Shall I Give It a Shot?
The evasion drills continued relentlessly.
“Pant, gasp. Argh!”
“Good dodge, Student Anne Peshua. However—”
“Ack!”
“Always anticipate the follow-up strike and react accordingly. Remember, we do not counterattack.”
“You’re moving way too fast, Instructor!”
“I attacked as slowly as possible. Approximately the speed of an average third-year, I would estimate.”
Just as he had done during the reflex training, Ziel naturally refrained from striking at his true speed. He calibrated his movements precisely to the students’ developmental threshold. Right now, that meant matching the tempo of a third-year—a baseline he had calculated after observing their movements during his reconnaissance.
The problem was that after a full day of unrelenting drills, the students’ stamina had already bottomed out.
‘This is precisely when their skills will sharpen the most.’
The crucible of extremity.
During his days of assassin conditioning within the Organization, Ziel had experienced time and again how rapid growth occurred when pushed to the absolute brink. When every scrap of conscious strength was drained, the mind raced to survive the imminent crisis. Movement ceased to rely on rational thought and surrendered entirely to pure instinct. Layer upon layer, those desperate reactions accumulated into genuine technique and instinctual prowess.
“Haaah, pant…”
“Next. Student Deleve Kundel.”
True to Ziel’s intent, Deleve gave himself over completely to instinct. His physical reserves had evaporated long ago.
“Hngh!”
A wooden practice blade plunged straight down from above. Deleve threw his entire body sideways, rolling across the floorboards with everything he had left—
Thud!
Ziel’s sweep snapped through the empty air where his torso had been, Deleve barely splitting his legs wide enough to avoid the snapping low kick.
“Pant, pant…” Cold sweat poured down his neck, stinging his eyes. But he had avoided it.
“Well done. Etch that sensation into your memory. Next. Student Celia Rihardt.”
Without a second’s respite, the onslaught resumed.
“Student Celia Rihardt.”
“Gasp… Can’t you… just call me… by my first name… for once?!”
“Why should I?”
“Because! Pant… It feels… so cold and distant! Gasp!”
“I address you as I see fit.”
“Oh, come on!”
Even while complaining at the top of her lungs, Celia hurled herself sideways to evade his incoming strike.
“Seeing as you still have breath to chatter, you clearly possess stamina to spare. Continuing.”
“Eeeek!”
In the end, Celia allowed a strike through.
Snick.
The practice sword barely brushed the hem of her uniform, leaving no scratch beneath, but the sheer chill of the close pass turned her blood to ice.
“In an actual battle, your arm would have been severed.”
“Pant… I know that!”
“If you know, get back on your feet.”
“Uwaaagh…”
Ziel showed no mercy. The sight of their instructor granting not an ounce of leniency even to the highborn daughter of House Rihardt spurred the rest of the students into desperate action. They scrambled, tumbled, and threw themselves across the gymnasium floor, straining every fiber of their beings to dodge his strikes.
Only when the entire cohort collapsed into heaps, lacking even the strength to twitch a finger, did the day’s training finally draw to a close.
“Good work, all of you. Remember everything you felt today.”
The students lay sprawled across the floorboards like corpses, completely drained of the energy required to offer a verbal response.
“Remember this. Trust your instincts and evade. Guarding and transitioning into a counterattack is extraordinarily difficult, but evasion itself is simple.”
Before undergoing this training, they would have dismissed such words as utter nonsense. But after spending hours dancing on the razor’s edge of exhaustion, the truth began to sink in. Evading really was simpler—at least compared to mounting a counteroffensive.
“Never lose track of your opponent’s arms, legs, wrists, ankles, or line of sight. No one can hit what they do not look at.”
Then, as though the thought had merely crossed his mind, Ziel added deadpan,
“Except for me, of course.”
“……”
Whether they were too exhausted to speak or simply rendered speechless by the sheer absurdity of his boast, complete silence answered him. Ziel looked down at the panting young martial artists, the corner of his lips curling upward in an imperceptible smile. Their growth was undeniable. In just a single day, they had begun layering hard-earned experience over raw instinct.
‘So this is what it feels like to teach.’
Evasion drills. They might have looked like a coward’s gambit from the outside, but there was no better way to bleed an opponent of stamina. Furthermore, in an actual engagement, they would be allowed to guard and strike back, making their situation far more favorable than these pure dodging exercises. Avoid open conflict whenever possible and herd the upperclassmen into a chaotic brawl—that was the overarching strategy Ziel had laid out for Match 2.
‘All that remains for tomorrow is collective unit tactics.’
Tomorrow would begin with light physical recovery followed by multi-combatant formation drills. He had never intended to send them into a live-steel brawl with nothing but the ability to duck and roll. Fortunately, having tasted the value of cooperation during Match 1, they would likely absorb group tactics with remarkable speed. Afterward, a period of rest, and then Match 2.
His preparations were falling into place.
“Bring your standard tactical manuals tomorrow.”
“Yeeees, sirrr…” a chorus of groans wheezed out.
“Dismissed.”
Yet after the hall had cleared and the students had dragged their weary bodies back to their dormitories, an unexpected variable presented itself.
“Instructor Ziel, do you have a moment to talk?”
Visitors had arrived at the gymnasium doors.
Professor Elkanto and Professor Marchen, the faculty supervisors in charge of the second and third years respectively.
“What brings you here?” Ziel asked.
“We’ve come to propose an alliance.” Professor Marchen nodded gravely toward Elkanto before locking eyes with Ziel. “Instructor Ziel, let us join forces.”
“Join forces?”
“A coalition in Match 2 to deal with the fourth and fifth years together.”
It was an extraordinary overture—at least from the perspective of the upper grades. While forming a coalition with the first years was not entirely unprecedented in the history of the Exchange Match, the freshmen had always been treated as mere cannon fodder. Extra bodies to pad out the ranks, nothing more. But this time was different.
“The way you’ve been training your students is truly remarkable,” Marchen continued, her tone laced with eager speculation. “I suspected you must have some sophisticated grand strategy in play.”
Ziel blinked, slightly taken aback. ‘A sophisticated strategy?’
Had they somehow deduced his tactical plans? He had noticed them lingering near the entrance earlier to observe his class, but surely they hadn’t unraveled the full layout.
‘As expected of academy professors.’
In truth, the professors had deciphered nothing of the sort. They were merely operating on the vague assumption that someone producing such bizarrely effective results must harbor deep, Machiavellian schemes.
“Which brings us to our proposal,” Elkanto chimed in smoothly. “What do you say to forming a joint front and taking on the fourth and fifth years together?”
Ziel looked at him flatly. “Do you have a concrete strategy?”
“Well, as I said, we combine our numbers. Even the fourth and fifth years won't dare charge into a unified front recklessly.”
“Is that all?”
“Well… if an engagement occurs, we will at least possess the numerical advantage.”
Ziel weighed the proposition with cold, unsparing logic.
‘Even with combined numbers, defeating the fourth and fifth years in an open clash is nearly impossible.’
This match was nothing short of a miniature war. While superior numbers conferred an advantage in warfare, that rule did not hold true in every circumstance—especially when facing an overwhelming deficit in individual martial prowess. Ziel knew large-scale warfare intimately. An assassin’s trade was not confined to slitting throats in quiet, shadowed bedchambers; he had executed dozens of missions where he had to ghost through roaring, blood-soaked battlefields, dispatch high-value commanders amidst the chaos, and slip away undetected.
‘A frontal clash would result in complete slaughter.’
Ziel pressed again, his expression unmoving. “Do you possess no other tactical plan?”
“We are simply proposing this to improve everyone’s odds, Instructor Ziel,” Marchen said, her voice tightening.
“Then I must decline.”
Marchen’s eyebrows twitched. Elkanto flinched in surprise, flustered by the blunt refusal.
“W-Wait, surely you see that an alliance offers far more advantages than drawbacks—”
“A strategy reliant solely on swelling headcount cannot produce victory.”
Beyond tactical futility, Ziel harbored another concern: betrayal. Any alliance formed in this arena was inherently temporary. At the end of the day, individual grade standings had to be determined. An alliance without structural guarantees was merely a trap waiting to snap shut.
Seeing the door closing, Marchen hastily interjected. “Then how about this, Instructor Ziel? The first and second years can form a vanguard to stall the fourth and fifth years, while my third years flank around to strike their rear.”
It was an utterly shameless suggestion. Elkanto had to bite his tongue to keep from cursing aloud.
‘This woman is blatantly trying to save her own skin!’
If the first and second years held the line until they were eliminated, the third years would automatically secure at least third place. And if the meat grinder managed to bring down a few fourth- or fifth-year elites in the process, the third years could swoop in, pick off the survivors, and potentially seize an even higher rank.
‘Her intentions couldn’t be more transparent if she painted them on her forehead.’
Naturally, Ziel did not hesitate. “That sounds like a terrible strategy.”
He delivered the assessment with zero diplomatic softening.
Marchen’s face darkened. “Instructor Ziel, you’ve been receiving quite a bit of praise lately, haven’t you? I hear Department Head Berhal holds you in high regard.”
“Yes. I am well aware. I am performing well.”
Whatever barbed lecture Marchen had prepared lodged firmly in her throat. “...So, just because you’ve had a bit of success, you find it appropriate to ignore what your senior colleagues are saying?”
“I hear you perfectly well. There is nothing wrong with my ears.”
Marchen’s brow furrowed violently. “Do you truly not comprehend the meaning of my words?!”
“I comprehend them.”
“Then what is it?!”
“You are asking for my cooperation.”
“And?!”
“I refuse.”
“Aaargh!”
The sheer, suffocating frustration radiating from the conversation made Elkanto feel lightheaded just standing nearby. Yet beneath the awkwardness, an exhilarating sense of catharsis washed over him.
‘Damn, he really knows how to get under someone’s skin!’
Before he realized it, Elkanto was internally cheering the junior instructor on.
“Hoo… whew… Fine. Alright. Calm down, Marchen,” she muttered to herself, taking a ragged breath. “Alright. Then what if the first years take the flanking role while we hold the front? That should satisfy you, shouldn’t it?”
It wasn't a matter of who attacked from where. Seeking an open, orthodox engagement against the upper years was fundamentally flawed from the outset. Ziel had no intention of altering his foundational battle plan. In fact—
‘If there is a way to utilize the second and third years to our advantage, that would be ideal.’
His thoughts ran in the complete opposite direction. He was more than willing to adapt his methods to secure victory, but an alliance built on such crude, transparent schemes held zero utility. Ziel’s focus was singular: the survival and triumph of the first-year class. His goal was to engineer a situation where the other grades bled each other dry before his students made their move. He had never intended for them to only run away.
“Well? Doesn’t that sound better?” Marchen pressed.
“It makes no difference who attacks from where. I decline.”
The last thread of Marchen’s patience snapped.
“Dammit all! To think I waited until nightfall just for this! Fine! Have it your way! Professor Elkanto, we’re leaving!”
“P-Professor Marchen…”
“That insolent… doesn’t even know an opportunity when it’s handed to him…”
Had Ziel been an ordinary academy instructor, he likely would have accepted the overture. It was a prime chance to curry favor with senior faculty and integrate into the department’s political fabric. But Ziel knew nothing of Sword School politics—and even if he had, it wouldn’t have swayed his judgment in the slightest.
‘Instructor Ziel really is refreshing in moments like this.’
That infuriating, deadpan bluntness! When directed at oneself, it induced murderous rage, but watching it completely dismantle Marchen was pure poetry.
“Professor Elkanto! Are you coming or not?!”
“C-Coming! Right behind you!”
Elkanto dragged his still-recovering ankle, hobbling as fast as his heavy frame would carry him to catch up with Marchen. Storming out of the gymnasium into the cool night air, the woman vented her fury in a venomous hiss.
“The moment the match begins, we crush the first years first!”
“B-But what about our alliance between the second and third years…?”
“Of course we stick together! We’ll grind those arrogant little first years into the dirt before doing anything else!”
Elkanto nodded along outwardly, but in his mind, he scoffed with utter disdain.
‘Do I look like a complete idiot? You obviously intend to use my second years as meat shields!’
“Professor Elkanto, you’ve trained your second years well, haven’t you? You can take the lead and smash the first years, right?”
Just as he had predicted.
“Of course, Professor Marchen,” Elkanto answered smoothly.
“Good. Let’s deal with that upstart first, and then we can sort out the rest.”
‘As if I’d ever let that happen,’ Elkanto sneered inwardly. ‘I wasn’t born yesterday.’
Pretend to engage, then pull back at the first opportunity—that was Elkanto’s true plan. In a chaotic free-for-all, survival was every grade for itself. Final rankings had to be established regardless.
‘She’s definitely planning to play nice until she can stab us in the back.’
And when the deed was done, she would lean on her seniority and academic standing to smooth it over. It was an all-too-familiar play. That was the reality of the professors’ social circle: act generous while dumping all the grunt work onto junior colleagues, then ruthlessly throw them under the carriage when stakes ran high.
‘And I never even got to do that to anyone!’
To be fair, he had never possessed a subordinate he could bully like that. Well, technically he had one now—except that subordinate was Ziel, a man far too terrifying to even contemplate crossing.
As his thoughts turned, an entirely different notion sparked in Elkanto’s mind.
‘What if… what if I secretly support the first years and orchestrate the elimination of the third years instead?’
In the past, such an idea would never have crossed his mind. He had spent his career bowing scraped-knee obedience to senior professors overseeing upper grades. But Dakeus had fallen from grace. Elkanto had stared death in the face during the doll incident. And when it came down to genuine gratitude, he owed far more to Instructor Ziel—who had pulled him back from the brink—than to senior parasites who only saw him as a dumping ground for administrative burdens.
‘Should I really give it a shot?’
Beneath the quiet surface of the coming storm, the currents were beginning to shift in a direction that favored the first years in ways no one could have anticipated.