[237] 4. Battle Simulation (7)
To build the halo, the Immortal Function had to be expanded to infinity.
But once he had grasped the concept of a perfect circle, there was plenty of room to simplify the mechanism on the second attempt.
Lifting targets react extremely sensitively to mental fluctuation. If the mind remained in absolute calm, the target would not move.
That meant he could draw a perfect circle without entering the realm of infinity.
From then on Shirone abandoned regular lifting practice and concentrated on producing a state in which the target simply would not move.
After a month, results began to show.
A target with maximum repulsive force floating motionless in the Spirit Zone never failed to amaze.
It was only possible because Shirone, having realized the feel of a perfect circle through the Immortal Function, could do it.
The students kept gasping, but they couldn't understand why he was doing that training.
Closer said, "He's been doing nothing but that for a month. And for what? He can't even hold it ten seconds."
Sabina added without missing a beat, "He's not a monk. Does he really need to go that far? How's that supposed to help his magic?"
The target above Shirone didn't so much as twitch. There were absolutely no mental fluctuations.
Such a mental state—indistinguishable from brain death—wouldn't be permitted in an ordinary person. Only Shirone, who had reached the Geumgangtae state, could achieve it.
Still, Shirone couldn't hold it past ten seconds. In the end the target shook violently and shot out of the Spirit Zone.
Dante spoke up for the first time. "Looks… like it got bigger."
"Huh? What got bigger?"
"The Spirit Zone. I think it's bigger than last time."
Closer and Sabina glanced back at Shirone. Even to the eye, it was noticeably larger than before.
"No way. If you could grow a Spirit Zone that easily, everyone would be an archmage. Usually you have to endure hardships or attain enlightenment… Huh? Enlightenment?"
Sabina caught herself mid-sentence. Mages do awaken, but pure mental constructs like the Spirit Zone were more closely tied to a mind seeking spiritual insight.
That was why Etella, a bishop of the Karsis Monastery, was also famed as an ascetic in the kingdom.
Sabina's guess was correct.
Having reached the Geumgangtae, Shirone no longer had limits on expanding his mind. Continuously tracing the perfect circle had rapidly strengthened his Spirit Zone.
While Closer and Sabina unloaded scorn as if they couldn't accept it, Dante watched Shirone silently.
@
Class session number two thousand had come around.
Etella, Shiina, and Sade presided over the lesson, and the students accepted that as a matter of course.
Shiina stepped forward to run the session.
"From today we'll learn one-on-one combat. It's different from tactical training in context, so follow the control rules closely."
One-on-one combat differed from tactical training in many ways.
First, powerful exchanges of magic occur, so gauges drain much faster. In other words, anti-magic effects are stronger.
Above all, the problem was that passive skills could register collisions with actual people.
A representative type of accident was when two mages casting teleportation collided at the midway point.
If that happened, even in a virtual reality it could lead to serious injury.
"That's also why three teachers are observing—because one-on-one combat is dangerous. Since today is the first day, we'll start with practice. If anyone wants to volunteer—"
"I'll do it."
Boil raised his hand, having waited for exactly this moment.
"Good. Then Boil's opponent will be—"
"Teacher, may I pick the opponent?"
Shiina was about to refuse—personal feelings shouldn't be involved—but Boil had already fixed his sights on someone.
Dante pointed at himself in disbelief. "Me? You want to fight me now?"
"Yeah. You've been showing off so far; you won't back down, right? If you're really that great, prove it with skill."
He could have backed down, but being first nationwide wasn't a title that accepted every challenger.
"You want to beat me that badly? No matter what?"
"Don't get the wrong idea. I'm top of the advanced class and you're the challenger. So why don't you climb up here? I'll fix your rotten attitude."
"Hahaha! Fine words. How about this: the loser kneels and admits defeat to the winner."
Etella said, "Dante, this is supposed to be part of the class—"
"It's fine. Please allow it, Teacher Etella. It's exactly what I've been hoping for."
Boil pleaded with desperate eyes. The memory of being struck by Closer was a lifelong humiliation. He was nearly grateful for a chance at redemption.
With the match set, Shirone wondered how Dante would handle Boil. The photon type had no offensive spells. Of course Dante probably knew other schools of magic, but he had called himself the Shining Boy, a mage of light.
While Shirone pondered, Boil and Dante took their places about fifty meters apart in the two-thousandth practice field.
Starting distance matters a great deal in one-on-one combat.
Once the fight begins, countless variables enter, but the opening always starts with the two facing each other—so deploying the sequence formula to strike first is crucial.
Summoning mages, however, differ in inclination from other mages, and enjoy more freedom in early tactical choices.
The orthodox approach is to forgo the first strike and summon as quickly as possible to defend with the summon.
Aware of that, Dante declared, "I'll call out the summon first and start calmly. I'm not the type to make a fuss from the opening."
Boil couldn't believe Dante's words.
But Dante wasn't the sort to lie before a fight and leave loose ends.
In any case, the early-defense posture suited a summoning mage.
"Do as you like. I'll fight my way," Boil replied.
It was an answer that restrained the opponent's psychology while not being swayed by it.
Dante kept his composure but scratched his brow in puzzlement. He had assumed Boil was a greenhouse kid, but the boy was surprisingly crafty.
'Summoning magic, huh. That's tricky.'
Summoning mages call forth their summons through a unique, difficult mental discipline called sangsa.
The first thing a mage learning summoning does is summon their own self.
This is called a doppelganger, and if you succeed this far, the doppelganger can potentially transform into a third kind of existence.
To summon something is essentially to know it perfectly.
That is sangsa, and it involves three stages.
The first is the imprint stage: using all five senses to observe the target to be summoned and engraving its image in the mind.
Because a summon's appearance must be memorized perfectly, summoning mages possess observational skills far beyond ordinary people.
A representative training is the arrangement drill: thirty rods mixed randomly with length differences of one millimeter, to be ordered by length within a minute.
The second is the empathy stage: studying the target's behavior and reaching the conviction that you fully understand it.
Sometimes vast knowledge will do, but most mages form that understanding by living with the being and sensing its traits.
If you spend more than a year together in an isolated place with any creature, its characteristics become imprinted on you.
The less intellectually capable the creature, the simpler the responses and the easier it is to clear.
The third is the extinction stage—the most important.
You must kill the imprinted target and erase its physical existence.
If the target still manifests in reality afterward, the summoning mage can realize it through the doppelganger.
It isn't necessary to kill it literally; the key is to make it into a state where you can never see it again.
The clearer that state becomes, the clearer the summon will be.
Killing something you've built empathy with over a long time is horrific, but leaving it alive is also dangerous.
For example, a female mage once tried to make the healing-mage monster Opoi her summon but hesitated in the extinction stage.
She eventually cleared extinction by selling Opoi to a monster collector, but five years later she heard through some channel that Opoi was still alive—and she lost the ability to summon Opoi.
Summons are ranked by the level of sangsa from Tier 10 up to Tier 1. According to the Mage Association's research, 13,872 species are listed at the lowest Tier 10, but only three species are registered at Tier 1.
One famous Tier-1 summon is the lich, a great-mage-class undead.
A Middle Eastern archmage named Zulu commands one—when that became known, academia was thrown into an uproar.
To clear the extinction stage you must erase existence, and the lich is a monster that lacks the ability to die.
Some say Zulu herself became the lich and merely summoned a doppelganger, but until she speaks, the truth will remain unknown.
Boil warmed up his voice arrogantly. "I was second in the advanced class last semester. By the narrowest margin. Do you know why I didn't deliberately move up to the graduating class and stayed here? Because I thought I needed more skill."
"Right. Seems so," Dante replied.
"But not anymore. I trained for four whole years. And this vacation I finally succeeded. My summon will tear you apart."
"Looking forward to it. To be honest, Merses was a bit disappointing."
Boil's face split with a feral grin. At this moment he wasn't a mama's boy or a rule-bound model student—he was a summoning mage.
"Don't worry. This time will be different."
When Shiina shouted to begin, Boil and Dante entered their Spirit Zones simultaneously.
Their sequence formulas unfolded, reinforcing their minds as their Spirit Zones took on form.
Boil was defensive; Dante was target-focused.
"Come forth, Gaos."
Where Boil extended his hand, another Boil was born. Following the trinity transference where a mage's doppelganger can shift into the summon's doppelganger, it transformed into the Tier-6 summon Gaos.
KRAAAANG!
A three-meter, canid-like beast assumed a quadrupedal stance. Its hairless, smooth skin was blue, and its muscles split like rock.
Its body resembled a human's, but it was eyeless, as if blindfolded; from the bridge of its nose to where a jaw would be, its entire face was a mouth.
Inside ragged fangs, straw-like tongues tangled, and tentacles ran along the spine from the neck, emitting electricity.
It had four fingers, each tipped with ten-centimeter claws as hard as diamonds.
"G-Gaos. He actually summoned Gaos."
The students were stunned. They'd heard about special training over the vacation, but never dreamed it would be Gaos.
Gaos ranks among the top Tier-6 summons, and in raw physicality it could compete with Tier-5 monsters.
The teachers were equally surprised.
There are no summoning mages in the graduating class now, and those who'd reached Tier-6 at school and graduated could be counted on one hand.
"My word. When did he learn such summoning? There's only so much time during vacation."
Etella said, and Sade smiled wryly. "He planned this a long time ago. The kid deliberately raised it."
One could only marvel at how cunning kids were these days.
Whether in the advanced or graduating class, mages are vulnerable to physical force. Summoning Gaos, which approaches Tier-5 in strength, would make passing the graduation exam much easier.