Chapter 35
Chapter 35
Fallen Angel Rampage
Although the students had come to realize the danger(?) of Professor Larkias, the class continued.
Even after the magical duel between Isolde Polchen and Assistant Instructor Clarice, everyone proceeded to training aimed at improving the precision of their shield magic. This involved directly receiving the assistant instructors’ offensive spells with their shield magic to build real combat experience.
“W-what? Are you insane?”
The students recoiled in shock at being told to block the assistant instructors’ offensive spells directly.
The shield spells they had only just learned were mostly about the size of a round shield. While not small, they weren’t large enough to trust their lives to.
“It’s fine. We’ll only be using level 0 spells.”
“Even so….”
The assistant instructors deliberately used simple spells classified as level 0, launching them so that they would strike the shields the students had raised.
Although they were visible attacks and light level 0 spells, the spells used by the assistant instructors still had enough power to harm a person. Students who had only studied magic theory until now couldn’t help but panic.
It was no different from having a lethal weapon aimed and fired at you right in front of your eyes.
Even if you were behind bulletproof glass, wouldn’t your heart sink if someone pointed a gun at you and pulled the trigger?
However, Idnia was able to easily deflect the incoming spell attacks with her shield spell.
The assistant instructor assigned to Idnia was none other than Clarice, the same one who had defeated Isolde Polchen in the duel. Seeing the shield Idnia cast, Clarice was surprised.
“Uh… no, not a single scratch.”
“Pardon?”
“Earlier in the duel I didn’t apply spell transformation, but… normally a freshman’s shield should be completely worn down by this level of magic. Look at that.”
Idnia looked to the side and saw Sennia paired with an assistant instructor, practicing magic.
Sennia had her shield spell cast as far away from her body as possible, extending her wand outward, and was trembling with her eyes tightly shut.
Even with the shield positioned as far from her body as possible in case of leakage or misfire, she was still shaking with her eyes closed. At this rate, even a real physical shield would not be able to properly block anything.
“You don’t need to physically hold the shield spell, but that posture is way too unstable. Are you okay?”
“I’m not okay! Just hurry up and do it!”
“Understood.”
The assistant instructor’s spell struck.
From the instructor’s perspective, they had cast a level 0 spell as gently as possible, aiming carefully so it would hit the shield and not harm Sennia.
But with a single strike, the shield was battered and torn apart, and part of the magic actually pierced through, spilling energy behind it.
“Aah! Th-this is murder! This is crazy, crazy! It went through! If I had been behind it, I would have died!”
“No, that’s because you’re closing your eyes… your concentration is dropping. This is a concentration-maintaining spell. You need focus.”
The assistant instructor, who seemed sleep-deprived, let out a sigh.
“Miss Sennia. Stop overreacting… and recast it.”
“Ah, I still have to keep doing this?”
“You’ve only been hit twice. I’m keeping the power as low as possible, so focus this time.”
The assistant instructor spoke and cast the spell again.
Seeing this, Sennia burst into tears and immediately recast her shield spell.
“Bang peh-yo! Bang peh-yo! Bang peh-yo!”
“Don’t waste your mana.
I told you, this is a concentration-maintaining spell.
You only need to maintain as much as your concentration can sustain.”
The assistant instructor, while trying to control her frightened student, cast her magic again.
Once more, the level 0 spell struck the shield and shattered it completely.
The problem was that Sennia wasn’t the only one behaving like this.
Most of the freshmen were crouched far away, eyes closed as they received spells, unable to maintain proper concentration, causing their shields to break far too easily.
“Most of them are like that. Just keeping your eyes open and watching the attack all the way through is already impressive. Hmm… as expected of a young lady from the ducal house of Zephyrus.”
Assistant Instructor Clarice, who was working with Idnia, turned to her with admiration.
“May I attack again?”
“By all means.”
“Then….”
Clarice cast her spell again. Flames, ice, lightning, water, poison—multiple arrows flew and struck Idnia’s shield, yet Idnia’s shield, cast only once, endured more than a dozen level 0 attacks from the assistant instructor.
Even so, the shield retained its brilliant shine without losing its luster.
“An overwhelming affinity for activation words. And your concentration at the moment of impact is precise. Your sustained focus is remarkable.”
Clarice was quietly impressed.
“If you can handle this easily, it might be better to move on to the next stage….”
Saying that, Clarice glanced toward Professor Larkias.
“…But Professor Larkias’s class is a bit… I’ll teach you some basic shape transformation and attribute transformation first.”
“Shape transformation?”
“You can change the form of the shield while maintaining its total volume. However, as the shape becomes more complex, it requires more concentration, making the shield harder to sustain. You should be careful with concentration consumption.
There are spells that require full, absolute focus, and others that only require intermittent mana management. Depending on the person, a spell that requires full concentration for one person might be treated as a supplemental concentration spell by another. It varies based on mental capacity. But in Idnia’s case….”
Idnia smoothly demonstrated transforming her shield.
“…Your concentration is extraordinary.”
“I’ve been doing logging.”
“Hmm? What does logging have to do with it?”
“Well….”
In the Duchy of Betelgeuse, Idnia had trained in the Overlord Secret Technique while also performing logging work.
At first, she had only the strength of an ordinary girl, and merely holding tools made her feel as though her hands would tear apart. But once she learned to concentrate, gather her aura, and control it, a new problem arose.
Her aura and immense strength would destroy the tools.
In particular, tools in this world were high-priced, premium-grade items, but even then they were inferior to cheap tools from Earth. Saws and axes would frequently break.
So before logging, Idnia would first bring her palms together, stabilize her aura, and concentrate. Then she would infuse aura into the tree to read its grain before swinging the axe with controlled force.
Concentrate and strike the tree. Concentrate and strike the tree.
At first, it took half a day to fell a single tree, and both her muscles and internal energy were exhausted beyond their limits.
However, as her concentration improved, she became able to fell massive trees with less force. Eventually, she could cut down a hundred trees before the sun passed its zenith.
After finishing a day’s worth of logging in the morning, she would train in martial arts and devote herself fully to managing other affairs within the territory.
“Perhaps the concentration improved as a side effect of training the Overlord Technique. It’s helpful for magic as well… concentration….”
Is that obvious?
There is nothing in the world that concentration wouldn’t help with….
Idnia realized that her concentration far surpassed that of her peers.
Assistant Instructor Clarice wrote something on a note and handed it to Idnia.
“Hmm, for the next step after shape transformation, I recommend finding these books in the library.
If you gain favor with Professor Larkias, the charm effect will become even stronger, so be careful.
Ah, the library hasn’t been unlocked yet since it’s still early in the semester.
The books I’ve listed here are available in the basic study library.”
After teaching shape transformation, the assistant instructor recommended reference books on defensive magic.
Professor Larkias was less like a professor and more like an indescribable, horrifying, blasphemous, inhuman entity.
Though his appearance was beautiful and alluring to humans, the fate of those who became captivated… was graduate students….
“Putting it that way almost sounds like we’re speaking badly about actual graduate students.”
Idnia calmly maintained her shield and glanced sideways at the other students’ situation.
Marie of Astraea, perhaps having received combat training from the church, was handling incoming level 0 spells quite well, as if she were dealing with divine magic.
At first, there had been concern due to her difficulty with shield magic, but once she was able to use magic, her vast mana allowed her to adapt quickly.
Truly, she was a genuine saint.
“Hm. But if that’s the case, wouldn’t it tarnish the reputation of the Archbishop of Betelgeuse who recommended me as a saint candidate? Still, I cannot reject the true saint just to preserve his dignity. I’m sorry, Archbishop.”
As Idnia was thinking this—
“Eek!”
A student panicked, crouched down, and withdrew their shield.
As a result, a magic projectile that had been traveling along the trajectory of the shield spell flew toward Isolde Polchen instead.
Most students, like Sennia Aspinal, had their wands extended outward and cast their shields from there. If the spell failed to counteract properly, it would slip through and threaten unintended targets.
“Ah?!”
“This is bad….”
The assistant instructor was shocked that their spell had gone off target, but upon seeing Isolde in its path, they relaxed slightly.
However, Isolde failed to notice the incoming projectile.
It came from her blind spot, and even for a gifted freshman like her, there was no way she could perceive it in time.
“Hup!”
Idnia immediately sprang forward, gripping her wand like a badminton racket and striking the incoming magic projectile out of the air.
Crack…
At that moment, the wand could not withstand Idnia’s grip strength and snapped.
“…Ah.”
Idnia looked at the broken wand in her hand, stunned.
“This is bad. I don’t have much money to begin with… and for a moment, the Overlord Technique slipped out a bit.”
As the suppressed Overlord Technique surged forth, her grip strength increased unexpectedly, and the wand broke under that force alone.
However….
“Hmm? This is….”
Professor Larkias, who had been standing with his eyes closed, suddenly looked startled.
“Overlord Yurik?”
Color flushed across Larkias’s face, and blood tears began streaming violently from his eyes.
Students nearby caught the scent and suddenly gasped.
“Gah?!”
“My heart….”
“What is this?!”
Assistant Instructor Clarice panicked.
“Emergency! Everyone evacuate the classroom!”
“Ghk!”
The assistant instructors immediately grabbed their pendants. They were anti-Larkias professor talismans sold at the shop….
Crackle!
The talismans began to burn away.
But the speed was no joke.
“Damn it, this academy! If you’re going to make something like this, at least make it reusable instead of consumable so you can keep selling it!”
“Because they need to make money?”
“Those bastards!”
“But I was the one who made them. As a part-time job.”
“Oh, sorry.”
The assistant instructors quickly ushered the freshmen out of the classroom and raised barriers to restrain Professor Larkias.
But Larkias walked forward while shedding tears, and with each step, dark red blood spread across the floor, easily shattering the barriers created by the assistants.
“Ah… Yurik… my beloved fleshling… where are you?”
Blood flowed from the wounds on his eyes and wings as Professor Larkias advanced, and the remaining freshmen who had not yet been evacuated began to approach him in a trance.
“Hah…”
“Ah… so fragrant…”
“I can’t resist….”
Drool spilled from the students’ mouths as they staggered forward like zombies craving the flesh of the living, moving toward Professor Larkias.
“This is bad! The freshmen are being enthralled!”
“No! If you go like that, you’ll become assistant instructors too!”
“…….”
“Now that you say it like that, doesn’t our situation sound really pitiful?”