Chapter 81: Professor, Would You Like a Punch?

A professor at Zeryon Academy.
They are individuals renowned as the best in the empire.
Zeryon Academy exists to nurture heroes who protect the world from its greatest foe, the Demonic Palace.
Naturally, selecting professors for the academy was no trivial matter.
Thus, every professor at Zeryon Academy was exceptionally skilled.

Most of them were former heroes who had achieved great feats against the Demonic Palace.
Their reputations soared to legendary heights.
However, even the purest water stagnates over time.
Among these professors, once celebrated as heroes, there were some who had fallen from grace.

Human greed knows no bounds.
Living as a professor at Zeryon Academy, basking in wealth and honor, some still hungered for more.
One such person had always been obsessed with being the best, having spent his student days perpetually ranked second.

Barkov Deblijeux, the third-year professor of magic studies, was known for his bitter personality.
Once hailed as a tragic genius, his brilliance overshadowed by the current master of the Blue Tower, he now harbored resentment.
Students had little love for him.
He frequently belittled and mocked less skilled students, earning himself a reputation as the worst among the faculty.

Time, however, had taken its toll on Professor Barkov.
His body was no longer what it once was, but his memories remained sharp.
He vividly recalled the humiliating days of his youth, when his pride was crushed by an unreachable genius who also claimed the title of Blue Tower Master.

For years, he dreamed of building his own tower, believing it to be the only way to reclaim his lost dignity.
Yet, within the empire, the magical peaks of the Blue Tower and the Yellow Tower left no room for a new contender.

Desperate, Barkov aligned himself with a foreign kingdom.
In exchange for providing imperial secrets and siphoning funds from Zeryon Academy, they promised to construct a tower for him.

Now, on the verge of defecting to the kingdom, disaster struck.
A group of insignificant students from the ‘Student Council Boycott Movement’ exposed his corruption during the Founding Festival.

Barkov’s composure shattered.
If this scandal reached the outside world before his escape, he was almost certainly doomed to execution.
‘Not yet. Not yet.’
For now, the news was confined to the academy.
If he could eliminate the perpetrators and buy time to flee, he might still escape.

‘More urgently.’

Top-secret documents prepared for his final deal with the kingdom remained in his private office.
Zeryon Academy was nearly impenetrable to outsiders, making his office an ideal hiding place.
He had never anticipated trouble from within.

Panting, Barkov flung open the door to his office.
On the way, he had vented his rage on every member of the Student Council Boycott he encountered, dealing them what he thought was well-deserved punishment.

All that remained was to retrieve the documents, eliminate the rest of the students, and make his escape.
As he reached for the papers, a sound interrupted him.

Click-
The door to his private office, which he had left open, shut on its own.

In the dim room, pale moonlight streamed through the window, faintly illuminating his office.
Turning slowly, Barkov saw a man with a familiar face standing there.

“Huh?”
A hollow laugh escaped Barkov’s lips as he recognized the figure.

A man with striking snow-white hair and amber eyes.
Though his face was remarkable, his magical skills were worse than anyone’s.

“Vikarmern?”
Vikarmern Niflheim.
The pitiful dropout who had been expelled from Zeryon Academy stood there.

Among all the people Barkov could recall, Vikarmern was the least talented in magic.
He had been mocked the most during magic studies classes.
And now, here he was, standing right in front of him.

Barkov’s gaze turned cold.
“So, that’s it. It was you.”
A look of grim understanding spread across Barkov’s face.

“You were the one behind this, weren’t you? To take revenge on me.”
The ridicule he had endured in the past.
To avenge himself, Vikarmern had revealed the truth under the banner of the boycott.

Barkov had no idea how Vikarmern had discovered his corruption.
But there was no way he’d forgive this audacious fool for daring to defy him.

“You insolent wretch. Do you even know who you’re dealing with? I’ll teach you a lesson!”
Barkov drew his staff from his waist.

Vikarmern frowned slightly at the sight, then spoke calmly.
“What nonsense are you babbling about?”

“Trying to deny it, are you? I see your anger. But if you want to blame someone, blame your pathetic magical skills!”

With that, Barkov unleashed his specialty—lightning magic.
The torrent of mana that erupted from him demonstrated why he held the title of a third-year magic studies professor.

Boom-
Black lightning coursed through the room in an instant.
Standing in its path, Vikarmern did nothing, merely watching as the surge of electricity approached.

The moment Barkov was sure Vikarmern was dead.

Crackle-
The lightning magic was abruptly sucked into a single ring on Vikarmern’s hand.

Barkov had no idea.
He and Vikarmern were a disastrously bad match.

Vikarmern possessed the Lightning Magnet.
It had the power to absorb all lightning except that sent by the goddess of thunder.

In other words, Barkov’s signature lightning magic was utterly useless against him.

Boom!
Before Barkov could fully process his shock, Vikarmern was already in his face.

Using a burst of energy from his soles, Vikarmern had propelled himself forward.
This was magic engraving: Explosion.
Vikarmern had activated it beneath his feet, launching himself directly at Barkov.

However, Barkov, proving his famed reputation was no lie, reacted in time.
With a surge of mana, a wall of flames erupted from the tip of his staff.

No fool would charge through a wall of scorching heat unarmed.
Vikarmern would surely retreat.

“You’ve clearly prepared some tricks to face me!”

Barkov was there to remind him—Zeryon Academy’s magic professors are not defeated by lightning magic alone.

Confident that Vikarmern would step back, Barkov sneered.

Whoosh!
And yet, a fool charging through a blazing wall unarmed was exactly what Barkov witnessed.

“What?!”
For the second time, Barkov’s mind reeled in disbelief.

Vikarmern, unfazed, smashed his fist down, aiming to make Barkov’s head ring as much as his own.

Boom!
Vikarmern’s punch sent Barkov crashing into the furniture of the office, tumbling across the floor.
Though shocked, Barkov had just barely managed to activate a protective spell around his face.

“Ugh, you lunatic…”
Who in their right mind would charge through a wall of fire unarmed?
He was so flustered that he couldn’t even cast his magic properly.

Still, Vikarmern had crossed the wall of flames with his body.
Surely, he must be suffering severe burns, unable to move.

“Foolish idiot.”

Barkov muttered as he tried to push himself up.

Thud!
But before he could rise, a sudden weight pressed down on him, forcing him back to the ground.
Alarmed, he looked up.

Standing above him, bathed in the moonlight streaming through the window, was Vikarmern.
His clothes were singed and scorched in places, yet his body showed no signs of burns.

Barkov’s expression twisted in disbelief.
He had passed through the wall of fire unscathed? That couldn’t be possible.

“Quite warm, actually.”

Vikarmern said nonchalantly.

Vikarmern’s body, strengthened like steel, was imbued with the essence of flame.
Naturally resistant to fire, his body had been honed to an even greater level of endurance.
He had subjected himself to daily magical explosions through engravings, making him nearly impervious to most flames.

In the dim light, Vikarmern’s amber eyes gleamed ominously.

Thump-
Barkov’s heart sank involuntarily.
Twice now, his proud magic had been completely ineffective.
Attacks that would have instantly electrocuted and burned a student to death had left Vikarmern untouched.

The sheer defiance of reason unsettled Barkov, filling him with dread.

“You insolent wretch! How dare you put your foot on me!”
In a desperate attempt, Barkov swung his staff wildly.

Lightning had failed, the wall of fire had failed.
There was only one option left.

“Fine, let’s see if you can survive freezing to death!”
He unleashed a storm of frost that swept through the office in an instant.

Known for his expertise in high-speed spellcasting, Barkov’s frost magic was nearly impossible to counter.

Crack-
The office was instantly transformed into an icy hell.
Vikarmern, caught in the direct blast, was no exception.

Encased in ice, he stood frozen solid, towering over Barkov.

Seeing this, Barkov, shivering from the cold himself, let out a twisted, triumphant laugh.
“Ha… hahaha! See? No matter how much you struggle, you’re nothing!”

He began channeling his mana to create a high-powered light projectile, intending to shatter Vikarmern completely.

“Die!”

Just as he was about to fire the completed projectile—

Clink!
The ice around Vikarmern’s leg shattered in an instant.

Crunch!
“Gahhh!”

Vikarmern’s foot came crashing down, crushing the hand that held Barkov’s staff.

The agonizing pain broke Barkov’s concentration, causing his spell to fizzle out as he dropped the staff.

Crack-
At that moment, the ice encasing Vikarmern shattered as his body moved.

A brilliant yellow light flashed in his right eye.
Within it was a reptilian gaze, reminiscent of a lizard.

Chill!
The gaze bore down on Barkov, a silent warning.
How dare he use such pathetic ice magic on him.
The eye seethed with rage.

Seeing this, an instinctual fear surged through Barkov—a terror ingrained in living creatures.

It was a unique ability born from the remnants of an elder dragon:
The awakened power of Fear.

This primordial fear engulfed Barkov completely.
His face turned deathly pale, cold sweat dripping from him in streams.

“H-heek…”

The magic of an elder dragon was a nightmare for any mage.
Unless someone was like Sharin, who wielded the Mirinae, a typical mage like Barkov had no means to resist the Fear.

Moreover, Barkov had grown complacent in the glory of his past, neglecting the study of magic.
He had lived his life obsessively pursuing his dream of building a magic tower, driven by his selfish desires.

For years, he convinced himself that he had narrowly fallen short of surpassing the Blue Tower Lord.
But in truth, countless other brilliant mages had long since surpassed him.

Barkov had ignored this reality, clinging to the illusion that he was eternally second best.
Yet those drunk on authority and power ultimately bring about their own downfall.

Vikarmern raised his clenched fist.

Even in the kingdom he planned to defect to, Barkov was nothing more than a pawn.
In truth, they likely had no intention of building him a magic tower in the first place.

“A guy who scams kids out of their potential dares to dream so big?”
Vikarmern was ready to bring that dream to an end.

“Wake up.”

With those words, Vikarmern brought his fist crashing down.