Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy - Chapter 280

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 280

A vicious cycle caused by the wrong question.

It was a nightmare situation for divination mages.

And the best way to prepare for such a situation was…

‘Not getting involved in the situation in the first place.’

It was a somewhat absurd answer, but this was the correct one.

Instead of attempting divination magic right away, recognizing and responding to the trap contained in the question.

He didn’t even expect the new students to master advanced techniques like leaving markers in divination that only they could recognize to escape the cycle, or forcibly shifting the divination’s perspective to a more distant future or further ahead.

Just recognizing and responding to the trap contained in the question was enough to deserve high evaluation.

In contrast, the worst response was attempting divination magic right away.

Since a new student jumped into a trap question without preparation, they would inevitably fall into the cycle and struggle until their mana was depleted, then faint.

That should have been the case…

Lee Han casually swung his staff and attempted divination magic, attempted it, and attempted it again.

Even Professor Paselette couldn’t understand what was happening for a moment.

‘What on earth…?’

* * *

Without noticing the professor’s perplexed gaze from the front, Lee Han cast divination magic once more.

However, no proper future was visible.

When nothing appeared before his eyes, Lee Han tilted his head and canceled the magic.

It was an escape as natural as breathing.

Of course, quite a bit of mana was consumed in the process, but it had no particular effect on Lee Han.

‘Wasn’t this the right approach to the problem?’

“Uuuuuaargh.”

“!”

Lee Han listened to the painful groaning sounds coming from beside him.

Due to the professor’s illusion barrier, he couldn’t see his friends, but he could hear the sounds.

No matter how he listened, this was the agonizing sound that only came when magic failed greatly.

“Krgh.”

“Keeeeek.”

Thud!

It didn’t end with just painful groaning sounds, but even the sound of collapsing to the floor.

Thanks to the harsh training he received from Professor Boladi, Lee Han had become able to assess situations using his other senses even when his vision was blocked.

From the sound of dragging and the fact that no more groaning could be heard…

‘They even dropped out during the exam?!’

Lee Han couldn’t understand it.

Of course, it wasn’t an easy problem, but it wasn’t Professor Boladi’s exam, so it shouldn’t have been enough to make them collapse.

‘Could it be…’

Lee Han quickly assessed the situation.

It seemed this divination magic problem wasn’t a simple test, but one about identifying the trap contained within.

If they failed to identify that trap and rushed in recklessly, they could collapse like the friends who were just dragged away.

…Of course, Lee Han had already attempted it several times!

‘I was lucky. It seems I could endure it because I have a lot of mana.’

Lee Han patted his chest in relief.

Considering the mana consumed by divination magic, it wouldn’t have been strange for the other friends to collapse.

Now he needed to approach this more carefully.

‘Did he realize it?’

Professor Paselette raised her eyebrows when Lee Han stopped the magic.

Although it was a beat late, seeing him react like that, he must have realized the true meaning of this test.

‘Right. Stop the divination magic now, and point out the trap contained in this test… No!’

Lee Han cast divination magic again.

Professor Paselette was even more flustered than before.

Why?!

He realized it was a trap, so why was he doing such a thing?

‘Come to think of it, there’s no need to save attempts.’

The reason Lee Han cast divination magic again was simple.

When he thought about it, there was no need to approach carefully.

Because his mana was overflowing!

Lee Han continued casting divination magic while pondering if there was any way to break through this cycle.

Actually, he could have just pondered without casting divination magic, but Lee Han naturally repeated attempts since he had mana to spare.

Professor Paselette, who finally realized the situation, was so dumbfounded that she almost let out a chuckle.

‘What kind of brute force…’

It was good that he noticed something was wrong with the problem, but then he should approach it differently, not try to break through with force.

What kind of behavior was that.

“Professor. I think I found the answer.”

“!”

Lee Han, who had been continuously attempting, finally spoke up.

Professor Paselette was amazed but prepared to hear the answer.

“Tell me.”

“I think the answer was to find the trap contained in the question. One shouldn’t carelessly attempt divination magic with such questions.”

“Correct.”

Professor Paselette nodded.

It was a good answer.

The problem was…

‘Then why did he keep casting divination magic?’

Originally, he should have given the answer right when he realized it earlier, but he continued casting divination magic after that before giving the answer, so she couldn’t help but be curious.

Professor Paselette eventually couldn’t overcome her curiosity and asked a question.

“But how did you figure out the answer? Was it logical deduction?”

“I did make logical deductions… but I used divination magic.”

“So, in what way?”

Professor Paselette’s voice became rough, slightly frustrated.

“Since it seemed difficult to find an answer with the given question, I set the perspective to a more distant future. I found the answer by using divination to see the time after the exam ended.”

“…”

Professor Paselette was momentarily speechless.

She had suspected it, but she never thought he would actually accomplish that very method.

Escaping from the cycle, or seeing a future beyond the cycle and using that as a clue to realize the answer was indeed a method…

But that wasn’t an ability expected from new students. No matter how talented they were, this didn’t make sense.

First, the uncertainty of divination increased as time became more distant.

Moreover, since it was a future unrelated to the question, finding clues there to discover the correct answer to the question was no ordinary difficult task.

It was a technique that only experienced divination mages could perform…

‘Could it be…!’

Professor Paselette realized.

Why Lee Han used divination magic continuously even after he realized.

“Don’t tell me you kept casting divination magic until an answer came out?”

“That’s right.”

When the professor realized the method he used, Lee Han answered with a purely admiring expression.

As expected, she wasn’t a professor for nothing.

To figure out how Lee Han found the answer just from a few exchanges.

“…”

Professor Paselette felt a throbbing headache as she wondered where and how to even begin teaching this absurd disciple.

What kind of ridiculous…

The fact that the person in question was just sitting there with an innocent expression as if asking ‘Is there something wrong?’ made her headache even worse.

“Sigh… You did well. You did well, but… it seems there are a few more things you need to learn.”

“Ah. Is that so.”

“Next week…”

“Next week is vacation though.”

Lee Han suddenly felt an ominous feeling.

Surely she wouldn’t say something ridiculous like telling him to come to the magic school during vacation?

‘If she says something like that, I might really have to send a complaint letter to His Imperial Majesty.’

“…Then next semester.”

“Ah. Yes. That’s fine.”

“You must come.”

“Yes. I understand.”

“You must come, understand? Swear it once more with sincerity.”

“…”

Professor Paselette didn’t notice, but Lee Han’s gaze as he looked at the professor was subtly changing.

‘Does she not have disciples?’

Professor Mortum, no, professors with few disciples tended to be very sensitive about their new disciples running away.

If a student simply decided not to attend at the beginning of a new semester, there wasn’t actually much a professor could do about it.

Of course, they could try various threats and persuasion, but once a mage made up their mind, it wasn’t easily shaken.

Professors with plenty of disciples could show a relaxed attitude like ‘If you don’t want to listen, then don’t, I don’t care,’ but professors with few disciples might really end up with no one attending if they did that.

Of course, there were occasionally professors who would sit confidently in their lecture halls even with no disciples at all, but that had to be considered an exceptional case.

‘Since I’m going to attend anyway, I should be considerate of her position.’

Since he was going to attend anyway, there was no harm in being considerate of the professor’s position.

Lee Han said kindly.

“Don’t worry, Professor. Why wouldn’t I come?”

“You’re already taking dark magic, summoning magic, illusion magic, enchantment magic, transformation magic, and healing magic.”

Lee Han was left speechless.

As expected of an excellent divination mage, she was very sharp.

‘That’s certainly true!’

* * *

Diret fought off drowsiness as he waved his staff.

He had to make full preparations for the underclassmen who would soon take their dark magic final exam.

Cohorti from the same year also waved his staff.

“Is everything ready?”

“It’s ready. But isn’t the number of bones too few? Shouldn’t we bring more? The poison bottles seem a bit lacking too.”

“It’s fine. There aren’t even five new students learning dark magic this time.”

“…”

At Diret’s answer, Cohorti made a complicated expression.

While there wasn’t necessarily a need for many underclassmen, when there were too few underclassmen learning the magic he was studying, that was complicated in its own way.

“Why doesn’t everyone show interest in dark magic?”

“Isn’t it because of summoning the Frost Giant King in the corridor last time?”

“Th-that was a problem with an artifact that had nothing to do with dark magic!”

Cohorti’s face turned red.

Of course, Diret knew all too well why dark magic wasn’t popular.

‘It would be strange if it were popular.’

If Diret saw an article in the imperial newspaper like 【Young Dark Mages Gradually Increasing… Does Dark Magic Lead the Trend of Imperial Magic?】, he would think ‘Is the Empire going to collapse?’

Every aspect of the magic seemed unpopular…

“Ah. They’re coming in.”

As the first-year students entered one by one, the fourth-year students quickly retreated to the back of the lecture hall.

It was a place with a perception-lowering magic circle, where the first-year underclassmen couldn’t see them.

“Hmm. Isn’t the difficulty too high?”

Seeing the first-year underclassmen, Cohorti suddenly seemed worried and said so.

This dark magic final exam was a comprehensive test of everything learned in the first semester.

Curses, poison, bones.

An exam that checked all the basics of these three areas.

While it sounded simple, these kinds of exams were usually more difficult.

Since they had to face all three fields of dark magic head-on, if even one area was lacking, there was no way to compensate.

“This should be fine. We decided this together when talking with the professor last time, so why are you saying this now.”

“Well… there aren’t even five of them, so I’m worried the number might decrease further…”

“…”

That was certainly a valid point.

Diret was surprised that Cohorti had made a rare accurate observation.

Of course, it was too late to change anything now…

Thud-

The door opened and a student entered.

The student who entered immediately cast curse magic on the curse magic scarecrows, knocking them down one after another, then threw bone fragments from the desk to cast bone magic.

A storm of bones swept through the center of the spacious lecture hall, and the bone magic scarecrows tumbled about.

Crash clang clang clang!

Not even a few seconds had passed up to this point.

Cohorti was watching with his eyes and mouth wide open, completely dumbfounded.

‘What???’

The new student didn’t stop there. Without rest, he immediately summoned poison from thin air and put it into a poison bottle.

The poison bottle, reacting with the properly made poison, began emitting smoke. The poison bottle, which emitted thicker smoke the higher quality poison it contained, spewed out smoke so toxic it could cover the entire lecture hall.

“Was it too… too easy? Huh? This is strange? The level of the new students…?”

“No. Just one of them is abnormal.”

Diret, who belatedly recognized the familiar face of the underclassman, answered coolly.

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