Chapter 22
The old stone stairs seemed more solid than expected. The chest-high railing was also made of stone, with the temple wall on the other side, making it safe to climb despite the considerable height. As Emily climbed the stairs that must have once shone white, admiring the beauty of the ancient structure, her gaze suddenly fell on Lord Eden climbing just ahead of her.
Sweat was trickling down the nape of his neck, which had turned slightly red from the blazing white sunlight. Emily looked down at his attire, which seemed quite dressed up.
While she was somewhat shielded from the sun by her wide-brimmed hat, Lord Eden was in full formal attire under the strong sunlight, which must be quite hot.
“Lord Eden, wouldn’t you like to take off your coat if you’re hot?”
As Emily, following behind him, suddenly addressed him, Lord Eden stopped and turned to look at her. Then he suddenly looked flustered at her words.
“No, it’s fine.”
“But you seem to be sweating…”
“…Really, I’m fine.”
As Lord Eden turned his gaze away, seeming strangely embarrassed, Emily was momentarily confused. She looked at him quizzically as he persisted in keeping his coat on despite the heat, and then stopped walking.
“Then, could we rest for a moment, Lord Eden?”
“Ah, yes. Alright, Miss Emily. Are you tired? Would you like to go back down?”
“No, I think I’ll be fine after a short rest. Besides, the view from here is really beautiful.”
Indeed, the view from above was dazzlingly beautiful. With no buildings taller than the temple around, the view was unobstructed, creating a spectacular scene with the quaint buildings and well-paved roads blending together. Looking at the town spread out under the cool-looking blue sky made her feel refreshed.
Emily took off her white wide-brimmed hat, held it in her hand, and softly recited a formula. As she slowly infused magic according to the calculated formula, a gentle breeze began to blow lightly around Emily. As the sudden wind enveloped them, Lord Eden turned to look at Emily. Her long brown hair, standing close by, puffed up roundly in the soft wind, fluttering as if swimming in water.
“Wind.”
And the next moment, a cool breeze brushed Eden’s face. As Eden looked at Emily with a surprised expression at the cool wind that cooled his whole body’s heat, she relaxed her face that had been tense with concentration and looked back at him.
“Feels cool, right? You seemed hot.”
“Yes, it’s refreshing. Thank you, Miss Emily.”
Eden answered, his gaze fixed on Emily’s smiling face. Emily swept up her long fluttering hair with her right hand and looked down at the distant view. Eden gazed at the endless blue sky reflected in her bright green eyes.
It was the beginning of a hot summer day.
* * *
“Miss Emily, what’s that?”
As Emily was changing into her training uniform for this Friday’s outdoor class, she poked her face out of her top at Kira’s question and looked at her.
“Phew, yes? What is it?”
“This gray egg. I’ve never seen it before. What kind of egg is it?”
“Ah, this is something I received for a Life Magic class assignment. It’s called a mana absorption stone, used for training in precise mana manipulation.”
Emily finished changing and picked up the absorption stone she had placed on the desk, handing it to Kira. Kira, looking at the absorption stone curiously, placed it on her hand and observed it closely.
“This is a mana absorption stone? It looks interesting. It seems like various intricate magics are complexly intertwined.”
“The teachers said they poured a lot of magical power into making these. If you input mana according to the formula, when the conditions are met, something called a ‘mana pet’ is born. This is the formula, would you like to take a look?”
“Really? Yes! Thank you, Miss Emily.”
As Kira brought her face close to the absorption stone and focused on it, the magical power infused in the stone emitted a faint light, tinting Kira’s blue eyes with a mysterious glow. Emily took out her class notebook from the shelf and showed Kira the formula she had written down.
“Ah, I see. That’s interesting. It’s set up so that if you input even a slightly wrong amount of mana, you can’t get a result. This would definitely be a great help in mana manipulation training.”
“Yes, that’s right. You’re amazing, Kira. You can understand just by looking at the formula? You have to increase the amount of mana by 1.1 times every day, so you have to keep recalculating the formula, which is trickier than I thought.”
“Ah, Miss Emily, you only wrote one formula? If you divide it into two, keep this as a fixed value, and only change this part daily, wouldn’t you not need to recalculate from the beginning?”
Kira, her eyes sparkling as she looked at the notebook, suddenly picked up a pen and started writing a new formula next to the one Emily had calculated. Emily, standing beside her, couldn’t help but marvel as she watched Kira calculate instantly in her head, skipping intermediate steps and writing the completed formula directly.
“Wow, you’re right. Wait, you can do this mental math? Kira… you’re really amazing.”
“It’s nothing. But this is really interesting. Do you think I could get one of these even though I’m not taking this class? Who’s the teacher in charge?”
“It’s Professor Calroph. You should try asking him. I think it might be possible.”
“Ah, you mean Professor Liam Calroph who teaches Illusion Magic? I didn’t know he was in charge of Life Magic too. He’s really impressive. Yes, I’ll have to ask him separately.”
At Emily’s words, Kira nodded and returned the absorption stone she was holding to Emily. Emily placed the absorption stone back on the desk and left the dormitory room with Kira. After the two left, a small crack appeared on Emily’s gray absorption stone.
* * *
The Magic Department’s training uniform was black like the Swordsmanship Department’s, but it was a bit looser. When they went out to the training ground, most of the students were already gathered, so Emily and Kira hurriedly approached the group of students. When the time came, Violet, who was in charge of the physical training class, checked if all the students were present.
“Everyone, it seems we’re all here, shall we start? Today, we’ll do some basic training at the Swordsmanship Department’s training ground before moving on to practical exercises. You’ll be working in teams with third-year Swordsmanship Department students, so cooperate well, understand?”
It seemed they were all gathering at the Swordsmanship Department’s training ground as it was much larger than the Magic Department’s. At the mention of third-year Swordsmanship students, Emily suddenly thought of Lord Eden. And naturally, the scene of having dinner and taking a walk with him on Wednesday also came to mind. Standing on the temple stairs, squinting his eyes in the wind, he had looked truly happy.
“If it’s third-year Swordsmanship students, do you think Lord William Chase or Lord Eden Valenti will be there?”
As Emily was recalling Eden’s profile as they stood side by side looking at the scenery, she was startled when Kira suddenly mentioned Eden’s name. Brought back to reality as if cold water had been poured over her, Emily stuttered slightly as she answered Kira’s question.
“What? Ah, yes. Well, we don’t know what classes the Swordsmanship Department is taking, so we can’t be sure, but we might meet them, right?”
“That’s true, right? If it’s people we know, it might be more comfortable when doing practical assignments. It would be nice if we could meet them.”
“Ahaha, that’s true.”
When they arrived at the Swordsmanship Department’s training ground, the students who were in training straightened up and wiped their sweat as they saw the Magic Department students approaching in a line. Then, the Swordsmanship teacher who was overseeing the students’ movements in the middle noticed that Violet from the Magic Department had arrived and stopped the training.
“Today, we’ll be doing practical training with the first-year Magic Department students. Everyone gather here!”
At the Swordsmanship teacher’s command, the Swordsmanship students who had been swinging wooden practice swords all at once stopped and flocked together. The Swordsmanship students, with faces reddened from practicing under the hot sun, looked curiously at the Magic Department freshmen.
Emily was looking towards the Swordsmanship students when suddenly the students around her started murmuring. As all the Magic Department students were looking in one direction, Emily naturally turned her head that way too.
“…Huh?”
There stood Lord Eden with an indifferent expression. He was standing looking towards the Swordsmanship teacher with a wooden sword in one hand. His face was red from training and dripping with sweat, and as if the sweat was obscuring his vision, he raised his arm and roughly wiped his forehead and face. However, as that wasn’t enough to wipe away all the sweat, he pulled up his top to wipe his face, causing his firm abs to be slightly revealed under the pulled-up top.
“Wow…!”
At that moment, exclamations burst out from the Magic Department students. Only then realizing the gaze of the Magic Department students at the sound, Lord Eden turned his head to look this way. His eyes met directly with Emily’s, who was standing among the students.
“…!”
Emily, surprised by Eden’s unexpected appearance, was staring at him when their eyes met directly. The moment she saw his gray eyes wide with surprise, Emily’s face instantly flushed red, feeling as if she had been caught peeking at him.
Then Eden, who had been blankly staring at her like that, was startled the next moment and hurriedly lowered his top that he had been using to wipe his sweat. Emily, unable to take her eyes off Eden’s reddened ears, came to her senses at Violet’s voice and quickly turned her head.
“Now, if everyone’s gathered, check your team members here in front.”
“Miss Emily, it looks like the teams have been decided. Let’s go check.”
As Emily was fiddling with her bangs, feeling unnecessarily embarrassed and trying to shake off the awkwardness, Kira, standing next to her, urged her to go check their team members. It seemed the practice groups for the Magic and Swordsmanship departments had been decided. The two approached the large temporary bulletin board.
As she walked, Emily deliberately didn’t turn her gaze towards where Eden had been, but all her senses were focused in that direction. She was worried that he might think strangely of her.
“Ah, here it is! You and I are on the same team, Miss Emily!”
Kira, who had looked at the bulletin board first, turned to Emily with a bright smile. Emily also looked up at the bulletin board and could see that she and Kira were assigned to the same team with Jake Lindell from the Swordsmanship Department.
“Are we Team 6?”
“Yes, it seems so.”
As Violet instructed them to line up starting from Team 1, Magic and Swordsmanship Department students began to gather with their team members.
