Grrrrrr—!
The basilisk’s low, murky roar vibrated through the air of the narrow corridor.
A massive heap of scales, thick violet venom rising from it like heat haze, coiled and reared up.
Lucian’s eyes gleamed with madness.
“Let’s see if that pathetic spiritization of yours can withstand this, then!”
Before his command had even finished, the basilisk slammed the ground with its heavy tail and shot forward.
Kwaaaaang!
The dry sand spread across the floor shattered into fragments and scattered in every direction.
A beast’s uniquely supple yet explosive movement.
The basilisk cleaved through the air, rushing toward Evan.
The turbid poison pouring from its mouth bent like a whip, completely cutting off Evan’s retreat.
“Kh!”
Evan’s brow twisted in pain.
He had barely managed to wash away the swarm of poisonous moths with his water spiritization, but the dense venom spewed by a high-grade magical beast was on an entirely different level.
The blue-glimmering wall of water blackened the instant it touched the poison, corroding and giving off a nauseating vapor.
“Too slow.”
The basilisk’s sharp claws tore through the water wall.
Paaat!
Evan hastily kicked off the ground and twisted his body, but an eerie poison burst from the tip of the claw that grazed his shoulder.
Overwhelming physical force that could rip even a spiritized body apart, and venom that burrowed into the wound.
Evan’s body lurched violently in midair and was driven backward.
Thud!
After rolling across the floor, Evan barely managed to catch himself on one knee.
The water spirit draped over his shoulder was stained a murky violet, flickering unstably.
The basilisk gave him not even a moment to breathe before opening its enormous maw once more and lunging toward the crown of Evan’s head.
“Haa……!”
The instant the basilisk’s massive jaws filled his vision, Evan’s hands sliced through the air and crossed.
The unstable wall of water surrounding his entire body condensed in an instant, transforming into a blinding white light. His final spiritization, wringing out every last drop of mana he had left.
“Veil!”
Paaaaat!
Holy water burst from Evan’s fingertips and expanded explosively, throwing up an absolute hemispherical barrier.
The basilisk’s enormous jaw slammed down onto that barrier.
Kwaaaaang!
A rupturing sound so fierce that his vision flashed white.
The beast’s venom-laden jaws collided with high-purity light mana, caving in the surrounding ground as a whole.
“Kh…… Cough!”
Inside the barrier, Evan let out a groan as if vomiting blood.
The Veil had barely repelled the basilisk’s powerful physical attack, but it could not perfectly erase even the aftershock.
The ground collapsed, and venom seeped through the cracks, dyeing Evan’s vision red.
An overwhelming difference in mass, and the gulf of a summoned beast’s grade.
Even after deploying his sure-kill skill, Evan’s knees were slowly buckling as he was pushed backward.
***
“Am I really supposed to use this like this?”
I glared at the summoned beast compatibility chart I had written in crooked letters in my notebook.
Beside me, Yurika nudged my elbow and snickered.
“Ah, seriously. I told you to write words, not draw pictures! What even is this symbol? A flaming potato?”
“You little—”
Just as I tightened my grip on the pencil and was about to glare at Yurika—
Piiiiiik—!
A sharp bird cry struck my ears from midair.
It was Wind Whisper.
Normally, the little guy would be pecking at the top of my head and playing around, but now it was circling frantically in the air, feathers bristling as it beat its wings in urgency.
“What’s with him? Why’s he acting like that?”
The moment I frowned and rose from my seat, Justia’s urgent voice flowed from Wind Whisper’s beak.
It wasn’t her usual cold, calm voice.
[Mr. Taesan, please come to the central corridor in front of the large lecture hall immediately. Evan is in danger.]
“The young lady sent it? What’s going on?”
Yurika’s eyes went round.
Normally she would have started spouting more nonsense, but even she seemed to realize from Justia’s urgent voice that the atmosphere was anything but ordinary.
“She said Evan’s in danger! The central corridor by the large lecture hall!”
I shoved my chair back roughly and sprang up from my seat.
The chair scraped across the floor and toppled over with a clatter, but I had no time to care.
Were those Imperial bastards picking another fight?
“Whisper, show me the way, now!”
I shouted at Wind Whisper as it circled in the air.
It let out one sharp cry, then quickly turned toward the window.
“Wait, Mr. Taesan! I’ll come too—!”
Yurika’s flustered voice came from behind me, but I had already kicked the door open and rushed out into the corridor.
Paat!
Wind Whisper flew ahead of me at a fairly fast speed.
A flight speed worthy of a mid-grade spirit.
But to my eyes right now, it felt as frustratingly slow as a grub crawling along.
My mind was filled with only one thought—that Evan might be lying collapsed somewhere.
‘Faster. Faster!’
I clenched my teeth and poured strength into my legs.
Bang!
The instant I kicked off the ground, the marble floor of the corridor cracked like a spiderweb, and fragments flew up.
Riding that explosive recoil, my body shot into the air like a cannonball.
Having overtaken Wind Whisper in an instant, I began sprinting toward the large lecture hall, tearing through the wind with a sharp roar.
The scenery around me stretched long and was rapidly pushed behind my field of vision.
As I crossed the air and cut between the buildings, a flash bright enough to stab my eyes burst out, and an enormous underwater barrier exploded like a wave.
A tremendous amount of condensed water energy erupted all at once, sending a downpour crashing down as if it would reach the corridor ceiling.
Swaaaaa—
Amid the spray striking in all directions, the sight of Evan kneeling at the center of it was burned into my vision.
The spirit that had enveloped his body was already shattering apart, nearly exhausted.
At the very moment the giant reptile’s maw surged forward to swallow him—
Bang!
While still in midair, I kicked hard off the wall one more time and barged into the center of the field.
As I landed like a falling spike, the ground beneath my feet shattered with a thunderous crash, sending grains of sand scattering in every direction.
The shockwave violently shoved the basilisk’s jaw upward.
“What’s this? So you came. Human summoned beast.”
Brushing back his dripping wet bangs, Lucian gave me a twisted smile.
But his eyes trembled ever so slightly at my appearance.
“Haa….”
I heard a sigh of relief behind me.
It was Justia.
Her usual cool-headed demeanor was nowhere to be found; her face was pale with tension.
“Mr. Taesan.”
Evan looked up at me, breathing hard.
Perhaps because his overextended spiritization was reaching its end, his body was trembling faintly.
Without a word, I reached out, placed a hand on Evan’s shoulder, and lightly pushed him toward Justia.
“You worked hard. You bought time until I got here, right?”
At my question, Evan let out a faint, empty laugh and nodded.
“Thank you.”
Justia said to me as she supported Evan.
The weight contained in that short phrase pressed down on my shoulders, but at the same time, a pleasant exhilaration began to flow through my veins.
“Now, then.”
I turned my head and glared once more at Lucian and his damn snake.
“Is it my turn this time?”
Swaaaaa—
Breaking the silence that had settled over the soaked sand-covered floor, the murmurs of the students gathered around began to spread like ripples.
“Is that the famous human summoned beast?”
“It’s my first time seeing him fight.”
Gazes filled with curiosity swept over my entire body.
Behind Lucian, from the group of Imperial seniors watching us with their arms crossed, came light snorts.
“He’s pretty tall. Well over 190, isn’t he?”
“He’s muscular, sure, but didn’t he still get completely crushed by Ailex’s Leviathan?”
Their jeering voices struck my ears without restraint.
“Hey, Lucian. You know if you struggle against a bastard worse than a beast like that, you don’t deserve to join Imperial, right?”
At that one remark, Lucian’s shoulders flinched and stiffened.
As he glanced back, the muscles in his jaw twitched like they were spasming, and an unconcealable nervousness and tension seeped across his face.
The honor of House Chartur, and his petty pride as a member of Imperial, were clearly strangling him by the neck.
“Let’s end this quickly.”
I roughly swept back my wet hair and took one step forward.
“No need to drag things out, right?”
The massive basilisk, murky violet venom gathered in its mouth, turned its body toward the ground.
Its heavy bulk burrowed beneath the sandy field in an instant, vanishing from sight.
Sssssss—
The sand covering the ground trembled and rippled like waves.
Movements agile and stealthy, utterly unfitting for its enormous size.
A game of hide-and-seek against a beast that could spring out from anywhere at any time created far more oppressive pressure than an enemy visible to the eye.
‘So he wants to feel me out, huh.’
I focused all my nerves on the faint vibrations traveling through my toes.
A high-grade magical beast.
And one carrying deadly venom at that.
There was no predicting from which direction those sharp claws and jaws—the ones that had torn through Evan’s spiritization—would burst out.
Kwaaang!
In the blink of an eye, a pillar of sand erupted explosively from beneath my right foot.
“Ugh!”
I hastily bent backward and retreated.
The massive reptilian tail, swollen with deadly venom, sliced through the air like a scythe.
Ash-gray grains of sand scattered from the tail as it brushed past my nose, stinging my skin.
Ssk—!
Just when I thought I had barely avoided the tail, the ground shook again, and this time the creature’s tail whipped in from behind me.
Paat!
I kicked off the ground hard and launched myself into the air.
The tail that grazed past the tips of my feet split the air and slammed into the marble wall with a thunderous roar.
The basilisk’s irregular attacks burst up from every direction without warning.
That bastard Lucian.
He had been putting on airs while worrying about the Imperial seniors watching him, but it seemed he was inwardly wary of my strength.
He was avoiding a head-on fight and trying to wear down my stamina somehow.
‘Fine. Let’s see you try.’
I spun lightly in midair and landed on the sandy field.