36. Magic Survival (2)
In the end, the match had started.
“Ah…”
Watching from afar as Baek Yuseol, who had been standing in the distance, was teleported away to the stage and vanished, Anella felt the strength go out of her body.
The security staff who had been blocking her entry immediately scowled.
“Student, if you keep doing this, we can’t just let it slide. Step back now.”
“…Yes.”
It was already too late.
Once the match had begun, the participants were moved into a completely isolated new space, so delivering any message was absolutely impossible.
In the past, during Magic Survival, incidents had happened where sponsors secretly passed information to participants or interfered with them through magic,
so Eltman Eltwin had chosen the extreme solution of using isolated spaces in the first place.
Because the stage was made entirely of fiction, and people could not truly be injured by one another’s attacks, it was actually considered safer, so Eltman’s choice could be called the correct one…
but—
Idiotic mages.
What was so impressive about them when they could not even detect something as basic as Dark Mage infiltration?
A 9-Class mage?
They could throw that title card straight into the trash.
Grinding her teeth, Anella turned away.
She had to inform someone of this somehow,
but even if she tried, would anyone believe her?
And even if someone did believe her, in order to stop the match, Eltman Eltwin’s power would be absolutely necessary…
Would Stella’s principal really move on the word of nothing more than some exchange student?
There could hardly be anything more absurd than that.
And besides… he said they couldn’t stop it easily, right?
To pull the students back out from that isolated space would probably require a considerable casting time.
So she had to report this as quickly as possible—but was there even any way?
As Anella stood there worrying with a dark expression, someone suddenly hurried up beside her.
“Hey, wait. Look at me for a second.”
“…Huh?”
When she turned her head, there was a young girl who looked about middle-school age.
The moment their eyes met, one could not help but gasp at how cute and pretty she was.
Yet despite that appearance, the girl was wearing a heavy frown, and even that looked beautiful enough that Anella was briefly left dazed.
“What are you standing there spacing out for? Just now, you were desperately looking for Baek Yuseol… What’s your reason?”
Without thinking, Anella checked the girl’s nametag.
Flame.
It seemed like a familiar face, and sure enough—she was famous.
Flame stared hard at Anella’s face, then noticed her twin-tail hairstyle and nametag, and her expression stiffened.
Anella…?
She had heard that name before, but did not remember it clearly.
Since Flame had stored the entirety of the original romance-fantasy’s contents in her head through sheer memory, when she wanted to recall something, she needed a moment.
…Ah, right.
But once she started remembering, it came quickly.
Flame immediately recalled that the person named Anella in front of her was “the character who barged in to drive a wedge between Eizel and Ma Yuseong” in the original romance-fantasy.
She had only been a one-off extra character,
but because Flame supported the Eizel–Ma Yuseong pairing, she remembered every villain who had interfered with them.
I’m pretty sure she was a Dark Mage, so why is she here…?
While Flame was thinking, Anella was the one who grabbed her by the shoulder first.
“You’re close with Baek Yuseol, right? Right? I heard it in rumors. They said you used to be lovers.”
“Uh, yeah. I guess… that’s right?”
Only then was Anella finally able to brighten.
As a special cadet, Flame surely had at least some influence even within Stella.
“Help me. Baek Yuseol might be in danger.”
Like someone clutching at a straw, Anella asked for help from a human mage far younger than herself.
Whooooo—
A bleak wind blew through.
It almost felt as though there was a scent of grass in it.
When I opened my eyes, a green horizon filled my view.
A vast grassland.
The thick weeds that had grown up as high as my waist obstructed my vision.
The sky dimmed a little, so when I looked up, clouds were brushing past the sun.
A space more real than reality itself.
But this was only the Stella Dome’s virtual reality.
It was not real.
“Hah…”
After drawing as much air into my lungs as I could, the first thing I checked was the map.
In Survival, each participant could see their real-time location displayed on the map, and if an enemy had tracking magic attached to them or some special event occurred, it would also show up on the map, so it was best to check it often.
I started all the way out on the edge.
The basic rules of Magic Survival were the same as the battle royales I used to enjoy back on Earth.
A barrier gradually shrank inward in a circular form from the outer rim, restricting the playable area, and if one remained exposed outside the barrier too long, one’s “life points” would slowly evaporate.
If your life points dropped all the way to zero, whether through battle or through exposure beyond the barrier,
it counted as death.
You would be eliminated and kicked out.
Which meant that in the end, it was a structure where you had no choice but to keep moving along with the play zone, and because it was a battle royale, naturally it was advantageous to secure a place near the center of the zone.
Of course…
the problem was that no one knew where the zone would ultimately shrink to.
To win a battle royale, the answer is to hunker down.
Back on Earth, when I played games like this, I usually played every round just for fun, so I would head into the city where the most players dropped, fight like crazy, and get wiped out early.
But in an actual tournament, I could not do that.
I had to play as strategically as possible and avoid friction with other people.
And if possible, I also ought to pick up the special “artifacts” scattered throughout the stage while I was at it.
In Magic Survival, one was allowed to wear only the most basic staff and a light robe, so in order to fight properly, artifact farming was essential.
In my case…
since I could no longer use the Terephon Sword, I absolutely had to obtain a very specific artifact.
Fortunately, through the glasses, I could identify this match’s artifact acquisition route.
[If you happened to spawn on the northeastern edge, then—wow. That’s bad luck.]
…I’m screwed.
Of all things, I had to land in the position where farming was the hardest.
[But it’s okay. I mean, if you keep picking up trash-tier artifacts, maybe something good will come out eventually, right?]
After checking the guide, I followed the compass and started heading south.
Far away, I could see a tiny village.
According to the setting, it was an abandoned village in ruins where no one lived anymore, but since I could still run into other enemies, I had to be careful.
I have to farm quickly and move toward the center.
The most important thing right now was dealing somehow with this situation that had abruptly transformed into a main episode.
The main villain of this episode was a Dark Mage disguised as a participant, someone who possessed the ability to inflict real damage on others even within this virtual space.
[The Dark Mage’s name is… Berenkal.]
[He spawns in the southwestern mountains, so if you happen to be nearby, going straight to him and forcing a duel to eliminate him would also be a good choice.]
My position was in the northeast, far too far away.
By the time I reached him, Berenkal would already be decked out solidly in artifacts, so even if I fought him, the chances were high that I would lose.
[If you spawned far from Berenkal… then head toward the central urban district as quickly as possible.]
[Berenkal likes to move through cities with high population density, and just after battles end, he hunts opponents one by one when they let their guard down.]
[That means his own combat ability is pathetic, but be careful—he does possess enough power to silence an enemy in a single strike.]
“Haa…”
I slowly read through the guide in full, but all it did was make a sigh come out.
The distance was too great, and without a magic sword I might as well be treated as having no combat power, so there were also many items I absolutely had to get first.
[If you spawned far away from Berenkal, then sadly…]
[you won’t be able to prevent casualties.]
[However, there is a way to interfere with and lure Berenkal as quickly as possible.]
[First: obtain the artifact “Scanning Field.”]
[Second: employ the strategy known as the “Lu Bu meta.”]
A term I hated with all my soul appeared.
Named after Lü Bu, the general from late Han China, this strategy referred to charging straight into the place with the greatest concentration of people and beating down absolutely everyone without discrimination.
That ran completely contrary to the strategy I had originally prepared for winning—my “hang-on-for-dear-life” strategy—and it also drastically reduced my chances of actually winning the match.
Why?
Because the moment you secured one kill, your location was exposed to every other participant for one full minute.
A direct kill earned you points and let you seize the other party’s artifacts, but the penalty was correspondingly enormous.
And now I had to repeat that just to lure in the Dark Mage.
“Haah…”
All I could feel was hopelessness.
Southwest side of the stage.
In the middle of a mountain ridge thick with green trees stretching so high that the sky itself could barely be seen—
Crunch!!
Berenkal stomped down on the girl lying collapsed in front of him.
“Ah, it hurts…”
The girl, dressed in the uniform of prestigious Daychelli High School, stretched out a hand pitifully, but it touched nothing.
“So Daychelli isn’t much either, huh.”
A sneer slipped from him.
That was the price she paid for lowering her guard because she thought this was, at most, just a match taking place in a virtual world.
The girl’s strategy had been a good one.
She had intended to accept part of the enemy’s attack, sacrifice a bit of her life points, and prepare an even greater counterattack.
But she must never have expected this.
That she would feel real pain from an attack she accepted.
Why…?
Why was she feeling pain?
She could not understand it at all, but the dark crimson flames clinging to her whole body numbed her thoughts.
Fwoooosh!
“Kyaaaah!!”
“Hahaha.”
This was fun.
So much fun.
There was nothing more entertaining than thoroughly trampling and breaking down a student from a prestigious school who, under normal circumstances, should have been more outstanding than him.
Even if he let her live like this, wouldn’t the trauma make it impossible for her to ever participate in magical combat again?
No.
It would still be cleaner to kill her.
That would be more fun too.
Once he made the decision, he put it into action immediately.
Berenkal lifted a finger toward the girl’s head.
Burning her from the head down did not sound like a bad idea.
But at that very moment—
Paaat…!
“…What the hell?”
Clusters of light poured down from the sky, illuminating the entire ridge nearby.
Because he had studied survival artifacts beforehand, he immediately realized what it was.
“A location scan…?”
It was an absurdly overpowered artifact that could scan a designated field, though only about five of them existed in a given match, making them hard to obtain.
Its downside was that one minute after the scan was initiated, the target’s location would be revealed—
and not just to the person who used the artifact, but to every single person on the stage.
This is insane!
He had no idea why, or who, had suddenly spread a Scanning Field over this area, but he needed to leave within a minute.
If that girl were to meet an abnormal death and be eliminated here, then the fact that he could commit real murder within the stage would be exposed.
Not yet.
If the participants on the stage realized what he was, all their firepower would focus on him at once.
Tak!
Kicking off the ground, Berenkal sprinted away and escaped the Scanning Field’s radius.
Only then did he remember belatedly that he had not finished off the girl from earlier, but there was nothing he could do.
Damn it…
Because of the Scanning Field, everything had gotten badly twisted right from the start.
I don’t know who it was or where they live, but… don’t get eliminated before I find you.
I’m definitely going to burn you alive.
Making that grim vow, Berenkal vanished into hiding.
Flash!
One minute later, the Scanning Field lit up the mountain ridge—
but found nothing.
It only caught sight of a mysterious girl standing motionless, utterly still.
— Read only on MugenCodex —
