I Became The Academy’s Narrow-Eyes - Chapter 75: Spicy Heavy Punch

Bang bang bang bang!

“Adryn of Teln!!! Show those weaklings a lesson!!!”

Following Agion’s valiant effort, Melhen celebrated an overwhelming victory.

Inebriated with the triumph and excitement of battle, he pounded his shield, capturing the wind.

Adryn!

Adryn!

Adryn!

His excitement was contagious.

The blood of the Swordsmanship Department’s freshmen boiled as they zealously chanted Adryn’s name.

It was a situation any swordsman would desire.

Having been born and raised in a family of swordsmen, Adryn had often dreamed of such moments.

At this moment, Adryn thought to herself.

‘This is too much pressure…!’

Experiencing it directly was less appealing than she had imagined.

The heavy taste of immense expectation and attention was too burdensome for the outwardly sharp but inwardly delicate Adryn to enjoy.

Adryn approached Ceylon with a withdrawn posture, surveying the surroundings, then whispered fiercely to him so no one else could hear.

“Ceylon!”

“Yes, Miss Adryn!”

“Not ‘Yes, Miss Adryn!’ you idiot! Why, why did you nominate me!?”

“Because I believe in you, Miss Adryn!”

“Really?”

Adryn, who had been indignant towards Ceylon, suddenly changed her expression.

“R-really?”

She asked hesitantly, and Ceylon had to muster otherworldly patience.

It was hard to resist teasing the perfectly responsive Adryn.

What deliciousness it would be to say, “No! I just wanted to see you flustered, Miss Adryn!’ But fearing that she might truly burst into tears, Ceylon suppressed that urge and spoke the truth instead.

“Of course! To carry on this momentum, who could be better than Miss Adryn? That’s why I nominated you!”

“Really~? Is that so?”

Her previous timidness nowhere to be seen, Adryn grew smug as she looked at Ceylon.

She nudged him with her elbow, demanding.

“Why did you think that? Tell me.”

Looking at her expectant face, Ceylon even felt a twinge of concern.

What if a con artist targeted this person? It seemed like a matter of time before Teln’s household would be ruined.

“Miss Adryn.”

“Yes?”

“What did you think about the first and second matches? What came to your mind when watching them?”

“Huh? Well, that’s—um…”

Adryn pondered deeply with her arms crossed before responding.

“It’s amazing…?”

Ceylon clapped and exclaimed appreciatively.

“Exactly, Miss Adryn! You saw it correctly.”

Adryn pouted.

“Don’t tease me, tell me quickly. What is it?”

“As for my inferior answer, I’m embarrassed to say it after Miss Adryn’s perfect response—

“Argh, really! You want to die!? Say that one more time!”

Ugh!

Adryn raised her fist as Ceylon chuckled and raised his hands, surrendering.

“Haha, sorry, so sorry. My thoughts after watching the two matches are this: They, the freshmen, lack what Miss Adryn possesses.”

“What? Isn’t it the other way around? Huh? Are you perhaps teasing me again—”

“No, this time it’s true.”

Ceylon said seriously as Adryn looked ready to rush at him.

“Really? What is it?”

Ceylon pointed forward with his finger and explained.

“It’s experience points.”

“Experience points…?”

She wondered what he meant by experience points.

Combat experience?

Adryn thought back to the recent matches, then her head tilted.

“That… makes sense? They fought too well to lack fighting experience…?”

Certainly, if it were the second match, Adryn would consider herself somewhat comparable.

But Ceylon was clearly referring to the first match, the battle between Magnus and Agion, as well.

If so, the story changes.

Adryn had no confidence that she could outperform the two of them in combat ability.

At her current level, wouldn’t she lose ten times out of ten in a fight against them?

“I think they didn’t fight well.”

“You don’t mean… you’re saying now, ‘Heh heh, to struggle so much against just Agion. I won without lifting a finger. I can see the level of this year’s freshmen. Boring enough to make me want to die’ or something like that, right?”

Adryn looked at him disdainfully.

“I’m suddenly curious how I am perceived in Miss Adryn’s mind. Anyway, it’s not about that.”

“Can you stop beating around the bush and speak directly?—”

Adryn glanced around.

Adryn!

Adryn!

Adryn!

“Hey! When is this Adryn of Teln coming out? Are you still crawling here from Teln!?”

“Don’t fret, you losers! It’s just delaying your defeat; you ought to be relieved!”

“Look at how brazen they are even though they are making us wait! What kind of idiots are these!?”

With the actual combatant Adryn absent, the Swordsmanship Department and Magic Department took over the taunting.

“My guts… they’re churning…”

“Understood. I’ll speak directly to you, Adryn. Do you remember the skirmish with the Dalleye’s troubleshooter?”

“Huh? Uh… yes, of course. How could I forget?”

It was Adryn’s first real battle experience, her first fight against a mage.

Very likely, she would remember it vividly until the day she died.

“If that’s the case, please remember this. Miss Adryn. They—those opponents—do not know how to confront what differs from them. They don’t know how to face a mage as a swordsman, nor how to confront a swordsman as a mage. They just push their own strengths onto others. Do you understand?”

“…Yes!”

Adryn nodded.

Truth be told, she didn’t understand at all.

Nonetheless.

Ceylon said so, so it must mean something.

Believing in Ceylon that believed in her, Adryn took her place on the thoroughfare-turned-battle stage.

“You’re finally here.”

The Magic Department’s contestant who greeted her from across.

With facial bones that jutted out as if his face was protruding with eyes set beneath them, dark circles laid heavily under them.

“Heheh! I heard you weren’t even in the top ten seats, didn’t you? To send me such defective goods, I’ll win this bout easily. I’ll savor my effortless victory as a token of gratitude to your slit-eyed representative.”

Lemilion, the Magic Department’s tenth place in the entrance exam, licked his lips as he looked at Adryn.

“Ugh…!”

Adryn felt visceral disgust towards his off-putting appearance.

“What is that? He’s not, he’s not a dark wizard…?”

She asked Ceylon earnestly.

“Incredibly, aside from specializing in healing magic, he’s a combative mage who casts traditional offensive spells.”

“Healing, healing magic? That? He specializes in healing magic!? You’re lying!”

Adryn yelped in shock before quickly silencing herself.

She cautiously observed Lemilion’s reaction.

“If I look this unpleasant, am I not allowed to learn healing magic…”

Having heard her words, he became oddly disheartened, drawing circles with his feet and muttering to himself.

“No, Lemilion!!!”

“Your talent for healing magic is real!!!”

“You wanted to use that magic to help many people, didn’t you!!!”

“Don’t mind the narrow-minded words of that ignorant swordsman!!!”

And amazingly, a few Magic Department boys—who seemed to hold him in esteem, at least among the male students—encouraged him sincerely.

“My, my comrades…!”

Lemilion drew strength from the new student’s support.

“I truly appreciate all your encouragement! I, Lemilion, promise to bring about victory to repay your kind faith!”

“Wait, wait…! Now I seem like the bad person!”

Abruptly labeled as narrow-minded and discriminatory, Adryn felt flustered and offended.

While they were marked for the duel with protective spells.

“Are both sides ready?”

Nod.

The countdown began, and the match started.

The initial setup was no different from the previous two matches.

“Haah!”

Mages have the advantage at range, while swordsmen thrive in close combat.

Adryn, like Agion and Melhen before her, followed that very formula.

She immediately pulled up mana.

The mana intertwined with the energies of both fire and wind enveloped her body and exploded.

The arcane swordsmanship of the Teln family, known as ‘Summer Sword’, typically granted explosive acceleration—no, it was the explosion that propelled her body.

-Swish!

For a brief moment, Adryn soared through the air, drawing a gentle arc before landing on the ground again.

Just two steps away from bringing Lemilion into her sphere of control.

“Hup!”

While Adryn closed the distance, Lemilion completed his mana barrier. He made his move.

He cast basic magic, the mana arrow, without any need for preparatory actions—this magic bought him time to complete his primary spell.

The aim of his primary magic was to repel Adryn, who had closed in on him.

Succeed in approaching and shatter the mana barrier.

Destroy the opponent before the mana barrier falls.

This was the win condition for both swordsmen and mages.

Thus, generally, the outcome of a duel between a mage and a swordsman came down to controlling the distance.

How many times had swordsmen and mages tug-of-warred over their distance to each other?

“What…?”

Click.

Suddenly, Adryn felt something click in her mind.

Now, she understood what Ceylon had said.

-They don’t know how to confront someone different from themselves.

-Swordsmen don’t know how to deal with mages, and mages don’t know how to deal with swordsmen.

-They just push their own strengths onto the opponent.

It was exactly as he said.

What Adryn realized.

Lemilion’s combat style was very textbook.

In other words, too formulaic.

Lemilion wasn’t fighting against Adryn specifically.

He was just against a swordsman.

Despite repeated encounters, Lemilion had probably come to understand Adryn’s combat style to some extent.

Yet his combat strategy remained unchanged.

Just sticking to the same method, trying to pressdown with sheer force.

Why didn’t he reflect Adryn’s combat style in his own, to seize the upper hand?

The answer was simple.

He didn’t know how.

Why?

Because that’s not what you learn in a magic family.

It’s what you learn at the academy.

And he was just a freshman.

Adryn was in the same position.

However.

She had one real combat experience before entering the academy.

It was only one real battle, but the experience points it contained were exceptionally dense.

All the more because.

It was a real battle for her life.

Her adversary was a mage with many real battles under his belt, a dark wizard hiding the power level of six stars while looking toward five stars.

And her guide and teacher in that actual fight had mastered both swordsmanship and magic, two fields with properties similar to each other.

Thus, Adryn possessed experience points that other freshmen didn’t have.

A vast amount of experience that would take years to accumulate even at the premier educational institution—the academy.

Those experience points converged with the realization Adryn had just reached.

They showed her much more.

-Snap!

Adryn, having incrementally closed the distance, now gave up on it and retreated.

“What!?”

Lemilion stopped casting magic.

It had been a close-range magic spell going by Adryn’s position.

“Haah!”

Adryn raised her mana in preparation for the charge.

Just as it was at the start of the match.

And so, Lemilion once again prepared to complete his primary spell, using mana arrows to hold her back just like at the start of the match.

Thus, Lemilion’s combat style, unlike Adryn’s, was not irregular and remained rigidly formal.

Just trying to overwhelm with force, hoping the strength of Adryn, who had lower mana sensitivity, would falter before his.

That was why he was certain Adryn would struggle to respond to his unorthodox movements.

“What are you doing…!”

Adryn rushed forward like before, closing the distance and then flung her sword at him.

Lemilion, in panic, redirected his mana arrows from Adryn to her thrown sword.

He couldn’t buy time with the arrows.

So instead of preparing his primary spell, he had to find a different way to cope.

But limited by his narrow experience, he came up blank for alternatives.

He continued casting his primary spell, and in the meantime, Adryn closed in even further.

“Yah!!!”

Thump!

Before Lemilion could finish his primary spell, Adryn’s spicy solid punch hit him squarely in the face.

“Argh…!”

Lemilion’s eyes rolled up, then back down as he endured the pain with a healing spell.

“Enduring it!?”

Swordsmen are different from martial artists.

Nevertheless, swordsmen incorporate some basic martial arts as fundamental skills.

Adryn caught Lemilion by the collar as he flew backward and pulled him in front of her.

Then the feast of spicy solid punches unfolded.

-Thump!

-Thump!

-Thump!

-Thump!

-Thump!

-Thump!

-Thump!

The sound of undiluted violence echoed rhythmically.

“Stop it! Winner! Adryn Teln!”

The absent-minded professor, whose defensive spell for the duel was about to break, came to his senses and hastily called an end to the match.

“Huh?”

Adryn’s arm, which had been relentlessly driving spicy solid punches into Lemilion’s face, finally stopped.

“Victory? I won!? Kyaah! What do I do!!!”

Her hand, which had gripped his collar as if to tear his uniform, finally relaxed.

-Thud

Lemilion crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut.

Adryn, leaving him behind, hopped around in place, expressing her joy at victory.

Her vibrant orange hair bounced with the movement.

Her youthful smile, coupled with her vivacious image, naturally elicited smiles from others.

“…”

“…”

However, the faces of those watching her were painted with astonishment.

Grabbing a mage by the collar and stuffing punches into his face until the defensive magic breaks.

As it was a duel fully protected by defensive magic, her actions posed no problem.

But regardless-

“Shock. Horror.”

Mizu’s single comment encapsulated everyone’s sentiment.

“Ceylon!!! I won!!! I actually won!!! It’s all thanks to your advice!!!”

Then Adryn beamed at Ceylon with a cheerful smile.

All eyes in the place turned to him.

Thanks to your advice?

Their mouths gaped open at how they interpreted that statement.

Even Melhen, who had been roaring like a half-beast until a moment ago, looked at Ceylon with a pale face, recalling when he toyed with Agion.

“Such a fearsome man…”

“No—”

Ceylon felt aggrieved.