Knighthood (3)

In fact, there was a little bit of Berayon's selfishness mixed in the request for a demonstration of defensive magic.

Rather than bothering me, it was a plan to make Morso of the Dorden Family, who supported him, shine more.

Morso was currently in Class B and had a much lower grade than his classmates in Class A. However, if he demonstrated superior magic in a mock battle against a Class S student, his position would certainly improve.

It was likely that he would be promoted to Class A.

"Both of you go up to the podium."

"Yes."

Stella Academy encouraged competition between students for the sake of gaining practical experience, under the premise that safety equipment were worn.

At one end of the long, straight class podium, I stood proudly.

As soon as he came, Morso stood on the other side.

"Show no mercy! Crush him!"

The boy standing next to Yuslek shouted. It was Raiden who was harshly beaten by me during the Dungeon Training.

'Narrow-minded.'

Raiden was gritting his teeth, making it clear that he still could not admit his previous defeat. Morso glanced at Raiden, then grinned as he gazed at me with a triumphant look on his face.

"Of course. Just you wait."

He knew that I was a difficult opponent. Not only did I play with Raiden and his gang during the Dungeon Training, but I also won a duel against Hong Bi-Yeon after that.

All that, however, was thanks to Flash. As such, he would be able to defeat me in this demonstration, as the attacker and the defender changed on a turn-by-turn basis, rendering Flash useless.

'Let him be publicly humiliated.'

The students approached the podium, gathered around both contenders, and started chatting.

"Will Morso win? Although the demonstration revolves around defence, he learned a powerful earth-attribute attack magic skill."

"I think it will be difficult to resist Morso's attack…"

"Baek Yu-Seol doesn't even wear a magic shield, so how is he going to block it?"

As Berayon raised his hand, the students' chatter stopped.

"I don't know who goes first, get ready."

Morso and I drew our staffs and aimed them at each other.

"Initiate."

As soon as the command was issued, Morso revealed his teeth and smiled, creating a brown magic circle in the air. Some students who saw it widened their eyes.

It was an implicit rule to use low-level Class 1 magic skill because it was a friendly combat, but he used the Dorden family's Class 2 magic skill, which had strong destructive power!

"Dorden Stone Meteors!"

A brown light flashed from Morso's staff and piercing stone rose from the floor, gathered in the air until reaching the size of a human's head, and then rushed towards me.

Even though the training uniform included a Class 1 magic barrier, the magic skill conjured by Morso was powerful enough to be dangerous for a student who did not know how to use defensive magic properly.

If the students' confrontation became too heated, the instructor would have to intervene. However, Berayon was watching the duel without showing any intention of doing so.

Awesome!

Fortunately, it did not matter if the instructor did not intervene.

Swish! I drew my wand diagonally in a relaxed motion.

Then, there was silence, as if nothing had happened.

Morso's magic skill had vanished into thin air.

Complete extinction. "Uh, huh?"

"What just happened?"

"The magic skill disappeared…?"

The students began to gossip after the sudden disappearance of magic. However, Morso, who performed the magic, as well as some high-level students and the instructor noticed it right away.

Morso's magic skill was properly activated. It was just that I destroyed it.

But, that was all they could grasp, and no one present could understand the principle behind it. It was the same with Instructor Berayon.

'What…? What just happened?'

The principle was simple.

Just as there must be an electric wire in all electrical appliances, there must be a mana bond in all magic skills. If that was cut, the magic skill would vanish.

The skill, which was not easy to master in game, posed a greater challenge in real life.

Just perceiving flying magic attacks was difficult with human eyesight, but for the skill to work, even the invisible bond of mana had to be severed precisely.

'I'm still only able to nullify Class 1 to Class 3 magic skill at most…'

It was the result of several days of Pitching Machine Training..

"Wow…."

Morso clenched his teeth and raised his staff again. Three stones appeared out of thin air.

It was then that Instructor Berayon and other students realised how I defended myself.

A white beam of light emanated from the tip of my wand. It was a top-notch intangible magic sword that some wealthy people who had no knowledge of offensive attack, carried for self-defence.

'Is the power of the intangible sword really as weak as it seems…?'

Instructor Berayon, who had seen the intangible sword, had his doubts, but he was soon forced to put it aside.

The moment the stones touched the magic sword, they all disappeared.

It did not require much movement. With the terrifying speed of those stones, it was impossible to consecutively block them by striking it like any baseball player.

The important thing was minimal movement.

I slightly shook the sword to defend my left shoulder, then with a snap of my wrist, the sword danced across my right thigh, engaging the second stone, and then I rotated on my own axis like a fan to block the stone that was flying at my head.

It was an efficient movement learned while being hit by the Pitching machine's Step 5.

'Isn't this pretty cool?'

If it was powerful magic skill, I would not be able to stop it like that, but for Class 2, it was enough.

While I was satisfied with my swordsmanship, Berayon broke out in a cold sweat and analysed his defensive skill.

'If Morso loses here, I am going to have a headache too…!'

Instructor Berayon, who was racking his brains for a way out, came up with a brilliant idea.

'Yeah, he's a little unique, but anyway, he has his weaknesses.'

So he deliberately gave a exaggerated round of applause in the middle of a battle with its real aim being to draw attention. Then he praised me.

"As rumoured, your magic attainments are great and I admit that your defensive skills are worthwhile. But…"

He glanced at Morso.

"At the end of the day, that defence technique has its limits, because it only nullifies the attacks one by one… What are you going to do if there are a large number of attacks?"

In other words, Berayon hinted Morso to attack with numbers, a method that took advantage of my inability to slash at multiple incoming projectiles at once.

Morso, hearing his words, pointed his staff towards the sky. The brown rhombus-shaped magic circle started rotating, gradually being overwhelmed with formulas after formulas.

The stones that rose from the floor were slowly clumped together to form eleven stone projectiles, but each was much smaller in size than before.

As an offensive magic that attacked multiple people by reducing its power, it was not suitable to be used on a single target, but it seemed to be the perfect magic skill to suppress me.

"Come on, wait. Isn't that too much?"

"There are so many..."

Morso had gone too far. Obviously, the magic skill he used was at a higher level than that of a mage who was in the first year of high school. This meant that it should not be used in the first-year friendly battle.

Despite knowing that fact, Instructor Berayon chose to turn a blind eye.

"Stone Meteors!"

At his shout, pieces of stones fell down from the sky one after another…

Chii!

… And were annihilated once more.

I had defended my body by rotating the sword like a windmill.

"What, what?"

"How…."

Chak! I, who held the intangible sword straight again, was sweating a little.

When I looked at the martial arts techniques, I saw a description which mentioned rotating the sword to block a swarm of flying arrows, but I had no idea how to actually do that.

This technique, known as 'Fanning,' had been extensively practised while defending against the Pitching Machine.

The disadvantage of Fanning was that it required several times more mental strength to keep Argento in shape, as well as a lot of breathing at once.

Furthermore, its defence was weaker compared to other skills which blocked single yet powerful magic attacks, so if Morso had been able to channel more mana there, the sword might have been unable to defend me.

"Oh…!"

"Wow, wow."

"It almost looks like Magic Shield...?"

Eventually, the students exclaimed.

It was a surprising technique no one had ever seen in textbooks. How many people in the world could perform such stunts with only a sword?

"Crazy..."

"I've never seen anything like that."

"Is there any magic skill like that? What special family are you from?"

"No. That's a sword in the first place."

In the midst of the uproar, someone stepped out when Berayon still did not stop the fight.

"Instructor."

At those words the students moved away, paving the way for the voice's owner.

Prince Jeremy Skalben. He, who had been quietly observing the situation from the back, stood up.

Examining his smiling face, Berayon, as well as Morso's complexion, became pale.

"Yeah, yes. Tell me."

"Why didn't you stop the fight?"

His words 'why?' seemed to have several meanings.

The magic skill used by Morso was not suitable for a first-year battle; his opponent could have been seriously injured if he made a mistake. It seemed that victory or defeat had already been decided, and so on.

Berayon then slowly looked around the students.

The eyes of all the students were cold and sunken.

It was over. The Instructor had an intuition that his career had ended there. Having provoked Prince Jeremy, he knew there was no way out.

His hands and feet trembled, and cold sweat was dripping down his cheeks, but he somehow parted his lips.

"Now it's Baek Yu-Seol's turn to attack…"

In that way, the initiative fell on me.

Although Flash could not be used, the other side could only use Magic Shield anyway. As I, who approached with a leisurely walk, swung my sword once, Morso's magic shield was shattered to pieces.

The friendly battle ended with me aiming the intangible sword at my opponent's neck.

Berayon started seeing red, and the words he had to say got stuck in his throat.

Prince Jeremy was watching. That fact alone made him feel a painful pressure all over his body as if he was shackled.

However, he had to admit reality,

He was forced to spit out words he never wanted to say.

"… Baek Yu-Seol, Victory."