Book 2 Chapter 14

Episode 38

300 years ago, the fourth summer.

Dirbeta Front.

“Your magic is pathetic.”

At the words of Lyn, the Archmage of the Hero's party, the mages of the Magic Brigade's Combat Unit 1 bristled and stood up.

“Of course, we know you’re an Aquizard (5-star) mage, but pathetic?”

“We are also battle mages recognized as the best in the Empire!”

“Please withdraw that insulting remark.”

But Lyn looked at their faces expressionlessly, then shook her head and turned away.

“It’s fine, don’t follow me. You’ll only get in the way.”

Watching Lyn leave, the mages were dumbfounded and exchanged glances. "That rootless orphan…" Some harbored such thoughts.

'Hmph, just how great is she…'

Yuslin, who graduated top of her class from <Delighten> and had just turned twenty, went further than just looking at Lyn with disdain.

She secretly followed the Hero's party using her specialty, the 'Presence Concealment' magic.

“……This is.”

And the reality she witnessed… was truly a nightmare.

The legions of the abyss, blackening the horizon and spreading out, 'ancient ones' that made her body unable to move due to the primordial fear etched into human instinct since time immemorial.

In front of that vast and terrifying wave of death, Lyn did not retreat an inch, endlessly intercepting with magic and steadily reducing the enemy forces.

'How many mana potions is she drinking…?'

Mana potions were a means of forcibly restoring mana, but the burden they placed on the spell matrix was immense, so mages rarely took them unless absolutely necessary.

It was even said among mages that it was 'selling one's future to fill the present,' which said it all.

Dozens of such potions already… Her whole body was covered in cold sweat, all while wearing such a pained expression.

“She probably drinks more than thirty on average per battle.”

At that moment, a voice answered her question.

Startled, she turned around to see a beauty wearing a witch's robe, embroidered with a golden dragon on a pure black background, looking at her while holding a kiseru pipe in her mouth.

“F-Friede-nim…!”

Yuslin immediately knelt on one knee to show respect. Even if their nationalities were different, the status of a shrine maiden was immensely high.

“Hmm, it doesn’t look like you’ve come with bad intentions?”

Then, from behind Friede’s legs, a girl with sky-blue hair peeked out. Her expression was full of wariness.

Above the girl’s head, Pipi, the Sun Parrot famous as Friede’s companion bird, tilted its head.

“Bad, bad, bad.”

Yuslin carefully asked.

“Bad intentions, what do you mean?”

“Bad intentions are just bad intentions. If you had come for that, I would have blown you away immediately.”

“…You really care for Lyn-nim.”

Friede smiled and nodded.

“Of course, she’s our youngest. And this one here is my daughter.”

It was an indescribably deep and wide smile of affection. Enough to lose herself gazing at it for a moment… Yuslin collected herself and said.

“Shouldn’t we stop her? If she keeps drinking potions like that, and unlucky mana surge occurs, she might never be able to be a mage again!”

“I know. Both I and Lyn know.”

“Then why are you letting her? No, if she’s going to push herself so hard, why did she say those things to us? If we lend our strength, wouldn’t it ease her burden, even just a little?!”

Friede exhaled a puff of smoke and looked up at the starry sky with a poignant smile.

“There are two reasons she said that. First, all the people who came to help ended up dying, so she wants you not to die.”

“……!”

“And the other reason is… she still lacks courage. The courage to be honest with herself and others.”

Holding the kiseru pipe bitterly, Friede gazed at Lyn’s back as she repeatedly wove magic circles.

It’s still okay.

Lyn, you’re still young.

You just need to grow from now on. There’s no need to force yourself to change that state already. Your life begins now.

“Master isn’t cowardly!”

At that moment, when Tourena, the girl with sky-blue hair, yelled, the parrot shook its head as if teasing.

“Scaredy, scaredy, scaredy, Lyn is a scaredy-cat.”

“Pipi, you!”

Watching their cute bickering, Friede held her stomach and burst into laughter.

“That’s not the kind of courage I was talking about.”

“Then what is it?”

“Well, perhaps Tourena and Lyn will know when they become adults.”

And one year later, the young Archmage died in the line of duty, protecting her comrades in the final battle.

Eighteen years old, without ever becoming an adult.

The war ended amidst the tears of those left behind.

* * *

“My goodness, I never imagined it would be at this level…”

Professor Caroline looked speechless. No, everyone watching the situation was.

'Indeed, an immense talent.'

Elin Ludwig thought, opening her bird-like eyes.

'Yanmang, the greatest summoned beast, considered the best among the Four Divine Beasts of Flame boasted by the Rivendell School.'

Imugi, Fox, Hawk, Fire Toad.

Among them, the Imugi, Yanmang, said to have been primarily used by Orvos Karain, the Archmage and founder of the Rivendell School, was famous for being extremely selective about its contractors.

In the long history of the Rivendell School, hadn't only five people been able to handle Yanmang?

'Perhaps because she's still immature, it's not perfectly summoned, so it's probably about 30% of its full power… Still, for a mere sixteen-year-old fledgling to summon Yanmang.'

Krista Warden, of course, also knew of Yanmang's prestige.

“Is there really a way to win against that…?”

Krista tried to think of a way for Gertrude to win, but… nothing came to mind.

A hawk focused on offense.

A fire toad focused on defense.

A fox focused on illusion.

Unlike those three, the Imugi was a spell that combined both offense and defense. It was truly an absolutely flawless summoned beast.

'Are you kidding me?'

The mere act of using Yanmang already far surpassed the cadet level. It was a level that even most professional mages would struggle with.

KWAARRRRRRRRRRR─────!

With a scream almost like an explosion, the rock covered by the Imugi's massive maw was engulfed in dazzling flames and burned away.

Its power was truly formidable, the rock melting and then scattering into ash.

'What in the…?!'

Gertrude, who barely managed to roll aside, gasped for breath and looked back at the source of the surreal heat.

Grrrrrrrrrr…

As Lillian aimed the talisman at Gertrude, the Imugi that had wrapped around the rock immediately dissolved into flames. Then it re-coalesced into a serpent form and rushed forward with a fierce charge.

'Avoid, I can't avoid it…!'

At that point, the professors were even telling the chief professor that the exam should be stopped.

“Even if they don’t actually die, the pain will be beyond imagination! It will leave trauma!”

“Chief Professor!”

The true intent of this exam was not to make cadets kill each other… Amidst such cries, Chief Professor Marhena closed her eyes.

'Is there none, is there none this time either?'

Hesitating, she raised her staff, and just as she was about to dispel the barrier and return all illusions to nothingness, a remnant of the past flashed through her eyes.

No, it wasn't just a remnant.

A window appeared in the lower right corner of her clairvoyance, and the boy's eyes, looking at Yanmang through it, blazed blood-red, then began to spin into a silver-white heptagram. Just as Skalji Ludwig had done before.

“Bel Quirius.”

Thump, a bursting pain instantly welled up in his heart, and Rein's vision was stained crimson. In this crimson-black world, everything slowed down.

┏ 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 1 ┓

ㆍThe magic circle of the spell has 5 triangles.

ㆍThe rune symbols used are a combination of formulaic Ruticien and amplification-type Delbeischertz, ratio 5:5.

ㆍSize 1,144 Axels, range 1,556 Kilites.

┗ 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 ┛

The vision imprinted in his mind through his eyes was not any scenery, but only the constitutive equations that make up the supernatural power. There was no formula those eyes could not decipher.

“Interpretation complete, calibration commencing.”

He twisted the constitutive equations.

So that their conclusion converged to zero.

He verified by inverse calculation to satisfy other constitutive equations. He introduced a new determinant to remove real roots from the magic formula and convert it to have only imaginary roots.

- Three times.

Skalji Ludwig warned him thus.

- Test results show that with your current mana, three times is the maximum. Of course, the higher the rank of the magic you intend to interfere with, the shorter the limit.

This is the last of his mana.

He had already used most of his mana hunting monsters…

- If your mana reaches its limit, never use it again. You’ll become incapacitated. So, only use it when it’s truly important.

The blood vessels that had expanded like spiderwebs around his eyes all burst, and blood trickled down.

It hurts.

It really hurts.

Swish, the light of the heptagram in Rein's eyes faded, turning into a death star, then vanished completely.

'I did something foolish….'

He had just finished hunting according to the plan and returned to Zone F, the last safe zone. Now he should have just found a suitable place to nest and defend his rank.

'….'

If Ristana, Friede, or Kees had been in the same situation, would they have ignored Gertrude here? That endless question gripped Rein’s ankle.

'No, they wouldn't.'

He knew for certain from his fight with Logan and the Rat-Spider Queen. Because the longer he continued fighting strong enemies, the faster he could reach 6 stars.

'This wasn't helping Gertrude. It was all for my battle experience….'

The moment Rein closed his eyes.

KWAARRRRRR, the flame Imugi, whose constitutive equations had been fundamentally negated—

That absolute flame, which had surged before Gertrude's eyes in a wave of murderous heat—

dissipated, scattering countless sparks across the horizon. It returned to nothingness.

“Oh…?!”

“Oooooooh…?!”

“Eeeeeeek…?!”

As a blast of hot wind swept through, scorching Gertrude’s skin, everyone was speechless for a moment. They couldn't believe the reality unfolding before their eyes.

'Did Lillian just threaten her?'

'Yes, it makes no sense to attack someone with Yanmang.'

But Lillian, who was on site, had her pupils dilated as if she was the most bewildered.

'Yanmang… disappeared…?'

It's frequent for Yanmang to be damaged by an opponent's magic. And for it to disappear when that magic damage accumulates.

But this wasn't that.

The emptiness of the mana link suddenly, forcibly severed… How could this strange phenomenon be explained?

“….”

And there was a mage watching the situation with eyes shaking even more intensely than hers. It was Chief Professor Marhena.

'In this battle royale exam format, there is one rule that all cadets clearly know, even without it being explicitly explained.'

That is, 'there is absolutely no merit in helping others.'

As the saying goes, "My nose is three feet long" (meaning it's hard enough to take care of one's own affairs), so how could there be leisure to care for others?

'And is that solely a problem for mid- to low-ranking cadets?'

Even high-ranking cadets, who have relatively more leeway, don't have time to care for others due to the competition for S grades.

This exam was designed to ascertain, in precisely such a situation—with limited time, resources, and the unique nature of a competitive exam—whether there was genuine chivalry to help others.

'There's no need to explain why Lyn's story has moved so many people for so long.'

Because it is a story of growth.

Because the story of one 'mage' approaching the realm of a 'sage' is contained within that life.

'Emitsa Page, Riot Warden… the commonality among the previous sages was that they were all righteous individuals.'

And Archmage Lyn also transformed into someone who knew how to sacrifice herself for her comrades in her final moments.

'Perhaps the answer to the path to becoming a sage lies in that righteous character….'

No professor has grasped the true intention behind creating this exam. It’s natural, since none of them have reached the same realization as me yet.

'Considering such evaluation criteria.'

Marhena gazed at Rein Ludwig’s face reflected in the window, a face on which Skalji Ludwig’s smile from his student days perfectly overlaid, and smiled contentedly.

“Skalji, your grandson is 200 out of 100 points.”