Episode 514

‘How?!’

Angrago, who was sitting at the table, was so startled he dropped his quill.

This stack of artifact papers allowed everyone to share messages, but you couldn’t tell who was writing.

Angrago looked around.

“If you swap it for Boxwood, it’ll be less enchanted, but the power will definitely improve.”

“This armor is so uncomfortable, isn’t there some way to fix it?”

“Endure it. You need at least this much to survive magic attacks.”

“True. If you think about Wardanaz, maybe we should make it thicker.”

His friends in the lounge sat around debating whose sword was better, or trying to make new gear to boost their combat power.

Not a single one of them was studying, making it a typical White Tiger Tower lounge.

‘There might be a spy.’

Angrago left bait on the paper hoping to test Wardanaz.

• I’m not Angrago.

-Sure. If there’s anyone around you thinking of joining the Festival of Saint Iaactus, tell them I’ll break their legs. And for the record, I’ll break your legs too.

Angrago was aghast.

How could he tell?

-I don’t know what you’re talking about. Wardanaz, I’m not Angrago, but it pains me that an innocent Angrago is being insulted.

-Alpha, I can see exactly who you are, so quit the nonsense.

-You could just sign as Alpha right from the start,

Shyles and Salko, the two friends from Black Turtle Tower, scolded Angrago.

-But Wardanaz, why are you stopping the Festival of Saint Iaactus? I don’t get it.

At Salko’s question, Lee Han was speechless.

‘These maniacs.’

Why wouldn’t I stop it?

-Right. Wardanaz, I’m not Angrago, but I don’t understand stopping the Festival of Saint Iiaktus, that’s the act of a tyrant!

-No matter how much we respect you in our tower, there’ll be plenty of complaints if you block the festival. Any particular reason?

Lee Han held back some curses and endured.

-I’m treating people who got hurt from the festival.

Suddenly, the other friends all fell silent.

“Junior, let’s head out.”

“Yes?”

Lee Han tucked the papers into his coat and turned.

The seniors were packing up crates of potions and various equipment, preparing to leave.

“Where are we going?”

“Hmm? The festival grounds, of course. The festival’s really heating up, right? It’s easier to be on standby close by.”

Lee Han barely managed to keep himself from blurting something out.

It wasn’t the seniors’ fault.

It was the fault of the other students, all chucking stones at each other like lunatics.

‘Wait, the festival isn’t even heated up yet?’

He couldn’t imagine how things would go once it really got going.

---

“It’s a stone giant!”

“Ram the fortress!”

Watching the seniors stage a siege battle on the plains, Lee Han was dizzy.

In just the short time it took to leave the healing room and descend the main building stairs, the seniors had built a fortress on the plains and made a giant to attack it.

Crash!

The giant made of stone rammed its massive body into the fortress.

The stone fortress seemed about to collapse at any moment but regained its balance instantly.

Powerful magic was keeping the stones attached and holding everything together.

“Fire! Stone giant, launch the stones!”

“Fortress, fire too!”

Stone giants and the fortress lobbed rocks at each other, wreaking havoc everywhere in a surreal sight, but the healing magic seniors didn’t care and pitched their tent, hoisting the school’s flag.

Partially smashed stone fragments flew toward the tent.

They probably didn’t even realize it, so engrossed were they in the fierce battle.

“I got it.”

“Yeah.”

The seniors weren’t surprised—they were used to it. One stepped up and waved his staff; tree vines burst from the ground and snatched the stone.

“Who is it?”

“That’s Blue Dragon Tower, the short-haired hawk-nosed one.”

“Got him.”

The healing magic seniors launched right into payback.

The face of the student who had accidentally flung a rock this way turned pale; he started choking and collapsed, clutching his throat.

“What’s happening?!”

“Ah, you idiot! What were you thinking attacking healing mages! Get him over here!”

The fallen student’s friends hurriedly carried him over.

Thud!

“Sorry!”

“Just don’t kill him!”

After tossing their friend—face still pale—on the ground and giving a quick apology, they ran off to rejoin the festival.

“Let him be for a bit and then unblock his airway.”

“Got it.”

When the Wardanaz family junior stood by blinking at the scene, the healing magic seniors realized their mistake.

Showing off their strength in a festival like this was almost necessary.

Otherwise, some idiot caught up in the festival fever might attack the healers too.

But that was their perspective as healing mages—someone less familiar might see it as a shocking and frightening scene.

What were healers, gathered for a noble purpose, doing attacking people first?

“Uh, junior, see, this might look a little weird…”

“Seniors, I have a question.”

“Huh? What is it?”

“That spell you used just now—can’t you use it on all the other students too? If you lay every single one out, then the festival…”

The seniors found themselves momentarily tempted by the junior’s suggestion.

“Ah, no, it’s too much mana drain.”

“…That’s too bad.”

Lee Han was disappointed.

They couldn’t attack everyone here just because of lack of mana.

He was oddly frustrated that he couldn’t share his mana to help.

“Guys, help!”

“Damn it, my hands are full!”

“Someone get this stone off!”

As the rush of casualties began for real, there was no time left for conversation.

And now, the injuries were far more complicated than before.

Not just simple fractures—stones stuck to bodies (someone had probably enchanted the stones with transformation magic), magic misfiring and rebounding (a senior with his entire back turned to stone), and other cases that were vivid demonstrations of “what happens when magic goes wrong.”

Lee Han, with a grim expression, helped treat them.

He couldn’t do the complex initial magic treatments, but after the seniors finished emergency care, Lee Han could take over from there.

Even that alone was a big help to them.

“Why did this idiot try to merge with an earth spirit?!”

“Are such injuries common?”

“The higher your year, the crazier it gets.”

Phil shouted as he poured de-petrification potion.

Ironically, the better a mage got, the likelier they were to get seriously hurt.

Low-level mages couldn’t even produce enough magic power to injure themselves, but once your skill got high enough, you could kill yourself with just a flick of a finger.

“To think they learn magic and use it for this! Don’t you agree?!”

“Of course. Truly terrible people.”

An injured student groaned along with Phil and Lee Han’s exchange.

To win… the festival… there’s no other wa…

“That senior doesn’t seem to be in pain—should we stop giving anesthesia potion?”

The healing magic seniors looked at Lee Han as if he were remarkable.

He was only a first-year, but he knew how to manage patients.

Rumble!

Lee Han was the first to turn his head at the shift in magic in the air.

A beat later, several other students did, and soon nearly everyone turned.

Magic energies were crashing and colliding, creating fractures in space, and streaks of light reminiscent of a white flash appeared.

Faced with that ominous spectacle, Lee Han asked:

“Is someone summoning that to throw stones with?”

“Uh… no.”

“That’s… it’s a problem from overusing magic.”

The healing magic seniors spoke in anxious voices.

Magic, by its nature, distorted the laws of nature, and casting too many different spells chaotically in the same space was never a good thing.

This was exactly how magic collisions created dimensional rifts.

“Cease fire! Cease fire!”

“Pause the festival—intercept everyone coming out!”

“Stop throwing already!”

“I was winning! This counts as my victory, right?”

“Can the nonsense—everyone wait! If you slip up here, it’s punishment room for everyone!”

Students halted all their mana for stone giants and fortresses, gathering in groups to study the dimensional rift.

If they accidentally let a monster from another dimension loose during the festival, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Maybe it’d be an unprecedented mass march to the punishment room…

“Is Wardanaz here?!”

Koholti from the Black Magic School came running; the healing mages were startled.

“What’s going on, Senior Koholti?”

“Koholti, what is it? What’s the matter?”

“Uh, I heard a first-year from our school was down here…”

Scanning around, Koholti’s eyes met Lee Han’s and he brightened.

“So you really were here!”

“How did you know?”

“One of our first-year juniors mentioned a first-year was here at the healing mages’ tent but got called a liar for it. Just wanted to check for myself.”

Lee Han felt a little bad for the unnamed senior who got chewed out.

“Wardanaz, I need a favor. Can you come with me? I need your help.”

“Wait, what is this about?”

“Koholti, what do you take juniors from another school for? Even if we’re friends, isn’t this too much?”

Students usually had a strong solidarity with others from their own school.

Especially in hard, understaffed fields like healing magic.

So when someone from another school tried to borrow a junior, there was no way they’d agree easily.

But Koholti had a defense.

“He’s also in the Black Magic School.”

“Oh!”

The healing magic students’ faces lit up in realization, and Koholti frowned.

“Hey, you guys…”

“N-no, we knew.”

“We knew, senior.”

Remembering the usual reputation of the Black Magic School, the healing magic students felt bad and changed the subject.

“If the junior’s fine with it, we’re fine too. But why do you want to take him?”

“Well…”

Koholti hesitated, then muttered softly.

“I need to borrow some mana…”

“What?”

“I just… need to borrow some mana…”

Swoosh!

Every healing mage present drew their staffs and aimed them at Koholti, face dead serious.

Koholti nearly dropped to his knees, begging and pleading for his life and trying to explain.

But he couldn’t stop the glares full of contempt.

‘What trash—no way he’s a senior anymore.’

‘No matter how much mana a junior has, you call him over because you’re out of your own??’

‘He’s abusing a junior’s kindness—not because black magic is evil, but because that guy’s heart is.’

“…Let’s go.”

Koholti was tormented by the sharp stares on his back.

If Lee Han hadn’t helped, he might have been buried there and then.

“Is it really that urgent?”

“Since something might come out of the rift, we’ve got to be set up in advance if we want to deal with it.”

Koholti was desperate enough to borrow not just a first-year’s hand but his mana too.

Seeing ominous signs at the dimensional rift, he wanted as much backup as possible.

“I’ve got an ancient artifact a friend lent me, and the undead here is pretty strong. The thing is, I haven’t charged the mana in it, so right now…”

“You want me to do it?”

Koholti couldn’t make eye contact out of guilt, but Lee Han didn’t really mind.

“I’ll go and recharge it. Don’t worry.”

“Junior…!!”

Koholti looked at Lee Han, becoming emotional.

How had such a junior found his way into the Black Magic School?

“Oh, uh, by the way…”

Damn.

“Can we keep today’s events a secret from Direte?”

“If she finds out, she’ll probably turn me into an undead…”