It wasn’t me who first found the match bracket bearing the name Conrad Ferdalos.
That credit went to Lulu.
Unlike me, who had gone over only the Department of Magic students’ bracket again and again, she had read through every other department’s bracket from top to bottom as well.
That was how she found my name on another department’s bracket before I did.
Gathering information was both Lulu’s specialty and her instinct.
Thanks to that instinct, I was spared from wasting ages wandering around in search of a name I would never have found.
While I was still so absorbed in the Department of Magic bracket that I couldn’t tear myself away from it, Lulu returned with an uneasy expression and spoke.
“Hey, Conrad.”
“Oh, yeah. You already looked through them all?”
“…I’m just asking to make sure, but did you find your name on the Department of Magic bracket?”
“No, not yet. I’m going through it for the third time, and I still can’t find it anywhere.”
“I found your name on the Department of Swordsmanship list… Is it someone else with the same name?”
“Department of Swordsmanship?”
At first, I thought she was talking nonsense.
But I followed Lulu when she tugged on my sleeve, and when I checked where her finger was pointing,
I found that the absurd thing I had dismissed as nonsense had indeed happened.
「First-Semester Midterm Evaluation Match Bracket
Department of Swordsmanship: Dike Osman / Department of Magic: Conrad Ferdalos」
“Department of Swordsmanship… Dike Osman?”
The bracket even helpfully labeled me as a member of the Department of Magic beside my name.
There was probably no room to deny that Dike Osman of the Department of Swordsmanship was my opponent.
“S-Something’s wrong, isn’t it? Dike from the Department of Swordsmanship is that famous guy.”
Setting aside the fact that a student from the Department of Swordsmanship had been matched against one from the Department of Magic in the first place,
The fact that my opponent was Dike Osman made someone’s obvious malice toward me clear.
“Looks that way.”
Dike Osman.
As Lulu had said, he was famous in more ways than one.
Although I had not given much thought to unimportant people since returning to the past, the name Dike Osman still lingered faintly in my memory.
There were probably several reasons I remembered him.
For now, the important one was that this man was a disciple of Professor Oliver Finn.
That alone was enough to tell me that Professor Oliver had interfered in the process that matched Dike and me against each other.
Was he really that bitter about what I had done to his students?
“Let’s hurry to the department office and protest. There’s no way a mock match between a swordsman and a mage can possibly be valid….”
“Are you Conrad Ferdalos?”
“Eek?!”
Lulu’s urgent attempt to propose a solution was cut off midway by someone who had suddenly appeared.
Sensing danger, she immediately tucked her tail and hid behind my back.
Silently praising her animalistic danger sense, I answered the person who had spoken to me.
“I am.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Dike Osman, a fourth-year in the Department of Swordsmanship.”
“I already know.”
“And I’m your opponent in the evaluation match.”
“I know that as well.”
Dike Osman held out his right hand with an amiable smile.
I looked at his outstretched hand once, then silently offered him my own right hand after reinforcing it with arcane magic.
SQUEEZE.
The instant I felt the powerful pressure of his grip, I squeezed his hand back with just as much force.
“Huh…?”
The one who pulled his hand away first after feeling my unexpectedly strong grip was Dike.
“You’re stronger than I expected. And here I heard you were from the Department of Magic.”
“You are weaker than I expected. Were you not from the Department of Swordsmanship?”
“H-Hey! What the hell are you saying…?”
The first to react to the provocation I had thrown at him was Lulu, who had been watching from behind my back.
“…Weak? Me?”
A beat later, Dike tilted his head and asked me in a hardened voice.
“For someone so famous, you did not seem nearly as strong as I expected. I suppose rumors truly are not a reliable source of information.”
The atmosphere between us instantly turned so vicious that anyone passing by could have sensed it.
The tension felt as though lightning might strike at any moment.
There had been quite a few people around only moments ago, since we were standing in front of the Department of Swordsmanship bracket, but most of the students had already sensed the ominous mood and backed away from Dike and me.
Aside from Lulu, who was pressed against my back and trembling like a sewing machine, Dike and I were effectively facing off alone.
“You’re an interesting little bastard.”
Dike forcibly relaxed his rigid expression.
Then he glared at me as though he wanted to kill me, his eyes filled with even greater hostility.
“I heard you took good care of our juniors.”
“There is no need to call it that. It was nothing, so please do not concern yourself.”
“Don’t get cocky just because you won with a sneak attack, you arrogant bastard.”
“Would that not be better than getting cocky over winning a one-against-many fight?”
“You really are a crazy little bastard, just like I heard.”
“Was the Mad Dog not your epithet, Senior Dike?”
“…….”
The Mad Dog of the Department of Swordsmanship.
Of all the many nicknames used to describe him within the Academy, none suited Dike Osman better.
The moment I was kind enough to mention his most famous epithet, his expression froze.
People called Mad Dogs usually flew into a rage when someone called them one.
Naturally, Dike was another man who carried on that tradition.
“You bastard… You really want to die….”
“Are you trying to get disqualified before the evaluation match even begins?”
“…….”
Dike’s bloodshot fist stopped in midair.
It seemed he had instinctively tried to resort to violence first, but the moment he heard me, he must have remembered what he stood to lose.
He hesitated, unable to bring himself to throw the punch.
The Academy revealed evaluation match opponents in advance only to give students time to prepare for them.
Threatening or assaulting an opponent beforehand in a way that affected the match was naturally grounds for disqualification.
Not only would the match be scored accordingly, but the academic punishment that followed would not be light either.
Even a Mad Dog with nothing but muscle in his skull probably did not want to be suspended with less than a year left before graduation.
The Academy rarely interfered in conflicts between students, but it always dealt firmly with disputes related to academic achievement.
“Hey, what’s with that guy? Is he crazy?”
“He’s acting like that toward Dike?”
“He isn’t even from the Department of Swordsmanship. Looks like he’s from the Department of Magic.”
Besides, there were already far too many witnesses.
Now that we had drawn this much attention, even Professor Oliver would not be able to clean up after Dike’s violence.
The hulking man before me had enough intelligence to understand that much.
“Whew… Hah.”
Dike’s fist dropped as he regained his composure.
“Fine. You’re right. I can’t get disqualified now, you bastard.”
“Good thinking.”
“And if I hit you now, I won’t be able to beat you ‘until you die,’ will I?”
“…….”
“Wash your neck clean and wait. If you run, that’s when you’ll really die.”
After leaving behind a threat that did not faze me in the slightest, Dike turned his two-meter bulk around and walked away.
It was a relief that a pointless fight had not broken out.
I had nearly gotten myself disqualified before the evaluation match even began.
“Hey, you, you, you….”
“Ah, sorry. I kept you waiting.”
“Have you seriously lost your mind?! Do you go around offering up your life?!”
Lulu, who had cowered and hidden from Dike’s intimidating presence, shot her tail straight up and screamed the moment he was far enough away.
“Why are you making such a fuss?”
“I’m not making a fuss, I’m worried, you idiot! What on earth are you going to do now?!”
“What else can I do? I’ll fight him in the evaluation match.”
I had made up my mind the moment I saw Dike Osman’s name written on the bracket.
If things unfolded as they had in my previous life, he would probably graduate from the Academy next year without incident.
The moment I pictured that sight, I decided I had to teach him a lesson at least once before he left.
I might not be able to make him pay for every vile act he had committed during his four years at the Academy.
But at the very least, I intended to crush his pride in front of everyone.
Normally, I was too busy to waste my time on something like this.
But if a stage had been prepared where I could legitimately beat him up, there was no reason to avoid it.
I almost felt grateful to Professor Oliver for the first time, since he had gone so far as to use his authority to create this opportunity for me.
“Are you sane?! What do you mean, fight him?! We need to go to the Academic Affairs Office right now!”
“Why the Academic Affairs Office?”
“Obviously because they chose the wrong opponent! We have to ask them to cancel the evaluation match!”
“Forget it. It’ll be a waste of time anyway.”
Professor Oliver had undoubtedly interfered to create this match.
Besides, every other bracket had already been finalized, so there was no way they could change only the two of us now.
Even if one or two students protested, the only answer we would receive was that there was nothing they could do.
The moment I explained that, Lulu’s expression looked even more like she had bitten into dirt.
“Th-Then what do we do…?”
“What do you mean, what do we do? I told you. I’ll fight him in the evaluation match.”
“D-Don’t. Let’s just forfeit instead. You can make up for it in the Final Comprehensive Evaluation. I’ll help you then too, okay?”
I appreciated that she cared enough about me to say all this, but I had never intended to back out of the fight with Dike in the first place.
I simply told her, in an even voice, what I was going to do.
“The Final Comprehensive Evaluation is one thing. This is another.”
“Enough. Just listen to me. I’m saying this because I genuinely care about you.”
“Why should I?”
“Why do you think? Because I already know what that bastard does in every evaluation match! You know too, don’t you?!”
As she said, Dike Osman’s deranged behavior in evaluation matches had long been notorious.
He had committed every kind of vile act under Professor Oliver since his first year.
There was no chance his vicious nature would remain hidden during an evaluation match.
If anything, the two evaluation matches held each year were nothing more than an excuse for him to unleash violence to his heart’s content.
During evaluation matches, Dike Osman always beat his opponents to death.
That was not a figure of speech.
It was literal.
The arenas used for evaluation matches were enchanted with Death-Prevention Magic, and any student who suffered a fatal injury was declared defeated and teleported to a medical facility at the same moment.
It was one of the Academy’s measures to minimize the number of students who died during examinations.
And from the first-semester evaluation match of his first year until now,
Dike Osman had triggered Death-Prevention Magic six times across six evaluation matches.
It did not matter whether his opponent surrendered, or whether the referee declared them unable to continue.
There was no reason behind the Mad Dog’s violence.
If one insisted on giving it a reason, it was probably that he wanted to intoxicate himself with pleasure.
Of course, under normal circumstances, it should have been impossible for Dike to beat his opponent one-sidedly in the Midterm Evaluation Match, where students of similar ability were paired together.
A hulking frame over two meters tall and a massive greatsword.
A burly body packed with muscle all the way into his skull.
I could admit that the man himself was strong to some extent.
But the Department of Swordsmanship already had several students besides Dike who were fully capable of facing him.
Even Prince Antonio, a second-year, possessed enough skill to play with someone like Dike in the palm of his hand.
Unfortunately, Dike’s evaluation match opponents were always students he could toy with easily.
In the first-semester evaluation match last year, a third-year Dike had even been matched against a freshman who had enrolled less than two months earlier.
I had suspected for some time that Professor Oliver might be interfering.
This incident had now confirmed who was behind it.
I had wondered why someone as strong as Dike had remained under Professor Oliver for four years.
The saying that like attracts like suited them perfectly.
“He already leaves every opponent looking like a bloody meat patty, and after you provoked him like that, he’ll really try to kill you!”
“Of course he will.”
“There’s barely any difference in points between losing and forfeiting anyway! Is it wrong to want you to come out of this with your body intact?!”
“Lulu, what nonsense have you been talking about this whole time?”
We had known each other for nearly a year, yet I had not expected her to have so little faith in her friend.
No.
Maybe it was because she knew me too well.
At this point, Lulu probably did not even know that I was now a Third-Circle mage.
She would not have realized that I could wield a secondary weapon in preparation for close combat either.
It was true that the version of me from my previous life would naturally have lost against him.
But in this life, it was difficult even to imagine myself losing to Dike.
“Lose? Why would I lose? I’m going to win.”
“…What?”
“I said I’m going to win.”
At the certainty in my voice, her drooping black ears rose slightly.
“You can win?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Are you sure you won’t get beaten like a dog, collapse, and get sent to the church?”
“Sorry, but I’m not a sexual deviant who enjoys being beaten by men.”
“…….”
It was not that I could not understand the worried look she was giving me.
From an objective perspective, comparing Dike’s ability with mine, It was a match between a mere First-Circle mage and the Department of Swordsmanship’s brute.
I had not yet told anyone that I had unlocked the Third Circle over winter break, since I intended to use it as a trump card if possible.
This evaluation match would probably be the moment I used Third-Circle magic in front of everyone.
“Just watch me closely during the evaluation match. I can take him down without suffering a single scratch.”
Lulu still looked unconvinced, but she reluctantly nodded at my answer.
The evaluation match was ten days away.