The Magician's Forest (4)
A massive explosion erupted, but thankfully the shockwave that reached Rone and me was negligible.
When I opened my eyes, wondering what on earth had happened, a familiar-looking silhouette caught my attention.
A man with blazing red hair, and a girl with light green locks.
If my eyes weren't deceiving me, they were unmistakably the two people we'd crossed paths with in the carriage earlier.
"You two all right?"
Keeping the partisan in his hand trained on the enemy, the man turned only his head, sharp rebuke spilling from his lips.
Once I got a proper look at his face, it was the face I'd expected—Aldric Billmeier, the Class C cadet who had handed me motion-sickness medicine back in the carriage. I hadn't imagined he'd actually fight his way here, even through the rampaging spirits.
"I blocked as much as I could, but I guess it wasn't enough... I'm sorry."
The woman who turned next, despite having just saved us, was the one apologizing instead, her face full of fretful anxiety. It was Enya Sistina—the same girl who'd explained the Magician's Forest to Professor Wilhelm in such a confident, ringing voice.
So those two were a team.
They hadn't made much of an impression on me before, but meeting them in the middle of a crisis, their faces felt strangely welcome. Come to think of it, was this our reward for saving those students back there? Apparently it pays to be a decent person.
"More importantly, who are those people? Going by their clothes, they're definitely not students."
"They're enemies. That's the most accurate answer I can give you."
I didn't have the luxury of launching into an explanation about the Followers' remnants, so I kept my reply short. Aldric's eyes narrowed, and he nodded as if he understood. I appreciated that he wasn't the type to keep digging for details.
"Rone—the Blessing of Astesia?"
"Y-yeah. Here."
I asked her where the flower was. Rone was still wearing a dazed expression, the shock apparently not yet worn off, but at my question she carefully drew the platinum flower out from her clothes and showed it to me. Thankfully, it seemed she'd grabbed it during the very moment I'd hesitated. One less thing to worry about.
If only the Spirit King's Touch had survived intact down here.
Whether from the force of that explosion or something else, the blue stone had shattered into pieces and was now scattered across the ground. Losing our last means of escape stung. Even granting that these two had theirs in working order, only two people could actually travel with each stone. Which meant either we settled things here, or someone had to act as bait. It wasn't as if our enemies would let all four of us slip away at once. Even if Bartel was already out of the fight, the other one was the real problem.
I'd suspected as much from the moment I first saw that gloomy, green-hued robe—and if my hunch was right, it was definitely him.
【Puppeteer】 Sirius. So that bastard shows up at this point in time.
In the original story, he was the very man who killed Arden's father, and like Bartel, a member of the Followers. He was always draped in that unsettling robe, never showing his face—a character designed that way—and true to his alias, he wielded a unique magic that controlled and manipulated whatever he pleased. What's more, his skill clearly surpassed even Bartel's. Honestly, he was an enemy I had no desire to face at this stage of the story.
But what choice did I have?
Fwoosh.
I fight.
I pulled my sword from the ground and settled into my stance. We had our own cards to play, after all. In the original story, Professor Wilhelm, having detected the anomaly among the spirits, entered the forest to investigate and ended up finding Arden there. All we had to do was hold out until then, and victory would be ours.
"You're planning to fight?"
"There's no running away anyway. You saw that magic earlier."
I shrugged at Aldric, who'd questioned me as I readied myself. If they could throw around magic on that scale so freely, then running or not running hardly mattered—they might wipe us out along with the entire forest without breaking a sweat. It was far better to press in hard here and deny them the chance to cast at all. And when it came to numbers, we had the advantage. With two mages supporting us, buying time seemed entirely possible.
"...Fair point."
Aldric nodded, looking like he'd accepted my reasoning. He was doing his best to keep his expression composed, but I saw it—the faint tremor running along the edge of his partisan. He was scared. Of course he was. The gap between us and the enemy was impossible to miss, felt straight through the skin. Sirius's mana alone pressed down on us like a physical weight.
"What about you two? You could still run."
I threw the final question at the pair who, unlike us, still had an intact Spirit King's Touch. The answers that came back were resolute.
"Run, my ass. Even four of us can barely hold on—how are you two supposed to manage alone?"
"Exactly. If we'd planned to run, we'd have just walked right past you."
Hard to trust words spoken while both legs were shaking like leaves, but the sentiment alone was worth plenty.
"Rone. Aldric and I will press in—you just back us up. If things go south, take the flower and get the two of you out of here."
"...I'm not running. I refuse to be saved by you twice."
Perhaps memories of the past had surfaced and stirred her emotions—Rone wiped her tears and steeled her resolve. Whatever the reason, her determination to fight alongside us to the end was admirable. In that case, there was no reason to hesitate.
Hwooing.
Just as I reset my stance and was about to charge at Sirius, a faint breeze stirred beneath my feet. Aldric had felt it too—his eyes went round as saucers as he stared down at the ground. The source, of course, was Enya.
"It's only Tier 2 wind magic... but it's better than nothing."
Excellent—a Wind Blessing. I could definitely feel my body grow lighter. Add Rone's fire support on top of that, and this might actually be more manageable than I'd thought.
Slither.
Barely had the thought crossed my mind before the forest surrounding us warped grotesquely, and the weeds carpeting the ground began to rise, sharpened into jagged points. Beyond them stood Sirius, one hand raised, eyes burning beneath the shadow of his hood.
Dammit. So that's why they call him the Puppeteer.
Fine, high-ranking mages are proficient in most magic outside their signature spells—but wasn't this a bit much? At this point you'd call him a druid rather than a mage.
"You. Go back ahead. I'll bring the Blessing of Astesia back myself."
"...Tch. Fine."
Having lightly rearranged the surrounding terrain, Sirius issued his order to Bartel, who had only just finished staunching his wounds. The man glared up at Sirius for a moment with rebellious eyes, but quickly registered his own blunder, clicked his tongue, and vanished from the spot. Only then did Sirius release his mana all the more ferociously, as if a nuisance had finally been removed from his concern.
Crackle-crack.
The risen flora answered his call, glaring at us with the savage menace of wild beasts. Then came Sirius's warning-laced voice.
"Hand over the flower and flee, and I'll spare your lives."
Words offered as if granting us one final chance. In response, I raised a middle finger and answered him with a sneer.
"What a load of crap."
Hidden as it was beneath the hood, I couldn't see it clearly—but I could have sworn Sirius's brow twitched, just slightly, at my blatant provocation.
"Then there's no need to hold back, I take it."
His signature voice followed—cold, stripped of all emotion. And with a sharp hiss, the vegetation that had been writhing like tentacles came surging toward the two of us at the vanguard.
KUWUNG!
I flung myself aside, dodged it cleanly, and drove straight into sword range. Sirius had always been hopelessly weak at close combat compared to other mages, even in the original story. That was the one weakness worth exploiting.
Aldric's movements and mine clicked into place like two halves of a whole, closing the distance from both flanks at once. The reach of his partisan was longer than my blade, so Aldric entered striking range first and swung it viciously—but a fresh wall of underbrush erupting from the earth blocked the blow.
The attack had been swatted away like a soap bubble, yet it accomplished exactly what it needed to. For the briefest of instants, the enemy's gaze had turned toward Aldric.
I didn't let that opening slip.
I called Professor Seras's movements back to mind—those I'd witnessed before—and embodied them. I erased my own presence from his field of vision. I slipped into his subconscious and moved my feet. A footwork closer to an assassin's than a swordsman's. This was the signature body-work that defined Seras herself. It was still rough and unrefined; after eating one hit from it, she'd never fallen for it again. Which was another way of saying that against this man, there was a chance it might land at least once.
Holding that conviction, I pushed off the ground harder still.
Suuik.
At last, Sirius's head turned, and his eyes locked onto me. But he made no motion—no raising of his hand, nothing. I hadn't even concealed myself, and yet it was as if I simply didn't register in his vision at all.
"......!"
Only when the blade was nearly at his throat did Sirius's eyes fly wide open. His reaction was quicker than I'd expected, but at this distance, my sword would reach. Without stopping, I drove the thrust deeper.
PUK!
The instant the blade bit into flesh, I heard a faint tick against the tip of my sword. Somehow he'd twisted his body even through that, which was why it sank into his shoulder rather than his head. The moment I confirmed it, I let my center of gravity pitch forward and launched myself like an arrow loosed from a bowstring.
Sswsuk.
Skating along on top of the underbrush, I put my full weight behind the blade buried in his shoulder. I might not kill him—but if I could sever just one of his arms like this. At the very least, if I could slam this bastard's body into that towering tree trunk behind him—
"Kgh...!"
A pained groan escaped Sirius's lips. The same trick wouldn't work twice. Even if I couldn't finish him here, I only needed to deal damage close enough to knock him out of the fight.
Just as my blade, laden with that hope, was about to reach the tree trunk I'd aimed for—
CRACK!
"!?"
A bolt of lightning poured down from somewhere and crashed over me. Thanks to the fact that I'd wrenched my sword free and thrown myself backward, I somehow evaded it, but the impact left the sleeve of my right arm scorched. Lightning-type magic? No—if that were the case, there'd been no opening for him to cast anything. Swallowed by the question, I lifted my head to find the source of the lightning.
There, crackling with electricity from head to toe, stood a medium lightning spirit, guarding Sirius's side like a devoted sentinel.
"...Son of a bitch."
As the true nature of Sirius's innate magic dawned on me, the curse burst out of me on reflex. In a certain sense, I was now facing a creature far less pleasant to deal with than Sirius himself.