22. Special Entrance Exam
22. Special Entrance Exam
At the moment the poor girl used magic, I confirmed the activation of a spell somewhere in the room that erased emitted Mana.
It wasn't that there was a person there.
Which meant there had to be a Magic Circle somewhere.
I kept the Basilisk, closing in by the second, in my sight and darted my eyes around.
Finding it didn't take long. It was inscribed all over the room.
The floor, to be precise.
There was a Magic Circle large enough to cover the whole area.
With something like that in place, it would definitely be brutal for a new student.
Sword Energy, magic, arrows wrapped in Mana—all of it would become meaningless.
Just look beside me right now.
"U-Uh, wh-what, what... what do we do? M-My magic... hic, f-first, let's just run. W-We'll rethink the plan..."
There was a poor girl trembling and tugging at my sleeve.
It wasn't as if there was no way to overcome it.
Judging by what was drawn on the floor and the way the poor girl's magic vanished, it erased Mana of up to Tier 3 or 3rd Circle.
That meant it was possible if I produced output above that.
Asking new students, mere 17-year-old brats, to do that was absurd, but considering the name "special exam" and its various benefits, I supposed it was fitting.
The Six Pillars of the Empire were said to have overcome these conditions and subjugated one at just 17.
I was looking forward to seeing how strong they were.
"Hey! Hey! Hurry, hurry, get over here! We're gonna die!! I said we're gonna die!! I-I... I can't do anything at all!!"
By then, the poor girl had nearly sunk to the ground.
No tears were falling, but tears pooled at the corners of her eyes, ready to fall at any second.
And yet she didn't run off alone; she kept trying to drag me with her. It was admirable.
She was sharp-tongued yet kind.
She acted as if she had weathered every storm in the world, but she was surprisingly innocent.
For a Wizard, she didn't even think about practicality.
The more I looked at her, the more unpleasant memories came to mind.
But she also had enough good qualities to outweigh all that.
I snickered at the poor girl's face.
"It's fine."
"You crazy bitch! It's not fine!!"
I placed a macaron on the hand of the sobbing, trembling girl.
"You're still a damn kid. What're you gonna do with so little fight in you? Back in my day, I'd have smacked your ass flat, brat."
The girl's face twisted.
She plopped down on the spot as though she couldn't even scream anymore.
But her hand was still holding my sleeve.
"M-My butt...? I don't care what you do to my butt, so please... please, let's run... okay? I'll somehow buy us time..."
"Forget it. Sit here and watch closely."
I gently loosened her hand.
"I'll finish before you finish eating that."
I turned my head and looked ahead.
I could see the Basilisk crawling toward me, letting out a cry with that peculiar low-frequency roar of a predator.
A huge body, and fangs as tall as I was.
The flames burning in its maw heated my skin, and its vertically slit pupils were horrifying enough to trigger primal terror.
But not for me.
It wasn't enough to make me flinch.
It was so pitiful and weak that comparing it to the Basilisks I had faced before would be embarrassing.
Still, this was for the kids, so they must have lowered the difficulty.
So, I wouldn't lose.
I would win, no matter what.
I drew up my Mana. In the gloomy Labyrinth, a pink energy rippled as if cherry blossoms had bloomed. But it vanished before it could travel far.
It didn't vanish because of the Magic Circle.
It vanished because of me.
To be precise, all the Mana was absorbed into my body.
I clenched my fist and stepped forward.
My steps were light. There was no hesitation. A fitting mix of tension and excitement added speed to my advance.
I twisted the corner of my mouth upward, running countless scenarios through my head.
Before long, the Basilisk's jaws opened as if to belch fire.
Crack—
They immediately closed.
A look of surprise flickered in the Basilisk's eyes.
"...Huh?"
A stupid question slipped from the poor girl's lips as well when she saw the cute little footprint stamped on the Basilisk's jaw.
"There was no need to recreate that shitty mouth stench too. Ugh."
Frowning at the foul stench, I lowered the leg I had kicked upward and charged.
The Basilisk reacted instantly. It writhed its long body and raised its head.
But I was faster.
Already mounted on top of its head, I roughly stomped down on the head as it rose beneath my feet.
Crunch—! With a dull sensation, its head dropped toward the ground.
With its support gone, my body floated into the air. I yielded to the dizzying weightlessness. I tilted my body forward and clenched my fist hard.
The pink light that had bloomed inside my body gathered in my fist.
Like scattering cherry blossom petals, my descending fist left behind the remnants of spring and drove into the Basilisk's head.
A hard, tingling sensation traveled up my fist. Blood flowed from the scraped skin of my fist, but the corners of my lips rose at a proper sensation I had never felt before.
"Heh."
Thump— Thump— Thump— Feeling my racing heartbeat, I seized the Basilisk's horn with both hands.
Bracing my left foot extended forward, I twisted my right foot inward. A taut, springy tension ran up my waist. Following it, I snapped out my neatly folded knee.
Craaack—!
My knee, sharply extended like a vigorously thrust spear, struck the Basilisk's horn. Countless fine cracks formed. I raised the hands that had been wrenching the horn.
[KKKKKKKKKKKKAAAAAAAAAAA―!]
The Basilisk screamed as if in agony. Its scream added to my strength. The fine cracks became gaps, the gaps widened, and I broke the horn.
The broken horn was held in both hands. I slammed down the right foot that had not yet touched the ground—thud!—and drove the horn, now held in a reverse grip, into the Basilisk's skull.
Crunch—
It tore through scales, split hide, crushed bone.
It reached the deepest place. The squishy brain.
The Basilisk, bleeding from its eyes and drooling from its mouth, thrashed. An ominous light shot from the eye visible beneath my feet.
If I had been alone it wouldn't have mattered, but in its path the poor girl sat frozen in fear.
With no choice, I jumped down from its head, planted both hands on the ground as if doing a handstand, and kicked both legs upward.
With a satisfying rebound, both my feet struck the Basilisk's jawbone.
Because of that, its head turned toward the sky. Its petrifying Evil Eye activated. The thick gray ray struck somewhere completely different from the poor girl's position.
The macaron rolled from the poor girl's hand at the sight. Before that macaron hit the ground, my body was already on top of the Basilisk.
I ran immediately. The Basilisk thrashed like mad to shake off the small human on its body, but it did no good.
Its scales became footholds, and the small horns sprouting from its back became handholds. Most crucially, it had no hands.
All that massive torso had was a single head.
A body like that was just like a neatly laid-out carpet.
So I ran.
My pink twintails streamed behind me. Before long, I reached its head, seized a sharp scale, and struck down the horn embedded in its skull.
Boom—! Cherry-blossom-colored Mana scattered, and the horn was driven even deeper.
[KKKKKKKKKrrr...]
A feeble scream leaked from its mouth.
The head that had been held so arrogantly sank. Its head finally touched the ground. But its thrashing didn't stop.
The tail trailing behind it shot up in an instant and came crashing down toward where I stood.
There was no way I would just stand there and take it.
Lightly, I jumped off its body.
Tap— Unlike me, who landed lightly,
Boom! Its tail crashed down hard and struck its own head.
"Pfft..."
With a sneer, I gathered Mana in my fist.
I threw my fist at the terror-filled yellow eye right in front of me. —Splat! My dainty fist burrowed into its eyeball. A disgusting sensation, like shoving my hand into a huge jelly, wrapped around my arm.
Inside, I spread my hand. I bared my nails and tore through it. Each time, pain-stained screams and thrashing followed, but my other hand slammed its jaw and my legs kicked it into submission.
Like that, once. Twice. Three times.
Around the time the Basilisk's left jawbone crumbled beyond recognition, I pulled out the arm that had been buried in its eye.
Splat! Stringy optic nerves, an eyeball crushed like chewed-up and spat-out jelly, and blood splattered across the floor.
Even so, it was still breathing.
I pondered how to finish it.
It would die if left alone, but I needed to kill it a bit more decisively to prove my skill.
My fist was still weak.
So, I would finish it with my feet.
"Hoo..."
I steadied my breath and shifted my weight onto my left foot.
"Hey. Scrub."
Then I called the poor girl.
"Uh, huh...?"
"Watch closely. This is my spear."
The poor girl, tears streaming down, murmured with trembling lips.
"...You really are like a crazy bitch..."
Whether she said that or not, I drew up my Mana.
Fully formed cherry-blossom-colored Mana rippled around me. The Mana, spreading fresh as if carrying the scent of spring, gathered in my leg.
When I thought it had gathered to the limit.
I twisted my left foot. I bent and twisted my waist. For momentum, I drew a full moon with both elbows.
My upper body, leaning forward, rotated.
At the same time, I drove out my right foot.
The Basilisk's head burst.
*****
For a while, I teased the poor girl—who was still hiccup-sobbing and couldn't even get up—by feeding her the completely crumbled macaron.
"Hey..."
The poor girl, finally done crying, looked at me. Sniffling with red, swollen eyelids and a bright-red nose, she spoke.
"So... was this place actually a fake Labyrinth like you said...?"
"What the hell is a 'real fake Labyrinth'? Pick one."
"Noo! I was asking whether this place was a fake Labyrinth!"
"Isn't it obvious? If it had been a real Basilisk, I wouldn't have caught it this quickly. I wouldn't have been able to pop its head either."
"Then, even if it was real, you still would've caught it... is what you're saying?"
"Who knows."
I'd catch it no matter what.
At my ambiguous answer, the poor girl, who had been staring at me for a while, shook her head and started a strange breathing exercise.
"Hah... hoo... hap!"
When her third deep breath followed.
The girl sprang to her feet.
"...Thanks."
Knowing another rude remark would come next anyway, I didn't answer and got to my feet.
And sure enough, just as I expected, an extremely rude remark came out.
"But you stink. Go away."
"I'll wring that little— ugh, damn it."
"Ugh... Hey! Fix that habit of yours with your hands!"
"You fix that mouth of yours, you damn girl. You've got a mouth that's just perfect for dying on the road."
"If you stink, you say you stink. What, should I say you don't? And your mouth is way worse than mine, you know?"
"You're impossible. Hold still. I'm gonna shove your face inside a Basilisk's skull. Get over here. Come here, you bitch."
"Urgh..."
As if she had actually imagined that happening, the poor girl dry-heaved.
Of course, I really had intended to do that.
So I grabbed the poor girl by the forearm.
Whoosh—!
A fresh wind blew in and carried away the Basilisk filth and sweat that had been on my body.
And all the wounds on my fist were healed completely.
"Oh? What's this? Cleanse and Heal?"
"That's right. It's the perfect magic for a nasty-smelling chimp—no, Martial Artist like you."
There was clearly a Magic Circle here that dispersed magic.
Even so, the poor girl had used magic.
That meant that in under two minutes, she had figured out a hole in the Magic Circle and increased her Mana output.
I couldn't hold back a hollow laugh that escaped on its own.
This kid's a real genius.
Of course, I didn't say that out loud.
"A scrub like you can use magic like this?"
"Hey! I'm not a scrub!"
Then, with a saucy "Hmph!" she clack-clacked over to the Basilisk's corpse.
"They say the Monsters in the special exam carry artificially made Mana Stones. Taking one will be our proof of passing."
"I know."
Actually, I had forgotten.
"Eliarnes Eustetia."
"What."
The poor girl, who had been rummaging through the Basilisk's corpse and now held the artificial Mana Stone in her hand.
"My name is Stella."
She said her name with a bright smile.
"Not 'scrub'—Stella Verheigen. That's my name. Remember it. If you call me 'scrub' again, I really won't let it slide."
Hearing that name, I laughed too.
"Hah..."
I laughed because I was dumbfounded.
-Ronan. My name is not "magic-shitter." Please remember it clearly.
-The name that will remain as the greatest Wizard in history.
-Kaloso.
-I am Kaloso Verheigen.