“Haa, haaa…”

 

Luke glared at me intensely, having taken a Magic Arrow to her left forearm.

I could tell from her gaze that her mindset in approaching the duel with me had changed a bit.

Not only had she failed in her attempt to stab me in one go from the start, but she had also allowed me to land the first hit. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

From now on, she probably wouldn’t treat me as just a magic-only novice mage.

I wished she would maintain that complacency until the end of the evaluation battle, but Luke was a character skilled at assessing situations on the spot.

Probably from now on, instead of recklessly rushing in with daggers, she was more likely to make more efficient attacks.

I quietly waited for her next attack as the situation changed.

 

“……”

Thudthudthud!

 

First, she moved her feet, circling around me as if to surround me, probably to avoid the sight-blurring magic from earlier.

If this were a battle between an ordinary rogue and an ordinary mage, Luke’s decision wouldn’t have been a wise one. When facing a mage or an archer, creating distance in combat is essentially the same as volunteering to be a living target.

However, I wasn’t an ordinary mage in the sense that I could engage in close combat, and Luke wasn’t an ordinary rogue fighting with just two daggers, either.

Sharp, needle-like objects began flying towards me from her hands, five or six at a time, as she circled around me.

 

Fwip! Fwip!

 

As expected, she immediately switched to this tactic as soon as she gave up on close combat.

It was quite a tricky attack that was weaker compared to wielding daggers directly but with the advantage of being able to attack from a distance.

The fact that she could send needles flying from various directions while moving at high speeds made it even more difficult.

Of course, it was impossible to dodge them all with my body, and it was also impossible to deflect them all with my dagger. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

For an ordinary mage, this would be a situation where they’d have to think about ‘which direction would hurt less’ and escape while taking a few needles to the body.

Fortunately, I wasn’t an ordinary mage, nor was I just any mage.

 

Ping! Plink! Ping!

Clink! Clang!

 

Arcane Barrier: it is the last basic skill in the Auxiliary Magic tree.

This was also a spell I had learned in preparation for my duel with Luke, just like Blurred Light. I thought she would definitely try a ranged attack at least once.

Of course, Arcane Barrier was the lowest level among barrier-type spells, a spell that would be destroyed after blocking just one or two incoming needles, but for me now, even that much was enough.

I used triple casting to protect three out of four sides of my body simultaneously and deflected the needles flowing into the remaining open space with my dagger.

If the Arcane Barrier broke due to its weak durability, I could just keep replenishing it.

After all, I now possessed an insane amount of mana with a maximum capacity exceeding 2000.

 

Whoosh!!

“DIE!!”

 

A slightly heavier sound mixed with the sound of thin needles flying.

This was also a sound I had often heard while playing “Luminor Academy,” so I quickly turned my body towards the direction of Luke’s voice.

I used my dagger to deflect Luke’s left dagger, flying among the thin needles, which he had thrown while aiming for my heart, upwards into the sky.

 

CLANG!

 

The sharp dagger, its trajectory twisted upon colliding with my silver dagger, flew up into the air.

Judging by the sparks flying just from deflecting the flying blade, I could tell how strong her determination was to finish me off.

 

‘Shit, I really thought I was going to die there.’

 

Unlike the thin needles, the dagger that flew from her hand was clearly different in weight.

If I hadn’t used Shockwave to match the moment the blades collided, it would have undoubtedly pierced my heart or at least wounded some part of my body if I hadn’t completely altered its trajectory. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

If I had relied solely on Arcane Barrier and been complacent, I probably would have been pierced right through.

After all, throwing her dagger was Luke’s most powerful technique at this stage, so she probably intended to end it with this one move.

She must have judged that it was impossible to wield properly with her injured left hand and used her finishing move at what seemed like the most vulnerable moment.

Fortunately, with the failure of her finishing attack just now, the tide of this duel had almost turned in my favor.

Luke, with only one dagger left, had her combat effectiveness reduced by about 30-40% by my estimates, so in terms of overall combat capability, I had naturally taken the lead.

Moreover, she looked anxious, having seemingly exhausted most of the needles she had been throwing while circling around me. Of course, even if she had a few left, they would still be blocked by my Arcane Barrier.

 

“……”

 

The problem was that I still wasn’t in a particularly good position to finish Luke off either.

To win the duel, I needed to use Mana Blast in a situation where I could hit her decisively, but the biggest issue was that such a situation hadn’t arisen yet.

To use the spell, which has a long casting time and leaves me defenseless while using it, I needed to subdue her more definitively than I currently have.

Originally, it wasn’t even an efficient spell to use in person-to-person combat; it was a spell used as a final blow in party hunts. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

Wounding one arm, blocking all ranged throwing weapons, and even taking away the left dagger she was holding wasn’t enough to say I had definitively subdued her.

 

‘The best thing to do would be to approach that girl somehow and bind her body with Mana Chains.’

 

Just as Mana Blast was the first Enhanced Skill of offensive magic, Mana Chain was the first Enhanced Skill of auxiliary magic.

It’s a skill that binds the opponent for 10 seconds without fail if they are of a similar or lower level than oneself.

The problem was that to use this skill, I had to approach her close enough to almost touch daggers, and since the opponent was a person, not a monster, there was a high possibility she would sense something off about my approach and try to run away.

…There’s no choice, I’ll have to call Luke over to me here.

I wasn’t very confident in provoking people, but having ‘conquered’ Luke in my previous life, I knew well enough what she liked and what angered her.

I quietly opened my mouth and turned Luke’s gaze, who was standing still and watching me, towards me.

 

“Is that all you can do?”

“…No.”

“Really? Then why are you just standing there?”

“…None of your business.”

“I thought the second-ranked in the Technical Department would have something more, confidently requesting an evaluation battle with me, but you’re more pathetic than I expected, huh?”

“……”

 

Luke fixed her gaze on me, filled with anger, biting her lower lip at my words.

I pretended not to even notice her gaze and nonchalantly picked up the dagger that had fallen in front of me.

I gripped Luke’s left dagger, which seemed to be a gift from Seraphine, in my right hand, turning it this way and that.

In my mind, I was slowly reciting the chant for Mana Chain that I could activate at any time.

 

“Isn’t this what you were holding in your left hand just now?”

“…Don’t touch it.”

“Why? Seeing how you threw it away like trash, didn’t you just discard it like it was nothing?”

“Don’t call it trash!”

“……”

 

…This is certainly effective. Is it because the dagger is related to Seraphine?

Well, I, as a player of “Luminor Academy,” knew best that this dagger was a good item. Seraphine wouldn’t have given Luke useless equipment as a gift in the first place.

To lure her towards me, I needed to use strong expressions to provoke Luke.

Just in case there’s any misunderstanding, I wasn’t showing this arrogant attitude because I particularly wanted to. It was just a necessary provocation to lure her towards me. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

I had to thoroughly convey emotions different from my true intentions to prevent Luke, who was quick-witted, from realizing that I was trying to guide her movements.

Without doing so, it would have been practically impossible to completely deceive her.

 

“Well, it’s too good to call trash. Looking closely, it’s quite a nice dagger.”

“……”

“Can I keep this?”

“…What?”

“Thanks for the gift. I’ll use it well, Luke.”

“G-Give that back…!!!”

 

As I pretended to actually keep it by trying to put the dagger into my uniform’s inner pocket, Luke, who had been standing still, started to move.

Realizing that my provocation had definitely worked on her, I watched Luke’s movements with only the last sentence of the chant for Mana Chain I had been reciting in my head left.

I just need to focus until the end and not misrecite the spell.

If I can restrain Luke’s right hand with the spell right before her dagger pierces my body and start chanting Mana Blast immediately from that moment, I can win comfortably.

Thinking this, I was preparing to use Mana Chain while predicting the trajectory of Luke’s right hand, but for some reason, my intuition started to spark an uneasy feeling in my chest.

…In Luke’s gaze, who had approached quite close, I noticed for a moment that she seemed to be looking ‘elsewhere’ for some reason.

 

‘Wait, something’s not right…’

 

Come to think of it, there was one awkward point in Luke’s actions in the recent battle.

When Luke threw her dagger in the fight with me earlier, why did she specifically throw her left dagger at me?

She couldn’t have thrown with her injured left hand, so if she wanted to aim for an opening as quickly as possible, she should have thrown her right dagger instead. [GalaxyTL/Axiomatic]

…And if it failed, it would have been better to hold the left dagger in her right hand. After all, there’s not much difference between left-handed and right-handed daggers.

Then, there must have been a reason for Luke to specifically switch her left dagger to her right hand. There’s a reason why she specifically threw the left dagger at me, even in that urgent situation.

 

‘Could it be that what Luke threw wasn’t just the ‘dagger’, but also the information that ‘there’s no dagger in the left hand’…’

 

The moment that thought occurred to me, I remembered the moment when Ethan and Harold were swinging swords in the Blackwood mansion training ground a few months ago.

I could also recall how Ethan had achieved his ‘first victory’ against Harold there.

 

“Die!!”

 

In the split second I was understanding Luke’s intentions, her body had already approached right in front of me, ready to swing her blade.

I didn’t have a clear certainty that this would happen, but following my intuition, I used my mana chain on the approaching Luke.

I used it not on Luke’s right arm swinging from the front but on her left arm coming from a blind angle.

 

Whoosh! Clank!

 

“AAAAAARGH?!”

 

Just before Luke’s left hand could stab a dagger into the back of my head, my Mana Chain first wrapped around her left arm, and immediately, I saw Luke being subdued and falling, bound by chains wrapping around her entire body.

Even in the situation of being dragged to a corner of the arena by the chain, Luke, wearing an expression of not understanding what was happening, muttered in a bewildered voice.

 

“H-How…?!”

“How what?”

 

Ignoring Luke’s last question, I quickly gathered all my remaining mana into a Mana Blast in my palm.

Seeing the huge mana sphere appearing above my head, Luke instinctively started to writhe against the binding chains in terror, but before the chains binding her body could loosen, my Mana Blast was already complete.

…As a gift for the loser, I might as well tell her why she lost.

 

“If you’re going to ambush…. you should maintain your gaze until the end, you idiot!!!”

 

With my resentful cry, the Mana Blast flew toward the corner of the arena where Luke was bound.

Whether my last words reached her or not, her expression froze in dismay as she accepted my final strike.

After a strong explosion passed, nothing remained in the place where Luke had been bound by chains.

…The Death Prevention Magic seems to have activated properly.

 

“W-Winner! Lilith Blackwood Rosewood!”

“Lilith! Lilith! Lilith!”

“Woohoo! That’s awesome! Lilith is insane!!”

“Kyaaa! Lilith! I knew Lilith would win!! Lilith!!”

“S-Sister, please calm down! Everyone is staring at us…”

 

Receiving the cheers of the academy students chanting the winner’s name, I led my tired body out of the arena towards my preparation room, where Ethan would be waiting.

…Phew, I really thought I was going to die this time.