Episode 1043

Episode 1043

“In hell???”

“What? No!”

At the junior’s question, Lee Han was greatly flustered.

Why did hell suddenly come up out of nowhere?

“What’s this about hell?”

“You said you left something behind, Senior…”

Alhidle deployed a logic worthy of a top student.

1. Senior Wardanaz was a very amazing person.
2. Relatives like Alsicle were also quite impressive.
3. But if Senior Wardanaz said he left something behind and was surprised by it?
4. It must be a place like the hell dimension!

‘Is this kid really top of the class?’

Lee Han harbored a slight suspicion about the abilities of the juniors in his tower.

“If it’s not the hell dimension, is it the dimension of cold elementals or frost giants?”

“No… I meant I left it in Petroguard. Another magic school.”

“…Is that really something to be so surprised about?”

Alhidle tilted his head.

Alsicle wasn’t a five-year-old child, and it wasn’t like he left her in the hell dimension, just another magic school—there wasn’t any reason to be so shocked.

“That’s true, but… it’s still disappointing.”

“It’s fine. I’m sure she’ll understand.”

Alhidle trusted the magicians of his own family.

Surely, just like himself, she wouldn’t hold personal feelings or grudges on the grand path of magic!

• * *

“Voladi Baegrek!!!”

Realizing the truth, Alsicle roared.

At that adorable roar, several Petroguard students wore deeply moved expressions. In their hearts, they even wanted to ask her to stay as a model for a while.

“Did they really go!?”

“I-I’m sorry.”

Petroguard’s professor, or rather, the magician Dalser who was acting as a professor, apologized.

To be honest, it wasn’t Dalser’s fault that the Einrogard students had all left en masse…

…but Alsicle looked so upset that it really didn’t matter.

“No, it’s not your fault. Ugh. It’s not your fault at all.”

Alsicle fumed in frustration.

To be honest, she understood about the other Einrogard students.

Lee Han or Professor Garcia probably got so caught up in dealing with the former disciple of the Skull Headmaster that they might well have forgotten.

But Professor Voladi was a different story.

With the temperament of a battle mage, there was no way he wouldn’t notice such a minor change.

He 100% knew, but didn’t say anything!

‘What a petty and underhanded…’

Alsicle felt truly wronged.

Was it really such a huge crime to take a student to hunt a dangerous dimensional monster?

…Come to think of it, it probably was a big crime.

Alsicle let out a deep sigh.

“Sigh. No point in getting angry—only hurts me. I’ll get going now.”

“Leaving already?”

By now, the Petroguard students she’d grown close to looked very disappointed.

Even aside from being a model, this magician of the Pengerine family was a senior magician with remarkable skills.

Especially her knowledge regarding cold or frost-related magic was unrivaled within Petroguard.

“I have to go. I had a good time, everyone.”

“W-Wait…”

“Why? If you have questions about magic, ask quickly.”

“Could you spare us just one feather?”

“…If you don’t step five steps back, I’ll freeze you all.”

• * *

“Hm. Certainly, Alsicle is kind of unexpectedly generous.”

Though not as much as Alhidle, Lee Han soon shook off his shock.

It wasn’t as if it was the Skull Headmaster, and leaving Alsicle in Petroguard didn’t seem like something she’d get so angry about.

“I think you’re right. Oh, where’s Eandurde?”

The reason Lee Han was looking for the junior wasn’t just because of the vacation.

There was also an issue related to Joulin.

• By the way! Is there any way you can recommend to tie up a magician? Actually, my older sister asked me about it!

Joulin’s younger brother, Uman, had once asked Lee Han about how to thoroughly tie up a magician.

At the time, he’d thought it was about the Skull Headmaster, but now, with time passed, he realized it might not have been.

‘Come to think of it, maybe they meant Eandurde.’

Even for Joulin, it was rather unlikely to capture the Skull Headmaster by force.

Compared to that, with Eandurde, it made sense.

She was Joulin’s friend, and also someone who could reasonably be bound…

If that was the case, he needed to find her first and warn her. If Eandurde went in unwary, she could spend the whole vacation inside Joulin’s cave.

“Are you referring to Eandurde? Eandurde got off the carriage as soon as we arrived in the capital.”

“Ah. That makes sense.”

She had been forced to come along, so there’s no way she’d tag along leisurely to the auction house.

“Before that, I did ask her a few things. She seemed to be looking for a gift for a friend.”

“Knew it! Alhidle, I saw from the start you were smart.”

Alhidle blushed at the senior’s flattery.

Since Eandurde had received a friend’s invitation, she seemed to be planning to prepare a gift before visiting.

And in order to buy the gift, she would need gold coins, so she was going to the underground arena…

“Eandurde!!!”

For the first time, Lee Han shouted out the absent junior’s name aloud. Alhidle was puzzled.

“Eandurde’s not here, though?”

“Never mind. Anyway, you said she was going to the underground arena? I’d better go see Professor Baegrek.”

As a tower senior, he had to go look for the tower junior together with the tower professor. Lee Han ran towards where the two professors were waiting.

“Alhidle. You come too. Since we’ve met up, take a gift with you.”

As a fellow tower junior, Lee Han wanted to share some useful things from his bag of gifts.

“But I have something I need to buy.”

“What is it?”

“It’s the Red Diamond of Bugni—I wanted to learn the magic imbued inside and…”

“…Some nouveau riche bought that earlier. Let’s go! Come along!”

• * *

After scattering out the gift bundle, Lee Han explained the situation to Professor Voladi.

The professor didn’t look very surprised by the mountain of presents and immediately answered.

“Come with me.”

“What about you, Professor?”

When Lee Han asked if Professor Garcia wasn’t coming along, Voladi shook his head.

“It’s more dangerous if he does.”

For a magician untrained in combat magic, the capital’s narrow, winding back alleys in the slums, so perfect for an ambush, were not a good place.

You could be ambushed by an enemy who suddenly jumped out from behind a wall you thought was impassable.

“Certainly, the professor could get hurt…”

“Or the surroundings could get destroyed.”

‘Ah. The opposite.’

Lee Han realized he’d misunderstood. His reasoning was correct up to the ambush by an enemy, but the part afterward was off.

A magician on Garcia’s level could use magic even after being ambushed. The problem was controlling the power of that magic.

Unless they wanted to blow away the entire slum, it was better to leave Professor Garcia behind.

“…Oh? Then what about me…”

“?”

“Oh, nothing.”

He had almost said, ‘So then it’s not dangerous for me?’ but decided to give up.

In Professor Voladi’s mind, the tower’s top senior student was fully capable of keeping up!

‘And if it’s the level from last year, it might be doable.’

Lee Han recited incantations, cast enhancement magic, consolidated his remaining magic, and moved the necessary reagents out of his pocket.

This was in preparation to unleash five or six spells at once if a fight broke out.

Last year, Lee Han had visited this very slum on the outskirts of the capital with the Skull Headmaster to scout Eandurde for Einrogard.

In these gloomy alleys, where no one would notice if a person died, mercenaries with daggers and clubs had leapt out after just a few steps.

‘I remember last time some thugs backed off after recognizing the Headmaster’s face. This time…?’

Setting foot onto the filthy path of the slums, Lee Han looked at the back of Professor Voladi, speculating.

Would the mercenaries or criminal guild members here recognize Professor Voladi’s face, just like with the Skull Headmaster?

• We’ve got a visitor.
• Idiot! Do you even know who that is?!

In a side alley between unfinished plaster buildings, someone was about to jump out but was dragged back in by another.

Lee Han nodded.

‘They recognize him.’

• That’s the guy who came last year with the Spirit Hall! Are you trying to get us all killed?!

“……”

Lee Han was shocked.

They’d recognized him, not Professor Voladi?

“That doesn’t make sense!”

“?”

Professor Voladi, walking ahead, looked back at Lee Han as if puzzled.

“…It’s nothing. But do you think people here would recognize you, Professor?”

“Not sure.”

The population in this part of the slums turned over rapidly. It might be called a guild, but unlike a legitimate imperial guild, it was mostly made up of runaway mercenaries and criminals.

So, it wouldn’t be strange if no one recognized Professor Voladi.

‘So it was just my bad luck.’

Lee Han breathed a sigh of relief.

Probably, that person who recognized him earlier had only done so because it had happened less than a year ago…

• Aaaagh! It’s the crazy hunter!!!
• The Butcher is here! The Butcher’s appeared! Idiots! Move!
• All you with bounties, get out here!

Shouts echoed from all over the alley, followed by the clatter of many feet.

A rickety wooden building located on the left side of the street suddenly collapsed.

It had been a secret tavern where wanted criminals gathered, but upon hearing the rumors, everyone tried to flee out the back, causing the old structure to cave in.

Lee Han used telekinesis to keep the debris at bay and maintain an exit. The criminal mercenaries who scrambled out expressed their thanks.

“Th-thank…”

Thud!

Before they could finish their thanks, they collapsed. Professor Voladi had dealt with them.

The professor pulled out a paper slip, wrote to send the bounties to Einrogard, and tossed it atop the unconscious bodies.

Upon this, the slip split in two, one half transforming into a paper bird that flew toward the city guards.

“You lured them well.”

The professor praised his student. Lee Han felt a bit wronged.

He hadn’t meant to lure them at all!

Thinking of the arrested mercenaries talking about how ‘Ugh, that magician was working with Professor Baegrek after all’ made him feel somewhat aggrieved.

‘I really was trying to save them…’

Grumbling inwardly, Lee Han noticed people peering at them from behind a fish-smelling alley, hiding behind some round wooden barrels stuffed with fish.

• Isn’t that the magician who came last time with the Spirit Hall?
• That’s right! And this time, he’s even here with the hunter!

“……”

“This way.”

While Lee Han wondered how far the rumors would spread, Professor Voladi found the entrance to the underground arena.

Every city in the empire had its own shady places, and there were specific conditions to be met in order to enter.

Knowing the entrance, having an introduction from a guild, etc.

The underground arena entrance Professor Voladi was heading to now looked, on the surface, like a shabby leather shop.

But if you went inside, a magic-concealed passage to the underground arena would appear.

“Aaagh!”

As Professor Voladi entered, the shopkeeper, tanning some mysterious monster hide, screamed.

“Why!! Why are you here!! Why are you here again!!”

“For the passage.”

“What? Passage? Ah, the arena? …You crazy magician! After what you pulled last time, you think it’s still running? It went out of business ages ago!”

The shopkeeper, baffled at first, flew into a rage as he belatedly figured it out.

Professor Voladi turned to Lee Han and spoke.

“Let’s go to the next arena.”

“……”