Hogg raised a hand to cut him off. With every new number he heard, the fire in his chest burned hotter. He turned and snatched his mage robe from the rack, throwing it over his shoulders. Before Marz could open his mouth to protest, a deafening explosion suddenly roared outside the window.
The shockwave rattled the glass, and several thick magic grimoires tumbled from the top shelf of the bookcase. Hogg strode to the window and pushed it open—a wave of heat accompanied by the stench of burning flesh hit him square in the face.
A three-story building less than two hundred meters from the Magic Tower had partially collapsed. Flames licked out of the shattered windows as thick smoke billowed into the sky. It was a guard barracks in the palace courtyard. Alarm bells began to toll frantically, and the sounds of running footsteps and shouting erupted throughout the grounds.
Marz hurried forward. “Master! The palace’s defenses are already spread thin. If you leave now—”
“You and the Imperial Guards are enough. I’m leaving this place to you for now.”
Hogg’s voice had returned to its usual cold, hard tone. His staff flew from its rack in the corner of the room, landing firmly in his palm. Four distinct colors of mana patterns lit up along the staff—crimson, ice blue, violet, and silver-white. The four elemental lights cycled and flowed; with every pulse, the surrounding air vibrated.
Ice, Fire, Wind, and Lightning—a four-element mage, one of the few four-element Heroic Spirits on the Ogu Continent.
“I’d like to see just how long these vermin think they can keep jumping around...”
As he spoke, his body transformed into a streak of light, darting out of the window toward the academy. The air behind him pulled into a white wake—a trail of light caused by the friction between his mana and the air due to his extreme speed.
Marz rushed to the window, catching only a glimpse of that light flickering against the dark red barrier in the distance. He stood dazed for a few seconds before quickly returning to the desk and picking up the communicator.
“Intelligence, Dean Hogg has headed for the academy. Repeat, the dean has headed for the academy.”
...
Above the academy.
Hogg hovered outside the pale red curtain of light, his robe flapping violently in the wind. At this close range, the dark red mana patterns flowing across the surface of the barrier were accompanied by a faint, unsettling hum. He narrowed his eyes and raised his staff.
The silver-white lightning patterns on the staff lit up first. Tiny arcs of electricity danced around the staff, emitting sharp crackling sounds. Mana was compressed into the tip, converging into a fist-sized orb of lightning. The air around it warped under the sheer concentration of energy.
“【Lightning】.”
The bolt of lightning shot forth, exploding the moment it struck the curtain. A blinding white light illuminated half the sky as if it were day, and countless arcs of electricity crawled wildly across the barrier’s surface. The point of impact shook violently, and the dark red mana patterns turned black and snapped like scorched blood vessels. A gap nearly three meters wide was torn open, its edges constantly eroded by the residual lightning, preventing it from closing immediately.
Hogg transformed back into a streak of light and surged through the gap.
He came to a halt in the air above the academy, looking down.
As far as his eyes could see—this was the place where he had served as dean for two hundred years. The main plaza was littered with the injured and the dead. Below the memorial, the city guard captain was covered in blood, his longsword stained with dark red filth. Near the teaching buildings, several junior students were desperately using basic magic to fend off charging cultists. On a path by the lake, a teacher was shielding several children as they ran toward the woods, pursued by three dark red figures. Fire and smoke were everywhere, amidst collapsed buildings and scattered corpses.
Hogg gripped his staff so hard his knuckles cracked. He descended onto the academy’s main road, planting the base of his staff firmly into the gaps between the stone slabs.
Before he could take a step, five figures emerged from the shadows of the surrounding buildings.
Three mages in dark red robes—one tall and thin, one short and stout, and one of average height—stood in a triangular formation. Beside them was a warrior in black heavy armor, wielding a metal tower shield that was nearly half his height. The five of them surrounded him in a semicircle, their mana fluctuations rippling outward.
Directly in front of him, a middle-aged man in a dark robe walked toward him with measured steps, clapping his hands slowly. The sound of his applause was jarringly out of place in the temporarily silent clearing.
“As expected of a Heroic Spirit.” Ignatius stopped, looking at Hogg across a few slabs of debris-strewn pavement with a smirk. “Even our strongest barrier couldn’t keep you out.”
Hogg didn’t respond. He raised his staff, the crimson fire patterns glowing to their absolute limit.
“【Flame Storm】.”
With him as the center, a ring of golden-red fire expanded outward, crushing everything in its path. The temperature of the flames was extreme; wherever they passed, stone was scorched into lava and the air warped. The thin mage immediately cast 【Shadow Veil】, but the black curtain was torn open the moment it touched the wave of fire, the impact sending him stumbling back a dozen steps. The warrior raised his great shield to the front, the earthen yellow glow of an 【Earthen Bulwark】 flaring to life. He managed to withstand the direct impact, but the surface of his shield turned glowing red, and the stone slabs beneath his feet cracked under the recoil.
Ignatius stood his ground, a high-speed rotating wall of wind—a 【Wind Barrier】—rising before him. The flames struck the barrier and were diverted by the airflow, sliding past him without so much as singeing his clothes.
Hogg’s brow furrowed slightly.
He hadn’t held back with that strike. Under normal circumstances, a 【Flame Storm】 of that level would have been enough to vaporize five Rank 7 practitioners instantly. Yet, they had not only blocked it but had done so without much apparent struggle.
Then, he sensed something strange—a minute thread of mana was constantly leaking from his body. The speed wasn’t fast, but it was steady. Given his total mana capacity as a Heroic Spirit, this loss was negligible, but the problem was that no magic should be able to forcibly drain mana from a Heroic Spirit mage.
“What is this barrier?”
Ignatius spread his hands obligingly, like a teacher explaining a concept to a curious student.
“The ‘Mana-Devouring Barrier,’ a gift from the Blood Moon God. It maintains the shield, drains the mana of the ‘materials,’ and suppresses everyone within its range. As for the extent of that suppression—”
He raised a hand and drew a small circle with his finger toward Hogg.
“No matter how strong you are outside, in here—you can only exert the power of the peak of Rank 7 at most. Even a Heroic Spirit is no exception. Your total mana pool remains unchanged, but the upper limit of mana you can mobilize for each strike has been locked at Rank 7. And as a friendly reminder, breaking this barrier requires at least the Legend rank... if you don’t believe me...”
Another person added, “Feel free to try a few more spells.”
Hogg didn’t waste time with further testing.
Once was enough.
The next second, he moved—the lightning patterns on his staff flared again, electricity coating the length of the staff as he charged like a bolt of lightning toward the thin mage on the far left. When one’s strength was suppressed while outnumbered, the best tactic was to close the distance and eliminate the opponent’s casting range.
The thin mage hadn’t expected him to charge into the encirclement. In his haste, he could only throw up another 【Shadow Veil】. But lightning was not an elemental magic; dark magic had extremely limited effectiveness against it. Hogg’s staff, wreathed in lightning, smashed down. As the dark veil was torn apart, the end of the staff slammed heavily into the thin mage’s own staff—with a sharp crack, a fine fracture appeared on the wood.
The thin mage’s pupils shrank, and he used the momentum to retreat frantically. Wind mana exploded beneath Hogg’s feet as he flashed forward in pursuit, his left hand splayed open as a rapidly spinning wind blade condensed in his palm.
The stout mage arrived from the side, slamming his staff into the ground—【Gravity Field】. A dull yellow halo expanded instantly, and the gravity within a dozen meters intensified several times over. Hogg’s movement slowed visibly. In that split second of hesitation, the warrior had already charged in, leading with his half-molten shield, which glowed with the white light of a 【Concussive Shield Bash】.
Hogg didn’t dodge. He pulled his left hand back and clenched it into a fist, a burst of lightning exploding over his knuckles.
“【Lightning Punch】.”
His fist slammed into the shield, sending sparks flying. The warrior was knocked back several steps, shield and all, leaving a scorched fist print on the metal. Hogg’s hand went numb from the recoil, and several small arcs of electricity leaked from between his fingers before vanishing into the air.
Almost simultaneously, Ignatius made his move.
His staff pointed forward silently, wind mana at the tip condensing into a nearly transparent needle—【Wind Fang Pierce】. There was no dazzling light or thunderous sound; the spell had been deliberately compressed to its finest point, its only characteristic being extreme penetration.
Hogg sensed the dangerous pressure and ducked to the right, but his physical reaction speed was half a beat too slow under the barrier’s suppression. The wind needle grazed his left ribs, slicing through his robe and leaving a wound that quickly began to bleed.
Ignatius retracted his staff and shook his head slightly. “You dodged it. That should have gone right through.”
Hogg’s face remained expressionless. Trading a non-lethal wound to break two of the enemy’s defenses was not a bad deal in his book.
He scanned the positions of the five men. The warrior was in front, protecting the thin mage and Ignatius; the stout mage was on the flank; and the tall mage remained at the very back, having not yet made a move. It was a standard three-front, two-back formation, perfectly balanced for offense and defense. Ignatius was the primary attacker with high-speed wind magic; the thin mage handled control, his dark magic countering most elements; the stout mage’s gravity field constantly suppressed his speed; the warrior’s heavy shield absorbed damage; and the tall mage in the back remained within Ignatius’s protection, as if waiting for something.
If this dragged on, though his mana was plentiful, his output per spell was capped. The five of them could rotate and rest, while he would eventually be worn down.
Hogg took a deep breath and did two things. First—he retracted all the mana shields surrounding his body. Then, the four different colored mana patterns on his staff lit up to their absolute maximum. Crimson, ice blue, violet, and silver-white—the four lights intertwined and swirled, causing the surrounding air to vibrate violently.
Seeing this, Ignatius’s expression turned serious. He whispered softly,
“He’s going all out.”
Rate on N.U.
