On the emerald green leaves of the plants, a strange, bright red clung, drops of blood slowly sliding down the petals, the pungent odor breaking the silence.

The cultist Lilette desperately suppressed the joy surging in her heart, preventing her lips from twitching.

She was certain Hyberian would never dare attack the Immortal Mercury.

Because if Hyberian got close, she would also have to guard against Lilette and the Immortal Mercury secretly joining forces to attack her.

Only Lilette dared to kill the Immortal Mercury with confidence.

For Hyberian, this was actually an invisible death trap!

In the distance.

As if understanding this point, Hyberian collapsed to the ground, all thoughts extinguished.

And Lilette had already rushed towards the Immortal Mercury without hesitation.

"..."

Lanci's gaze shifted slightly from the pages of the book, catching sight of Lilette, who was frantically harming the summoned beast.

This outlaw seemed very enthusiastic about directing and acting her own play, occasionally letting the silver alien counterattack a few times, making it look like she was really mortal enemies with this summon, trying her best to frame Hyberian.

Lanci then turned his head to look at Hyberian on the ground.

Their eyes met.

Lanci quietly winked.

Meaning plan accomplished.

"..."

Hyberian's eyes were full of speechlessness and helplessness.

She felt that even if Lanci took the two demon teachers to hold back the cultists, he wouldn't necessarily lose.

Of course, it would be best to win without bloodshed.

However, Hyberian suspected that Lanci just wanted to see the cultist's breakdown when she finally learned the truth and realized that her intelligence had been played with.

...

A few minutes later.

On the messy lawn of the botanical garden, after the joint efforts of the head of the magic department and Lilette, they finally succeeded in destroying the silver alien summon.

Lilette breathed a sigh of relief and looked in the direction of the principal.

She believed the mechanism had been successfully passed.

Next, the principal would help her deal with that duchess.

However.

This sense of security lasted for less than a second. The moment she relaxed, a dead, inhuman magical power struck from her side, like thunder in the sky, without warning.

It was an ambush from the head of the magic department.

Lilette's reaction was exceptionally swift. Almost instantly, she sensed the danger, and her body reflexively bent, dodging the fatal attack.

Even so.

Her coat was still cut open by that magical power, and blood oozed from the wound, staining her dress red.

At this moment, Lilette's heart was filled with terror again.

In the distance.

The principal was still reading.

Hyberian was still sitting on the ground.

This harmonious state was as if the principal had no intention of fulfilling his promise to execute Hyberian.

"Why?!"

Lilette quickly resisted the head of the magic department's deadly offensive, her eyes full of astonishment and incomprehension.

If her reaction hadn't been quick enough, she might have already died here.

And one of the demon teachers beside the principal had already taken action, directly attacking the second-tier black mist warlock and taking his head.

"Stupid fellow, did you think you could fool the principal?"

The head of the magic department sneered mockingly.

He naturally understood the principal's plan.

At this moment, he admired the principal's world-shattering wisdom like a great demon sage.

With simple words, he manipulated this disobedient student to personally kill the troublesome silver summon!

"Isn't the principal supposed to be neutral?!"

Lilette's heartbeat was like an out-of-control drumbeat, rapid, chaotic, and frantic. The heavy sense of despair brought by reality made her brain tremble.

She didn't understand why this Shadow World was so unfair.

It was as if no matter how she walked the mechanism just now, it would be her who was executed!

"Of course I'm neutral, but you're the one who violated the school rules, and you still want to bite back at a good student. Who am I supposed to execute if not you?"

Lanci said calmly, as if he was turning the pages of a book in his own backyard, not wanting to look at the buzzing pests.

And Hyberian, who was sitting on the ground, finally didn't want to act anymore and let out a relieved smile, as if mocking Lilette.

The scene she caught sight of gave Lilette a momentary illusion—

Making her suspect that this principal was actually unfairly favoring Hyberian!

"Lanci, can I tell her the truth?"

Hyberian turned her head and asked, looking at Lanci.

"Didn't you already tell the truth?"

Lanci's fingertips brushed over the pages of the book, and he said without raising his head.

"Lanci...?"

At the moment when Lilette's suspicion and unwillingness reached their peak in the distance.

She heard Hyberian call the principal's name.

Lanci.

An absurd and terrifying guess suddenly exploded in Lilette's heart like muffled thunder.

At the same time, more and more doubts seemed to converge and connect in her heart.

Why were Hyberian's teammates nowhere to be seen?

Why was this Radiant Demon's magical power so strong that it was almost imperceptible?

And why did the principal let the challengers pass the mechanism smoothly before?

When all these questions were intertwined, coupled with the explanation that "Lanci is the principal," everything seemed to be solved!

"Could it be that you are Lanci?"

The only explanation Lilette could find was this one.

"It is indeed this principal, that's right."

Lanci elegantly and calmly took out the [Lanci, Music Department Teacher] nameplate that he had initially obtained in the music classroom from his pocket and hung it on his chest, as if to tell Lilette that he was not only the principal but also a formal subject teacher in this school.

This attitude of never looking at her directly from beginning to end seemed to show the vast difference in their identities in the Demon Academy at this moment.

"Ahhh!! Lanci! You bastard!!!"

Lilette's cry tore through the air, echoing with rage and despair among the bushes of the botanical garden.

Her eyes were red and swollen, and the bloodshot eyes under the tears seemed to overflow with that bright red.

She finally understood that she had been fooled around like an idiot by this guy.

Not only was she deceived by the clear superior-subordinate relationship between this guy and the demon professor in the principal's office before.

Now, she was even more bewitched by his aura and words, and personally wiped out her greatest reliance on escaping.

And at this time.

A large number of demon teachers had already gathered on the corridor, waiting for Lanci's order to take action.

"Teachers, please punish this student who violated school discipline, harmed students and teachers, and seriously damaged school property."

Lanci, who was holding a book in one hand and reading it attentively, raised his right hand and moved his index finger slightly.

The next second, the demon teachers on the corridor behind stepped into the classroom together.

In Lilette's horrified eyes.

She saw a dense wall of demon teachers, as if they were about to flatten this botanical garden.

The earth roared.

At this moment, she finally recalled the nightmare-like, beyond-limit fear that a human could feel.

Until her mentality collapsed, she couldn't understand what kind of madman could rise from a student to a principal in a school full of demons in one night.

...

"Hyberian, thank you for playing with the Great Love Poet."

Lanci said, still reading the book in a race against time.

There was less than a minute left in the Shadow World.

From the moment the Great Love Poet was defeated, he, sitting in the principal's office, sensed the changes in the botanical garden.

So he set off in the first moment.

It was also when he was rushing on the corridor that he delayed a lot of reading time.

But fortunately, he was finally about to finish reading.

"If I continue to hang out with you and the Great Love Poet, I feel like I'm going to officially join the demon race."

Hyberian stood up tiredly.

She learned a lot of things on this trip to the Demon Academy.

The good news is that she learned everything from Lanci.

The bad news is that she felt that her bloodline had awakened.

Theoretically speaking, she should be learning how to be a human from humans, but she hadn't learned any human elements from Lanci at all.

Just as they were waiting for the end of this fourth-tier Shadow World.

"Lanci!!"

At this moment, a sudden voice came from the place about to be submerged by the demon teachers in the distance, like the last curse before death,

"You will regret helping this half-blooded demon duchess!!"

As the sentence came to an abrupt end.

The cultist Lilette's voice, along with a desperate scream, was drowned in the sea of demons by the sound of flesh being torn apart.

Lanci didn't seem to have any feelings or reactions.

He just kept reading.

And Hyberian's face suddenly turned pale.

The secret she had been hiding from Lanci for a long time was unexpectedly revealed at the last moment of this Shadow World.

Although she knew that she wouldn't be able to hide her demon background for long.

But she had planned to wait until she returned to the real world and find a better opportunity to confess to Lanci on her own initiative.

Instead of being heard by him from someone else's mouth like this, as if she had been deceiving him.

"Lanci, listen to me, I... I was going to tell you as soon as possible."

The heavy silence seemed to suffocate her, making her every word come to an abrupt end.

But Lanci's gaze was still fixed on the book in his hand, as if he didn't want to listen to her explanation at all.

"...I really didn't mean to deceive you."

Hyberian's voice became weaker and weaker, like the breath of winter, gently evaporating in the cold air.

(End of this chapter)