Three months passed once more. After the renewed competition of the second round, under Charles's encouragement, Saya pressed forward with unwavering determination. He successfully defeated all his opponents and secured his place in the tournament.
Thus, the golden duo—Saya and Charles—were reunited once again.
Within the top-tier resources provided by Silent Heart Academy, the two pushed each other forward, motivating and supporting one another. Their strength began to soar at an astonishing pace.
Saya opened his eyes, sensing the fundamentally transformed energy now coursing through his body.
He understood—it was official. He had become a true wizard.
There was no longer any need to bear the title of apprentice.
By all conventional standards, reaching this level should have taken him several more years. But thanks to this rare opportunity, and the Academy's all-out investment in his growth, he had arrived early.
Saya was well aware of how lucky he was to be shaped by this era. The opportunities he now had were incredibly rare.
If he could prove himself on the battlefield of the World War, many things that once seemed unreachable would come to him naturally—no longer would he need to worry about connections or background.
"Maybe this is the fairest time the world has seen in over a hundred thousand years..."
"The World War is a massive stage. If I can shine on it, then maybe..."
Not long after, his communicator buzzed with a message.
After reading it, Saya couldn't help but smile. It was from Charles—he had also advanced to become a full-fledged wizard, and was asking how Saya was doing.
Unlike the electronic devices of technological civilizations, communicators in the wizarding world were made from intricate rune arrays. They could detect soul fluctuations and didn't require things like servers. However, they had their limitations: outside of the wizarding world, if the user's strength wasn't high enough, the device functioned as little more than a short-range walkie-talkie. How short? That depended on the individual's power. For most apprentice-level wizards, it barely reached a few dozen meters—shouting was often more effective.
After replying to Charles's message, Saya calmed himself and began adjusting to his new physical condition.
Upon becoming a full wizard, one's body would naturally emit a special energy field—a kind of innate force field that served as both defense and a latent threat. It could easily harm innocent bystanders.
Because of this, the Wizard Council had explicitly mandated that newly promoted wizards were not allowed to go out freely until they had full control over this energy field. So for now, Saya was grounded until he could fully master his newfound power.
---
Sitting in the stands through the avatar, Orsaga watched two people exchanging blows in the arena. Despite not understanding why two wizards were duking it out with their fists, their fighting style looked oddly familiar. Upon closer inspection, he realized their techniques resembled moves from his long-running comic series The Unnamable Fist.
That was a comic he'd drawn a few years ago during a phase when he was masquerading as a master artist—mostly out of boredom.
His true passion, after all, lay in drawing nude figure studies of beautiful women. Comics were a low-brow distraction by comparison and didn't align with his main interests.
He hadn't even bothered writing dialogue for it before he lost interest and tossed the whole project into the trash.
Someone had probably fished it out of the garbage. After all, even the rough sketches of a master artist could fetch a decent price.
Thinking back on it, he recalled—
All the techniques in that comic had been made up on the spot. But since he was a martial arts master, even those random doodles had some legitimate technical value. Whether they worked in real combat was anyone's guess—he was just a wandering demon artist minding his own business in a foreign land, not someone who studied such profound topics.
---
Two years later.
Just as prophesied, amid the endless shifting of world orbits, the barriers between two realms were about to make contact.
The first manifestation of this was a narrow passageway connecting both worlds. At the center of that corridor was an isolated space, jointly shaped by the two realms.
This would become the designated battlefield between the Wizarding Civilization and the Gaienser Civilization.
Neither side wanted the fires of war to spread to their own homeland—no matter who won, the cost would be unbearable.
And so, this compromise was silently accepted by both sides.
Small-scale sabotage and skirmishes would still occur, but large-scale invasions were off the table—at least until one side's main force was thoroughly defeated in this neutral zone. Only then would either consider launching an all-out invasion of the enemy's homeworld.
Of course, both sides were fully aware the other likely had deadly surprises waiting on their home turf. If things reached that point, mutual destruction was entirely possible.
---
Using a sensory projection device powered by wizardry, Charles was busy fine-tuning the war equipment under his charge.
This was a wizard tower standing over fifty meters tall—a massive conduit for channeling and releasing magical energy. It could draw power from a deep underground energy furnace and unleash devastating offensive and defensive spells.
The furnace itself was buried several hundred meters beneath the surface, protected by countless layers of runes, forming an almost impenetrable barrier.
For context, both the energy furnace and the wizard tower stood on a floating sphere forty kilometers in diameter.
This was the wizarding world's doomsday weapon—the Aelthorpe Star: Mobile Annihilator.
Not only was it absurdly expensive to build, the craftsmanship required was so complex that only one could be made every three thousand years.
Charles didn't know every detail about it, but he did know this: the tower he operated could level a small mountain in a single strike—and it was just one of tens of thousands scattered across the surface of this floating star.
If the operator of the Aelthorpe Star so desired, all of those towers could be synchronized through intricate wizardry rituals into a single, terrifying attack.
According to what Charles had picked up during idle banter with superiors, these two features were just the basic functions. The truly devastating capabilities were hidden within other classified departments, sealed away as the star's ultimate secret weapons.
Immersed in the neural network within the tower, Charles felt a godlike sense of empowerment—as if infinite power were surging through his veins.
He knew it was an illusion, but still, he couldn't help but think:
'With a weapon this powerful… we're bound to win.'
He looked up at the timer above his head—there was just over a day left on the countdown.
That was the time remaining until the predicted first clash with enemy forces.
____
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