Chapter 67
“Whoa!”
“W-what? Mana…!”
The moment I opened the stylish wooden box, the mana sealed inside surged out all at once.
It roamed around as if trying to dominate the entire space, yet it didn’t feel unnatural at all.
Rather, it felt natural.
I looked inside.
A pitch-black wand lay there.
A wand that reminded me of a magic wand.
Its length was just right.
It wasn’t so long that it would get in the way, nor was it absurdly short.
It might be the most suitable length among all the wands I’d used.
For someone like me, who enjoys hand-to-hand combat, the wand’s length was especially important.
“Sure enough. That guy really does carve wands well.”
“That guy?”
I looked at a stylish sheet of paper placed beneath the wand box.
The wand and the maker’s name were written on it.
[Silver Scale, James P. Millennium]
“M-Mr. James!!”
“You know him?”
“He’s the Empire’s greatest magic tool artisan, isn’t he!?”
“That much?”
“That much indeed!! Even my father, who’s a 6th-rank mage, had to visit him several times just to get a wand made!”
…No wonder Karnarov and Isabelle had been cautious around him.
He was even more incredible than I’d thought.
And yet he only pushed back once before making one for me.
He might be a good person.
I set the wand aside for the moment and looked over the various accessories.
Whiteflower wand care oil, Instruction Manual 1, automatic-assembly wand stand, Instruction Manual 2, a document detailing the material ratios and mana patterns, Instruction Manual 3…
“Why are there so many instruction manuals!”
“Of course. Wands each have different characteristics, you know? Naturally, their handling has to be finicky.”
“…There was such a thing?”
“Didn’t you get one when you rented your wand? The basic mana patterns should all be different too.”
…Come to think of it, I feel like they gave me something like that, or maybe they didn’t.
I don’t remember at all!
“Ah. I remember now. They did give me one the second time.”
They hadn’t given me one for the first rental wand.
Of course, Karnarov hadn’t given me one either.
But I used it just fine without any of that.
I skimmed through Instruction Manual 1.
“Not needed.”
“Eeeek!!”
“Things like this, you do by feel!”
“Well, if there weren’t any problems, I suppose it doesn’t matter…”
Of course, I also know the basics.
Different wands really do have different feels.
But in the end, if you skillfully shove the mana in, they all listen nicely.
There was that trivial problem of the wand not being able to withstand my mana and breaking down, but I’ve used it well enough, so it’s fine.
“Well… it would be good if you could get the hang of it all at once.”
“Is it that hard to get used to?”
“Until you’re used to a new wand, magic doesn’t even activate properly, you know?”
It works right away for me.
For now, I picked up the new wand.
It was light, yet it still had a definite heft.
And I could tell for sure.
This wand’s performance was far superior to any I’d used before.
I couldn’t help but want to try it in the training grounds.
I headed straight for the training grounds.
* * *
I went to the multi-person training ground.
A stage 3 multi-person training ground could be rented if a student using stage 3 applied for it.
I had already rented the stage 3 one.
“Aris, could you move aside for a moment?”
“Huh?”
Though puzzled, Aris immediately gave me the space.
In the fairly spacious training ground, I set scarecrows up densely, a few paces apart.
“I’ll do a simple warm-up first, then move on to the real thing.”
I took the wand out of my inventory.
The wand settled into my small hand.
I placed the wand on my palm and spun it around with a flick.
The wand spun with a whooshing sound.
Then, in an instant, I pointed it and focused my mana once before chanting.
“Casting, Bullet.”
My mana flowed smoothly.
It took no time at all for the mana bullet to fire.
Then I swapped to my sword.
Aura flashed, and the instant I severed a scarecrow’s head, a mana bullet flew into another scarecrow.
—Paaang!
The scarecrows’ heads burst apart one after another.
Smooth.
A different kind of thrill from what I felt facing Karnarov.
The feeling of the movements I imagined and the magic I pictured flying true and striking without a single error.
I stayed focused and kept concentrating on toppling the scarecrows.
What matters isn’t just knocking them down.
What matters is how you knock them down.
I looked back.
Before I knew it, dozens of scarecrows had lost their heads and fallen over.
Aris let out a groan.
“…Whoa.”
“That’s a pretty lukewarm reaction.”
Honestly, I thought I’d done pretty crisp moves, but Aris’s reaction was complicated.
“Did I do something wrong?”
“No, it’s just way more than I expected… Our family’s covert unit trains like that too…”
“And?”
“Even compared to them, I’d say you’ve got some bite… It’s pretty savage.”
Is that a compliment?
“Mm-hm. You’re basically like an assassin squad.”
Linia, who had followed behind us, chimed in too.
I’d wanted a normal compliment, but weird things kept coming out instead.
“How is the wand?”
Linia asked.
She seemed interested in good wands too.
I told the truth.
“It’s unbelievably good.”
The mana goes in smoothly, with no catching at all.
It was much better than when I borrowed Robert’s wand before.
It feels like racing in a sports car.
“And that’s not all.”
The grip feels great, and the weight distribution is perfect.
James had definitely asked me before about what my combat style was like.
I had said I preferred fast-paced combat.
It really feels like it was made with close combat in mind.
‘Observation Eye.’
[Information cannot be accessed!]
It’s at least a UR-rank artifact.
I got a similar reaction when I observed Leokan’s essence with Observation Eye.
Of course, I already had the information thanks to the Tower’s explanation.
If I took this to modern Earth, it’d cause a huge uproar.
And…
“This thing has a vessel.”
A dragon’s vessel.
It reinterpreted the dragon’s parts in human terms.
It could be called a single work of art.
“Let’s give it a try.”
“Yumia?”
I cast the spell.
What I had to aim at was the target.
What I had to fire was the red mana bullet.
Crimson-dyed mana flowed along my nerves more smoothly than ever before.
“Wait a second!”
“In Code, Bullet.”
“If you break another one, it’s going to be a pain!!!”
Ah.
I’d forgotten to think about the power.
—KWAAAANG!!!
* * *
“I got kicked out again…”
The floor dropped by one level.
In other words, the training room’s stage went up by one.
Of course, if I used dragon mana, it looked like I could probably break through there too.
For reference, a staff member came running over again this time too and, furious, handed me a key.
“No, how the heck are you even breaking through this? Even the top geniuses among the upperclassmen couldn’t get out of a stage 2 training room in their first year!”
“Yes.”
“From now on, please stop punching holes in the training rooms, okay?”
You’re being dramatic.
From the way he said it, it seems upperclassmen sometimes punch holes in training rooms while practicing too.
Then I can punch holes too, I guess.
“Whew, let’s head out now.”
“It’s a little awkward to stay here…”
We left the building with the training rooms.
As we were about to head up to the dormitory building after passing through the main auditorium, someone’s voice called out.
“Hey! Yumia!”
“Chef?”
It was the head chef from the kitchen.
He not only always provided delicious meals; he’d even set us up with a spice supplier. Such a kind man.
“Have you been well?”
“I’m always doing well. Except when the professors torment me.”
It’s a bumper crop of assignments, a bumper crop.
I only found out at the end of the semester that the only ones who could finish them all were weirdos like Robert and Aris.
“Haha, it’s because you keep saving them up.”
Haha.
“If I hold back twice, it feels like a top-tier attack spell is going to get lodged in my head.”
Seriously.
“Hahaha! You’ve got a great sense of humor!”
The chef seemed to be taking it as a joke.
“I’m not joking. Professor Karnarov is especially bad.”
The other staff should’ve seen the sight of Karnarov planting a top-tier spell in me.
“Haha, there’s no way Professor Karnarov would do that.”
To the staff, Karnarov was practically synonymous with fairness and integrity.
Damn, I’ll have to tell Adrian everything.
Not that it would really change anything.
I then gave the chef a recipe book I’d bought in the modern world.
Leaving the chef grinning with his mouth open as wide as a basin, I returned to the dorm.
* * *
Aris and I were lying under the air conditioner.
Right after finals ended, I didn’t even feel like moving.
But not moving made me feel stiff.
I felt like I needed to stoke the fire a little.
“…So what do we do over vacation?”
Honestly, this side is more fun than just going back to the modern world to hunt magical beasts.
And the modern world is a blazing inferno right now.
I don’t want to work in record-breaking heat.
‘I wonder if it’s a little cooler inside the Tower.’
That would be nice.
I hope the weather isn’t linked to it.
“I’m wondering that too… I already went home last time…”
While I was groaning from the backlash of overclocking, Aris had apparently gone home.
That leaves Aris with nothing to do either.
“Hmm… in that case, maybe we should study…”
“Let’s look for something else!”
Studying is out of the question.
No matter how bored I am, voluntarily studying is nonsense.
“Could you at least think about it a little before answering…”
As we were having that conversation, a quiet voice came from one side.
“Want to come to our house?”
Linia said with sleepy eyes.
“I’ll keep the promise I made last time.”
“Promise?”
That promise…
Ah.
During midterms, I said I’d give you a magic book if you drew the students’ attention.
“You’ll be able to get some interesting magic out of it.”
Linia smiled faintly.