[V5C14] For the First Time Ever, This is Fun
Translated by Jodas 5: The Magic BattleWith her arms spread wide, Tia slowly glided down to the surface, with Oliver’s limp form hanging beneath her.
As Oliver collapsed on the ground, Tia wriggled around on his back. She wanted to get off as soon as possible, but with the carrying strap holding her on tightly, she couldn’t just peel herself away.
“Pevuvu… I’m supposed to take this buckle and…”
It was pretty hard for her to undo the buckles purely by feel. Especially since Tia’s fingers weren’t terribly dextrous to begin with.
As she groaned Pevuu, pevuu during her desperate struggle with the buckle, Rukiye came running over.
“Tia, hold still.”
“Piyo!”
Rukiye deftly undid the buckles for her, allowing Tia to dismount from Oliver’s back.
Lying crumpled on the ground, Oliver was more or less unconscious.
(That attack with the twirling wind… was on a whole different level.)
Damage in a magic battle was dealt proportionally to the mana density of the attack and the area of its target.
Thus, a spell where the mana was all squished into one point was small, but dealt a ton of damage. Likewise, a weak attack that’s spread out over a large area would also deal a fair amount of damage. That was why they’d started using the drawing boards as shields to minimize the area that got hit.
But in a magic battle, if you had to ask which type of attack hurt the most, it would overwhelmingly be the former. With high enough mana density, even the tiniest pinprick could be intensely painful.
Thus, Frederik tried to use attacks with the widest impact area possible against the Apprentices. That was the essence of the balls of wind he threw at them.
On the other hand, there was the twisting wind he aimed at Oliver. That would hurt to get hit by. If this was a real fight, just as Frederik said, his body probably would have been cut in half.
(Now that Oliver’s been knocked out, Frederik probably won’t use that twisting wind again…)
She felt a tingling sensation on her shoulder blades.
This was the tingling she felt when she was about to take on a challenge.
“Tia, let’s move to plan two.”
Rukiye took off the bag she was carrying this whole time.
Tia’s answer was obvious.
“Piyopp! Of course!”
“Great. Once I’m done with this setup, we can start whenever you’re ready.”
The corners of Rukiye’s mouth lifted into a slight smile.
At the moment, Tia knew exactly why she felt like smiling despite their desperate situation.
Pefu, pefu, breathing heavily, Tia removed her boots.
Even after knocking Oliver out, Frederik was incensed.
He’d shown off the overwhelming power gap between them, yet he didn’t get the impression that Oliver’s heart was broken.
(…Still, I’ve got to get my head in the game.)
Frederik floated at low altitude with flight magic. He was not letting his feet touch the ground. Nevertheless, he could feel the ground shake beneath him. It was the tremor of a large creature running at full tilt.
An immense crimson lion ran with its eyes locked on Frederik. Riding on its back was the Barbarian Sword Princess, Sevil.
There was no saddle and no reins on this lion. Regardless, Sevil kept her balance by holding the lion by its mane.
“HAAAH!”
With a shrill shout, Sevil brought her curved sword to bear.
Frederik parried it with his spear, then spun about his right leg to redirect the energy of the attack.
(Each swing is so heavy.)
To begin with, curved swords were designed to cut enemies down when swung from horseback. They excelled at slashing rather than piercing, and with the momentum of a charging horse behind them, they were said to be able to slice clean through even an armored enemy.
The true strength of the Barbarian Sword Princess was mounted combat.
So not only were her sword strikes far more powerful, Sevil herself was in her element.
— Enemies like this were tough to handle.
(Still, she can’t touch me as long as I’m flying high out of her reach.)
Now that Oliver had been knocked out, it would be difficult for Tia to fly any more as well. That being the case, the only one of his opponents who could target him while he was in the air was Julius.
Perhaps he should deal with Julius before he flies too high… Or so he thought, until Frederik noticed something strange out of the corner of his eye.
(…Rope?)
By this point, the team on the ground had traveled a long way from the spot where they were earlier.
Where they’d had that last surface battle was an area with very dense tree cover.
But now, they were in an area that was split evenly between open ground and forest.
He could tell that they’d chosen the open ground intending to give space for this massive lion to run about.
But thin ropes were stretched between the trees surrounding that area. What appeared in the corner of his eye were these ropes.
(…Were they trying to limit my flight magic with ropes? It’s not a bad idea, but…)
The ropes were hung relatively high up in the trees — high enough that if you were to leap from the ground, you might be able to just barely touch one with your hands.
Then, all he had to do was avoid those when flying.
— The moment that thought crossed his mind, he felt a presence behind him.
“Pyoffu!”
“—!?”
A girl’s bare feet came from behind, grazing past Frederik’s hair.
Lunging at him as if to kick him in midair was none other than Tia.
(Her Magical Flying Device looks a little different now? The metal wings look shorter than before.)
With her kick evaded, Tia landed on the ground, then immediately jumped nimbly into the air. Her feet were on the ground for less than a second.
(Her movements just now…)
It was different from gliding through the sky, reading the wind currents.
With light movements like a cat, Tia jumped up and latched her feet onto a high rope. Then, using the momentum of her jump, she spun around the rope before flying back towards him.
“Piyo!”
He would rather not have her slam into him.
While he wouldn’t receive any damage from physical attacks, if Tia was able to grab a hold of Frederik, Frederik’s mobility would suffer. That would make it easier for his other opponents to target him.
As he avoided one of Tia’s lunges, something grazed his side. It was a fish made of water — Roswitha’s magecraft.
(That one was close.)
Just when he was off-balance, the red lion charged towards him. He tried to avoid it by floating up, but once again Tia flew towards him.
The Magical Flying Device Tia was now wearing must have been of a type designed to only activate momentarily. It was very different from flying with the wind. If anything, it shouldn’t be called a ‘flying’ device, but a ‘leaping’ device.
“You’ve got an interesting fighting style there.”
To Frederik’s words, Tia chuckled “Pyofufu.”
Tia leapt, caught onto a rope with her feet, then hung upside-down from it. Like a bat.
“I really wanted to beat my rival, so I came up with all sorts of ideas.”
The white-haired girl’s hair swayed in the breeze; she smiled with her amber eyes. She was childish, but confident.
Riding on the red lion’s back, Sevil approached and swung her curved sword. At the same time, Roswitha’s fish of water attacked from the opposite direction.
When Frederik floated up to dodge them, Tia jumped at him to interfere.
Then, just when he was off balance, Julius fired an arrow of flame.
His eyes spun from the incessant attacks and countermeasures he had to do.
(If I cut the ropes… No, that won’t work. Everything they brought into the magic battle will be protected. They even thought of that, huh… They sure did their research.)
With Frederik on the defensive, Tia made a confident declaration to him while hanging from a rope.
“We’re going to win, my rival.”
It was a sobering thought to him.
He’d come all this way with the idea that he would use this magic battle to hurt Oliver and demonstrate the difference in strength between them. — By thinking that way, he’d ended up just thinking of the other Apprentice Mages as not even worth talking about.
There was just such an immense distance between their strengths. That much was simply a fact.
(However…)
The little rival before his eyes had gone through countless rounds of trial and error, expending all of her effort in the name of winning against Frederik.
The first day he met Tia, she had been overjoyed when he offered to fly her around with flight magic.
She had said that she wanted to fly no matter what it took. There surely were underlying reasons that Frederik did not yet know.
But now, Tia stood against Frederik for a completely unrelated reason.
The words Winston Barrett told him this morning replayed in the back of his mind.
“That kid is desperate to win against her rival, you know? She won’t want you going easy on her.”
(…That’s right. It was rude of me to hold back so much.)
He hadn’t intended to hold back so much, but the fact remained that he had been going far too easy.
Frederik brought his spear to a ready position, and Tia spoke to him with a huge smile.
“Frederik. You can use that spinny wind again!”
“That one hurts if it hits you, you know? Even if it grazes you, you’ll lose your balance.”
“I’ll keep my balance! I did it earlier, after all! Pefufun!”
She was right.
Not only did that attack, with a vortex of wind enveloping his spear, have a highly lethal force to it; the spiraling winds would throw off the enemy’s balance. Against flying enemies, most of them would fall out of the sky just with that.
But just now, Tia had held on through it. Far from being shot down, she gracefully glided her way to the surface.
(…What is this feeling?)
Frederik hated being hurt. That was why he always ran away from his father’s attacks during his training when he was a kid. As a result, he naturally developed a talent for flight magic.
Even now, he did not enjoy fighting. He hated both being hurt and hurting others.
—And yet, for the first time ever, he was enjoying this magic battle.
So he thought, confronted by his little rival who sought to challenge him with all her might.