The fight was hopelessly one-sided……
“Vanguard bout——begin!”
The moment the female judge signals the start——
“Haaaaaaaah——!”
——Curse and Bazakk charge at each other simultaneously.
“Here we go!”
Curse’s opening slash, delivered with the conviction of first-strike advantage——
“Ha, too slow!”
——is dodged with contemptuous ease……
From there on, it is entirely Bazakk’s turn.
“Take this!”
“Oof……”
“And this!”
“Guh——”
“How about that!”
“H-hang on, wait——HBWUH!?”
Three consecutive blows without a breath between them.
Curse takes all of them directly to the face and crumples forward onto the stage.
“——Winner: Bazakk Dormy!”
Match time: a mere ten seconds.
The Battle Tournament’s ‘shortest defeat record’ had been shattered by a wide margin.
“He’s so……weak……!”
Luna’s eyes waver with shock, while——
“What on earth was that dramatic line even for……?”
——Ro watches with a cold stare, while——
“With this level of ability, how did he pass the Holy Knight Academy entrance exam……”
——Sarko raises a purely genuine question, while——
“He was beaten absolutely senseless——is he going to be all right……?”
——Wendy murmurs with a worried look, while——
“Well. Expected result.”
——Raios nods as if the outcome were never in doubt.
As Luna and the others stand there dazed, Curse goes by in front of them on a stretcher.
“I mean, there’s no way I could’ve won……. I mean, just thinking about it normally, you know……!”
He lays bare his innermost feelings as he is carried off to the infirmary.
“Now then, the second bout——Raios Reinhardt versus Garric Lampard! Both participants, please take the stage!”
At the judge’s instruction, Raios heads for the stage.
“Do your best, Raios-san.”
“Don’t mess it up.”
“I will not forgive you if you lose.”
“Fight hard.”
Receiving the cheers from his party members, Raios mutters——
“Who on earth do they think they’re talking to.”
——with undisguised irritation, and takes the stage for the second bout.
One minute later——
“——Winner: Raios Reinhardt!”
Raios wins without taking a scratch.
He is one of the top five students at the Holy Knight Academy.
There is no reason a man of natural talent who pushes himself tirelessly would stumble somewhere like this.
“Splendidly done.”
“Well, that was never really in doubt.”
“As expected of the Reinhardt heir——a magnificent showing.”
“That makes it one win each. We’re even again.”
Showered with praise from the party members, Raios——
“Hmph.”
——sniffs, as if this were only natural.
With the vanguard and second bouts done, it is now time for the middle bout.
The Battle Tournament Charter specifies that ‘the vanguard and second positions are filled by Holy Knight Academy students, the middle position by a Saint Academy Support Division student, and the vice-captain and captain positions by Saint Academy Saint Division students.’
Which means the next fight is the turn of our very own Saint-sama.
“And now the middle bout——we begin the match between Luna Spedio and Katie Oltzen! Both participants, please take the stage!”
Hearing the judge’s announcement——
“Hhh……”
——Luna lets out a long, deep breath.
“Luna, please at least not get hurt.”
Ro prays for her master’s safety, while——
“Luna, show them what you are capable of!”
——Sarko clenches her fist, while——
“Relax, Luna-san! (It’ll be fine……right? She won’t accidentally misjudge her own strength and……kill her opponent……will she?)”
——Wendy calls out to her while dying inside, while——
“Luna……I will see your true strength for myself.”
——Raios sharpens his eyes to a point.
Luna gives a tense nod and sets her foot on the stairs leading up to the stone stage.
(The mental rehearsal is perfect. If I do it just like in practice, it’ll definitely be fine……!)
Luna had, in fact, been putting in a ‘secret training session’ in preparation for today.
Rewinding six days——
“Hmm, this is a problem……”
Luna lies on the bed in her room, worrying alone.
Sarko had asked her so insistently, and she had agreed to enter the Battle Tournament, which was all well and good——but……
The Saint remains, as ever, bad at holding back.
Against an opponent on Natasha’s level——one of the highest-tier mages in the human world——she might be able to avoid killing them.
But her opponents this time are students.
Naturally, the conditions are entirely different.
“First of all, winning too overwhelmingly is absolutely out.”
Doing that would sharply raise the chances of being found out as the Saint.
“But then again, losing on purpose is even more out……”
The Battle Tournament is a team event, five against five.
Doing that would cause trouble for everyone.
If she were going to lose on purpose, she should have refused the whole thing from the start.
Which means what is needed now is——’winning in a natural way that doesn’t give away that she’s the Saint.’
“Hmm, is there some good way……”
Luna sits herself up and stares intently at the bookshelf, then reaches out and picks up a single book.
One of what might be called ‘overpowered-protagonist villainess novels.’
She seems to have decided there might be some kind of hint there.
Her sources of knowledge are heavily skewed toward villainess novels, and the situation is genuinely unhealthy.
After that she completely forgets about the Battle Tournament, spends a happy hour absorbed in the story, and then——
“Th-this is it……!”
——a particular scene hits Luna with a bolt of inspiration.
It is the scene where the protagonist villainess coolly defeats an assassin sent after her with a small, precise chop to the back of the neck.
“Of course, this is what I should have been doing!”
A small chop to the back of the neck, and a person falls unconscious easily.
How had she never realized something so simple until now.
The Saint, whose boundary between fiction and reality has never been particularly firm, springs to her feet and begins practicing neck-chops on the spot.
“Yah! Hah! Hup!”
A murderous hand-blade moving faster than the speed of sound cuts through the air with a series of vicious swoops.
“Wuh, wafuu……? (Is master going off to defeat the Demon King again……?)”
A killing chop thrown like a casual jab.
Tama, chewing her tooth-cleaning toy in the corner of the room, watches her master’s training with an expression of vague unease.
“If they come at me like this——this! If they come from the other side——this! From behind——this!”
The mental rehearsal progresses smoothly, and her chops at last reach the speed of light.
It is the supreme strike that severs all things without exception.
If something like this were to catch a regular student in the neck……it would produce a tragedy too gruesome to describe.
“All right, perfect……! This should get me through the Battle Tournament!”
And now——
“Both participants, are you ready? Then——Luna Spedio versus Katie Oltzen, begin!”
The judge snaps her hand down, and the middle bout begins.
Luna stands there with her usual wide-open defenses, a living invitation to attack. Against her, Katie activates two spells.
“<Sharpstone Waltz> × <Galewind Possession>!”
<Sharpstone Waltz> deploys a ring of small sharp stones around her body; <Galewind Possession> sends them spinning at high speed——she clads herself in an ‘all-in-one offense-and-defense armor’ of stone and wind.
“Advanced technique: dual-casting. Handling earth and wind magic simultaneously——pretty impressive.”
Ro murmurs with genuine admiration, while——
“The simultaneous deployment of two different attributes carries a risk of misfire……. That Katie student must have considerable confidence in her magical technique.”
——Sarko sends words of praise, while——
“……Why is someone that capable in the Support Division?”
——Raios frowns, and the well-informed Wendy begins to explain.
“Katie Oltzen, the third daughter of the distinguished magical family House Oltzen. An elite with a genius for magic who has mastered spells of every attribute at a young age. Her magical technique in particular is outstanding, a full head above her peers. However……her magical energy volume fell just short of the cutoff, and she was unable to enter the Saint Division.”
Wendy is a spy dispatched by the Emperor.
Before being assigned to the kingdom’s Saint Academy, she had finished gathering information on every student.
Meanwhile, witnessing Katie’s exceptional technique, Luna is left speechless with surprise.
“Earth and wind magic at the same time……!”
As well she might be——because the Saint-sama’s magical technique is, to put it generously……garbage.
High-order magic such as <Otherworld Gate> and <Holy Dragon’s Breath> only functions because her enormous magical energy brute-forces it into existence.
Her technique is so hopelessly crude that the great mage Shasha had thrown up her hands and declared “there is simply no saving this.”
(If I had that kind of magical sense, maybe I could cast prettier spells too……)
Herself, capable only of blunt and heavy-handed magic. Katie, capable of fine and intricate magic.
As Luna holds a generous portion of envy and a small scoop of jealousy, Katie’s eyes spark with aggression.
“I’m going to prove my strength at this Battle Tournament and……go back where I belong, to the Saint Division! I will not let something like magical energy volume decide my future!”
As if responding to that fierce emotion, her magical power surges.
“……!”
Luna takes an involuntary step backward.
(This magic might be bad for me……!)
An expression she rarely wears——one of genuine distress——crosses her face.
Katie closes the distance little by little, and Luna retreats accordingly……until she is backed all the way to the edge of the stage.
“Ngh……! (There’s nowhere left to go……!?)”
“Now, this is over!”
Katie draws her practice sword and closes the gap at tremendous speed.
“I win……!”
The moment she steps into killing range and brings down a blow with everything she has——
“Ahh, eh, eh, eh——AAAH-CHOO——!”
“Wha——kyaaa!?”
A gust of wind like a natural disaster tears through the arena, and Katie slams into the outer wall——and loses consciousness.
(……I, I did it……)
The Saint has something of a sensitive nose.
The dust cloud kicked up by the earth and wind magic irritated those delicate Saint nostrils, and the resulting sneeze was fired off like a cannon.
“……Huh……?”
As a thoroughly inexplicable atmosphere settles over the arena——
“W-winner: Luna Spedio!”
——the judge declares the result a beat late, and the match commentator rapidly analyzes the situation.
“Th-this is……the dreaded scenario has come to pass! It appears Katie’s dual-cast failed and her magic misfired!”
The spectators, witnessing an extremely rare conclusion to a match, begin to stir.
“I’ve never seen a magic misfire before……!”
“Yikes, terrifying……. So that’s what a magic misfire looks like.”
“That mage has some strange liquid all over her……is she going to be okay?”
While an uneasy buzz fills the arena, the medical team rushes to the fallen Katie.
“Ugh, this is bad……!”
“What is this——some kind of weird sticky fluid……?”
“Don’t be an idiot, don’t touch it carelessly! The magic misfired! Who knows what kind of dark matter got produced in there!”
Drenched in the Saint-sama’s snot and spit, Katie is gently placed on a stretcher and carried to the infirmary with great care.