if she knew I was here!"

The green haired girl had no idea what the transparent cloth was supposed to be, but assuming the little girl was telling her the truth, it was definitely an easily recognizable keepsake in the eyes of the professors and guards. 'S-Should I bring this up with the professors? Anyway, Evelyn is a good girl, so what could go wrong?'

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