Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy

-Hmm. No. Maybe it isn't a clue after all.

The hamster quickly came back to its senses, befitting an experienced magical criminal.

Even if there were magic hidden in the fortress, the chances of it being in a place like this underground prison were slim.

Only clueless brats read old fairy tales and thought, 'Maybe there's treasure in the dungeon!' Generally speaking, people did not store valuables in dungeons.

What they usually kept in dungeons were prisoners.

Anything truly valuable would be kept somewhere close by that only verified people could enter, like the upper levels of the fortress, rather than some ambiguous place like an underground prison...

"No. Trust my intuition. There's something in the underground prison!"

-R-really?

The hamster wavered slightly.

It was rare for this mage of House Wardanaz to speak with such confidence.

The brat was always annoyingly chattering while keeping one step back, yet now he was showing this much certainty.

Maybe there really was something here.

As soon as Lee Han sensed that the hamster had fallen for it, he moved quickly. If given time, this hamster could come to its senses again.

Fortunately, there were no other vampires near the underground entrance. Perhaps because the surrounding area had collapsed, even the dead who had lost their reason did not seem to wander around here.

"This is..."

After descending through the collapsed entrance, Lee Han was amazed by the gruesome traces left along the passage.

The vampire dead were embedded here and there in the walls and ceiling as though they were decorations hung up for display.

-The assassin is escaping... We have to stop...

-The cunning archmage pulled something... The enemies have broken in...

Even though the battle had ended long ago and they themselves had already fallen, these dead still had not grasped what had happened.

The dead above in the fortress were similar, but at least they were in a better state than these ones. They could still move around, after all.

The hamster ignored whether the dead were crawling miserably or hanging from the walls and sharply examined the traces.

They might be clues to the magic hidden in the fortress.

-Looks like enemies the assassin took down. This one wasn't ordinarily fast.

Even among combat mages, styles varied greatly. Since there was no single correct answer, the mage's own individuality tended to reveal itself all the more clearly.

This combat mage's style was speed-focused.

The comparatively high-level magic had been invested into speed and stealth, while offensive magic consisted of combinations of low-circle spells that supplied only the minimum necessary destructive power.

To fight in this way, one needed the eye to quickly identify an enemy's weaknesses and the skill to drive attacks precisely into vital points. Otherwise, the lack of destructive power would inevitably become a liability.

-Interesting, but far removed from powerful and extraordinary magic. Do you really think there's a clue here?

The hamster asked again in confusion.

Of course, the accomplishments displayed by a combat mage like this were impressive and unique, but this was not the kind of magic the hamster was looking for.

What this hamster wanted was powerful, extraordinary ancient magic—something significant enough to interest the Yaksha King and for Sanguros to hide—not techniques that pushed ordinary magic to its limits through training and combination.

"Of course. I'm even more certain now. More importantly, look at this dead one here."

Lee Han pointed to a dead being with only its upper body remaining.

Unlike the hamster, he still lacked enough experience to tell at a glance what magic had been used.

The dead groaned at Lee Han.

-The assassin... escaped... We have to chase...

"All right. All right. Be quiet."

-The assassin... escaped, I said... A truly wicked...

When the irrational dead refused to listen, Lee Han cast a curse and sealed its mouth shut.

The hamster squeaked and asked.

-What am I supposed to look at? Its miserable state after being ruined by an evil god?

"Not that. I mean these severed marks here. What kind of magic do they look like?"

Judging from the upper body of the dead, it seemed to have first been struck by a spherical elemental spell, then heavily slashed while its feet were briefly pinned.

Lee Han knew the former, but the latter was not easy to guess.

-Let's see... With cutting power like that, wind or ice... No, neither. If it were wind, the cut surface would be more destructive, and if it were ice, there would be frost. Most likely a dark element.

"What? Profe—... The assassin was skilled with the dark element too?"

-You don't have to be a master of an element to use its magic. You only need to learn as much as necessary. Like I said, this assassin is the type who creates destructive power through skill and combination, so something like that wouldn't matter much.

"I see. I see."

Having roughly learned what he needed to know, Lee Han began working backward from the remaining clues to reconstruct the magic.

'Dark-element type, with cutting power, so sword-shaped. Since the attacks happened simultaneously, Professor wouldn't have gone over and swung it personally, so summoning... Then it must summon behind the enemy and slash. Professor hates waste, so rather than maintaining the sword, there would've been a restriction that made it disappear immediately after activating.'

-...Aren't you going to look for the clue?

Lee Han answered the hamster firmly.

"This is the clue. Trust me."

-R-right.

The hamster was gradually starting to become confused.

It was nice that Lee Han seemed reliable, but what exactly was this bastard relying on to be so confident?

"Hmm... Is this <Dark Sword of Ambush> around the 3rd Circle?"

-It's 4th Circle. Can't you even count circles?

The hamster forgot its confusion and stared in disbelief.

The Empire's current magic classification system was clean and simple enough for even this ancient-magic-worshiping magical criminal to acknowledge.

It would be one thing for someone who had only just begun learning magic, but for a mage at a level where graduating from Einroguard would not be strange to get confused about what circle a spell belonged to...

"I got confused because I don't usually have to count magic circles. People can make mistakes. You don't have to criticize me so harshly over it."

Lee Han argued back instead.

Normally, mages progressed by spending a long period learning 1st Circle magic, then another long period learning 2nd Circle magic, and so on.

Lee Han, however, had learned magic in a way where, while he was still learning 1st Circle magic, lunatics came over and taught him 2nd Circle magic, and while he was learning that, other lunatics came over and taught him 3rd Circle magic.

Because he had learned so quickly and in such a compressed manner, he did not intuitively recognize whether a given spell was 3rd Circle or 4th Circle.

Wasn't it enough to distinguish whether he could learn it or not?!

'Is this bastard insane?'

Of course, the hamster was only even more dumbfounded by that argument.

If someone who could reverse-engineer magic from traces claimed they had simply mistaken its circle, no one would believe them.

"Then let's look at the next trace. Can you tell how this one moved?"

The next question was even more difficult.

There was one dead guard whose body was wrapped tightly in chains around the mechanism that opened and closed the prison bars, and another dead being collapsed inside the bars.

At first glance there seemed to be nothing strange, but on closer thought there was an oddity.

The moment this dead guard fell, the bars should have closed. So how had Professor Voladi entered inside the bars without leaving any traces and killed the one within?

It had not been attacked from outside, either. The dead inside had clearly been killed by close-range magic.

Nor had Professor Voladi used spatial movement. There was no way the professor would do something so inefficient just to kill one dead being inside the bars.

Likewise, with the guard standing in front, the professor would not have killed the one inside the bars first...

-You're overthinking it. Time magic. The assassin increased speed through acceleration.

Lee Han had a similar spell as well. Though he had to borrow the power of a pocket watch, he could use <Limited Time Acceleration>.

"I see...!"

The situation immediately took shape in his mind.

If one accelerated quickly and moved around behind the opponent, then what magic was used for the actual attack did not matter much.

Once Lee Han thought that far, he even realized that Professor Voladi would not have used time-acceleration magic in such a crude manner.

Wasting mana freely and lavishly was Lee Han's style. Professor Voladi would never do that.

'Professor probably mapped out a route first, then applied time acceleration only along that route. There'd be no need to waste magic anywhere else.'

Just as there had likely been a restriction on the summoned dark-element sword so that it appeared briefly behind the enemy, this time-acceleration spell had surely been designed in the same way.

As Lee Han eagerly scribbled down the magic with great interest, the hamster asked in confusion.

-This doesn't seem like a clue to ancient magic.

"You mustn't neglect even a single clue. You never know when this might be useful."

After finishing his notes, Lee Han moved farther inside.

He saw interrogators and guards who looked as though they had been struck down by chains used by the Death Knights. These dead were still unable to come to their senses, muttering that they had to torture the assassin.

-There's nothing here.

"Of course there's nothing. The assassin escaped."

-...?????

The hamster was bewildered when the bastard who had confidently been saying things like trust me and there's a clue here suddenly acted like this.

Had he really gone insane?

-You clearly said there was a clue...

Ignoring that, Lee Han looked around the empty solitary cell. Aside from his interest in magic, he wanted to know what had happened here.

"!"

Lee Han focused his gaze when he spotted a short piece of writing carved near the bottom of the wall.

It was so brief and simple that he probably would have missed it if he had not been paying close attention.

'This is...'

The contents of the writing were simple.

It was an apology to the Skull Principal for acting however one pleased.

Who had written it, and what it meant, was far too obvious.

"......"

After thinking for a moment, Lee Han quickly erased the writing.

As a disciple, it felt like this much was something he should do for his teacher.

-What did you erase? Was it a clue?

"No. It was nothing important. If it had been a clue, I wouldn't have erased it. Let's go back up."

-You said there was a clue!

"Looks like I was mistaken. Haha. That happens."

-......

While the hamster was so dumbfounded that it was left speechless, Lee Han swept away every last dead being remaining there.

They were spirits that had already lost their sense of self, so completely destroying them probably did not mean much, but he still wanted to do it.

'This bastard... Is he threatening me?'

The hamster was alarmed.

If so, he was truly despicable.

***

The magic is higher up. There's nothing below...

After Lee Han emerged from underground, Sanguros's voice could be heard again.

Apparently, this incomplete evil god was growing impatient because Lee Han kept wandering around strange places.

The hamster glared fiercely at Lee Han.

'I definitely said we had to go up!'

Lee Han nodded with a shameless expression.

"I see. That was unexpected. Who could have known it would be in the upper levels of the fortress?"

-......

The ones there will welcome you mages. Hurry. There's no telling when this fortress may collapse.

Sanguros laughed pleasantly and disappeared. At that, the hamster seemed even more anxious.

Unlike the material world, unstable dimensions like this underwent severe changes. A fortress that had perished long ago could collapse again at any time.

-We need to hurry, just like it said. If the fortress collapses, the traces of the magic will disappear into the void beyond the dimension!

"Understood. Calm down. We're going now, aren't we?"

Lee Han agreed, but still remained relaxed.

His attitude was light, as though it would be nice if he got his hands on it, but if not, then so be it.

Seeing that, the hamster thought to itself.

'No way... He's a mage too, so there's no way he isn't interested in magic like that... He must just be pretending to be calm. He must be burning with impatience inside right now! He's definitely putting on a brave front because he doesn't want to show weakness in front of me.'

What a stubborn bastard!

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