“So, you want to learn how to defend against Sword Mana?”
“Yes, Lord Ruben.”
I looked at the disciples of the Magic Tower bowing before me.
The pathetic fools had apparently gotten themselves beaten up somewhere, judging by the enormous bruise around one of their eyes.
No matter how aggrieved they felt, they had even come looking for me when I was merely visiting the Magic Tower.
“Start from the beginning. Who did you fight, what were you doing, and how did you end up getting beaten that badly?”
“Well…. Yesterday was the weekend, so we went to a tavern in the capital to relieve some stress, and we ended up getting into a dispute.”
“And?”
“As you know, Archmage, mages like us are weak in close combat. And our opponents were Sword Expert-level warriors, all of them viciously wielding Sword Mana….”
“Enough.”
Sigh.
These hopeless fools.
In other words, they had gotten into a tavern brawl with a group of Sword Experts and had been thoroughly beaten because the fight took place at close range.
“Did you get beaten to a pulp because of their Sword Mana, or because it was close combat?”
“…”
Seeing them instantly fall silent made them seem twice as pathetic.
I might not have been the Tower Master or even an administrator of the Magic Tower, but as an Archmage, surely I could teach them this much.
“Both are problems. Mages are weak in close combat because they have difficulty defending against high-speed attacks, and they are vulnerable to Sword Mana because our magic has trouble contending with the sharp physical energy used by warriors.”
“Uh…. Then there really is no solution after all. Surely even you, Archmage, if you fought a warrior at close range….”
THUD!
“Ghk!”
I hurled a book straight into the face of the fool muttering at the front.
Was he looking down on an Archmage right now?
“Sword Mana and Magic Mana are no different in the sense that they are both forms of energy. I’ll show you how I deal with it. Hey, Pan Slipel.”
“Yes, Archmage.”
“Attack me with that pointy thing.”
“W-Wait…. Pointy thing? This is my spear. And you want me to attack you…?”
“Put Sword Mana into it.”
“But….”
My Personal Knight stared at me with an idiotic expression that practically said, ‘If I do that, I might get dragged before the Imperial Palace and executed.’
What a frustrating man.
“Do you want me to do ‘that’ in front of all these people? Come now. You must have plenty of grievances against me. Take this opportunity to let them out.”
“…If it is an order, I suppose I have no choice.”
Perhaps because Pan Slipel was constantly being subjected to punishment drills because of me, his expression changed the moment I told him to vent his frustrations.
He was normally a proud knight known as the Spear of the Empire.
Seeing him make such a terrifying face was honestly a little frightening.
“Watch carefully, disciples of the Magic Tower. I’m only going to show you this once.”
Pan Slipel had already moved ten paces away from me.
He raised his spear and aimed it directly at me.
With his mountain-like frame looming in my direction, he charged forward at tremendous speed with a shout.
“Here I come!”
BOOOOM!
The deafening collision of energy against energy shook the Magic Tower’s outdoor garden.
The impact sent an enormous cloud of dust billowing into the air.
Only after it gradually settled could everyone see what had happened.
“Wow…. He blocked it.”
Just as one of the Magic Tower disciples said, Pan’s spear, which had been thrust directly toward my heart, had been stopped by an invisible force.
A wall of mana had manifested before the warrior’s technique and effortlessly blocked it.
“As you just saw, simply exploding a sufficiently large amount of mana can produce an effect similar to Barrier. The important thing is that you must never expend all of your mana doing it. Because once a warrior has gotten this close….”
BOOM!
“Guh!”
Pan Slipel was struck by the Hand Seal for the Smite (Smite) spell gathered in my left hand and promptly lost consciousness.
Like a hunter posing over freshly slain prey, I planted one foot atop his enormous body and declared triumphantly,
“You still have to finish him off.”
The Magic Tower disciples responded enthusiastically to the dramatic conclusion.
“Waaaaah!”
“Magic really is the best!”
“Me too! I’m so glad I abandoned the warrior path and learned magic!”
“Long live Archmage Ruben Seirin!”
Heh.
What adorable fools.
Of course, reaching the level where they could overpower a Sword Master’s spear simply by exploding their mana would take them several decades at minimum.
Still, there was no doubt that I was their hope.
“Yes, yes. Study hard.”
I removed my foot from Pan Slipel’s body.
Looking down at my Personal Knight sprawled there like a hunted bear, I felt a faint twinge of guilt.
Had I gone too far?
“Who cares?”
This was the age of magic, not martial strength.
An era of magical prosperity ushered in by Archmage Ruben Seirin.
Surely even he could understand something like this.
And frankly, even if he could not, what was he going to do about it?
“It’s not as though anyone held a sword to his throat and forced him not to learn magic.”
...
..
.
Come to think of it, something like that had happened in my previous life.
Now, however, it was nothing more than a memory that no one else knew.
“Rapid Star (Rapid Star)!”
The Wooden Spear carrying Pan Slipel’s ferocious energy flew straight toward me.
Right.
That was why I had suddenly remembered that moment.
But Pan Slipel.
That will never happen this time.
Archmage Ruben Seirin will not exist in this life.
I will not allow the world to be destroyed that way again.
“Come!”
In my previous life, I had formed Hand Seals and recited incantations.
Now I shouted like a warrior.
The mana of nature exploded in response to my battle cry.
And the sole point from which it erupted was the wooden sword in my hand.
Try taking an attack from me as a warrior this time, Pan Slipel!
BOOOOOOM!
“What are you doing···?!”
Ribart, who had been watching Ruben and Pan’s Duel near the sparring arena, nearly jumped between them without realizing it.
And for good reason.
The technique Pan Slipel had just used was a killing technique imbued with Sword Mana.
Rapid Star (Rapid Star) was one of House Slipel’s throwing-spear techniques.
It was an extraordinarily aggressive technique used when one needed to kill an opponent with a single blow.
Yet Ribart did not intervene.
The moment Pan’s Wooden Spear, imbued with Sword Mana, shot toward Ruben, Ribart sensed an equally tremendous amount of mana erupting from Ruben’s side.
It was enough to send chills through the body of even the Head Professor of swordsmanship.
BOOOOM!
A heavy sound like the earth splitting apart shook the entire sparring arena.
In an instant, a thick cloud of dust rose high into the sky, so dense that the spectating cadets coughed and narrowed their eyes.
And within that cloud stood a single figure holding a wooden sword.
“That’s impossible!”
“He blocked that attack like it was nothing?”
“That guy must be insane.”
The moment the spectators realized Ruben was still standing unharmed, cries of astonishment erupted around the arena.
That was how destructive Pan’s technique had been.
Ribart himself was deeply shocked for two reasons.
The first was that Pan Slipel’s level exceeded even his expectations.
Anyone capable of infusing a weapon with Sword Mana and launching it in an attack had already reached the level of a 1st-Class warrior—a realm that even a talented martial artist would ordinarily need at least twenty years of training to attain.
Yet somehow, that boy had reached it at only sixteen years old.
He was no ordinary talent.
The second reason was Ruben’s ability to manipulate mana.
Ruben had effortlessly blocked the killing blow of Pan Slipel, a genius who might appear only once in a decade.
Naturally, he had not done so with his physical ability.
Most of the cadets present had probably failed to notice it.
But Ribart, an accomplished master, had seen it clearly.
Ruben had instantaneously exploded a tremendous quantity of mana and used it to disrupt Pan Slipel’s Sword Mana.
Considering that he carried the blood of the Seirin family, perhaps it was some Family Secret Technique intended for emergencies.
If it was not, and Ruben had blocked the attack purely through his own mana, then he would have to be either a 10th-Circle Archmage or a 10th-Class Grand Sword Master.
“But that is impossible.”
Up to that point, Ribart could still explain it away as a Family Secret Technique of House Seirin.
However—
“Hmm?”
What Ribart saw afterward made absolutely no sense no matter how hard he tried to understand it.
After exploding that much mana, Ruben’s Mana Core should have been completely empty.
Yet Sword Mana was still visibly swirling around his wooden sword.
“What Class is that boy supposed to be…?”
A freshman who vastly exceeded the 1st Class?
That was impossible.
Ribart’s reason screamed as much.
Ruben was a son of the Seirin family.
He should have studied nothing but magic from childhood.
And judging from his frail physique, he clearly had not spent years training in martial combat.
‘No. But if I judge only by what I can see…?’
His physical performance during the Willpower Test on the first day, along with the Sword Mana still infused into his weapon even after that tremendous eruption of mana, clearly indicated that Ruben had reached an extraordinary level as a warrior.
It was still unrefined, but the boy’s potential unquestionably reached at least the level of a Master.
The moment Ribart reached that conclusion, he forgot his dignity and let a curse slip from his mouth.
“Insane···.”
Ruben’s accidental display had left both the spectators and Ribart stunned.
But naturally, the person most shocked of all was Pan Slipel himself.
The technique he had genuinely intended to kill Ruben with had been neutralized with absurd ease.
Worse, he had thrown away his Wooden Spear and was now empty-handed.
‘What the hell just happened?’
Perhaps the completely unexpected turn of events had caused his mind to stop functioning.
Pan stared helplessly at his empty hands.
A throwing-spear technique had to succeed.
If it failed to kill the opponent, then the one who died would be the thrower.
And now that his technique had failed, all that remained was to acknowledge defeat and lower his head.
“Do you want to continue?”
The instant Pan saw Ruben sneering at him with a thoroughly rotten grin, his reason disappeared.
He scraped together every last bit of mana remaining in his nearly depleted Mana Core, concentrated it into both fists, and charged toward Ruben.
“You bastard!”
There was no technique behind it.
It was merely a reckless charge.
But perhaps because Pan had been born with an exceptional Martial Constitution, even that was considerably threatening.
Ruben, however, merely shrugged while holding his wooden sword.
Then, using Physical Enhancement, he struck Pan across the shin.
Pan had been charging with terrifying momentum.
His lower leg slammed directly into the wooden sword without losing any of that speed, and he went skidding forward in a brutal face-first slide.
“Kyowl!”
Pan collapsed with a remarkably strange scream.
Ruben’s eyes gleamed as he slowly walked up behind him.
Then the one-sided beating began.
“Manners!”
THUD!
“Make”
THUD!
“A man!”
THUD!
Ruben rhythmically struck Pan’s backside with the wooden sword every three syllables.
The sight made him look like a demon.
For someone proclaiming that ‘Manners make a man,’ his own behavior was remarkably lacking in manners.
Ruben himself did not seem concerned in the slightest.
Pan had already lost consciousness and could no longer respond.
Just as Ruben was about to drive the wooden sword between his buttocks—
“Enough!”
Fortunately(?), Ribart stepped in front of Ruben.
Thanks to him, Pan avoided the ultimate humiliation of having a wooden sword lodged in his anus.
Unfortunately, the countless cadets who had witnessed the scene already had that final image permanently burned into their memories.
“Hey, did you see him about to stick that wooden sword up his ass?”
“He really is insane.”
“He’s not human. He’s a demon.”
“He’s practically an Anus Hunter.”
And thus, for the first semester at Lion Heart Academy, Ruben acquired the nickname ‘Anus Hunter.’
“Ruben Seirin. The outcome of this unofficial Duel has already been decided. You won. However, according to Lion Heart Academy regulations, a ‘Duel’ between incoming cadets who have not yet been assigned to classes is not recognized. Therefore, this ‘Duel’ is invalid.”
Ribart held a thickly bound copy of the Academy regulations in one hand.
It was opened to the section concerning ‘Duels,’ which his assistant had barely managed to find.
Recognizing Ribart from the formal uniform worn exclusively by professors, Ruben withdrew the Sword Mana from his wooden sword and bowed respectfully.
“My apologies, Professor. I was unfamiliar with the Academy’s rules and caused a disturbance. If punishment is required, I will accept it without complaint.”
In an instant, Ruben transformed from a demon hunting someone’s anus into the refined son of a noble family.
The transition was so seamless and shameless that it was difficult to believe he was merely sixteen.
‘Good grief. What a sly fox.’
Ribart was beginning to wonder whether Ruben could surprise him any further.
The boy’s way of handling himself was more reminiscent of a middle-aged schemer than a teenager.
Ribart looked down at him for a moment before reprimanding him in a deliberately stern tone.
“There will be no severe punishment for an act committed out of ignorance. However, even during a Duel, you must show respect for your opponent. Ruben Seirin, remember my words.”
“I will carve them into my bones.”
Carve them into his bones, my ass.
To everyone else, he might have looked like a humble young noble sincerely acknowledging his mistake.
But Ribart had seen through him.
Behind those elegant words was a mass of stubbornness wrapped in pretense and hypocrisy.
Between that unnervingly seasoned change in attitude and the sheer obstinacy he had just displayed, the boy did not resemble a fresh-faced sixteen-year-old in the slightest.
If anything, he gave off the air of a veteran who had been kicked around by life until every last trace of innocence had rotted away.
‘Can I really teach this boy?’
A raw gem that might appear only once in the history of the Empire.
Yet Ribart was becoming less and less confident that he could polish that raw gem into something proper.