Yenil

"Yenil. Your people were called the Tesla, weren't they?"

"Yes. That is correct."

It was the sort of name that looked ready to send a share price into convulsions at any moment, so he had remembered it properly. An academy for raising sorcerers and sorceresses. What, then, were the conditions for clearing this event dungeon? A conversation he had once held with Atradeon — mind to mind, back when he fought Yenil — rose unbidden.

After becoming a Great Barbarian, Yujun had obtained a shop key. If Yenil and Manuela became sorceresses, could they obtain one as well? But Yenil was already a sorceress, and she was already regarded as a great being. What happened in a case like that?

"Yenil, you still haven't received a key, have you?"

"I have not."

"No trial or anything?"

"You obtained yours through a trial?"

"Yeah. It was pretty brutal, though. I nearly died."

"Then ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠even if there is a trial, if it's hard enough that you call it difficult... we couldn't manage it, could we?"

"It still wouldn't turn out the way it did for me. Not if the System really arranged for players to obtain a shop key."

It was possible the trial's difficulty had spiked so sharply because he had piled up achievements too fast. If the only way to obtain a key was to bring down a being on the level of the Fire Spirit King, then one might as well say no player could obtain one at all. Even Yujun had only barely felled the Spirit King after reaching an enlightenment in Swordsmanship.

"So for a whole month you did nothing but study? Nothing else at all?"

"Yep."

Manuela said it without a shred of shame.

"Shouldn't we try coming at this a different way?"

At that, Manuela and Yenil nodded hard.

"We did try another approach, just as you said, but we could not find a single thing out of the ordinary. And I do not think we ought to leave this empire, either..."

"It's probably meant to be solved inside the academy. Even if the scope widens a little, it shouldn't take us outside this city."

Out on the grasslands he had gone a fair distance to settle things, but whenever a task required traveling that far, the magic academy would surely lay down a clear road — a contest of magic, or something of that sort.

"When's the exam?"

"Two days from now. There are quite a few subjects, so they say it runs across both days."

"Is everyone here a mage?"

"Yes. And it is not only the academy. I stepped outside the dormitory once, and the streets held nothing but the Tesla. Every last one of them a mage."

"Is that so?"

Nothing but mages. He could tell the place was the exact opposite of where he had been — a land packed with nothing but rough Barbarian warriors. Set beside that, this one felt remarkably peaceful. Not that the grasslands had been without their peace, but the air of the two places was different all the same.

I'll have to look around a little more before I can say for certain.

Already, though, this so-called magic academy had caught his interest. He could not say whether the System had sent him to the Barbarians because it judged his Swordsmanship the greater art, but his magic had reached a formidable height of its own. For the moment he was a Barbarian and could not cast, yet he had originally ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠wielded New-Generation Magic of GX Tier. He was curious what they taught here.

Come to think of it, I did gain that power called Barbarism...

It's higher than the other stats...

He did not know exactly how the power of Barbarism manifested, but he knew that number was anything but low.

Rap. Rap. Someone outside pounded hard on the door.

"Word has reached me that an unidentified person is within! Open this door!"

"Just a moment!"

Manuela turned a panicked look on Yujun. He shrugged and opened the door at once.

"Who are you? You do not appear to be a student of our academy."

"I'm a transfer student."

"...I have heard no such thing."

"And who might you be?"

"I am Professor Fretalin."

"Please take me to the headmaster."

"I find it difficult to believe a student of the magical arts such as yourself exists. You truly claim to be a transfer student?"

"Yes."

A transfer student would never appear out of uniform, dressed so shabbily. And yet Yujun stated it with such bare confidence that Professor Fretalin began to waver.

"Let's just go. I'll prove it to you."

"...Hmph. Very well. For now."

Fretalin set off ahead. Yujun kept his face blank and matched her pace. He could feel an assistant's suspicious gaze from the side, and he made a point of ignoring it.

This is bad.

Cold sweat traced a line down his spine. In truth, he had no plan at all. He did not even know what he was meant to do once he met the headmaster. He had only said it because doing something seemed better than being thrown out without having tried anything...

Should I not have opened my mouth?

He was tense, which was not like him. Not a single idea would come, and the blankness of it left him stranded.

Click. Click. Following the professor in her high heels, his steps down the corridor felt heavy. Students of the magic academy turned curious eyes on him. The clothes were a little too revealing, the muscle beneath them swollen as if it might burst the cloth, and their gazes had nowhere else to land. Since he had gained the power of Barbarism, his body had grown even more like a sculpture. It had always been impressive, but now it was larger beyond any comparison with before — and, above all, beautiful. It was not merely hulking. The sight barely felt real, as though some great artist had poured painstaking devotion into the carving of a statue.

"Never seen him before."

"They say he's a transfer student?"

"A transfer? Who said that? Look at that body — he's no mage..."

"Then what else would he be?"

"He's the same race as us, right...?"

"The ones following behind him are Yenil and Manuela..."

"Now that you mention it, they did seem to know each other."

"Seriously? That's rich. They wouldn't so much as speak to us. All we ever got were looks of contempt."

"Good grief. They don't even know that might be for the best."

"Huh? What do you mean by..."

Why did the walk to the headmaster feel so endlessly long? Yujun pretended to glance about at his leisure while he turned over how he might get out of this, and before he knew it he was standing at the office door.

Professor Fretalin rapped as if to knock, and spoke.

"Headmaster, a transfer student wishes to see you. May we enter?"

"A transfer student? Come in."

Doubt threaded the words, but permission had been given. Before stepping through, Yujun planted himself in front of Professor Fretalin, as if to bar her way.

"What do you think you are doing?"

"I have something important to say to the headmaster. It isn't for other ears..."

"That is not yours to decide."

"No. It concerns my house, and the secret must not leak under any circumstances. Would you like some misfortune to fall upon you, Professor, should anyone happen to overhear?"

He said it in a tone just short of a threat. Having taken on, without quite noticing, the rough ways of the Barbarians, his words pressed harder than he meant them to.

"...Hmph."

Fretalin sank into thought. An assassin come to harm the headmaster would never have approached in so conspicuous a fashion. And the headmaster's skill was acknowledged by every mage in the empire, not merely those of the academy. She studied Yujun's eyes once more, long ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and steady, then nodded.

"Go in."

Yujun let out a silent breath of relief and stepped into the office. Then he shut the door with a bang.

"Hrm?"

The headmaster had the look of an old gentleman well along in years. He had been sitting upright over his papers; when he saw Yujun, his eyes flew wide.

"And who might you be?"

"A transfer student, sir."

"We have no transfer student."

"Please don't be alarmed. Just watch. I have something to show you."

Yujun's appearance was far too extraordinary for the headmaster's guard to ease. Mana seethed across the desk, ready to become a spell at any instant. Yujun put into practice the very thing he had until now only been considering.

A vast magic circle drew itself, and Paranet rose above it. Before the form had even finished taking shape, Yujun spoke.

"Bow your head. Paranet."

"Yes, Master!"

The ceiling ran a little low — no space in which a giant of five meters could stand at his full height. One careless movement and he might punch straight through it. Yujun's judgment proved right. Even with his head bowed, Paranet came within a hair of the ceiling.

"An undead...?"

The headmaster's eyes, usually narrowed nearly to slits, opened wider than they ever had.

"Have you lost your mind? And before that — whose orders are you under? I have never seen an undead that radiates power of this degree... An enemy of the empire? Did the rebels send you?"

"None of that. Please calm yourself and hear me out."

Yujun spoke from as respectful a posture as he could manage.

"......"

"Paranet. Give me that axe I left with you."

"Ah — at once."

It was the Legendary-grade axe he had obtained in the Trial of the 500k Stat Realm. At the sight of that vicious weapon — a thing with no place in a magic academy — changing hands, the headmaster conjured several great spears of ice.

"What is your aim?"

"This axe is a Legendary-grade item. I'll give it to you."

"I asked you what your aim is."

"I want to become a student here as well."

"...Speak sense."

Did his eyes just waver?

Or not?

Yujun piled on another offer.

"Is this not enough? Then I'll teach you magic."

"Teach me magic? Me — Solaphe? Ha..."

Headmaster Solaphe let out a scoff of pure disbelief.

"And I scarcely feel any mana from that body of yours. You do not seem a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠mage at all."

"My body may be so. My theory is not."

To win Headmaster Solaphe over, Yujun truly began to explain magic of a higher order. He did not, of course, preach the theory of New-Generation Magic. Measuring the headmaster's level, he taught him to his eye, reciting unchanged the theory of one of the more difficult spells among the Ancient Magic of the Tower of Infinity.

Solaphe listened with a face still half in doubt, and little by little that face changed. It was the fruit of talking without a single pause for three whole minutes.

"You... from whom did you learn that?"

The headmaster had begun to believe him. Disbelief was no longer available — Yujun had laid out a theory a shade more advanced than everything Solaphe had known until now. In truth, Yujun had no notion of how high a professor's theory in this place actually stood. He had only struck by feel, and the blow had landed.

"I had a master. He had left the secular world to live upon a mountain, and as a child I was taken in by chance, which is how I came to learn magic such as this. The trouble was that my body was utterly incapable of mastering it."

After that, too, he invented stories that had never happened and fed them to the headmaster.

"What I just shared is no more than the tip of the iceberg. If you accept me as a student, I will come regularly and pass this knowledge of magic on. It is of no use to me anyway."

"...Higher magic, the sort one cannot obtain even by paying for it. Were I to say it did not tempt me, I would be lying."

The headmaster's response was favorable. Persuasion — no. A negotiation. It had succeeded.