Illusions Visible to All (2)

Karalin leaped into the sky in an instant, slamming her black blade—scabbard and all—down onto the steel hawk. The creature shattered like a cookie, snapping apart with a loud crunch. Whether it was the wielder or the master, that monstrous strength was unbelievable.

“...Miss, where does all that power even come from?!”

“Focus, Jurchen!”

It was a force no one could have imagined coming from her slender frame. Even though Jurchen was busy holding back the iron hawks, he had been so stunned that he earned a scolding from the lady. On the ground, she usually restrained herself from using her frost aura to avoid collateral damage to her surroundings. But here in the open sky, where the only targets were steel hawks, there was no need for such restraint.

Karalin’s blue eyes glowed in midair as she unleashed a surge of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠pure white mana. A ferocious blizzard exploded outward in every direction. The sky was swallowed by a snowstorm. The snowflakes swirled like razor-sharp blades. The steel hawks soaring through the heavens were struck by the flakes, losing direction in an instant. They twisted and spun before the impact overwhelmed them, tearing their bodies apart.

With a heavy patter, the steel hawks rained down from the sky like iron hail.

A flash of light—

“...Go, my spirits!”

Finally snapping out of his daze and grasping the situation, Cryan sent his souls toward the spot where the lady was falling, creating a simple cushion to catch her. Karalin landed upon it with graceful dignity, as if stepping onto a prepared seat.

But the surviving steel hawks, enraged as if they had lost comrades, immediately charged at her the moment she touched the ground.

“Who said you could—”

However, Jurchen, who had been ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠watching from the side, grabbed them with both arms and hurled them away. The few that slipped past him—

“M-Miss!”

Eclipse read the incantation and burst forward at a speed completely unlike her usual sluggish self, eliminating them. Her flames traced arcs across the sky, colliding with the remnants of Karalin’s blizzard and erupting into massive clouds of steam. The steel hawks struck directly by the fire simply melted away.

Yet even as everyone moved in perfect coordination during the battle… for some reason, the area around them was still swarming with steel hawks. They had no way of knowing, but it was because the true culprit behind these minions—the Iron Giant—was nearby.

Vankite was close to her.

Even without knowing that, they weren’t blind. They could naturally sense that the situation was gradually turning hopeless.

“...This won’t do!”

Deciding they couldn’t afford to waste any more time, Cryan shouted in a voice so loud it was hard to believe it came from his throat.

“Miss, and the rest of you! Mount the horses we brought!”

“Time to tuck tail and run, huh!” Jurchen responded eagerly, as if he had been waiting for those words, even while getting pummeled.

“That’s right, Jurchen. You might survive by curling up, but we’re wearing human skin. We won’t last!”

“If I don’t polymorph, it stings pretty bad for me too, you know?”

“The problem is that for us it doesn’t just end with stinging, you idiot!”

But there was no time for banter. Escape was urgent.

“H-Horses, you say…! Alright. Let’s abandon the luggage. Getting out of here is the top priority…!”

At Eclipse’s cry, Karalin spoke to Cryan, who was busily deploying his souls beside her.

“...Those things. For birds, they aren’t actually that fast.”

“I agree, Miss… It must be because their bodies are made of iron. Still, they’re faster than a human on foot, but if we mount the horses, we should be able to shake them off.”

“In that case, the answer is the forest.”

“...A reasonable choice. We need obstacles.”

“In open space, it would be total annihilation. Their main stage is where we cannot move freely.”

They moved quickly, mounting the horses and disappearing into the dense forest nearby.

Clop— clop—.

The sound of hooves racing to save their lives thundered like a storm.

As payment for using the students as bait, I would pour every ounce of my strength into the one thing I could do: saving people. It was the will I had expressed to Hilken, and more honestly, it was the right and upright way to prevent the “passionate and heated” situation Vankite desired.

The reason I was doing this was simple. Wasn’t he just enjoying the sight of the students desperately struggling? So, in opposition, I would gift them salvation. To a bastard who only ever did despicable things from start to finish, it was only natural that I wouldn’t let him have his way from beginning to end.

Of course, to do that, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I had to stay out of his sight.

Strangely enough, I still didn’t understand why I was so famous… but the moment I opened my mouth, the Sigmund students would recognize me. If I showed myself in front of the sharp-eyed Vankite, I would be caught immediately.

But that much was easy to handle.

From the moment Vankite summoned the Iron Giant, he was surely circling around the lady, waiting for any chance to approach her.

And Yagnus would be the same. Vankite has a paranoid obsession with his own safety, so even if Yagnus wanted to act separately, he would keep him close. That’s how it was in the original story.

Therefore, if I could locate the lady, I could pinpoint the positions of both Vankite and Yagnus.

With that in mind, I had attached a kind of tracker to the lady. Its true identity was the sword I had been using. Of course, I hadn’t had time to add any special devices, so it wasn’t anything like that… I had simply used the ability I already possessed: Burga.

That girl was practically a sommelier when it came to iron. If it was a familiar scent, she could detect it from an incredible distance.

So I had ordered her to track the scent of the familiar sword I had used.

And sure enough, she was navigating perfectly.

“Don’t use imperial units, it pisses me off.”

“Accurate. I like it.”

If she kept locating the sword like this, I simply had to avoid that area and intercept the iron beasts. Since I had already cut off their supply route, the iron beasts wouldn’t be produced endlessly as Vankite and Yagnus hoped. Even if there seemed to be many now, if I kept intercepting them, the numbers would eventually run dry.

“Hoo… Did I finish them all…?”

Once again, I had just saved a group of students who were fleeing in tattered condition at a snail’s pace. And among those I rescued, I spotted a rather familiar face.

“Bysang and Lumein must have escaped safely.”

Bysang. And Lumein. In the original story, they were fixed party members who, in most routes, would have become close friends with Eclipse and overcome the field training together. I had never seen them desperately fleeing from birds after losing their party… but that was surely because of the snowball effect caused by my interference, leading them to an unplanned fate.

So I saved them. They still couldn’t die yet.

And if Lumein died—even if Bysang didn’t—Jurchen would be furious.

The reason Jurchen had come to the academy, as far as I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠remembered, wasn’t just for the degree. It was because of his childhood friend from back home—Lumein. She was the woman who shook the walls around his heart and the beautiful elf who stimulated his pure feelings.

In the original story, when the male Eclipse did the BSS route, his reaction was insane. He immediately left the party and followed her from beginning to end like Vankite, turning the surroundings into a complete mess.

And unlike Vankite, he did it openly and shamelessly. In that sense, Lumein was the heroine with the highest capture difficulty. Of course, I had zero interest in doing anything that troublesome, and I didn’t want to trample on someone else’s pure heart, so I never did… but that was how it was.

Saving them was enough. I had no intention of touching them or getting involved anyway.

Vroooom—!!

As I soared back into the sky, I saw Hilken in the distance, diligently rescuing students. Of course, at this range it would normally require a telescope… but the Celestial Magic she used unfolded across the heavens. Unless someone was as blind as Bysang, anyone with eyes could see it.

Shwooo—!!

Riding her dragon, she fired several arrows into the air. The sky glowed, and from the direction she had shot, the constellation of Leo shone brightly.

Flash—!

Rumble—!!!

Sudden lightning bolts struck from the sky, reflecting and multiplying across the surfaces of countless steel hawks. In an instant, dozens of them plummeted to the ground.

“Kid, you’re making it worth saving you.”

Her aggro was lethal. In fact, I had deliberately asked her to fight in such a conspicuous way. Unlike my relatively quiet abilities, Hilken’s Celestial Magic created all kinds of chaos. If she kept spamming it like that, even Vankite couldn’t ignore it. As long as she did this, all the aggro would be drawn to her side, and he would inevitably pay less attention to where I was.

The so-called “darkness under the lamp” strategy.

Grrrr—.

Jabberwock shook his mane as if he wanted to fight so stylishly beside his comrades too.

“Just a little longer. Wait a bit more, Jabberwock. Your stage is somewhere else.”

I flatly rejected his enthusiasm. Just a little longer. In just a little while, I would ride the wind to meet the lady. There would be plenty of time to rampage then. Not now.

So I pulled Jabberwock’s reins downward once more, dropping into a backflip descent toward the ground to rescue more students from the shadows.

The powerful gravity pressing down on my entire body. Ah… the more I rode him, the more I liked it.

“Lady Gremory! It appears the gamekeeper is still alive─!!”

“That’s a relief. We’ve identified the source of that lightning we just saw!”

“Yes. It was an attack squadron of four dragon-mounted units, but there was only one rider on top. It must be the sole surviving gamekeeper.”

“...While that person buys us time, if we can just avoid these steel hawks and escape the hunting grounds─.”

At the next Magic Tower Master’s words, the mages under her looked troubled.

“The thing is, as you know…”

“A range-sealing formation—and an extremely large one at that? Whoever it is, they’re a powerful user of divine magic. What an annoying thing to do.”

Gremory no longer wore her usual gentle, smiling expression. She simply listened quietly to the report. As she did, she bit at her thumbnail. It was a habit of hers that appeared whenever something required her full concentration.

The moment this incident occurred that morning, she had sent out scouts to escape the training grounds, but they discovered it was impossible to go beyond a certain range. She had also received a horrifying report that the faculty responsible for the event were panicking and turning on each other. The heavy pressure of needing to keep her composure weighed down on her small shoulders.

“If we were near Karlandel, the 3rd Fortress Defense Knight Order would be there. Have we contacted them─? Of course not. No mana can escape beyond this range-sealing formation, so communication magic won’t work either.”

“But we will find a way somehow!”

“...There’s no need to look. Our own survival comes first.”

Gremory let out a sigh.

“Haa… I wonder if Cryan is doing well─.”

Even in this situation, she was worried about Cryan. He was a subordinate she had watched over for at least ten years. After he lost his parents and fell into depression, she had given him gentle guidance and treated him like a younger brother. That was why she couldn’t understand why he had abandoned her during this field training and joined another group. And now that this crisis had broken out, she couldn’t shake the feeling.

What kind of change of heart made him leave me behind and go to the other side? And to the Grand Duke’s daughter, no less… Was it because he felt sorry for her? Really, that child too─.

But Gremory pushed those thoughts deep into her heart, crumpling them up like scribbles in a notebook. What was her role right now? She was the future head of the Magic Tower. As someone in that position, protecting everyone was more important than anything else.

“...As expected, we have to gather everyone.”

At that moment, a powerful resonance of green mana surged around her.

Kwaaaa—.

Spirit resonance. A magic usable only by archmages and above. It was a resonance spell that allowed her to convey her will to those bearing the mark of the Magic Tower. As she had said, she couldn’t send messages outside the range-sealing formation, but inside it, she could do as she pleased.

So she used spirit resonance to broadcast to every mage currently within Karlandel, taking the place of the incapacitated instructors.

“……!”

“It’s a transmission.”

“...Lady Gremory!”

Everyone’s minds connected. Soon, as if in a dream, Gremory’s clear and pure voice echoed inside their heads.

She had opened a path toward safety in place of the instructors. And through the general announcement, she called for Cryan.

“Cryan… If you can hear this voice, please come. Together with the Grand Duke’s daughter you went to escort.”

Of course, Cryan, who was aiming for a much greater cause, had not the slightest intention of doing so.