Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy - Chapter 686

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

Chapter 686

-I asked who it was…

Creak.

With the sound of a sliding door opening from inside the workshop, the dryad hybrid senior revealed himself.

Ilendil, who walked out dropping leaves onto the oak floor, was very pleased to see Lee Han.

“From the Wardanaz Family… Lee Han!”

“Yes.”

Ilendil pointed at his junior and continued speaking in his slow manner as he recalled his memories.

“Right! The one who helped and took care of the dark spirit last time…”

‘That seems quite different from the facts.’

To be precise, it was closer to attacking and subduing the rampaging dark spirit, then forcibly making a contract with it.

And the contract wasn’t something Lee Han wanted to do either, but something he was forced into by Ilendil’s pressure…

“Ah. Yes. That’s right.”

“And the person next to you is… Ugh.”

Ilendil quickly stepped back after seeing Diret’s face.

“H-hello… Senior…”

“Y-yeah. Hello.”

Diret waved his hand with an awkward expression.

Ilendil also bowed his head with an awkward expression while hiding behind the workshop bellows.

As the atmosphere suddenly became suffocating like Adenart and her followers’ tea party, Lee Han looked around.

Unfortunately, there were no juniors younger than Lee Han present.

‘I need to hurry up and advance to second year or something.’

Lee Han let out a deep sigh. Without any juniors, Lee Han had no choice but to resolve the situation himself.

“Senior Diret. What happened between you two?”

At his junior’s whispered question, Diret kept an eye on Ilendil and answered in a whispered voice.

“I told you before. The dark magic school kids got attacked by Ilendil when they went into the forest to gather reagents.”

“Ah.”

Only then did Lee Han recall the past between the dark magic school and Ilendil.

Actually, it wasn’t limited to just the dark magic school.

Among Einroguard’s schools, there wasn’t a single one that didn’t need forest reagents.

Students entering the forest and getting greedy enough to harm the forest was commonplace, and it was natural in a way for Ilendil, who tried to protect the forest, to clash with them.

“Uh, but Senior. Then other seniors being awkward would make sense, but why are you awkward, Senior Diret?”

“Well, since we’re from the same school, I went to rescue them…”

Diret brought up the rest of the story he hadn’t told last time.

When the dark magic school students who were attacked by Ilendil got captured, Diret naturally went to rescue them as their senior.

When he arrived, the dark magic school students were captured by forest golems…

…Diret had no choice but to destroy all the forest golems before rescuing the students.

“Uh, don’t golem-type summoned creatures take quite a bit of effort to make? You destroyed all of them?”

“I had no choice in that situation! The golems were quite violent.”

‘Senior is quite aggressive too.’

If Diret had heard this, he would have thought ‘Look who’s talking’ and grabbed him by the collar, but Lee Han just nodded.

Ilendil, who had been hiding behind the workshop bellows and staring at the two, quietly asked.

“You seem… close with the dark magic school…”

“I also take dark magic classes.”

“Wh… What?! Why…!?”

“Well, it’s possible to take them.”

Diret got slightly irritated.

What was so surprising about taking dark magic?

…Of course, it was surprising…

At that reaction, Ilendil was horrified and lowered his posture.

“Eek.”

“…No, no. I’m not angry. Junior. Look. I’m not angry, right?”

“Don’t angry people usually say that a lot?”

“Whose side are you on?”

“…Senior! Senior Diret is not angry! Look! You can come out!”

Ilendil hesitantly stood up.

But his eyes still seemed full of wariness toward Diret.

“Just how did you destroy the forest golems…”

“Hey. Junior. You’re saying that because you didn’t see it then! I just don’t talk about it, but he’s also a pretty crazy junior!”

Diret was indignant.

He had held back because he didn’t want to badmouth a junior from another school as a senior, but Ilendil also belonged to the category of pretty crazy juniors.

Without a single word of conversation, he had tried to use forest golems to smash Diret’s undead army.

Diret had wanted to resolve it peacefully too, but being ambushed, he had no choice but to detonate his undead army and blow up the entire vicinity.

“What brings you here…?”

“Ah. About that.”

Lee Han pointed outside the workshop window at the groups of mages lurking around ominously.

Still not giving up and wandering around looking for Lee Han, they reminded him of a cult group.

Ilendil must have thought the same, as he asked in horror.

“A cult?!”

“It’s not that.”

Lee Han selected only the less strange parts from today’s events to explain.

After being active at the exchange meeting, all sorts of mages came chasing after him…

“Ah. I’ve had that experience too.”

Ilendil slowly mumbled and agreed with Lee Han’s words.

He had once gone to an alchemists’ conference and been quite bothered by all sorts of scouting requests.

“That must have been difficult… Wait.”

Ilendil frowned as if he had spotted someone outside the window.

It was Yukveltire.

Displaying hostility that didn’t match her usual calm and slow attitude, Ilendil asked.

“That evil mage came too?”

“…”

“…”

Lee Han and Diret exchanged glances.

‘I guess we should hide that we’re close with her?’

‘Yeah…’

Ilendil said firmly.

“You came at the right time. Rest comfortably.”

“Thank you, Senior.”

After finishing his conversation with Lee Han, Ilendil looked at Diret.

Unlike the wariness from before, respect could be seen in his eyes.

To think he would even enter another school’s workshop to protect his junior against someone like Yukveltire.

“I didn’t know you were such a warm person, Senior.”

“Hmm.”

Diret felt awkward.

Actually, he was also close with that evil mage outside, but if he said that, he felt like he would never become friends with this alchemy school junior.

“I… just did what I had to do.”

“That’s what makes it great.”

Feeling like he couldn’t bear the pangs of conscience if he received any more praise, Diret changed the subject.

“I’ll keep watch over there to see if the evil mage comes or not.”

“…”

Lee Han looked incredulously at Diret, who was slyly slipping away from his seat.

No matter what, how could he use such an excuse?

“What were you working on?”

“Potion brewing… I need to secure research funding for this year.”

Ilendil, who prioritized the forest regardless of his alchemy skills, had limited commissions he could accept.

As such, he had no choice but to focus even more on this type of potion brewing commission.

“I want to conduct research on the races that trolls prefer as prey…”

“…”

Lee Han was more shocked than when he had met the Arrogance Duke today.

So it was Senior Ilendil who had proposed that insane research?!

“That… why?”

Ilendil’s face brightened when his promising junior showed interest in the research.

“Are you perhaps interested?”

“I, I was just curious what kind of research it was.”

Though Lee Han, paralyzed with fear, quickly changed the subject, Ilendil had already interpreted it favorably.

“Forest trolls are powerful monsters… but at the same time, they’re also monsters that maintain the forest ecosystem. They also play a role in dealing with enemies coming from outside…”

“…So, so you’re trying to research the races they prefer as prey in order to raise such forest trolls?”

At Lee Han’s words, Ilendil paused. It was quite an interesting idea.

“I’ve never thought about it, but… maybe we could think about it that way.”

“Ah, no. I think I misunderstood.”

“Really? That seems like a good idea too…”

Ilendil spread out the research he had written with slow movements.

Since forest trolls were threatening monsters, there was also much damage caused by them.

In the midst of this, Ilendil noticed that the damage to certain races was particularly severe.

Perhaps there were races that forest trolls preferred as prey?

If they could figure that out, adventurers and forest keepers entering places where forest trolls appeared could approach more safely.

If the party didn’t have races preferred as prey, the forest trolls wouldn’t react either.

‘It was a more decent research than I thought?’

It was a decent research proposal to analyze forest trolls more deeply in order to reduce damage caused by forest trolls.

The title was just a bit strange…

“It seems like interesting research.”

“Really?!”

Ilendil was overjoyed.

His movements were slow, so it wasn’t very noticeable though.

“Then would you like to participate in the research? It’ll definitely be fun.”

Diret, who was standing by the window in the distance, waved his hands frantically in horror.

It was a signal to absolutely refuse.

In the first place, there was nothing good about a second-year Einroguard student participating in upperclassmen’s research.

Of course, it wasn’t like there was nothing to gain.

He could grow by helping a senior’s magic who was superior to himself.

But in Diret’s view, Lee Han already had too many opportunities to grow by helping magic of mages superior to himself.

Starting with professors right away…

‘If he helps upperclassmen too, he absolutely won’t be able to endure it!’

“I, I’ll think about it.”

“I knew you’d be interested…!”

“I didn’t agree, I said I’d think about it.”

Lee Han suddenly noticed Yukveltire walking along the main road in the distance.

Then he looked at Ilendil in front of him.

‘…Wait. There doesn’t seem to be much difference between the two?’

* * *

Since talking more about research would only dig his own grave, Lee Han changed the topic.

“Come to think of it, what kind of potion did you receive a commission for?”

“Ah. This is… a potion I developed. I call it 【Liberation from Skeletons】.”

“That’s an unusual name. What kind of effect does it have?”

“It has the effect of temporarily paralyzing the magic cast by the Principal.”

“…”

Lee Han was flustered by the unexpected effect of the potion.

Come to think of it, Ilendil had a history of revealing himself in front of juniors in the previous forest incident.

That wouldn’t have been possible if it weren’t for the potion he made.

“Wait, who’s buying this?”

“Other Einroguard students would buy it.”

Diret answered instead with his arms crossed.

Ilendil’s potion was already a famous item among some students who knew about it.

“Is this really that useful? I’ve never seen upperclassmen who used this…”

“It’s not used to meet juniors, but to avoid the Principal’s minions. Among the Principal’s minions, there are some that track by smelling the magic cast by the Principal.”

‘Really formidable!’

Lee Han regretted thinking ‘I think I know a little about Einroguard now’ after finishing his first year.

Einroguard seemed like it would be unknowable forever. Even after graduation.

‘But I’m glad I learned about it through this opportunity.’

“Could you teach me as well?”

At times like this, he had to learn in advance to have even one chance to escape from the Skeleton Principal’s clutches later.

Lee Han asked politely. Fortunately, Ilendil readily agreed.

“Yeah… it’s not difficult.”

‘It must be very difficult though…?’

Diret thought to himself at Ilendil’s words.

If it really wasn’t difficult, Einroguard students wouldn’t need to pay expensive money to buy it from Ilendil.

Alchemy potions were things that looked simple on the surface but became endlessly difficult when they got complicated, so even Diret, who had some expertise, would leave it to specialists rather than try to make them himself when they became difficult.

“Is this how you do it?”

“Not bad…”

“Like this here?”

“Good… keep going.”

“Is this completed?”

“Wait. Let me check… Yes. It’s completed.”

“!?”

Diret jumped up after listening to their conversation.

Who just completed what?!

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