For Sale. Fallen Lady. Never Used.

While I was dumbfounded, Carla smiled with satisfaction, as if she had been waiting for this moment.

“Master, you’ve already learned how to resist mana interference. That’s because I’ve been teaching you from the start… I mean, I’ve been guiding you well!”

“…”

What’s with the ulterior motive?

I was briefly dumbfounded by her unintended confession, but Carla quickly continued in a playful tone.

“By the way, wouldn’t it be a shame to stop here? How about you try disrupting the professor’s magic this time? From what I’ve observed, if you do this and that…”

Carla began to explain Ethan’s habits when casting magic and how to exploit them.

Well, Carla did attend the academy until her fourth year, so she must have taken Ethan’s classes often.

That was probably how she figured out Ethan’s weaknesses so quickly.

And, of course, the fact that Ethan was an excellent professor but somewhat lacking as a magician might also be a factor.

In the first semester, even if you excelled in practicals, the written exams were tricky, so I didn’t receive the top points. But this time would be different.

The academy always favored students who were eager to learn. If I showed some initiative, Ethan wouldn’t refuse.

He might even give me extra points…!

Thinking about the radiant beauty of the Dragon Heart fragment, I spoke up.

“Professor!”

“Hmm? What is it?”

“This time, can I try mana interference?”

“Having enthusiasm is always a good thing. Given the significant difference in mana between us, you might succeed with the second method. Very well…”

“No. If possible, I’d like to try the first method, mimicking the mana pattern and exploiting any gaps.”

“…You do realize that I am a professor?”

“Which means there’s even more for me to learn.”

“Haha! Well, in that case, I can’t say no! Whether you succeed or fail, it will be a valuable experience for the other students as well. Let’s give it a try.”

Ethan smiled warmly as he extended his finger, casting the same Tinder spell as I did.

“You don’t need me to explain the method in detail, right?”

“No. I already felt it once, so I’m confident.”

I nodded confidently and slowly closed my eyes.

I recalled the sensations I felt when Ethan’s mana interfered with my spell, along with the simple tips Carla had just given me about Ethan’s weaknesses.

After organizing these thoughts in my mind, I began to slowly release my mana.

Like a snake slithering through the underbrush, the line of mana extended discreetly, its end brushing against Ethan’s spell as it began reading the structure and pattern.

A mana pattern is like a magician’s fingerprint. It’s impossible to replicate it entirely. So, all I needed was to fool him for a moment.

I pressed my mana into the brief gap I had carved out.

“Ugh!”

And Ethan doubled over, regurgitating his breakfast.

“Gueeeck!”

His face turned pale, and the veins visible on his skin glowed blue—a classic sign of mana backlash.

“Professor?! Are you alright?!”

“I-I’m… fine… It’s only… temporary… Uweeeck!”

I only shook his shoulder lightly, but it must have made him dizzier as the amount of vomit increased.

Naturally, the spell had been dispelled long ago.

Even though Carla had given me advice, I didn’t expect him to react this strongly!

When I turned to look at Carla, she seemed just as surprised, standing there with her mouth agape.

However, her gaze wasn’t on me or Ethan but was scanning the surroundings.

I wondered why she was acting like that, but then the murmurs from the students around us began to reach my ears.

“No matter how much you dislike learning from someone weaker, this is just too much…”

“I thought he had mellowed out lately.”

“We respect his achievements, but this…”

The students were whispering about how I had supposedly tried to humiliate Ethan, a professor respected for his knowledge, despite his practical skills being somewhat lacking.

“Oh.”

“…”

“…”

“…”

A short sigh of exasperation escaped me, and the previously noisy surroundings suddenly fell silent.

It felt like déjà vu, as if I had returned to the beginning of the first semester.

Watching the students glancing at me warily, I let out a long sigh.

---

Fortunately, Ethan understood that it wasn’t intentional, just an accident. In fact, he even praised me and gave me extra points.

But even after receiving the extra points I had wanted so badly, I couldn’t be happy about it.

The reason was simple—there were still many lectures left, and the focus of the second semester was practicality.

“Today, we’ll be learning about the synergy between elemental spells. For example, after using a fire spell, if you follow up with a wind spell, the lingering flames can reignite and cause additional damage.”

“…”

“O-Of course, this only works if the embers remain, and too strong a wind could blow away the remnants of the previous spell, so it’s not something you can do with just any combination. You need to find the right one.”

The professor glanced at me nervously, perhaps having heard some rumors.

I let out another sigh that I had been holding in since earlier, causing the professor to flinch and hastily add more explanation.

“For example! Yes! There’s the combination of Igni and Gale Tornado!”

Igni is a fire spell that emphasizes heat and persistence. Gale Tornado is a wind spell strong enough to lift a person temporarily.

It’s the basic combo of fire followed by wind that the professor mentioned earlier.

Moreover, unlike Fireball, which is explosive, Igni, when combined with Gale Tornado, can spread out, making it an effective area attack, which was quite handy.

Since this was a well-known and conventional strategy, I pretended to focus on the lesson and nodded.

Only then did the professor continue with his explanation in a much more relaxed tone.

“There are also spells that lose their power when cast consecutively. For example, earth and water magic…”

“That’s not true… That combination works well…”

“Huh!”

Maybe it was because what he said was so unexpected, but I muttered without realizing it. The professor caught it instantly, gasping as if he’d heard a ghost.

With a very cautious expression, he asked me,

“Yandel…? Is there something wrong with my lesson?”

“No, there’s no problem. It’s just that in practice, nearby earth can be washed away by water, resetting the terrain, and water spells blocked by rocks lose their effectiveness. Also, the derived elements like metal and ice don’t really synergize with each other.”

“Th-That’s right! So, after using earth magic, it’s good to follow up with an explosive fire spell like Fireball to shatter the rocks into fragments for an attack! If you’re wounded by metal magic, you could channel lightning magic to conduct electricity inside, or even expect a bit of homing capability!”

The professor quickly moved on to the next explanation, his eyes pleading with me to stop talking.

…But this was too good a tip to keep my mouth shut.

“But if you’re using it for defense rather than attack, there’s no better combination than earth followed by water.”

For example, Earth Wall and Ice Flower.

You can reinforce the defense by freezing the relatively soft earth wall.

Or, take Rock Shell, which encases you in a dome of rock to block attacks from all directions. It’s great for defense but has the drawback of immobilizing you.

However, if you spread water and freeze it on an ice floor, you can slide around on it to move.

There’s also the trick of dousing earth armor with water to turn it into mud, which, while increasing stress, removes the movement speed penalty.

Or, if there’s a lot of debris from Earth magic lying around, you can use water magic to sweep it together into an instant barricade.

These were all combo techniques I stumbled upon back in the early days of H&A, when meta research was still lacking.

…For the next hour.

These methods only really work with lower-tier spells, and they’re not all that impressive now that I can use elemental combinations.

But it seemed that wasn’t the case for others.

In the end, the professor of Elemental Magic left the classroom with a slightly dazed expression, having barely progressed with the lesson.

Sorry about that.

I’ll try to keep my mouth shut and quietly attend class from now on.

---

“Were you waiting? Were you waiting? It’s the sparring time you all love!”

Iona raised both hands and bounced up and down in place.

The students from the Magic Department, who were used to Iona’s peculiar behavior, just chuckled, but the students from the Knight Department looked puzzled, their expressions awkward.

Well, it’s not easy to know how to react when you meet someone like Iona for the first time.

For the record, it doesn’t really matter how you react as long as it’s not rude. Iona isn’t really thinking much about it anyway…

Originally, it was behavior meant to suppress her allure, but now it’s almost become a habit.

Iona, who had been growing stronger as a vampire by regularly drinking my blood, probably didn’t have much difficulty controlling her allure now. She just stuck to her usual way of speaking.

Professor Jason from Class A of the Knight Department looked around.

“You all know why we’ve gathered students from both departments today, right? From now on, you’ll be forming parties with each other and sometimes becoming sparring partners, testing each other’s strengths in various ways.”

“Right, right. This is so magicians and knights can understand each other better! Later, we’ll even bring in the Divinity Department for classes, so just keep that in mind!”

As soon as Iona finished speaking, excited murmurs spread through the room.

No matter what, everyone seemed to be looking forward to sparring with students from other departments.

I was also nodding in agreement from a distance when I suddenly felt a gaze on me. When I looked up, I met Iona’s eyes.

She smirked.

Her crimson eyes curved beautifully as she smiled mischievously.

“Well then! Before we explain the sparring format… I’ve heard some interesting news. There’s a student who’s already secured perfect scores in practicals and even earned bonus points!”

“Oh.”

I realized what was happening as Iona spoke in that playful tone.

She was going to tease me about what I did in the previous class.

“It wouldn’t be fair to let such an outstanding student spar with the others, right? It would turn into a game of luck instead of skill!”

“Yeah. If the focus is more on who you partner with rather than how you actually fight, there’s no point in a sparring class.”

Jason nodded in agreement, as if adding a comment.

I have a bad feeling about this.

“So! One student will sit out! But that would feel too much like exclusion, wouldn’t it?”

I tried to back away and blend in with the other students, but… it was too late.

“Heup!”

With a graceful flip, Iona leaped into the air, landing right behind me.

She then lifted me up from behind, practically hugging me.

“So! Let’s all spar nicely! Today’s class will be the Yandel Raid!”

This is insane.

I looked back at Iona in disbelief and asked,

“No teams for me, Professor?”

“Nope! But if you win…”

Iona leaned in close, her soft lips almost brushing my ear as she whispered,

“I’ll let you play vampire hunter tonight.”

“So I just have to knock everyone out?”

Whoosh!

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