Chapter 78: 'Who are you?'

"Everyone, prepare your strongest spells!" Seraphina commanded. "Concentrate everything you have on that attack. We need to divert it before it reaches the pillar!"

Her voice carried across the battlefield, forcing the students to abandon their hesitation.

The senior students immediately began forming magic circles. Those who specialized in elemental magic summoned whatever power they could still draw from their exhausted bodies.

A student gathered flames between his hands, while another condensed the surrounding moisture into a cluster of ice spears. Several others combined their efforts to create a powerful gust of wind.

Seraphina herself raised her sword and began gathering mana.

She had already expended much of her strength during the battle against the undead, and her reserves were approaching their limit. Her arms felt heavy, and every attempt to circulate mana through her body produced a dull ache.

She ignored the discomfort. There was no room for hesitation. If the pillar fell, everyone in the area would be exposed.

"Release your spells!" She shouted.

The students unleashed their attacks.

A barrage of magic rushed toward the gathering darkness, filling the battlefield with flashes of elemental energy.

For a brief moment, the combined assault illuminated the surrounding ruins.

Then the enemy released its spell.

The dark energy surged forward like a tidal wave.

The collision produced a tremendous shock wave that swept across the battlefield. Students staggered as the pressure struck them, and several who were already exhausted fell to their knees.

Their spells collided with the darkness.

Fire vanished.

Ice shattered.

Lightning dissolved into scattered sparks. The wind magic was swallowed almost immediately. Nothing they did could meaningfully slow the incoming attack.

Seraphina watched in horror as the dark energy continued toward the pillar. Their combined efforts had accomplished even less than before.

No...

She tightened her grip on her sword. She wanted to cast another spell, but her mana reserves were nearly empty. Even if she forced herself to continue, she doubted she could produce anything powerful enough to matter.

Around her, the other students had reached the same realization.

Some stared at the approaching attack with blank expressions. Others lowered their weapons, unable to summon the strength to continue fighting. They had done everything they could. And it still wasn’t enough.

The dark caster watched the approaching spell with satisfaction.

This time, there would be no mistake. The attack was strong enough to obliterate the pillar and everything standing around it. Even if the young swordsman attempted the same trick again, the caster was confident that the sheer amount of power would overwhelm him.

Its mouth twisted into a cruel smile.

"Let’s see how you handle this one," the dark caster muttered.

The dark energy drew closer to the pillar.

Then Kael moved.

He stepped forward without hesitation, placing himself directly in the path of the incoming spell.

"Grayford!" Seraphina shouted.

Her voice was filled with alarm.

"What are you doing? Get away from there!"

Kael did not look back.

He could hear her perfectly well. Unfortunately, moving away would accomplish nothing except allowing the attack to destroy the pillar.

He had no intention of letting that happen. Not when he had already figured out how to deal with the problem.

’Honestly, I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this.’

Kael adjusted his stance and watched the approaching darkness. The first deflection had not been a lucky accident.

He had noticed something while observing the caster’s attacks.

The dark energy possessed tremendous destructive power, but its movement was not entirely stable. The caster had compressed its mana into a concentrated mass before releasing it, giving the spell tremendous force in a relatively narrow trajectory.

That made the attack devastating when it struck a target directly.

It also meant that the spell depended on maintaining its direction.

Kael did not need to overpower the entire mass of dark mana. He only needed to interfere with its movement at the correct moment.

The principle was simple.

Executing it against an attack of this magnitude was considerably more difficult. He had already learned how to redirect force through his swordsmanship. The Returning Tide Sword Manual emphasized receiving an opponent’s momentum, guiding it along a different path, and allowing the opponent’s own strength to work against them.

However, that technique had originally been intended for physical combat.

Applying the same principle to a concentrated spell required a different approach.

During the first attack, Kael had used the faint mana surrounding his sword to reinforce the point of contact. Rather than attempting to block the dark energy, he had struck its outer edge at an angle, disrupting the spell’s forward movement and redirecting its momentum.

The result had been far from perfect. His arms still felt numb from the impact, and the mana circulating through his sword arm had become noticeably unstable.

He could not afford to make a mistake this time.

’Don’t fight the current. Change its direction.’

Kael exhaled slowly.

He allowed his breathing to settle into the rhythm he had practiced repeatedly during his morning training.

Four counts to inhale.

Two counts to hold.

Six counts to exhale.

His mana responded to the familiar rhythm, gathering around his sword in a thin, barely visible layer.

The dark energy approached.

Kael waited.

The students watched him with expressions of disbelief and fear.

Most of them wondered since when was he able to gather mana. For all they knew, F-rank Hero Core couldn’t do it.

Unless...

They finally started suspecting that Kael had a breakthrough.

However, even if he got a breakthrough, it was still dumb to try to face a dark spell of that magnitude.

Some wanted to shout at him to retreat, while others could not even find their voices. They had already witnessed the result of their combined magic, and they knew how little it had accomplished.

Some of them started to cling to a little hope that maybe a miracle could happen twice in a row.

Because if Kael failed, there would be nothing left to stop the attack. And the undead would be able to advance.

The dark caster’s smile widened.

The spell was almost upon him.

Then Kael moved.

His sword cut through the air in a smooth diagonal arc, striking the outer edge of the dark energy at the precise moment before impact.

The collision sent a sharp vibration through his arms. Pain shot from his wrists to his shoulders, but Kael maintained his grip. He did not attempt to stop the attack.

Instead, he guided it.

The dark energy twisted away from the pillar, its trajectory changing as the concentrated force was redirected toward the empty ground beside the ruins.

For an instant, the massive spell appeared to bend around the young swordsman. Then it swept past him.

BOOOOOOM!

The explosion shook the battlefield once more.

A cloud of dust rose into the air, and fragments of stone scattered across the ground. The impact carved a deep trench through the earth before the remaining dark energy dispersed into drifting wisps of black smoke.

The pillar remained standing.

Kael lowered his sword and released a quiet breath.

His hands were trembling slightly.

’That was considerably worse than the first one.’

He flexed his fingers, checking whether he had injured himself. The movement produced a dull ache, but nothing seemed broken. That was good enough.

He had more immediate problems to worry about than sore arms. For several seconds, the battlefield remained silent.

Then someone spoke.

"He did it again..."

The student’s voice sounded faint, almost as though he were afraid that speaking too loudly might somehow shatter the scene before him.

Another student stared at Kael with his mouth hanging open.

"That was stronger than the previous attack, wasn’t it?"

"Much stronger," a senior student replied, unable to hide the disbelief in his voice. "Our combined spells couldn’t even slow it down."

"Then how did he..."

The student failed to finish his question.

Nobody had an answer.

Even those who previously mocked him for being the bottom-tier couldn’t find their words.

The first deflection might have been explained away as a fortunate coincidence. Perhaps Kael had found an unexpected weakness in the spell, or perhaps some obscure interaction between his sword and the dark mana had produced an unusual result.

But the second attack had been considerably stronger.

Kael had still redirected it.

Alone.

With nothing more than a sword and a thin layer of mana.

The students who had previously dismissed his accomplishment now found themselves struggling to reconcile what they had witnessed with everything they believed they knew about him.

Even Seraphina stared at Kael in astonishment.

She had spent years studying magic, and she understood better than most how difficult it was to interfere with a spell of that magnitude. Redirecting such an attack required extraordinary timing, precise control, and an understanding of how the incoming energy behaved.

Yet Kael had accomplished it twice.

She glanced at his sword, then at the crater left by the attack.

What exactly have you been hiding, Kael Grayford?

Meanwhile, the dark caster looked as though someone had struck it across the face. Its expression twisted with disbelief, quickly followed by anger.

The second attack had been stronger. It was faster. And it had failed just as completely as the first.

The caster stared at Kael, unable to comprehend how a human who barely appeared to possess any mana could repeatedly interfere with its magic.

Its years of cultivation had not prepared it for this.

It had expected the students to resist desperately before their defenses crumbled. It had expected the pillar to fall, the protective formation to collapse, and the undead to overwhelm the survivors.

It had certainly not expected a young swordsman to stand in its way. The caster’s fingers trembled.

"Who are you?" It demanded, its voice carrying across the area.

Kael looked up.

For a brief moment, he considered giving an elaborate answer.

Then he decided against it.

"Kael Grayford."

The caster’s expression darkened. It had not asked for his name. It wanted to know what he was. How could someone with such a weak magical presence interfere with its attacks? What kind of technique could accomplish such a thing? And why did the boy seem more concerned about checking his sword than acknowledging the power of the spell he had just redirected?

The caster’s gaze settled on Kael’s blade. A terrible suspicion began forming in its mind.

Is that a special blade?

It could not identify the exact principle behind the deflections, but it had noticed something important.

Apparently, Kael’s was just recently enhanced, upgraded to +7. But that was not what made it seem capable. The reason why his blade could cut those cursed undead and even redirect a very strong dark magic was because it was enhanced with Moonstone as one of the materials.

Just like moonsteel, moonstone had a property that was able to resist curses. But unlike moonstone, moonsteel didn’t have a property to deflect dark energy.

That means moonstone was a much better material than moonsteel if talking about their properties. It was also more effective and higher quality.

Using his Returning Tide Sword Technique, Kael did not try to overpower the enemy’s magic. He had redirected it.

The enemy couldn’t understand why such a person who had almost close to none mana was able to deflect his spell.

Perhaps that kid’s technique is designed for deflecting spells.

The thought made the dark caster’s expression grow even darker. If the boy possessed a technique specifically designed to redirect incoming force, then simply increasing the strength of its attacks might not be enough to defeat him.

That possibility was unacceptable.

The caster had already suffered enough humiliation.

It would not allow a mere student to stand in its way.

Dark energy began gathering around its body once more.

This time, however, the movement was different.

The mana did not immediately condense into a single mass. Instead, thin strands of darkness spread outward, twisting through the air like living tendrils.

Kael’s expression changed.

’Oh, come on. You’re not seriously going for a third round already, are you?’

He tightened his grip on his sword.

His arms were sore, his mana was limited, and his breathing had become noticeably heavier. Redirecting another attack of comparable strength would be considerably more difficult.

Worse, the caster appeared to be changing its approach.

Kael could not assume it would launch another straightforward projectile.

Behind him, Seraphina finally recovered from her shock.

"Everyone, stay alert!" She ordered. "Do not assume the danger has passed. The enemy is preparing another attack!"

Her warning brought the students back to their senses.

The pillar was still standing, but their situation had not improved as much as they might have hoped. Their mana reserves remained depleted, and the undead were still pressing against the protective formation.

They had bought themselves more time.

Nothing more.

Kael glanced over his shoulder at the students.

"Can anyone here still cast a defensive spell?" He asked.

A few students exchanged uncertain looks.

One of the senior students raised a trembling hand. "I can manage one more, but it won’t be particularly strong."

"That will have to do," Kael replied. "Don’t waste it trying to overpower the enemy. Wait until I give the signal, then target the ground to its left."

The senior student blinked.

"The ground?"

"Yes. Unless you have a better idea."

The senior student hesitated before shaking his head.

Kael turned back toward the caster.

He did not have enough strength to keep redirecting increasingly powerful attacks forever. Sooner or later, the enemy would either overwhelm his technique or discover a way around it.

He needed to end this before that happened.

Fortunately, the caster had made one mistake.

It had become so determined to prove that Kael’s earlier successes were flukes that it was no longer treating him as an ordinary opponent. That meant it was paying attention to him.

And while the enemy focused on him, it might overlook what he was preparing to do next.

Kael lowered his center of gravity and watched the dark tendrils spreading through the air.

His expression remained calm, but his mind was already working through the possibilities.

’All right. Let’s see how you handle an opponent who doesn’t play by your rules.’

The crimson sky flickered overhead.

The remaining pillar continued to glow faintly, holding back the undead beyond the barrier.

And on the ruined battlefield, the young swordsman and the experienced dark caster faced each other once more.

This time, neither intended to give the other an opportunity to retreat.

At that moment, a shout suddenly rang.

"I finally figured out the rules behind it!"

Lilith exclaimed.