I was made to feel in my bones a fact I had briefly forgotten, because all I had ever done was either rough scuffling or running away for my life.
A knight was, by nature, a specialist who had honed their skills for battle.
One who spent nearly their entire life swinging weapons.
Even if what they handled was an enormous golem, so long as they could handle it as a weapon.
It was more than possible for them to melt all their combat experience into it and produce combat power beyond what I had anticipated.
“You ought to start showing your teacher some respect.”
With a voice that sounded faintly amused, Professor Reina’s Cyclops waited until I got back up.
And as I rose, I immediately analyzed the situation.
“You kept riding it and internalized the delay between your own sense of control and the Cyclops’s movements…?”
“It is an excellent machine, but the fact that it is slower than handling something directly with your hands is rather troublesome. Though with this size, that is only natural.”
Even the human body sometimes had a slight gap between thought and movement, so a Cyclops went without saying.
But if one grasped even that gap precisely, all one had to do was move while taking it into account.
“If you give up only half a step and then immediately connect into your next motion, this side can move quickly enough as well.”
That was the secret behind why Professor Reina’s Cyclops moved even faster than the technical demonstrator.
Conversely, it also meant that if responsiveness improved, knights like Professor Reina would absolutely not be pushed back even in close combat.
“This demonstrator wasn’t built to lie flat on its back!”
In the first place, this mock battle had begun precisely to obtain even this kind of unexpected data.
A mountain to overcome was something to gladly welcome and a problem to surpass, not something I had any reason to dislike.
I immediately activated the backpack and swung my weapon once more at Professor Reina’s Cyclops.
The edgeless sword and axe collided, and soon we entered a contest of strength.
“My weapon is actually longer on this side…!”
The sword had become the shape of an ordinary longsword rather than what I had originally intended, but in any case, by Cyclops standards, its length corresponded to a human longsword.
It was longer than a one-handed axe, and since it had to withstand the force of being swung, it had been reinforced more as well.
But it still could not overcome the output of Professor Reina’s Cyclops.
‘This side has higher output. Friction is minimized too. In terms of responsiveness, Professor Reina can react in advance, but this side has definitely improved, so its speed itself is faster. Then the reason I can’t overwhelm her right now is…’
While we were locked in the contest of strength, I stepped in close and pushed, causing Professor Reina’s machine to be driven back slightly.
Professor Reina’s Cyclops immediately lifted a leg, and I activated the backpack to slip upward.
I felt the sun shining behind me, and as I added weight and falling speed within the backlight and brought the sword down, Professor Reina’s Cyclops retreated a beat late. Under the effect of the floor collapsing from the impact, it dropped to one knee.
I immediately threw a punch to completely break its posture, then pulled it in again, about to fling it backward, when—
“I can see exactly what you’re going to do, Aizen!”
Instead, Professor Reina’s Cyclops pulled me in, throwing me down, and the rotational force generated by the massive Cyclops sent the technical demonstrator sprawling flat.
I was dazed by the impact, but I got up at once and charged into Professor Reina’s Cyclops with my shoulder. Due to the difference in weight, the Cyclops fell over, but…
“I learned quite a lot from you too, you know.”
Soon, the opposing Cyclops used the backpack booster for the first time to evade my follow-up attack and corrected its posture.
Then it precisely read my attempt to swing my weapon, ducked to avoid it, and swung its axe straight toward the cockpit.
“This should be enough.”
The axe blade had stopped precisely in front of the cockpit.
The mock battle was over.
****
The arena had been turned upside down, but in the end, it was only a mock battle.
We sat the Cyclops and the technical demonstrator side by side, and soon Noel spread out the lunchboxes she had prepared.
“I brought more than enough for everyone. Please eat as much as you like.”
“I’m not one to refuse free food.”
Mina immediately accepted one of Noel’s lunchboxes, and soon she and Erika laid out a place in one corner of the arena.
Professor Reina, I, and the others began helping as well, and before long, one side of the arena had somehow turned into something like a small banquet.
“Lord Aizen, here.”
“You didn’t prepare this yourself, did you?”
“Unfortunately, I can’t cook. I bought them from a lunchbox shop near the academy.”
I wondered why such a thing existed… but apparently, because the academy had many outdoor classes, there was a lot of demand for such shops, and quite a few of them existed.
I thought there would be no point if people could cook for themselves or ask the cafeteria, but—
“Nobles who know how to cook are rare.”
“The cafeteria has to take care of the people who normally eat there too, so they say they don’t have enough hands.”
Mina and Erika’s explanations neatly explained the reason.
On top of that, they charged quite a lot of money too.
“Still, though they’re lunchboxes, the shops do business with nobles, so the quality is all good.”
“That’s because you only go to places like that.”
Mina narrowed her eyes and said there were plenty of academy students without money.
Then she pointed behind her with a finger.
“…There are so many. If there are any leftovers, could we perhaps take some…?”
“Hey. She’s the young lady of the Duke of Nexia’s house. There are still plenty of potatoes too, but if you ask her for this…”
“…Once mealtime is over, you may take some of what’s left.”
The alchemy department students cheered.
Amid the noisy commotion of the alchemy department students, who had secured dinner as well, I quietly looked up at the technical demonstrator and said,
“Still, I didn’t get a single chance to win.”
“True.”
I had thought I had gotten fairly skilled after surviving all the desperate fights I had been through, but I lost.
It was only a mock battle, so it was fine, but still, my pride was a little…
“That is the limit of a deskbound scholar. Will you come to the knight department?”
“You’re teasing me, aren’t you? I can’t transfer at this point.”
“Would a professor tease a student?”
She said that, but the corners of her mouth were rising, and the brightness of her face had increased by about thirty percent.
Yes, she was definitely teasing me because she won.
“Even so, from what I saw, Aizen seemed to match you pretty evenly. You should act like an adult, Reina.”
“They are plenty adult too, Iserina. But there were many situations worthy of putting into a manual.”
Reina came over to this side.
When Noel tried to make some room, I held her back for a moment, and Erika and Mina quietly gave up a place for Professor Reina.
At that sight, Professor Reina smiled briefly, then approached the place that had been offered and spoke seriously.
“For my part, it was possible because I applied my combat experience as a knight, but honestly, I couldn’t move as flexibly as you did. The backpack’s… booster, was it? I had the disadvantage that I could not immediately think to make use of that function.”
Thanks to my memories of my previous world, I could easily think of things like emergency evasions using boosters from mecha works, but Professor Reina knew nothing of the sort.
Even if she knew about maneuvering using boosters, the disadvantage of not being able to think of it in the moment was only natural, and at the same time, it was something she herself needed to improve.
“And there were also times when you moved rather sharply, Aizen. I mean when you put the light at your back.”
“That’s something people often… No. For now, I tried it because I’d seen it somewhere. Was it all right?”
“Since I see the outside through a magic tool, of course it was effective. The eyes that see are still mine.”
The mono-eye was a magic tool that, because of unit cost, only had the function of transmitting the outside situation inward; it did not have an effect like reducing light.
In other words, if it was suddenly exposed to a large amount of light, it would lose sight of the target.
It seemed the reason Professor Reina’s Cyclops had reacted slowly for a moment during the battle was that, while tracking me, she had looked directly at the sun.
“All of it was useful content worth putting into a manual.”
“I’m glad it was helpful. I can tell you more later if I think of anything, right?”
“As long as you do not start spouting strange, incomprehensible things.”
How harsh.
But from here on was what mattered.
“The output was definitely higher on the demonstrator’s side, but it never once gained an advantage in strength against the Cyclops.”
This was a fairly serious defect.
And it was the reason the mock battle had been important.
Professor Reina also nodded.
“I did use my wits and avoided taking the force head-on, but I was still able to receive it easily.”
“That’s a problem. You didn’t use that, did you?”
Officially, Overload was not attached to civilian-use Cyclops, but Professor Reina’s machine had it put back in.
Of course, secretly.
Because she had persuaded Mina and me by force, saying how was she supposed to write the manual if we removed it?
So I spoke indirectly, and fortunately, Professor Reina understood what I meant and nodded.
“I did not use it.”
“Then this is a real problem.”
It meant the machine we had gone to the trouble of making had simply lost.
While I was wondering exactly where the problem was, Professor Reina seemed to remember something and spoke.
“Come to think of it, Aizen. I saw something while we were fighting.”
“What was it?”
The opponent could see what I could not.
So when I asked right away, Professor Reina slowly said,
“I thought I might have seen it wrong, but for some reason, the arm of the golem you were riding…”
Professor Reina tapped her forehead with a finger.
Then, as if she had recalled it, she spoke with certainty.
“It seemed to be spinning a little uselessly.”
I see.
I could understand the reason.