The School Nurse Appears (4)

"Then — begin the spar!"

The instant Professor Kim Jin-hyeok's signal rang out, Han Seo-yul charged straight at me.

Thump.

A faint heartbeat registered in my chest. It meant Combat Sense was answering this opponent, however slightly.

"Hyaaah!"

Han Seo-yul was fast, as befitting the top-ranked second-year. But he could not keep up with my eyes.

Insight.

I caught the horizontal slash aimed at my ribs with Cotton Guard and, in the same breath, detonated a small burst of flame right in front of his face.

"Ugh!"

Fwoosh!

Han Seo-yul leaped backward. Not a bad call — except a magic circle was already waiting behind him.

Blaze.

"...?!"

A searing torrent of fire swallowed him whole. Scorched from head to toe by the inferno that had erupted at his back, he poured mana into his sword and carved a great slash through the flames, snuffing them out.

I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠gave him no room to breathe. I pressed the assault.

Fwoooosh—!

I read his movements and fired a burst of flame every time he changed direction. Han Seo-yul defended calmly against the fire crashing in from front and rear, but he was being driven steadily backward. Eventually, deciding that staying on the defensive would get him nowhere, he tanked a portion of my magic and forced his way through to me.

Not bad.

He was strong even by cadet standards. So why was he an extra?

A sword came screaming toward my shoulder with terrifying force. I triggered Acceleration, spun my body to slip past the blade, and in the same instant formed a Force spell that slammed into the opening at his side.

"Guh!"

Of course, the fact that Combat Sense hadn't fully awakened meant he was still far below my level — though to be fair, my base stats already sat well above a cadet's.

Han Seo-yul backflipped away, then used the sword-copying ability he'd shown earlier to hurl four blades at me. His all-out throw died against my Cotton Guard, utterly powerless.

Time to wrap this up. I still had seven more opponents waiting. I couldn't afford to waste another second.

Woom!

I summoned orbs of flame in every direction. Dozens of fireballs, each one packed with an enormous concentration of mana. In a matter of seconds the sparring arena was drowning in magic, and Han Seo-yul let out a long, weary sigh.

"That's Double Casting, right? Ha... my self-esteem is taking a real beating here."

He gave a hollow laugh, as if he couldn't quite believe what he was looking at.

"You're too kind, senior. You're strong yourself."

Han Seo-yul really was strong for an extra. It was almost strange that someone like him had never once shown his face in the game. Of course, the answer was obvious: he was a guy. What room was there for men in an eroge?

"Gee, thanks. I'm done. Professor, I forfeit."

He surrendered the moment he saw those fireballs. I'd actually put some effort into this, trying to give a senior his due. What a waste.

"These are a shame to throw away. I couldn't reuse them in the next match, could I?"

"Not a chance."

Professor Kim Jin-hyeok shot down my nonsense without missing a beat.

"...Hey. Was he always that strong?"

"Well, he was strong, yeah... he wrecked Kim Ho-jin, remember?"

"I mean, sure, but... they said that's Double Casting. Is that even a technique a cadet can learn?"

"Hell if I know."

The cadets watching the top-tier spars stood with their mouths hanging open, staring at Lee Ho-yeon. The lower-ranked students had no interest in the lower brackets unless it was their own turn. People liked to say that watching small fry slug it out was the most fun — but that only held at a certain level. A professional league was always more entertaining than an amateur one. That was why more than a hundred cadets had packed themselves around the highest-ranked sparring arena.

"Whoa. That's his sixth opponent by himself."

"He's actually insane.... Wait, did you get video?"

"Obviously, dumbass. Upload a Lee Ho-yeon clip to Everyday and you're guaranteed a hundred upvotes minimum."

"Shit. I need to start recording."

Among the cadets, the controversy over Lee Ho-yeon's skill had already evaporated. When a first-year was swatting seniors out of the air like mosquitoes right in front of you, there wasn't much left to argue about. On top of that he was hurling spectacular magic in every direction and moving like a blur, so they watched the spars the way you'd watch a genuinely good show.

The professors, however, were another matter.

When Nam Da-eun and Elise had taken the floor, the faculty had been lavish with their praise.

"Wow. This year's first-years are the real deal."

"Right? Shouldn't we give them a name? How about the 'Golden Generation'?"

"Not bad~."

"Miss Elise's mana control is just beautiful."

"Her swordsmanship looks like it's already reached a true stage. She's far better than I expected."

And then they watched Lee Ho-yeon spar, and every mouth in the group closed.

"...Tell me I'm seeing this wrong."

The middle-aged man who had held a professorship at Victoria Academy longer than anyone else muttered under his breath.

"...The Class A students are all terrifying, every last one of them."

"Terrifying? That's not even the problem."

A female professor shot back, incredulous.

"No kidding. Forget the hype — this kid is the genuine article. A once-in-a-generation talent."

Even among the faculty, there had been professors who believed Lee Ho-yeon was nothing more than academy publicity. The older they were, and the longer they had served, the more stubbornly they clung to that view. They were the type who refused to believe anything they had not seen with their own eyes. And since even an academy professor was not in a position to receive briefings directly from the chairman or the dean, they had naturally assumed the whole thing was advertising. They had never openly denounced Lee Ho-yeon, which was one reason Kim Jin-hyeok had never bothered trying to convince them.

"I think the overrated theory is about to die completely... or no — won't it just get even louder?"

"The videos are already spreading. The second the guild scouts see this, it's over."

One of the professors was scrolling through Everyday on his smartwatch. A video of Lee Ho-yeon was already sitting at the very top of the feed.

"Magic circles deployed at an impossible speed, Double Casting, and virtually no gap between spells... he's the complete package. The ultimate combat mage."

"He clearly has a physical enhancement skill as well. There are moments where his reaction speed spikes."

"At this level... isn't that an Awakening?"

Awakening. The process by which an ability-user shattered their own limits and stepped into the next stage. Whether a hunter reached that threshold or not completely changed how the world treated them. The vast majority of active hunters never arrived there. It was that difficult a realm to touch.

"Of course ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it is. Nothing else explains this."

"I don't even want to think about how big the fallout is going to be... it makes my teeth chatter."

The professors, naturally, concluded that Lee Ho-yeon had already reached that stage. One of the male faculty members sighed and knocked back his coffee.

"I want nothing to do with it. Leave it all to Professor Kim Jin-hyeok. He's the homeroom teacher."

"...Fair enough."

While they were still talking, Lee Ho-yeon defeated every second-year down through seventh place. The way he kept switching to different magic made it look less like a spar and more like he was testing the extent of his own ability. He was operating on an entirely different level from the other cadets.

"For this midterm... we might as well print the first-place pamphlet in advance."

"..."

The faculty's opinion of Lee Ho-yeon had reversed one hundred and eighty degrees, and now they were worrying about the storm he was about to drag in with him.

"That's my darling...!"

"Pardon? Saint, what did you just say?"

"Ah. Nothing!"

Baek A-young had been watching the arena with rapt attention. She promptly dropped her head and stared at the floor.

A squat little figure climbed into the roaring arena.

"Hello, Senior Yoon Hyun-gyu."

"Y-you... what the hell are you?"

Yoon Hyun-gyu had been shoved up onto the floor. The greasy little smile he'd worn in the student council meeting room was nowhere to be found; his face was tight with nerves.

"I heard you had quite the pride, so this junior came to experience your magnificent magic firsthand. I look forward to it."

"You... you son of a—!"

Yoon Hyun-gyu couldn't hide his fluster. His hands trembled.

"Surely you aren't going to forfeit without even fighting a junior who just took down seven people and must be running on empty, right? Mana and stamina all spent?"

I grinned at him, needling every word.

"Who said anything about forfeiting? Come on!"

The pint-sized senior flooded his body with mana. A mage — and a fire-attribute one, same as me.

Do I unveil the other elements here?

There were plenty of eyes, and it wasn't a bad stage on which to reveal my strength. If I showed them I could command every attribute, the shockwave would be enormous.

No. There's a bigger stage waiting.

The midterms, and the festival. One of the two would give me the opening I wanted. If I was going to stand in the spotlight, I might as well take the biggest one available. Besides, there was no reason to show my hand against someone I could crush with the same attribute alone.

"If you're ready — begin!"

The moment Professor Kim Jin-hyeok gave the signal, Yoon Hyun-gyu drew a magic circle. A fireball. Simple, fast, and powerful — the bread and butter of any fire mage.

Fwoom!

A sphere of roaring flame took shape and spat fire.

"Don't you dare look down on me!"

Five fireballs streaked toward me. I swatted them aside with a light Cotton Guard.

"You're far too slow, senior. This is how you use a fireball."

Fwoosh—

Fwoosh—

Two fireballs began generating endlessly around my body. One. Two. Three. Four. Five... twenty-four fireballs blanketed the arena in three seconds. Yoon Hyun-gyu had taken more than five seconds to produce five. It wasn't even a comparison.

"Do try to block them properly. It wouldn't be any fun if this ended in a single volley."

KABOOM!!

I dumped all twenty-four fireballs on him at once. Realizing there was nowhere to run, Yoon Hyun-gyu threw up a barrier in front of himself. A Wall of Fire — a shield woven from the fire attribute, and therefore highly resistant to flame. The judgment itself was sound.

But.

Fwoom—!

My fireballs tore through his shield as if it were paper.

"Aaaagh!"

The instant the orbs ripped the barrier apart, I yanked chains of flame up from the floor and snared his ankles. Yoon Hyun-gyu went down with a heavy thud, and a fireball grazed over his head.

"A fire-attribute shield got punched through by fireballs?"

"That's how big the gap in skill is. Between Lee Ho-yeon and that senior."

"Ah... yeah, he never did look like a fighter. Theory type, maybe?"

Sneers and laughter drifted up from the cadets below the arena. Yoon Hyun-gyu's face went scarlet. He tore free of my flame chains and lurched to his feet.

"You... you... I am not letting this go...! You think you can mess with me? I'll show you what happens when you pick a fight with the Vice President!"

"Yes, yes. Just don't forfeit on me."

Yoon Hyun-gyu, seething, started hurling magic. I snorted and began dismantling his spells one by one.

"H-how..."

"Just admit it already, senior. You're pathetically weak."

"I-I'm a second-year! There's no reason I should lose to a first-year freshman!"

Every spell he had was stripped apart. I walked slowly toward Yoon Hyun-gyu as he stood there denying reality.

"Just keep licking the Vice President's ass and stay in your lane. Don't go picking fights you can't win."

"Gah!"

I kicked him in the shin with the tip of a mana-wrapped foot, left him crumpled on the floor, and turned my back.

"I forfeit."

"...That's not an appropriate way to use a forfeit."

Professor Kim Jin-hyeok was looking at me with a distinctly sour expression. Give every spar your all — that seemed to be the idea.

Nam Da-eun and Elise forfeited just as casually a little while ago, Professor...

Maybe Kim Jin-hyeok played favorites ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠with pretty girls because he was a man. Fortunately, I had a perfectly good excuse ready.

"Professor, I've done too many spars. My head is killing me. I think I need to rest in the infirmary."

"You look like you're in the best condition I've seen you in lately."

"...I'm not. You can even ask the school nurse."

"Hah. Nurse Baek A-young is not so idle that she has time to play along with your—"

A clear, ringing voice cut Kim Jin-hyeok off and filled the auditorium.

"Cadet Lee Ho-yeon!!! What's wrong??!!"

Baek A-young, who had at some point been watching the spars from among the professors, came rushing up onto the arena floor and immediately began assessing my condition.

"He's clearly not well. He needs rest, Professor Kim Jin-hyeok."

"...Is that true? He looked perfectly fine to me..."

"I'm certain. Are you questioning my eyes?"

Baek A-young stared Kim Jin-hyeok down, her eyes wide.

There wasn't an active hunter alive who didn't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠know that line.

"...My apologies. Please take him at once."

"Cadet Ho-yeon. Can you walk on your own? Shall I help you?"

"...Yes. Please support me. Thank you."

They were looking at those perverted eyes and nobody suspected a thing?

Someone really needed to shatter the Saint image and face reality — but the reputation Baek A-young had built as the Saint was truly unshakable.

"Whoa. She just got appointed and she's already checking the injured... that's actually crazy..."

"That's why they call her the Saint. I'm becoming a fan starting today."

Even those lust-drunk eyes were being read as the gaze of someone burning herself out to heal others. Impressive, in its own way.

"You're all blind."

"Cadet Lee Ho-yeon. Your wounds might reopen, so you mustn't talk."

"I never even had a wou—"

"Shh!"

"...Yes, yes. Understood."

And so Baek A-young and I slipped out of the auditorium.