Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy

This is why false information is dangerous.

Lee Han resolved to think twice before spreading fake rumors in the future.

“If that’s true, then they really are vile, disgusting intruders!”

“I-Is that so? Junior, stealing the Principal’s treasure doesn’t necessarily make them more evil…”

Catten was confused by how angry his usually calm junior class representative had become.

Jowrin quietly explained from the side.

Lee Han is like this because he is Gonadaltes’s disciple.

“I see…”

To Catten, the Skull Principal was merely an unfamiliar archmage with a strange personality, but if Lee Han was his direct disciple, anger over such theft made sense.

“Junior may seem cold, but he’s actually quite sentimental.”

Jowrin thinks so too…

“What are you two whispering about back there? Hurry up!”

Lee Han snapped when Catten and Jowrin lingered behind him.

***

Mages were fundamentally fragile beings.

The magic they wielded was powerful and destructive, of course, but mages themselves were ultimately mortal, vulnerable, and full of weaknesses.

That was why experienced adventurers did not fear mages all that much. There was even a saying among adventurers:

-Rookie adventurers tremble at the mere rumor of a mage, but veterans prepare calmly.

There were plenty of ways to deal with them.

Disrupt the spellcasting. Ambush them before they could cast. Sow confusion and break their concentration. Disturb the surrounding mana.

The adventurers of <Kangle’s Shadow>, who had infiltrated Einroguard, were naturally veterans when it came to fighting mages.

And since they were infiltrating Einroguard, they had come with far more preparation than usual.

But there was one thing these adventurers had never experienced before.

Dozens of mages tracking them down relentlessly by every possible means.

-Stay calm. There are many of them, but they’re rookies with no real combat experience. We can fool them easily—

-There’s an intruder over there! Intruder over there!

-Damn it! My artifact found them first! My artifact found them first! Hormasi! Can’t you hear me?!

-I can’t hear you! My dog found them first! Kill them!

-…

The confidence they had worked so hard to maintain vanished within minutes.

The students of Einroguard began hunting the adventurers down almost instantly.

-Grrrrrowl!

“Isn’t that a cerberus?! Why is a school raising one of those?! That should be illegal under Imperial law!”

“This isn’t the time to worry about that. Swordsman! Run this way! Tear the fog scroll so they can’t follow us!”

“The scroll won’t activate!”

-The Kitchen Club blocked the scroll! Everyone saw that, right?! That’s our achievement!

-What are you bragging for?! Don’t even think about claiming the reward with that!

“These arrogant little brats! They’re getting carried away just because we’re going easy on them!”

After being chased around by young students, one of the adventurers finally snapped. Since only wicked people had been gathered for this job, their patience had never been very deep.

The swordsman drew the sword strapped to his back and chanted.

“Drink blood and tear my enemies apart!”

The keen blade grazed his finger, drawing drops of blood. As the sword absorbed them, it trembled ominously and began to glow faintly red.

“Hah!”

With a sharp cry, the swordsman swung.

A beam of light from an artifact flying in from afar was extinguished completely.

This sword, too, was a powerful artifact capable of erasing low-level magic.

The swordsman held his breath and erased his presence. Concealing himself in the bushes, he thrust his sword straight into the unlucky student running at the front.

Thud!

From the feeling in his hand, the swordsman was certain he had succeeded.

“You mage bastards, do you see this?! Keep chasing me, and I’ll turn you all into—”

“I caught him! I caught him!”

“?!”

The student who should have died was giggling while gripping the swordsman’s wrist.

Then the student cheerfully shouted to the others that the intruder had been caught. The eerie sight sent a chill down the swordsman’s spine.

“What kind of lunatic…?”

The swordsman hurriedly pulled his blade free. Other mages were already closing in. There was no time to waste.

Swish!

With a spell, the tree branches near the swordsman transformed into blades and aimed for his neck.

At the same time, stones on the ground turned into sharp projectiles and shot upward. The swordsman swung his sword to erase the magic.

But this time, the magic did not disappear.

His eyes widened. The light from his sword had vanished as well.

“That’s impossible— Gah!”

“Got you, bastard! Hand over the treasure!”

“Hey! I’m the one who caught him properly! I sealed that sword!”

“Even if you hadn’t sealed it, I could’ve caught a guy who was showing off with an artifact like that!”

With the swordsman fully subdued, the students began arguing over who would take the treasure.

The student with a large hole still gaping in the body grumbled.

“I went through the trouble of transforming my blood to seal that sword…”

“Hmph. If it were me, I would’ve caught him right away without getting stabbed. What’s there to brag about when you couldn’t even catch him first?”

“Hey, this guy was hiding really well! How was I supposed to find him while casting transformation magic?”

“Everyone, stop fighting and let’s just find the treasure.”

The swordsman glared at the students with bloodshot eyes, but to the Einroguard students, he was already of no interest.

The upperclassmen of Einroguard had experienced far too much danger to be frightened by an adventurer of this level.

“There’s no… treasure?!”

“Damn it! We caught the wrong one! I knew it was strange that he came out alone to draw attention!”

“Wait. Friends. This intruder seems to want to say something.”

When the bound swordsman moved his mouth, the students released the paralysis for a moment, full of expectation.

“Are you going to tell us where you hid the treasure? If you tell us, we’ll show you a little mercy…”

-I’ll kill you all! You rookie mage bastards!

“…Seriously? Why did we have to catch this kind of guy?”

“Tie him up again. Tie him up. Send him to the Death Knights.”

“Isn’t that a waste? Can’t we use him for magic experiments?”

“Don’t say things that’ll get us in trouble. The Skull Principal will lose his mind.”

“Why is it fine to perform magic experiments on the students themselves, but not on outside intruders?”

“I think the Principal wants to monopolize the fun.”

-…

For the first time, the swordsman learned that calm conversation could be more terrifying than crude threats.

He had often heard that Einroguard’s mages were on a different level from mages elsewhere, but he had never imagined it meant this.

They were far too different from the mages he had always known.

***

“No way. They caught this many??”

Arriving late, Lee Han was shocked to see the upperclassmen taking a short rest after hanging the captured intruders at the foot of the mountain range.

Far more intruders had been captured than he had expected.

Did Antagondals get scammed?

He had assumed the adventurers Antagondals trusted enough to hire would be impressive, but so many had already been caught.

“Ah. Maybe the ones captured here are only a small portion, and there are still many intruders left…”

“Huh? No. I tortu— I mean, interrogated them, and we’ve caught almost all of them. Only a few are left.”

“…”

Lee Han began to wonder whether his upperclassmen were amazing, or whether these adventurers were simply mediocre.

<Kangle’s Shadow> had quite literally been dismantled.

Once discovered, most of the members had been caught in an instant, so even calling it “dismantled” was generous.

All the preparations they had brought were meaningless. Even if they blocked an attack once or twice, the students simply kept pressing forward with overwhelming numbers.

If they blocked divination tracking with scrolls, magical creatures tracked them instead. If they evaded the magical creatures with floral scents, detection artifacts found them.

And all this had happened after they had been discovered just once.

From the intruders’ perspective, it was absurdly unfair.

“Hmm. Maybe they really were third-rate adventurers. Antagondals might have been scammed after all…”

Hmm. That might be true.

Jowrin agreed with Lee Han’s guess from beside him.

Since Antagondals was a magical criminal, there must have been limits to the adventurers he could hire.

Besides, who would willingly enter Einroguard?

In the end, he had probably been forced to hire people with poor skills…

Lee Han and Jowrin carried on an insulting conversation that would have made the adventurers of <Kangle’s Shadow> shed tears of blood if they had heard it.

“By any chance, have you seen Professor Ingledel?”

“Professor Ingledel? He went inside earlier, saying he would catch the intruders.”

“As expected, professors are different. We’ve half given up by now, but he’s still planning to catch them to the end.”

The upperclassmen admired Professor Ingledel’s persistence.

The students gathered here had nearly given up on finding the Skull Principal’s treasure, despite catching this many intruders.

Professor Ingledel, however, was still tracking them without hesitation.

It was a decision only possible through an unyielding greed to obtain the treasure at any cost.

Was this the difference between students and professors?

“…No. Is he really doing ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) this because of the treasure? Why? If it’s the Principal’s treasure, shouldn’t the Principal be the one to act?”

“I think exactly the same thing! Isn’t it cheating for a professor to enter the competition?”

At the admirable junior’s point, all the students agreed.

Honestly, someone at the professor level should not covet the Skull Principal’s treasure.

He should yield it to the students.

Should I just give up?

Lee Han hesitated.

Judging from the number of intruders the upperclassmen had already caught, there could not be many left even if Professor Ingledel captured the rest.

Then even if those intruders appeared as exam questions during midterms, it might not be that difficult…

What kind of insane thought was that? Even one is dangerous enough.

Adventurers who had survived all kinds of hardships outside were not opponents he could feel relieved about just because their numbers had decreased.

They had to be stopped unconditionally.

“I didn’t know Professor Ingledel was this greedy.”

“It may be because of the exam.”

“That’s even more terrifying.”

Professor Voladi’s words horrified Lee Han.

If Professor Ingledel was doing this not out of greed for treasure, but purely out of the desire to use intruders in the midterm exam, that was even scarier.

-Found an intruder!

“!!”

A shout from far away reached Lee Han’s ears while he was thinking.

The upperclassmen immediately broke into a free-for-all.

“Shadows, blind the enemy’s eyes!”

“Earth! Bind them!”

“Fog, confuse their direction—”

Why, why are they doing that?!

For a moment, Jowrin wondered if the students had been struck by some kind of spell.

Catten kindly explained.

“They’re trying to hinder one another so they can get there first, Your Majesty.”

…

Jowrin looked at them with pity, then turned to Lee Han.

But Lee Han, if you’re looking for Professor Ingledel, shouldn’t you go that way?

“Ah… I was thinking of giving up, since it seems too late.”

Lee Han was gradually considering giving up and simply facing the intruders during midterms.

With the upperclassmen fighting this fiercely, how difficult would it be to stop Professor Ingledel?

…Lee Han! You mustn’t give up! Lee Han must obtain Gonadaltes’s treasure first!

That’s a false rumor.

Lee Han wanted to stop Professor Ingledel from capturing intruders, not obtain treasure.

But Jowrin paid no attention to that. She spread her wings wide and forcibly picked Lee Han up.

Let’s go! Jowrin will take you there!

At the sight of the dragon soaring into the sky, the upperclassmen who had been fighting one another looked up in shock.

Flying on a dragon?!