Ch.8484. Riding Aptitude Test (5) – Revision

“That bastard… What’s going on? He doesn’t even have a weapon…”

Junon approached step by step, and magic clearly reached him.

But if someone were to witness this situation and write a report about it, they couldn’t use the word “hit.”

They would have to describe it as: “It touched his hand and disappeared.”

“Don’t panic. That guy, he’s blocking magic in advance with a shield, just like before. Use projectile magic without magic circles if there’s no blind spot, and counter with emission or radiation-type magic!”

“Caden. That, that’s…”

“What now?!”

“Emission-type magic, radiation-type magic, even installation-type magic doesn’t work on him… It’s strange! Everything just disappears!”

“What the hell are you talking about?!”

“I don’t know! It’s like he makes all magic completely disappear!!”

Someone who had experienced this before was here and had prepared countermeasures against Junon’s unique magic power shield application.

They realized that the shield created in the direction of the projection was interfering with the magic, deceiving their eyes.

Once they knew that, they just needed to use different types of magic to prevent him from using that trick.

However, no matter how much they attacked Junon together, they couldn’t even scratch him with magic alone.

“This low-class bastard broke my tooth…!”

“That’s why I told you to clench your teeth. Now it’s fallen out.”

“Kuk, kuhak!”

“Get your filthy hands off me, you bastard!!”

Unable to just watch his comrade being manhandled, someone fired magic.

But surprisingly, this time the magic didn’t disappear and hit someone directly.

“…You’re using a person as a shield?”

“You cowardly bastard…!”

“…Cowardly? Me?”

“Yes! What else would you call someone who won’t reveal the nature of their power and refuses to fight fair and square?!”

The accusation of cowardice made him laugh involuntarily.

“You fucking bastards. I can’t even deploy a magic shield, and at the academy, I can’t even carry weapons because of the unreasonable rules you nobles forced through, and you call ME cowardly? That’s rich.”

His fists trembled at their audacity to turn the tables.

“I have no weapons. No armor. We have nothing but our bare bodies to counter the magic you keep using, and you gang up on us and trample us down, then have the nerve to call us cowards, you goddamn bastards?”

The nobles flinched involuntarily.

From the beginning, this situation was caused by them drawing their magic shields to force the submission of those without power, so even a ten-year-old child could judge which side deserved to be called cowardly.

“No. There’s no point explaining it to you. Just learn it through your bodies. I’ll make sure every single one of you understands.”

They were the type who chose the easy path of long-range magic.

And those who choose the easy path are pathetically weak.

Even those who avoided positions that didn’t match their aptitude, who avoided being oppressed in the same way, were essentially the same.

In the end, they were only obsessed with stepping on those below them.

All they wanted was power and superficial strength.

Therefore, they wouldn’t be satisfied unless they were crushed by greater force and rendered completely immobile.

Like before.

He didn’t run or walk quickly.

He just approached calmly, making them realize they would soon be beaten to a pulp. So they could gradually tremble in fear.

“Uh, uuugh… I, I don’t know anything!!”

“What are you doing! Don’t run away! Stand and fight…”

“Right. You shouldn’t run.”

With a thud, something tripped the noble and he fell. Looking again, there was nothing there.

Before the fallen noble could get up, Junon approached. He grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and slammed his face into the ground repeatedly.

“Jondo and Noel fought without backing down once even when you brought so many people. You trash.”

“Puhak! S-stop… Puheok…!”

For a moment, the face that had been making contact with the ground stopped.

“When those guys asked you to stop, did you stop?”

“T-that’s…”

“You never did, not once. You probably only thought about inflicting more pain on those who were already bowing and begging, and laughing at them. So now you get to experience the same thing. What those guys have been going through because of you.”

As he said, the grip on the noble’s neck didn’t loosen as his face was being smashed into the ground.

By now the noble had passed out, and a bright red handprint was marked on his neck.

Stepping on the unconscious noble’s head, Junon said:

“I’ll do this to every single one of you, so come at me, all you fucking bastards.”

***

It was just one person, but even against one person, the nobles couldn’t win.

Like before, when they created and launched a giant fireball together or tried to restrict his movement, the magic either disappeared or he dodged it.

Eventually, only one person remained.

“Now it’s just you, Caden.”

“Ha, haha… You crazy bastard…”

Who could have predicted this? That they would all be so thoroughly defeated, unable to escape, their legs bound, forced to crawl on the ground.

They had manifested their magic shields, and they’d figured out how he was deceiving their eyes.

With a sound barrier in place, no one would come to help, and with twelve companions, they shouldn’t have been outnumbered.

Yet those twelve had been completely defeated, and Caden instinctively knew he couldn’t win against Junon either.

The threat to break his arms wasn’t just bluster.

Nevertheless.

“Kuk kuk. Do you think anything will change because of what you’re doing?”

“…What?”

“Nothing will change. Whether you beat me up or beat up these guys, nothing changes. Do you think the noble families higher up can’t handle something like this if you report it to the professors? No way! They’ll just cover it up, saying the lower ranks caused some trouble.”

Unlike the others, Caden showed no signs of cowering.

Despite having seen with his own eyes others sitting down, giving up, and trying to run away.

“You vanguards will eventually be defeated by us rearguards as we grow stronger. That’s the power difference. We might be defeated now, but we’ll claim victory against you again. That’s reality!!”

“…”

“Besides, for several years since the nobles started taking power, nothing has changed no matter how much you complain. The world revolves around nobles and rear positions. That’s the principle, the unchanging truth!! What can you bottom-feeders do? Trash is trash no matter how you dress it up. Whatever you useless people do, nothing will change!!”

In the end, he was still laughing unpleasantly, confident that he wouldn’t lose his position.

Yes, that laughter was directed at those struggling desperately.

There are those even lower than the bottom.

Trash is trash no matter how you dress it up.

Nothing changes no matter what a useless person tries to do.

These are the words often used by those who try to put down the powerless without even a shred of expectation.

At the same time, these were words he had heard so many times that his ears had grown calluses.

He could endure being criticized and scolded, could bear whatever labels were attached to him, but this was the reality he most wanted to deny.

But for one person, it was more than denial—it was like touching a raw nerve.

“The world doesn’t change. You’ll always stay in your place, groveling under our feet, just watching… Kuhak!”

“Are you done talking? You frog in a well.”

“Kuk… Kukukuk!! You still don’t understand no matter what I say. Junon! You’ll take the biggest punishment this time. Congratulations!”

Caden had just been hit, but he didn’t seem too upset. Rather, he was smiling vilely as he imagined the situation Junon would face later.

But that filthy laughter wouldn’t continue any further.

“Oh really? Fine, I’ll take it.”

“W-what…!”

“What? You expected to get beaten up after all that talk, but you didn’t expect this? That’s why you’re a frog in a well.”

Junon showed not a shred of concern about the unjust punishment he would face at the academy.

Originally, his only goal was to prevent the Second Inferior Student Rampage.

To deal with the nobles’ aggression and set an example for the lower classes and the weak, giving them hope so they wouldn’t give up.

He had thought he could end it there.

But Caden’s disgusting mockery changed his mind.

“You say nothing changes if I beat you and your gang? Not at all. This is already a change. I haven’t knelt down or bowed my head yet!”

Perhaps there could have been a future where he bent his waist and bowed his head in submission, like before.

But he hadn’t submitted yet.

“You say we’ll be defeated no matter how hard we try? Your thirteen have already lost. To just one person!!”

Perhaps there could have been a future where he gave up, thinking it was useless to try, like before.

But instead, he had claimed victory.

“You say the world revolves around nobles and rear positions? Don’t make me laugh!! I, an E-class, even called the weakest vanguard, a mere commoner, have defeated you!! This itself is a change!!”

If he had sat down, given up, and resigned himself, nothing would have changed.

But by stepping forward himself, he had completely overturned a matchup that everyone might have called impossible.

“Being a commoner or a vanguard doesn’t mean you can’t do it. It’s because you haven’t tried anything yet that there’s a possibility for change. The world does change!!”

“Kuheouk…!”

Considering the aftermath, this wasn’t something he should have done. Making things worse would only invite the nobles to respond with even greater force.

To avoid this troublesome situation, it would have been right to maintain an appropriate level of restraint.

But he hated what that guy had said so much.

It felt like a denial of all the actions he was taking to avoid repeating the past.

It felt like ignoring and mocking each of his actions.

It felt like a definitive statement that things wouldn’t change this time either.

And… it felt like saying his life was meaningless.

His body moved on its own, making him do something he shouldn’t have done.

“Kehek… Y-you… If you do this, you’ll face an even bigger punishment…”

“Shut your mouth!!”

He no longer intended to create the same result.

That was the future chosen by a man who had received one more chance and wanted to survive until the end.

And that future wasn’t walked by just one person.

“Sorry, Junon. I feel bad just jumping in after you’ve done all the work, but we can’t stand it either.”

“Kuk…?! Y-you guys…!”

“What? You say nothing changes for us? Don’t make me laugh, you bastard!!”

“I’ll never kneel again. Never!!”

“I-ik! You guys couldn’t even win in a fair fight!”

“Win or lose, don’t say disgusting words like ‘fair and square.’ Aren’t you embarrassed?”

“After ganging up on Jondo and Noel to win, you’re saying we can’t gang up on you, you bastard?!”

“Even if we get hurt by you next time, we’re settling everything today!”

“We need to add in what those two suffered! Don’t think you’re going home in one piece!”

They had been trembling.

The weak who had been crushed by the strong every time.

They had always bowed and submitted.

The lower classes who couldn’t resist the nobles’ power and gave up.

As if convinced that nothing would change no matter what they did, they had hung their heads and hunched their shoulders.

They had placed themselves in the position of the weak.

But not anymore.

While he had expected something to happen, it hadn’t.

The conviction that nothing would change no matter what they did was already being denied by them directly.

If they ran away now when they saw an opening, they wouldn’t suffer worse treatment from the nobles. But they wanted their bodies, already wrecked by the nobles’ abuse, to stiffen here instead.

Their eyes remained fixed on one person, unwilling to look away.

It was as if Junon, who had completely defeated the nobles, was telling them:

‘You can do it.’

So they decided not to kneel anymore. No, they decided not to remain inferior students.

“Get your filthy foot off… Kuk! I said get it off…! Khak!”

“Shut up!!”

Even though they knew a backlash would come from directly harming Caden, they did it anyway.

“Ugh… I want to hit that bastard too.”

Even Jondo, who had just regained consciousness, was expressing his desire to join them.

Junon wasn’t the only one who wanted to deny the unchanging reality.

They were people too, and they had personally confirmed that nothing would change if they just kept backing down. That’s why they were stepping forward.

To say they wouldn’t be pushed around anymore, that they would fight back. To put into practice their determination not to give up.

“Everyone’s been inspired by you. If we give up and stay still, it might be comfortable for now, but that would be like listening to what that guy said.”

“…”

“Isn’t that right? Um… I’m not sure. Anyway, watching you made everyone rise up because they didn’t want to just take it anymore! You get what I’m saying, right?”

“…Yeah. You don’t need to say more.”

Though he spoke awkwardly, unable to organize his thoughts coherently, Junon understood what Jondo meant.

Wasn’t he saying they wanted to create small changes to overturn the unchanging reality Caden had spoken of?

That was enough.

Not long after, people from the academy rushed in.

And it seemed the heavens were on their side.

“You all! Stop this right now!”

“Professor Jake…?”

It wasn’t someone who backed the nobles and showed favoritism, but Professor Jake, who was friendly to commoners, who appeared first.

With this, everything Caden had predicted was overturned.

As if the world had heard Junon’s cry that it was changing.

The Second Inferior Student Rampage.

Since there were no more inferior students, such an incident couldn’t occur.

***

“Why are you so late, Senia? I’ve already finished making it and have been waiting for a while.”

Clearly, Senia should have headed to the Dube Building first after delivering the message to Erika.

Only the beads of sweat on Senia’s hair know why she was late.

“…”

“Senia? Did something happen to you?”

“…No. Nothing.”

Everything was true. Just as Aris had said, without a single word being wrong.

The intense scene that had flowed into her mind was undoubtedly something she had seen and experienced.

Now she had made her decision.

“Erika. Remember when we talked about a new team member? About recruiting Junon. About that.”

“…Why are you suddenly bringing that up? It makes me uncomfortable, so don’t talk about…”

“You were right. That guy, we shouldn’t bring him into Tembris.”

“…Huh?”

To avoid repeating the same thing. So that in the future, his life wouldn’t be extinguished by someone from Tembris.

Senia had to grit her teeth and reject the person who had saved her life from joining the party.