The Academy’s Weapon Replicator - Chapter 44

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

The Academy’s Weapon Replicator — Chapter 44
Part 11: Dragon Heart (4)
I headed northwest.
It was a direction that took me away from the Field’s center.
“Frontier, is it all right to go this way?”
“Hm?”
Aten spoke from beside me.
“From what I understand, there’s a boss at the center of this Field.”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
For this Practical Exam, you earn points proportional to the monsters you subjugate.
Of course, the points vary depending on the monster.
Stronger, higher-ranking monsters give more points than weaker ones, and small, fast ones that mainly focus on escape also fetch their own decent rewards.
And among them, there’s one creature that yields unusually high points.
The kind of monster where catching just a single one guarantees first place — a creature in a league of its own.
That’s the Field Boss.
“If you’re targeting the Field Boss, shouldn’t you be heading toward the center?”
Aten’s question was reasonable.
I nodded.
“Right. But I’m not going to target it.”
“Pardon?”
The Field Boss is completely out of my league.
From what I remember, it’s a monster called Trunkuns — think of a hideously enormous longhorn beetle.
It flies, bites, and charges with its body — a creature of almost laughable simplicity.
But that simple power set is far too overwhelming; there’s nothing I can do about it.
I could manage something if I used my Greatsword, but plenty of students are challenging Trunkuns, which means many eyes are watching, and I don’t have enough total mana to wield the Greatsword freely yet.
“While the other students are focused on the Field Boss, we’ll hunt the monsters in the outer regions.”
Soon enough, the Field’s center will become a war zone.
Frontal assaults on the boss, opportunists cleaning up the monsters around it, hyenas lurking with greedy eyes trying to steal the boss’s loot, and thieves trying to shake down those students — all of it a chaotic mess.
I wasn’t confident I could handle that kind of confusion.
“But the outer regions have fewer monsters.”
“That’s fine.”
I know what I’m doing.
We took advantage of the moment when everyone’s attention was fixed on the boss, moving through the outer regions and dispatching monsters as we went.
By the time we’d gathered a substantial amount of materials, I stopped walking.
“The strategy worked perfectly. With this much, we should easily earn a good score.”
……
“Frontier?”
I heard Aten’s voice, but I was gripped by a troubling thought.
“……There are too few.”
“Too few? But we’ve gathered enough materials, haven’t we?”
“Not the monsters. I mean the people.”
This is the Field’s outer region.
Normally that would be explanation enough, but there’s an eerie atmosphere lingering around us.
Aten spoke.
“You just said yourself that everyone would be focused on the Field Boss.”
“Yeah, but I thought there’d be other students with the same idea as me.”
I hadn’t expected to hunt completely unobstructed.
This kind of thinking is obvious to anyone.
But since moving to the outer regions, I haven’t encountered a single other student.
Is this really just coincidence?
Are all the students really heading toward the center, with no one coming this way?
I glanced around the area.
I spotted a drone nearby, faithfully filming.
……What if I replicate that drone and send it skyward? I could get a view of the whole situation.
A simple replication won’t work, but if I use Heukcheon, it might be possible.
I put the drone into my workshop.
[Replica of Konstel Filming Drone]
– A counterfeit mimicking the appearance of Konstel’s video drone
– Because it is a counterfeit, it possesses no recording capability.
“……What?”
The moment I saw it, a chill ran through my entire body.
“……Aten.”
“Yes?”
“Keep watch around us.”
Aten seemed about to say something, but caught herself and straightened, scanning the perimeter instead.
She must have held her tongue after seeing my expression.
I was grateful for that restraint.
‘Was it a fake from the start? No, that can’t be.’
If it were, I’d have been caught immediately.
Aten is right beside me.
If a shot of Aten didn’t appear on the feed, the swap would be obvious in seconds.
In other words, sometime after the game began—while my attention was fixed on the Field Boss—the drone was switched out without my noticing.
A drone positioned so close to me, and I never caught it.
……An opponent in a different league entirely.
I made a decision.
“Menosorpo.”
I deployed the magic circle with a word.
Better to fortify my defenses while the enemy still hasn’t revealed themselves.
Every coordinate within Menosorpo’s domain is mine to read.
Meaning if the enemy is already inside, I can detect them instantly.
“Frontier, what are you—”
“Hush.”
I brought my finger to my lips.
Even this much would be enough for Aten to sense the gravity of the situation.
But.
I was worried whether my voice had trembled, whether she’d noticed.
‘……What in the world is this monster.’
The moment I unfolded it, cold sweat ran down my spine.
The enemy is already within the domain.
And not far away.
Their presence scraped against my skin like something tangible.
A pressure so immense that even this field’s boss would seem laughable in comparison.
The location is—
“What is it.”
And then, suddenly, a voice cut through the darkness.
Aten spun toward it in surprise.
It was rare to see Aten startled like this.
The enemy was close enough for their voice to reach us.
Which meant I’d failed to sense them until now.
“Did I get spotted?”
Speaking in an unhurried tone, a man parted the shadows and stepped forward.
A man appeared before us.
……Grey hair, rough stubble.
A muscular frame befitting his enormous greatsword.
He walked toward us with the weapon slung across his shoulder.
I stared at him as if frozen.
I knew who he was.
A named character. A villain.
Someone I had no way to stand against, no matter what I did right now.
─Renzo, the Glutton of Chaos.
One of the strongest human villains in existence, standing before me.
“Didn’t think you’d catch on. Not bad for a kid—good judgment calling down that magic circle, even if you don’t know what it is.”
“…….”
I couldn’t respond.
Normally I might have thrown back some biting remark, but my lips were sealed shut, not even twitching.
It seemed this very silence piqued Renzo’s interest.
“……You know me, don’t you?”
At Renzo’s words, Aten darted a glance toward him.
“Do you know this person?”
“I can’t explain much. He’s an enemy. Whatever either of us does, we’re no match for him.”
“……I can tell just by looking, but.”
Throughout that brief exchange, Renzo drew steadily closer while we retreated in kind.
“What business do you have with us?”
I forced myself to speak.
I needed time to think.
Time to escape.
Perhaps no such opening existed, but it was better than doing nothing.
“Ah, I’ve got no interest in you. The princess next to you is the objective.”
“Did you make the students disappear as well?”
“That’s right. I set up a barrier—the Barrier of Approach Prevention. It makes people naturally drift in a different direction. Without ever realizing it themselves.”
The Barrier of Approach Prevention.
It created a space where, driven by vague thoughts like “I don’t want to go this way” or “This doesn’t feel right,” people would find themselves turning away without understanding why.
In the city, its effect would be sluggish, but in an open Field like this, the barrier would work beautifully.
“What’s your reason? What are you trying to do to the princess?”
“No idea. I just take the job and the money.”
“……So you were paid enough to kidnap a princess?”
“Who knows? I just took what seemed reasonable.”
Thud.
The man lowered the Greatsword from his shoulder.
Even from this distance, I could feel the vibration and sense its weight.
“In the end, the money doesn’t matter much. It just looked fun, so I’m doing it.”
Yes. This was the kind of man he was.
There’s a phrase for troublemakers who cause chaos wherever they go.
But what happens when an incomparable force does that kind of thing?
That unfunny joke had taken human form—and his name was Renzo.
Renzo had no convictions, no dreams, no goals.
If something looked fun, he did it.
With the simple-minded logic of a child, he wielded that absurd power.
That made him a villain.
Even knowing the things he did were evil, he never bothered to care—making him perhaps the closest thing to true villainy.
“So, kid, I’ve got nothing to do with you. I just need to take the woman next to you. Though I heard they said it wouldn’t matter if I killed you too.”
“Is that ‘fun’ for you?”
“No. What comes after—that’s the fun part. Princess kidnapping, or maybe princess execution. Either way, plenty of interesting things will follow.”
Damn it.
The teachers of Konstel, the entire Imperial Knights—they’d all come to kill this man, and he saw it as nothing but entertainment?
“Do you think I’ll simply go along with this?”
Aten spoke, her displeasure evident.
At her words, Renzo blinked several times.
“Well? What of it?”
So he said.
Aten’s eyes turned ice-cold.
The temperature around her dropped, and her white hair gleamed with light.
Aten extended her hand.
Glacial Magic, Third Form
Instant deployment, wide range, amplification applied
Glacier Mist
The spell unfolded directly where Renzo stood.
In an instant, the Glacier Mist dropped the temperature and froze its target solid.
With three amplifications deployed at once, Renzo’s entire body froze in a heartbeat.
“Frontier! Escape now while you have the chance!”
Aten called urgently to me.
Crack.
The frozen state lasted less than a moment.
Renzo’s stride was effortless.
As if he’d never been caught by magic at all.
He brushed away the ice crystals clinging to his clothes and spoke.
“Just as I thought.”
That unbearably calm face
“You’re obedient.”
brought only terror to those who beheld it.
“……Hah!”
Aten reached out again, gathering mana in her palms.
I placed a hand on her shoulder.
“……Aten.”
“Why are you calling me?”
“You’re the one who needs to run.”
I pulled Aten gently forward and stepped ahead myself.
Taking a breath that was almost a sigh, I centered myself.
In all my attempts at this Practical Exam, an absurd event like this had never once appeared.
Whether it was because Aten had joined my party, or because Phily was moving more aggressively than the game mechanics dictated.
I couldn’t say what butterfly effect was at play.
It only proved that Ethius was a truly terrible game.
“Run the moment you see an opening.”
Aten couldn’t die here.
She was performing brilliantly as an elemental mage, but her true role lay elsewhere.
She hadn’t yet awakened to her own gift, but Aten possessed the ability of a formidable healer.
For now she knew nothing of healing magic, but one day she would come to understand it.
If Aten fell, then eventually the game would be over anyway.
Though it would be putting the cart before the horse if I died first.
‘The probability that I can defeat Renzo.’
Impossible.
Not worth considering.
‘The probability that Aten can escape successfully.’
Extremely low.
I’d told Aten to run, but I didn’t truly expect it would work.
Renzo was being leisurely right now—not slow, leisurely.
Even if I created a massive opening for Aten to slip away, the moment he decided, he could catch up to her in an instant.
‘The probability that reinforcements arrive.’
……That’s the only thing I can rely on.
Even if the main focus right now is the central area where the boss is being dealt with, they’ll find it strange if Aten stops appearing on screen.
Renzo would know that too, though he probably isn’t thinking about it deeply.
Whether the princess’s abduction succeeds or fails, it should matter little to Renzo.
His only purpose is mere amusement.
So here I stand, buying as much time as I can.
While Menosorpo is still active.
I drew in a breath,
and brought my hand to the Heukryeon hanging at my neck.
Then I poured my strength into it and shattered it.
Jikjo, Heukcheon
Rank — Divine Rank
Iokeira
The arrows of Artemis.
I lifted a single arrow into the air and drew it toward Renzo.
The bow Kriselakatos was still “female-only,” so I couldn’t wield it myself yet.
This was my only option—borrowing Menosorpo’s power to use it as a stopgap measure.
“……Hmm.”
Even as a Divine Rank arrow turned its aim upon him, Renzo merely cast out a hollow murmur of admiration.
I spoke.
“Rain Fall.”
[Iokeira]
• Rank: Divine Rank
• Description: An arrow forged by Hephaestus, god of the smithy, and given to Artemis. It forms a pair with Kriselakatos.
Ability Details >
– Rain Fall: Shall become rain
With those words,
the arrow multiplied infinitely in an instant, filling the space all around me.
“Fall.”
And with that command, the arrows became true rain,
descending upon Renzo.

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