Ariel from the Swordsmanship Department Class B doesn’t pay attention to most things around him.

 

The rumors about him, or the female students who subtly flirt with him.

 

Unless someone directly expresses their feelings to him, he doesn’t react. More precisely, he doesn’t even notice.

 

This wasn’t because he had no interest in the world.

 

He simply didn’t have time for it. He was managing a schedule that ordinary people couldn’t even imagine every single day.

 

Even in the current situation, he was unaware of the rumors circulating about him and Iria.

 

But

 

“Hmm…”

 

Recently, he had started to feel that something was strange.

 

Feeling like someone was following him, he turned around to see the silver-haired girl he had encountered before.

 

Thinking it was just a remarkable coincidence, he would head to his next lecture, only to feel someone following him again.

 

And he was right, because when he turned around, that striking silver hair would be there.

 

Even for someone as oblivious to rumors as him, this was a phenomenon he could notice.

 

He might not care about other things, but having reached a certain level, he was better at sensing others’ presence than most people.

 

So one day, while walking in the academy corridor, he stopped in his tracks.

 

Turning around, there was the silver-haired girl again. Ariel scratched his cheek and hesitatingly asked,

 

“Um… Do you have some business with me?”

 

“No.”

 

“Don’t you think we’ve been running into each other a lot lately?”

 

“It’s a coincidence.”

 

Ariel thought for a moment.

 

When they first met, it was in a dark mountainous area, so he couldn’t see clearly, but now, up close, she was quite a beautiful girl.

 

Her neatly arranged silver hair looked as fine as silk, and her faintly glowing red eyes seemed like embedded jewels.

 

She had a generally cold impression, but that enhanced her beauty.

 

Even Ariel, who kept his distance from women, had an eye for appearance. She must be very popular among other students.

 

She was a girl whose appearance would draw attention wherever she went.

 

‘Was there any reason for such a girl to follow me?’

 

“…”

 

Thinking about it, there wasn’t.

 

Perhaps it was just a coincidence as she said.

 

From that day on, Ariel began to wonder if he was being overly self-conscious.

 

***

 

The rumors surrounding Iria and Ariel grew in scale as time passed.

 

The reason for this was that on the tenth day of Iria following Ariel, he finally reacted.

 

In the usual scene of Iria walking behind Ariel, he stopped.

 

Then he turned around and started some kind of conversation.

 

Although the content couldn’t be heard from a distance, the fact that they stopped and had any conversation at all was significant.

 

And something was revealed in his expression.

 

People could see Ariel looking a bit troubled, scratching his cheek and seeming at a loss.

 

There wasn’t much else, but the fact that the usually stoic Ariel had reacted was meaningful.

 

“Hey, doesn’t that look like he’s blushing?”

 

“Iria is definitely pretty.”

 

“With her looks, if she sets her mind to it, who wouldn’t fall for her? And she’s skilled enough to be the top student. Who could be a better match for Ariel as a girlfriend than Iria?”

 

Thus, the current rumors mainly revolved around the two becoming a couple.

 

At this point, no one was complaining. Everyone could see that the two looked good together.

 

They were both at the highest positions in their respective years, and both were exceptionally good-looking.

 

And above all, their color combination matched well.

 

Iria’s appearance was basically silver hair and red eyes, while Ariel had black hair and blue eyes.

 

Just standing side by side without any reason, they looked like a painting. Even their personalities were similar in that they didn’t care much about others’ gazes, so some people even thought they had already started dating.

 

But this wasn’t true.

 

Iria was simply investigating him out of curiosity, and Ariel, aside from speaking to her once, wasn’t even paying attention to her.

 

It was like a disaster brought about by a lack of communication.

 

“Look at that crazy bitch. Left alone, she’s been following him for ten days? Do something about it, Sera. You’re good at that kind of thing.”

 

“Should I?”

 

Sera stood up with a relaxed smile.

 

Just that was enough to make the surrounding mana vibrate. Her very existence was like a massive lump of mana.

 

Sera, the second-ranked student in the second year, had a mana capacity of 8300. In terms of total mana, it was a figure that wouldn’t lose even to the top student of the third year.

 

Overshadowed by Ariel, she hadn’t received much attention, but she was originally someone who should have been the top student. It was almost unfair to compare her to Iria, the top student of the first year.

 

After all, wasn’t Iria famous for having a low mana capacity?

 

For humans, most of their strength comes from mana. Small differences could be overcome with skill, but overturning an overwhelming amount of mana isn’t easy.

 

Sera proved this with her ranking. She overwhelmed students with much lower mana capacities with ease.

 

The reason she was called someone who could have been the top student without issue was because the difference between her and the third-ranked student was overwhelming.

 

She won without even using half of her mana. So, there was no way a first-year top student could be her match.

 

“Usually, I wouldn’t even be interested in weak people, but when someone flirts with the person I’ve got my eye on, I get curious. How strong are they?”

 

“Are you… angry?”

 

Sera laughed incredulously at the question from beside her.

 

“Why would I be angry? I’m in the best mood right now.”

 

“Hmm.”

 

But the student beside her couldn’t continue speaking.

 

Because Sera’s slightly smiling face looked far from normal.

 

“In this world, power is everything. I only acknowledge those stronger than me. If you want something, prove it with strength. If we want the same thing, the winner takes it.”

 

“You’re not just looking for a duel, are you?”

 

“That’s exactly it.”

 

“…”

 

The second-ranked student had a way of thinking different from ordinary people.

 

Come to think of it, she hadn’t had a duel in a while. She was itching for one.

 

***

 

At this point, the second-year class of the academy was so full of talented individuals that it was naturally called the golden generation.

 

Excluding Ariel, who showed exceptional strength, it was always an interesting topic of debate who would take the second-place position.

 

The current second-year class was obsessed with duels to overturn rankings. It was so extreme that even professors with considerable experience said they had never seen such belligerent students before.

 

But that didn’t last long, as the hierarchy of the second year was settled by one person.

 

Sera was the strongest, most battle-crazy student among them.

 

Especially among the fierce competitors of the talent-rich second year, she demonstrated overwhelming strength and took the second-place position.

 

Anyone who had seen Sera even for a moment would know how obsessed she was with duels and how fixated she was on overwhelming force.

 

That’s also why she had feelings for Ariel. In her own words, he was the first man to defeat her in a duel.

 

Rather than liking him romantically, it was closer to an obsession with strength greater than her own.

 

It is a known fact that Sera is crazy. The name ‘madwoman’ suits her perfectly. She was already infamous among the second-years.

 

She would challenge anyone who looked strong to a duel under any pretext, and if they didn’t accept, she would harass them until they did.

 

There was no malice in her actions, she simply wanted to duel, so there was no way to avoid it.

 

There was even a joke that school life was easy as long as you didn’t catch Sera’s eye.

 

And Iria caught her eye because recently, she became excessively famous.

 

She was always well-known, but as her name was mentioned several times among the second-years, it eventually reached Sera’s ears.

 

Sera was like an unavoidable natural disaster. Even if Iria hadn’t been following Ariel around, she probably would have had to face Sera sooner or later.

 

“Let’s have a duel.”

 

“…”

 

Iria showed a puzzled expression.

 

It wasn’t uncommon for the top student, Iria, to receive duel challenges, but the ribbon color was different.

 

Blue ribbon meant the second year, didn’t it?

 

She wondered why a student from a different year would specifically challenge her to a duel.

 

‘Sera.’

 

It was a name that seemed familiar somehow. It felt similar to when she had first heard Ariel’s name.

 

A face she was seeing for the first time, but for some reason, the name was familiar. Did she know this person? Maybe she was someone she knew but had forgotten.

 

‘What a tiresome personality.’

 

She can tell what kind of person someone is by looking them in the eye. If refused, she would probably stick around until Iria accepted.

 

That’s the kind of person Sera is. Someone who won’t be satisfied until she’s had at least one fight with a person she’s set her eyes on.

 

Refusing would probably be more troublesome.

 

It might be better to just go along with it once.

 

“Alright.”

 

She knew what would happen if she didn’t accept someone who wanted a duel.

 

She recalled what happened with Lucia.

 

With someone as fanatical as this, you never know what kind of excuse they might come up with if refused.

 

In the end, Iria accepted the duel with a very annoyed expression.