The Genius Professor Wants An Easy Life - Chapter 38

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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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Chapter 38
I watched the blade leveled at me and thought to myself.
‘I can win this.’
I’ve changed somewhat, it seems.
If this were before, the sight of a sword alone would have left me trembling, but I felt no fear.
…Well, truth be told, I was still a little frightened, but it was bearable.
Because I was certain I wouldn’t lose.
‘For all his boasting and posturing, he’s no one I’ve ever encountered in a Scenario.’
When I first came to the Training Venue, I was caught off guard.
None of the competing temporary instructors were faces I recognized.
That I—who had played through every route’s Scenario—had never seen them before meant one thing.
They were Extras.
Characters with no significance in the Scenario.
And indeed,
—Duel against swordsman of unknown standing: 100% win rate
An absolute guarantee of victory!
“It’s not too late even now. Kneel and beg my forgiveness, and I’ll grant it to you.”
A cold blade pointed at me with chilling precision.
The feeling of facing a knight, not a mage.
Yet it didn’t feel threatening.
Though I’d just met him, I could see his weakness immediately.
‘He’s a failed class.’
It was because of his Sword Mage class.
‘The Dual Knight and the Sword Mage are different.’
The Dual Knight—a sword-wielding knight.
The Sword Mage—a sword-wielding mage.
Both classes wielded sword and magic simultaneously, but there was a crucial difference.
‘The Dual Knight emphasizes the sword, while the Sword Mage emphasizes magic.’
When both classes develop properly, they wield formidable power.
The synergy between sword and magic cannot be ignored, after all.
But his problem was,
‘Despite being a Sword Mage, he’s focused on swordplay. Magic, for him, is nothing but an ornament for show.’
I intuited something of his true nature.
A prestigious swordsmanship family.
A house of sword fanatics.
Likely he had despaired of his own sword talent and turned his eyes to magic instead.
To gain recognition, if only through magic.
‘But his magic, in truth, is riddled with holes.’
Which explained the 100% win rate.
Had he been a true mage or a true knight, the odds would be far lower.
‘There’s no way I lose to someone like this. I don’t even need to use the power I’ve newly gained.’
Whoosh!
My eyes opened to a vision no one else could see.
His movements were rendered as formulae, his magical flaws laid bare.
The problem was, there were far too many.
So many I could afford to deliberate.
‘I could strike any of them and win.’
Then a thought struck me.
A more dramatic victory.
The question was whether it was possible,
‘But I think I can do it.’
A gut instinct.
I watched his blade descend toward me.
A typical mage would block it with a shield, but I did something entirely different.
I reached out my hand.
As if to catch his blade.
“Are you insane?!”
He was instantly thrown into confusion.
What madness was this? And yet.
Crack!
My hand struck the fellow’s wrist with perfect precision.
He widened his eyes in shock.
Such a thing was possible because of another trait of mine.
‘The Thousand Transformations—Versatility of All Arts’.
‘Across all disciplines, you possess talent of an unprecedented caliber!’
As a knight, too, I possessed talent of that same legendary standard.
“You should count yourself fortunate. I shall graciously demonstrate to you what a Sword Mage truly is.”
I unleashed magic.
First-rank Tremor magic.
“You bastard!!”
He braced himself and deployed a spell in return.
He tried to unfurl a powerful offensive incantation.
Crunch!
I pivoted my foot and swept his ankle.
Already unsteady from the Tremor magic, his stance crumbled entirely, and I moved to follow with another kick to his ankle.
“Care for another?”
He thrust his blade to block my leg strike, but it was a feint.
Flash!
A Magic Arrow hammered his face.
“Ugh?!”
Tap-tap-tap!
As Magic Arrows poured down like a comb, he raised a shield around his face, but—
Thud!
I swept his legs again with a vicious kick, and he toppled to the ground.
And then.
Rumble!
An Ice Spear erupted from the stone beside him as he fell.
……
He swallowed hard.
The Ice Spear stood sharp and bright inches from his throat.
If it had been even slightly to the side, his neck would have been severed.
In other words, I had won.
Decisively.
“How tedious, really. The hardest part was fighting the urge to yawn.”
!!
The hall fell into a silence thick as the grave.
Everyone stared at me as though I were a phantom.
“This… this can’t be… surely not…”
Kansir ground his teeth, but when his eyes met mine—
!!
—he lowered his gaze.
He had accepted his defeat.
‘Not entirely a fool, then. He must truly come from a sword-master house.’
The Malbern house of sword masters.
A lineage of swordsmen obsessed with the blade, bound by tradition to accept the result of any duel without excuse or complaint, regardless of opponent.
‘Their family code, was it? In defeat, one accepts with humility and learns.’
A far different house from the scheming, dangerous Magical House.
A family that any protagonist with the ‘Knight’ class was bound to entangle with.
‘But that shouldn’t concern me at all.’
Kansir descended the platform unsteadily as the journalists began their murmuring.
“Did you see that? I didn’t imagine it, did I?”
“Surely Kansir let his guard down? He couldn’t have been dominated so completely otherwise.”
All of them wore the expression of those who could not believe their own eyes.
Yet the way they looked at me had shifted.
They had all grasped that I had changed.
‘But this alone isn’t enough.’
Just then, I heard a voice.
“That was an impressive match, Master Balas. Truly magnificent.”
Another rival instructor.
Balas, an adopted heir of the Magical House!
Girin, who had surprised the academic society with her groundbreaking paper.
Eyes sharp with unmistakable hostility fixed on me.
“For Master Ban to have brought about such a ‘miracle,’ no less. I do wonder what sort of display we’ll witness in tomorrow’s academic training.”
Miracle.
A word deliberately meant to diminish what I’d just shown as mere chance.
But then.
“Yes, feel free to look forward to it.”
I nodded and slowly turned my gaze toward the spectators.
As though speaking not just to him, but to all of them.
“Merely watching me will become an opportunity for the Opening of Eyes. You’ll come to understand what difference in caliber truly means.”
“!!”
My declaration sent heat rippling through the venue.
Journalists erupted in a frenzy.
“Get Master Ban’s statement on record right now!!”
“Send it to headquarters immediately!! This is a scoop! Run the headline: ‘Master Ban Declares He Will Show All the Difference in Caliber!'”
And so the formal training began.
* * *
Meanwhile, there was one who had turned his attention to news of Ban.
“Do I really need to attend the training?”
It was former Chancellor Randolph!
‘Ordinarily, no matter who I am, I wouldn’t be foolish enough to follow along to a new professor’s training session.’
This thought had risen because of Ban.
‘Something’s wrong. Why did the Ascendant’s traces lead back to Professor Ban?’
Randolph, who had been hunting for clues about the Ascendant, arrived at a startling realization.
The place where Professor Ban had been in hiding overlapped with the Magical Power traces of the Ascendant.
‘It’s impossible. It has to be coincidence.’
Ban and the Ascendant. Even thinking it himself, the supposition was absurdly far-fetched.
And yet.
‘Still, it might be worth checking once. Something feels off about this.’
Former Chancellor Randolph thought this while reading the article “Master Ban Causes an Uproar!”
The instinct of an archmagus who had once reached Level 8, the pinnacle of power, was sounding an alarm.
* * *
The day of the academic training.
A small raven flew into the Training Venue.
Bernstein, who had arrived early, bowed his head toward the raven.
“Welcome, Chancellor?”
[Don’t call me Chancellor—I came in secret.]
The raven’s true identity was former Chancellor Randolph’s transformed body!
“But what brings you here? You never showed interest in training instruction before, did you?”
[I was bored, so I came out.]
“Hmm? Weren’t you busy searching for traces of the Ascendant?”
[Don’t ask so many questions.]
Ban and the Ascendant.
Even he found the conjecture ridiculous, so former Chancellor Randolph hid the fact that he’d come to see Ban.
But then Bernstein spoke as though he’d read Randolph’s mind.
“I thought perhaps you had come to see Professor Ban.”
[…Ban? Why would I come to see him?]
“Come inside and see for yourself.”
Randolph, in raven form, hopped onto Bernstein’s shoulder and entered the Training Venue, whereupon his eyes widened.
An unbelievable sight was unfolding before him.
“Mana Manipulation—Ban Ecclesia, highest score!!”
“Magical Application—Ban Ecclesia, highest score!!”
“Practical Magical Response—Ban Ecclesia, highest score!!”
Ban was sweeping nearly every category with top marks!
[How is this possible?]
“Didn’t I tell you? Among the new professors this term, Ban is the one most worthy of attention. Look for yourself.”
Balas was stepping up to the podium.
The one who had become an adopted son of the Magical House with his groundbreaking theory.
Stiffened by consecutive unexpected defeats.
“I am Balas. I will now present my recently developed Fractal Defense Theory.”
Balas fixed Ban with a menacing stare.
“Lord Ban, might you lend me your assistance? To demonstrate my Fractal Defense Theory, I require an opponent. Since you claim to have discovered a way to breach fractals, you’d be the perfect match, wouldn’t you?”
It was a provocation.
Everyone held their breath, watching the two of them.
Even Randolph, the former Chancellor, let his eyes gleam.
‘Surely? Ban couldn’t possibly match him?’
Now they would see.
Whether his own wild conjecture held any real possibility, or not.
“Fine. Easy enough. But are you certain about this?”
Ban tilted his head askew.
“You might have to abandon your theory by the end of today.”
!!
Balas let out an absurd laugh.
“Silence and observe. This is the Fractal Shield I invented! Unbreakable by anyone!”
Whoosh!!
A shield of endlessly repeating hexagons unfurled.
A near-perfect manifestation of fractal geometry.
Balas cried out with unmistakable pride.
“Well? This shield breaks through the limitation that actual magic cannot properly implement fractal structures, achieving perfect defense with ultimate power…!”
But then.
Thud.
Ban walked toward the fractal shield.
“This is perfect?”
Tap.
He rapped the shield with a mana-wrapped hand.
Like knocking on a door.
At the same moment.
Crash!!
The shield shattered.
“No, that’s impossible?! What sorcery is this?! It can’t be…!!”
“Deploy it again.”
“W-what did you say?”
“I said deploy it again if you don’t believe me.”
Balas clenched his teeth and manifested the Fractal Shield once more.
But it was the same.
Crash!! Crash!!
The identical outcome repeated three times in succession.
‘This… this can’t be real.’
Everyone froze at the incomprehensible sight.
Only one person, Ban alone, spoke with unhurried composure.
“Just as I feared. Dreadfully mediocre.”
!!
“Now I’ll show you what true perfect defense really is.”
Then Ban uttered something even more astonishing.
“Kansir, Balas—both of you unleash your attack spells on me at once.”
!!
“Actually, two of you won’t be enough.”
Ban turned to where the professors overseeing the training instruction waited behind the platform.
“Would one of the professors be willing to step forward?”
Ban’s lips curved upward.
As if in challenge.
“To prove the greatness of my new first-rank defensive spell, the Satellite Formation, I fear two combatants won’t suffice. A professor or two would be ideal.”
!!
The hall froze with an entirely different kind of tension.
Ban had just challenged the full professors themselves.
That was it.
This was the ‘plan’ Ban had prepared.
Through this training, he intended to overwhelm not merely his fellow competing instructors, but the senior professors as well.
Meanwhile.
‘…Is that really Ban?’
Randolph swallowed hard, his throat working against itself.

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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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