Chapter 33

  Academy life improved noticeably after Rose and I became comfortable with each other once more. No more awkwardly scanning the crowds and taking detours to avoid the risk of running into her, and no more lingering feeling of self-loathing and regret.

  I had worked out a system for bettering myself as well. This involved spell training with Meztili and Lily one day, followed by sparring with Felicia the next. Axel had stopped joining in in favour of following a personalised training regimen made by Professor Kuhn.

  I spied on him out of curiosity one day, but couldn’t determine what he was trying to do. He would stand in one position with his palms together and arms stretched forward in silence. I could tell it had something to do with channelling magic into his hands and releasing it in a burst of lightning, but his normal reinforced punches were far stronger, and the range was about the same. Whatever it was, it didn’t look like he had mastered it yet.

  After three weeks, Leon and I had spent enough time working together that I could comfortably refer to him as a friend. We would split our team into two and run through exercise after exercise to drill our movements into their muscle memory. I knew the others viewed us as relentless slave drivers, but they couldn’t argue with the results.

  There was also an event that overshadowed the talk of my fight against Axel, though it happened off campus and didn’t involve me at all.

  From what I heard from Lily, Lloyd and Zachariah had been sent to clear out a wild animal den that had been causing problems near Borderton, only to find a barghest. I had run into a couple of them in the Feral Abyss myself, but apparently this one was able to ignore all physical attacks.

  They are massive canines that border the realms of life and death. Or so the common belief claims. In reality, they have a unique habit wherein they bind half their soul to their mate before shifting to a completely different plane. This causes their bodies to flicker in and out of two realms. From an uneducated standpoint, it certainly made them look spectral.

  Anyway, the point is that Lloyd made waves when the rumour spread that his sword could affect even the immaterial. Zachariah, being the top-ranked in the school, was the one who shared the story, which left no room for anyone to doubt its authenticity.

  Had I known about the barghest beforehand, I would have intervened. Oh well, at least people stopped bugging me and moved on to Lloyd.

  As for the Crucible, I had finally begun to understand the theme and expectations of the second layer.

  It started on the fifth night when I managed to get the jump on a group of three insectoid creatures that looked to be made from bone. I had quietly dropped down and beheaded the one in the back, and it was then that I noticed something interesting.

  The moment my axe made contact, the other two flinched and spun to attack me. They certainly had not heard or seen me, so how could they react like that?

  Initially, I assumed it was a hive mind species or they were connecting their senses in some other way. However, after they killed me and I reformed elsewhere, I noticed similar behaviour among all the groups.

  I ran some tests on a particularly slow group of shambling corpses. I took one hostage and hacked away while watching the others. They would always flinch as if they felt the pain of my attacks at the same time as the one actually being wounded. But that wasn’t what caught my attention.

  It was that I could see faint wounds appearing in the same areas where their ally was hurt. They weren’t as dire as the initial wounds, but it was still noticeable.

  Remove a leg, and the others started limping. Remove an eye, and they seem to grow inaccurate with their strikes. Throw one into a deep ravine, and the others fall over and briefly convulse.

  On the seventh night, I confirmed this behaviour was identical for everyone here. I also confirmed that every group always consisted of the same species. There was never a group of skeletal humanoids mixed with insectoids, for example. I also hadn’t noticed it because of their strange appearances, but I did eventually notice that every member of a group always looked identical.

  They may wear different clothing or weapons scavenged from the bones of the fallen, but beneath that, it was like they were copied and pasted.

  I had my theories, but Ada’s response to my letter all but confirmed it.

  Soul Divide. Ada detailed this as a method most popularly known because of liches, wherein they split their soul and attach it to an object to preserve their life. However, she didn’t know of any such way that would let you literally duplicate yourself.

  For the rest of the nights, I tried repeatedly to split my soul into two, using the same method Primal Soul utilises. The main difference was that I wasn’t reaching out to another soul to meld with it, but rather reaching out to nothing and trying to physically recreate my image.

  Needless to say, this is beyond difficult. I had not succeeded on a single attempt, but I had managed to create some odd little homunculi that vaguely resembled me. They all died immediately, and the backlash of their deaths in turn destroyed my own body.

  Still, it was progress. How this would help me in the material world was still a big question mark in my mind, however.

  I woke up from my latest venture into the Crucible and found a disappointed girl leaning over me.

  “Ah, damn… I was so close.”

  Lily pouted, and I saw her holding a bowl of warm water to my hand. It seemed that the classic prank existed in this world, too.

  “Nice try. Next time, pick an easier mark.”

  “I did, you were to be my second victim.”

  She pointed to Oliver, who was still deep asleep in the second bed that was finally brought in this month. His hand was hanging out from the blanket and submerged in a second bowl of water.

  I sighed and went to move his hand out, but I noticed the wet patch on the bed.

  “...”

  I silently left the room, then slammed the door on Lily’s face.

  “Uwah! Wh-what’s happening?”

  I heard Oliver waking up. And just as planned, he saw only one person in the room to blame.

  “What’s this… LILY!”

  “Nyahaha!”

  A shadowy substance wiggled under the crack of the door I was holding closed, then Lily materialised from it and scurried downstairs, cackling all the while.

  ***

  The knight we would be serving was due to arrive this morning. Thus, Meztili, Lily, and I made our way to the main hall and waited for the gold class crew to join us. We were a little late due to Lily getting stuck behind and being lectured by the more morally upright of the dorm residents—Lloyd, Bridgit, and Isolde.

  I don’t know why they bothered. Lily wouldn’t change, and now they had made themselves the perfect targets for her next prank.

  “Took you lot long enough.”

  One of the gold class members spoke up. He was the one we referred to as broccoli boy previously. We now knew his name to be Christopher Bullard, but in private, we still referred to him by his haircut.

  “Sorry, we got tangled up, we’re good to go now.”

  Arnold, our spearman, scoffed at my words.

  “Oh, well, if you’re all good, I guess that’s fine. No need to be on time for a meeting with an imperial knight.”

  “Arnold.”

  Leon spoke firmly and gave him a look of quiet admonishment.

  “...Apologies, sir.”

  This kind of exchange had become familiar to me by this point. I knew the dynamics of the Donnerschnitt/Goldklinge families, and the two members before me had wildly differing opinions of me personally.

  Leon had come to respect me for defeating the person he could not scratch, but Arnold only saw me as the guy who was corrupting his master with dishonourable tactics.

  “Oi! Rex!”

  A voice interrupted us, and a familiar face tactlessly pushed her way into our circle.

  “Felicia, what’s up?”

  She was still in silver class, much to her disdain. I already had a good idea what she wanted to ask.

  “I submitted a third request, once they give me the okay, I’ll be joining you! Great, right?”

  She declared proudly.

  Honestly, I envied her bottomless self-confidence and optimism. Both of her last requests were poorly worded and came off more as demands to be approved for live action. Why she thought this third one would be any different was beyond me.

  “So anyway, I know you’re meeting the knight guy soon, I should come too, right?”

  “Sorry, Felicia, if they approve your request, I’ll introduce you myself.”

  “Aww! I already came in the top 20 in our class assignment, there’s no way they’ll turn me down again! C’mon, just bring me with you.”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  “Psst psst psst, hey girl, come here girl!”

  The voice calling to her like an alleycat came from a group of second-year silver class students. Apparently, they took umbrage with the presence of a therian in their junior class.

  “Well, looks like you have your own battle to fight here anyway.”

  I clapped her on the shoulder and headed out while the others followed behind. The silent rage simmering beneath Felicia’s sky blue eyes did not escape my notice.

  I had no doubt I would be hearing more about how this would unfold later. For now, though, I had a knight to meet.

  We had already been told ahead of time where to find him, so we travelled as a group to the outskirts of town. It was a weekend, so there was no need to be concerned about missing class, and the town guard was given forewarning of what was going on.

  We left through the western gate and travelled along the path until we came upon an oft-used hunting trail. Arnold double-checked his notes and confirmed we were to travel down the trail until coming out into a large field.

  It was not a long journey, only 20 minutes had passed since we departed. Luckily, there was no room for doubt that we had arrived in the correct location, as a single figure stood waiting for us.

  “You’ve arrived. Good.”

  The man walked down to greet us, and we immediately saluted him. For the Kronenvolk—that being myself, Lily, Meztili, Leon, and Arnold—we simply clapped our heels together with our hands held behind our backs and bowed our heads. For the Soleans, they all took a knee to show respect.

  “Haha, you guys were taught well, but you can be at ease. I’m not all that much older than you anyway.”

  The knight laughed, and I took a quick look at him.

  Indeed, he looked to be in his early to mid-20s, yet his attire proved his authenticity. An imperial badge on the left side of his chest served as identification. But even without that, he wore a black tabbard with silver trimmings that looked to be made from a slightly glossy material that cost an arm and a leg. He also wore silver gauntlets, pauldrons, greaves, and sabatons. His limbs were well protected, but he sacrificed any torso or head protection, likely for mobility. He looked every part the knight, badge or no.

  I surmised he was a hybrid class of fighter, considering he had a shortsword by his waist, a spell tome right next to it, and two odd-looking crescent blades on his back.

  “Let’s get introductions out of the way. I’m Gustav Falk, Silver class knight for the Order of the Watchdog.”

  Knights in the empire followed the same class system as the IMA; that much was straightforward. However, there were two things to note here in particular.

  For one, achieving knighthood is not a simple feat. Even a bronze class would be stronger than most students here, regardless of whether they were bronze themselves, or even diamond. The fact that we had a silver class here was worthy of a few raised eyebrows.

  In addition; the Order of the Watchdog was an imperial knight order focused on internal affairs and acted as law enforcement when traditional methods wouldn’t cut it.

  In other words, Gustav was not just some no-name grunt.

  “I’ve already read all your files on the way here, it looks like I’ve got quite a fun crew this time!”

  He clapped Leon on the back playfully before turning his attention to me.

  “And I hear the Druids have returned? I can’t wait to see what you’ve got up your sleeves.”

  The surprisingly approachable knight went around greeting us all individually, but it didn’t feel performative to me. Rather, this came off like the behaviour of someone who valued teamwork and wanted to really understand our strengths.

  “Alright! Now that we’ve got all the boring stuff out of the way, let me see what you can all do.”

  He abruptly drew his sword and, in a single backward leap, he flew through the field, leaving a generous gap between us.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t go too hard on you guys, just fight as best you can.”

  The rest of us exchanged hesitant glances, but once I drew my axe, the others quickly fell into formation.

  Our three shieldbearers in front, Lily and Meztili behind them, Leon and I covering the flanks, and finally, Arnold in the rear.

  We didn’t rush forward. This was a formation devised to measure the strength of an opponent assumed to be greater than any of us individually.

  So instead, Meztili kicked off the engagement by conjuring a spear of bones and firing it through the air like a rocket-propelled javelin.

  Gustav swiftly skirted around the attack and decided to come to us instead. Meztili followed up with a hailstorm of small bone needles, but no matter how many she fired, Gustav was effortlessly deflecting them all with his blade.

  What’s more, he looked like he was weaving a performance with his every movement, like his swordsmanship had evolved to the realm of art. We weren’t quite done yet, though.

  Two more spears of bone were fired, but they were intentionally fired in a ‘v’ shape, missing the knight in the centre.

  “Gotcha.”

  Lily grinned and activated her spell. The shadows of both spears warped and suddenly stretched out to connect to one another. Gustav, who had been in the centre of the shadows, was suddenly wrapped in black chains.

  However, he only paused to give an impressed whistle, after which he vanished.

  “Woah!”

  Donald, the central shieldbearer, cried out in surprise as Gustav suddenly appeared above him and circled around like a viper to put him into a chokehold.

  The others reacted well, just as we had practised. The other shield bearers backed off in separate directions while Meztili and Lily stayed behind them. Like this, our formation had shifted to a three-way encirclement. Now it was Arnold’s turn.

  A flash of frost magic turned the ground beneath Donald to ice, and Gustav briefly lost his grip. Donald, expecting this, broke free and ran to Arnold’s side.

  “Nice coordination, guys! You’re doing much better than I expected. You don’t mind if I kick it up a bit, yeah?”

  Gustav applauded us with genuine praise, then his movements grew erratic.

  He sword was dancing once again, despite no attacks being aimed at him, and he skated across the grass in staunch defiance of the laws of physics.

  “Rex, stop his sword!”

  Leon called out and leapt forward to engage from one side. I hadn’t caught on to what was happening, but I trusted his judgment and followed suit.

  “Watch out, boys, it’s not always smart to dogpile your foe.”

  Gustav smiled and continued to make odd movements. I could tell there was some kind of meaning to the way the sword was moving, but even with that knowledge, I couldn’t do much.

  Leon and I coordinated our strikes, narrowly missing each other as Gustav dodged. But even so, between forced parries, Gustav’s speed still allowed him to flick and swish his blade around.

  “Back up!”

  Leon shouted again, I reacted immediately, and a pillar of intense wind suddenly burst up from the ground where I was standing.

  I had no time to question how Gustav cast that spell without any spellcrafting, as he immediately cut through his own tornado and pressured me again.

  I tossed my axe to the ground, aiming for his foot. This halted his advance for only a moment, but it was enough time for me to deliver a jab to his nose.

  As his head sprang back, Arnold came to relieve me.

  I took his former position behind Donald and analysed the ongoing fight.

  Meztili began sending skeletal minions as a distraction, and Lily was using any opening she could to send spells through their shadows.

  But Gustav was like the wind itself. In fact, the more he moved around, the faster he became. I could see his feet were no longer making contact with the ground, and realised he had begun using wind magic to push himself around the battlefield.

  “Vek.”

  I called out, and my spider friend, who had remained hidden in the shadows of the trees, launched out onto my back.

  This might seem silly to call a deadly Visceranid in considering this was just a friendly test, but fighting strong opponents together was a great way to build trust quickly. Besides, I carried antivenom around just in case any unfortunate accidents were to occur.

  I couldn’t fuse with him yet, but I could use Soul Link. Vek was not technically a magical creature, so while I could not use mana even now, it did have different advantages.

  I ran out to rejoin the fight, this time with my bare fists.

  Leon backed off this time, and Arnold took a back seat, only occasionally providing jabs to support me where needed.

  “I thought you Druids were all about magic? Is pugilism normal for you?”

  Gustav commented as he evaded my attacks with relaxed ease. Even the earlier attack I landed didn’t seem to have left a mark.

  Wild swings, quick jabs, leg sweeps. I was incorporating everything I had learned from Axel and Felicia to keep up the pressure and find the opening I needed.

  “No time to chat? That’s good, you shouldn’t let your opponent distract you.”

  Gustav continued commenting on my movements.

  “Still, this isn’t enough to catch a knight, you know?”

  Suddenly, I felt a force hit me from my left side. A rock had flown straight into me from afar. The same thing happened from the other side, then from behind, then I was sent hurtling through the air as another tornado appeared beneath me.

  As I quickly regained my footing, I wondered where my support had gone, only to see everybody on the ground groaning.

  “Oh, you’re still good to go? Alright, here I come, junior!”

  I wasn’t given time to comprehend my surroundings as his sword came for me again. Of course, he was expertly avoiding cutting me, but I still instinctively tried blocking the perceived danger of the blade. This always led to me being punished with a light slap or half-hearted jab.

  Finally, I dropped to one knee, and he pointed his sword at me.

  “Give up?”

  He asked with an easygoing smile.

  I lunged forward and grabbed his wrist before squeezing tightly. He looked confused as it couldn’t really be called an attack, but he must have felt something was wrong and quickly kicked me back.

  I luckily landed right near my axe, and ran back in after grabbing it. Gustav responded, but noticed too late how hard his movements had been impacted by my ploy. He moved in slow motion, and his eyes widened as Vek appeared from behind me to join the attack.

  A moment before I was about to secure victory, Gustav flashed with a golden light, and as if nothing had happened, his speed returned. A thrust from his hilt and a spinning kick were all it took to knock both me and Vek down.

  “Poison, huh? However did you manage that?”

  Gustav cooed in wonder as he examined the wrist I grabbed earlier.

  It was simple, really. When Soul Link is active with Vek, I could excrete poison from my flesh. Unlike Vek’s usual concoction, mine does not have any benefits, it also isn’t as potent. It can’t paralyse, but it can dull my victim’s movements considerably.

  “Pretty good, you guys! Anyone in need of a potion?”

  We all groaned as our bodies and pride were bruised all over, but nobody accepted the offer.

  ***

  After the fight, Gustav gave us feedback on where we could improve and suggested we discuss the battle as a group to come up with a game plan for tomorrow.

  That’s right, Gustav wanted to do this again tomorrow. And the next day, and the next day, so on and so forth until it was time to leave for Farrowgate.

  I had expected a strategy meeting to discuss the mission, but Gustav handwaved it by saying it could be discussed on the journey to Farrowgate. He was much more interested in seeing firsthand what we could do in the next week.

  Well, that was fine by me. Everybody else had become more motivated as well, and we immediately gathered in the academy training field to recreate the fight as we each perceived it.

  Leon explained that Gustav’s sword movements were somehow gathering and releasing mana simultaneously, and this was the cause of the sudden spells. Meztili added onto that by explaining each spell used was indeed done with a spell circle, even though none of us ever saw anything of the sort

  Lily explained the sudden rock attack that came from every angle, which I learnt had affected them as well. Apparently, Gustav had used a combination of earth and wind magic to draw rocks out of the ground, then fling them at us.

  As for how he suddenly vanished after Lily restrained him, that was something none of us understood. At first glance, it resembled Phase Step, but there was a delay that should not have been present if he was truly teleporting.

  Using what we knew, we tried recreating the same movements. Lily would use shadows to randomly toss rocks at us while we sparred and Meztili would cast force spells to push us back to simulate the cyclones. Leon and Arnold would fight as one against me and the shield trio to mimic Gustav’s speed.

  It looked bizarre to the onlookers, but none of us cared. We were joined in a single goal now. We couldn’t do anything even in an 8v1, so now we had to prove we weren’t going to hold him back before the week’s end.