Necromancer Academy’s Genius Summoner

Chapter 230

The Curses class by Bahil was eagerly awaited by all students.

He was the most admired, the greatest role model in Kizen, and his classes always left the students the most satisfied. Hong Feng was the only other professor who came close.

Bahil always conducted himself professionally in the classroom. And in addition to his skills as a necromancer, he was an excellent educator who could translate his vast knowledge into easy-to-understand explanations for his students.

This seemingly perfect man, Bahil, had a big problem as of late.

Tap tap.

Bahil turned around to see who was tapping him on the shoulder. There he saw Chief Assistant Chehekle, and she was carrying a stern look.

"Professor… You're making that face again."

"Ah, my bad."

"And stop drooling, too."

Bahil wiped the spit off with his sleeve and turned back to watch the corner of the lecture room.

Class A was in the middle of a practical exercise, with assistant teachers scattered around to help wherever they could.

But Bahil wasn't looking at how the class was doing. No, he was only focussed on a single group.

"Just so you know, I won't go easy on you, alright?"

Meilyn stretched her arms in preparation, getting each finger ready to cast.

"Of course. What's the point if you do?"

Her opponent was Simon.

Meilyn was an all-around elite who averaged scores of 90s in all subjects. Out of all of those, Curses was one of her best.

She scored a whopping 96 in it. She was so confident in the subject that she volunteered to be in charge of Curses when they first formed 'Group 7'.

In fact, Simon's chances of beating her using curses were slim. The skill gap was simply too great.

The two stood some distance apart.

"Simon Polentia, Meilyn Vilenne, are you both ready?"

"Yes!"

Looking around the room, Simon saw other students in the middle of other one-on-one duels. However, he wasn't given much time to gawk, the assistant teacher getting ready to write on a clipboard as he announced,

"Then, you may begin!"

Slide.

Simon immediately pushed his feet shoulder-width apart and held his arms out in front of him. Bringing both hands together, jet-black surged and gathered between them, forming a magic circle.

Meilyn, on the other hand, was leisurely completing a circle with only her right arm raised.

"Take it."

{Exhaust}

Exhaust, a basic and versatile curse learned in the very first class, shot out from Meilyn's magic circle as a gray sphere of gas. Meanwhile, Simon's magic circle was still being prepared. It was only 60% complete.

'Hmmmph!'

Simon strained his eyes, looking at the curse approaching.

Suddenly, his circle leaped forward in completion, and without him even seeing the jump from 60% to 100%, he sent it toward Meilyn's curse.

{Cancel}

Tiiiiiinnnggg!

Just in the nick of time. The curse and the counter-curse canceled each other out and disappeared. Simon fell back onto the ground out of shock.

Today's class was about the spell 'Cancel', a curse that nullifies an opponent's curse.

This exercise was also designed to familiarize the students with the Cancel curse, where students would take turns attacking and defending using the curse.

"Do you think you have time to sit around?"

This time, Meilyn was drawing the Cancel spell. Not wanting to lose, Simon also prepared an Exhaust from his seated position.

By the time Simon finished his Exhaust, Meilyn was leisurely standing with a completed Cancel. She was adjusting her hair out of boredom from having to wait for Simon to finish.

'…Wow, that's amazing. There's just too much of a skill gap if we only use the knowledge from Curses.'

Simon couldn't win with standard tactics.

Knowing that, he brought the Exhaust magic circle he'd prepared closer, squeezed out a bit of jet-black from his fingertips, and added a few characters to the formula.

Meilyn's eyes widened at the sight.

'Huh? What did he just add? I didn't s—!'

{Exhaust}

Not wanting to give Meilyn time to create a counter-measure, Simon launched the curse immediately.

Nervous, Meilyn raised her right hand holding the Cancel counter-curse to block the incoming blow, but out of nowhere, the Exhaust swerved down and around her guard.

'The Exhaust changed direction?!'

The spell went straight past her right hand and toward her waist. Simon smiled in satisfaction.

'It's my victory!'

Pooooow!

However, it wasn't over yet.

Meilyn's left hand shot up from beside her and blocked the Exhaust.

The movement brought her off-balance and made her stumble, but the curse never touched her. According to the rules of the duel, she was safe.

'Two Cancels!'

"Idiot! Have you forgotten that I can do multi-casting?!"josei

She grinned, raising her arms.

A turnaround. Simon hastily prepared a new Cancel, but one wasn't enough to defend against the two Exhausts Meilyn sent spinning forward.

Simon stumbled backward, blocking one, but the other hit him unopposed. The assistant teacher checked the clipboard and said,

"Alright, well done."

"Hurray! I won!!"

Cheered Meilyn, throwing her arms in the air. Simon hung his head in defeat, but he was still proud of himself for managing to last so long against Meilyn when casting curses.

"I know this is a friendly match with no winners or losers, but…"

As if both amused and annoyed and Meilyn's flippant declaration of victory, the assistant teacher revealed,

"technically speaking, it is Meilyn's loss."

"Huh? Why?!"

"You were disqualified. You're only supposed to exchange one spell at a time. I explained it to you less than three minutes ago, and you already forgot?"

Meilyn moved to defend herself and her actions, but she was interrupted by Simon howling with laughter.

"You keep breaking the rules, huh? Even in the dodgeball game you couldn't keep on the straight and narrow."

"Sh-Shut up!"

Shouted Meilyn, face turning red.

Knowing he was getting on her nerves, Simon went to rub it in further.

"So much for being the—"

"Just now…"

Suddenly, Simon felt someone behind him. Bahil was standing there, his eyes gleaming.

"What kind of formula did you add to Exhaust?"

* * *

* * *

Simon didn't respond at first. However, the guilt on his face spoke for him.

There was a reason why professors emphasize using the original formula. The magic circle is a complex 'ecosystem', so messing with even the smallest detail could cause the whole thing to fall out of balance and collapse.

It's like how killing bugs would also kill the flowers from a lack of pollination and some birds from the lack of food.

With magic circles, the resulting explosion from improper modification was often lethal. It's said to be one of the more common causes of death for novice necromancers.

There was a reason for every formula and sequence of magic circles taught in Kizen.

"Professor, the thing is—"

"Answer the question."

Bahil looked very serious. Simon stammered,

"I-I mixed the 'load' function into the Exhaust's ejection formula. That would make the curse heavy and sink immediately after firing."

"And you used that to induce a change of direction."

"Yes, precisely."

"What made you think mixing separate formulas wouldn't damage the original?"

The question sounded accusatory to say the least. Because of that, Simon was cautious when he answered,

"I just thought that it would work… It was only my intuition. I'm sorry."

Simon bowed his head deeply.

The atmosphere was so heavy that even Meilyn couldn't bring herself to say anything. All she could bring herself to look at was Simon's trembling back.

And that was a good thing.

It was good that neither of them saw the look on Bahil's face.

'A genius who keeps people on their toes.'

Bahil thought of a line he would include in Simon's biography when he wrote it in the distant future.

'He must've understood it with his feelings, not his mind. His gentle touch as he added the formula was relaxed, done without any hesitation. It's like he was just jotting down an idea.'

It was good that neither of them saw him grinning ear to ear.

'I've never been more satisfied with my job.'

"Professor Bahil!!"

Chehekle ran towards him, looking frightened.

"D-Didn't you say you needed to go to the lab?"

"Thank you for reminding me, Chehekle."

Bahil's face returned to normal.

The two of them raised their heads, as well.

"Simon Polentia, please follow me."

"…Yes sir."

The two walked out of the lecture room side by side.

Meilyn followed with a serious look on her face as she realized that Simon might receive disciplinary action.

"Professor! Could you please hear me out for a s—?!"

"Stop."

Chehekle stepped forward and blocked her path.

"Don't worry, Professor Bahil isn't calling Simon out to scold him."

"Assistant teacher…!"

'I wish he'd scold that student… But Bahil probably wants to write hymns about this day.'

As an educator, you should indeed be scolding someone for changing the magic circle you've taught them. The advanced techniques needed to modify them are for higher years.

But Bahil was no ordinary educator.

And as Chehekle expected…

"You did a good job earlier."

Bahil was praising Simon.

"I hope you'll continue to display that kind of brilliance in the future. Of course, I'm not saying this as a professor in Kizen. It's just my personal wish."

"Wh-What?"

"It's not a very interesting topic, so let's just talk until we get to the lab."

Bahil glossed over it and spoke very casually.

"You know, the kind of talk that normal people do."

Simon gave a confused smile.

'Only people who aren't normal say that they're being 'normal'.'

On the way to the lab, Bahil stared out a window for a moment before continuing,

"So, how did you spend your vacation?"

'Wow, that really is a normal question.'

Inwardly relieved, Simon replied,

"I've been helping my father with his work."

Bahil's eyes shone intensely.

"Oh! What was your father like? Was he a necromancer? What was his name? What was his profession? Did he ever attend Kizen? What is he doing right now?"

…Simon could never say that his father was the Commander once known as Yona.

As Simon struggled to find a satisfactory answer, Bahil coughed, belatedly realizing he had made a mistake.

"Oh, my apologies. Some students don't like to discuss their family history, after all."

"…I'm sorry."

"Let's go back to our normal talk."

Bahil smiled.

"What kind of dark magic did you practice over vacation? Learn anything new?"

"Yes, I did! Corpse Explosion and I also converted my mud golem into a mountable summo—"

Shatter!

'Again, again, it's Summoning again!'

Enraged, Bahil flailed his arms wildly from behind Simon so he wouldn't notice.

Curses spewed out in rage were fired through the window Bahil had paused in front of.

"Professor, did you also hear that?"

"Hear what?"

A moment later, screams came from a couple sitting on a bench below as they whispered their love.

They had both been turned into raccoons and fell off the bench. It was a curse that turned people into animals for two hours.

"It's kinda noisy here."

Simon's gaze moved out the window at the sound of frantic squeals. Bahil shrugged.

"Looks like a wild animal has moved in. By the way, how much have you figured out about the theme of this exam?"

"I'm not sure yet, but I think it's going to be some sort of trap dungeon with multiple weapons."

As he said that, Simon glanced at Bahil's face, but the professor didn't react.

"I'm sorry, but a professor can't give a student any unauthorized hints. So, how are you preparing, Simon?"

"I'm preparing a gole—"

This time, the flurry of curses struck some boys playing sports outside, their bones turning soft.

"What was that?"

Simon looked out the window in bewilderment, but it was peaceful outside. He was looking at the back of the building where the second wave of curses had landed.

"Now, come on in."

Bahil brazenly stopped in front of his lab and invited Simon inside.

"There's something I prepared for you."

Starting today, the battle for Simon would change.

——