Boom!
“……! One hit?”
“I thought the shield was broken and the commoner had won… What just happened?”
“Professor Cronia didn’t even use fire this time!”
“What did she do? That strong Dia was taken out in one hit…!”
“Did you see what happened in that split second?”
“No, I didn’t. Was it magic? It didn’t seem like anything a physical human could do.”
Dia’s attack was outstanding.
She distracted by striking the shield with her sword and stealthily dampened it.
From her ability to manipulate water, it seemed the dampness was meant to analyze and find a way to take the shield down.
She perfectly shot a stream of water to destroy the shield as she rebounded off.
However, changing to a gauntlet weapon in the follow-up attack was a bit disappointing, but considering she’s still a newcomer with less experience, it’s understandable.
Compared to other students I’ve seen up to now, she easily qualifies as skilled.
If she had enrolled last year, she could have been the top of her class.
Yet, Pulsreino knocked her out with a single kick.
Luke. What kind of trick was that? I’ve never seen an attack like that before.
Normal attacks have activation and action phases.
Even that Seiren’s attack couldn’t evade my sight.
But with this guy’s attack, I couldn’t even register what hit me.
Me, Marcus… unable to grasp a student’s attack?
Is it magic? I’ve never seen anything like that.
What on earth…
I was planning to analyze the duel and explain it to the newcomers, wrapping up today’s lesson, only for this to happen…
Well now. Am I really still lacking?
The term ‘that person’ that Dia mentioned was really bothering me.
That’s why I wanted to finish the duel quickly and ended up using it.
The problem is that I won too easily by using it.
Other students might start looking down on Dia because of this.
If that happens… I’ll have to protect her.
With how quickly the duel ended, Marcus wrapped up the class right there.
Probably because there was nothing left to explain about the duel.
When Simon mistook my clone for a dragon’s polymorph, the ‘combat self-defense’ class concluded.
Thanks to that rapid end to class, I dashed back to the dormitory.
“Sorry, Dia!”
“I’ll apologize later when I see you!”
“But right now, I have something important to do.”
Bang!
“Uh? What’s up? Why are you back so early? Weren’t you coming in for dinner?”
When I opened the door, Io, who was cleaning, welcomed me.
I was supposed to check out the orientation for other classes after the ‘combat self-defense’ class… but that isn’t important right now.
“I got caught up in something. Can you step out of my room for a moment? I have stuff to do.”
“Right now? …Alright. You won’t tell me why, will you?”
She had an inquiring look. Despite that, she opened the maid’s room door and went into her room.
Left alone in my room, I pulled out a communication crystal for Lydia from the void space and activated it.
“Lord, did you call for me, my Lord!”
“It’s been a while, Lydia.”
I didn’t want to raise any suspicion, so I stayed in touch only through letters and avoided meeting directly or using this crystal… but it’s urgent, so there’s no helping it.
“I contacted you like this because I have a request.”
“A request! Just tell me, my Lord! I’ll do anything!”
“I need you to look into one person for me. This person is…”
The body I possessed is that of Luke Pulsreino.
Unlike my sisters, I was a weak boy with zero talent in martial arts.
Not only that, I had no aptitude for magic either, just pure incompetence.
The only decent thing was my slightly handsome appearance?
Being the brother of popular characters like Seiren and Meiru, I could at least say I was good-looking.
But the problem is this world of [Deus Ex Machina], where supernatural powers and mysteries abound, is dominated by strength.
No matter how good-looking you are or how high your status is, without power, you could suddenly find yourself in trouble at any moment.
Especially with the ‘Chaos’ forces rampaging at the story’s starting point, the importance of power for me could not be overstated.
Fortunately, I possessed this body at a young age, allowing over ten years to pass, which I intended to use as efficiently as possible.
My unique advantage as an incarnation is information, setting me apart from others.
Being a seasoned player, I don’t know everything, but I know a lot about the many hidden pieces in [Deus Ex Machina], so I aimed to obtain such opportunities and artifacts.
With my father’s permission, I diligently roamed with Hans, gathering such treasures.
Initially, due to my inexperience, I faced setbacks like being betrayed by mercenaries, but once I built up some know-how, I easily began to gather hidden pieces.
The most I managed to collect were elixirs.
Using the money Lydia sent, I bought or excavated items in [Deus Ex Machina] that increase a character’s stats.
Through this, my physical abilities grew to knight level, and I managed to reach the level of a grand mage in terms of magic capacity.
Next, I focused on artifacts.
No matter how strong my physical abilities became, if my swordsmanship was terrible, fighting with my body alone would be inefficient. Moreover, I wasn’t great at manipulating this body’s magic either, so my solution became special artifacts.
The artifacts of the current age and those of the ancient forgotten age differ significantly.
Current age artifacts were created for the powerless who cannot use supernatural abilities. As such, their powers and ranges are limited compared to those made for that purpose.
In contrast, ancient artifacts discovered through excavations are not designed for this purpose, thus allowing powerful and extensive supernatural abilities at the cost of the user’s magic.
Ancient humans required these artifacts because even with plenty of magic power, they couldn’t learn swordsmanship or magic, while in current times, institutions like magic towers or guilds provide places to learn such skills, making artifacts that require the user’s magic unnecessary.
Anyone capable of using ancient artifacts would likely already possess excellent swordsmanship or magical capabilities.
Because of these characteristics, except for some cases, most ancient artifacts became unpopular with the humans of the current age. Some were even treated as useless antiques, resulting in excavation efforts being insufficient due to low profit relative to expenses, unlike me, who didn’t even know the locations of ruins.
This allowed me to easily obtain ancient artifacts.
In fact, mercenaries who attempted to steal artifacts from me were a special case. They likely didn’t even know the difference between regular and ancient artifacts.
The presence of magic towers and guilds brought uniformity to magic and swordsmanship systems, leading many types of magic and sword techniques to be forgotten.
Many ancient artifacts contained such forgotten abilities, significantly aiding me.
For someone like me, limited by an ambiguous gift that I cannot use freely, ancient artifacts became an effective means of boosting combat power.
The fact that ancient artifacts provide forgotten abilities would be highlighted during part two of [Deus Ex Machina], causing the value of ancient artifacts across the continent to skyrocket.
But right now, their worth is at rock bottom.
Through various practical experiences with Hans, I also learned how to effectively use the artifacts.
And I either shoved away or sold off a few artifacts that didn’t suit me.
Dia’s sword, the mermaid’s Hauf’s sword, ‘Huphnis’ was one such weapon.
Being an ancient artifact, it requires the user’s magic, but it allowed summoning and manipulating this much water even in dry places.
It was a sword favorable for swordsmen, so unlike other artifacts, there was demand for it.
Thus, it was easy to convert to money, and I sold it at an auction…
So why does Dia have it…?
I never expected Lydia would give it to her.
Now that’s a twist I never saw coming!
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