Why Am I Lying Here?
The events had unfolded only thirty minutes earlier.
All the students gathered here had succeeded in entering the academy.
“The Martial Arts Department, this way please!”
So why had they all come together?
‘It was to determine the entrance scores.’
I, along with the other nobles who entered through the noble exception, hadn’t taken the usual entrance exam. That made it difficult to fairly decide the scores.
If we simply placed the high scorers in the top class or the low scorers in the bottom, it would sound unfair to the other students. So that was why we were deciding the entrance scores separately.
The academy’s slogan was “Equality for all inside the academy.”
Of course…
‘Eyes closed and then chaos.’
The level of the exceptional students, including the noble exception students, had been predetermined to some extent.
If they had exceptional talent in swordsmanship or magic, there was no reason for them to enter through the noble exception in the first place.
The same went for the other exceptional students. They were those who had achieved special feats in their field or received recommendations from people of high reputation. This side was…
‘Out of the question.’
They had already reached a high level that an ordinary student couldn’t compare to.
Therefore, this was nothing more than a demonstration duel. The scores were already fixed, and all we were doing was letting the students know “We are equal.”
In my original case, if everything had gone according to plan, I would have entered the Administration Department, watched this duel as a mere spectator, and…
‘Hah.’
Because of someone’s conspiracy, I was standing on the dueling field.
The unfamiliar feeling of the hilt in my hand gripped tightly. I had held a sword only once, roughly ten years ago. Even then, I had swung it haphazardly, so I had assumed I lacked talent with the blade and lived accordingly.
Who would have ever guessed I would meet the sword again in this way?
Standing on the dueling field, I closed my eyes briefly to the pouring gazes, then opened them and let out a long breath.
‘Damn it. It’s a one-on-one fight.’
The content about duels had already appeared in the novel, so I had known a duel would happen. I had also known it would be one-on-one. But now that the situation had actually arrived, I regretted the academy leaders who had set it up this way.
No matter what, if the Martial Arts Department top or bottom graduate appeared, my chances of winning were almost zero.
No matter how much of a bottom of the academy, someone who had never held a sword once could still not win.
The fact that my academy entrance score was at the bottom meant I had managed to secure admission to the academy among those fierce competitors.
There were about two hundred martial arts department freshmen.
Only about 1,500 applicants for the martial arts department per year.
One might think the competition rate wasn’t that high, but if you considered that only the odd-job applicants had been filtered out, it was still an overwhelming number.
After all, I was one of those odd-job applicants.
‘Still…’
One thing I hoped for was that I wanted to avoid dueling the main characters at all costs.
In the first place, getting entangled with the main characters in any way was absolutely out of the question, and among them, Selena was the most so.
If I was mercilessly crushed by Selena, it would inevitably draw her gaze toward me.
But annoyingly, this world didn’t seem to have the slightest intention of helping me out.
Tap, tap.
The noisy voices of the students cut through the bustling dueling field, suddenly bringing instant silence.
Just a few steps.
That single step of walking onto the dueling field stole the gazes, the breaths of the entire audience.
“Selena.”
“Wow, dueling the Martial Arts Department top, huh?”
“Insane.”
A mere baron’s eldest daughter.
Even though the baron’s name was unknown, the eldest daughter of this noble house shone solely as the top student among these geniuses.
Envy, jealousy, awe, respect— all mixed in the eyes. The girl calmly accepted those gazes and stepped onto the dueling field.
Her dazzling golden hair and blue eyes gleamed.
This duel was one that everyone envied. Of course, that wasn’t because she was the Martial Arts Department top.
“Truly… beautiful.”
Someone muttered that. But no one objected to it.
Anyone who saw Selena’s beauty longed to mix a word with her and a swing of the sword at least once. But that opportunity wasn’t given to just anyone.
In that sense, I…
‘Please, anyone, just take me.’
I was shedding tears of blood inside.
You’re giving me the golden opportunity I want for free?
No matter how much I screamed internally, nothing changed. I let out a small breath and looked down at the hilt gripped in my hand.
‘I have no choice.’
It meant I would lose miserably.
Of course, it was correct for me to live quietly without being noticed. In that sense, this was a stage I had to lose anyway.
In the first place, I couldn’t win.
Even if my luck was 9,999,999, my chances of winning were infinitely low.
It meant I couldn’t overcome the gap between me and Selena through good fortune or miracles.
Why was I so despondent?
Selena was basically a sincere girl about the sword.
She wasn’t the type of protagonist in a romance fantasy, but that personality itself made her draw the gazes of other male protagonists.
Not just her appearance.
Anyway, even though she was that kind of person, there was a strangely protagonist-like side in other aspects.
If I was mercilessly trampled under her feet, my remaining honor would fall to the bottom. Of course, no one would care…
Anyway, that honor that no one cared about, even I didn’t care about, only Selena would care about.
It meant that on the dueling field, mercilessly beaten and left there, and when I came down, it was inevitable that she would end up caring about me because of those things.
Such interest was out of the question.
‘For now… I’ll do my best…’
Before the sincere girl, the sword saint, I would lose anyway. If I showed a leisurely attitude, she might get angry.
So it was right to squeeze out even the little knowledge I had and swing the sword.
I let out a short breath and steadied my breathing.
Recalling the knight who had taught me and my older brother since childhood, I calmed my mind.
“Ian, second son of the Killian Viscount family.”
“Selena, eldest daughter of the Blint Baron family.”
Holding up the sword, I exchanged brief greetings.
Staring at the tip of her sword, I let out a long breath again.
Unlike her sword tip with no tremor at all, my sword was shaking as if an earthquake had struck.
The gap was already visible from the basic stance.
‘It’s heavy.’
No matter how it was a practice sword, it was made similarly to a normal longsword and had the same weight.
If I couldn’t adapt to the weight while swinging it, all the things I had learned would be completely useless.
Therefore, with no strength training at all, I could barely swing the sword properly.
It was fortunate if I didn’t get knocked down by the sword rather than swinging it.
“Begin!!”
Clenching my lower lip, I stepped forward with the start signal.
Selena looked down at me with lowered eyes and stood motionless.
She wasn’t giving me a hand because she was ignoring me. Rather, because she wasn’t ignoring me and not being complacent, she was calmly reading my moves and waiting.
‘Huff…!!’
There weren’t many times I could swing the sword.
Even though she had slimmer arms than me, in the moment I clashed with the stronger Selena, I would exhaust all my strength.
If my hand… tore, it would hurt.
Thinking of useless things, I stepped forward again.
Since the dueling field wasn’t that wide, the distance between us could narrow quite a bit with just two steps.
That meant we had entered the range where we could take each other’s necks if we swung our swords at each other.
As if knowing that, Selena’s body began to move.
‘It’ll hurt…!!’
I screamed inside and stepped forward again.
At the same time, Selena lowered her body fully and started aiming at my empty body.
A perfect, flawless stance.
Unknowingly, I wanted to close my eyes tightly.
“……W-what?”
My body went limp unconsciously as I looked at the burning passion in Selena’s blue eyes staring at me.
My weight shifted forward dangerously, and the sword I had raised for swinging fell straight down.
Pain rose from my twisted ankle as I twisted and tried not to fall, flailing my arms desperately.
“Eh…?”
At the same time, Selena’s bewildered scream rang out.
Two timings faster than her expectation.
The sword slashed downward.
Thwack…!!
With a dull sound, I had closed my eyes tightly in expectation of pain, but since it didn’t come, I could only open my eyes slightly.
‘It hurts!!’
My wrist throbbed. It was probably because the sword had hit the ground, sending the shock traveling straight through the blade.
Forgetting my pride, I threw down the practice sword.
Only then could I look around.
Ah, right.
‘I was in the middle of a duel.’
While I was turning my gaze to pick up the fallen practice sword from the floor, I found something strange and could only blink slowly.
The place my gaze turned to was…
‘Why are you lying there?’
Selena was lying there.