novelraw Chapter 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 2
Yeah, this was reincarnation.
I was certain. If anything, denying the situation would have given me even more of a headache.
Then how had I been able to reincarnate?
I couldn’t answer that with confidence.
But there was one part that made me suspicious.
‘Could it have been then?’
It was right before Tyrant’s magic orb struck my body, when I had also manifested a spell by drawing out every last bit of power I had.
If I assumed it was the effect of that spell, it made some amount of sense.
Or it might have been a phenomenon caused by the transcendent energy created when my magic and Tyrant’s magic clashed.
Of course, that wasn’t a definite answer.
It was only the part that made me suspect something.
I had thought I would die on the spot, no question.
That had been the predetermined path, the unescapable conclusion.
‘Wait, then what about Etar? What happened to Etar, who suffered a fatal attack fighting Tyrant that day?’
If Etar had died as well, would he have reincarnated just like me, in the form of a boy?
The question suddenly crossed my mind.
“Artel, what are you doing? I said let’s go eat already! Now that vacation’s started, we’re the only ones here. For the next two months, this Class 0 floor is our world!”
“Yeah, it’s the fifth summer vacation the three of us are spending at school!”
Hei and Kiena spoke in voices overflowing with excitement.
The mention of the word ‘vacation’ made it clear this was the Magic Academy.
And Class 0……
“Class 0?”
“Whoa! Why are you so startled?”
“Told you…… I said Artel’s acting weird. I think Teacher Reji hit his head too hard…….”
Hei looked confused, and Kiena whispered quietly to him.
Class 0.
It was the class called the ‘initiation floor’ of the Magic Academy.
In this era, there were two types of mages.
‘Elementalists’ and ‘Summoners’.
An Elementalist was a mage who found the element among the seven that suited them.
They were Flewd (Flewd), Darkness, Light, Water, Fire, Earth, and Wind.
Among them, especially, a Flewd Elementalist—one who could handle all elements—was the rarest and strongest of all.
Thus, the name Flewd was a combination of the first letters of Fire (F), Light (L), Earth (E), Water, Wind (W), and Darkness (D).
Elementalists who were not Flewd were also called ‘single-element Elementalists,’ usually able to handle only one element.
If one handled fire, then they were called a ‘Fire Elementalist.’
On the other hand, Summoners were mages who fundamentally could not handle elements and instead summoned living beings called ‘divine objects.’
Class 0 existed to determine whether a student was an Elementalist or a Summoner.
And once that was determined, from Class 1 onward, each student received tailored education suited to element or summoning magic.
The reason I knew the Magic Academy so well was that I had attended it as a child, but more importantly, because in my previous life I had been the Archmage.
Since an Archmage also served as the headmaster of the Magic Academy, it was impossible for me not to know.
I lifted my eyes toward the ceiling.
‘Then does that mean that above me is Draco Tyrant, the bastard who killed me and became the new Archmage?’
The book I had seen right before losing consciousness had said Tyrant was a great Archmage, so the current Archmage must be Tyrant.
I had grasped the situation to a certain degree.
What I now had to figure out was just how much time had passed before I reincarnated into this world.
‘I know at least that this is the era when Tyrant is the Archmage, but…….’
Mages did not age easily.
The average lifespan of a mage was 400 years.
With a lifespan that long, the rate of aging was extremely slow.
The appearances of me, Kiena, and Hei were unmistakably those of teenagers, but from appearance alone, it was impossible to accurately determine age.
So I had to find out how much time had passed.
First, I looked around the school.
Then I looked at Hei and Kiena.
There was only one reason students remained at school even during vacation.
They were from the orphanage of the place called the ‘world below.’
The place where the Magic Academy was located was the ‘world above.’
You could think of them as worlds in different dimensions.
The reason the names were differentiated like this was because the Magical Society allowed only mages to enter.
But that didn’t mean only children of mage families became students.
Quite a lot of children born among commoners became mages as well.
Commoners were ordinary people who belonged neither to mages nor swordsmen.
Some called them heretics, lowborns, and other derogatory terms, but their official name was commoner.
And among the commoners’ children, many showed potential as mages or swordsmen and were able to enter the school.
So when vacation came, they returned to their homes in the world below to spend time with their families before coming back when school reopened.
The world below was the only world where commoners, mages, and swordsmen lived together without discrimination.
But these two—no, now including me with the name Artel—seemed to be three students from the Class 0 orphanage.
With nowhere else to go, they stayed at the school even during vacation.
There had been many such students in my previous life as well, so it was easy to accept.
“You two go ahead and eat. There’s something I want to check.”
I told Hei and Kiena and turned my back.
“Where are you going? Artel!”
Kiena shouted, but I didn’t even spare her a glance.
---
After confirming that Kiena and Hei had gone to the cafeteria, I hid behind a pillar.
If I really was in the body of a student right now, then that ‘thing’ would definitely be inside my body.
“Mob manifestation.”
Pop!
“Just as I thought…….”
My guess had been right.
A Mob was a combination of ‘Mini’ and ‘Orb.’
This magic orb, called a ‘small orb,’ served as a student ID while also functioning as a means for friends to communicate, a schedule for the Magic Academy, a navigation tool inside the school, and more—something my master had developed purely for the convenience of students.
It existed solely for student convenience, so no records were kept about whom a student contacted or what they searched for using the Mob.
It was implanted in a student’s body upon admission—a magic-engineering orb that moved according to the commands of its owner.
“Now, let’s see what kind of student the owner of this body was.”
I checked the personal information.
[Personal Information]
-Name: Artel
-Age: 13
-Admission: Ed Branch School
-Class: 0
-Year: 5
-Record: None
The fact that there was no surname and only a given name meant the original owner of this body was indeed a commoner.
Surnames were privileges granted only to families, so it would be the same for Kiena and Hei.
Thirteen years old, fifth year since admission.
In other words, he had entered at nine years old and had remained in Class 0—the initiation floor—until now.
‘Should I interpret this as him being truly hopelessly lacking in talent?’
I was curious how he had even managed to enroll.
Children of mage families generally found their element within two years at the latest.
For mages, a family was one representing a particular element or one that had mastered it.
Because they were children of such families, the element they would handle was already decided, so manifesting it did not take long.
But then—
“……Ed Branch School?”
There was only one family I knew that bore the name Ed.
It was the representative family of the fire element, my Disciple’s family, and the family of Etar—who had collapsed while trying to stop Tyrant from killing me in my past life!
And I couldn’t understand the existence of a branch school, either.
The only Magic Academy I knew was the one where I had been the headmaster…….
“Wait…….”
I suddenly looked down at my chest.
I saw a flame-shaped badge pinned over my left breast.
Come to think of it, the Magic Academy where I had served as headmaster had uniforms, but not red robes, and there had been no badges.
I focused on the fact that the emblem engraved on this badge represented fire.
“Ed Branch School…….”
This was the thing that bothered me the most.
The mention of a branch school on the Mob meant there were multiple Magic Academies now, and if the Ed mentioned here was truly the same Ed family I knew, it meant someone from the Ed family was the headmaster.
There was a lot I needed to figure out.
But I couldn’t find answers alone.
As I searched for a good method, the two students who were likely eating in the cafeteria came to mind.
‘Right, those students named Kiena and Hei.’
They had always been beside me.
Judging from their atmosphere and behavior, they seemed extremely close even in their daily lives.
[Friends]
1. Kiena
2. Hei
Just in case, I checked the Mob, and as expected, those two were the only ones listed in the address book.
Since I had only just reincarnated into the body of this student named Artel, I knew nothing about the current era.
A blind man with his eyes open.
Somehow, that phrase suited my situation too well.
It seemed fastest to ask them about the school.
I headed toward the cafeteria where the two would be.
---
“Huh? Artel, you came? I knew it, you were hungry, right?”
Kiena was the first to notice me as soon as I entered the cafeteria.
“Yeah, sure.”
I decided to act as naturally as possible.
Even if my soul had been replaced by Archis Eimer, the Archmage, the body itself was still their friend Artel.
The student cafeteria had all sorts of dishes laid out.
You chose whatever you wanted and ate from your own plate.
I put just a bit of scrambled eggs on my plate and sat next to Hei.
After deciding how to bring it up as naturally as possible, I finally opened my mouth.
“By the way.”
“Mm, what is it?”
Kiena was the one who responded.
Hei simply dipped bread in soup and chewed in silence.
From what I had observed so far, Kiena had the more energetic personality, and Hei seemed to have a considerably blunt one.
“We enrolled in the Ed Branch School.”
“Yeah! It’s been five years already. Five years ago, the three of us came together from the orphanage in the world below.”
As expected.
Artel, Hei, Kiena.
These three had leaned on one another since their orphanage days as they endured school life.
It also explained why Artel’s Mob had only two entries in his friends list.
They were pitiful students from the orphanage, ignored even by their own classmates in Class 0.
That was also why, when Reji had scolded me earlier, mocking laughter and disdainful comments came from all over the room.
“Anyway, how many branch schools were there again? I don’t remember.”
I took a slight gamble asking this.
Even if they looked at me strangely, I could just act as though I had temporary memory loss because Reji’s magic had hit my head too hard.
“You’re only asking that now? You never cared even once for the past five years.”
Thankfully, I avoided suspicion.
“There are five. And the one we chose is this school—the one where Ed Etar is the headmaster!”
Ed Etar……?
My Disciple Ed Etar was the headmaster of this school……?
So Etar hadn’t died that day.
Hearing a familiar name made me feel relieved.
But I was curious about the identities of the other four branch schools.
“Then who were the headmasters of the remaining four?”
“I don’t know their names. But I know the branch names! Rus, Ramus, Mirne, Lamic. That’s how I remember them.”
“And among them, we came to Ed Branch School because it has the fewest students.”
Hei, who had been quietly chewing bread, added to the explanation.
“Yeah, they said that with fewer students, they can give more focused lessons!”
Those thirty students I had seen in the classroom.
So that was the total number of Class 0 students?
Compared to the Class 0 of my previous life, it wasn’t even half that number.
And the names of those four branch schools felt far too familiar.
They were all surnames that my Disciples had possessed.
‘The headmaster of the Ed Branch School is Ed Etar. Then are the other branch schools also headed by my Disciples?’
Could it really match that perfectly?
If so, the era I had reincarnated into might not be very far in the future from the day I died.
“Is there a way to find out the names of the other branch headmasters?”
“Hmm, maybe if we go to the library? I think I saw something like that while studying before.”
The library.
Yes, all knowledge began in the library.
“But why are you suddenly curious about that?”
Kiena asked, puzzled.
“……Just because. It’s not wrong to be curious, right?”
“Well, that’s true.”
“Anyway, thanks.”
Without touching even a single bite of the scrambled eggs on my plate, I stood up.