Chapter 16
The air itself seemed to tremble.
Bepure was gathering mana again—preparing to unleash Dark Spear.
Even for someone at Core Stage 2, it was an extremely mana-draining technique. Apparently, he was so eager to flaunt his abilities that he was willing to pay that price. A finishing blow with Dark Spear certainly had impact.
But still…
If he thought I would just stand here and take it, he was making a grave mistake.
Boom!
Another spear hurtled toward me.
This time, he’d taken his time—clearly anticipating that I might dodge—and had conjured two of them. The jet-black lances, heavy with condensed darkness, came straight at me.
This had gone far beyond some petty “let’s toss darkness around” game.
If I took that hit directly, I could see my future—unconscious for days.
Was this how he planned to pay me back for the humiliation I’d dealt him before?
Predictable.
And because it was predictable, it was easy to counter.
“Gather, and distort.”
The moment I chanted, a pitch-black barrier swelled before me, like an immense curtain. It looked thin, almost fragile—but the spears that were about to skewer me simply dissolved into it without a trace.
“W-what the hell is that…!”
He must have assumed his strike would land.
I snapped my fingers, restoring the barrier’s shape. Now it was a rounded, squirming black sphere at my feet, wriggling almost playfully.
“Ooh, splendid! You’ve adapted the resistance properties of a Dark Slime!”
Banshee clapped her hands, her praise lilting like song.
Truthfully, I could have just used the bone pile from yesterday’s summon to smear darkness onto him. The skeleton was more agile, after all.
But I had chosen the seemingly harmless Dark Slime for a reason.
Because… I can reshape it like this and use it for defense.
Slime-type undead lacked killing power, but their stats were heavily weighted toward resistance against dark elements.
True, as a low-rank undead, it would never withstand a properly trained Core Stage 2 mage’s assault.
But for someone like Bepure—who had only recently awakened to Stage 2?
It’s more than enough to block him.
I didn’t give him time to recover. The tables had turned.
Now it was hunting time.
Bepure ran with all his might.
If the spears had been launched, Kalmia must already have pinpointed his location. Until then, he had to avoid her attacks at all costs.
Just a bit longer… Three minutes will be enough!
Foolishly wasting mana on Dark Spear had left him drained. For a rookie dark mage like him, the spell was a huge burden. Until his mana recovered, he was dangerously exposed.
It’s fine. I still have a chance.
He hadn’t expected that idiot girl to use Dark Slime that way—it had caught him off-guard. But now her tricks were revealed. Slimes were too slow; in a straight fight, he could avoid them all day. And there were plenty of ways to ignore their resistance and smear darkness on her.
He ducked into a narrow enclosure surrounded on all four sides by high walls and locked the door. In terms of defense, it was perfect.
The only flaw was the open ceiling—but that didn’t matter.
With Core Stage 1 dark magic, there’s no way she can get in here!
She’d need either a large undead to climb with, a flying undead, or a high-tier dark elemental spell—things that required at least Core Stage 3 or higher.
Three minutes… no, let’s make it five to account for surprises.
He steadied his breathing, focusing entirely on circulating mana to store power in his core.
That’s when he heard it.
A strange, rhythmic sound.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Is she actually hitting the wall with magic?
He scoffed. During lessons, they’d tried darkness-coating exercises on walls like this—it was impossible to damage the structure with student-level magic.
Probably just lashing out because she was frustrated.
Curious, he strained to listen for her incantation, but the walls muffled her voice too much to make it out.
Whatever. It’s nothing.
Two more minutes, then he’d give her a taste of real magic.
Thud!
Suddenly, a heavy sound came from above.
Bepure’s head snapped up.
“Heave-ho.”
Perched on the top of the wall was a petite, platinum-blonde girl. She moved with sharp agility, her eyes curving with amusement as she looked down at him.
“Thanks for walking right into your own grave. Really appreciate it.”
“Wha—”
“Distorting Darkness.”
He had no time to react.
A black Dark Slime expanded its body, spreading like a massive net.
For an instant that felt like an eternity, despair crushed him.
The foul, sticky substance clung to him, coating him completely in darkness before he snapped back to reality.
“Core Stage 2 and you still lost to a slime? Seriously.”
“…!”
“Guess the real trash here isn’t me—it’s you.”
And with that, the reality of his complete defeat settled over him.
“H-how dare you call me trash…!”
“Why not? Your mom already gave me permission.”
“…What?”
“I told her you called me trash, and she said, ‘Kids say things like that sometimes.’”
He grit his teeth. He wanted to accuse her of lying, but knowing his mother’s temperament, she’d probably said exactly that.
But none of that mattered now.
“You… you cheated somehow! You can’t even use much dark magic—how did you get over the wall—”
“Oh, no cheating involved.”
The voice that cut in belonged to Banshee, the match’s host. Floating into the air, she seated herself opposite Kalmia, smiling warmly.
“Kalmia’s skill was truly remarkable. To think she would use summoning coordinates like that…”
“Summoning coordinates?”
Banshee nodded firmly. Every undead could be summoned to a designated location—these were called summoning coordinates. In fact, Kalmia had used this trick before to summon Dark Slimes in all directions to knock out other students.
“But all she can summon are shapeless slimes or bones! What could she possibly—”
“Ha-ha! Yes, normally that’s true!”
Banshee spread her arms in theatrical enthusiasm.
“But Kalmia summoned bones in midair—and used them as stepping stones!”
“…What?”
Summoning in midair was possible, but normally pointless—summons just fell to the ground. But Kalmia had focused on the brief moment a summon could hang in the air.
By chaining bone summons like stepping stones up the wall, she had bounced her way to the top.
In theory, Bepure could see how it might work—but the execution was insane. With her small frame, she’d have needed dozens of steps. That meant dozens of perfectly timed, precisely placed summons in sequence. A single miscalculation in timing or positioning and she would have plummeted—best case, with broken bones; worst case, with a snapped neck.
The sheer disregard for that risk carried a kind of madness.
“A dark mage’s skill isn’t measured solely by mana or core level.”
“It’s about control, quick thinking… but most importantly—”
A lesson from the past surfaced unbidden in his mind.
“—the obsessive drive, bordering on madness, to reach the Source.”
And just like that, the crushing weight of defeat settled on him again—this time far heavier than the slime’s touch.
