The Red Mist Gauntlet
Hahk! Huh! Phew!
Two students staggered along, gasping for breath. Their legs wobbled like overcooked noodles, utterly drained of strength.
The forest around them was thick with red mist. Monster corpses littered the ground, and their knuckles were smeared with blood.
"Seriously, though."
One of them wiped the blood trickling down his forehead with the back of his hand, scowling.
"This isn't even a survival exam — it's just course registration. Isn't this way too brutal?"
Within this billowing, uncharted fog, no one could unfold a magic circle or open a subspace pocket.
Magic Combat only.
They'd had to fight the endless waves of monsters with nothing but their own two hands — and only after fighting their way through and finding Hong Peng would they earn the right to sit in on her class.
"I can't even get a read on where Professor Hong Peng is."
The student muttered to himself and heaved a deep sigh. Her class was absolutely worth this suffering, of course — but that didn't make the here and now any less grueling.
"Hey! Get over here!"
His friend shouted.
"What now?"
"Blood. It's blood!"
"...You finally lost your mind, huh? You never seen blood before? What d'you think was all over your hands earlier?"
"No, you idiot! Just come look!"
At his friend's frantic yelling, the student trudged over, grumbling, Fine, I'll fall for it one more time.
And then —
"...!"
There was nothing he could do but stand there, mouth agape.
The whole clearing was drenched in crimson — a swath of blood so vast you could have called it a river of it. All around, monsters lay toppled at every bizarre angle, their bodies contorted into a hillside of the dead.
"...Wh-who passed through here?"
At that same moment.
Birds burst from the treetops, and the monsters began to flee.
Two men were carving straight through this monster-infested forest like a runaway freight train, all brute momentum and nothing held back.
"It's been too long!"
CRACK!
Simon shattered an orc's jaw, launched himself into the air, and hammered a spinning kick into the face of a mid-sized monster.
"Fighting side by side with you, Kajan — like this!"
The monster he'd kicked skyward was torn in half by the very next strike and dropped dead on the spot. And behind it, eyes gleaming, stood a man with grey hair whipping in the wind.
"First time since we broke into Silaje's lab, isn't it."
Kajan vaulted across the battlefield, stepping lightly from the shoulders of one mid-sized monster to the next as if crossing a row of stepping stones. Each time he passed, a monster went down in a fountain of blood, deep claw marks gouged into its throat.
His signature footwork — loose and fluttering, like a paper doll caught in the wind — was as sharp as ever. He could bend every joint in his body into impossible shapes.
His movements looked impossibly light, yet every punch and claw strike that landed carried devastating force.
Monsters simply burst apart wherever he went.
I've still got a long way to go before I catch up to Kajan with Matu alone.
Simon marveled, gathering Jet-Black into his right hand.
Simon swept his arm through the air, and trees and monster bodies alike went spinning away with a ringing clang-clang-clang.
Then he kicked off the ground and soared upward, swinging through the branches like a monkey — hand over hand, branch to branch — snapping monsters' necks with his kicks as he went.
He wasn't giving a single step to Kajan. These were techniques honed through years of living in the Leshill mountains.
"Hup!"
Back on the ground, Simon dove straight back into the melee and started flattening monsters with his fists.
"By the way, Kajan — you're already a Magic Combat major. Why bother taking it again as an elective?"
Kajan fell in beside Simon, toppling monsters left and right. The two of them tore through the horde like they were competing, and even the monsters began to falter under the pressure.
"Professor Hong Peng made me an offer. She said I'd need free time on campus. Take one more of her classes, she told me, and you're excused from another — move as you see fit."
"Oh!"
So Hong Peng had guessed that Kajan was no ordinary student.
Typical of her — that kind of consideration.
"Then does she know you're with the Thieves' Guild, too?"
"I don't think she's caught on that far."
Just then, Simon's eyes went wide.
Out in front loomed a monstrous orc, well over two meters tall, with a mouthful of jutting, crooked tusks. An Orc Warlord — Danger Rank 5.
Simon quickly scrambled up a tree and drew the monster's attention.
"Kajan! Big one incoming!"
-KRRAAAAAGH!
The Orc Warlord swung a battle axe of terrifying size.
Simon hauled himself up by his grip on the branch like he was doing a pull-up to dodge — but the tree, having taken the axe head-on, groaned and toppled with a mighty crack!
KU-GU-GU-GUNG!
Seconds before hitting the ground, Simon snagged a vine on a neighboring tree and swung clear to the side. At the same instant, Kajan came charging in from below like a bolt of lightning and hammered a strike into the Orc Warlord's jaw.
-KRUK!
The blow rattled the monster's skull to the core. Snarling, the Orc Warlord whipped around, searching for its attackers.
TU-KWANG!
Simon snapped his fingers with the hand not gripping the tree, and a shockwave burst against the Orc Warlord's forehead.
The monster wheeled toward him.
SHAAAAAK!
This time Kajan came slicing down from above, raking past the Orc Warlord's chest. A long claw wound opened across it, and blood fountained out.
Having conceded attack after attack, the Orc Warlord bellowed in fury.
"Catch, Simon."
Just then, one thick-looking vine slid quietly toward Simon, arriving right on beat.
Simon grinned and grabbed it.
WHUM! WHUM!
Kajan held the front line against the enraged beast, keeping its attention fixed on him. Evading with nothing but shifts of his upper body, barely moving his feet at all — every motion radiated seasoned experience.
And that was the moment. Simon swung in from behind, and the vine lashed around the Orc Warlord's throat in a flash, cinching tight.
-KHHAK!
Choking, the monster's movements turned sluggish. It swung its battle axe wildly, trying to shake Simon loose, but from such an unstable position there was no leverage.
And Kajan moved in for the finish.
TATAT!
He ran straight up the monster's knee, abdomen, and chest — then drove his lengthened claws precisely into its throat and heart.
The Orc Warlord convulsed, frothing blood at the mouth, and both men leapt clear in the same breath.
Clutching its own neck, the massive body vomited blood from mouth and throat in heaving waves before crashing face-first into the ground.
"Whewwww."
Simon let out the breath he'd been holding and raised a fist toward Kajan.
"Getting back in sync with you after so long — I missed it!"
Kajan bumped the fist, then idly scratched the scar over his right eye.
"Nefthys's orders stand: protect you from outside threats. Legion Commander Magnus of the 5th Legion is still hunting you. If anything goes wrong, come find me anytime."
"Thanks, Kajan. Really. Always."
"Also — from here on, I'm moving alone."
"Huh?"
"A held-back senior and declared major helping students mid-registration exam? It could look bad, the wrong eyes watching. Instead, I'll give you information worth your while."
Simon's eyes went wide as he listened.
The final event of course registration.
By now, a third of the entire second year was converging on the red mist zone.
The students who had already secured their second and third classes were all gunning for Hong Peng's course now.
But the difficulty — Magic Combat only, nothing else — made them click their tongues. All across the forest, Barrier Gauges were flashing down to 0%, stranding students in the forced thirty-minute rest that came with it.
And here was one more, skating on the edge.
"Haa... haa..."
A girl with sky-blue hair dropped to one knee, gasping.
Her remaining Barrier Gauge: a measly 8%.
And of course, another monster came bounding out at her.
"Hyahp!"
Camibarez came whirling in, light-violet hair flying, and smacked the monster square in the gut with her palm, sending it flying. It was her own original Matu technique, specialized in exactly this — launching opponents away.
She spun around immediately.
"You okay, Meilin?!"
"Ah — yeah! Thanks for the cover!"
THWACK!
A crossbow bolt buried itself in the forehead of the monster Camibarez had launched.
"I'm almost out of bolts, though."
Clack. Dick opened his crossbow and slotted in the last of his ammunition.
His remaining Barrier Gauge: a hair-raising 1%.
"You, honestly."
Meilin retied her hair with a cord and let out a hollow laugh.
"Your luck's so bad it's a miracle you survive every single time."
"Hey, it's not luck, it's skill!"
"Everyone! More coming, over there!"
Monsters came surging in as one. The three of them each dropped into their own distinctive battle stances.
"Well, I suppose this is~ where it all ends~"
"Stop jinxing us, you walking disaster!"
"Ah!"
Camibarez, readying herself with both small palms spread open, suddenly pointed ahead.
"Look over there!"
TAT!
TAT!
TAT!
Above the oncoming horde, a boy in school uniform came bounding from treetop to treetop. In an instant he'd overtaken the entire pack of monsters and dropped to the ground right in front of the three of them, like a wall thrown up between them and harm.
Shhhhrrrk—!
His shoe scraped the ground in a spinning pivot, and his Jet-Black-wreathed right arm traced a trajectory that made the skin crawl.
SHWOOOOOOOM!
The scale was in a league of its own compared to an ordinary Fixed Blade. The blade-strike swept out in a wide semicircle and sheared through every monster in its path.
Six in one swing!
Dick's eyes went wide. The boy's spin slowed to a stop, sweat-soaked hair whipping around.
"Glad you're all in one piece."
"Ah!"
Everyone's face lit up like the sun.
"Simon!!"
Looking back over his shoulder, Simon gave the Student Council members a casual little wave. Then he tilted his head back slightly — and a monster's spear hissed through the empty air where his head had just been.
TUP! TUP!
Simon seized the monster's wrist and arm, used its own momentum against it, flipped it over, and slammed it headfirst into the dirt.
More monsters charged in behind, swinging weapons wildly, but Simon fought like a man playing an entirely different sport. A light palm-push here to deflect a blade, a fist to the solar plexus there to fold a monster in half — he made it all look effortless.
Then he launched into a mid-air spin, kicking the heads off three monsters before landing — and all Dick could do was gape.
"...Wow, though. Seriously."
Dick lowered his crossbow with a hollow laugh.
"His Matu got a lot better over break, didn't it?"
Simon wrapped a monster's neck in a joint lock and pinned its arm. Before he could snap its spine, two more came charging in from either side.
"HAAAAAAH!"
A tremendous battle cry rang out.
Meilin came flying through the air and punted the monster on the left flank with a picture-perfect kick. In that opening, Simon snapped the neck of the one in the lock and seized the next in another joint hold.
This one was an armored orc.
"Now, Meilin!"
Meilin landed from her kick and drew back a Jet-Black-wreathed fist.
BU-BOOM!
Cheonhyung — one of the rare penetrating strikes in all of Matu — landed clean. The fist punched straight through the center of the armor, and the monster went down foaming at the mouth.
"Wow, your Cheonhyung's gotten seriously good."
Simon grinned and complimented her.
"......."
Meilin rose to her feet, cupping her fist tightly in her left hand, her face burning red.
"What's up with you?"
"Ah~ now that you mention it, Meilin has been weird today."
Dick grabbed the arm of a monster gunning for her, drove his knee into its face, and tossed it toward Camibarez — who finished it with a crushing palm strike to the gut.
"Every single time she lands a Cheonhyung, she goes all red in the face."
"I-I do NOT!!"
Meilin shrieked, her face flushing even redder.
"See? Red again."
"Do you WANT to die?! Why are you picking fights today of all days?!"
Meilin lunged at Dick with her fist raised, and Dick flailed dramatically, pointing at his own dwindling Barrier Gauge in desperate appeal. Simon laughed quietly to himself.
"Simon!"
Camibarez came over with a beaming smile.
"How did your registration for Professor Jane and Professor Bahil go?"
"Went exactly as planned. Got into both."
"I'm so glad!"
Her little wings fluttered happily.
"They're not majors, but all four of us are in the same classes again this year!"
"Yeah."
Simon turned to glance at Meilin and Dick, still brawling.
"Anyway — everyone, follow me. Kajan told me where Professor Hong Peng is."
Dick, mid-headlock and getting his hair yanked out by the roots, stuck out his hand.
"The pavilion behind the waterfall! Right?!"
"That's right. How'd you know?"
"Kajan's the best, obviously. Same intel I got... AH! AAAH! Keep hitting me and I'll get the forced thirty-minute rest for real!"
"SHUT UUUUP!"
Shhhhaaaaaaah!
A small pavilion nestled beside a picture-perfect waterfall. Inside it, Hong Peng, Professor of Magic Combat, was enjoying a peaceful cup of tea with her Head TA.
"Professor."
"Yes?"
Clink—
The Head TA set down her teacup.
"You made this year's course registration unusually brutal. Was there a particular reason?"
"Ah, well, o' course."
Hong Peng smiled slyly.
"If it were too eathy, my favrite stujents might never come at all, y'know."