Mightiest Melee Magician

In the Altein Stadium, there were a total of 32 benches, and the students who were participating sat on those benches and spectated their rival schools’ matches.

The first representative match of the opening ceremony was the match between the Ignit Magic Academy and Oyota.

However, most students didn’t really pay much attention to it.

“Well, Oyota’s gonna win anyways.”

“Obviously. Rather than that, is it the Raynac Magic Soldier Traning School next?”

“Yeah.”

It was because, from the perspective of the observers, the outcome was too obvious.

That’s why, rather than the current match, they chose to talk about Raynac’s match that would be held next.

However, even if they wanted to ignore it, a situation appeared that they couldn’t ignore.

That was, the ‘position’ of the students.

“What? They are they positioned like that?”

“No way… Did they split the igniting and throwing operations?”

Normally, heating up and throwing the mana bomb was all done by one person.

However, the Ignit Magic Academy looked as if they wanted to split this operation by making two major groups and had even set aside one person to move the bombs.

The ones who saw this all showed signs of ridicule.

It was natural.

The student representing the Ignit Magic Academy, Ruin Ardell.

Didn’t he boast and taunt to everyone about him obtaining first place?

It was only natural that everyone saw him in a bad light.

“Do they really think that’ll be effective?”

“As expected of the Acadummies. This is why they’re in last place all the time. This event follows the time attack formula, but if you follow such a slow process like that, how can you expect to win?”

“That’s right. On top of that, they even put aside one person to move the mana bombs as well. There’s no way they can produce enough firepower like this. Don’t you agree, Irene?”

“……”

Of course, there were opposing opinions.

Irene Prius.

From start to finish, she hadn’t strayed her eyes from the match and was silently watching the field.

Her thoughts were quite different to the majority of the other people.

After silently looking at the field from the bench for a while, she slowly opened her mouth.

“…It’s possible.”

“Eh? What’s possible?”

“No, rather, this might be a more effective method for the Ignit Magic Academy.”

“…Irene.”

“What are you talking about right now?”

“……”

A thought crossed her mind.

It was possible.

On a basic level, the job of heating up the mana bomb was affected by one’s casting speed and mana sensitivity.

On the opposite end, throwing the mana bomb was affected by one’s magic evocation skill.

If a magician was skilled in both aspects, it wasn’t a problem to do both jobs, but what about magicians of the Ignit Magic Academy who might be lacking in one or both aspects?

‘It’s a wise decision to split up the parts to amplify the strong points of each member.’

Of course, this method had one problematic condition.

‘The problem is… how do you find each student’s strengths accurately enough to put them into different groups?’

It was done by humans.

Asking the professors responsible for tens of students to pick out each one of their strengths and weaknesses accurately wasn’t an easy task at all.

But for the representative student to do this?

This was an even more daunting task that wouldn’t be easy, even if he had all the report cards of his peers.

However,

“Look at the mithril golem on the Oyota side! They already blew up one of the arms!”

“What the hell? Is Oyota losing right now?”

“……”

As the match officially began, Irene Prius became dispirited.

‘It wasn’t a coincidence?’

She couldn’t accept it.

The insight Ruin Ardell had when he picked out the book <Quantum Mechanics of Sword and Magic>, the book that she was looking for,and said ‘it looked valuable’.

This wasn’t mere coincidence.

Ruin Ardell had perfectly seen each student’s strengths and weaknesses and separated them into their appropriate roles.

The Acadummy—

No.

Ignit Magic Academy was crushing Oyota to show their prowess.

Irene’s gaze landed on Ruin.

‘You… Just what can you do…?’

* * *

* * *

Proudly flipping everyone’s expectations on their heads.

This was a truly special moment.

Even more so if it was the rise of the Acadummies.

I used the <Player’s Eye> to take note of each student’s strengths to position them effectively.

And this layout I predicted operated as perfectly as planned.

“Hankus! The igniting speed is sufficient now. Mora! Ayake! You two go help the throwing group.”

“Understood!”

I smoothly transitioned students from other roles who were proficient at throwing in order to solidify our lead.

“Jason! Target the mithril golem’s right arm this time!”

“Ok! Get the right arm!”

I directed the battlefield by analyzing the situation in a detailed manner.

The effects became obvious.

“Kuaaaah!”

“The right arm’s destroyed!”

“Aim for the golem’s core!”

“Nice! Just a little more!”

“……”

Was it because, recently, I had taken the role of a ‘villain’ to face the disrespect of the ‘Acadummy’ head-on?

Or was it because of the freedom we felt from not being disrespected by being called Acadummies?

It was probably both.

My peers had shining smiles as they threw the mana bombs at the Oyota’s mithril golem.

Boom! Crash!

And the mithril golem was noticeably being destroyed in front of our eyes.

Simultaneously,

“What are you shits doing?! Throw faster!”

Seta Malkiri’s expression crumbled.

“You snail-like bastards! Do whatever you can to win!”

“……”

As Seta Malkiri shouted as he became more impatient, the Oyota students started to make more mistakes.

Some threw mana bombs that weren’t fully heated up,

Others threw recklessly and missed the golem’s core.

As this happened more and more, Seta Malkiri became furious.

“What are you doing right now! Fuck! I shouldn’t have trusted you guys making that bet!”

He was obviously expecting he would win.

He wasn’t nervous at all.

He didn’t make any preparations beforehand either.

This was why he lost.

On the contrary, we were moving in perfect teamwork with one heart and one mind.

The motivation that pushed everyone like this was just one thing.

‘Escape from last place.’

This motivation was like a chance the Oyotas made for us themselves.

Not long after, the mithril golem on Oyota’s side lost its protective barrier around its core.

There was just one hit left.

The person to finalize the first event was none other than Jason.

“This is the end…”

Jason’s specialty was evocation.

He normally just didn’t properly put in effort, but looking at just his magic evocation abilities, he was probably second only to Michael.

That Jason showcased his talent in full bloom and imprinted it into the minds of the thousands of people gathered here.

“…you sons of bitches.”

With a cool pose, he shot the mana bomb with wind magic at the golem’s core.

Whooosh~!

The mana bomb thrown at super high velocity…

Crack! Creak!

Directly hit the core of the mithril golem, and the golem that already had its arms and legs blown off…

Crash!

Crumbled into a million pieces and disintegrated mid-air.

“……”

“……”

It was quite the sight.

The golem’s body which was destroyed in the air produced fireworks and a huge banner was formed.

On it, written for all to see,

<Ignit Magic Academy’s Victory>

“W-we won!”

A flood of cheers of joy poured out.

“We won!”

“WOOOOOOO!”

The looks of my peers as they hugged each other and shared the joy of victory.

And,

“W-what did we just see?”

“…The Acadummies won?”

The students from the 31 other schools’ faces froze, as if they were just put into icy waters.

And finally,

“…Sigh.”

Seta Malkiri’s broken expression that said he wanted to go crawl into a hole.

These three distinct expressions harmoniously combined to create one spectacular scene.

And at the center of it, I felt goosebumps flow all throughout my body and gave my peers a thumbs up.

“Good job.”

* * *

<Mana Bomb Throwing>

After the fresh and unexpected twist of the first game, all the other games went as expected.

The Raynac Magic Soldier Training School, heralded by Doom Prime, swept through their competition.

And the other winning candidate, the Seiki Women’s Residential College easily gained their win.

The teams who should win, won.

And the teams who should lose, lost.

That was why our victory attracted even more attention.

“Then, is the Acadummy not the Acadummy no more?”

“That’s the Oyotas now.”

“What do we call Oyota then? Oyotrash?”

“Kekek. What the hell is that?”

The change in recognition.

It started from one small step forward.

Right then, we had won against our rival nation, and also the ones known to be hostile, the Oyotas.

And everyone here had witnessed it.

But…

“No one should be able to disrespect us now, right?”

“Not yet.”

“…Ehm. Not yet?”

“Yeah. We need to win once more…”

Our image that had already deeply been stuck in everyone’s heads wouldn’t quickly change.

For it to change like that,

“…Overwhelmingly.”

An Overwhelming Victory.

So that no one would be able to point their fingers at us in disrespect.

So that no one blamed it on mere chance.

A victory that dealt crushing defeat.

Jason laughed as if he liked that word and smacked my shoulder.

“Overwhelmingly… I like that. Next up is the representative. Overwhelmingly… Are you confident?”

I jokingly laughed at Jason’s question.

“I am called the representative for a reason. How could I let go of this opportunity served to me by my teammates?”

“That’s right! Keke. Don’t you know how hard fought that win was?”

“Good work. Really.”

Then,

[In a moment, the ‘Capture the Flag’ event between the student representatives will begin. The first event will be between Ruin Ardell of the Ignit Magic Academy and Seta Malkiri of the Oyota Nation Magic Institute. I repeat. In a moment…]

“Rep, it’s your turn.”

“…I guess it is.”

The announcement that the individual competition would start was heard.

As expected, the first event was between Seta and me.

I turned my head.

Seta Malkiri wasn’t hard to find.

He was the one shouting at his teammates loud enough for all to hear.

Seemingly having heard the announcement as well, he turned to where I was.

Our eyes met.

“……”

A battle of wits.

And…

The battle of pride where one must triumph against the other, even if there wasn’t an event.

Straang, sitting on my shoulder the whole time, muttered as if she were amused.

“Master, are you nervous?”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“A bit. Well, I’m nervous for another reason.”

“Another reason? What reason?”

My eyes rose up to the hosting room that flew in circles above the Altein Stadium.

At that place,

“I need to show it to him. To the King of Magicians.”

Was the King of Magicians.

——