Theorad, the Star Instructor (2)

The following day. Twenty-first floor, Imperial University Mage Tower.

Outside the large lecture hall.

Today's finally the day.

I stood before the automatic doors, their surfaces set with magic stones, and tried to calm myself. My grip tightened on the lecture papers.

Can I really give this lecture? And more importantly…

I glanced at the elf standing beside me.

Thankfully, nothing I'd feared the night before had happened. She hadn't tried to pounce on me or seduce me. In fact, she'd simply helped me with the final stages of preparation.

Perhaps she'd taken pity on me because the lecture was the next day. I didn't understand her intentions, but I couldn't deny she'd been helpful.

“…?”

The elf noticed my gaze and looked up at me. She seemed a little tired; her red eyes blinked slowly.

“Aren't you going in? The students are waiting.”

“…In a moment.”

“Very well. Don't shake. I'll take care of the rest.”

She gave that brief advice and looked toward the doors. I wasn't certain what she had in mind, but there was no time left to ask.

All right. Go in.

I took a deep breath and stepped forward. The doors slid apart to reveal an old-fashioned lecture hall. Tiered desks spread in a fan around a raised platform and an enormous blackboard. Nearly a hundred students sat facing me; more students and several professors had crowded in to stand along the back.

This feels more like an examination than a lecture.

I was glad to see the students' curiosity. The professors were another matter. Their severe, skeptical gazes made me feel as though the slightest tremor in my voice would invite them to tear me apart.

Still…

I'd prepared as thoroughly as I could. Whatever else happened, they wouldn't be able to call the lecture useless.

I walked steadily to the podium, laid out my papers, and faced the audience.

“Greetings. I am Theorad Deharem, creator of artificial rain magic.”

I left out my other titles. Following the elf's advice, I spoke with deliberate arrogance.

The professors showed no obvious reaction. Some of the female students, however, began whispering excitedly among themselves.

“Quiet. The lecture is beginning.”

I looked over the seats.

“I've heard that quite a few of you enrolled despite having little interest in magical design. So we'll begin with the fundamentals.”

I raised a hand and snapped my fingers. A small flame appeared in the air: a simple domestic spell that almost anyone with mana could perform.

“To produce a flame like this, you need only remember the pattern in your mind. As long as you have mana, it's an easy spell. However…”

I put out the flame and touched one of my lecture sheets. The sheet unfolded and floated beside me, revealing a diagram for Fireball, an elementary attack spell.

Of course, I wasn't the one holding the paper in the air. The elf, with whom I'd been practicing for the past week, was moving it with her telekinesis so it looked like my own magic.

“Fireball combines the patterns for ‘flame’ and ‘elemental condensation.’ When you use two or more patterns, you must connect them harmoniously through circuits. The academic term for linking the patterns and manifesting the resulting spell is chanting.”

When I finished, the sheet folded itself away. A few of the students were paying closer attention.

“As you know, with a simple spell such as Fireball, one can visualize the magic circle and recite a chant. A wand makes the process easier still. Does anyone know why?”

A student raised a hand. I pointed to them.

“Go ahead.”

“A wand greatly reduces mana consumption while increasing a spell's effective output. Its built-in auxiliary memory can also simplify the chant, allowing the caster to manifest magic beyond their usual level.”

“Correct.”

It was a textbook answer. I nodded and tapped the second sheet.

A much larger magic circle unfurled in the air. Fourteen patterns, fifty-eight symbols, and three hundred forty-two circuits spread out before the audience.

The room went still.

The patterns, symbols, and circuits were so densely interwoven they looked almost impossible to follow. Yet there wasn't an error to be found. A flawless design of that complexity made the audience doubt what they were seeing.

“This is the diagram for my artificial rain magic. At this level, chanting alone cannot ordinarily manifest the spell. That's why magical design still matters, even though wands and shortened chants have made many simpler magic circles less necessary.”

A breath seemed to pass through the room. Many had apparently never seen the artificial rain circle itself. Some recovered enough to reach for their notebooks. Even professors began discreetly taking notes while checking whether their colleagues were watching.

I could understand their astonishment. It was rare for so many pieces of a magic circle to fit together without a single flaw. Roylen hadn't exaggerated when calling artificial rain a milestone in the history of magic.

Of course, the elf deserved much of the credit. But with her committed to the role of my slave, she wouldn't let me acknowledge her as a fellow creator. I swallowed my misgivings and continued as we'd prepared.

“Magical design is closely tied to natural phenomena. To design a spell correctly, we must approach its circle with a scholar's understanding. For example, here, levitation and gravitational reversal interact to produce adiabatic expansion…”

The audience followed closely. As I explained the mechanism of artificial rain, answering the occasional question, the lecture began to flow. By the time we approached the more advanced material, nearly an hour had passed.

Then a student raised a hand. There was something confrontational about the look directed at me. I considered the interruption, then nodded.

“Speak.”

“My name is Albizabe. I study military magic in the school corps. I've listened carefully, Instructor, but I believe what matters most in a mage is intuition, practical skill, and the ability to produce a phenomenon—not merely scholarly theory.”

“That isn't wrong.”

“Thank you. But after observing your lecture, I suspect that, however learned you are in theory, you lack practical skill.”

I was caught off guard. I couldn't afford to show it. After a measured breath, I asked coldly:

“Why?”

“Other instructors demonstrate various spells themselves to prove their abilities. So far, you've shown us nothing beyond magic anyone here could use.”

The room fell silent. Many students frowned at Albizabe for disrupting the lecture, though some plainly shared the question.

That wasn't the real problem.

Beside me, the elf was glaring at Albizabe as though she wanted to kill the student. If I didn't stop her, that might cease to be a figure of speech.

I fixed Albizabe with the most disdainful look I could manage.

“Do you imagine you'll understand my magic simply by seeing it?”

Albizabe stood firm.

“If you'll show me, I—”

Whooosh!

Blazing flames surged through the lecture hall, sparks spinning together as if the fire were alive. They contracted into a brilliant sphere, as bright as a small sun.

The students recoiled. Then the light flickered.

Bang!

The fireball burst apart. Screams rose throughout the hall. Fragments flew in every direction, yet none struck a living person; each piece stopped suspended in the air, a blazing constellation scattered around the room.

The magic was the elf's. The audience stared, transfixed by the spectacle. One student reached toward a fragment as though under a spell.

“Don't touch it!” I shouted.

Every eye turned to me.

I steadied my breathing, took the fountain pen from the podium, and carefully brought it against a nearby fragment.

Hiss.

The pen melted on contact. It didn't merely catch fire; it liquefied.

What the hell…?

I barely swallowed the profanity that rose to my lips. Keeping an eye on the elf, I set the pen aside as calmly as possible.

“As you've just seen, every fragment in this room is at an extraordinary temperature. They may give off no noticeable heat, but if you grab one, you could lose your hand.”

As I spoke, the fragments vanished like snow melting. The elf had released the spell.

An icy silence settled over the room. Students sat trembling; professors murmured urgently among themselves. Albizabe stood rigid, unable to speak.

“I don't blame you for being a frog at the bottom of a well.”

I was scarcely less shaken than they were, but I had to bring the confrontation to an end. I looked down at Albizabe.

“But a frog facing a lion should know better than to speak so recklessly.”

The meaning was plain: outside the protection afforded a student in a lecture hall, such insolence could have ended in death. Albizabe gasped.

There was no hope of resuming the lesson now. I gathered my papers with a sigh.

“That concludes today's lecture. Reflect on what you've done wrong.”

I turned toward the door. In the silence, my footsteps sounded absurdly loud.

A student suddenly called after me, almost pleading.

“I-Instructor! If we work hard enough, could we ever use the magic you just showed us?”

Tap.

I stopped but turned only my head.

“Even if you devoted your entire life to studying magic…”

It was unfortunate, but an instructor ought to tell the truth. I narrowed my eyes and answered in a voice as cold as I could make it.

“You wouldn't even come close to my heels.”