Chapter 232

Translator: Kell | Editor: Weasalopes

Ivan’s Fireworks

Ivan woke up to the sounds of swords clashing outside . He was drinking up until two hours ago, so he was still a little groggy, but he needed to get up .

「Ivan! We got company!」

A knight, one of the men Alexei sent for reinforcement, stormed in through the door . Just like Ivan, he was drinking a while ago too, but while his face was red, he was already armed .

「S-Sorry! I’ll be right there!」

「You can bring your sword, but don’t use it . You’re drunk, it’ll only get in the way . Either tie up enemies, or help our comrades!」

「G-Got it!」

The knigh bolted through the hallway . As Ivan stood up, he tripped on the sheets and tumbled down to the floor .

「Ouch…」

Covering his face, he caught sight of his bag propped against the wall, a thin rod sticking out of it .

「O-Oh, right . I need to call Hikaru . 」

It was given to him by Hikaru to use if the enemy attacked at night . At the tip of the rod was a chrysalis-shaped object with a small string extending from it .

「Let’s see… A vase…」

Ivan shoved the rod into the empty vase with the chrysalis pointed upwards . As he opened the window, a chill breeze rushed in, and he could clearly hear men shouting as they fought . I need to join them soon . Why did I even get drunk? Ivan thought .

He shook his head . 「I gotta do this first . 」

A small candle still burned on the candlestand on the table .

「Uh, he said to light it up . 」

Ivan took both the candlestick and the vase to the window . As he brought the flame close to the string, it made a hissing sound and gave off sparks . Ivan’s eyes widened as the spark quickly consumed the string .

「What the?!」

He thought the chrysalis would explode, but instead it let out a shrill noise as it launched high into the night sky along with the rod before going off with a bang . It was a so-called skyrocket that, of course, Ivan knew nothing about .

「Wh-What was that…?」He stood there, dumbfounded . 「I-I gotta go, too . 」He then bolted out of the room .

Hikaru slept alone in his room . Right now, Catherine was in the apartment as well . She could’ve slept at the mansion where she stayed when classes were in session, but the servants weren’t around during winter . He couldn’t let her stay in a huge mansion all alone .

Suddenly, light coming from a magic item illuminated his entire room . Created by Katy, it functioned by lighting up once the skyrocket exploded . Through some sort of a radio wave, the explosion would cause a mana reaction that would trigger the device . His place might be close to the academy, but he couldn’t possibly hear the explosion .

Hikaru explained about the radio that they discovered in the Zubura ruins to Katy, and she made progress in her studies about it . As for the skyrocket, Katy herself learned about it from the catalog of artifacts . The fact that she could create this with little information just proved how incredible she was as a Magic Item Specialist .

「They’re here, huh?」

Hikaru quickly got out of bed and changed . After wearing his cloak and fastening the wakizashi on his waist, he was good to go .

「Hikaru . 」

He was met by Lavia and Catherine in their pajamas in the living room . The magic lamp emitted only a faint light, and he couldn’t see clearly, but he thought Catherine was surprisingly blessed around the chest area .

「Sorry I woke you up . I’m going . 」

「Okay . We’ll—」

With his mobility, it would be much easier if Hikaru went alone, and Lavia’s forte was large-scale magic against a large number of enemies . She wouldn’t be able to do much this time .

「You can go back to sleep . 」he said .

「Kay . 」

「W-Wait! How can you be so calm about this?!」Catherine exclaimed .

「You can stay up, then, if you want . Anyway, I’m in a hurry . 」

「Bye . 」Lavia said .

「Hm… Take care, then . 」Catherine added, still not convinced if this was the right idea .

Both Hikaru and Lavia were already used to urgent situations, while Catherine was not .

Hikaru ran down the stairs and out of the building . Up in the sky, the bright moon illuminated his snowy path . With five points on Power Burst, it actually made it harder to dash at full speed in the snow . Even so, the academy was close . He made it there in less than ten minutes after the magic item in his room went off .

Hikaru slowed down as he neared the dorms . The knights from Jarazack, slightly injured, had the assailants surrounded . A few severely-injured ones gathered in a corner, tended to by Ivan .

There were less than ten assailants, while twenty men—double that of the enemy—surrounded them . But the knights, their weapons on the ready, couldn’t get closer .

The assailants were stained in deep red . Blood oozed from their bodies . One of them even lost his arm . But each and every one of them still stood . They were willing to fight to the bitter end .

「Keep your guard up . 」Mikhail said, his great sword on hand .

「Yes, Sir!」the men replied in unison .

Looks like I can just leave this to them, Hikaru thought . Is this all of the enemies?

Hikaru’s Instinct spoke to him . Claude was not here . He was in lecture building C with Luka .

What if an elite team headed there? A cornered rat will bite a cat .

Claude hadn’t fought someone who was prepared to throw their life away . Even the knights who clearly outnumbered the assailants couldn’t take them all down immediately . Tenacious enemies with such firm determination were tough .

Hikaru deactivated his Stealth as he approached Ivan .

「Ivan . 」

「H-Hikaru?! Where’d you come from?!」

「Where are the other knights? Over at Claude?」

「Well…」

Ivan explained things to Hikaru . There were supposed to be fifty men, but about twenty of them took a request from the guild and went monster hunting .

「Those idiots!」

Monsters surging forth at this point in time couldn’t possibly be true . Pretending to go hunt monsters and then come back was one thing, but actually going out on a hunt for real was utter foolishness .

「That means…」

A chill ran down Hikaru’s spine .

Right now, only Claude is protecting Luka…

Claude’s sword deflected the sword of the blue-haired man . It wasn’t as though Larks Lordgrad Ludancia wasn’t strong enough . Claude was just that much stronger .

How?! No one told me Claude Zahard Kirihal was a skilled swordsman!

Larks couldn’t hide his agitation .

「Now you know the difference in our abilities . You’ll have to bring more people if you want a chance of defeating me . 」

Claude sounded calm, but he was anything but that . He was up against three people . If he took down Larks, the other two would surely attack . To make matters worse, the lanky man was a short-bow user .

Claude just needs to buy time and he wins, Larks thought . So he doesn’t need to kill his opponent…

Utter humiliation . He expected to lose against a man from Jarazack, but not someone from Kirihal .

Contrary to Hikaru’s expectations, Claude managed to defend himself .

「Oh, what’s this?」Then all of a sudden, Larks heard an indifferent voice . 「Come on, Sir . You should at least be able to kill Claude . I know we didn’t expect him to be this strong, but I thought you were quite strong yourself . 」

The lanky bow-user, Ray, suddenly started speaking . His words took Larks by surprise . It wasn’t the same Ray he knew . It wasn’t the young man who expressed how much he respected his commander .

Something’s wrong, Larks thought . Though he couldn’t exactly tell what exactly . The other man, Larks’ right-hand Joseph, noticed Ray’s strange behavior .

「You moron! Keep your mouth shut!」Joseph yelled as he grabbed Ray’s shoulders . 「We have an enemy right before us—」

Ray stabbed Joseph’s arm with something . Joseph quickly pulled away, his face twisted in pain .

「What are you doing?!」

Ray smiled . On his hand was a syringe, its needle as big as the ones used by smiths in sewing . Blood dripped from Joseph’s arm .

「We’ll surely lose if this goes on longer . So how about we use the ace up my sleeve?」

His mouth curved into a smile, but his eyes were dead serious . The next instant, Joseph let out a scream .