Surviving As A Mage In A Magic Academy [EN]: Chapter 1057

Kitarenanum, though he didn’t yet know who had brought him here, was indeed a seasoned magical criminal.

He was not going to fight a strong mage when he was still hurt. That would be reckless.

If something seemed off, he ran.

Surprisingly few criminals in the Empire followed this simple rule.

Kitarenanum gathered his things from the small room and went to the storeroom. He quickly swept up some hard, dried meat and stale bread – enough for a quick escape.

Kitarenanum whispered to himself, ‘Time to go, Ibinta. Thief’s luck be with us both!’

“That’s odd.”

Actually, Professor Voladi hadn’t come here to find the Iron Cloak Ibinta.

He had been searching for a rancher who had fled into the nearby forest when he discovered the ruined village.

“Indeed. There’s a long-range viewing spell set up here, too.”

Ihan, with his keen senses, recognized the magic on the ruins.

Something felt wrong, as if the flow of magic was different nearby.

Giselle stared at her friend, puzzled.

“Why?”

“Nothing.”

Her friend’s senses were increasingly entering the realm of monsters, not humans.

Maybe by next semester, he would be closer to a professor than a person…

“Wow. Whoever it is must be really stupid.”

Gainando scoffed.

Setting up such obvious magic nearby was practically shouting, ‘I’m here!’

Of course, this was unfair to the thieves and Kitarenanum.

The thieves were suffering because of the magical criminal’s inconsiderate behavior, and…

…Kitarenanum had his own complaints.

-The man who can find magic hidden in places like that with just his senses is a monster! Am I supposed to predict that and disguise it?!

He was already seriously injured and didn’t have the magic to spare for such things.

“Could it be magic left by the rancher who hid in the forest?”

“No. The magic is too strong.”

Professor Voladi shook his head, recalling the rancher’s information.

He was someone who had smuggled in and sold a forbidden variant of Cockatrice eggs, caused an accident, and fled. If he were skilled in magic, he wouldn’t have caused such an accident.

A mistake anyone could make who doesn’t know magic.

“There are traces in the village.”

“Traces, you say?”

Gainando asked, puzzled.

He hadn’t sensed any other traces in the ruins besides the magic.

“The ruins are artificial.”

“!”

Gainando was very surprised by the professor’s answer.

To not simply dismiss the ruins as dust-covered and broken, but to find an artificial regularity within them.

Ruins made only by nature would be messy, broken in no pattern. But these ruins had lines, shapes – someone had built them.

‘Indeed.’

“There may be those hiding underground.”

Professor Voladi said this and then told them to wait while he checked the forest.

“Yes.”

“Understood.”

Ihan and Giselle answered immediately. Gainando happily sat down on a nearby rock.

‘Heh heh. This will be easy.’

“Did he leave?”

“Yeah.”

“Then let’s go.”

At Giselle’s words, Ihan nodded and approached the ruins.

Gainando, who was about to sit down and rest on the rock, shouted in surprise.

“Where are you going?!”

“We’re going to catch the people hiding underground before the professor gets here.”

“……”

Seeing Ihan and Giselle acting as if it were obvious, Gainando wondered if he was the strange one.

‘Am I the strange one?!’

Professor Begreck clearly told them to wait… didn’t he?

“I, Ihan. Did you perhaps fight with Professor Begreck?”

“No. If I had fought, I wouldn’t be without a scratch.”

‘That makes sense?’

Giselle was inwardly impressed.

It was certainly a logical answer.

“But why are you trying to go in on your own?”

“Well…”

Ihan and Giselle exchanged glances.

Could they convince Gainando without revealing that they needed to hide information related to the evil god to prevent Professor Voladi from going berserk?

“I’m just someone mad about challenges, aren’t I?”

“Yeah. Completely mad.”

Giselle chimed in, agreeing with Ihan. When Ihan stared at her, Giselle whispered in embarrassment.

“I, I was just backing you up.”

“Seems like there’s some emotion mixed in… Anyway, thanks.”

Gainando stared at them both and then sighed deeply.

“Well, Ihan was always like that. Let’s go.”

“……”

Ihan was slightly conflicted about whether to be happy that his friend had understood so easily or to worry about him.

“Alright. Let’s go then.”

“But won’t it be dangerous?”

“It’s not far from the capital, and the village isn’t very big. There’ll probably only be about a dozen of them.”

Ihan checked for danger using the Crystal Spinning Top, using magic to see the future. The results didn’t seem too dangerous.

“Arise, golem made of bones.”

Ihan summoned a Dragon Tooth Soldier Golem and ordered Gainando to summon his own familiar.

Preparing for battle together, Giselle thought to herself.

‘But how are they planning to find the entrance?’

The village wasn’t very big, but if a hideout was hidden in these ruins, finding the entrance wouldn’t be easy.

Moreover, judging by their camouflage skills, they weren’t amateurs. Only a hunter like Professor Voladi would have noticed the incongruity.

“Are you ready?”

“Yeah. But how are you going to fin…”

Ihan began to hurl large Water Orb Bullets everywhere at the floor of the ruins.

Trusting in his magic, he kept firing until the area became as noisy as if large hailstones were falling.

Crack!

Eventually, an unlucky section of the floor collapsed, revealing itself. Ihan widened the hole and jumped inside.

“……”

“……”

And he made eye contact with twenty heavily armed thieves surrounding him.

Both Ihan and the thieves were greatly surprised.

“Intrusion…!”

“There are more than we thought! Everyone be careful! Split apart, Lightning strike!”

“Aaaargh! That crazy mage!”

The thieves screamed and retreated down the passage as the mage, surprisingly quick for someone who was panicking, unleashed a chain of lightning bolts.

“Gainando! Don’t come down, just send your familiar!”

“Stop chattering and focus!”

Giselle, who had already come down, slapped him on the back and shouted.

The scale of the hideout was much larger than they had thought above. The number of thieves who had just fled, as well as the passage itself, showed its size and quality.

A passage carved out of rock, with walls that could be sealed off, and all sorts of traps. This was no time to worry about the prince above.

Tap tap tap tap tap-

Darts flew from all directions, likely activated by the fleeing thieves.

Ihan had the Dragon Tooth Soldier Golem destroy the walls and devices, and he blocked the remaining attacks with telekinesis.

“Is this some kind of fortress?!”

“We were too hasty!”

Giselle realized her mistake.

She had been so focused on Wardanaz’s goal that she had underestimated the opponent.

She had thought that the people hiding in this village wouldn’t be very impressive…

‘I’m not there yet. To be so careless!’

Clunk!

The passage they had entered through closed, and new walls opened on both sides. The thieves charged in, shouting.

Giselle fiercely scattered her sword, disarming the approaching thieves. Each time she swung, a wave of cold air surged, and the thieves gritted their teeth and shouted.

“It’s a mage! Tell them to bring the cold resistance potions!”

“Wardanaz, some support…!”

Giselle, who was pushing forward with the intention of wiping out the enemies here and going back up, sensed something was wrong.

Her friend, who should have been pouring magic down with several times her firepower, was quiet.

“…I summon you!”

With a massive distortion of space, the Thunder Lord tore through the bedrock of the underground fortress, revealing his terrifying presence.

Giselle shouted in shock.

“You summoned a Spirit King?!”

“The… the opponent is stronger than I thought.”

Ihan was certainly an outstanding Einroguard mage.

The moment his expectations were off, instead of stubbornly sticking to his plan, he deployed the most powerful force he could use.

Of course, it might seem like using a dragon-slaying sword to kill a chicken…

Amazing! To summon the Thunder Lord for such a sensible reason! Why couldn’t you be like this more often!

Perkuntra, summoned for a sensible reason for once, was very excited and began to obliterate the underground fortress.

Seeing the devices and passage barriers, which must have been bought expensively from the dwarves, being destroyed by a natural disaster, Giselle felt sympathy without realizing it.

‘They’re thieves, but they’re really unlucky…!’

“Professor! Professor!”

Gainando immediately shouted and tried to run towards the forest.

When even the open entrance closed and his friends disappeared, Gainando completely panicked.

However, Professor Voladi suddenly appeared next to him, as if he had been there from the beginning.

“!??!”

Gainando, who had fallen over, blinked, wondering if he had seen wrong.

But it was Professor Voladi.

“W-when did you get here?!”

“I was waiting over there.”

Professor Voladi explained calmly.

He couldn’t have failed to notice that his student had been acting strangely lately.

He had expected that if he left to search the forest, they would immediately rush in on their own.

“T-that’s…! Of course, Ihan has been doing reckless things lately, but he’s always been like th…!”

Gainando, who was about to say that Ihan had always been like that, trailed off.

He had been denying it for the sake of friendship, but honestly, Ihan had seemed a bit strange lately.

Could the shock of losing to the headmaster still be lingering?

Rumble!

“Wh-what’s that sound?”

“He summoned the Thunder Lord.”

Professor Voladi immediately guessed the situation from the sound coming from below and the powerful spirit’s energy.

The only spirit his student would summon in that situation was the Thunder Lord.

…It sounded a bit strange that he had summoned him just to fight thieves, but considering his magical power, it wasn’t that strange.

“Then… what about the lesson?”

“Lesson?”

“Weren’t you planning to go in to help, and then Ihan would reflect and promise not to go to dangerous places in the future?!”

Professor Voladi slowly shook his head.

Gainando’s big plan was far from Professor Voladi’s original thoughts.

In the first place, the level of the thieves hiding in a place like this wouldn’t be enough to put his student in a crisis that would make him reflect.

He had already summoned the Thunder Lord, hadn’t he?

Professor Voladi had simply been waiting in case of an emergency.

Gainando looked as if he had been struck by lightning at the news that his friend wouldn’t learn a lesson.

‘No way!’

“Professor! You have to give him a stern talking-to!”

“I’m not sure.”

Professor Voladi was skeptical.

I can tell him what to do, but I can’t make him listen.

His student’s personality wasn’t easy to control; he wouldn’t listen if he told him not to do something.

Especially since Professor Voladi himself hadn’t listened when he was a student.

“Lately, Ihan keeps trying to fight against things on his own!? And recently, he seems to be fixated on evil god worshippers again. Who tries to fight against evil god worshippers on their own?!”

Because he was stamping his feet and getting angry, Gainando didn’t see Professor Voladi flinch.

In fact, he wouldn’t have noticed even if he had been calm.

“If there’s a thorough plan and a will of steel, it’s not impossible…”

“It’s impossible! Only a complete madman would do that!”

“……”

Professor Voladi hesitated slightly.

He tried to argue, but Professor Voladi eventually gave up.

“Perhaps that’s true.”

“Right?! You have to tell him that, Professor!”

“Which cult is it? Prahgal?”

The cult with the worst relationship with his student was the cult of these vibrant chimeras.

It wouldn’t be strange if he was really focused on fighting during the vacation.

“I don’t think so? I’ve never seen Ihan reading related books.”

“Then is it Ksaksarigol?”

“No. He doesn’t react much even when he sees related wanted posters.”

Gainando displayed an unexpected sharpness that no one had expected.

Professor Voladi was puzzled by his sharpness.

Was there an evil god cult related to his student besides those two?

Oh