6. John Armstrong
6. John Armstrong
I got my ass kicked.
The Archbishop of the War God's Shrine was stronger than I'd expected.
Might've even put up a good fight against my father.
Afterward, I negotiated while pressing the ice the War Archbishop had brought me against my solar plexus.
Since the War God's Shrine had struck first this time and the fault lay entirely with them, the negotiations went in my favor.
The settlement covered the automatic-door repairs, everything broken in the fight, and my medical expenses.
Once the negotiations were done, I asked what had become of Skadi.
"Ah. You mean her. She resurrected at the Central Fountain this time. At least there she only gets a bit wet—it shouldn't cause any lasting trauma."
Honestly, compared with resurrecting in a sewer, that was practically a blessing.
Afterward, I said my goodbyes to the Archbishop and returned to my own temple.
"Oh, damn."
When I returned to the temple, the Archbishop possessed by Rictus was prostrating himself on a scorching griddle.
*
Three years passed.
I entered the academy at the same time as my coming-of-age ceremony, feeling as though I were starting university.
Hetairo Academy.
A world-class institution that boasted an illustrious history and tradition, or so they said. I didn't know about any of that—I just wanted to go home.
The problem was that this academy was selective, with an entrance exam and everything.
"Hey. I've always wondered—why the hell do academies make you go through these complicated exams?"
"People flock here from all over the world. It can't be helped. Besides, our ancestors worked themselves to the bone building this place up precisely so it could grow this large."
A tall, handsome blond young man answered my complaint.
Thanks to His Highness the Prince reminding me of our empire's glorious history, my dissatisfaction with the entrance exam vanished entirely.
Since Sanctuaries appeared and full-scale warfare ceased, nations around the world sought to display their strength by producing talent.
Not wanting to lose its continental hegemony, the Empire rolled out a radical policy: it developed an entire island for the academy campus and permitted enrollment regardless of nationality or status.
The Empire was so serious that it even secured the cooperation of the Magic Towers to build teleport terminals connecting the academy to locations all over the world.
But what did any of that have to do with me?
"... Still, don't you think it's a bit much that I have to stand here and watch this farce with my own two eyes?"
"I sympathize, but you can't exactly step forward and proudly declare you're John, can you."
"God damn it..."
We were currently taking the one-on-one sparring test, one of the entrance exam subjects.
The problem was that the students before me had picked up somewhere the bizarre combination of <crossbow + close-quarters combat> and were clumsily bringing it to the matches.
"Stop! What did you even learn from the films?! John's joint locks are not this sluggish. Did you watch them properly?!"
"I'm sorry!"
The problem was that the instructor was actually correcting them.
"Man. I'm seriously going to die of embarrassment."
"Hold it in. If you die of embarrassment over this, how are you going to handle classes from now on? I heard they established a John-style Combat course starting last year."
"That didn't get canceled?!"
"They say it is a popular course." "Gyaaah!"
I had not realized it at the time, but in this goddamn fantasy world, films were more than entertainment.
Films were educational materials, cultural texts, and video lectures in themselves.
"Now that I think about it, the last eight problems on today's theory exam were about the John Armstrong Series too."
"What?!"
I was not bright and ran out of time halfway through. Who knew those questions were about John?!
If I had started at the end, I could have gotten those points for free!
As I clutched my head and sank to my knees, the instructor called my name.
"Exam number 1796, Allen Price! Enter the sparring floor!"
I trudged toward the center of the sparring floor.
"Are you also using John-style combat?"
"No."
Honestly, practically every martial art I performed was probably John-style combat, but I didn't bother splitting hairs.
Besides, showing the original techniques in a place this packed would pretty much be advertising 'I'm John,' so I had no intention of showing them.
"Then tell me your school, and I'll face you accordingly."
As befitted the world's finest academy, the instructor was someone with knowledge of practically every martial school.
I didn't decline his offer and named my family's martial art.
"Price-style Practical Combat Technique."
"Price style...? Ah, are you William Price's second son? I am sorry. I did not recognize you immediately."
"Ha ha. It's fine. Sparring must always be fair, and I deliberately didn't make it obvious."
In a modern society, this would've been a conversation that drew accusations of admissions fraud or something similar, but no one batted an eye.
In a fantasy world where bloodlines and hereditary martial arts could overturn the course of a war, a family name was a legitimate ability.
I took a deep breath and entered a combat stance.
As I inhaled and exhaled, concentrating mana into my fingertips, the sensation of an electric current flowing through my blood vessels arose.
Price-style Practical Combat Technique—the Price style for short—was a martial art derived from our family's unique constitution.
Members of the Price Family can project magic at the blood-vessel level, allowing them to cloak their entire bodies in magic without incantations.
However, cloaking magic was still an academic discipline in the end, so the power of the magic I could cloak was... a bit lacking.
Even that I'd learned by taking hits and memorizing it with my body, following the family maxim that you absorb it through getting beaten up.
Anyway, I wrapped lightning around my fist and glared at the instructor.
The moment he saw the lightning on my fist, the instructor seemed to understand the Price style's strength and didn't approach recklessly.
In general, magic equivalent to a finishing move consumed large amounts of mana, so it was only used at the decisive moment when the opponent couldn't dodge.
But the Price style could hold magic in the body until it struck the opponent, so you could swing finishing moves as freely as basic techniques.
Thanks to this trait, once you closed the gap to arm's reach, Price-style martial arts could beat down an opponent with near-overwhelming dominance.
The downside was that it had no specific gap-closing technique, so I had to close the distance on my own two legs, and even then I had to launch a relentless offensive with the aim of putting my opponent down before I ran out of stamina. That made it extremely exhausting.
In short, it was a one-on-one martial art built around one principle: I'd wreck the other guy before I ran out of steam.
Tap!
In an instant I closed the distance with the instructor and threw a jab to probe.
I mixed uppercuts and hooks between the jabs, but the instructor handled them with ease.
From there, a one-sided offensive continued.
This was the first time since sparring began in Examination Hall 6 that the instructor was only dodging, and the watching students let out murmurs of admiration.
But I didn't let their admiration make me arrogant.
This man had definitely fought my father before.
If he'd been someone who'd never experienced the Price style, he would have tried to block one of the trickier attacks and been badly hurt.
But the instructor somehow twisted his body and dodged every single attack.
The fact that he could dodge everything meant he knew this martial art.
The occasional counters he slipped in showed that he still had plenty of breathing room.
I saw that as an opportunity instead.
If he knew the Price style, he had no choice but to be vulnerable to modified variations of it.
Once more, an uppercut.
Naturally, the instructor slipped his jaw past the trajectory and moved toward my back.
He was trying to exploit the inevitable opening that appears right after an uppercut—but that was exactly what I'd been aiming for.
Normally, an uppercut would leave your body leaning forward, creating a large window.
But since I knew he'd dodge, I deliberately didn't put power into the uppercut, so my body didn't lean and was ready to transition into the next stance immediately.
With my back to him, I stomped hard and shoved him with my shoulder and back.
"Wh—?"
Ah, yes. This is called the 'Iron Mountain Strike.'
Getting hit by it felt wonderful.
The instructor's feet left the ground.
I sprinted at full speed toward the instructor, now floating in the air.
Thinking this would be my only chance to land a blow, I charged right up to his nose, stomped hard again, threw my upper body's center of mass forward, and thrust with all my strength.
"Oo-ah!"
<Bung Fist>
The moment my fist connected, I was certain I had won.
The instant I felt the sensation at the tip of my fist, I was certain of victory.
Yes.
It should have been a win.
"...Is this a bug?"
The instructor planted his feet in midair and slipped away from my Bung Fist.
Lightly and nimbly, he stepped and settled into a stance in midair.
"Fuck! Fucking fantasy! How can a person step in midair?!!!!"
My indignation was cut short.
The moment the instructor's heel gently touched my temple, my consciousness ended right there.
*
An unfamiliar ceiling.
I had not moved to another world again. I had simply become the infirmary's first patient of the year.
"You awake?"
"My head's still ringing..."
I wasn't exaggerating—my vision was genuinely shaking.
Getting kicked in the temple with a combat boot, it was only natural.
"The instructor asked me to tell you he was sorry. To make amends, he will give you full marks on the sparring test and bonus points on the written exam."
"He can do that?"
"You're in the Hero Department anyway. The Hero Department mainly cares about sparring and the interview, so they said it's fine."
"Oh. That is a win."
Still, getting kicked in the head with a combat boot was an experience I only needed once.
Even in my past life I'd never been kicked in the head with a combat boot, and now that I'd finally experienced it, I felt strangely annoyed.
I shot upright!
I sprang energetically from the bed and gathered the things neatly laid out on the desk beside me.
Though "personal belongings" just meant a knife and a pistol.
"You're a fist-fighter, so why do you only grab a knife and a pistol and not a gauntlet?"
"My family's secret techniques can only be used without a gauntlet, so I've got no choice. And carrying backup weapons never hurts."
"That's true."
Leon nodded.
"Right, what'd you do about your test? You can't use Imperial martial arts."
"Don't worry about that. I'm in the Political Science Department anyway, so the sparring score doesn't count. I forfeited and left."
Imperial martial arts were the royal family's last resort for protecting themselves, so they were a top-level secret.
They couldn't possibly be revealed for a mere entrance exam, so Leon's handling of it was admirable.
"But there were some kids in our department who stuck it out through the sparring to the end, you know."
"Why? Do they use combat strength to establish departmental rankings these days?"
Sparring didn't count toward the score, but occasionally students in the Political Science Department who wanted to gauge their own combat power would check it this way.
However, Leon flatly denied my prediction.
"It's not that, it's John—"
"Stop! Don't finish that! I get it!"
I'm genuinely a sinner.
John here, John there, John everywhere.
It would've been one thing if John came up just often enough for me to feel proud. At this point, it only made me recoil.
Even back home all I heard was John John John—it was getting to the point of a neurosis.
But Leon only found my reaction entertaining.
"You're up now, so head straight to the interview hall. They said to send you over the moment you woke up."
"Huh? How long was I out?"
"Two hours."
"Yikes."
Fortunately, thanks to the consideration of the instructor who'd knocked me out, my interview time had been pushed back.
I left the infirmary and went to the interview check-in desk, where they fitted my turn in among the other applicants.
"Exam number 1796. Candidate Allen. Please proceed to the interview room."
I steadied my pounding heart with a deep breath and grasped the doorknob.
Knock, knock.
- Come in.
Carefully, carefully.
Being mindful not to let my usual habit of kicking doors open slip out, I slowly opened the door.
After checking that I'd closed it properly behind me, I greeted them and sat before the interviewers.
"Allen Price, correct?"
"Yes! That's right!"
Start strong.
The Hero Department interviewers seemed pleased with my resounding answer and began the interview, nodding as they did.
I answered the pressure interview without hesitation as each interviewer scribbled on a scoring sheet.
The Hero Department interview had more questions testing morality and judgment than knowledge.
"Let's assume a situation where your allies are being pushed back on the central front line. If you withdraw, that front will collapse and your nation will suffer heavy damage. But if you request fire support while accepting the risk of being caught in the bombardment, you can hold the line. In this situation, what would you choose?"
"Are you asking whether I would call for Danger Close?"
"Yes."
In my previous life, I would have called for Danger Close without hesitation.
For a soldier, the mission must be accomplished no matter what.
"I would withdraw."
"Why?"
"Because I am not a soldier now. A Hero protects people. A Hero must focus on protecting them rather than merely completing the mission."
My answer must have been satisfactory, because that interviewer asked no further questions.
As if he had completely grasped who I was.
The remaining interviewers' questions were also things I'd experienced in my past life, so they weren't particularly difficult.
Then the final interviewer remained.
The one who had kept his mouth shut while everyone else asked their questions only opened his when he was the sole questioner left.
"Greetings, young Allen. I am Charles, an insignificant knight from the Leven Kingdom."
"It is an honor to meet you, Sir Charles."
I'd heard of him.
He was renowned even in the neighboring knightly kingdom of Leven.
He was also the president of my fan club.
"I reviewed your answer sheet, young Allen, and noticed that you left only the final eight questions unanswered."
No way.
"Was there, by chance, a reason you left unanswered only the questions concerning the John Armstrong Series?"
Damn it. Why were they doing this to me?