Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy - Chapter 670
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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 670
-Save me! Save me!
When the poachers screamed, Lee Han opened the stable door to check.
“Did you eat them by any chance? Hmm. No, you didn’t.”
Ponrig scratched the wall in dissatisfaction, protesting.
Don’t treat me like some wyvern who can’t even control their appetite!
“Yes, yes. I trusted you. They were just screaming so much. Everyone be quiet.”
“Sa, save me! Please!”
“I already saved you. If you keep talking nonsense, I’ll release the basilisk too.”
The remaining poachers looked at each other.
…What’s this about a basilisk?
Bang!
Lee Han closed the door and went back outside.
When he went outside, Seorigugeol-eom was looking at a wanted poster.
Lee Han felt a sense of familiarity and spoke to him.
“Are you looking at Professor Bendozol’s wanted poster? I have one too.”
“Ah. No. I was looking at a poacher’s wanted poster. I thought he looked familiar, and that guy Jyulban. He’s quite a famous poacher. There was a bounty on him.”
“What?”
Lee Han looked at him with an expression that said ‘A bounty on that guy who acted stupidly and got hit by lightning magic directly?’
“Hahaha. He was careless, but that guy is quite notorious.”
“Oh my. Poachers seem to be quite careless.”
It wasn’t something someone who didn’t even cast detection magic and went straight for a surprise attack should say, but Lee Han spoke shamelessly.
‘I hope they all become more careless.’
If more poachers with bounties like that Jyulban guy came looking, he could make a hefty profit before the vacation ended.
“Will more poachers come by any chance?”
“Hmm. That’s a difficult question. More might come, but… I don’t think they will.”
Seorigugeol-eom took out a long brass telescope artifact and checked the surroundings.
Sure enough, the presence of people that had been annoyingly lurking around until just now had completely disappeared.
“Poachers aren’t cultists, they’re cunning thieves. Magic just exploded and Jyulban’s gang was annihilated, so they must have realized.”
They had only tried to probe Jyulban’s gang because they thought there were weaknesses.
But now that Jyulban’s gang was destroyed like this, the poachers must have realized that the mages here were not ordinary.
“Did they flee outside the mountain range?”
Lee Han asked with slight disappointment. Seorigugeol-eom didn’t notice the emotion contained in Lee Han’s words.
“That’s not the case. Poacher bastards are persistent. They probably rushed deeper to find the unicorn first rather than keeping us in check.”
At those words, Gainando, who was listening nearby, was startled.
“Then shouldn’t we hurry inside too?”
“You don’t need to worry. Unicorns aren’t monsters you can catch in such a hurry.”
At Seorigugeol-eom’s words, Gainando whispered to Lee Han.
“Lee Han. That person seems to be wrong about a lot of things, can we trust what he says?”
“…Don’t be too hard on him just because he didn’t notice the poachers right away.”
* * *
Poacher Akga was closer to a solitary hunter, unlike Jyulban.
If you had to compare, he had a similar nature to the Shadow Patrol (though the Shadow Patrol would never acknowledge it).
In the Empire, there were people who felt exhilaration and achievement from defeating difficult and strong prey.
Hunters would say that such people had received the blessing of Zarmis, the god of hunters.
Those who abandoned the ordinary happiness they should have enjoyed and chose a solitary and dangerous life.
And poacher Akga was one of these people.
‘I will catch the unicorn.’
Akga took out an incense compass from his pocket.
This incense compass containing a strand of unicorn mane was a treasure that any hunter chasing unicorns would drool over.
The smoke rising from the incense would point toward the unicorn’s direction.
Akga planned to approach the unicorn alone and kill it while others were wandering around the entrance of the mountain range.
“!”
Akga blinked at the white and beautiful creature visible in the distance.
As a hunter, he had never lost his composure upon seeing prey, but the unicorn made it possible.
‘Found it!’
Akga carefully and slowly drew his crossbow.
The unicorn was a monster with powerful magic, so if he couldn’t kill it in one strike, Akga could be the one to suffer instead.
But it didn’t matter. Akga intended to finish it in one strike no matter what.
When he drew the crossbow bolt, an evil aura rose. The air trembled as much as the curse capable of cutting the unicorn’s breath was embedded in it.
‘Zarmis. Let one of us die…’
Suddenly the unicorn’s appearance changed. Akga’s pupils shook.
…Did unicorns also have shapeshifting abilities?
-■■■■■■!
The unicorn that had transformed into a human suddenly shouted. Akga felt a shock that shook his soul. The mental defense artifacts he was wearing all shattered at once.
At that moment, Akga realized. The instincts of a seasoned hunter were crying out.
The opponent was not a unicorn!
“You… you…!”
“Hey, you damn poacher bastard. How dare you try to catch a unicorn? Even if you had a hundred lives, you couldn’t trade them for a unicorn!”
The sight of a short, malicious-looking human mage walking toward him was the last thing Akga saw before collapsing.
Thud!
Professor Bendozol spat on the fallen poacher and then stole the incense compass.
Then he removed the mane hair and undid the magic. The beautiful unicorn hair returned to Professor Bendozol’s hair.
“The poacher bastards are less capable than I thought. I expected them all to come this way, but they’re still hesitating at the entrance?”
Professor Bendozol growled as if displeased.
The strategy of scattering fake unicorn hair in the market was a method inspired by the Skeleton Principal.
He thought all the poacher bastards would come this way when they cast search magic with unicorn hair, but…
“This won’t do. I’ll have to take action myself.”
-■■■■…
“Don’t worry. I’ll protect you until you’re completely healed.”
Professor Bendozol spoke firmly to the unicorn and then began walking down with large strides.
At his murderous momentum, even the threatening monsters of the Pitong Mountain Range didn’t dare attack and cleared the way.
* * *
“The search around this area is complete.”
After three days, Professor Lightningstep and the hunters returned.
Lee Han quickly brought hot coffee with plenty of butter and freshly baked toast. Professor Lightningstep looked at Lee Han as if he found him adorable.
“I don’t know why a guy like you is learning under Thunderstep.”
‘High praise indeed.’
The professor and hunters hurriedly devoured the coffee and toast. Searching the mountain range was tiring work that exhausted even experienced hunters and patrollers.
“Did you find traces of the unicorn?”
“No. We only found other things instead.”
“Poachers? We caught some too.”
“!”
Meurangse, who was sipping coffee, was startled. Professor Lightningstep spoke with his eyes.
-What did I tell you?
“D-did you really catch them?”
“I locked them up in the stables over there.”
Meurangse glanced at the stables and nodded. Judging by how quiet it was, it seemed like they had caught two or three people.
“I found traces of the poachers from the beginning. They weren’t even trying to hide, so it wasn’t particularly difficult. The problem is something else…”
“?”
“The poachers are being hunted.”
“Isn’t that a good thing?”
“It is. But I don’t know who’s doing it.”
Professor Lightningstep drained all the coffee from his tin cup.
It was good that someone was catching the poachers, but having an unexpected opponent in the mountain range wasn’t good.
Since unicorns were tricky creatures that even Professor Lightningstep handled with caution, having more variables was never good.
“Aren’t the poachers fighting among themselves?”
“It’s too professional for that. Besides, poachers usually don’t fight each other before catching their prey.”
“What if another monster came down?”
“No matter how stupid the poachers are, they’re not stupid enough to get hunted by their prey.”
Lee Han, who had been listening to the conversation between Professor Lightningstep and the students, asked in confusion.
“Professor Bendozol went missing here, so could it be that Professor Bendozol is taking out the poachers?”
“…”
Professor Lightningstep was so startled that he dropped the tin cup he was holding.
“Ben, Bendozol was here!”
All the students, including Lee Han, looked at Professor Lightningstep as if they couldn’t believe it.
Even so, to think he had completely forgotten!
“You said Professor Bendozol went missing here…”
“Ah… ah… right. Right. That’s what happened. I really didn’t think of it. Well then. If it’s Professor Bendozol…”
Professor Lightningstep nodded as if he finally understood.
“I was wondering what crazy bastard kept attacking poachers like a beast, but it was Professor Bendozol. That would make sense for Professor Bendozol. So he’s alive…”
“…”
The students’ faces darkened at the thought of meeting a new professor next semester, but Professor Lightningstep didn’t notice.
Lee Han tried to find the positive side of the situation.
“If the professor is really there, wouldn’t that make things easier?”
“Hmm.”
Professor Lightningstep fell deep in thought. After pouring and drinking coffee from the pot once more, Professor Lightningstep answered.
“No. Not really.”
The students’ faces darkened even more.
“Having Professor Bendozol around will be troublesome. He’s someone who would attack us too.”
“…S-surely not.”
Gainando denied reality.
A professor attacking students didn’t make sense…
…actually, it did.
“Still, it’s not like he’s Professor Bagrek, surely he wouldn’t attack students he’s meeting for the first time!”
“…”
Lee Han looked at Gainando with sad eyes.
“You’re saying such carefree things because you haven’t met Professor Bendozol. Professor Bendozol is originally a troublesome person, but he becomes even more troublesome when he has rare animals with him. He probably won’t trust us either. Everyone be careful. It would be easier to think of him as one more crazy mage added to the monsters in the mountain range.”
‘Isn’t there anyone trustworthy among the Einroguard professors?’
Lee Han was dumbfounded.
They finally encountered a professor in the mountain range, only to have to treat him as a more dangerous monster.
“Aaaaah!”
“!”
Everyone was startled by the scream.
Professor Lightningstep pulled out a glass bottle containing hellbreath. He would need to use at least this much to subdue Professor Bendozol.
“S-sorry. I was startled seeing Jyulban’s gang.”
Meurangse apologized with an embarrassed expression.
He had opened the stable door without thinking and was shocked to see it full of prisoners.
“Please save us!!”
Realizing there were new people, the poachers thought this was their last chance and cried out.
Professor Lightningstep spoke in an annoyed tone.
“Close the door. It’s ruining my appetite.”
“No!”
Thud!
When the stable door closed again, the unnamed hunters whispered among themselves while looking at Lee Han.
Using a griffin as a guard!
That boy was a born tamer. They had never seen anyone command a griffin like that.
Even a basilisk too.
Lee Han, half giving up, sat quietly without saying anything.
‘I shouldn’t have made coffee for them.’
“Lee Han. Those people say you’re beloved by wild beasts.”
Surprisingly, it wasn’t an insult.
Lee Han felt slightly better. It seemed his first impression had changed a little.
“They say only the king of monsters could be loved like that…”
‘Next time I’ll use cheap coffee beans.’
Suddenly, the surroundings became quiet.
The unnamed hunters gestured to Professor Lightningstep. The professor pulled out the hellbreath glass bottle and said.
“Professor Bendozol has really come. Wardanaz.”
“Yes?”
“Cast your strongest magic outside.”
“…”
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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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