The Academy’s Weapon Replicator

Chapter 436 (1) – The Academys Weapon Replicator

─“He seems like the nicest of all the smart ones.”

Elodie had once said those words to Dier.

With a nuance that suggested she was relieved he was nice.

For some reason, those words lingered in Dier’s mind for a long time.

Come to think of it, it was true.

Most people saw Dier as a ‘nice person’. Though Dier himself considered himself to be quite cunning.

“That’s because you’re a good person.”

In the past, before Frondier was branded a devil.

When asked about it, Frondier simply replied.

A good person. Dier didn’t like the sound of that.

“You don’t like being seen that way?”

“Everyone seems to think I’m easygoing. Well, it’s true, but…”

Sighing deeply, Dier muttered.

‘Nice’ had no negative connotations in its dictionary definition, but the image of ‘nice’ that people held was far from the dictionary definition.

Most of them were associated with weakness, timidity, and indecisiveness. There were also quite a few people who thought that being nice was a way of sugarcoating those things.

Dier asked Frondier.

“Have you ever been told you’re nice?”

“……No.”

Frondier’s lips thinned. Rather, it seemed he had heard the opposite many times.

“I wonder why. You’re a war hero, and you’ve saved a lot of people. You seem to fit the description of ‘nice’ the best.”

“……Well?”

Frondier dodged the question for now. In fact, he knew exactly why he didn’t hear such things.

“Or have you ever been called righteous? Or good? Or chivalrous?”

“……Never heard that.”

Now that he thought about it, he didn’t seem to remember being complimented on his personality.

No, it was more like he rarely received any compliments at all.

“I wonder why. I think they all suit you.”

“……Some might think it doesn’t suit me at all.”

For some reason, Frondier was avoiding Dier’s gaze.

Well, he started to worry after trying to listen to his disciple’s worries.

“I wish I had the same image as you.”

“……You want to be seen as a crazy, insane, son of a bitch?”

“Is that your image?”

Dier asked back in surprise. Dier had hardly heard what others said directly to Frondier. So he thought everyone thought of Frondier as a war hero.

“I feel like the niceness hides who I really am, and people see me as someone they can easily take advantage of. It’s quite annoying, or rather, tiring, to be caught up in those things because of it.”

Of course, Dier was originally smart, but through Frondier’s teachings, he was showing excellent results in both the literary and military arts in Constel. Still, there were many people who knew him easily.

Dier was polite, kind to everyone, and willing to help others.

In that sense, Dier was indeed ‘nice’. As a result, he was often burdened with excessive requests, and teachers tended to look for him first when something came up.

“At least if I had the same image as you, I wouldn’t have those annoyances. Besides, my forte is ‘psychological warfare’, not ‘goodness’.”

“Does being nice get in the way of your psychological warfare?”

“It doesn’t suit me.”

It didn’t suit him. Well, that’s true.

In fact, Frondier himself knew that he had parted ways with ‘goodness’ since he started deceiving his enemies and using cunning tactics.

Now that he thought about it, Frondier looked at Dier with a strange feeling.

Dier was indeed adept at psychological warfare and mind games. In the proficiency test, Frondier himself was caught in his schemes and had to pass him.

And Dier must have used that method for a long time. Not only against Frondier, but also against many others.

And yet, Dier’s reputation was still overwhelmingly ‘good’.

Frondier stared at Dier for a moment before speaking.

“But you, you can’t be a bad person, can you?”

“……That’s the problem.”

Dier hung his head low.

The characteristics of Dier Aigar.

His physical abilities, except for his eyes, were extremely ordinary, and his aura proficiency and skill growth curve were nothing short of mediocre.

However, his mentality was not inferior to even Aster’s, and his psychological warfare, based on calculations, was an outstanding ability that seemed to give him an edge even in rock-paper-scissors.

And even in the game that he and countless other users had played over and over again, he was a complete hero who had never once turned into a villain.

‘Dier being nice isn’t just an image. It’s also a character trait that will never change.’

Even if he wanted to get rid of the image of being nice, it was impossible for him to become bad, and he was aware of it to the extent that he was aware of it.

But at the root of his ability lay psychology and calculation, deceiving others and manipulating their thoughts.

The contradiction between these two elements was quite interesting to Frondier.

“Maybe that,”

After a moment of thought, Frondier said.

“You might be able to use that.”