Chapter 13

Chapter 13: Entrance Exam (3)

Roughly ten minutes before Damon’s test began.

At another testing ground, the applicants stood with their mouths hanging open as they watched the bizarre spectacle unfolding before them.

BOOM! CREAK! THUD!

The Steel Golem’s fists pounded against the scarecrow like it was a sandbag, sending heavy shocks through the air.

It had already taken more than twenty direct blows, so it would have been no surprise if the scarecrow had been dented and scarred all over by now.

CLANG! TING! TONG!

And yet there was not even a tiny scratch on the scarecrow’s body.

Despite supposedly being made of rubber, it gave off hard, metallic impacts and even scattered tiny sparks.

She was not merely restoring the scarecrow with Holy Power. 

She had reinforced its durability as well.

The examiner swallowed hard.

‘…The top entrant has already been decided.’

She had clearly consumed a great deal of Holy Power, yet there was not the slightest trace of fatigue on the applicant’s face as she stood there with only one hand stretched toward the scarecrow, continuously releasing Holy Power.

A blessing at a level that would have been impossible without both an overwhelming abundance of Holy Power and a deep understanding of how to wield it.

In the end, the Steel Golem failed to land a single meaningful blow on the scarecrow under that blessing.

WHIRRRR…….

Having exhausted all of its operating time, the Steel Golem stiffened and came to a halt.

“Y-You pass.”

With the teacher’s halting words, Yulia withdrew her Holy Power.

As everyone watched silently while Yulia stepped down from the testing ground, one applicant approached her while clapping enthusiastically.

“Hehe, your blessings are still amazing. No wonder you came from the Holy Order.”

“Do not tease me…… You are from the Holy Order too.”

“Oh, come on. Are you and I really the same? If I do not tease you at times like this, then when am I supposed to do it?”

The friendly woman covered her mouth and giggled.

Having finished their entrance exam, the two of them walked over to the waiting area.

“By the way, was his name Lloyd? Picking a fight with a Black Mage at the registration desk was a bit much. If you had really gone at it, you would have been thrown out immediately.”

“I held back in my own way. If it had been up to me, I would have used my Sacred Ma—”

“Yulia.”

At the woman’s warning, Yulia hastily cleared her throat and continued.

“Ahem……. If this had not been Saengterminum, I would have gotten rid of him on the spot.”

“Why not use this chance to tone down that personality of yours too? If you enroll here, you are going to see plenty of Black Mages besides the House Desmond lot. Are you going to pick fights with all of them too?”

“…I will try.”

“You really are high-maintenance.”

Wearing a bitter smile, the woman patted Yulia on the back.

“Even so, I wonder whether you stood out too much right from the start.”

“If I am going to do it, I should do it properly. It is still an exam.”

Yulia turned her head and looked at the Steel Golem standing in the testing ground.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. I was just surprised they use a golem of that level for an entrance exam.”

“Ah, that?”

Following Yulia’s gaze, the woman looked the golem up and down as well.

It stood a full ten meters tall, with a massive frame and a tough outer shell of steel.

Even the golem’s core, the power source that made it move, was wrapped in that outer plating and hidden away under careful protection.

It really was an extremely well-made golem, but—

“For a golem, it was hitting rather weakly.”

Since it was being used for an exam, it seemed they had lowered the golem’s output on purpose, but what would it have been like at maximum output…….

“If we assume the Steel Golem were operating at its full capacity, and the exam had been something like a one-on-one battle against it… even I think I would have found it a little troublesome.”

“Saengterminum really is prestigious. To think they use a golem like that for the entrance exam.”

Just as the two of them were openly admiring the Steel Golem created by Saengterminum—

BOOOOM!

A deafening crash thundered through the entire testing ground.

The sound and vibration were on a completely different level from the noise that had been heard from the testing areas up until now.

The eyes of everyone there, including the two women, reflexively turned toward the source of the noise.

THUD! KRAAASH!

Everyone who saw the scene before them sucked in a short breath.

The Steel Golem, its eyes now glowing red, was smashing its fists into the floor of the testing ground.

Its enormous size made its movements somewhat slow, but that same bulk gave it a vast range of attack.

Each time the golem drove its fists down or stamped its feet, the ground was gouged deeply and chunks of stone flew everywhere.

For an ordinary person, even a light graze would have been fatal.

This was no longer output intentionally reduced for the exam.

“Applicant! Get out of the testing ground! It is dangerous!”

A scream, almost a shriek, rang out from the woman who appeared to be the teacher, but the man inside the testing ground paid it no mind.

He dashed back and forth across the testing ground with mana daggers in both hands.

“That guy is……”

Yulia recognized him.

She clearly remembered him as the one she had run into at the registration desk.

It seemed that, like her, his chosen department had been the Holy Magic Department.

Had the golem perhaps gone berserk and broken free of its commands?

‘I have to help…….’

She was about to kick off the ground and rush toward the testing ground where the man was, but the moment she saw the way he was moving, she came to a halt without realizing it.

The same was true of the woman standing beside her.

“Does something not seem a little strange?”

It was not enough that he was evading the golem’s attacks by a hair, twisting his body and adjusting his steps.

He also kept driving mana daggers into the golem’s body.

It looked almost like some kind of stunt.

“Yes. I do not think this was an accident.”

At first, it had seemed possible that the golem had gone berserk and caused an accident, but if that had really been the case, there should have been some sign of panic in the man’s movements.

There was only one explanation they could think of.

“Do not tell me he is trying to destroy the Steel Golem?”

“There is no other explanation unless he attacked the golem first…….”

The two women concluded that the Steel Golem was now carrying out its defensive orders while fully exerting its original abilities in order to protect itself.

And without either one needing to say it first, they both spoke at once.

““…Why would he do that?””

At that moment, the man’s movements changed.

Until then, he had kept his distance from the golem and thrown daggers at it, but now he immediately rushed in toward its feet and lowered his body.

The instant the Steel Golem raised its foot with a metallic groan, trying to crush him beneath it— the man straightened from his crouch and leapt high, thrusting the tip of his foot toward the golem’s body.

The place his foot was aimed at was one of the mana daggers stuck in the golem’s leg.

Using the mana daggers as footholds, the man scaled the golem’s body all the way up to its shoulder, the corner of his mouth twisting viciously upward.

Then he summoned a Mana Spear and forcibly drove it into the joint connecting the golem’s neck and torso, one of its weakest points.

CREEEEK?

The golem’s eyes flickered rapidly, and then it lost its balance, tilted sideways, and crashed to the ground.

The impact split apart the steel that made up the golem’s body in several places.

And the man did not miss that opening.

“So this is where it was. The core.”

At some point, the Mana Greatsword he had summoned had already been driven deep into the golem’s split-open chest.

Ruuumble…….

With its core heavily damaged, the Steel Golem lost both its regenerative power and its mobility, and collapsed on the spot.

***

Levia had come to the testing ground at the call of the Holy Magic teacher, and all she could do was blink blankly.

“…So, what exactly is going on here?”

The floor of the testing ground had been cratered all over as though it had been shelled by artillery, courtesy of the Steel Golem’s fists.

On top of that, the steel pieces that had made up the golem’s body were scattered everywhere, and even the golem’s core, lying in one corner of the heap of scrap, had been split clean in two and shattered.

And in the middle of all that, the only thing left perfectly intact was the scarecrow standing at the center.

That made the whole thing even more absurd.

“Hoo……. Did you make this kind of mess because I came to see you personally a week ago and embarrassed you a little?”

Levia snapped her head around and, with a cold smile, looked at the culprit responsible for this disaster.

More precisely, she looked at Aron Bayonel, who was shamelessly standing there disguised under the alias Damon.

“I did not know you would retaliate in such an adorable way. Is that not right, applicant Damon David?”

“I am not that petty.”

“Then why did the testing ground end up like this?”

“Because I wanted to get into Saengterminum no matter what.”

“…What?”

Levia could tell at once that Aron had avoided placing his desired department as the Black Magic Department in order not to draw suspicion.

‘It does not seem he even used Black Magic during the entrance exam either…….’

When she asked the examiner, she heard that he had subdued the Steel Golem using nothing but Mana Forging.

Even for a child of House Bayonel, his combat instincts themselves were abnormally sharp for his age.

And on top of that, he mainly wielded Black Magic, yet he also bore a Sacred Mark.

It would have been too wasteful to throw out such a bizarre applicant.

Which meant there was room for at least some leniency.

“Let us hear why this happened.”

“Ahem. Headmaster, is not ‘healing’ the concept of treating someone who has been injured?”

“And?”

“This exam is one where one uses Holy Power to ‘heal’ the target, is it not? I believe I acted in my own way according to the spirit of that exam.”

“Heh. Go on, then. Keep talking.”

“Stepping in before the target of healing is injured, identifying the cause that would inflict the wound, and eliminating it first. Would that not also count as ‘healing’ in a broader sense?”

“…….”

At Damon’s words, one fact was branded into the minds of everyone present at the testing ground, headmaster included.

‘This lunatic.’

Damon David.

This guy was insane.

***

Once the two women understood the whole situation, their eyes turned cold.

“Did I hear that correctly?”

“So that is what it was. He smashed the Steel Golem to protect the scarecrow.”

“And without even using the Holy Power he was supposed to use…….”

“What kind of attention seeker does something like that?”

“Do we really need to say more…….”

At the sight of Damon being dragged away by the back of the neck by Headmaster Levia, whose eyes had gone frighteningly sharp, silence settled over the testing ground.

***

Levia dragged me into the headmaster’s office.

No, rather than saying I went in, it would be more accurate to say I was hauled in.

“You want to learn how to handle Holy Power through the Sacred Mark? And that is why you applied to the Holy Magic Department?”

After forcing me into a chair, then sitting across from me and hearing the full story, Levia pressed a hand to her forehead.

“Wow, I honestly never expected that. Are you seriously planning to learn Holy Magic?”

“Of course.”

I could understand why she would ask that again.

An ordinary Black Mage would shudder at Holy Power itself.

But once you have gone through hell trying to stop the end of the world, you come to understand.

When the world is on the line, what do rank, nation, or political ideology matter?

If something is useful, then it should be used.

Even if it runs contrary to the convictions of the Dark Empire where I was born and raised.

“Aron, how much do you know about the Sacred Mark?”

“I know that there is only one in the entire world.”

“You do know that much. And yet, right now there is a Sacred Mark engraved on the back of your hand. Though I do not know why.”

“What is your point?”

Levia folded her arms and studied me closely.

“I think I need to reconsider how long your identity ought to remain hidden.”