Surviving As A Mage In A Magic Academy [EN]: Chapter 502

The Headmaster sighed. “If I don’t deal with this now, it will cause trouble later.”

The thin Headmaster got a little worried. Ipadur was very interested in Ian.

Ipadur’s interest in Ian wasn’t a problem by itself, but if it got mixed up with Einroguard, it would become quite troublesome.

“So,” Ipadur asked, “how did you stop the spirit flood?”

“Wodanaz took care of it,” the Headmaster replied.

Ipadur stopped, looking at the icy floor. “Wait,” he said, surprised. “This ice… Gonadaltes, is this from a frost giant? Was a frost giant here at the school?”

Gonadaltes nodded. “Yes. Wodanaz dealt with that too.”

The Headmaster thought, ‘Originally, there was no harm in creating a song praising a student, but in Ian’s case, it was a bit… too much.’

He continued to think, ‘A song about ‘a first-year student succeeding in lightning elemental magic’ would make the people of the Empire smile, but a song about ‘a first-year student dueling the Frost Giant King’ would shock them.’

Even now, the Emperor was giving him the stink eye, saying, ‘Ease up a bit, you pest.’ If a song like ‘A first-year student fought the Frost Giant King~’ spread from the capital…

“You. Your face is full of fatigue!” the Headmaster exclaimed.

“The Headmaster is a magic… secret… Mmph!” Ian started to say.

The thin Headmaster summoned a bony hand from the air and covered Ian’s mouth.

Saying ‘I learned secret arts to fight against magical criminals’ in front of Ipadur was not a good idea.

“You’ve worked hard! Go in and get some rest. Sorry for making you suffer at dawn!” the Headmaster said.

“I’m still okay, though?” Ian asked.

“No! Go and rest!” the Headmaster insisted.

Ian was puzzled, unaware of the Headmaster’s true feelings. He was trying to do his best for what he had received…

‘Why is he being like this?’ Ian wondered.

For now, Ian nodded, as the Headmaster seemed desperate to send him in.

“Understood. Then, I’ll see you next time. Ipadur, it was an honor to meet you today,” Ian said.

“The honor was all mine,” Ipadur replied.

The old minstrel smiled contentedly as he spoke. It wasn’t just polite greetings; he meant it sincerely.

As a minstrel, it was rare to find a student with such a treasure trove of exciting stories.

‘I somehow managed to send him back,’ the Headmaster thought with relief.

Now that Wodanaz had returned, Ipadur would now take an interest in other parts of Einroguard. …That was a problem in itself, though…

“Ah. Professor Thunderstride,” the Headmaster noticed.

The dwarf professor could be seen walking from afar, holding a bunch of moonlit herbs in one hand.

Professor Thunderstride, recognizing Ipadur’s face, spoke with great delight. “Are you perhaps Ipadur? I heard you were invited, but to think you’d actually come!”

The Headmaster stared at Professor Thunderstride with a disgruntled look.

Of course, some quick-witted figures in the Empire sometimes didn’t come even when invited to Einroguard, but to say it so openly like that.

Fortunately, Ipadur didn’t seem to grasp the meaning behind those words.

“I’m glad everyone is welcoming me,” Ipadur smiled gently, wrinkles forming, pleased with Professor Thunderstride’s welcome.

“The students as well, welcoming me like this, I’m not sure how to repay this kindness…” Ipadur added.

“Oh, you’ve met the students too?” Professor Thunderstride asked.

“Yes. A student from the Wodanaz family helped guide me,” Ipadur replied.

“Ah. Wodanaz. It hasn’t been long since he fought the Sea Serpent on his trip, what a diligent fellow,” Professor Thunderstride commented.

“Sea Serpent, you say?!” Ipadur was so surprised that he took out his quill.

At that sight, the Headmaster sighed so deeply he felt the earth sink. ‘Everyone is so unhelpful!’

It was a weekend afternoon.

“Wodanaz. Here,” the White Tiger Tower students said, bringing the boxes and placing them in front of Ian.

They had gone to confirm the location of the ingredients they heard from the person beyond the mirror.

“No trouble?” Ian asked.

“Huh? There wasn’t,” one of them replied.

‘Hmm,’ Ian thought, slightly surprised.

The person beyond the mirror hadn’t played any tricks, contrary to expectations.

‘They didn’t play any tricks… Then it’s highly likely that the Black Tortoise Tower or the White Tiger Tower really aren’t involved,’ Ian considered.

Ian subtly insulted the White Tiger Tower in front of the White Tiger Tower students.

“Alright. You’ve all worked hard, take this,” Ian said, pointing to the groceries promised as a condition of the deal.

The White Tiger Tower students quickly grabbed them… but then hesitated.

“?” Ian questioned.

“Wodanaz, um…” one of them started.

‘What is it?’ Ian wondered, even more puzzled because they weren’t usually the type to act like that.

Could something have happened while they were gathering the ingredients?

“Tell me honestly. I won’t say anything. What happened?” Ian encouraged.

Encouraged by Ian’s kind words, the White Tiger Tower friends asked, “We heard you met Ipadur?”

“We heard you’re helping Ipadur…” another added.

Whack!

“Ack! You, you told us to tell you honestly! You said you wouldn’t say anything!” one of the students cried.

Whack! Whack!

Ian hit them once more with his wand and then waved his hand. “Go. Don’t talk nonsense.”

He was already nervous about making the high-difficulty clairvoyance potion, and they were talking nonsense.

The White Tiger Tower students grumbled and left, and Ian’s real friends, who would help him, came. Reliable friends who were achieving excellent grades in alchemy class.

Yoner pulled up a chair and sat next to him, asking, “By the way, I heard Ipadur came?”

“…Uh, do you know Ipadur?” Ian asked, looking at Yoner with a face that said, ‘No way!’ He didn’t think Yoner would know!

“Of course, I know…? My family has invited him occasionally. My sister likes songs too,” Yoner replied.

Ian was slightly discouraged, and Yoner tilted her head as if asking why. ‘I thought we were comrades,’ he thought.

He thought they only looked at the economic section of the Imperial newspaper together, but the basic level of the Maykin family was on a different level from the basic level of the Wodanaz family.

Not only Asan but also the White Tiger Tower, and even the Phoenix Tower students, were having a lively discussion about Ipadur.

“I saw it with my own two eyes. He took out a flute from his shell…” one student said.

“You got your song evaluated?” another asked.

“I got some criticism on the lyrics, but I still got quite a bit of praise. I’m going to send it to my older brother and sister too,” the first student replied.

Ian swallowed his gloomy feelings and trimmed the ingredients. Even the princess was talking about Ipadur, so he must be really famous.

“Wodanaz. Wodanaz,” Nilia said, poking Ian and whispering lowly.

“?” Ian responded.

“Who is Ipadur?” Nilia asked.

“…You’re the only one, Nilia,” Ian said.

“Why, why are you doing this? Suddenly!” Nilia exclaimed.

Even if he had gathered all the ingredients, making a high-difficulty potion was not easy.

Ian had spent all of Saturday and was still stuck in front of the cauldron on Sunday.

Ian frowned at the cauldron. “We’re running low on ingredients,” he muttered.

Yoner bit her lip. “Yeah, if we mess up again, we’re really in trouble.”

Putting in the exact amount of ingredients without even a slight error, finely adjusting the magic power to cast the spell, and stirring in the prescribed direction when the potion boils…

No matter how talented Ian was, he couldn’t succeed in all these things at once. There had already been several failures.

The only fortunate thing was that there hadn’t been a failure that required him to start completely from the beginning.

However, it was true that even minor failures reduced the ingredients as they were repeated. Ian threw the blue Meanil flower into the cauldron once more with a nervous face. Then, he fed the basilisk egg that was placed next to him.

Priestess Siana, who was watching from the side, was dumbfounded. He said he was nervous, but he was so calmly taking care of the egg feeding that he didn’t seem nervous at all.

‘Is he really nervous?’ she wondered.

It was then. Priestess Siana was so surprised that she shouted, “Oh… Oh! Wodanaz! Wodanaz!”

“I know. Priestess Siana! Don’t worry!” Ian quickly added Donghaso and poured cold freshwater to prevent the potion from boiling over the cauldron.

But that wasn’t enough. The potion, which was creating heat on its own, was blazing as if it would melt the cauldron.

‘I knew this would happen!’ Ian thought.

But Ian was prepared, thanks to his experience with several failures. He immediately cast cold magic to prevent the cauldron’s temperature from rising any further.

“Cold…!” Priestess Siana exclaimed.

Originally, such heat generated during the alchemy process should be resolved with a combination of ingredients or special reagents, not with separate magic.

If the proper cause is not known, the problem will continue to recur even if magic is used to stop it.

However, Ian didn’t care and cast magic in rapid succession. ‘If the problem recurs, I can just stop it with magic again!’

If he couldn’t solve the problem with his brain, he was going to compete with the amount of magic power.

“Wodanaz!” Priestess Siana cried.

“I’ve stopped it all, Priestess Siana! I told you not to worry!” Ian replied.

“Not that, look at the egg! The egg!” Priestess Siana exclaimed.

“?” Ian turned his head without thinking.

Crack!

Cracks were forming in all directions on the surface of the basilisk egg. It was a crack that looked like it would break at any moment.

Crack!

In an instant, the egg broke, and something the size of a scarf crawled out from inside. The baby basilisk crawled towards Ian, looking happy. It was like a newly hatched chick running towards its parents.

However, Ian reacted differently from what the basilisk expected. “Priestess Siana, lie down and close your eyes!”

Ian covered the baby basilisk’s eyes with his hand and shouted. Priestess Siana was surprised and quickly lay down.

-……

The baby basilisk looked at Ian with hurt eyes.

After a brief commotion (three small cauldrons fell over and one chest was broken), Ian realized that the baby basilisk didn’t indiscriminately fire its Evil Eye.

It didn’t shoot its Evil Eye unless it recognized someone as an enemy.

‘But I should still cover its eyes just in case,’ Ian thought.

Ian wrapped the baby basilisk’s eyes tightly with silk. The baby basilisk hit Ian’s wrist with its tail as if it was very dissatisfied.

“Priestess Siana. Are you okay?” Ian asked.

“Ah. Yes. I’m okay. By the way, it was a real basilisk! I thought the White Tiger Tower people were talking nonsense…” Priestess Siana replied, also subtly sarcastic.

Ian nodded and said, “I was raising it at the professor’s request. But… it came out too early than expected.”

Ian wasn’t an authority on raising basilisks, but he knew enough from what he had learned that the basilisk had come out too early.

“Really? Didn’t you give it too much food?” Priestess Siana asked.

“I gave it the right amount…” Ian replied.

“Or did you put the egg in a place with excessively strong magic power?” Priestess Siana inquired.

“There’s no way I would put the egg in such a plac…” Ian paused while speaking.

Come to think of it, he had been carrying the egg around a lot lately.

“…I did have it with me a lot,” Ian admitted.

Priestess Siana chuckled at Ian’s words. “What nonsense are you talking about, Wodanaz? If the basilisk egg absorbed Wodanaz’s magic power, then Wodanaz would have noticed it. Wodanaz isn’t a simpleton, there’s no way he wouldn’t notice something like that.”

Ian was slightly hurt. The basilisk, wrapped around him like a scarf, patted Ian as if to comfort him.

“But you don’t have to worry too much. Even if it comes out early, it’s just smaller, but it can still do its job,” Priestess Siana reassured.

Priestess Siana took out a sharply pointed brass syringe. It was one of the alchemist’s tools used to extract liquids by inserting it into plants or animals.

“Okay. Wodanaz. Hold it,” she instructed.

“…Excuse me, Priestess Siana, what are you trying to do now?” Ian asked, concerned.

“Oh? Weren’t you raising it to extract venom?” Priestess Siana replied.

The basilisk wrapped around his neck trembled as if it felt ominous.