A Word From Violet

Violet slowly opened her eyes from where she was seated.

Having stopped her training to accumulate magic power within her body, she tried practicing circle formation training as a test.

‘This is fun…’

She found herself so delighted that what she couldn’t achieve no matter how hard she tried before was now possible. For three days now, she had been dedicated to this training alone in an empty house.

“Oh, today is the day for the additional test. I need to go to the academy.”

The academy was currently on break.

Originally, this would have been her last semester, her graduation term.

But Violet had repeatedly failed.

The reason she was going to the academy today was to take an additional test.

‘As expected, I’m late.’

Violet arrived at the test location, the training ground.

Sure enough, at the entrance of the training ground,

Her schedule was posted.

But she had already anticipated that Professor Colvera, who was in charge, would not arrive on time.

Professor Colvera had previously intentionally shown up three or four hours late, making Violet wait.

That wasn’t all.

He would make her run meaninglessly around the academy to make people laugh at her, or worse, he would find trivial faults and make her do menial tasks like cleaning the training ground.

‘The most difficult part was being treated as invisible.’

There were countless times when she was troubled by the instructor acting as if she didn’t exist during training sessions.

Hearing people gossip about how it was the first time they’d seen an instructor ostracize a student made Violet’s face burn with shame.

‘At first, I wondered why he was tormenting me like this.’

The reason was simple.

Professor Colvera had, when Violet was 14, proposed to her, who was twenty years his junior.

‘He proposed to me…’

Of course, she refused as politely as possible.

Her fiancé, Bluedine, had laughed and said after hearing the story,

“Colvera’s intentions are obvious. If he married a rich family’s illegitimate child like you, your father would reward him with a fortune out of gratitude. You refused him without enough courtesy, and that’s why he marked you.”

Only then did she understand the whole situation.

But she still had questions.

‘How could I have refused the proposal more politely?’

She had clearly said she was sorry she couldn’t accept it.

Yet, it was considered impolite. Should she have knelt and cried while refusing for it to be considered a ‘polite rejection’?

‘Would that have made him dislike me less?’

Probably not. People looking for faults would criticize you no matter what.

Exactly three hours later, Professor Colvera arrived.

“What kind of posture is that? Look at how you’re standing crookedly. It’s exhausting enough that I have to waste my precious time on a failure like you!”

Professor Colvera was a small, sharp-looking man for a knight.

Violet stared at him expressionlessly.

‘Did I come here for nothing?’

Still, she intended to keep her manners at least for today, since it was a pre-arranged additional test.

But her affection for the academy had vanished.

No one had recognized Violet’s talent throughout her time at the academy.

So, she thought she could quit at any time.

“Not only have you failed in knight training, but you’re also brainless. It’s enough that you’ve snagged a rich fiancé. Hmph…”

Professor Colvera sighed loudly enough for Violet to hear.

He strode toward the command platform in the training ground.

The high platform, made of stairs, allowed instructors to look down at the students like on a stage.

It was at that moment.

‘Huh?’

A tinkling, crystalline sound rang in her ears again.

‘Am I seeing the future again?’

Violet stood tall.

And beneath her feet was… Professor Colvera’s head being crushed.

His face was so distorted it was unrecognizable.

But Professor Colvera looked at least ten years older than he did now.

Professor Colvera couldn’t respond, only making muffled noises as if his mouth was blocked.

A magic circle surrounded Violet. She touched one of the circles.

Then she slowly shaped it with her hand.

It turned into dozens of sharp crystal shards.

With a gesture, Violet sent a hundred aura shards flying towards Colvera.

The future vision ended.

Standing in the training ground, Violet swallowed dryly.

‘Future me kills Colvera?’

Moreover, didn’t they say the future me killed over 700 people before?

‘Guess she deserves the gallows…’

While Violet stood in a daze, Professor Colvera barked at her.

“Show me the basic techniques first. Slash, horizontal slash! Move quickly!”

Violet’s blood pressure rose momentarily.

‘I don’t intend to commit murder, but I can understand future me a little…’

Violet gritted her teeth.

Professor Colvera sat on a chair in the center of the command platform, tapping his foot and openly reading a paper.

His intention was clear.

As soon as Violet started swinging her sword, he would ignore her and make her repeat the same moves over and over.

It had happened many times before.

Violet considered storming out but changed her mind and grabbed the practice sword at her waist.

‘Could I really shape my aura into shards like future me?’

Violet activated the magic circle around her.

‘It’s really forming?’

Violet was astonished as she felt the aura in her hand. She had never been taught anything like this.

She ran her hand over the aura.

The sharp aura soon turned into pointed crystal shapes.

‘Am I really a genius?’

Violet was dumbfounded.

With all her might, she created just three crystal shards.

Sweat poured down her body, and she was exhausted.

But Professor Colvera, yawning and flipping through his paper, had no idea what Violet was doing.

‘Oh right, the task.’

Leaving the aura crystals behind, Violet demonstrated the basic techniques.

“Professor, I’ve performed the techniques as instructed.”

Naturally, he didn’t even look.

‘Of course.’

A cold smile appeared on Violet’s lips.

“Professor, didn’t you hear me?”

Colvera snickered, flipping through his paper.

“Stupid girl, call out all you want.”

His taunting tone snapped Violet’s patience.

She started walking slowly out of the training ground, intending to leave like the invisible person he treated her as.

At that moment, Professor Colvera angrily looked up and shouted.

“You stupid illegitimate girl, can’t you understand me? Stand there and keep swinging your sword as I told you!”

He grabbed the practice wooden sword leaning against his chair and threw it at her.

“Ah!”

Had it hit her, she could be seriously injured. Feeling threatened, Violet sent the aura shards hovering near her flying.

The wooden sword and the aura shard collided. However, the shard shattered the wooden sword into pieces and didn’t stop.

“Ugh!”

This time, a scream came from Professor Colvera. The aura shard was heading straight for his head.

‘No! I can’t kill someone here!’

She refused to become an infamous villainess. Violet barely managed to change the course of the aura shard.

The shard, initially aiming for Professor Colvera’s forehead, grazed the top of his head and embedded itself in the wall of the training ground.

“Ow!”

Professor Colvera fell off his chair, rolling on the ground and screaming in pain.

And then.

Crack! Thud!

A spider web-like crack spreaded across the wall where the aura shard hit, creating a deep indentation

Wow.

Violet stared at the crack in the wall in shock.

Had it hit Professor Colvera’s forehead, his head would have shattered like a broken watermelon.

He was now unconscious, his mouth open and eyes rolled back.

‘Just from a graze? This really work?’

Violet had inadvertently perfected a lethal technique.