Episode 796

Lagesa and her chain-wrapped pirates drew their weapons, preparing an ambush.

There was a solemnity to them, like hunters waiting for their prey to appear on a familiar path.

‘So professional.’

Already filled with respect, Lee Han found their actions even more admirable.

Professor Verdus, meanwhile, was strolling by with a nonchalant face, oblivious to the rising threat nearby.

“Gonadaltes, what an idiot. Did I ask for so much? All I wanted was five boxes of diamonds for fuel! How could you refuse that? Call yourself a wizard!?”

“Get him! Crush that deadbeat con artist!!!”

At Lagesa’s shout, the pirates burst from the corridor. Professor Verdus cried out in shock.

“What!? What is this!?”

“Give me back my gold, you con artist!”

“T-the failure of an investment is the investor’s responsibility!”

Even as he fielded an ambush from real archipelago pirates, Verdus was unfazed. He’d dealt with so many attacks like this before.

His belt and amulet lit up, linking together to create a powerful repulsion field.

Instantly, the distance between Professor Verdus and the pirates expanded dramatically.

“You con artist! What? You said you’d build us a flying pirate ship? Where is it!?”

“Great magic requires trial and error!”

“……”

Lee Han looked on, his face turning complicated as he realized the truth.

Before them stood a man with even less honor than pirates: a con artist.

‘To think he’d swindle pirates…’

“Whew-!”

Verdus’s skin suddenly paled and puffed up blue. Lagesa had interfered in his bloodstream, stopping the flow.

The professor choked, gasping, and barely managed to flex his boots. This triggered a -Wave of Curse Expulsion- that dispelled the interference.

Meanwhile, the chain-bound pirates rushed at him.

Lagesa shouted at the top of her lungs.

“The first of you to catch him gets to go free!”

“!!”

The eyes of the pirates blazed even brighter at those words.

For those kidnapped into forced service after being caught at piracy in the archipelago, freedom was a dream even in sleep.

‘Those are magic-resistant items.’

Lee Han realized as he saw the pirates resisting Verdus’s spell bullets that the chains not only served to restrain but also protected them from external magic. It was a rare kind of artifact, even at Einrogard.

Clang!

The pirates swung enchanted axes and cutlasses at the repulsion field trying to break it down.

Inside, Professor Verdus shouted in panic.

“Within Einrogard I’m protected by the domain’s laws, not imperial law! You can’t just do this!”

“I’ve got the lord’s official permission too, you con artist. Drop the field! We’ll just beat you a bit and then strip you of your stuff!”

“Who invited this pirate?!”

Grumbling, Professor Verdus started summoning artifacts from his pocket dimension.

Fortunately, after the recent betrayals and ambushes by unscrupulous colleagues, he’d upgraded his defensive preparations.

Seeing this, Lagesa only grew more enraged.

“How many scams did you pull to end up this heavily armed!?”

Anyone ignorant of magic might imagine wizards conjured spells with a snap—swords and shields flying to them at a whim.

But every dazzling spell required effort.

Artifacts like these needed daily attention, maintenance, recharging, and checking.

Each morning, he’d check them, ready his spells for any emergency, carefully combine artifacts that didn’t conflict…

Professor Verdus was currently better defended than most pirate captains.

And yet, after taking all their investment, he hadn’t even produced a single sail for their ship while making sure his own defenses were foolproof. Lagesa’s fury burned only hotter.

“Mana, churn and shake their magic!”

Lagesa swung her sword and chanted.

Lee Han’s eyes widened in astonishment.

‘She’s entangling the magic itself!’

Normally, the flow of mana in a space ran under set principles.

Mages read and harnessed those flows to cast spells.

But Lagesa deliberately made those flows irregular and turned the surroundings chaotic.

Spells being cast twisted, tangled, and grew confused.

Professor Verdus’s summoned swords—beams of light meant to pin down enemies—wobbled off course and struck the ceiling. Spell bullets veered to lodge in floors and walls.

That wasn’t all. The repulsion fields began to clash among themselves, creaking loudly, until gaps appeared. Professor Verdus, alarmed, scrambled to reinforce.

‘I see why Professor Baegrek brought her in.’

Lagesa’s battle magic was very unique.

To put it nicely, it was unconventional and ingenious; to put it bluntly, it was totally unstructured and chaotic.

If Yumidihus attacked Verdus, he’d have used anti-magic or directly overpowered Verdus’s artifacts.

But Lagesa didn’t try to fight head-on. She turned the fight into a swirling, muddy brawl.

Of course, this could work against her. The spell entangling could easily backfire.

But the veteran pirate woman didn’t care—in fact, she seemed to enjoy it. The more confusion, the more it felt it favored her.

‘When fighting someone stronger—like the Skull Principal—wait, why did I think of the Principal just now?—anyway, there’s a lot to learn from this.’

You couldn’t beat someone stronger by fighting fair. You had to shake things up, create variables.

“…Argh!”

Realizing his position was getting worse, Professor Verdus hastily reached into a pocket in thin air.

He grabbed whatever he could and started throwing it around.

Clatter!

Imperial gold coins, jewels, rare reagents, and all manner of artifacts scattered across the floor.

Like a lizard dropping its tail, Verdus bought his escape by tossing treasures in his wake and fled.

Lagesa snorted.

“Hmph. No need to chase. We’ll let him off easy this time.”

“You’re truly magnanimous.”

Lee Han promptly sucked up.

If he played his cards right, maybe he could bring her to his next Verdus class.

‘I wish the seniors could see this.’

“Keeheehee, you’ve got a good eye. Wait a sec. Why didn’t you activate the necklace?”

Lagesa suddenly noticed Lee Han hadn’t triggered the one she’d given him.

“You just told me to wear it.”

“…You’re supposed to wear it and activate it too, brat! If I tell you to eat, would you swallow bread but not drink the booze?”

Lagesa was baffled.

When she stirred up the flow of magic, a mage should’ve felt substantial dizziness.

It was rare for a mage to stay upright when the mana around them flipped.

Yet this boy hadn’t even activated his necklace and stood there unruffled.

“I’ll activate it next time.”

“…Yeah! Good, good!”

Very impressed, Lagesa burst out laughing and slapped Lee Han hard on the back. Rocked back and forth, Lee Han wondered silently,

‘What’s so good about that?’

• * *

“I have a question, Miss Lagesa.”

“I know, I know.”

The pirate woman nodded.

Of course, with her magic being so intriguing and after just witnessing that fight, anyone would be dying to ask.

Normally she would test a challenger’s talent and will in trials, but today she decided to let it go.

He was a disciple of both Yumidihus and Baegrek, and he was clever and cunning—she liked that.

“No way around it! I’ll have to explain the spell I used today.”

“Huh? Actually, I wanted to ask… just how much did Professor Verdus actually swindle you for…”

“……”

Lagesa stared at Lee Han in disbelief.

The chained pirates behind her wore the same look.

‘Really? That’s what you’re curious about?’

“Ah, sorry. I mean ‘Professor Verdus.’”

“That’s not what shocked me! You’re really that curious about it? Hm. Let’s see… Bible probably took off with at least twenty boxes of imperial gold. Something like that.”

“!!”

Lee Han’s eyes shook with shock and terror.

“A-and you let him live?”

“I didn’t know it was a scam back then! I thought our flying pirate ship was right around the corner.”

Lagesa’s wrinkles deepened with a grumble; she was still bitter just thinking about it.

“By the time I realized, he’d already run away to Einrogard!”

‘Maybe you should search Einrogard, not the Empire, if you want to catch a magic criminal.’

“Don’t make investments carelessly, you hear me.”

“Yes. I’ll take investments instead.”

“Keehee! Yes, you, you seem different from that Bible character—you look like you’ll do things properly.”

“……”

Lee Han averted his eyes a moment, but Lagesa didn’t notice.

“So about the spell you asked about… let’s see… where to begin?”

“?”

Lee Han cocked his head.

‘Did I ask anything?’

He supposed he’d better keep quiet, since the pirate was clearly in a good mood.

“Remember how I cast spells with just one or two syllables back in the basement classroom?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think those were?”

“Abbreviated chants… right?”

At that, the pirate woman burst out in laughter, clapping and stamping her feet before she finally stopped.

“Right, right! That’s what everyone thinks at first! But that’s not it. This is pirate magic, a proud tradition of our family.”

Pirate incantations like “E-ha” or “Ai-ya” were fundamentally different from abbreviated imperial chants.

‘True. Now that I think of it…’

Even with short spells, there’s usually a word or abbreviation—something to help the mage focus, however short.

But those “E-ha” and “Ai-ya” incantations had nothing to do with transforming furniture into parrot swarms or turning a back door into a wall.

“While imperial mages tie themselves in knots over mana, my ancestors just gave themselves to the flow, and—as pirates—shouted out whatever they pleased.”

“…?”

As she explained, Lee Han’s face grew steadily more dubious.

So basically…?

‘Random magic??’

Every spell required precise calculation and control.

Otherwise, the spell might turn on the mage.

Yet Lagesa was flatly denying the very principle of imperial magic: draw out mana freely and toss it wherever you liked!

“…Wouldn’t that make the spell’s effects a bit random?”

“It does, somewhat. Actually, I was hoping for a giant bald eagle before, but parrots came out. Parrots are good too, aren’t they? A pirate’s friend.”

“What if the spell effect goes somewhere you didn’t expect?”

“You embrace the flow! Magic—any magic—sometimes goes somewhere unpredictable.”

“……”

Lee Han recalled the time his fire spell had almost veered off—and wondered:

‘Can you really enjoy that?’