Episode 504

Episode 504

‘Wait a minute.’

Lee Han shuddered at a sudden ominous thought.

No way?

“Is this by any chance a senior-only event?”

It was an event for students learning transmutation magic, but if none of Lee Han’s friends knew about it…

…Wasn’t this a seniors-only event?

Professor Voladi briefly showed a look that said he had never considered Lee Han’s question.

“I think so.”

“I feel like that should have been the first thing to check… Did Professor Reji accept readily?”

The professor gave a slight nod.

‘He didn’t threaten Professor Reji with his sword, did he?’

Lee Han was slightly suspicious.

Among the professors, Professor Reji was on the timidly weak side.

Even if Professor Voladi had pointed his sword and threatened, resulting in a ‘Please participate!’, it wouldn’t have been strange.

“Professor. Now that I think about it, even if Professor Reji agreed readily, wouldn’t the seniors find it unpleasant?”

Students at Einrogard tended to be subtly exclusive.

Didn’t even the White Tiger Tower students get pettily angry when Lee Han broke into their dorm?

Just as students had useless pride in the towers they belonged to, so it must be for the schools of magic.

And even within the schools of magic.

‘If a first-year junior keeps poking around, the seniors would probably find it unpleasant.’

A protruding stone inevitably gets struck.

Unless it was a unique, understaffed school like healing or dark magic, no one liked underclassmen being pushy.

“Were you worried about that? It’s fine.”

“Oh. The seniors said they’re fine with it?”

“I meant I’d admonish any student who was displeased.”

“……”

Lee Han glanced at the sword Professor Voladi wore at his side.

‘He’s not going to admonish them by stabbing with his sword, is he?’

“…I’ll just do my best to make a good impression on the seniors.”

Professor Voladi patted Lee Han on the shoulder, as if he was admirable.

The basilisk let out a noise, as if displeased.

• * *

The snake biting its own tail, the Ouroboros, was a beloved being in alchemy and transmutation magic.

As it symbolized eternal cycle, the wizards of both schools could only love it.

Thus, the event for transmutation wizards was also named -Ouroboros Day-.

Sssnap!

A whip in the hand of a student transformed into a snake and wrapped around another student’s wrist.

Even though a snake coiled around their wrist, the student didn’t panic at all. Calmly chanting a spell, the snake’s fangs turned to cotton.

Bang!

The student, with their wrist tied, struck the floor with a staff, and suddenly the floor quivered and changed into a swamp.

Losing balance, the student dropped the snake whip and staggered. They hastily tried to turn the swamp into solid earth, but the spell failed and it turned to honey.

“I lost.”

“It was a good match.”

The student who got up holding their friend’s hand looked around at the other transmutation wizards gathered in the auditorium.

-Ouroboros Day- sounded grand, but the rules were actually simple.

It was a day to show each one’s achievements using only transmutation magic. Events like these were common in other magical schools as well.

Magic duels using only transmutation, presentations of newly researched transmutation spells, exhibitions of rare monsters’ peculiar transmutative abilities, and so on.

“Stop fooling around and come here, everyone. We have to prevent the outsiders from causing trouble.”

“I don’t want to deal with outsiders, can’t we get the death knight to do it…?”

“No. Suck it up.”

Einrogard’s transmutation students scowled at the outsiders bustling about in the auditorium.

Inviting outside wizards to such events was a given, and treating them as hosts was also natural.

But the students really hated these basic things.

It wasn’t that the external wizards were unpleasant or rude.

Nor was it because they had mountains of assignments piling up.

It was just…

They simply really didn’t want to do it.

“Want to make the loser at rock-paper-scissors do it?”

“Hello!! Einrogard students!!”

“Ugh.”

Pop!

A transmutation wizard from outside approached, showing off a race-changing spell.

A classic trick often shown by transmutation wizards, transforming one’s own race.

The spell itself wasn’t particularly special, but it was a great icebreaker for greetings or starting conversations.

Evidently hyped up, the wizard transformed from elf to human, human to dog beastfolk, and from dog beastfolk to orc.

Then looked at the students with expectant eyes. They apparently thought the students would respond by showing something as well.

“……”

“……”

But the students’ reaction was the opposite of what was expected.

They fidgeted and avoided eye contact.

“???”

“……”

“……”

“Umm, did I make a mistake or something?”

“N-n-no!”

“N-nice to meet you! Nice to meet you!”

“Ah… okay.”

The transmutation wizard retreated, looking sheepish.

The students looked at each other with faces full of self-loathing.

“You were supposed to answer! You were closer!”

“No, I looked at you. You should’ve answered!”

There were exceptions, but most transmutation wizards tended to have cheerful and sociable personalities.

Perhaps that had something to do with the nature of transmutation magic.

But the students majoring in transmutation at Einrogard were a bit unusual.

They were very…

Introverted.

“Enough, everyone. Ah. I should have studied dark magic…”

“I-I feel a bit queasy, give me another potion.”

“No. If you take too much confidence potion, you’ll become a complete delinquent.”

The transmutation magic students desperately wished for the event to end quickly and for the outsiders to leave, so that they could freely chat about magic among themselves.

“It’s Professor Muje!”

“What? Professor Muje?”

The students turned their heads.

The truly crazy professor was really coming in, bringing a first-year student.

“What’s he thinking?”

“I heard he took a disciple…”

“Isn’t he shadowing him to make sure he can’t run away?”

“No way, but… it’s possible.”

But that didn’t answer all their questions.

Why on earth would he bring a first-year to this kind of event?

No matter how you looked at it, it seemed like pointless bullying.

“Why did Professor Reji allow it?”

“He’s supposed to be very talented. Heard from a dark magic friend that he’s from the Wardanaz family.”

“You don’t really believe those rumors about Wardanaz? Wardanaz is just a regular grand noble family. It’s not some family that teaches secret techniques to five-year-olds.”

“They’re not exactly ordinary…”

While the students mumbled in the corner, Lee Han entered, walking together with Professor Voladi.

Transmutation wizards from outside were showing off various things (one wizard had turned his arm into a swarm of bats and received applause), Professor Reji was fielding questions in the center, and the seniors…

‘Aren’t visible?’

As Lee Han wondered about not seeing any seniors, he soon realized.

“Professor. Uh… Shouldn’t the headmaster’s constraint be lifted during events like this?”

He knew the skeleton headmaster put perception-disrupting curses on the seniors, but didn’t he occasionally lift them when necessary?

And now was precisely such a time.

If a first-year participated in this kind of event and couldn’t even talk to the seniors…

“Why would I?”

“……”

“Ah. Lee Han.”

Professor Reji saw Lee Han and gestured him over. Then he spoke quietly.

“I’m sorry. I couldn’t refuse the request.”

“That happens.”

Lee Han understood.

Even if Professor Voladi hadn’t threatened with his sword, he probably still intimidated with it strapped at his side.

“I’m really sorry.”

“…No, it’s really fine.”

Now that Professor Reji was apologizing this much, Lee Han actually felt awkward.

It was the professor who dragged him here who was at fault, not the one who allowed it.

“Still, the wizards attending this event are all outstanding transmutation specialists, so there’s much to learn if you…”

“Let’s go.”

While they were chatting, Professor Voladi, who had disappeared to somewhere, suddenly returned.

“Where to?”

“Permission has been granted.”

Professor Voladi nodded behind him with his chin.

The transmutation wizards who had been dueling atop a makeshift duel stage were now glancing over, whispering.

-That’s a first-year… not a student?

-Must be mistaken.

-Are they actually suggesting a duel with a first-year? Isn’t that a bit dangerous?

‘This is shameful.’

Lee Han felt embarrassed as the outside wizards looked at him with concern and surprise.

Professor Voladi must have gone around saying, ‘Please duel my student,’ ‘Please duel my student,’ ‘Please duel my student,’ pestering until someone agreed, and now that it’s happening, they were clearly surprised at how young the opponent was.

A dwarf wizard, who looked around forty, looked at Lee Han and asked with a sour face.

“Are you a first-year? I won’t presume to interfere with Einrogard’s methods, but isn’t this a bit early for this kind of duel?”

“It’s fine.”

Before Lee Han could answer, Professor Voladi answered.

As Professor Voladi turned and walked to the stands, the dwarf wizard whispered again.

“Did your professor coe… Never mind. Forget I said anything.”

Finding himself too rude, the dwarf wizard swallowed his words, and Lee Han smacked his lips bitterly.

All these transmutation wizards here were good people.

That made it all the more difficult.

• * *

“…The rules are as follows. Let’s begin.”

‘This is nuts.’

Lee Han’s mind was racing as he faced his opponent.

He had had a few magic duels before, but today’s event was a little unusual.

A place where you could only use transmutation magic.

The problem was that Lee Han’s repertoire of transmutation was not that broad.

He was basically limited to transformations based on steel, simple transmutations, colors, rocks-to-sand, things like that.

Going against a seasoned transmutation specialist with this was like going at the skeleton headmaster with a fork.

Professor Voladi undoubtedly wanted Lee Han to experience as many diverse defeats as possible.

After all, you learn more from losses than from victories.

To be defeated in as many ways as possible and figure out which types of transmutation he needed to learn…

Ssssplash!

“!”

The dwarf wizard suddenly grew wings and soared up, gliding through the air.

At the same time, his cloak spread out like a tent, blocking Lee Han’s view. Lee Han intuited that the dwarf wizard was about to transform into another monster.

‘If I leave him alone, it’ll end instantly!’

Deciding to deal with the cloak first, Lee Han swung his staff.

A sigh rose from among the transmutation wizards to the side.

“Ah!”

“He shouldn’t have done that!”

“Ahh…!”

“Oh dear!”

Since the dwarf wizard had already cast a transmutation spell on the cloak, it wasn’t wise for Lee Han to cast a transmutation spell on it as well.

Interfering with another’s magic was several times harder.

And in a tense situation like this…

Pop!

“!?”

The cloak turned into a steel hook and flew at the dwarf wizard.

The dwarf wizard, who was trying to transform into a hippogriff, was shocked by the steel hook grabbing his ankle and his spell wavered. Only his arms and legs transformed into a hippogriff in a bizarre partial transformation.

“Wow! To succeed with that approach!”

“Amazing! Excellent!”

‘…They’re kind of annoying, aren’t they?’

Lee Han was starting to find the impressed reactions from the audience of transmutation wizards increasingly annoying.

At first he was a bit touched by their concern for him, but their huge reactions to every spell were becoming a bit much.

The dwarf wizard hastily swung his staff to remove the steel hook.

But, surprisingly, the hook didn’t come off. As if imbued with persistently pooled mana like an enchanted ore, spells bounced off it.

Confronted with a situation even a seasoned transmuter hadn’t experienced, the dwarf wizard was flustered and failed his landing.

Normally, even bound by the steel hook, he could have finished Lee Han off with a spell, but the dwarf wizard cleanly admitted defeat.

To show this many openings in a duel was as good as losing.

“I lost, I lost! Amazing! How on earth did you transmute that? Is this a secret technique of Einrogard?”

While Lee Han worried about how to explain in a way that wouldn’t let the opponent down too much, Professor Voladi, hiding his disappointment, began to engage other transmutation wizards in conversation.