13
The match began, and very little time was needed before the first exchange took place.
Dyke kicked off from his position twelve meters away and rushed at me in a single breath, swinging the greatsword in his hands toward my waist in one clean arc.
It was a movement so fast that an ordinary person—not an Academy student—would have been unable to perceive it.
“Huh?”
There was a single scraping sound.
The grinding noise of metal clashing against metal, along with the sparks that flew from the impact.
It was the phenomenon produced by my broadsword shooting out from my cloak and colliding with Dyke’s greatsword.
“What?”
“Isn’t that a sword?”
“Isn’t he from the Magic Department? Did he transfer departments or something?”
The moment I drew the sword from inside, I could feel the atmosphere growing rowdy all the way to the arena where I stood.
I didn’t think I was particularly skilled with a sword either, but it was a necessary choice.
A 3rd Circle magic barrier couldn’t fully withstand that heavy blow.
An eye for an eye. And there was no more effective method than answering a sword with a sword.
“What?!”
Dyke, who had belatedly grasped the situation, instantly widened the distance he had closed.
The signs of confusion at the unexpected response were evident.
I had blocked an attack from a greatsword swung with speed and weight using a broadsword only slightly longer than my forearm.
Even that idiot should have been able to understand what that meant.
“Weren’t you a mage?”
“If it bothers you, why don’t you use magic too?”
Naturally, there was no rule in the evaluation matches stating that mages couldn’t use swords.
There were even a few Academy students outside the Magic Department who had unlocked their magic circles.
Most such students used magic to strengthen their bodies.
Rather than using spells of middling power that couldn’t match their physical abilities, they focused on enhancing those physical abilities instead.
The technique I had just used to block Dyke’s sword strike was similar.
Arcane Magic. Strength Enhancement.
Wind Magic. Tailwind.
Since they were high-speed chants, their power fell slightly short, but regardless, they were two spells cast by a 3rd Circle mage.
There was no way I couldn’t receive a blow from that muscle-brained idiot.
Moreover, I had confirmed from our exchange that Dyke’s greatsword was blunt and dulled.
It was an exchange that offered a glimpse into what he had been thinking as he faced me in this match.
“.......”
Dyke’s gaze grew heavy.
Naturally, because I was an opponent he should have finished in one blow.
His opponent had never shown any exceptional talent even within the Magic Department, while Dyke himself was an honor student swordsman on the verge of graduation.
Even if he couldn’t cut me down in one strike with a dulled blade, the attack itself should not have been blocked.
Dyke’s preemptive strike had been stopped by a broadsword not even half the length of his blade, failing to inflict a single wound on me.
Hesitation creeping into the flustered fool’s response was inevitable.
Hesitating against a mage was tantamount to giving them time to act.
Cursing the mad dog’s foolish judgment inwardly, I immediately finished chanting the next spell.
“Kuh!”
Light Magic. Flash.
Naturally, it wasn’t a lethal spell.
But it was still an auxiliary means for attacking.
Dyke furrowed his brows and reacted to the white light that suddenly appeared before his eyes.
Protecting one’s eyesight was a matter of instinct, so it was inevitable that his movements would slow for an instant and show an opening.
That small opening was precisely the moment I was aiming for.
“Kuaaaack!”
Immediately after the sound of the broadsword’s tip piercing flesh rang out.
A scream loud enough to be mistaken for a monster’s rang against my eardrums.
Impossible to respond immediately after being stabbed due to vision that hadn’t yet recovered, he widened the distance again to avoid a blind strike.
“Y-you son of a...”
The moment I confirmed he had barely opened his eyes, I blinded him again with another Flash spell.
This time he immediately swung his sword in the direction I had last been.
“You fucking... Kuaaaack!”
Anticipating as much, I deliberately moved into his blind spot and thrust my sword in.
“You cowardly bastaaaaard!”
Having fallen for the same attack twice, Dyke was burning with rage.
Blood dripping from both forearms, he roared at me.
I hadn’t expected him to fall for it so easily, so I actually felt a bit bewildered.
I suppose it just meant that Dyke’s level was exactly that.
Having more or less reached that conclusion, I cast Flash directly at Dyke’s face as he opened his eyes again.
“Kuh... C-come here! Come at me, you brat!”
Seeing him swinging his greatsword around wildly, mind completely gone, showed that he did have some capacity to learn after all.
He probably thought he wouldn’t give me even a single opening to attack.
I wasn’t incapable of following that logic, but it was truly a shortsighted response, nothing more.
Because I was a mage, not a swordsman, to begin with.
“Come here, you bastard! Come and stab me again! Come oooon!”
Leaving the convulsing Dyke be, I immediately finished chanting two spells.
Spells capable of demonstrating sufficient power, thanks to the time he had so kindly dragged out.
First, Flame Pillar.
“Kyaaaaack!”
It was a spell usable from the 1st Circle, but a 3rd Circle Flame Pillar was overwhelmingly stronger than its 1st Circle counterpart.
The flames that burst from beneath his feet instantly engulfed Dyke’s entire body, wrapping him in searing fire.
“Kkeuk, uaaaaack!”
Intending to deliver the final blow to Dyke, who was letting out repeated screams of agony.
I used a 2nd Circle wind magic near Dyke’s burning body.
A spell that gathered oxygen from the atmosphere and fired it: the Oxygen Bullet.
It was an original magic I had created in my previous life.
“You rotten son of a bitch! Stop this right—”
Dyke’s curses toward me were immediately drowned out by the ensuing explosion.
It burst with a noise too loud to be described in just one or two syllables.
The strong wind stirred by the aftermath of the explosion made my cloak flutter.
Having taken a blow of this magnitude, the death prevention magic should have definitely activated.
“Huff, I... I thought I was going to die....”
Contrary to expectations, Dyke was still standing on the training ground on both legs.
In one hand, he held a potion bottle he appeared to have just drunk from.
Judging by the shape of the bottle, it appeared to be an Elixir.
An absurdly expensive potion, with one bottle costing as much as a family of four’s annual living expenses.
I had drunk it almost every day during my time in the Demon Hunters, so there was no way I wouldn’t recognize it with my own eyes.
“Did you just drink that...?”
The Elixir’s effect lived up to its enormous price, instantly healing all wounds the user had sustained.
Thanks to that, Dyke remained on the stage without any significant injuries despite being caught in that massive explosion.
Honestly, I could only think of it as a foolish act.
While it was an evaluation match that permitted any means usable in actual combat.
Drinking an Elixir during an evaluation match was so bad that choosing defeat would have been better.
For one, the price of the Elixir itself was a factor, but evaluation matches weren’t scored simply by win or loss.
Naturally, winning forcibly using such a fraudulent item wouldn’t earn a good score.
And if he lost, there was nothing more to be said.
“You prepared an Elixir just to win an evaluation match?”
“You’re out of your mind. I wasn’t going to drink it originally.”
“For someone who says that, you drank it all without leaving a single drop.”
“I was going to beat you to death like a dog, make you drink it right before dying, and then beat the shit out of you again, fuck....”
It was a thought process no ordinary person could possibly follow.
To think he would burn ten gold coins just to beat someone a little more.
Having used it to preserve his own life rather than for its original purpose, I could feel the magnitude of the loss he must be feeling.
“I won’t let my guard down anymore.”
Dyke closed the distance toward me as he had at the beginning.
He swung the greatsword he held at various parts of my body with great speed.
It was a motion indicating he would cut anywhere on my body, regardless of where.
It was a serious movement, as if he was finally treating me as a sparring opponent rather than an ordinary inferior mage.
Clang. Clang. Clang. Accompanied by those sounds, two silver trajectories overlapped in the air several times.
I confirmed through our exchange of blades that his attacks had changed somewhat from before.
Dyke’s strikes, genuinely invested while fully excited, were quite heavy.
Even with my body doubly reinforced by wind magic and arcane magic, they were becoming increasingly difficult to handle.
“Where’d your momentum from earlier go? Try acting up like before again! Huh?!”
Even at a distance where a short sword should have the advantage over a long sword, Dyke wasn’t being pushed back at all.
His greatsword, drunk on the Elixir’s effects and invigorated, cleaved through space far faster than my light broadsword.
If I, without any decent armor, allowed even a single attack through, it would likely lead directly to a devastating impact.
“Getting slower and slower! Huh?!”
“.......”
“You won’t die easy, you son of a bitch!”
The number of times my broadsword moved half a beat slower gradually increased, and accordingly, the intervals between openings grew wider.
I had already used all the light magic available to me for the day, so I couldn’t use Flash either.
The explosive magic using fire magic combined with Oxygen Bullet had a high chance of catching me in its power as well.
If I lost, it naturally wouldn’t end there.
The moment I lost the tempo even once, Dyke would crush my entire body with that dulled blade.
He was truly a human with nothing but madness left.
“Son of a bitch! Brat! Damned bastard!!”
His strikes, growing faster along with his curses without showing any fatigue, gradually drove my body backward.
Before I knew it, my body was blocked by one of the arena walls, driven into a corner.
It was a natural result that the mad dog’s overconfidence, already convinced of victory, was boiling over.
“Die, you son of a bitch!”
Dyke took a preparatory stance to deliver the final blow, thinking the interval between openings had grown wide enough.
If he struck with that much power and weight, it would be impossible to block even with a reinforced body.
With a heavy gust, Dyke’s greatsword cleaved down directly on the position where I had stood.
“Huh?”
His greatsword split the arena floor.
Or rather, the exact spot where I had been standing just moments before.
“Cool your head a little.”
I had deliberately waited for him to use a large, powerful strike.
Because I wanted to finish it cleanly in one go.
Not wanting to give him another chance to recover with another mediocre attack, I had purposely pretended to be pushed back and created an opening.
This two-meter hulk swung the attack I had anticipated without realizing my feint.
At the same time, he had entered the range of my offensive magic.
The 3rd Circle Mana Bullet I had been accumulating over a long time detonated directly against Dyke’s nape.
“Kahaaaack!!!”
If I had used an attack in a projectile format, he might have dodged it with the quick movements characteristic of swordsmen.
After bringing his vital point within my range.
I slammed the mana bullet created in my hand down onto his nape like a stake.
“Kkeuk, kuh, kuaaaack...!”
Dyke, taking a direct hit from the mana bullet on his vitals, let out a beastly roar and absorbed all the power of the offensive magic at a single point.
Not long after, he completely vanished from the arena.
It meant the arena, judging the power to be fatal, had activated its Death Prevention Magic.
“Phew.”
All that remained in the arena was one mage. And one greatsword embedded in the ground, bereft of its owner.
Although this was the first time in this life and my previous one that I had officially fought him, his skill was exactly the pathetic level I had expected.
The type to fight crudely and simply, using nothing but strength and stamina.
Personally, he was the easiest type of human to deal with.
“......?”
Despite the match being over, the arena was surprisingly quiet for some reason.
Even if a student with no presence whatsoever won, a few courtesy claps should have been expected.
Even after Dyke disappeared from the arena, several seconds of silence swept through.
The one who broke the silence was the voice of my blonde junior.
“Senior Conrad!”
Starting with Stella calling my name, the atmosphere in the spectator stands suddenly grew rowdy.
“Hey, you Conrad bastard! I believed you’d win, you son of a bitch!”
“Senior Conrad! Congratulations on your victory!!”
Starting with those two people’s loud celebrations, my name gradually spread throughout the entire spectator area.
“Is he really from the Magic Department?! Did you see him fight just now?!”
“That was a truly heart-stirring battle....”
“Conrad! Conrad! Conrad!”
By the time I came to my senses, the entire spectator area was already chanting my name.
I hadn’t really wanted this much attention.
But it’s good publicity for the family, so it’s not bad, I suppose.
“The winner, Conrad Perdalos!”
Hearing the announcement that was far too late, I quickly escaped the noisy evaluation match arena.
Even after leaving the arena, I could hear my name being chanted in unison from afar for quite some time.
Right now, I could only hope that this wouldn’t lead to any further troublesome matters.