Iris Academy, the main setting of [Spell Breaker], was located in the Holy Azerum Empire, which contained four major powers.
The Imperial Family, the heart and symbol of the empire.
The Knight Order, responsible for the empire’s military might.
The Magic Tower, responsible for the empire’s technology and mana.
The Lumen Order, responsible for the empire’s welfare and divine power.
Each governed the empire within its own sphere, cooperating with the others while simultaneously keeping them in check.
No matter how much they opposed and quarreled with one another, however, their existence ultimately depended upon the preservation of the empire. To prevent their own divisions from tearing it apart, they joined forces to establish ‘Iris Academy.’
By gathering the children of high-ranking nobles in one place and educating them together, they intended to forge relationships between them from an early age and create a foundation for future cooperation.
Because of its founding purpose and its stated commitment to the pursuit of knowledge, Iris Academy became inviolable territory with which even the emperor could not recklessly interfere.
Moreover, its commitment to scholarship allowed talented people of every social class to enroll. That was why the protagonist of [Spell Breaker] had decided to conceal his identity and cultivate his strength at Iris Academy.
As an academy attended by high-ranking nobles, it received extensive public and private funding. The empire’s most renowned experts and scholars consequently sought positions there as professors. Promising students then gathered at the academy to learn from them, naturally transforming Iris Academy into the finest academy in the empire.
As Iris Academy’s reputation grew, it needed a way to distinguish exceptional talent from mediocrity. It therefore administered an entrance examination that assessed each applicant’s ability and aptitude in martial power, mana, and divine power.
That entrance examination served as the tutorial for [Spell Breaker].
For members of the Imperial Family and children from prestigious houses, however, the entrance examination was little more than a formality.
After all, it had been created because the lesser and middle-ranking nobles had persuaded the high-ranking nobles to introduce it.
Outwardly, they claimed to be pursuing equality. Within the academy, they claimed that the examination selected commoners fit to associate with the nobility. In reality, they were desperately struggling to secure admission for their own children.
The high-ranking nobles knew this, but the examiners unconditionally admitted their children, so they saw no need to interfere.
Besides, Iris Academy had been founded in the first place to foster unity among the high-ranking nobles. Although I had transmigrated into a scoundrel, I was still a direct descendant of a prestigious magical house. My admission was virtually guaranteed.
I’d probably pass as long as I managed to produce a little flame from my hand.
***
Iris Academy was a place where equality between social classes was guaranteed by imperial decree, no less.
In truth, even the emperor could not recklessly interfere with the academy, making that guarantee more secure than the imperial decree itself. As a result, nobles rarely flaunted their authority openly.
But that was only how things appeared on the surface. Social status itself had not disappeared, and commoners were still far from free of its influence.
Faced with differences in status so vast that they could never even meet these people outside the academy, most students humbled themselves. Meanwhile, the ambitious groveled in hopes of securing valuable connections by any means possible.
The result was the bustling, marketplace-like commotion that filled the academy on the day of the entrance examination.
“I’ve prepared a red carpet!”
“I’ve brought the elixir for which our merchant company is famous!”
“I brought this healing scroll……!”
The children of lesser nobles and merchant company owners crowded around the scions of prestigious houses, all clamoring in desperation to make themselves known.
At the center of each crowd, the prestigious heirs browsed the offerings as though they were shopping, selecting and taking along whichever applicants had presented something they liked.
Not a single person approached me.
I know I’m a scoundrel, but isn’t this a bit much? I’m still a high-ranking noble.
When I frowned and looked around, people began whispering.
“Look over there. It’s Van the Scoundrel!”
“Hey, keep your voice down! He’ll hear you!”
“Let him hear. He’s already fallen out of favor with the head of his house.”
“E-Even so, what if he retaliates……?”
A sigh escaped me as I listened to the surrounding conversations.
Van’s treatment in [Spell Breaker] was somewhat unusual.
He was scorned for being incompetent and out of favor with the head of his house. Yet because his family had not cast him aside, he still enjoyed its protection while running rampant, so everyone feared him.
In other words, people normally ignored him while simultaneously dreading the moment he might cause another disturbance.
While playing the game, I had dismissed it with a casual, What kind of ridiculous premise is that? Experiencing it firsthand left me with no idea how to behave.
The fact that Van had maintained his life as a scoundrel despite receiving this kind of treatment made him seem impressive in several respects.
No one approached me, but I was not disappointed.
Unlike the heirs of prestigious houses, who had grown up under this kind of public attention, I found the entire spectacle extremely uncomfortable.
Besides, none of the gifts they offered were as valuable as the information I already possessed, so I had no reason to envy them.
Still, if I’d known I would transmigrate into the game, I would’ve crammed even one more scrap of information into my head…….
There was no point regretting it now. I should focus on not forgetting the information I did possess.
The entrance examination proceeded according to an assigned order, and applicants were free to spend their time however they wished until their turn arrived.
Most used that time to form factions or socialize with the children of prestigious houses. I did neither. There was somewhere I needed to visit around this time.
After exploring the academy countless times from the protagonist’s perspective, I knew its interior layout by heart. As I made my way toward my destination without getting lost, I checked Van Astraea’s status window.
【Name: Van Astraea】
【Level: 10】
【Martial Power 15 Mana 25 Divine Power 10】
【Skills: Basic Fire Magic, Basic Water Magic, Basic Wind Magic, Basic Earth Magic, Dual Casting, Basic Swordsmanship, Basic Sacred Art-Healing, ■■■】
I had allowed myself to expect something from the scion of a prestigious magical house, but the instant I saw his status, I sighed.
What kind of life had this bastard been living……?
No, seriously! He’s from a prestigious magical house! Why does he have 15 Martial Power?! And he even has 10 Divine Power? Of course he only has 25 Mana despite being level 10!
My head began to throb.
A character started at level 1 with ten stat points and gained four more with every level. Since he had invested a combined total of twenty-five points into Martial Power and Divine Power, he had effectively thrown approximately six levels into the gutter.
This went far beyond choosing a poor build.
In this game, stats measured strength while also representing the faction to which a person belonged.
The higher a noble’s position, the more likely they were to invest only in the stat associated with their faction. They almost never used the other stats, so those might as well not have existed.
This bastard, however, had spread his stats remarkably evenly.
That could mean one of two things.
Either he had cultivated friendly relationships with several factions.
Or he was a walking bomb who had caused trouble everywhere and earned the hatred of every faction equally.
I desperately hoped it was the former, but there was no way that would be true of the Empire’s Greatest Scoundrel…….
Characters like this occasionally appeared while playing the game.
They had personal connections with several factions and triggered unusual events whenever the player became involved with them.
Regardless of their relevance to the main story, those events were always so brutally difficult that they made me feel sick.
Unless the rewards were exceptionally good, avoiding them was the wisest choice. But I had transmigrated into that very character…….
The one consolation was that he possessed a fairly diverse collection of skills.
For Martial Power, he had 【Basic Swordsmanship】. For Divine Power, he had 【Basic Sacred Art-Healing】. His skill tree was respectable enough that I could not dismiss him as a completely ruined character.
Most importantly, unlike his disastrous stats, his skill set was magnificent—perhaps because he was still a direct descendant of a prestigious magical house.
He possessed all four foundational elemental magic skills—fire, water, wind, and earth—even though an ordinary character would struggle to wield two elements.
They were only at the basic level for now, but if I developed them later, I could reasonably aspire to a high-ranking position within the Magic Tower.
And on top of that, he had 【Dual Casting】!
It allowed the user to activate two spells simultaneously, greatly increasing the variety of possible attacks. It was an essential skill for any magic build, useful during the early, middle, and late stages of the game alike.
For a scoundrel, he appeared to have worked surprisingly hard.
Still, if you were going to work that hard, couldn’t you have raised your stats properly……?
And finally…….
【Name: ■■■】
【Type: Passive】
【Effect: ■■■ ■■■ ■■■■ ■■■ ■■■ ■■■■ ■■ ■■. ■■■ ■■■ ■, ■■■ ■■■■ ■■■ ■■■ ■■■.】
He possessed one hidden skill whose name and effects were both completely obscured.
Hidden skills could be obtained while playing the game, and their details became visible once specific conditions had been satisfied.
In my experience, acquiring hidden skills had always been beneficial and never harmful, so this one would probably help me someday.
While I examined the status window, I reached my destination: the indoor sparring hall in the main building’s west wing. I dismissed the window.
The sparring hall was surrounded by sturdy iron walls, yet its floor was unusually covered in lush green grass.
Warm sunlight streamed through the wide-open ceiling and shone upon the grass.
A girl stood there, swinging an iron sword.
WHOOSH—! WHOOSH—!
The sound of wind being cleaved apart echoed with every powerful slash. She must have been swinging the sword for quite some time, as beads of sweat had formed beneath the hair she had tied into a ponytail.
The beautiful girl who brandished hair as deep a red as the sun while glaring at an imaginary enemy with black eyes was Reina Serenia, my favorite character.
Visiting the western sparring hall before the tutorial began allowed the player to encounter Reina.
There were several reasons I had come straight here, including the opportunity to become acquainted with her before enrollment. But the greatest reason was much simpler.
I just wanted to see her.
I wanted to know how it would feel to see my favorite character with my own eyes instead of through a monitor.
The first emotion I felt upon seeing her in person was wonder.
It was like meeting a celebrity I admired.
I had imagined meeting her someday but never genuinely believed it could happen. Now that she stood before my own eyes, I experienced the unfamiliar sensation of being unable to see anything except her.
I wanted to approach her and speak to her immediately, but I could not think of anything to say. I also did not want to interrupt her diligent training, so I sat on a nearby bench.
According to the setting guide, House Serenia had once been one of the Three Great Houses and a prestigious lineage of swordsmen. The house had since been exterminated, leaving Reina as its sole survivor.
Her abilities had already reached the level of an apprentice knight in the Knight Order. She would pass the entrance examination with ease.
Despite that, Reina continued training immediately before the examination because of her innate disposition.
She never cut corners.
She believed that training was the proper path (the true way) to strength, and that the strength earned through training would always prove itself honestly.
That disposition must have been what allowed her to become as strong as she was.
It was also why I had become so engrossed in Reina’s story.
I admired how she always tried to overcome every hardship through her own efforts.
Her excessive strictness made her reluctant to accept anyone else’s help, which was admittedly a headache for players trying to save her.
Even that was part of Reina’s charm.
I did not know how much time had passed before Reina abruptly stopped swinging her sword and looked in my direction.
“Do you need something from me?”
Reina sheathed her sword, wiped away her sweat with the towel around her neck, and approached me.
What should I say?
I knew Reina well, but she knew nothing about me. I therefore pretended not to recognize her.
“No. I came here to warm up before the entrance examination, but you were here first, so I was waiting.”
“Oh-ho~.”
Smiling, Reina looked me up and down.
“Judging by your clothes, you don’t seem like an ordinary noble……. Are you from a prestigious house?”
“Something like that.”
“Then your admission is probably guaranteed already. I’m definitely going to pass the entrance examination too, so let’s get to know each other in advance. I’m Reina Serenia.”
Her easygoing manner was exactly as I had expected, and I could not help smiling.
“What? Why are you laughing? Is there something on my face?”
“No. It’s nothing.”
I’m just happy that I finally met you in person.
I swallowed those words and took her hand.
“I’m Van Astraea. I look forward to getting to know you.”
After hearing my name, Reina fell into thought for a moment. Once she remembered who I was, she covered her mouth in surprise.
“Van Astraea! The scoundrel from the Ducal House of Astraea?!”
Oh, right. I’m a scoundrel.
It still felt strange because this body did not feel like mine.
Fortunately, despite knowing that I was a scoundrel, Reina neither recoiled nor fled from me.
After recovering from her surprise, she smiled and nodded repeatedly.
“I see. So that’s why you were laughing…….”
She was clearly misunderstanding something.
I had no way to respond when I did not know what she was imagining.
“You seem surprisingly normal, considering the rumors about you being a scoundrel.”
I suddenly became curious about those rumors.
“……May I ask what kinds of rumors you’ve heard?”
“Hmm……. They range from the minor incident where you blew away the ceiling during your society debut and threw the whole place into chaos, to the major disaster everyone mentions—when you visited the Magic Tower headquarters and blew away part of the complex.”
Blowing away the ceiling during a society debut was a minor incident? And holy shit! I blew up part of the Magic Tower? The headquarters, no less?!
That revelation left me dizzy, and I rejected reality.
“N-No way. You’re saying I blew up the Magic Tower?”
“I think so. I remember because when I heard the rumor, I also heard that you were innocent.”
“…….”
The Magic Tower headquarters was not simply a gathering place for mages or a symbolic building representing one of the empire’s powers.
It was an artificial Akashic Record containing technology, magic, and every variety of knowledge from throughout history. It was also a nuclear weapons depot housing enough military power to wipe an entire island off the map with ease.
And Van had interfered not with some distant branch, but with the headquarters itself…….
If an ordinary noble had done that, the incident would have been enough to get them disowned. In effect, it had been an act of large-scale terrorism.
Destroying part of the Magic Tower headquarters was merely the most notorious incident. There had to be countless smaller incidents as well.
Had Van not been a direct descendant of the Ducal House of Astraea, he would have suffered an untimely death long ago.
“Whatever the rumors say, people who work hard can’t be bad. I never thought anyone besides me would be training before the entrance examination. That means you’re definitely a good person.”
Reina declared it with a smile. She was undoubtedly comforting Van rather than me, yet I felt comforted as well.
Another of her strengths was her ability to judge people for herself without being swayed by those around her.
Reina suddenly pulled me to my feet.
“Let’s spar!”
Reina loved sparring as much as she loved training.
It was the simplest way to confirm the results of all her hard work.
Brimming with excitement, Reina shook my arm vigorously.
“You’re a direct descendant of the Ducal House of Astraea, so you must be incredibly strong, right?!”
No? I’m a complete weakling…….
I had arrived in this world less than an hour ago and had never used magic in my life.
Before I could answer, however, Reina reached her own conclusion.
“And you seem to train hard, so you must be strong!”
I was not yet accustomed to controlling mana, but I could not avoid this spar.
I needed to produce a meaningful result here if I wanted to establish a good relationship with Reina.
Even apart from that, I wanted to live up to the expectations in her shining eyes.
“Fine. Let’s do it.”
Strategy was all I had, but I had nothing to lose.