Chapter 35
Chapter 35
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 35
Chapter Title: The Uncrossable Bridge (2)
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Contrary to the intense psychological battle unfolding, to the spectators watching from afar, it looked like nothing more than a chaotic plunge. It was a close contest, fought in mere seconds.
‘You haven't fallen until you've fallen.’
Even as the cliff edge was just a step away, Shirone's body did not glow. This, in turn, made the hearts of the spectating students pound. Kicking off the edge of the precipice, Shirone leaped as far as he could. An immense feeling of floating. Strong winds shook his body, and mountain birds flew in flocks far below his feet.
Shirone focused solely on Teleportation. At the critical point of his leap, his body finally flashed and shot out as a streak of light.
With Shirone's turn, everyone had completed their first round. Naturally, as they moved into the second round, the rankings were overturned. The group that started first fell to the rear.
Shirone made up for the gap that had formed during the run-up. More importantly, he managed to pull ahead of Mark by a slight margin.
Mark was stunned to see Shirone emerge from behind. How late must he have started to overtake him in the very first round? Of course, the gap between the lead group was still within ten meters, so the rankings could change at any moment, but it was infuriating that his anticipated strategy had gone up in smoke.
“You bastard! Stop right there!”
With a hair's breadth of a time difference, Shirone and Mark cast their Teleportation spells almost simultaneously.
* * *
Ten minutes before the promotion exam began.
There was a girl heading toward the training grounds with a gloomy expression.
Maria of House Erlang.
The third daughter of the Erlang family, a third-rank noble house, she was a talented nineteen-year-old who had awakened her magical abilities early and entered Alpheas Magic Academy.
Although she was now stuck in Class Seven, ridiculed even by Mark, who was four years her junior, it wasn't as if she hadn't shown promise from the beginning.
She had entered the academy at ten and fought fiercely for nine long years. But at some point, such competition began to feel meaningless.
She couldn't understand why she had to struggle so hard to climb to the upper classes. Even if she was promoted, it would only be the start of a new competition. The life she was living was nothing but a marathon with no finish line.
“Sigh, what am I even doing right now?”
Was it because she had missed her chance to surge ahead? From the moment she realized she was the oldest in Class Seven, everything felt futile.
The probability of a Class Ten entrant rising to Class Seven was about forty percent. Overcoming odds of less than half was something to be proud of.
When Maria entered Class Seven at fifteen, she had been ecstatic, as if she were flying. But the happiness was fleeting, and she grew to fear the ever-narrowing path to promotion.
Ironically, her best academic performance was during her first year in Class Seven.
But from the following year, her grades began to decline, and now she had reached a point where even new students looked down on her.
She was afraid of competing. She had to risk her life for something. Had to be more persistent, more perfect. Every time she had these thoughts, she felt like she was suffocating.
Was she unable to leave the academy out of inertia, or because a small spark of passion remained? Or was she just being stubborn, unwilling to let go of the time she had invested?
Maria, who had entered the magic academy out of her love for magic, sighed as she found herself losing her sense of identity.
The promotion exam felt like someone else's business. Yet, staying behind in the classroom to study on her own with the younger students was a blow to her pride.
Lost in such thoughts, she wandered aimlessly. Then, she suddenly decided she should go to the training grounds and turned back.
Perhaps at the very top, brilliant talents were engaged in aggressive competition? Seeing them would only deepen her sense of inadequacy, but she already felt the lifespan of her passion dwindling away.
Clutching at straws, or perhaps hoping for some incident to provide even the slightest stimulation, she continued her listless walk.
“Huh?”
From the direction of the peak, a light spell from Instructor Etella shot up. Seeing the blue color, it seemed preparations for the exam were in full swing.
The students' cheers echoed down. Having lost the confidence to head there, Maria stopped walking. She was not the one their cheers were for.
‘My place isn't there. Only the exceptional students from Class Seven would be there.’
At that moment, a devilish thought embedded itself in her mind and guided Maria's way.
At first, she had only turned away because she didn't want to ignore the existence of a certain possibility.
By the time she came to her senses, she had already arrived at the control room for the Uncrossable Bridge.
The hope that perhaps it wasn't over.
Clinging to that hope, she opened the door to the control room. A staff member was sitting in a chair, yawning. For a normal promotion exam, an instructor would have been present, but today, the bridge's mechanisms were off, and all instructors had been dispatched for the students' safety, so none were in sight.
The relaxed staff member stretched out his legs and whistled. But a moment later, his eyelids slowly closed, and his head slumped.
Behind the deeply sleeping staff member stood Maria.
Sleep magic, which relaxed the mind, was nearly ineffective against mages, but it was quite potent against those who knew no magic.
Maria looked around at the control panel. The Air Net's safety device was activated, and to the side, she saw a rotary switch that adjusted the difficulty of the Uncrossable Bridge.
She placed a finger on the safety device button. Her body trembled. Was this really the right thing to do? No, beyond right and wrong, was this something she could truly handle?
All she had to do was press the button. Normally, she would never imagine doing something that could lead to such terrible consequences, but when a person becomes possessed by an idea, their mind fills with nothing but the sweet reward.
Maria pressed the button. Once she acted, it was so simple it was almost laughable. There was no terrible incident, no tragic outcome. She had simply pressed a button.
The indicator light for the Air Net installed on the cliff began to lose its red glow.
* * *
Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop!
A series of explosive pops erupted from the group of students. Twenty individuals were blinking in and out of existence, racing across the sky at an altitude of 1,000 meters.
By the time the third round was underway, the distance between the front and rear groups hadn't widened significantly.
It was like a massive human formation on the move.
However, the difference in skill was becoming apparent. Most of those who had started early couldn't endure the emptiness of having nothing beneath their feet, and their minds wavered.
‘Pant, pant! Are we really falling? From here?’
Looking down, they saw a bottomless cliff. They wondered if the safety device was even really there. No, even if it was safe, the thought of having to fall 100 meters unconditionally was terrifying.
As their Spirit Zones weakened, their leap distances shortened. The gap between them and the lead group widened in an instant.
The Spirit Zone was an extremely sensitive mental state. Thus, it couldn't be maintained if concentration wavered even slightly. Eventually, the students in the rear group, failing to master Teleportation, began to plummet.
“Aaaaaah!”
“H-Help! Somebody help me!”
Wahahahahaha!
The upperclassmen watching from the other side burst into laughter. Having already experienced the Uncrossable Bridge, they found the flustered state of their juniors rather endearing. The instructors also smiled, meticulously recording the evaluations of the failed students on their documents.
But the festive atmosphere changed in an instant.
As one, the instructors looked up with startled expressions. Enough time had passed for the students to be caught by the Air Net, yet no siren was sounding.
“What! What's going on! The control room!”
“I'll go check!”
Thadd cast Spatial Transfer. A flash of light shot into the sky and curved toward the control room.
“I'll save the students first!”
Shina dived off the cliff, casting Teleportation at a frightening speed. Etella, who was watching from the other side, also realized something was wrong and leaped down.
“Headmaster, what should we do? Should we stop the exam?”
Alpheas let out a thoughtful breath. With two Grade 6 Mages on the scene, the students would be safe. However, whether to continue the exam as is was a matter for consideration.
From the academy's perspective, it was easier to halt the exam. But doing so would be an irreparable loss for the students who were fighting with all their might to maintain their lead. As long as safety could be guaranteed, it was best to respect the participants' will.
“Let's watch for now. They can certainly protect twenty students. If we end it like this, wouldn't we be making light of the students' passion?”
From the chasm, Shina and Etella shot up simultaneously. The students, caught in their Air Net spells, ascended behind them.
“What's going on? It looks like there's a problem.”
Seriel said, scanning the empty air with a telescope. The other students also began to murmur at the unexpected situation.
But Amy was not swayed by the atmosphere. A foolish situation like a fatal fall wouldn't happen with Grade 6 instructors on standby. Besides, the students in the lead were still unfaltering. She would have been the same. With Class Five on the line, what did safety matter?
On the other hand, a noticeable commotion arose in the middle-ranked group. Seeing the instructors dive off the cliff to catch students, they sensed that something had gone wrong.
‘The safety device is gone?’
The only reason they had been able to endure the fear until now was because, no matter how realistic it felt, it wasn't a real life-or-death situation. But now, they were truly floating over a bottomless chasm.
“Aaaah! No!”
“Instructor! Save me! I forfeit the exam!”
“We're going to die at this rate!”
The middle-ranked group began to fall one after another. A spectacular scene unfolded as instructors emitted flashes of light, rescuing the students.
Even in such a situation, the lead group's race did not stop. They, too, knew there was a problem with the safety device, but they were actually cheering inwardly.
‘This is a chance! Let as many as possible fail.’
These were children who had grown up hearing they were one-of-a-kind geniuses before entering the magic academy. Their competitive spirit was on a different level from ordinary peers. So far, the lead group had advanced 270 meters. For Class Seven, this was an incredible level.
Shirone was still maintaining first place. Mark and his designated team took turns overtaking him, but in the next round, they were invariably passed again. Over the course of 27 consecutive Teleportations, his leap distance per round was exactly ten meters, without the slightest error.
‘Only repeat the moment. Erase the concept of linking.’
The mechanical routine Shirone had polished in preparation for this test was shining. Under certain conditions, humans could become far more precise than machines, and that was the unconscious effect of repetitive compulsion. Humans who utilized compulsion were fearsome. Once they decided to do something, they would break down barriers and advance like a machine.
‘Dammit! He's so persistent! What are the others doing!’
Mark was getting annoyed. Because Shirone never lost the lead, there was no room for his team to interfere. He shot a sharp glare to his side, and a female student from his team, who met his eyes, flinched. It was a silent pressure to initiate the final measure.
The method was mutual destruction.
But the safety device was off. She wondered if this was really the right thing to do.
‘No. I have to do it. Whether I die here or live a failed life, it's all the same.’
She pushed her concentration to its peak. By giving up on finishing the course and casting Teleportation, she could take the lead, if only for a moment.
Executing a rapid series of Teleportations, she blocked Shirone's path. Simultaneously, another member of the team cut off Shirone's route to the left.
With his front and side blocked, the female student slowed down, forcing Shirone to shorten his leap distance as well.