episode_0068

And alongside it, lightning flashed. Even though the sky was so blue it was almost clear.

“Woah…!”

The war of nerves between the Archmages was the cause. Cheon Hyeon-a tightly held onto her wide-brimmed hat and lowered her posture, letting out a wry laugh.

Even as a formidable A-rank Awakener herself, the Archmages’ quarrel was beyond her league. Knowing that nothing good would come from needlessly interfering, she simply kept an eye on them while looking after Cheon Woohyuk.

Her younger brother was already narrowing his eyes, wary of Seol Hayeon’s presence. Their opponent was one of the three great Archmages in the country. At a time when the title of Archmage was almost recognized as equivalent to a Special S-rank, the Ice Empress Seol Hayeon was a rare genius who had reached that position at merely twenty-two years old.

She was twenty-five now, and thus arguably in her prime. However, it was actually Cheon Hyeon-a, being closest in age and a peer, whose mind was most complex.

She was not qualified to join the conversation here. She could only keep her mouth shut and wait, suppressing her presence and praying that the two mages’ discussion would end amicably.

The siblings of the Cheon family remained silent, and that was when Seol Hayeon took another step forward.

Click-clack…

Along with the clear sound of her heels, the chill filling the surrounding space began to intensify. It wasn’t furious. Just chilling.

It felt as if a blizzard would rage here at any moment. No, it was an intuition that the Archmage of Ice would make it so.

Cheon Sehee did not tolerate such arrogant behavior from her distant junior.

Crackle-!

She conjured lightning. With just the small current held at her fingertips, she swung her hand, and the chill was dispelled by an even more intense heat. In some cases, it could be seen as magic being nullified by a difference in rank.

But not now.

“It seems like the match has just begun…”

“……”

Seol Hayeon’s lips twisted, and Cheon Sehee merely looked at her with emotionless eyes. A natural, yet somehow mocking, expression appeared on Seol Hayeon’s face.

“Auntie, you look like you’ve been dying to scold me since a moment ago. Ah, perhaps you don’t like the address? Haha.”

“What’s so new about that?” Adding that, Seol Hayeon casually waved her hand and tilted her head upwards.

With her relatively small stature and build, it was Seol Hayeon’s role to look up at her opponent.

“I sent you a message, didn’t I? Why didn’t you reply? It’s been quite a while since we last met. Weren’t we at least on terms to exchange private greetings?”

She spoke mockingly to Cheon Sehee, while Cheon Sehee, in contrast, restrained her emotions as much as possible and shook her head.

“Be quiet. The match is ongoing.”

Nevertheless, Seol Hayeon’s smile didn’t fade. Because it was bound to happen this way anyway. She wasn’t unaware. No, she knew, and that’s why she came so directly.

“Ah, the match, you say…”

One corner of Seol Hayeon’s lips pulled up. A smile that clearly, unmistakably held the meaning of scorn. Cheon Sehee instinctively frowned and turned to look at her.

And her uneasy premonition indeed came true. Seol Hayeon smiled brightly and flicked her silver hair back.

She looked at Cheon Sehee, and beyond her, at the two twenty-somethings in the center of the stadium, and uttered a single phrase with absolute conviction.

“My disciple will win anyway, so what’s the fuss?”

“……”

The atmosphere in the spectator stands. It couldn’t help but cool down at an even fiercer pace.

CRACKLE…!!

A strong, thick current flowed down Cheon Sehee’s cheek. She raised her head, and at the same time, Seol Hayeon also rotated her mana. WHIRR! The mana-storing heart ring made a pleasant sound, tensing her entire body. It was, so to speak, a warm-up.

Cheon Hyeon-a, hidden in the back row of the stands, gasped in shock, and Cheon Woohyuk also widened his eyes.

Surely, they weren’t planning to fight just because they disliked each other in a place like this. But the two women’s expressions were so serious that an inexplicable unease arose.

No, Seol Hayeon was smiling, but.

As the two siblings’ tension surged to its limit, and the Archmages’ war of nerves approached its own critical point. Seol Hayeon moved her hand.

CRACKLE-ZAP!

Cheon Sehee’s eyes also held lightning.

And Ryu Jinseong fell from the sky.

…

…

…

“Eh?”

Breaking the momentary silence, Cheon Hyeon-a let out a voice laced with bewilderment.

Falling straight down. CRASH!!

In the middle of the spectator stands, precisely parting the two Archmages, the third and final Archmage, who had likely appeared for mediation, shone with his characteristic gloomy eyes. Ryu Jinseong, having straightened his momentarily bowed back, summoned darkness and draped it around his body.

Having descended with the clear intention of stopping the overheated parties, he first turned to Cheon Sehee and was about to utter a few words. “It’s been a long time, Cheon Teacher-nim…”

It was the same phrase he had once said to Gwon Hwang Baek Muyeom. Ryu Jinseong, who was surprisingly young among high-ranking Awakeners.

Unexpectedly, he was truly a man who knew how to be courteous. The unfortunate part was perhaps that he didn’t get the chance to greet them? Before Ryu Jinseong could continue, and before Cheon Sehee could respond.

“Hyaaah!”

Seol Hayeon molded a snowball into the shape of a baseball bat and swung it directly. An attack that powerfully struck the back of Ryu Jinseong’s head! SMACK!!

Ryu Jinseong stumbled forward and fell. Even his large body had no way to react to the sudden ambush. THUD! Ryu Jinseong slammed his face straight into the cold concrete floor…

And Seol Hayeon snorted “Hmph!” and broke apart the baseball bat. Her eyes were currently staring at Ryu Jinseong with the utmost disapproval.

“I told you, didn’t I? Don’t show your face in front of me after that wretched proposal.”

“……”

“Ugh, if my disciple gets *that kind* of misunderstanding because of you, how do you plan to take responsibility, really!”

Ryu Jinseong ground his teeth with a *grind*. He wasn’t usually the type to express emotions, but even he felt shame.

He might not have known it then, but it was different now. Ryu Jinseong had newly learned how rude an emotionless proposal was. Though he couldn’t say he understood it deeply with emotion, he at least understood it intellectually.

Therefore, he had some personal guilt towards Seol Hayeon. But even so, he wondered what warranted hitting him in the back of the head. Ryu Jinseong thought, *Like master, like disciple.*

‘…Well, never mind.’

But Ryu Jinseong was Ryu Jinseong. After all, Archmage Black Heaven was someone who wouldn’t think much of being hit by a much younger student. Ryu Jinseong casually sprang to his feet and took a seat in one of the chairs as if nothing happened.

“Why don’t you just watch the matches?” Then he gestured to his fellow (?) Archmages behind him, speaking in a somewhat detached and indifferent tone.

“Isn’t this your disciples’ fight? I think it would be better to see the outcome of the match first rather than wasting time raising your voices like that…”

“……”

“……”

Cheon Sehee and Seol Hayeon fell silent. Nevertheless, they leisurely took their seats. They didn’t explicitly answer, but perhaps they decided he had a point.

Of course, they naturally moved to a different row than where Ryu Jinseong sat. Such things were very familiar to these three Archmages.

Ultimately, with Ryu Jinseong left behind, Cheon Sehee and Seol Hayeon sat apart, leaving one seat between them. They had, in effect, adopted the stance of watching the match, but…

“Auntie.”

“……”

“You’re listening, right? And you remember, don’t you? Our bet.”

That didn’t mean the conversation was over.

Seol Hayeon let out a scoff.

“The one whose disciple loses has to kneel naked… Well, it’s nothing big, but it could be a small diversion. At least it’d be fun to watch, don’t you think?”

“Ha?”

And Cheon Sehee’s expression thoroughly contorted. Cheon Hyeon-a and Cheon Woohyuk, who had been quietly shifting in the back, also whirled around to look at Seol Hayeon with expressions of shock and horror.

“Oh, well, *I’m* fine with it.”

Of course, Seol Hayeon didn’t mind the stares of the three family members and hummed happily.

“Naturally, it won’t happen, but even if by some one-in-a-thousand, one-in-ten-thousand chance I lose, I’d prefer you make me do the penalty in front of my disciple. I have to show off my pretty body, you know.”

And she swayed her upper body slightly while watching the match. She showed no doubt in her disciple’s victory… Indeed, she judged that her disciple held the substantial advantage in skill.

Well, once she saw it directly, the female student, Cheon Soyul, seemed quite capable, but even so, Seol Hayeon had faith. Her disciple would never lose!

“Fighting, Disciple-nim!”

She jumped up and down in place to show her encouragement. Lee Hyunjin probably couldn’t see her from that angle, but— In any case, Seol Hayeon absolutely did not entertain the assumption that her disciple would lose.

Lightning flickered. Ice walls crumbled.

Until a gigantic lightning greatsword plummeted from the momentarily darkened sky above the arena. Until then, she trusted Lee Hyunjin’s abilities.

He would absolutely not lose.

…But then.

“…Huh?”

She was momentarily flustered. That attack, *that* attack was dangerous. The timing was one thing, but large-scale magic that struck all space like that was anathema to ice mages. She herself had trained her stamina to overcome that defensive vulnerability, and she had semi-forcibly made her fifteen-year-old disciple train her stamina too.

But yes, wasn’t that the kind of attack that couldn’t be avoided or blocked by merely training stamina to a certain extent? Seol Hayeon’s expression hardened. Her smile vanished completely, and her body twitched for a moment.

‘Wait, just a moment—’

It was just as she, with a master’s heart, unconsciously began to generate a mana flow within her body to protect Lee Hyunjin. RUMBLE-RUMBLE-RUMBLE!!!

A blue-white lightning bolt began in the center of the stadium and shot up into the sky. It wasn’t Cheon Soyul’s.

Silence descended upon the arena.

It was calm. Quiet. A little more eerie, feeling colder, and at the same time, its form was quite peculiar.

The owner of that lightning, rising like a sharp icicle… probably.

“……”

Seol Hayeon’s face instantly turned pale. It looked as if she might hyperventilate.