The Return of the EX-Class Wizard - Chapter 291

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

The Return of an EX-Rank Mage Episode 291
[You have obtained the qualification to challenge the 100th Floor in the shortest timeframe!]
[You have recorded a historic Achievement up to Floor 99!]
Everyone already knew about this much.
Currently, the “Mage” is the hottest topic across the entire Universe.
[The boss of the 100th Floor wishes to meet you soon.]
[If you enter the 100th Floor within 3 minutes, your Awakener’s job title will change.]
[Mage ▶▶▶ Great Mage]
It wasn’t about clearing it.
Simply by entering, the job title would change completely.
From Mage to Great Mage.
‘Oh…!’
Even though I had become a “Mage,” the world still saw me as an Emperor.
There were certainly more people now who recognized me as a Mage, but fundamentally, the perception of me as an Emperor was far more dominant.
But what if it wasn’t just a Mage, but a Great Mage?
If the System certified it?
‘It is tempting.’
The problem was the difficulty.
Could I really clear it right now?
Still, it’s the 100th Floor.
[This opportunity comes only once.]
[The job title change privilege applies only on your first attempt within 3 minutes!]
[2:25]
[2:24]
The time dwindled rapidly.
I had barely two minutes left.
‘I mustn’t be too greedy.’
I had only just mastered temporal magic and healing magic.
By my own assessment, I still had a long way to go.
If I stake my life on a title of greatness when I’m not yet great, my life could slip away.
‘Don’t waver.’
Even if the fruit before my eyes looks sweet, I must not eat it if it contains poison.
There were many paths to becoming great without needing the title “Great Mage.”
If I focused on magic and continued to master it, someday I would be recognized as a Great Mage without such things….
“It’s been a while, my disciple.”
Choi Kang-mok flinched in surprise.
At the same moment, I deployed a shield.
-(Mayo): A chill ran down my spine.
Several short blades that had been pressed against Choi Kang-mok’s neck fell to the ground.
Clang!
It made a sound before melting away into nothingness.
The floor was drenched with water.
‘Water-attribute magic.’
My shield’s remaining durability had vanished.
I couldn’t discern when, where, or how it had appeared.
I couldn’t even see my attacker.
Choi Kang-mok sensed it instinctively.
“Were you the 100th Floor Boss?”
This was utterly different from the previous ‘invitations’.
This time, the boss had come directly.
“Assassination magic infused with water attributes through spatial liberation. There’s a familiar scent in this magic, Professor Pease.”
No.
Could he even be called a professor anymore?
He was no longer a professor.
He was merely a 100th Floor Boss to be eliminated.
“Have you grown stronger than you were on Floor 90?”
The wall blurred, and a humanoid figure composed entirely of water revealed itself.
[1:40]
[1:39]
[1:38]
“I’m delighted to learn that my disciple was that [Mage].”
Pease fell into a moment of reminiscence.
Some distant past, barely remembered.
The day I was designated a ‘magical creature’ while destroying the Tower.
I had encountered the [Mage] and suffered defeat.
It was a faint and ancient memory, as though I’d merely dreamed it.
“There was something familiar about him from the moment we first met, heh.”
The attempt at conversation had been a deception.
Choi Kang-mok’s energy bolt swept through the empty air.
Like Pease, it was an energy bolt infused with the subtleties of spatial liberation.
It passed through the space where Professor Pease’s neck had been.
Two energy bolts collided in midair and shattered into fragments.
An ordinary human would perish from merely grazing one of these shards.
“Still, each fragment remains a formidable threat.”
Yet Professor Pease remained composed.
Composed entirely of water, he effortlessly dissipated the destructive force of the energy bolt.
“This is how I’ve learned to counter the [Mage].”
The opponent’s offensive magic had been honed to its absolute limit?
Then I would perfect my defensive magic to match that same extreme.
“Natural talent and aptitude favor the [Mage].”
The same applies to physical prowess.
In most combat-related domains, a mage surpasses a magical creature.
“However, in magical capacity, control ability, and experience—I hold the advantage.”
[0:54]
[0:53]
[0:52]
“A second confrontation between magical creature and mage truly excites me.
My disciple.
”
Choi Kang-mok’s brow furrowed slightly.
“I’m the one who taught you.”
Now I understand.
The Floor 90 boss.
In the past timeline, Pease had been defeated by Choi Kang-mok himself and fled.
After countless years of relentless training, he had become the Pease of today.
“Shouldn’t I be the master?”
Pease did not deny it.
“Certainly. Had you not been my disciple, I would never have achieved what I am now.”
“My teachings were truly exceptional, then.”
Choi Kang-mok was taken aback.
This resembled what he did with Raymond far too closely.
“My past master becoming my present disciple—that does have a certain thrill to it, doesn’t it, my disciple?”
[0:30]
[0:29]
Choi Kang-mok exhaled softly.
Instead of an invitation, the boss had come directly.
This place was essentially no different from the 100th Floor.
It was clear that Pease had sought him out with the intention to fight.
“I will make you my disciple without fail, my disciple.”
“What if I refuse?”
No matter how I thought about it, becoming Pease’s disciple felt wrong.
He was clearly a madman.
I had no desire to become the disciple of a madman.
“Then I will make you my disciple by force.”
Pease chuckled darkly.
Within his universe, Choi Kang-mok was already his prized disciple.
“Your talent and aptitude as a disciple are innate. I have already devised the plan. You will become undead.”
“?”
“You will never die. Not unless I permit it.”
He would transform me into the undead.
And make them eternally devoted to learning magic.
[0:15]
[0:14]
Turning them into undead is indeed the optimal method.
They’ll obey their master’s commands perfectly, so their education will proceed smoothly.
“First, I’ll have to kill them.”
“Master, wait a moment.”
Pease flinched at the unexpected form of address.
Of course, it was a deception.
In that brief moment Choi Kang-mok had bought, I unfurled Baek-ik and transformed into Light’s archer.
[Entering Floor 100 of Tower (South Korea).]
Reality had already become indistinguishable from the Tower.
Under these circumstances, fighting within the Tower was preferable.
[Challenge: Defeat the Floor 100 Boss!]
[※If the challenge fails, you will be forcibly enrolled in Graduate School.]
[※If the challenge fails, your job title will be changed to ‘Pease’s
Disciple
‘.]
[※The changed job title will be permanently maintained.]
I shifted the space.
‘He must have followed.’
I didn’t fully understand the method of movement.
But I knew he had been transported somewhere on Floor 100.
‘The precision falls short.’
My combat magic couldn’t match Pease’s mastery.
It was impossible to pinpoint his location with precision and strike him.
‘Instead, I’ll go wide.’
Leave no room to escape.
Fill the entire space with ‘Light’.
Like the sun pouring down.
[‘Mage’ has been changed to ‘Grand Mage’!]
[The first challenge of ‘Grand Mage’ begins!]
“Magic Conversion.”
I converted my mana into Light and projected it into the space.
A transformation into a universe where not a single shadow existed.
This ‘Light’ contained the mana of a ‘Mage’.
“Mere damage doesn’t work on me, disciple.”
As expected.
The Floor 100 Boss Pease had already reached Floor 100.

* * *
Upon hearing the word “master,” Pease’s excitement surged.
Of course, he wasn’t unaware this was a deception for combat, but he had still heard himself called “master,” hadn’t he?
Once becomes twice, twice becomes thrice, and thrice becomes eternal.
‘He’s relocated to the Tower?’
Without overthinking it, I grasped the reason instinctively.
‘He intends to unleash an area-wide attack.’
This was the difference between a ‘magical creature’ and a ‘mage.’
A ‘mage’ always considers their surroundings.
They do their utmost to avoid destroying the environment.
‘Sometimes that very tenderness invites failure, my disciple.’
I had resolved to impart harsh lessons.
Had he failed to anticipate an area-wide attack, that would be one thing.
But knowing what’s coming, there’s no defense I cannot prepare.
As a master of combat magic, I predicted Choi Kang-mok’s attack pattern in an instant.
‘He’ll likely saturate the space with light.’
Indeed, Choi Kang-mok did exactly that.
I drenched my body in darkness.
Magic with supreme affinity against light.
A transformation into a form that repels light itself.
And I elevated gravitational magic to its extreme, converting into a black hole constitution.
A fusion of darkness and gravity.
“Light itself cannot escape my control. I conceived this from my disciple’s black hole. Behold—black hole defensive magic.”
The light had no effect on Pease’s body.
Pease neutralized Choi Kang-mok’s area-wide technique with only the minimum necessary power and skill.
“This is how one truly employs an area-wide technique, my disciple.”
A world brimming with light.
Sharp blades pierced through the void, revealing themselves.
“Meteor Sword.”
Like a meteor shower descending.
Blades rained down.
A steel tempest saturated the empty space.
-(Mayo) : Hmph, my magical support surpasses such crude techniques, ahhhhh! There are so many of them!
‘Light Mayo’ began intercepting.
Choi Kang-mok closed his eyes for a moment.
‘Stay calm, Mayo.’
A deluge of meteor swords far exceeding the current Mayo’s computational capacity cascaded down.
I had no choice but to acknowledge it.
“Certainly. I sense your desire to teach me a lesson.”
Such energy expenditure was not Professor Pease’s typical style.
This was unmistakably taking the form of a ‘Magical Exchange’ or ‘Mage’s Codex’.
Something inexplicable churned within Choi Kang-mok’s chest.
Defeat would transform me into the undead, but in this moment, I focused entirely on the war between magic and magic unfolding before me.
In the collision of magic against magic, there existed something more important than victory or defeat.
“The reason for deploying such a rapid area-of-effect spell must be to push my time magic training further.”
Time had been forcibly accelerated around me.
The meteor sword felt overwhelmingly fast to my senses.
Then conversely, I simply needed to play it back slowly.
“Time magic.”
My time magic was founded upon belief.
Therefore, no difficult techniques or calculations were necessary.
‘I can do this.’
Kang Hye had shown me.
What it meant to believe.
She had illuminated the path.
If I had learned it, I simply needed to execute it.
“Slow progression.”
I made the second hand of the world’s clock surrounding the meteor sword grow heavy.
I imagined anchoring weights to its feet so it could not race forward.
My imagination and belief became reality, dulling Pease’s magic.
-(Mayo) : Computational capacity has become somewhat available. I, Mayo, shall intercept all blades.
Then a voice echoed from the void.
His voice carried a peculiar sense of triumph.
“I knew you would counter with time magic.”
A mage.
You would have perceived this as a form of magical exchange.
“But do not be confused, my disciple.”
A raid and a magical exchange must be clearly distinguished.
This is
the master’s
teaching.
“This is not a magical exchange—it is a boss battle.”
In an instant, he dissolved the meteor sword.
In truth, this area-of-effect magic had been a ‘mage-exclusive’ feint.
A restraining attack designed with the assumption that any mage would react this way.
What came next was the real thing.
“Observe—this is what combat magic truly is.”
Grand and elaborate spells are unnecessary.
A single small dagger is sufficient to sever your opponent’s throat.
“Spatial release.”
The water-attribute short blade would bloom where Choi Kang-mok’s heart lay.
I would carve out my disciple’s heart and implant an artificial one in its place.
“I shall grant you eternal life and my teachings.”
My disciple.
My eternal disciple.
One who obeys my teachings and commands,
,
my disciple alone!

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