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Chapter 63: Training (3)
🕑 Added 2024-02-26 23:30:48 +0000 UTCI thought a normal life consisted of simply going to class, staying at home, and coming back. I was just a little hen in a den of wolves, it was necessary to attract the least amount of attention I could.
But that dream was crushed today as I walked through the veil of trees and deeper toward the northern half of the academy.
Today was the day that I, Atlas Whisper, ordinary extraordinaire, was going to skip class.
Not of my own volition.
“So…” Zacka said. “It’s a straw doll you can’t fight? What smith made the doll?”
“I don’t have to fight it!” Prince Ier stressed his words. “I have to cut it.”
“And the doll is immune… to magic…?” Ken added.
“No! I am not allowed to use magic! Did you guys hear anything I said?”
“Not really.” The yellow-haired Argent shrugged. “You said we’re skipping class, so we followed along.”
Prince Ier sighed. “I’ve managed every other test, but this is the only thing I can’t do. If I could use magic, it would have been easy, but just emitting mana is like blowing on something with your entire body.”
Argent leaned ahead and stared Prince Ier down. “Your muscles do look better,” he said. “But not as good as mine.”
“Whatever, grasshead,” Zacka clicked his tongue. Argent could not say anything to the real muscle guy here. “I think we’ll see your doll when we fight it.”
Wait a second. Didn’t they say they were here because they wanted to skip class?
I didn’t want to do that. Skipping class would only make me seem like a bad student, being seen like a bad student would make the professors work me more, being worked more will stress me out more, being stressed out will make me misbehave more, and then I’ll be seen as a punk, and then the others will start to hate me, and that will stress me more, and I’ll do more bad stuff, and then bam! Beheaded for insulting royalty!
Skipping class is death.
At least for me.
Since they were doing this voluntarily, I didn’t have to follow along. I could just leave!
I slowly turned on my heels and started to walk away. Escape was imminent. I lowered my stance and charged off—
“Ahp!”
—When someone grabbed my collar and held me back.
“Where do you think… you’re going…?”
I looked back and found Ken, staring down at me. If I skipped class, I’d die eventually, but if I ditched these guys, wouldn’t they kill me immediately?
Tears were forming in my eyes.
“I thought I’d go back.”
“No can do…” said Ken.
“Friends should share responsibility,” added Zacka.
“We skip together, we flip together.” Prince Ier pointed his thumbs down.
“And well, if you’re with us, then Ethan won’t scold us a lot.”
All four of us looked at Argent.
“Ethan?” asked Prince Ier.
“The professor…?”
We nodded and were back on our way. I guess it wasn’t just me who found calling the professor ‘Ethan’ a bit weird.
After the short walk, Prince Ier brought us to a clearing in the middle of the thicket. A straw doll stood at the edge of a clearing with the distant mountain peering over it. The trees around the doll had been struck down with messy gashes and blasts and had opened a clear way to the mountains at the back.
Green grass had been squashed, it looked more like green blood than grass, this was all the effect of Prince Ier using his mana. It was not magic, there was no magic circle involved.
This almost felt wasteful to me, wouldn’t using mana be easier? But Prince Ier did say his Ice Magic had grown rapidly in the last seven days.
“Is this it…?” asked Ken.
Prince Ier nodded. He pulled out the wooden sword strapped to his waist. Prince Ier raised the sword and pulled it back.
I observed his stance, it was very different from what I had seen back in the fight with Ken. Even Ken seemed to have noticed that.
It looked more… relaxed? He seemed more neutral than before as if he was ready to face anything.
“I can aim and reach it…” Prince Ier’s sword started being colored with a white hue.
A gasp left me. This was the first time I had seen such a concentrated use of pure mana and not any kind of magic.
Prince Ier swung the sword. A white crescent left his sword and charged straight ahead. The white crescent cut through the air and reached the training doll.
And then, right as it hit the doll, it spread away like splashing water. The doll was only pushed back a little bit.
“Cutting through is impossible!” Prince Ier clicked his tongue.
He then handed the sword to the others. Argent went first. He swung the blade and discharged a ton of mana, which in turn pushed him back and made him fall.
Then went Ken, and then Zacka, both of them could launch it out but their mana dispersed within moments.
They even handed the sword to me, but I could barely do anything. Mine traveled much less than Ken and Zacka’s and was dimmer than Argent’s, but at least I could launch the mana out.
It was frustrating.
Just as we were about to try again, we all heard footsteps from the back.
We turned around, and there stood our professor. He held his hat down and narrowed his gaze as if asking what we were up to.
“Why are you skipping class?” He asked.
Before anyone could say anything, Prince Ier intervened. “You monster! This is impossible, isn’t it?! No one can cut a straw doll with mana alone!”
The professor sighed.
“You have done enough, just go back today.”
“Ah ha! So you know no one can do it and you’re backing off!”
“Even Professor Barnum can do it, injured. It became a standard military training for people on the front lines.” The professor held his hand out, and Prince Ier angrily handed him the wooden sword.
“Like I said.” The professor dropped his attache case and held the sword on his shoulder. He stood twenty steps away from the doll—like the rest of us—and lowered his blade.
“You’ve done enough. You’ve learned enough. Once I cut it, all of you go back and Student Ier, rest for today.”
“Sure,” Prince Ier huffed. “If you do it, that is.”
Was it just me or had they gotten more casual? Well, maybe learning or life-and-death situations can both bring people together.
We couldn’t see anything, it didn’t seem like the professor was going to fill his sword with mana.
He casually swung the blade up, a very fast swing.
“Oops!” he said.
“See! You can’t even shoot the mana—”
Prince Ier held his tongue. A slick slide resounded in the air as the straw doll suddenly dropped from the center.
It was cut neatly in two halves.
Everyone looked at the doll with surprise.
The professor pushed the blade away and sighed. “I thought I put in too much strength. I am a little out of touch. Now then, you’ve seen it can be done, let’s go back now.”
No one could object. The others grumbled a bit as the professor picked up his attache case again and turned around. The others, too, followed him and started walking away from the thicket.
“Damn it, if I could train a bit more.”
“Will you be fine tomorrow?”
“I don't think everyone can do this… I want to learn too…”
I held my breath.
I couldn’t even feel when his mana entered the blade and when it shot out. No, not just that, I could barely follow his swing either.
My eyes were stuck on the doll. Was something like this really possible with just mana?
I slowly raised my gaze.
That’s when I noticed.
A giant cloud of dust had formed on the distant mountain, rocks were falling off, and a sudden landslide.
“Ah…”
I shook my head and pulled my glasses off. I wiped them and looked up again…
This time, the cloud of dust was gone, but the rocks that had fallen were visible.
“Student Atlas? Why did you stop?”
“S-sorry! I’m here!”
I held my thumping chest and rushed behind the others.
Right, it was a coincidence.
A small landslide happened at the same time. It couldn’t be the professor.
***
The rest of the day passed without incident. As the sun set and rose once more.
The day of the battle between the two classes came by.
***
[A/N: These]
