◈ Episode 216. Class (1)
“!”
Seeing an unmistakable exclamation mark rise in her pupils, it really was Jesse Heinness this time. Though I was the one who should have been surprised. Somehow, Jesse looked far more shocked than I was.
“It’s been so long since I last saw you in a place like this, Chief Lee Hoyeol!”
For now, it seemed she did not remember what had happened in the social hall of space-time.
Bow—Her posture as she bent at a right angle was so polite that I answered without thinking.
“It seems the aftereffects of your mana exhaustion have improved.”
Asking after her was fine. Sure.
But there was such a thing as being too blunt!
I just said it, didn’t I? ‘It seems she does not remember what happened in the social hall.’ She didn’t even remember meeting me.
How do you know I suffered from mana exhaustion?
What if she asked me that?
What if she looked at me strangely?
I worried for a moment, but.
“Mana exhaustion……? As expected of you, Chief Lee! You noticed that the flow of my mana was unstable! Thank you for your concern. I’m all right now!”……
At times like this, the karma I had built up actually helped.
Anyway, I looked at Jesse.
No matter how I thought about it, wasn’t this place a little too dangerous? ‘She was in the early to mid-500s, wasn’t she?’ I could say it with certainty.
This battlefield was too much for Jesse.
The evidence was already visible.
Her shoulders were trembling faintly.
Jesse had appeared through a portal.
The farther the destination, the more sharply the amount of mana consumed to manifest a portal increased.
It was visible that she was catching her breath. Jesse must have expended a great deal of mana to manifest that portal.
Jesse would not have been able to track the Tower Master’s mana trace.
Then, as expected.
Had she moved according to her class quest?
I glanced around.
The Tower Master had yet to reveal himself.
It seemed I needed to exchange information with Jesse.
The more information about the enemy, the better.
In that sense, Jesse was a reliable reinforcement. ‘In a way, she is one of the people directly involved.’ Through my conversation with the Tower Master, I had come to know some of the story behind this incident.
But I did not know his specific objective.
Even though there was a quest, it was far too concise.─Thwart the archmages’ conspiracy. (In Progress)●Face the Tower Master’s body. (Failed)●Eliminate the rampaging Tower Master’s body. (In Progress)
Eliminate it.
That was all it said.
But Jesse, the Archmage, surely would be different.
My guess was correct.
“As expected, you had already guessed! It’s because of my class quest. I can’t compare to you, Chief Lee, but…… I’ve been trying my best in my own way too!”
I nodded sincerely.
Not because Jesse was admirable.
Because I, Lee Hoyeol, was admirable.
Because I really do struggle myself to death every single day!
Why, just look at today.
Let’s say everything somehow works out, I resolve the emergency update, and I return.
Once I return to Yusra or the Magic Tower, what I have to do is obvious.
To raise [Tenacity],
I would abuse my body.
And to the point where it reached its limits.
Was that all?
Now that I knew there were competitors in the realm of the Strange, including high-ranking Demon Kings,
I could not neglect my research on the Strange either. ‘I’m tired just thinking about it.’ However, lofty Pride
would never whine in front of others.
So I spoke calmly to Jesse.
“I know.”
There was also what the Tower Master had said.
Even if not, she had suffered mana exhaustion.
By the way.
Since the subject had come up, let me add just one more thing.
I shamelessly continued.
“However, what matters most is that you do not sink.”
“……
Ah, you mean mana exhaustion!”
“That is correct.”
I meant it sincerely, not just as a passing remark.
I would like her to refrain from pushing herself until she suffered mana exhaustion.
My heavenly luck had long since run out. In other words, I could not guarantee which archmage’s personality might pop out of that pointed hat.
“Yes, I’ll keep that in mind!”
Jesse answered with an exclamation mark, if only for a moment.
I got to the main point.
So what was it? The objective of the Archmage class quest.
The Tower Master’s plan was, indeed……!
“This class quest is [Class]!”……
Class?
The moment I heard that word,
the questions that had been scattered like puzzle pieces began to fall into place.
From the moment the Tower Master had called Jesse into the Magic Tower to this very moment.
Even the reason he had led Jesse to this place, a space far beyond her ability.
Even after inhabiting the pointed hat,
the Tower Master had left behind his own body
in order to teach Jesse, the next Archmage.
Jesse was an adventurer.
An existence with not even a speck of magical knowledge.
And yet, in order to thwart the archmages’ conspiracy, she was an indispensable existence from another world.
To pass on such vast magical knowledge to Jesse, he must have needed a special method.
Clutching her staff tightly with both hands, Jesse said,
“The quest objective is to encounter the body of the previous Archmage! I’m a little nervous, but I’m also looking forward to it! Other than the pointed hat, it’s my first time seeing his body!”
I compared my quest objective with Jesse’s. ‘……
Mine says eliminate. Jesse’s says encounter.’ That had quite a different nuance.
Naturally,
unless I told her, Jesse would not know about my quest.
So I understood why she was simply excited.
But I knew.
“Jesse Heinness.”
“Yes, I’m listening, Chief Lee!”
“This class will not be easy in the slightest.”
After all, even before the class had truly begun,
was this not the Tower Master’s body that had manifested ten Meteor Strikes toward Earth? Having gone through so many damned situations, I had developed some sense for this.
As if answering my conjecture,
beyond the shifting scenery of the illusion magic,
amid the surging waves of mana,
the Tower Master’s body revealed itself.
“It seems the class has begun.”
At those words, Jesse’s pupils left me for the first time.
The Tower Master’s body emerged from an opaque sphere of mana.
Was it male or female?
With androgynous features that made it difficult to discern its gender.
What stood out more than that were its empty, unfocused eyes.
Soon, Jesse’s urgent voice reached my ears.
“……
Chief Lee!”
I knew without her saying it.
“The quest objective has been updated! But…….”
“You may tell me.”
“It says, ‘Survive this class’……!”
Survive? That was an impossible quest objective for Jesse, wasn’t it?
But I felt like I understood why he had given Jesse such a ridiculous quest objective already.
Surely, inside that pointed hat. Among the consciousnesses of the archmages. Something ominous was happening, wasn’t it, Tower Master?
Time was short.
He no longer had the leisure to remain within the pointed hat
and look after Jesse.
In that situation, he must have thought of me.
If it was me, who had formed a Circle.
Moreover, if I, the founder of the Strange, was with Jesse.
He must have judged that the arrangements he had prepared for Jesse in the far future
could be set in motion now.
To sum up the situation in one phrase. ‘……
This feels a bit like an open class, doesn’t it?’ With his body and consciousness separated, it was impossible for the Tower Master to control his own body. If, by some chance, his body went berserk and tried to harm Jesse,
it clearly meant he wanted me, who was watching, to eliminate it. ‘No, he really is like a department head.’ What is this, pushing work onto a subordinate employee while shoving a quest objective at them?
But it was not something I could simply grumble about.
After all,
every spell the Tower Master was manifesting right now was quite literally for Jesse, the next Archmage.
It meant that ultra-high-level magic, the kind one could not even glimpse in magical books, such as Meteor Strike, would come pouring out.
In that sense, open your eyes wide.
Change your way of thinking, Hoyeol.
Think of it not as observing, but as taking the class together. 『His innate magical talent was such that he could imitate most spells simply by seeing them.』 I, Granfell, possessed the talent to absorb everything I witnessed.
Good.
Let us begin the class in earnest, Tower Master.
I brazenly declared,
“I hope there will be something worth learning.”*
The Magic Tower.
Yugwid looked at the gathered senior mages.
Then she kindly raised the corners of her mouth.
“With this, the Magic Tower’s shame has been exposed to the world.”
Chief Lee, I am especially ashamed before you.
From the rebellion of the elders, including Karimjeva,
to protect the Magic Tower.
And to set it right.
Hoyeol had drawn all attention to himself.
However, making that sacrifice meaningless,
“To manifest ultra-high-level magic right away. How energetic.”
The Tower Master, who could be called the Magic Tower itself.
Our Tower Master had stabbed them grandly in the back.
Needless to say, Yugwid and the seniors gathered here could not know the exact situation.
However, they had come to realize one thing for certain.
“I think I understand why Chief Lee kept silent.”
“The Chief simply could not bring himself to say it.”
“Matisse.”
Matisse, the senior of Black Magic, opened his mouth.
“Chief Lee has always placed the Magic Tower first.”
His silence in the Crystal Hall had undoubtedly been consideration as well.
If the Tower Master revealed and unleashed hostility, the Magic Tower would have to step forward and stop him. No one here would welcome such a situation.
However.
“It is time to make a decision.”
It did not truly matter who the Tower Master bore hostility toward.
What mattered was that the Tower Master’s actions posed a tremendous threat
to this place.
To the world of adventurers.
“We cannot leave everything to Chief Lee.”
“I am of the same opinion, Lady Yugwid.”
“Oh, Senior Bellier, is it?”
“I, as well.”
“Oho, Nasrow?”
With them at the lead, all twenty senior mages unified their opinions.
Yugwid smiled once more.
It seemed she had worried for nothing.
“What a relief. I no longer have to worry about stepping forward alone.”
Then, Yugwid’s gaze changed.
The Gentle Giant, Yugwid.
It was not an alias derived from 『magic』 like Karimjeva’s or Senios’s.
In fact, it was an alias she had gained belatedly after entering the Magic Tower,
after passing from senior to chief, then elder.
The reason such an alias had been attached to Yugwid was simple.
“Then shall we begin in earnest?”
Cold judgment hidden within a benevolent smile.
Yugwid possessed decisiveness.
Once a giant began to step forward, no one could stop them.
In that sense, Yugwid was a giant.
Because she had never once backed down from a decision she had made herself.
A chilling joke followed.
“If we are being precise, this would be a rebellion against the Tower Master, wouldn’t it? Well, that is not bad. Since I have set foot in the Magic Tower, perhaps I should put my age forward and sit in the Tower Master’s seat. Huhu.”
Yugwid immediately tracked the mana trace.
Rather than the Tower Master’s mana trace…….
It would be far easier to track Chief Lee’s mana trace.
That was what she thought, and yet.
Yugwid let out a hearty laugh.
“……
You truly are no ordinary person, are you, Chief Lee?”
To think she could not even track his mana trace.
Was this what [『the Strange』] was?
Your words were correct.
To you, the Circle was merely a realm to pass through.
“That must be why you returned the Tower Master’s Meteor Strike to the sky.”
A Strange so profound that even Yugwid, an elder, could not fathom it.
She admired the fresh shock for only a moment.
Then Yugwid opened her mouth.
“If this old woman has not gone senile, it seems Chief Lee’s mana has reached a realm that ordinary people like us cannot dare to track. Is that not so, Matisse?”
“The elder’s words are correct.”
“Bangrit, how does it look to you?”
“Y-Yes! J-Just a moment!”
Bangrit, senior of Pure Mana Studies.
Among the seniors, he possessed the greatest mana sensitivity.
A sensitivity so great that he was said to have been chosen by mana. It would not be an exaggeration to say that his talent, almost a blessing, had raised Bangrit, a commoner who had not received proper magical education, to the position of senior.
“It seems Elder Yugwid’s words are correct.”
Of course, even for such a Bangrit, what was impossible was impossible.
“It cannot be helped.”
Yugwid shrugged.
“It seems we will need Chief Marcelo’s help.”
“Marcelo, you say…….”
“Come to think of it, I do not see him.”
If it was Marcelo, who walked the path of the Strange alongside Hoyeol,
tracking a mana trace should be well within his ability.
Yugwid sent telepathy to Marcelo.
No, she tried to.
“Oh dear.”
Bellier flinched and asked,
“What is it, Elder Yugwid?”
“It seems we were too slow.”
“Yes?”
“My telepathy does not reach Marcelo.”
“Do you mean……?”
“Most likely, Chief Marcelo has also entered the same space as Chief Lee. In other words, the mana vortex manifested by the Tower Master. My, is this too much for an old woman trying to chase after two Chiefs?”
Of course, it was an exaggeration.
As stated, the giant had already stepped forward.
Yugwid immediately tracked Marcelo’s mana trace.
Soon, she manifested a portal.
Yugwid said,
“We are late, but let us hurry after the two Chiefs.”...
I looked at Marcelo standing across from me.
“Chief Lee Hoyeol. I cannot trust you.”
Marcelo said that as he drew up his mana.
His voice was serious in its own way.
But to me, there could not be a funnier statement.
Of course there couldn’t.
In a private setting like this, Marcelo’s way of addressing me was always fixed as “Sir.” Had I not told you, Tower Master? The Magic Tower you knew and the current Magic Tower are in somewhat different circumstances.
So put away this childish illusion already.
“This is far too light to call a class.”
I continued with sincerity.
Like the harsh words I had spat out
in the Topaz Hall, where the preliminary verification for the regular conference had taken place.
“I hope you do not lower the dignity of the Magic Tower. Tower Master.”
Then a voice reached me.
“I agree with that opinion as well.”
This time, it was real.
“You could not possibly know this, but Sir simply calls me Marcelo. He does not attach the unnecessary title of Chief. Of course, he does the same with the elders.”……
Somehow, it sounded as if he was implying I was a man who knew nothing of polite speech.
In any case.
Good to see you, the real Marcelo.
But somehow, Marcelo’s reaction was unusual.
The look in his eyes, which should have been wistful before the Tower Master…….
Somehow seemed to be blazing fiercely……?
I soon realized the reason.
The fact that Marcelo was also a mage.
That was right.
Those blazing eyes were the same eyes as those of the Eternal Snow, Senios.
“Well, that is just like you.”
I.
“No, I am rather glad to see that you remain unchanged.”
Apparently.
“That way there will be meaning in breaking you, will there not?”
I had completely misunderstood the relationship between the Tower Master and Marcelo……!