Necromancer Academy’s Genius Summoner - Chapter 336

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Summoning Genius of the Necromancer School — Episode 336
Thump! Thump! Thump!
The sound of marching boots shook the very earth. The air hung taut with dread, and the whispered prayers of frightened soldiers drifted through it like smoke.
Before the fortress, a dark mass of twenty thousand strong from the Can Kingdom pressed forward. Somewhere within those walls, fifteen Kizen students were waiting.
Swiftly, the vast army encircled the fortress entirely, their formations splitting to prepare simultaneous assaults on all four gates.
“Screech! Hold fast—don’t yield to fear!”
“Fight to the last! Hold!”
The beastfolk officers moved along the ramparts, rallying the defenders. Simon watched them work, then turned to glance at Merin.
“You all right?”
Her expression had gone rigid.
“…I’m fine. I just didn’t realize twenty thousand would look so… overwhelming.”
A harsh laugh burst out.
Dick suddenly popped up beside them, his cackle sharp and cutting.
“Scared, Merin? Are you scared?”
“For gods’ sake, try to take this seriously!”
Merin’s palm connected with his back in an instant, but Dick merely laughed that same dark chuckle, unbothered as always.
“Tension’s only bad right now, in this moment. Once the battle starts, you won’t have time to think. At all.”
Dick thrust his head forward, eyes wide.
“Only madness.”
Clack!
Merin seized his face in both hands, her fingers sharp and cold.
“Your face is the mad one, you lunatic.”
“Aaarghhhgh!”
Dick thrashed and shrieked, flailing in mock agony.
Simon watched the scene unfold and smiled quietly to himself. It was Dick’s way—his peculiar method of breaking the tension that bound his companions.
It seemed to be working; Merin withdrew her hands with practiced grace, drew out her handkerchief, and wiped her fingers clean before setting her gaze forward once more. The steady focus in her eyes told him her resolve had solidified.
Boom! Boom!
A heavy footfall reverberated across the field, drowning out all other sound.
The ranks of the Can Kingdom parted like curtains, and through that gap emerged a massive war elephant, its carriage swaying with each thunderous step. Upon it stood a girl with twin-braided hair, draped in a pristine white coat and wielding an ornate fan with lazy arrogance, her legs crossed in studied indolence.
“What the—”
Merin’s brow creased.
“Is that the siege commander?”
“This one’s going to be rough.”
Dick, leaning against the wall, rubbed his jaw with a grave expression.
“Elisa Selin, Special Exception number seven, of the Phantom Fleet. We’ve never had a name of that caliber show up to a siege before.”
Thud!
The elephant came to a halt.
Elisa uncrossed her legs and rose gracefully as a knight of the Can Kingdom bent forward to assist her down, his movements formal and precise.
“Ahem.”
Elisa wove Amplification Magic around her throat.
“A— a—”
Her clear, youthful voice rang out across the battlefield, cutting through the tension that hung like iron and blood.
Merin’s eyes narrowed to sharp slits.
“Of course. She wouldn’t pass up a chance to flaunt her strength.”
“…Her strength?”
“Did you forget? Her father’s an active Minister of State. That family lives and breathes politics.”
Elisa opened her mouth.
“I am Elisa Selin, Commander-in-Chief of the Can Kingdom. I stand here as a Guardian sent by the Creator himself, answerable for the Can Kingdom’s victory in this siege.”
Those words sent a ripple of alarm through the beastfolk defenders of the Aon Kingdom.
“Screech! Screech! A Guardian? Weren’t Guardians supposed to belong only to our kingdom?”
“How could the Can Kingdom have a Guardian too…!”
Elisa let the murmuring wash over her for a moment, then continued.
“Hear me, people of the Aon Kingdom.”
Her voice rang with crystalline clarity.
“You are already dead.”
Silence.
The weight of dread settled over the battlefield like a shroud.
“Open your eyes if you have them. Use your reason if you possess it. Consider whether this—”
She spread both arms wide.
“—is a gap your strength can truly overcome.”
A heavy silence fell over our ranks. Meanwhile, the soldiers of the Can Kingdom were hurling fierce, threatening shouts.
“The dread you feel is justified. The fear you feel is real. This war’s outcome was decided the moment it began. That crumbling, diseased fortress cannot protect you, and the three-inch tongue of sycophants who fan only patriotism will drive you to the slaughter. You have—”
Elisa Selin was.
“Been deceived.”
A creature that devoured anxiety itself.
“Yet still you stand. Is it patriotism? Patriotism is the tyrant’s tool, the hypocrite’s tongue. Why must the people die because their king failed in diplomacy? Why are the people expected to surrender their lives to the nation in war as though it were the natural order?”
Her voice grew taut with intensity.
“Surrender. Bring forth those who drove you to ruin. Then I, Elisa Selin, who have come bearing the Creator’s will, shall annihilate those who deceived you with vicious patriotism and cornered you, and your lives and the lives of your families shall be spared. I declare this!”
Elisa’s voice reached its crescendo.
“No Creator desires the blood of the created. Surrender and open the gates! Only thus shall blood be spilled less. Otherwise, the only choice remaining to us is annihilation.”
Indeed, a politician’s daughter.
She had silver words.
A single speech had visibly shaken our soldiers’ resolve. Worse still was how she’d turned their hostility not toward the Can Kingdom, but toward their own court’s traitors—and was subtly driving a wedge between our own ranks. That was what truly frightened me.
“Wow, this is dangerous.”
Dick, reading the shift in the soldiers’ mood, clicked his tongue.
“In the last siege, the student never gave speeches like this! The beastman commander just came out and said ‘Glory to the Kingdom!’ or something, and that was that!”
“Merin.”
Simon turned his head.
“Can you use Amplification Magic?”
“Huh? Oh, well. I learned it in the Pure Magic Club and can use it, but…”
“What are you thinking?”
Simon offered a faint smile.
“Speeches are an important element of war too, aren’t they?”
If their Commander was going to come at us with that three-inch tongue of his, we’d meet it with one of our own.
“Dick, do you know any unique greetings or famous phrases from the Aon Kingdom?”
“Ah—yeah, I do. The king said this before Aon fell and he died.”
Dick spoke, and Merin conjured an Amplification Magic Circle floating in the air before Simon.
Simon examined the Magic Circle carefully, then placed his hand against it and let a thin stream of Darkness flow through.
Merin’s eyes widened in alarm at the sight.
“Hey, wait! That circle runs on mana alone, and if you do that like that—!”
Shriek!
A sudden, grating howl burst forth, and the people who had been in disarray suddenly clapped their hands over their ears and turned toward the source of the noise.
“Hmm.”
Simon stepped forward before the Magic Circle as though he’d been waiting for this moment.
“I am Simon Polentia, Commander of the Aon Kingdom.”
All eyes naturally shifted toward Simon.
“I have come bearing the Creator’s command to defend the Aon Kingdom.”
This time, the Can Kingdom’s soldiers stirred. They probably believed their own side had a guardian descend as well.
“?!”
Elisa, who had been contentedly fanning herself from her carriage, looked up in shock.
‘Simon Polentia!’
So this wretch had come to the siege too. But to dare match me in rhetoric!
She rose quickly from her seat.
“I hear you were urging surrender with the logic that patriotism is merely a ruler’s tongue.”
Simon’s voice descended like a heavy weight.
“It is an insult.”
The ability to seize the mood in an instant and capture people’s ears—it belonged to someone other than Elisa as well.
Elisa’s expression hardened as she cast her own Amplification Magic once more.
“Are you saying I’m wrong? These people are being driven to their deaths by this despicable farce of hollow patriotism to the kingdom, all for nothing but your own interests—”
“The heart that protects.”
Simon cut her off.
“The anxiety and fear that come before war are entirely natural. None of us are free from emotion. But do you think that’s why we stand here now, holding this line despite that fear?”
Simon’s voice grew strong.
“My family.”
Each word spoken with force.
“My friends.”
As though pouring out emotion, a flood of feeling.
“To protect my home, my livelihood, my daily life. We are not fools who would abandon what we hold dear to an enemy and lay down our arms. Your words are an insult to us, to Aon—”
Simon finished.
“An insult.”
Thump!
Someone stamped their foot.
Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump!
In moments, every soldier along the wall began stamping in unison, their faces flushed with fierce concentration, eyes bloodshot and fixed on the enemy.
“How dare your kingdom speak of ‘guarantees’ when you have plundered and ravaged your way to the royal gates?”
Thump!
“We will not be deceived. We will defend ourselves through our own strength.”
Thump!
Simon threw his fist into the air and shouted.
“Aium Aon!”
The soldiers were startled that the Guardian from another world knew their battle cry, but that shock transformed into exaltation in an instant.
Every soldier planted their spear and roared until their voices cracked.
“Aium Aon!”
“Yeaaaaaaaa!”
A thunderous cheer erupted from the ramparts.
The soldiers wept and laughed, shouting with violent intensity. They had kindled their hatred of the enemy and their will to fight.
“That’s our Simon!”
Dik grinned widely and shouted.
“The morale of our troops has skyrocketed!”
Merin’s eyes remained fixed on Simon. He lowered his fist and touched his throat, then, catching her gaze, offered an embarrassed smile.
“Ah, that’s a bit humbling. I may have gotten carried away.”
“No.”
Merin took a quiet breath and smiled warmly at Simon.
“That was magnificent. Simon.”
Yeaaaaaaaaaaa!
The cheering still continued.
“You—blast it!”
Elisa Selin’s face flushed crimson with rage and humiliation as she shouted, but the soldiers of the Aon Kingdom paid her no mind.
“Aium Aon! Aium Aon!”
Their morale climbed higher by the moment.
“Elisa.”
A young man wearing an eye patch and carrying a longsword at his waist dropped onto the carriage where Elisa rode.
“Enough pouting. Come back. He’s furious now.”
“This is infuriating!”
Elisa thumped her own chest in frustration.
“Those beasts are clearly nothing but rodents in terms of brains! Are they idiots? What is more precious than their own lives? How does some words like that raise morale? In the end, Simon’s speech was nothing but emotional manipulation!”
“I am not learned in such matters and know little of politics.”
The young man let out a deep sigh and continued.
“I have heard that when men stake their lives, they follow emotion rather than reason. Your defeat lies in appealing to reason in a war speech.”
He seized Elisa by the scruff of her neck. Her body lifted easily into the air.
“What are you doing!”
“I shall retrieve you before the Commander becomes an even greater embarrassment.”
“Aaaah! Let go! I haven’t lost yet!!”

* * *
The battle had begun.
Simon knew that the Can Kingdom also had limited time. They came in a general assault, dividing their forces to attack all four gates simultaneously.
“They’re coming!”
Dik shouted.
The enemy flooded toward the South Gate where Simon stood. The vast tide of beast-kin from the Can Kingdom bore a considerable weight of intimidation.
Still, the South Gate had its defensive advantages. Though dried up now, it had clearly once been a moat.
At the base of the wall lay the pit of that ancient moat, forcing climbers to scale it using large ladders, and above all, there was only one path leading up to the gate itself.
And Simon, in his current state, was confident there was no one better to hold such a narrow chokepoint.
“Let us begin.”
Standing atop the wall, Simon raised both arms like a pianist preparing to play.
Eight Skeleton Mages lifted their staffs toward the sky in perfect unison.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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