Chapter 35
The Rampage of the Fallen Angel
The students realized the danger of Professor Rakias, but the class continued nonetheless.
After the magical duel between Izolde Polchen and the assistant Clarisse, everyone began training to improve the precision of their shield magic.
This involved using their shield spells to block incoming attack spells from the assistants, thereby honing their combat skills in a practical environment.
“Wait? Are you crazy?”
The students were shocked at the idea of blocking attack spells with their shields.
The shield spells they had just learned were mostly round and not small by any means, but they were not large enough to fully trust for protection.
“It’s fine. I’ll only use Level 0 spells,” Clarisse reassured them.
“Still…” the students hesitated.
The assistants deliberately cast Level 0 spells, which were simple but powerful enough to cause harm, at the students’ shields.
Despite being low-level spells, they were potent enough to hurt someone, causing the students who had only studied theory so far to be taken aback.
It was almost like being targeted by a weapon.
Even behind bulletproof glass, if someone points a gun and pulls the trigger, wouldn’t anyone get cold feet?
However, Idnia easily deflected the incoming spells with her shield.
The assistant who cast the spell was Clarisse, the one who defeated Izolde in the duel.
She was startled by how easily Idnia blocked the spell.
“…Wait, not a scratch.”
“What’s that?”
“Unlike the duel earlier, you didn’t use magic conversion, but with a spell like this, a freshman’s shield would usually be torn apart. Look at that.” Clarisse watched Idnia’s shield in awe.
Idnia glanced to the side and saw Sendia practicing with an assistant.
Sendia had her shield spell extended as far as possible with her magic staff, eyes tightly shut, shivering in fear.
Even though her shield spell was as far from her body as it could be, she was trembling with her eyes closed.
It was clear that she wouldn’t be able to block anything properly, even if she were using an actual physical shield.
“Well, you don’t really need to physically hold up the shield spell, but you’re leaning too much. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“No, I’m not okay! But I have to hurry!”
“Alright.”
The assistant’s spell hit Sendia’s shield with full force.
The assistant, aiming for the shield, had tried to cast a low-level spell gently to avoid hitting Sendia directly, but in one strike, the shield was torn apart, and some magic passed through it, overflowing with energy.
“Ah! Murder! It went through!”
“That’s crazy! It went through! If I was behind it, I could have died!”
“Well, that’s because you kept your eyes closed… your focus was off. This is a focus-maintaining spell, you know. Focus is needed.”
The assistant sighed, looking exhausted.
“Sendia, stop overreacting… try again.”
“Do I still have to do it?”
“You’ve shot two spells. I’m casting as lightly as possible, so focus this time.”
The assistant cast the spell again, and Sendia, tearfully, immediately tried to recast her shield spell.
“Bang peh-yo! Bang peh-yo! Bang peh-yo!”
“Stop wasting mana. Didn’t I tell you? It’s a focus-maintaining spell. You can only maintain as much as you can concentrate.”
The assistant, seeing how frightened Sendia was, tried to cast the spell with gentle force. Again, the shield shattered upon impact.
The problem was that Sendia wasn’t the only one making such mistakes.
Most freshmen were in the same boat—holding their shields weakly while their focus slipped, resulting in shields being easily pierced by the spells.
“Usually, it’s like this. If you just keep your eyes open and focus until the end of the attack, you’ve done well. Hmm… as expected from the daughter of the Seonjeung family.”
Clarisse, the assistant facing Idnia, glanced at her with admiration.
“Can I attack again?”
“Go ahead.”
“Then…” Clarisse cast a series of spells—fire, ice, lightning, water, poison, and multiple arrows—all aimed at Idnia’s shield. Yet, with just one casting of the shield spell, Idnia blocked more than ten of Clarisse’s Level 0 spells.
The shield continued to shine brightly, untouched by the magic.
“Impressive affinity with activation words. Plus, you’re concentrating perfectly at the moment of impact. Your focus maintenance is good too. This is surprising.”
Clarisse was inwardly amazed.
“If you can do this so easily, we can probably move on to the next lesson…”
Clarisse looked toward Professor Rakias.
“…But Professor Rakias’ lessons are a bit different, right? First, I’ll teach you simple shape-shifting and attribute conversion.”
“Shape-shifting?”
“You can change the shape of the shield as long as the overall volume remains the same. But, the more complex the shape, the more concentration it requires, making it harder to maintain the shield. You have to be careful about that.”
“There are a lot of spells that require focus. They’re divided into intense focus spells, which require all your energy, and auxiliary focus spells, which need just some mana management. Depending on the person, someone might use someone else’s intense focus spell as their auxiliary spell, depending on their concentration level. But Idnia, you…”
Idnia easily altered her shield spell.
“…You have incredible focus.”
“I’ve been chopping wood.”
“Chopping wood?”
“Well…”
While training the Emperor’s Will in the Betelgeuse Duchy, Idnia had to chop wood.
At first, she had no more strength than an ordinary girl, and just holding the tools felt like her hands would tear apart.
But once she learned to concentrate and gather her resolve, a new problem arose.
Her immense strength was too much for the tools.
Especially the tools in this world were high-quality, luxury items that broke more easily than cheap tools on Earth.
Saws and axes would often snap in the middle of use.
So, before chopping wood, Idnia would calm her resolve, focus, and infuse the wood with aura to understand its grain, and only then would she strike.
Focus, chop. Focus, chop.
At first, it would take half a day to cut down a tree, and both her muscles and aura would quickly deplete, making it impossible to continue.
But as she kept focusing, she became able to chop down even large trees with minimal effort, and soon, she could chop 100 trees without the sun even reaching its zenith.
After clearing the trees by midday, she would focus on her martial arts and handle affairs within the region.
‘Maybe my concentration increased when I trained the Emperor’s Will. It’s helping with magic, too… Concentration…’
Idnia realized that her concentration was far superior to anyone else her age.
Clarisse handed her a note with a recommendation.
“Well, for the next step in shape-shifting, I recommend checking out these books in the library. If you catch Rakias’ attention, your enchanting powers will grow stronger, so be careful. Oh, but the library access hasn’t been unlocked yet since it’s early in the semester. The books I’ve listed are available in the basic study library.”
After teaching shape-shifting, Clarisse recommended reference books on defensive magic.
Professor Rakias was less of a professor and more of an indescribable, horrifying, and blasphemous figure.
She had a beautiful appearance that mesmerized people, but the mesmerized ones spoke of her as a graduate student…
‘Saying it this way, I feel like I’m criticizing actual graduate students…’
Idnia casually cast her shield spell while glancing at the other students.
Mari from Astraea, showing her powerful divine magic, was likely receiving separate combat training at the church and managed to deflect incoming Level 0 spells quite well.
At first, she had struggled with shield magic, but once she was able to use magic, her immense mana made it easy for her to adapt.
She truly was a saint.
‘Hmm. But if she keeps doing this, doesn’t it ruin the Archbishop of Betelgeuse’s face for recommending me as a candidate for the saint?’
However, for the Archbishop’s reputation, she couldn’t just kick out the real saint and take her place.
“Sorry, Archbishop.”
As Idnia thought about this, a student screamed.
“Ahhh!”
One student, trembling with fear, lowered her shield, and a magic bullet that was supposed to hit the shield flew straight toward Izolde Polchen.
Most students, like Sendia Aspinal, had extended their magic staff to cast the shield spell, so when the shield didn’t work, the magic flew off course, threatening others.
“Ah?!”
“A big problem…”
Clarisse, the assistant, was shocked by her magic going off-course but felt relieved when she saw Izolde in the path of the magic.
However, Izolde didn’t notice the magic bullet flying toward her.
It was flying from her blind spot, and no matter how skilled Izolde was with magic, there was no way she could detect it.
“Hah!”
Idnia immediately jumped in, grabbing her magic staff like a badminton racket and swatting the magic bullet out of the air.
Crack…
At that moment, the magic staff snapped under Idnia’s strength.
“Ah…”
Idnia was startled by the broken magic staff in her hands.
‘This is bad. I’m already low on money, and I just used up some of the Emperor’s Will…’
Her unexpected surge in strength from the Emperor’s Will caused her magic staff to snap.
But then…
“Huh?”
Professor Rakias, who had been with his eyes closed, was suddenly startled.
“Emperor Yurik?”
Rakias’ face flushed, and tears of blood began to pour from his eyes.
The students around them gasped in surprise.
“Ugh?!”
“My heart…”
“What’s happening?!”
Clarisse panicked.
“This is an emergency! Everyone, run out of the classroom!”
“Ugh!”
The assistants immediately grabbed their necklaces—amulets made specifically for Professor Rakias.
Crackle!
The amulets started burning.
The speed at which they burned was astonishing.
“Ugh, damn it, Academy! Why didn’t they make these amulets permanent?! Why do they keep selling them as consumables?!”
“They need to make money, right?”
“Those bastards!”
“Well, I made them as a part-time job.”
“Oh, sorry.”
The assistants quickly pushed the freshmen out of the classroom and created a barrier to block Professor Rakias’ movements.
But Rakias, walking with blood streaming from his eyes and wings, stepped forward, and the blood spread under his feet, easily shattering the barriers the assistants created.
“Ah, Yurik, my beloved flesh. Where are you?”
Rakias, bleeding from his eyes and wings, approached, and the freshmen who hadn’t yet evacuated excitedly surrounded him.
“Ugh…”
“Ah… so fragrant.”
“I can’t resist…”
The students, drooling, approached Rakias like zombies desiring the flesh of the living.
“This! The freshmen are under the spell!”
“No! You’ll all become assistants too!”
“…”
“Well, doesn’t it make us feel pretty pathetic when you say that?”
