“G-got it just in time…”
“Is Johann a wizard now?”
“Well, I’ve heard he has a wizard certification…”
“I noticed before that you could build a tower with that certification?”
“How is that even possible?!”
“I don’t know either. But hey… he’s super versatile, right?”
At Shuri’s question, Viola shrugged her shoulders. She had no idea how that was possible either; she could only admire him.
“But, don’t we need to save Lewis…?”
“That’s right! Lewis! Can you hear me?!”
Shuri’s voice echoed through the training hall. In response, a fireball came flying at them once again.
Maybe it was because they shouted, or maybe because they just stood there. Without a chance to confirm which, the wizard group hurriedly ran to dodge the fireball.
“Phew, that scared me.”
“Don’t shout, Shuri. We’re fighting that uncle right now. It’s not good to attract attention.”
“Y-you’re right. If we talk now…”
“Let’s hurry up and join in. Like it or not, we have to get Lewis out.”
The most efficient method would be to bombard attacks, hoping Lewis would dodge on his own, but they didn’t have the guts to do that. If he accidentally got hurt, the guilt would be too much to bear.
“First, let’s break through that maze and distract the uncle to buy some time for Lewis to escape. Otherwise…”
Just then, a ground-shaking sound drew everyone’s attention toward the maze. A distinctly bright blue aura cut through the maze’s walls, revealing itself.
“Impressive…”
“Lewis is amazing! With that kind of attack, he can surely escape the maze…”
“…”
“…Isn’t that a bit too much?”
Lewis’s sword strike was futile, and the maze rapidly underwent repair. The terrifying recovery speed made the party realize they couldn’t easily extract Lewis with conventional methods.
“What do we do?!”
“Ugh, how do we win against that?”
“If we can just stop him from moving around the walls…”
“How?”
“I-I’ll push Johann off the wall with wind magic!”
‘If I do well, maybe Johann will think better of me!’
Elisa closed her eyes and began her incantation. Viola pulled out a potion.
“Shuri, let’s buy some time.”
“Okay!”
Shuri nodded vigorously.
———————
‘There’s no chance in this maze. I need to get out!’
Lewis’s gaze turned upward. The easiest way to escape the maze was to climb the walls. But the top of the walls was already the enemy’s territory.
If he climbed up, he would be immediately attacked by Johann.
‘But breaking through the maze is even more dangerous.’
He swung his sword horizontally, but despite being sure he had struck, the maze reverted to its original state with just the word “Repair.” Lewis felt hopeless in front of the freshly restored maze.
‘I can’t just wait for a rescue, can I?’
But he couldn’t just leave it at that.
Lewis gauged the remaining amount of aura in his lower abdomen and gathered his energy.
‘There’s less than half left. I can’t keep fighting for long.’
While he had more aura than his peers, it wasn’t enough to sustain a long battle in this environment.
Thus, he needed a way to break through the deadlock.
As Lewis’s mind began to race, a faint voice rang out from afar.
“Lewis! I’ll shoot wind magic over the maze, so when the spell passes, get out over the maze!”
A sound he wouldn’t have heard had he not entered the realm of the superhuman. Lewis looked up at her voice. Oddly enough, his vision was dim.
“I got it.”
“Why is Sir Quartz responding?”
“I’m being attacked, so shouldn’t I respond?”
A shovel swung down from Johann, who was crouching on the wall, aimed right at Lewis’s head.
The shovel brushed past his nose, and blood flowed. Lewis wiped the wound on his nose with the back of his hand and charged at the man on the wall.
“Crafting.”
Just before Lewis’s attack, a wall rose between them. However, it was a pattern he had already experienced once. Lewis kicked the wall and jumped up to the top.
It was due to the experience of almost getting trapped when trying to respond from inside the maze. At the very least, going up was better than being trapped—
“Crafting.”
‘…Doing this won’t yield any results!’
Lewis rotated his body in mid-air, smashing the suddenly appeared ceiling and rolling onto the floor. Had he tried to go up, he surely would have smacked his head into the ceiling.
Even for a knight, taking a direct hit to the head was no trivial matter, leaving Lewis with no choices.
“If you recklessly enter the enemy’s territory, you’ll just be tossed around. But it’s not like there’s absolutely no way. Do you know what it is?”
Somewhere, Johann’s voice echoed. Lewis pondered Johann’s sudden remark, but he couldn’t find a way to escape the maze. He wasn’t exactly the type to think deeply; he was just a martial arts man.
‘A way to get out of this…‘
Lewis mulled over Johann’s advice.
“If you recklessly enter the enemy’s territory, you’ll just be tossed around.”
Then what’s a way not to be tossed around?
‘I need to get out of this maze.’
If entering the territory was the problem, then getting out of it should work.
But how?
Just cutting through the walls alone wouldn’t allow him to escape this maze easily.
“Is it difficult? Let me put it simply. Break free from your frame of thought. Use any means at your disposal. Is the sword only for slashing?”
Lewis glanced down at the sword he was holding, the words from Johann echoing in his mind.
‘That’s right; the sword’s purpose isn’t just slashing.’
A simple truth that he hadn’t realized due to the bewildering situation. The aura within Lewis stirred, bursting forth again.
The finely polished sword began to shimmer with blue aura once more.
Widening his stance, he held the sword horizontally at chest height, stretching his arm out toward the wall with all his might.
Not a slash, but a thrust.
As the young man, barely having shed his boyhood, thrust forward, aura burst forth from the tip of his sword.
The aura shot out and pierced through the wall one after another. No matter how sturdy the walls were, they were just ordinary stone. They couldn’t remain intact after being struck by an aura projectile.
With a loud bang, the blue sky became visible straight ahead.
Lewis instinctively lunged forward, kicking the ground.
“That’s it. Lewis.”
Somewhere, he heard a voice that seemed to echo back. Turning around, he saw Johann crouched on the wall, looking down at him.
“It’s becoming doable again.”
“Maybe. Crafting.”
Lewis looked up at Johann with a face full of disbelief.
At this point, it was hard to tell whether this was mock combat or a maze-building project.
“…Are you planning to turn the training hall completely into a maze?”
“Who knows? It could happen during a fight.”
Johann chuckled lightly and turned his gaze to Elisa, who was chanting a spell towards him.
‘Impressive.’
Considering Elisa’s seriously timid personality, it was already a sign of great growth for her to cast a spell on him.
[Contractor, you need to intercept the magic before it hits! If you don’t, you will really lose!]
“Stop fussing.”
He shushed Rue, then immediately unfolded his next move.
“Crafting.”
He expanded the maze, bit by bit. And more…
Lewis stepped back with a look of disgust at that action. It was meaningless to engage in battle right now, so the best option was to fight while the wizards supported him; he needed to focus on control rather than outright fighting.
Once again, he swung his sword, the blade glimmering.
Just as expected, it was a miss.
Yet Lewis wasn’t disappointed. A strike that was good if it hit, but didn’t matter if it missed.
“Crafting.”
“If this continues, there won’t be a place to step.”
“Then step inside here.”
Johann kindly suggested entering the inner part of the maze, but Lewis firmly refused.
“I refuse.”
It was too obvious what would happen, so no one would step into danger. Johann quietly nodded without any signs of disappointment and continued to widen the maze.
Now, about a third of the training hall had been transformed into a maze.
Lewis looked up at him with a grossed-out expression, sweating cold.
‘It’s going to be tough if magic doesn’t come into play.’
They lacked firepower. They needed enough firepower to wipe out the whole maze.
But it was difficult to acquire that kind of firepower.
“Lewis!”
A familiar voice. At the sound of his lover, Lewis opened his eyes wide and stared at Johann. A mass of wind began to fly toward Johann almost simultaneously.
‘Should I dodge or block? I can’t tell.’
After contemplating whether to erect another wall, Johann fell under the maze.
There was no reason to bother blocking.
And as Lewis watched that scene, he kicked the ground and ran out to join the support team.
“Shuri, Elisa, use magic to neutralize Johann as quickly as you can, or break down the maze to stop the expansion!”
At Lewis’s words, everyone nodded.
“…Can we do it?”
“…I’m not sure either.”
The one staring blankly at the maze that had crazily expanded adjusted his grip on his sword and spoke.
“But we have to try. Even if the chances of success are close to 0%, we must do something to survive.”
The young man wielding the blue sword chuckled.
That smile resembled that of the man watching him from the wall.
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