1.
Iris Meirude.
Iris, the second daughter of House Meirude, had never once lost the top spot at the Magic School.
Magic theory, Magic Formula construction, Mana Control, practical evaluations.
From the year she enrolled until graduation, every single grade was at the very top.
In some subjects, she found answers faster than the professors, and in her graduation exam, she even broke the school’s existing records.
She didn’t bother to humbly deny the fact that she was exceptional.
It wasn’t as if it was a lie.
After graduating from the Magic School, entering the White Magic Academy, the one considered the finest among the four Magic Academies, was only natural.
She would quickly build up achievements here too, and become the next Academy Head.
That was the plan Iris had set for herself.
At least, until this morning.
Late at night.
“……What is this?”
Iris, who had returned to her Dormitory Room, was glaring at the paper spread out on her desk.
“How in the world did he do it?”
On the paper were drawn eight circular Iron Plates and a trajectory passing between them.
It was the Homing Bullet Leon had shown her that morning.
But a Homing Bullet wasn’t a spell used that way.
First, you aim in one direction and fire.
After hitting the first target, you calculate the next coordinates and add a directional formula and a Propulsion Formula.
After that, you repeat the same process each time you pass through a target.
She had heard that exceptional mages calculate the next Magic Formula the moment they fire a Homing Bullet.
Even so, a drop in output was unavoidable.
No matter how skilled the mage, crafting a new Magic Formula required a fraction of a second.
But what Leon had shown was not on that level.
The light that pierced the first Iron Plate immediately changed direction.
After that, it continued smoothly to the final target, maintaining its speed and trajectory.
“……Continuous Trajectory Formula.”
A formula that binds all coordinates and direction changes into a single spell before firing.
If that were the case, it would explain why there was almost no output loss.
The problem was that the Continuous Trajectory Formula was not a formula that could be applied to a Homing Bullet.
To be precise, there was no one in this world who could apply a trajectory formula to a mana bullet of that size.
A mana bullet the size of a fingernail is small, so the mana inside it moves almost as a single mass.
So you only need to grasp one central coordinate and the external flow.
But the moment the size becomes that of a fist, the story changes.
The surface collides with the air, the mana inside rotates, and every time it changes direction, force surges in all directions.
You have to calculate the flow contained within the Mana Bullet zone by zone, then bind it back together so the form doesn’t collapse.
To use an analogy, it’s like this.
The difference between making one person run along a set path,
and making hundreds of people, each trying to run in different directions, all run to the same place without a single inch of error.
That’s why the Continuous Trajectory Formula was only used on mana bullets as small as marbles.
And even that was a technique that mages who had trained in Magic Formula calculation for years could barely attempt.
Iris copied down the positions and distances of the eight Iron Plates onto the paper.
She roughly calculated the speed of each section, the angle of direction changes, and even the mana loss that occurred at the moment of penetration.
“Air resistance correction, flight speed maintenance, current coordinate update, next coordinate calculation, direction change angle calculation, rotation radius adjustment, central axis fixation, outer shell compression, internal mana circulation, propulsion redistribution, penetration point calculation, shock dispersion, lost mana replenishment, trajectory error correction, form collapse suppression….”
A moment later, her pen stopped.
“……Fifty per second?”
She checked again, but the result was the same.
Leon was calculating fifty different formulas every single second.
And in that state, he had pierced through eight Iron Plates.
‘He calculated all of that in his head……?’
It was beyond what a human being could handle.
If the order had gotten tangled even a little, the entire Magic Formula would have collapsed.
And if he had forced it through anyway, his head would have given out before the spell was even completed.
And yet, Leon was perfectly fine.
His breathing wasn’t disturbed, and there was no sign of pain.
In fact, he had asked to do it again.
With a face that seemed unaware of what he had just accomplished.
“……He’s not human.”
The Fireball he had launched afterward was the same.
Ordinary fire magic always leaves traces.
At the point of explosion, soot forms, and the surface melted by the heat and debris scattered in all directions remain.
No matter how precisely you control the output, you can’t completely block the heat from spreading to the surroundings.
No, that wasn’t a problem unique to fire magic.
Even light magic, said to be the cleanest offensive magic, leaves burn marks and cracks around the point of impact.
But Leon’s Fireball had none of that.
There was no large explosion, and not even a speck of stone dust flew off.
The area the Fireball passed through simply disappeared in a perfect circle.
As if the stone in that space had never existed in the first place.
“What is that guy……?”
Was he a direct disciple of the Academy Head?
If not, he might be a secret weapon raised in secret by a great mage who had hidden his name.
Either way, he didn’t seem like an ordinary person.
At that moment.
What was Leon, the one causing such turmoil in Iris’s mind, doing?
2.
“Hey, AI. Let’s play word chain.”
[I accept.]
“Racehorse.”
[Magnesium.]
“……”
[Please provide a word starting with ‘ium’.]
“Where am I supposed to find a word like that?”
[I win.]
“You motherf—”
[Profanity detected.]
+
Iris looked back at the paper on her desk.
“……Not yet.”
No matter how impressive Leon’s Homing Bullet and Fireball were, she hadn’t completely lost yet.
Theory and practice are different.
Hitting a fixed target and facing a moving Monster were completely different problems.
In the Tower, Monsters would spring out from outside your field of vision, and there were zones where mana wouldn’t gather properly.
Iris had experience climbing to the 10th floor of the Tower on her own while still enrolled at the Magic School.
In terms of practical experience alone, she was ahead.
“The Tower will be different.”
She just needed to show him tomorrow.
What a true veteran’s magic looked like.
With that resolve, Iris lay down on her bed.
But even after closing her eyes, the trajectory of the light piercing through the eight Iron Plates didn’t leave her mind for a while.
+
“……That concludes what we’ve confirmed so far today.”
The Instructor finished the report.
Celia slowly flipped through the documents on her desk.
A Homing Bullet that pierced through eight Iron Plates.
A trajectory presumed to be a Continuous Trajectory Formula.
And a Fireball that had pierced only the target without leaving any traces in the surroundings.
Every single one of them was unusual, hardly the results of just one person showing off in a single day.
“Yeah. You can go now.”
“Yes.”
The Instructor bowed and left the Academy Head’s office.
Click.
As the door closed, Herman, who had been sitting on the sofa across from her, spoke up.
“I had my suspicions, but it seems it really is the Continuous Trajectory Formula.”
“The problem is who taught it to him……”
+
At that moment.
“Hey, AI.”
[Standing by.]
“That Continuous Trajectory Formula thing, where did you learn that from?”
[Acquired from a street circus the user watched at age 14.]
“A circus?”
[Scanned the formula of a magician who was circulating two spheres floating in the air.]
“And you put that into a Homing Bullet?”
[Reconstructed it to be suitable for combat magic.]
“Oh. Amazing.”
+
Celia traced the trajectory written on the document with her finger.
“Putting that aside, his calculation ability is extraordinary. It’s as if he has hundreds of brains attached.”
“Furthermore, the Fireball is also a problem.”
“At first, I thought it wasn’t a Fireball either.”
Celia recalled the round hole that had been blown through the warehouse wall.
Even then, apart from the dust, there were almost no traces of an explosion.
But at the Training Grounds, he had reportedly pierced through the target precisely without leaving even dust behind.
In a matter of days, his precision had increased even further.
“Is there a possibility it’s a new formula developed by another Magic Academy?”
“There are no similar cases among currently known spells.”
Herman pulled out the documents he had placed beside him.
“I also re-investigated Leon’s past. Birth registration, orphanage admission records, and his whereabouts after age 10 all mostly match.”
“And anything suspicious?”
“I couldn’t find anything.”
The answer was short.
“Market merchants, guards, and the junkyard keeper all remembered Leon as well. He’s lived doing odd jobs in the city for a long time, and there’s no trace of contact with any specific Noble or Magic Academy. He’s never left the city for an extended period either.”
“A hidden teacher?”
“Nothing on that front either. At the very least, he doesn’t appear to be a spy sent by another Magic Academy.”
Celia leaned back in her chair and tilted her head.
“So he really learned it all on his own?”
Herman set the documents down on the desk.
“That child never had a proper environment to learn magic. There’s no record of him purchasing grimoires, and he’s never attended a Magic School. Yet looking at just the results, it’s a level that even high-ranking mages would find difficult to replicate.”
“Looking at just his history, even calling him a genius isn’t enough.”
A faint smile hung at the corner of Celia’s mouth.
“He might be a real monster.”
“There is no precedent.”
Herman’s expression remained stiff.
“……Which makes it all the more suspicious.”
Celia silently looked down at the documents.
The more she learned, the more questions piled up.
“……What will you do?”
Herman asked.
Celia closed the documents and turned her gaze out the window.
The Tower rising in the middle of the city was clearly visible even in the darkness.
“Let’s watch a little longer.”
“You’re going to send him to the 30th Floor as is?”
“Yeah.”
Celia let out a light laugh.
“If he’s hiding something, it’ll come out tomorrow. Things rarely go according to plan in the Tower.”
Herman was silent for a moment.
“And if there’s nothing unusual about him?”
Celia’s gaze, which had been fixed out the window, lowered to the desk.
The name written at the top of the paper.
Leon.
If all those accomplishments came entirely from one person’s talent.
Celia’s lips slowly curled upward.
“……Then we snatch him up.”
“Excuse me?”
She lightly brushed Leon’s name with her fingertip.
“So he can never run away.”