Episode 361
Episode 361
"You shameless bastard. Now that the crisis is over, you're trying to weasel out of it?"
Lee Han stared at Rafael with disbelief.
"To think there's someone in this world with no conscience... Are you really a knight?"
Gainando also stared at Rafael as if he couldn't believe it. Rafael exploded and shouted.
"Who said I wouldn't pay it back?! I will! I said I will!"
"The more vehemently you deny it, the more suspicious you sound."
"Shut up!"
Rafael snapped at Gainando and turned away sharply.
"White Tiger Tower guys really have the worst tempers..."
"They'll even punch seniors if they get pissed off."
Hearing the murmurs of the Black Magic seniors, Lee Han paused.
He recalled the time he and Yumidihus had ambushed third-year seniors behind the mountain range to steal their belongings while learning Water Elemental Magic.
"...The White Tiger Tower students aren't that bad."
"Are you defending them just because they're your friends? How kind of you."
"But Wardanaz, how come a Blue Dragon Tower student gets along so well with White Tiger Tower kids?"
Lee Han answered with a practiced smile.
"We're all here to learn magic. Just because we're from different towers doesn't mean we have to fight."
"...Is this kid really an Einrogard student?"
"Strange, isn't it? Did the rules change this year?"
Lee Han had given the textbook-perfect answer, but it didn't work on the seniors.
Unfortunately, the seniors had already been thoroughly warped by their time at Einrogard.
'How unfortunate. They've all become twisted.'
Unlike himself—a perfectly normal person—Lee Han genuinely pitied the distorted seniors.
After Professor Mortum's long speech (which began with the tearful life story of a Black Mage and ended with the tragedy of the buried fortress steeped in the tears of countless Black Mages), the Black Magic students started their own conversations.
"I've been trying to summon a Hroekal lately, but it's tough. Probably because it's an undead that lives underwater."
"Undead in water are even harder. Their poison is strong, and they're difficult to defend against. What are you using as bait?"
"I've been throwing rotten meat, but this bastard just eats it and refuses to make a contract. Ugh. Maybe I should look for another undead type..."
"Senior Diret. Are you going to fifth year?"
"I'm still thinking. If I want to continue my current research, staying at Einrogard would be best."
Diret answered and then turned his gaze to Lee Han.
He'd been curious earlier but hadn't had the chance to ask.
"But junior... What's this about professors fighting in the streets...?"
"Senior Diret! I have a dilemma. Should I stay at Einrogard next year too?"
"...Should we talk about this separately later?"
"My original goal was to inherit the role of village gravekeeper. But at my current level, I could probably take over already, and my parents want me to come back and settle down... I could still do research there, but... Ugh. It's tough. Really."
Diret swallowed his frustration and tried to console the junior agonizing over his future.
"Think carefully about the magic research you want to pursue..."
"Senior. I got a suspicious offer recently. They're looking for a Black Mage skilled in Curse Magic, but they wouldn't say where the curse would be placed. Should I take it?"
"No. Never accept vague offers. Especially not as a Black Mage..."
"Senior. I'm short on silver coins right now because I need to buy a new wand, but I heard adventurers in Langyen are hiring Black Mages. Would it be okay to join them?"
'Interesting.'
Lee Han listened intently to the seniors' conversations.
Beside him, Gainando was playing Wizard Card with Emirg and getting pummeled so badly his face had turned pale.
"This... this is cheating, isn't it?! You cheated, didn't you?!"
"If... if I'd cheated, you would've lost way more miserably than this..."
"Lee Han! Lee Han! Be the judge! This isn't cheating, right?"
"Nope. You just lost because you're bad."
"You didn't even watch!"
Lee Han let Gaidnando's words go in one ear and out the other as he flicked his quill pen.
Professor Mortum, watching Lee Han scribble away intently, asked with evident puzzlement.
Cough. "Wardanaz. You're not taking any commissions over break, so why are you writing that down?"
"I am taking them, though?"
"......"
Professor Mortum gave Lee Han a look that plainly said, 'What a bizarre little creature.'
"I'm starting to see why the Headmaster likes you... Cough. You're alike, that's why."
"That's going too far...!"
Lee Han found himself shouting in indignation before he could stop himself.
Even for someone as emotionally controlled as Lee Han, this insult was hard to bear.
"Too far?"
"...You flatter me too much!"
"Is that so? Cough. I thought you might take offense... Though come to think of it, even accounting for that, Lord Gonadaltes is a Grand Archmage after all."
Professor Mortum seemed well acquainted with the Skeleton Principal's eccentric temperament.
'Well, anyone who spends time with him would have to know.'
It was the kind of personality you'd recognize even without eyes—no, even if you lacked eyes entirely.
Cough. "If you enjoy working during breaks... There's an Overlap Phenomenon coming up soon. How about participating in that?"
"Professor?!"
The upperclassmen from the Black Magic department were more shocked than Lee Han.
"Professor! He's a first-year!"
"If he's a first-year who faced the Frost Giant King and lived... Cough. Then there's no issue with him participating."
"The Frost Giant King?!"
"Why would a first-year face that... how could he even... Is Einrogard insane...? Well, it was always insane, but..."
As the underclassmen buzzed with disbelief, Diret ducked his head in embarrassment, hiding behind his wings.
He swore to himself that once they got back to school, he'd bury Coholti and Kumandas upside down in the graveyard!
"By 'Overlap,' do you mean when planes converge?"
"Exactly. Wow, you're really something."
One of the seniors chimed in with admiration.
Normally, for mages to visit other planes, they needed highly complex spells.
The magic circles set up by Professor Millet, who taught Summoning Magic, might look simple, but they contained profound wisdom.
Even after visiting, there were considerable restrictions. After all, forcibly visiting a world that wasn't your own was no small feat.
But there were moments when those means and restrictions disappeared—when the opposing dimension overlapped and merged with this one.
Lee Han connected the dots.
'Like when the Frost Giant King appeared.'
Back then, the upper corridors of Einrogard were both the school and not the school.
The Frost Giants' dimension had overlapped, spreading blade-like cold throughout the surroundings.
This phenomenon could also occur with the Undead plane.
"Recently, we found a spot where the Undead plane will soon overlap. The mana there is incredibly dense."
"If it's dense, shouldn't it be dispersed?"
Lee Han asked, recalling his experience during the graveyard keeper commission.
Dense mana meant anomalies were more likely to occur.
"In principle, yes, but when it's accumulated to that degree, it'd be a shame to just disperse it. That's an opportunity too."
"......"
Lee Han gave the seniors a suspicious look.
Realizing his unspoken question, they hastily explained.
"It's all permitted by the Empire!"
"Oh. In that case..."
Professor Mortum coughed and continued the explanation.
"For black mages, an Undead plane overlap is a golden opportunity."
"A chance to contract with a powerful summon?"
"Huh?"
The gathered black mages reacted with surprise to Lee Han's words.
"Hahaha. You don't just barge in and contract with a powerful summon like that. You need preliminary research."
"With lower-level summons, you could just barge in and scour the area, but renowned and powerful undead won't yield to such brute force methods."
First, you had to gather information about the undead—how to make contact, what kind of contracts were possible—and meticulously research every detail.
'Is Perkuntra not that powerful, then?'
"There's something more important than contracts."
"What...?"
"Everything."
Professor Mortum took a sip of juice and continued.
"The soil, the bones embedded in it, the mushrooms growing from those bones, the insects feeding on those mushrooms, the trees those insects thrive on... Everything in the Undead Realm is valuable material and reagent. Cough. Normally, there are many restrictions, making collection difficult, but during an overlap, it's a different story."
"Of course, you can't just haul everything back. You need a discerning eye."
"If you're really lucky, a single find could let you lounge around for a whole year."
"!"
Lee Han's eyes sparkled with sudden interest.
"It's that valuable?"
"Yes. Most of what you find are reagents only black mages use, but occasionally, there are reagents for other mages or materials nobles covet. Those fetch exorbitant prices. Senior Diret here is legendary. In his second year, he found Fire-repelling Herb..."
Lee Han gazed at Diret with several times more reverence than usual.
Diret, however, was more baffled than pleased.
'Is he looking at me like that just for this?'
"...Anyway, even if it seems appealing, entering an overlapping Undead Realm is quite dangerous. Unless you're a black mage who knows how to handle undead, it's tough. First-years usually struggle, but..."
"As the professor mentioned, if given the opportunity, I'll do my best."
At Lee Han's words, the seniors nodded.
Above all, if Professor Mortum vouched for it, there was no reason to stop him.
"Are you really sure about this...?"
"By the way, what happened to the Frost Giant King? The one from that blizzard incident?"
"I thought Senior Coholti handled it after getting an earful."
Listening in, Lee Han suddenly grew curious and asked,
"Speaking of which, seniors... Have any of you heard about, say, basilisks, or the Taoist mage families, or ghouls... or anything like that?"
"Huh? I just got back three days ago."
"I don't really go around town much."
"I just read books in my dorm—did something happen?"
Lee Han was moved.
Few people were as unpretentious and easygoing as black mages!
"...I really don't say things like this normally. I hope you don't misunderstand."
Yoanen spoke cautiously.
"Aren't you taking on too much right now?"
"Huh? Am I?"
Lee Han, who had been carefully melting a pale white metal with green flames to extract it, looked up in surprise.
"Actually, with the professors not around, I thought the past few weeks have been relatively relaxed..."
"...Right. Let's just keep extracting."
When faced with someone even more obsessive, people tend to feel relatively sane by comparison.
Normally, Yoanen would have told an assistant, "Let's focus on work," but...
'Honestly, I'm curious!'
Just from what he'd heard directly from Lee Han, there was magic study, work at Puyo's staff workshop, the planned visit to the Undead Realm—and if rumors were to be believed, everything from the professors' midday brawl to the subjugation of the Ghoul King.
Yoanen was usually someone who never let distractions interfere with work, but this time, even his nonexistent curiosity was piqued.
"Should we stop here? We could call the alchemists from the workshop and have a meal—"
"Ah. There are impurities in the composition. We'll have to redo it."
"...Isn't this good enough?"
It was the kind of statement that would have made Yoner faint in shock, but Lee Han shook his head.
"No."
"We could always finish after eating—"
"No. That would just waste the extraction."
Yoanen briefly glared at his past self for having taught Lee Han so thoroughly.
Then he stepped back and called a servant.
"Hey?"
"Yes, Lady Yoanen."
"Fetch Yoner."