Chapter 4: The Key to Victory is Her Single Strike

It happened in the Dormitory Lounge of Artemia Dormitory on the ninth day since Kanata had taken up his post as instructor.

At the top of the stairs lay a shared common space that branched off toward the boys’ dormitory floors on the right and the girls’ dormitory floors on the left. Beneath a spacious atrium ceiling stretching five stories overhead, Kanata was hogging an entire three-person sofa all to himself, having dumped piles of documents across the nearby coffee table.

“Even if everyone in the dorm avoids you, you really ought to pick your spots better, Kanata. Spreading your work out here is a nuisance to everyone else.”

Spotting the mess a moment later, Lloyd walked over with an exasperated smile and offered a token word of caution.

“Hm? Everyone goes out of their way to keep their distance from me anyway, so it works out fine, doesn’t it?”

“I have to take my hat off to that attitude of yours, Kanata.”

“? Why take your hat off?”

“Normally, saying you’re glad everyone keeps their distance from you would sound like the confession of a painfully lonely life, yet coming from you, it somehow sounds remarkably positive.”

“Does it? Wait, is my life really that lonely?”

“If you haven’t noticed, I’d be happy to point it out for you. Being branded a traitor and ostracized by an entire academy city isn’t something you see every day.”

“Huh, is that right? Well, right now I couldn’t care less about that.”

His own dorm room was such a pigsty that he didn’t even want to waste time cleaning a space on his desk. Since none of the other students wanted anything to do with the resident traitor, Kanata was given a wide berth that made him look like a total pariah—not that Kanata himself minded in the slightest.

“Pardon the interruption while you’re talking, Lloyd-senpai. Would you mind if I joined the conversation?”

Having spotted Kanata from across the lounge, Yuri walked over and spoke in a sharp, prickly voice.

“Come to think of it, I hear the date for the next ranking match of the platoon you’re coaching has been set for one week from today, Senpai. Apparently your opponents are a squad considered top contenders for promotion to D-Rank.”

“Pretty much.”

Still staring down at the files of his platoon members, Kanata gave an absentminded reply.

Not a soul knew that ever since their matchup had been posted on the campus bulletin board yesterday, Kanata had pulled an all-nighter racking his brains for a strategy that would let E601 win.

“And does that ‘F-Rank Platoon’ have even the slightest chance of winning? Or are you planning to make up some excuse and run away again? Ever since that accident, after all, you’ve sunk to being nothing more than a coward, Kanata-senpai.”

Her words dripped with open scorn for the traitor before her. Lifting his eyes from the documents, Kanata looked up at Yuri.

“Hm? Yuri, you’re convinced Fireteam E601 doesn’t stand a chance of winning, aren’t you?”

“Obviously. They were already weak to begin with, and sticking an irresponsible instructor like you in charge isn’t going to magically make them strong.”

“Gotcha. Well, that actually works out great for me.”

When Kanata flashed a fearless grin, Yuri blinked in visible confusion.

“Works out great for you? W-What do you mean by that?!”

Setting his papers aside, Kanata fixed Yuri with his deep, magnetic jet-black eyes.

“No matter who you ask, everyone assumes we’re guaranteed to lose. Especially since we’re up against a platoon favored for promotion to D-Rank. By every objective measure, the other side wins hands down. Which means even if we lose, we’ve got nothing to lose—so my girls can go into the match without any extra pressure weighing them down.”

“In other words… you’re admitting you expect to lose?!”

“Wrong. I’m saying another factor in favor of us winning just fell into place. That’s all.”

Right now, he’s wearing the exact same expression he used to have back when everyone called him our ace, Yuri thought in a quiet corner of her heart.

It was the fearless, unyielding look of Chronos, the Black Master Swordsman, who never gave up no matter how overwhelming the odds—a look she hadn’t seen once since the day he betrayed them.

“I’ll be praying that you’re not just all talk, at least.”

Leaving behind that biting parting shot, Yuri cast a few lingering glances back toward Kanata before walking out of the lounge.

“Lloyd, mind doing me a favor?”

“You want me to go check on Yuri and make sure she isn’t sulking too hard, right? Honestly, if you’re doing this on purpose, you’re a thoroughly wicked man, Kanata.”

Just like Yuri, Lloyd didn’t know the full truth behind why Kanata had “betrayed” the squad. Yet the fact that he went straight after Yuri while trading light banter showed just how deeply he trusted his friend.

***

At the firing range tucked into a corner of the Training Grounds, Misora aimed at a dummy target hurtling along a rail a hundred meters away and squeezed the trigger built into the handguard of her Magic Cannon Sword. The magic cannon blast she unleashed slammed straight into a boulder way in the foreground, blowing it to smithereens instead.

“How many times do I have to tell you to stop aiming at moving targets right off the bat? With your current marksmanship instincts, there’s zero chance you’re ever gonna hit one.”

It was the second day of Misora’s individual combat training—two days since their talk on the hill. Watching Misora glare fiercely downrange as she lined up shot after shot, Kanata called out from behind her in exasperation. After missing every single blast she fired, even Misora was starting to look crestfallen.

“Finally convinced?”

“…Y-Yeah.”

Looking at Misora as her shoulders slumped in defeat, Kanata remarked nonchalantly:

“Don’t look so down. I knew from the very beginning that you had zero natural knack for aiming.”

“Ugh… B-But I really felt like the next shot was gonna hit!”

Brimming with a little too much enthusiasm, Misora had brushed past Kanata’s warnings and insisted on jumping straight into advanced drills, only to spin her wheels with nothing to show for it. She believed there had been no lie in the words Kanata had spoken to her up on Hope of Hill, yet she still couldn’t shake her underlying anxiety.

Day one of her individual special training had been classroom theory. Kanata had started by drilling her on the fundamental principles of magic artillery—a subject Misora had never paid the slightest attention to before—and the results had been nothing short of disastrous.

Even though Kanata had broken down ballistic flight trajectories—the ABCs of ranged gunnery—into terms simple enough for a grade-schooler to grasp, Misora’s head had been spinning from start to finish, and to top it all off, accumulated fatigue from her daily solo workouts had caught up with her until she nodded off mid-lesson.

Since it was a one-on-one tutoring session, Kanata had promptly rapped his knuckles against the top of her head without mercy. Bristling with wounded pride, Misora had talked back—insisting “I was totally listening!”—only to fall dead silent and shrink into her chair when she couldn’t answer a single one of Kanata’s pointed follow-up questions.

Hesitantly, Misora spoke up:

“H-Hey… Do you seriously believe I can actually get strong like this while still using my Magic Cannon Sword?”

Of course, even if he told her to quit now, she had no intention of giving it up.

She simply wanted reassurance that she really could grow stronger on this path. Kanata’s breezy, unreadable demeanor always left her feeling restlessly insecure.

“Yeah, no problem at all. Your tactical role as a mid-guard artillery specialist doesn’t change either way. The only catch is that unlike a Magic Cannon Staff, which has built-in firing stabilization and aim correction, a Magic Cannon Sword is way harder to handle, so we’re gonna drill the fundamentals into your bones. …Here, see that stationary target over there?”

Stepping up beside Misora, Kanata pointed toward a fixed dummy target two hundred meters downrange. Immediately, Misora raised her blade to take aim—

“With your current skill, aiming from this distance won’t hit the broad side of a barn. First, look through the Sight.”

“Why do I have to use a toy like this—a Sight… Ow!”

“Talk back one more time and I’ll give you a forehead flick twice as hard. Just shut up and look through it.”

Ordinarily, Magic Cannon Swords didn’t come equipped with optical scopes, so Kanata had personally visited the Alchemist Department to have one custom-mounted onto her weapon.

Tucking her right elbow tightly against her ribs and supporting the long, heavy blade with her left hand just as instructed, Misora peered through the Sight and made fine adjustments until the distant dummy target sat neatly inside the crosshairs.

“See? I can line up my aim on it just fine from here!”

“Well, sure, because the target’s standing still—and even from here, you’d still have to compensate for hand tremor and wind drift when pulling the trigger. …Alright, keep looking through the scope and walk forward toward the target.”

After checking that no other students were using the firing range around them, Kanata hopped over the firing booth partition with Misora and walked right out onto the range floor, stopping once they had closed the distance to a spot he judged appropriate.

“Now look through the Sight again.”

“Hmm… Now it’s so huge the whole target doesn’t even fit inside the lens anymore.”

Peering through the Sight a second time, Misora saw that the dummy target now filled the entire field of view from edge to edge, so close you couldn’t even tell what shape the whole target was supposed to be.

“Right. Pulling the trigger at this exact distance is your baseline. For a beginner to jump straight into long-range sharpshooting is impossible, so for now, burn this exact range into your head—along with the golden rule of aerial combat: always take your target’s six. Don’t overcomplicate things; just focus hundred percent on doing what’s right in front of you.”

“B-But anyone who uses ranged artillery weapons can do something this basic in their sleep, can’t they?!”

“Sure they can. Problem is, you can’t do it yet. Being able to pull off the basics reliably every single time is what matters most. Neglecting foundational marksmanship to chase after advanced techniques like Deflection Shooting is putting the cart way before the horse.”

“…What’s Deflection Shooting?”

“I literally taught you that yesterday…”

“Hey, I already apologized for yesterday, didn’t I?! I said I was sorry for nodding off!”

“Sigh… All I remember is you making excuses, but whatever.

Deflection Shooting means calculating your target’s flight vector, your own projectile velocity, and the relative distance between you so you can lead the target and fire where they’re going to be—which is completely out of reach for your current skill level.”

Even though she had unconsciously been trying to do that exact thing earlier, Kanata recalled the sight of Misora firing wildly at the moving rail target.

Her gunnery was still far too green; in a live match, a stray blast from her could easily hit her own teammates by mistake.

“B-But… then what are we supposed to do?! If I can’t pull off Deflection Shooting, aren’t our chances in next week’s ranking match looking super dicey?!”

When Misora looked up at him with a pale face, Kanata scratched the back of his neck and replied:

“Oh, right, now that you mention it, that’s true…”

“D-Don’t say that like it’s somebody else’s problem! You’re our instructor, aren’t you?!”

“Quit looking like the sky is falling. Do you seriously think I haven’t come up with a way for us to win?”

Still, for that plan to work, Misora’s growth was indispensable. Despite her high baseline physical and magical stats, her actual combat technique lagged so far behind that, frankly, she was dead weight as she stood now.

“In the upcoming ranking match, we can’t win unless you can pull this off without fail. So for the next four days starting today, pour everything you’ve got into practicing point-blank marksmanship like your life depends on it.”

“I-I’m already giving it everything I’ve got…!”

“I know you are. Drop all your sword-swinging drills for now and focus exclusively on artillery practice. I’ll supervise you as much as I can, though I’ve also gotta check in on Lecty’s training.”

“…What about Rico?”

“With her, step one is convincing her to actually show up for the match… Well, before I go, I’ll pass down the secret trump card that’s gonna make you the key to our victory.”

At the words secret trump card, Misora’s heart leaped and her eyes lit up like stars. She still didn’t trust this traitorous upperclassman a hundred percent, yet curiosity got the better of her and she immediately started pestering him to tell her what the secret move was.

Just then, the campus-wide PA speakers crackled to life overhead.

“Special Fireteam S128, the Royal Guard—Guardian Department, second-year Regular Course, Chloe Sevegny. If you hear this broadcast, report immediately to the Guardian Leader’s Office. I repeat…”

Hearing the announcement echo across the grounds, Kanata frowned slightly and murmured aloud:

“Hm. That’s weird.”

“What’s weird about it?”

“Normally, when they page someone over the campus-wide PA, they never use formal titles like Royal Guard. Announcing to the whole school that headquarters has urgent business with the Special Fireteam tends to make students suspect something bad happened and stir up unnecessary panic.”

Turning toward Misora, who blinked in surprise at his observation, Kanata added flatly:

“Whenever headquarters drops stiff, formal phrasing like that, nine times out of ten it’s an omen of bad news.”

Bathed in the amber glow of the late-afternoon sun slanting through the windows of the Guardian Leader’s Office, Chloe reported in right in the middle of afternoon practical training hours.

“What seems to be the matter, Guardian Leader?”

“Look through this file.”

True to her brisk, no-nonsense nature, Freon immediately slid a bound stack of reports across her desk without preamble.

With every page Chloe turned, the color drained a little further from her face.

“Th-This is…!”

“Those frequent small-scale Armored Insect skirmishes we’ve been dealing with lately… Last night, a D-Rank platoon out on night patrol duty failed to return to base.”

“…You have my deepest sympathies.”

“There is no need for you to console me. This is the duty we chose. Pouring out every last drop of our strength, risking our lives for strangers, and falling in battle where no one will ever remember us—it’s a thankless role, isn’t it?”

Though a trace of self-deprecation colored her voice, Freon kept her expression composed and unsentimental as she rose from her chair and looked out the office window over the Training Grounds below.

Reflected in her sharp, stern obsidian eyes were hundreds of Guardian Department students throwing themselves whole-heartedly into their afternoon drills, completely oblivious to the tragedy that had transpired the night before.

Without turning her face back toward Chloe, Freon continued:

“Getting back to business—in the final, faint transmission we picked up from that lost D-Rank platoon before contact was severed, our operators made out a single word: ‘Chimera.’”

“…A Chimera—a Mutant Variant.”

“Yes. From today onward, I am reassigning all night patrol shifts exclusively to C-Rank platoons and above—and naturally, I expect your Royal Guard to dedicate yourselves to patrol duty as well.”

As Freon gazed down at the students training on the field below, her right hand trembled ever so slightly with the bitter mortification of losing subordinates under her command. Though Chloe noticed the tremor, she pretended not to see it.

“It must be a large-class Chimera, then. After all, there’s no landmass anywhere near the airspace sector our city is currently cruising through.”

“…That is the most likely conclusion, yes. …Tell me, Chloe, doesn’t news like this rattle you at all?”

“If we let fear get the better of us before battle even begins, we’ll lose fights we otherwise could have won. Don’t worry—if anything happens out there, I, Nirvana, the Princess of Annihilation, will take full responsibility.”

As Chloe placed a hand gracefully over her heart and executed a theatrical, courtly bow with a playful wink, the rigid tension in Freon’s shoulders finally eased.

“I feel like I’ve just caught a small glimpse of the secret behind your strength, Chloe…”

Thanks to Chloe deliberately lightening the mood, the harsh edge vanished from Freon’s expression. With her lips softening into a rare, unguarded smile, the Guardian Leader looked every bit like an ordinary girl her age.

“Come to think of it, how is that F-Rank Platoon we entrusted to Kanata Age faring?”

She had been so buried in emergency paperwork that it had slipped her mind until she looked at Chloe’s face.

The traitor Kanata and three hopeless dropouts. Frankly, even with Chloe’s personal recommendation, Freon had considered a traitor like Kanata utterly unfit to serve as an instructor—expecting that putting him in charge would only turn an “F-Rank Platoon” into a “Super F-Rank Platoon.”

“Let’s see… Knowing Kanata, I’m sure he’ll betray everyone’s expectations in a way even I couldn’t possibly predict. Ever since we were little, nobody’s ever been able to guess what Kanata’s going to pull next.”

“Hm? What is that supposed to mean?”

Looking at Chloe’s beaming, angelic smile, Freon couldn’t quite decipher what her friend was getting at.

***

The intra-academy ranking matches—a competitive league held within the Guardian Department to sharpen each platoon’s live combat proficiency. Divided into five official leagues from A-Rank down to E-Rank, achieving strong results in the upper leagues directly impacted not only every squad member’s academic grades, but their day-to-day treatment and privileges across the academy.

Put simply, platoons competing in the higher leagues received preferential treatment across the board, from scholarship stipends to squad budgets and priority equipment allocations. To take last year’s reigning champions, Fireteam S128, as an example, its members enjoyed full exemptions from all dormitory and tuition fees, priority distribution of newly developed Mithril armaments, and non-repayable scholarship grants.

Today, down inside the deeply excavated, bowl-shaped Combat Arena where ranking matches were held, the two platoons scheduled to face off were going through light warm-up exercises on the arena floor.

“Hey, from where you’re sitting, which side do you think is gonna win?”

“—The side you guys are scheduled to fight next.”

Sitting in the nearly deserted spectator stands, Kanata answered Misora’s nervous question without a second’s hesitation. Since today was a school holiday, Kanata had brought Platoon Leader Misora along to scout their upcoming opponents.

Hardly anyone else sat in the spectator tiers. While clashes between top-tier A-Rank platoons always drew a packed house, the only people who bothered showing up to watch a bottom-rung E-Rank match were either total idlers with time to burn or students directly connected to the competing squads.

“B-But the other team has four members, and Fireteam E571 only has three!”

By academy regulations, a platoon’s roster was capped at a maximum of five members and a minimum of three.

“Numbers alone don’t decide a battle. How tightly a team coordinates decides it just as much. Take a closer look at their faces—your upcoming opponents have way sharper eyes, don’t they?”

“…Y-Yeah. Now that you mention it, they almost look like they’re enjoying themselves down there.”

“Exactly. Having that kind of mental leeway means they aren’t sweating a one-man disadvantage in the slightest. Since your platoon is a three-man squad too, you’d do well to take notes from them.”

At his blunt observation, Misora made a sour face.

She could tell by now that Kanata never cut corners when it came to competition, yet she still wished he would offer a little more comforting reassurance.

At the center of the bowl-shaped arena, magical power was channeled into a massive Spherical Monument engraved with intricate patterns of Rune characters, deploying the Sorcerer Field across the entire battleground. This barrier-generating device converted physical trauma and mental shock into harmless Magic Power drain, allowing Sky Wizards to wage full-force mock battles without risking fatal injury.

At the referee’s starting signal, the ranking match kicked off. Both platoons dispersed swiftly into their pre-assigned formations, with Platoon Leaders issuing real-time orders and individual members adapting on the fly to the shifting flow of battle. Victory in a ranking match was claimed either by seizing the platoon emblem worn around the opposing Platoon Leader’s neck or by knocking the opposing Platoon Leader unconscious, with a standard match lasting roughly fifteen minutes at most.

Several minutes into the bout, Kanata—watching the aerial skirmish unfold from the stands—murmured under his breath:

“Huh. For an E-Rank squad, they’ve put together a really clean, mistake-free team.”

His dark eyes gleamed as though he were genuinely relishing the match. Looking at his profile, Misora couldn’t help tilting her head and wondering how someone who loved combat this much could ever have become a traitor.

“Their combination play in particular is really slick. Both the mid-guard and rearguard are constantly shifting positions to match their lone vanguard’s maneuvers and back him up. Sometimes they deliberately draw enemy fire onto themselves, placing complete trust in their vanguard to finish the job. When your backline supports you that well, playing vanguard feels unbeatable. …Look, they just shot down one of the four.”

Picked apart by the three-man team’s seamless coordination, the four-member platoon was thrown into disarray and defeated one by one in detail. While Kanata admired their textbook execution, Misora’s face grew paler by the second.

“C-Can we seriously beat a team that moves like that?!”

Almost as if he hadn’t heard her panicked outburst, Kanata kept his eyes glued to the arena floor for another beat before turning to her.

“Hm? Why’re you making such a worried face?”

“B-Because we still can’t pull off slick combination plays like that…! And how do I put it—they have this sense of solidarity that our squad doesn’t have at all!”

“Well, duh. You three haven’t done a single full-squad combination drill yet, you didn’t even know each other’s faces a month ago, and you only just started eating lunch together this week. You can’t expect deep camaraderie to magically sprout overnight out of a bare-bones relationship like that.”

“I-In other words… y-you’re saying we c-can’t win?!”

“I never said you can’t win. I’m just saying the other guys are strong too.”

“Th-Then we can win…?!”

“Who knows? That comes down to how much effort you guys put in.”

“‘How much effort we put in,’ you say…”

Seeing that Misora was letting the opponents’ performance psyche her out, Kanata flashed a fearless grin and spoke firmly:

“What’s the point of getting cold feet before the match even starts? Those guys down there are looking down on you as an F-Rank freebie. Which means all you’ve gotta do is catch ’em off guard and smash their cocky noses flat. Just focus on that.”

Confronted with Kanata’s fearless grin—looking as though he were relishing the uphill odds—Misora felt her anxiety vanish in an instant.

“You’ve been grinding through every special training drill I assigned you. When you guys—Fireteam E601—are pouring everything you’ve got into your effort, there’s no reason on earth you can’t go toe-to-toe with them. Effort never betrays you. It’s always people who do the betraying. All you guys need to do is believe in yourselves and keep honing your skills. Nothing else to it—right?”

As Misora nodded silently, Kanata stood up from his seat with a satisfied nod.

“Alright, go put in some solo marksmanship practice for the rest of the afternoon. I’ve got a little errand to run right now.”

“An errand? What kind of errand?”

“Nothing much. Just meeting up with an oddball who happens to have some real promise.”

Leaving a puzzled Misora tilting her head in the stands, Kanata strolled briskly out of the arena toward his meeting spot.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Hmph. To detect my approach before I struck—even rotten, it seems you really are a former ace.”

Beneath the shade of a large tree outside the park bordering the Combat Arena, Kanata had been waiting at their agreed meeting spot when Rico circled around through the park to sneak up behind him—only for Kanata to call her out without turning around.

Had it been anyone else, it might have passed for a childish prank, but Rico’s approach was another matter entirely. The technique she had used to erase her presence was a specialized stealth method unique to Magic Gunners trained to stalk and snipe targets unseen in aerial combat—clear proof that she had been testing Kanata’s reflexes.

“Pure coincidence. I just happened to glance over my shoulder and saw you sneaking up on me.”

“You were not merely relying on sixth sense; you confirmed your surroundings visually as well, didn’t you? And here I thought seasoned Sky Wizards were the most prone to relying solely on presence detection while neglecting visual confirmation.”

Just as he thought, Rico stood head and shoulders above her peers in both tactical knowledge and technical skill. This girl is an absolute must-have if Fireteam E601 is going to win, Kanata thought, the corner of his mouth twitching upward.

“You asked what I think I am doing, yet as a goddess, allow me to return that exact question to you. Just what do you think you are doing?”

“Hm? What do you mean?”

“Summoning me out here on a holiday under the pretext of having business with me is one thing. However, deliberately choosing a meeting spot right in front of the Combat Arena… reeks of ulterior motives.”

Kanata had timed his summons to coincide with the exact minute E571’s ranking match in the arena concluded—calculating every move around the towering pride of this showy, genius-type girl who styled herself a goddess…

“Heh. Judging by that reaction, it looks like you were watching that ranking match just now too.”

“…………”

“So what’s the plan? As things stand right now, your platoon doesn’t stand a chance against those guys, does it?”

“…………”

“You already figured that out watching them, didn’t you? Eleven straight losses for a platoon graced by a supposed goddess, huh. Or are you planning to run away because you hate losing? Though a real goddess wouldn’t run away with her tail between her legs, right?”

“…That is an awfully cheap provocation.”

“Because for our platoon to win, your power is indispensable. With only Misora and Lecty’s strength, we can’t pull it off.”

Fixed under Kanata’s steady gaze, Rico flipped her long black hair back and schooled her features into a cool, composed mask.

“That a goddess like myself is needed goes without saying. However, I have no intention of participating in a match only to suffer an unsightly defeat.”

Continuing to lose was something Rico’s pride could never stomach. And if she refused to lose, her only two options were to boycott the matches altogether, or step into the arena and achieve an outcome other than defeat…

Reading Rico’s pride and inner conflict like an open book, Kanata made his pitch:

“Gotcha. Then what if I told you I can give you a foolproof secret plan that guarantees victory?”

“…What did you say…?!”

“It’s your chance to turn your frustrating academy life completely upside down in one stroke.”

“…By what right does someone who barely knows a thing about me make such a grand claim?”

“I know a fair bit about you, actually. You’re the holder of Clairvoyance, aren’t you?”

“…………”

Recorded in the confidential remarks of her student dossier was the supreme-grade detection unique skill: Clairvoyance. When Kanata had first spotted that term in her file, even he had been floored.

“I don’t know why you refuse to use Clairvoyance under normal circumstances, but I figure your boast about having goddess-tier ability isn’t actually far off the mark. At the very least, I rate your true skill highly.”

“Hmph. That the ability of a goddess like myself should be highly rated is only natural. Though it seems the ugly, mediocre commoners of this city are too blind to comprehend it.”

Giving a lofty snort, Rico regarded Kanata with a composed gaze.

“Hmm. You have piqued my curiosity slightly. Just once, as a test, I shall deign to take the field in our upcoming match. …However, I shall not participate in daily drills. I despise working up a sweat, after all.”

Leaving behind only those words, Rico turned and strode briskly away. Though she was vaguely aware that she had played right into Kanata’s hands, having her goddess-level talent genuinely recognized left her in far too good a mood to care.

While Rico remained as uninterested in group drills as ever and Lecty seemed to have grasped an important breakthrough from her costume training—having now returned to practicing her standard Magic Dual-Swordsmanship forms with newfound poise—

Kanata and Misora were hovering high up in the sky at an altitude of 4,000 meters. Starting two days ago, alongside stationary marksmanship drills on the ground, Misora had begun practicing midair artillery fire from a hover as well as high-speed mobile firing on the fly.

Massive banks of stratocumulus clouds drifted across the heavens, mottling the deep blue sky like patchwork.

As usual, Kanata straddled his jet-black Broom, while Misora hovered beside him using Flight Magecraft. Not another student was in sight anywhere in the surrounding sky, as they had flown well outside the standard training sectors directly above Mistgun. Out here in the deserted open air, Kanata spoke deliberately:

“Listen up, Misora. I’m only gonna demonstrate this technique once, so watch closely.”

Extending his right arm straight out to his side, Kanata channeled his wavelength into his ring. The very next instant, a single Magic Cannon Sword materialized out of thin air. Misora recognized that blade on sight.

“—Gladius, the Jet-Black Magic Cannon Sword!”

The name slipped from her lips in an awed whisper.

That greatsword was the very reason Kanata had come to be feared as Chronos, the Black Master Swordsman — the all-conquering blade gripped by the former ace of Mistgun’s strongest platoon, a weapon of pure destruction wielded by the one who had stood atop all two thousand Sky Wizards of the academy city.

While Misora stared in wide-eyed wonder, Kanata hefted the massive black greatsword effortlessly with one hand, leveling the cannon muzzle built into the tip of the blade toward a massive bank of clouds floating in the distance.

Refining his internal Magic Power to the limit, he poured nearly all of it straight into the Magic Cannon Sword. Inside the hilt of Gladius, the cylinder-type Magic Degeneracy Reactor spun rapidly through five full revolutions as an eerie, otherworldly luminescence bled across the black blade. Narrowing his eyes in fierce concentration, Kanata squeezed the trigger—

Magic Cannon Sword Combat Technique—Strike Blaster!

A deafening roar split the heavens, accompanied by recoil violent enough to tear an ordinary wielder’s arm out of its socket. Simultaneously, a colossal, swirling torrent of jet-black light erupted from the muzzle, threatening to swallow the sky whole.

It was a vortex of black light—pure violence given form. Scorching gale-force winds tore outward as the beam punched a cavernous hole clean through the distant cloud bank miles away, leaving swirling ribbons of displaced air and residual magic trailing in its wake.

It was over in the blink of an eye.

A single, breathtaking instant that left an observer struggling to tell dream from reality.

“No way…! W-What did you just do?!”

Staring dumbfounded at the pierced horizon, Misora had just witnessed an overwhelming gulf in true strength — a Magic Cannon Sword technique so dazzlingly destructive that even asking how it worked felt laughable.

Many advanced artillery techniques were classified as Limit Skills — Restricted Combat Techniques—and this was unmistakably one of the highest order.

“Hm? What do you mean, ‘what did I do’? You were watching right there, weren’t you?”

Having just unleashed a heaven-rending blast, Kanata spoke in his usual breezy, unbothered drawl.

“Anyway, that’s the technique you’re gonna learn next. …Hey, are you listening to me?”

No way—what did this guy just say?! Misora stood frozen with her mouth hanging half-open. M-Me, learning a technique like that?!

“C-Can someone like me seriously learn a technique that powerful?!”

“There’s a fair chance, yeah. Well, depending on how much effort you put in.”

Right now, Misora’s direct hit rate against stationary targets hovered around fifty percent at best, and against moving targets it dropped below twenty percent. Even so, compared to the first day of gunnery training when she hadn’t been able to land a single shot, it was a massive leap forward.

Right there in midair, Kanata walked Misora through the mechanics of the technique step by step: how to knead and refine her internal Magic Power, how to channel it into the Magic Cannon Sword’s reactor, how to engage the Simplified Inscribed Formula of Rune characters carved along the blade, and how to gauge the exact critical threshold before firing.

Once he finished his explanation, he nodded as if it were the simplest thing in the world.

“Alright, give it a shot once.”

“…O-Okay! I’ll try!”

Unable to wield the heavy Magic Cannon Sword one-handed like Kanata, Misora assumed her two-handed firing stance with slightly stiff movements, tucking her right elbow tightly against her side and bracing the long silver-white blade with her left hand just as she had practiced on the range.

Yet she couldn’t fire right away. Kneading the sheer volume of Magic Power required to activate the combat technique took her a painfully long time. After several tense seconds, she finally built up a massive charge of refined Magic Power inside her body, channeled it into the six-chamber rotary cylinder of her Magic Degeneracy Reactor, and—

Magic Cannon Sword Combat Technique—Strike Blaster!

The instant Misora squeezed the trigger, the ferocious recoil wrenched her muzzle sharply skyward as a brilliant lance of silver-white light erupted from the tip of Razgriz. Though clearly smaller in scale than the colossal torrent of jet-black light Kanata had unleashed moments earlier, it was still a high-powered magic cannon blast incomparable to any standard shot she had ever fired.

Shining with blinding radiance, the beam carried so much destructive force that Misora could scarcely believe it had come from her own hands.

The very next moment, however, all strength drained abruptly from her limbs. The glow at the tip of her blade winked out, and a wave of heavy lethargy and vertigo washed over her all at once.

“I-It puts this much strain on your Magic Power reserves…? H-How on earth can you act like it’s nothing after firing a blast like that?!”

Staggered by the astronomical magic consumption of a single shot, Misora turned her head back toward Kanata—

And froze. Hovering atop his board, Kanata looked as nonchalant as ever on the surface, yet something about him felt unmistakably off.

His expression was schooled into its usual carefree mask, yet looking closely, beads of cold, clammy sweat clung to his forehead, his complexion had gone noticeably pale, and his breathing was shallow—as though he were desperately forcing himself to act normal.

Misora had seen these exact symptoms several times before during her first year in the Preparatory Course. It was what happened whenever a green Guardian freshman pushed past their limits without knowing their own capacity—the classic signs of Magic Depletion.

“Hm? What’s the matter, Misora?”

Putting on a puzzled look to feign composure, Kanata called out to her from atop his Broom.

His Broom. Even during today’s training session, Kanata was relying on that board to stay aloft—avoiding the continuous magic drain of Flight Magecraft as if trying to keep his Magic Power expenditure to the absolute bare minimum…

Come to think of it, aside from long-distance travel, Brooms were also used to prevent beginners from plummeting out of the sky if they suffered Magic Depletion while flying.

Wait… could it be that his current Magic Capacity is actually really low? Even though he used to be the ace of S128…?

“Alright, Misora, on top of your standard marksmanship drills, we’re adding this to your daily menu. Keep the output dialed down and cap it at three shots per day max. Since you’ve only got three tries a day, make every single shot count. Firing any more than that’ll wreck your stamina for the rest of your training.”

Oblivious to her realization, Kanata rattled off her instructions before pausing to squint at her.

“Why do you keep staring at me like that? Have I got something stuck to my face?”

“N-Nope! N-Nothing at all! Just thinking about my own form!”

Focused on coaching her, Kanata didn’t pick up on the shift in Misora’s demeanor.

What is going on here? Troubled by the unsettling discrepancy, Misora turned the puzzle over in her mind. Under normal circumstances, it was unthinkable. For a wizard who had once stood at the very summit of Mistgun’s Guardian Department to show early symptoms of Magic Depletion after firing a single combat technique…

“Alright, we’re folding this into your regimen starting now. Any questions?”

In the end, she couldn’t bring herself to ask. Misora shook her head silently. A sudden fear had crossed her mind that if she pried into his condition right now, the fragile bond of trust they had finally built might shatter completely.

The Traitor. Could the reason this former ace had abruptly abandoned the ranking matches and been branded a traitor have something to do with what she had just witnessed…?

Pushing that unsettling thought down into the back of her mind, Misora forced herself to focus on the task in front of her and began charging her second shot.

The day before the ranking match. Gathered inside the Fireteam E601 Platoon Room, Misora, Lecty, and Rico were holding a pre-match strategy briefing with Kanata. Standing at the front of the room, Kanata was busy sketching a three-dimensional tactical formation on the whiteboard, marking down each member’s relative position.

“Alright, I’m gonna lay out our strategy now.”

At Kanata’s opening words, all three girls leaned forward intently.

After all, they were about to receive the battle plan that would deliver them victory in tomorrow’s ranking match—a strategy devised by none other than a former S-Rank ace, traitor or not.

Expecting a brilliant, intricate master plan beyond anything they could have imagined on their own, Misora and her squadmates waited with bated breath for Kanata to speak.

“—Lecty stops ’em. Rico backs her up. And then Misora lands the Finishing Blow. That oughta make it a pretty solid fight.”

“““…………”””

Kanata delivered the one-sentence summary with brimming confidence. Misora, Lecty, and Rico, however, stared back at him in dead silence, giant question marks practically floating above their heads.

For starters, he hadn’t even pointed once at the elaborate diagram he had just spent five minutes drawing on the whiteboard.

“Hm? What’s with the blank stares?”

“We can’t make heads or tails of that bare-bones explanation! Explain it in actual words so normal human beings can understand it!”

“Indeed. Even a goddess like myself could not decipher that. Do not tell me you actually have no plan at all.”

“K-Kanata-san! W-We really can win tomorrow, right?!”

Assailed by their exasperated protests, Kanata folded his arms and tilted his head as if genuinely puzzled why they hadn’t understood.

“Hmm… As our vanguard, Lecty pins down the enemy Platoon Leader in close quarters. Rico supports her with covering sniping fire from the rear. That alone guarantees their Platoon Leader is locked in place, and with a little luck it’ll draw the attention of at least one more of their squadmates. Meanwhile, Misora flies around the field like crazy until she shakes off her mark and gets completely free. And once Misora has a clean line of fire, she charges up her Magic Power and sweeps away the enemy Platoon Leader in one shot with Strike Blaster. That’s literally what I just said—how did that not get across?”

“““—You left out ninety percent of that just now!”””

When all three girls roared back at him in unison, Kanata blinked in mild offense.

“Hm? Didn’t I say all that?”

Pressing a hand to her forehead with a groan that said Here we go again, Misora suddenly noticed another glaring issue.

“…Wait a second. Even with the full explanation, is that seriously the entire plan?”

Beside her, both Rico and Lecty nodded in agreement.

“Lecty pins the enemy Platoon Leader, Rico provides covering fire, and I break free to land the Finishing Blow… For a strategy cooked up by a former ace, isn’t that awfully bare-bones?”

They hadn’t conducted a single full-squad combination rehearsal together. Worse yet, Misora was still struggling to master her Magic Cannon Sword technique, and firing Strike Blaster still carried the fatal drawback of requiring several long seconds of stationary Charge time.

“I hate to repeat myself, but the three of us haven’t practiced together as a full unit even once!

How are we supposed to win with such a dead-simple plan?! Shouldn’t we spend at least a little time practicing team coordination today?!”

Seeing Misora’s agitation, Kanata—who hadn’t cut a single corner in his tactical analysis—answered without hesitation:

“Even if we crammed in a group drill today, half-baked teamwork thrown together overnight won’t hold up in a real fight. A castle built out of wet sand gets washed away by the very first wave.”

“B-But can we r-really win with just this?!”

“Misora is right. This plan is far too simplistic. I refuse to suffer an unsightly defeat.”

“Umm, Kanata-san, will we really be okay tomorrow?!”

Looking across the anxious faces of his three students, Kanata flashed a fearless grin.

“So long as the three of you trust each other and link your roles together, a squad like Fireteam E571 won’t even know what hit ’em. In fact, you won’t just win—you can blow your opponents’ minds and walk away with a flawless, zero-casualty victory.”

“N-No way! With the simple plan you just explained, we can r-really win flawlessly…?!”

“Obviously. The key is that you can’t just focus on your own individual job—each of you has to understand your teammates’ roles inside and out too. And now that you three actually know how your teammates move and think, you can seize victory for sure. Plus, this is a battle-proven live-combat tactic that works great against real Armored Insects too, so go out there with your heads held high.”

From the very beginning, the intra-academy ranking matches had been designed to simulate live combat against Armored Insects.

The rule that victory went to whichever side seized the opposing Platoon Leader’s emblem or knocked the leader out stemmed directly from the fact that Armored Insect swarms were led by high-intelligence Commander-Type Chimeras directing ranks of soldier-type drones.

Faced with the quiet conviction radiating from Kanata’s voice, none of the three girls raised any further objections to the strategy.

“And once the strategy’s locked in, you know what comes next, right? From that point on, the match is decided right here.”

Kanata tapped his fist lightly against the center of his chest.

“Whether you’re content staying an F-Rank Platoon for the rest of your lives, or whether you’re hungry to claw your way up to the top—show me just how badly you want it tomorrow.”

Gulp. Fired up by his challenge, Misora, Lecty, and Rico swallowed hard and steeled their resolve.

Tomorrow, at long last, the fruits of all their grueling training would be put to the test.

After writing down today’s entry in her diary alone in her bedroom, Misora flopped backward onto her bed with her arms and legs spread wide. Having spent the entire afternoon grinding through marksmanship drills right up until sunset, she was exhausted down to her bones.

Staring up at the ceiling, she reviewed her progress over the past week. In standard marksmanship, her hit rate against stationary targets still hovered around fifty percent, while her accuracy against moving targets sat at roughly twenty-five percent. In tomorrow’s ranking match, firing ordinary magic cannon blasts on the fly probably wouldn’t score a single clean hit.

And most crucial of all was her mastery over the Magic Cannon Sword combat technique. While she had managed to reach the point where she could reliably fire Strike Blaster, she had never once practiced timing the blast alongside her squadmates in a live formation drill. Kanata had told her not to worry about it, yet knowing that the entire strategy hinged on her landing the decisive Finishing Blow made her stomach flutter with nerves.

Ugh… Catching herself starting to lose confidence, Misora sprang upright on her mattress and slapped both hands firmly against her own cheeks—smack!

“Owww~~~!”

The sharp sting cleared the cobwebs right out of her head. With faint red handprints blooming across both cheeks, Misora reminded herself that as Platoon Leader, she couldn’t afford to get cold feet. Quite the opposite—since Kanata had entrusted her with the key to victory, she had to work twice as hard as anyone else.

—Whether you’re content staying an F-Rank Platoon for the rest of your lives, or whether you’re hungry to claw your way up to the top—show me just how badly you want it tomorrow.

“He actually knows how to say some pretty cool things when it counts, doesn’t he?”

Sitting alone on her bed, Misora couldn’t help letting out a soft giggle.

In the first place, sitting around worrying by herself wouldn’t change a thing. No matter how much she fretted tonight, the hurdle waiting in front of her tomorrow wouldn’t magically shrink, so worrying was a total waste of energy.

A moment later, her thoughts drifted back to Kanata himself—specifically, to how pale and drained he had looked right after demonstrating Strike Blaster high up in the clouds.

No matter how you looked at it, those were the symptoms of Magic Depletion. Wait, calm down, me! There’s no way the ace hailed as Chronos, the Black Master Swordsman, would ever run out of Magic Power after a single blast. Either my eyes were playing tricks on me, or he was just feeling a little under the weather. Besides, tonight isn’t the time to get distracted worrying about him—I need to focus one hundred percent on tomorrow’s match! I can always ask him about it after we win.

Thinking only about tomorrow’s victory was her duty as Platoon Leader. Having settled her mind—and worn out from days of non-stop training—Misora fell fast asleep the moment her head hit the pillow, without even having time to toss and turn with pre-match jitters.

The day of the intra-academy ranking match. Hovering in midair inside the bowl-shaped Combat Arena were Kanata and the three girls of Fireteam E601.

Because an E-Rank matchup involving the bottom-ranked squad drew virtually no campus interest, few spectators had bothered to show up, leaving the tiered stands around the arena almost completely empty.

Across the field, the three male members of Fireteam E571 watched Misora and her squadmates float out to the starting line and couldn’t help snickering among themselves.

“Looks like our promotion to D-Rank is in the bag.”

“Yeah, thank goodness we drew the F-Rank Platoon. We can take it easy today.”

“Once we wrap this up, it’s victory party time!”

Treating E601 as a joke of an F-Rank squad, not a single member of the opposing team viewed Misora and the others as a threat.

Meanwhile, hovering across from them, Kanata and his students were reacting in their own ways…

“Heh, they’re looking down on us with everything they’ve got, aren’t they?”

Kanata flashed a fearless grin, looking as though he were thoroughly enjoying picturing the rude awakening awaiting their opponents in a few minutes’ time.

“They’re ticking me off so bad!”

“Hmph. The smaller and more mediocre the mortal, the more eager they are to look down upon others.”

“By that definition, wouldn’t that include you too, Rico…?”

“Hmm. A goddess like myself cannot be measured by a mortal yardstick to begin with, so there is no contradiction.”

“I-I’m… starting to feel super nervous all of a sudden!”

Looking across his three students as they traded remarks, Kanata called out to them:

“Hey, do you guys know something?”

Even though they were floating right in front of the enemy squad, Kanata spoke in an unhurried, conversational tone.

“Out of everyone sitting in this arena right now, there probably isn’t a single person who thinks you guys are gonna win. Which means whether you’ve lost ten matches in a row until today or a hundred matches in a row, you’ve got zero reason to feel stiff or nervous.

I know I’ve said it a dozen times already, but if you execute my strategy the way we went over it, you can bring this fight to dead-even fifty-fifty odds. And from that point on, what tips the scales is your—”

At the exact instant Kanata was about to deliver his final pep talk before the starting bell, the Sorcerer Field enveloping the arena was forcibly shut down from the outside.

As the shimmering magical barrier vanished into thin air, confusion rippled through both squads and the scattered spectators in the stands. Nobody had the faintest idea what had just happened. Before anyone could ask, the match referee urgently ordered Kanata and all competing students to descend to the ground at once.

“What in the world is going on?”

The exact moment Misora’s boots touched down on the Training Grounds, a piercing siren wailed like a scream from loudspeakers across the entire city. Wooooooooon— The low, guttural howl of the emergency air-raid siren echoed across the sky three times in succession.

For a single heartbeat, the Academy Floating City Mistgun fell dead silent.

The very next instant, a massive uproar erupted simultaneously from every district of the city.

It was exceedingly rare for Armored Insects to approach close enough to threaten the Floating City itself; at the very least, not a single air-raid alert had sounded during the entire previous year.

Though Kanata couldn’t see the residential streets from the Training Grounds, he could easily picture panicked crowds screaming in terror and stampeding toward the shelters across the city.

“An air-raid siren at this exact timing, of all times…?”

Among the stunned students standing on the Training Grounds, Kanata was the first to speak.

True to his pedigree as a former front-line ace, he looked completely accustomed to life-or-death emergencies, showing not a trace of panic.

Since the rest of Fireteam S128 was ordered to focus on outer-airspace patrol duty, they’ve gotta be out on patrol outside the city at this exact moment… Well, Chloe and the others will be fine. They aren’t the type to slip up.

Even as that thought crossed his mind, Kanata turned his eyes toward Misora, Lecty, and Rico, whose faces had gone tense with alarm. I have zero intention of letting anyone living in this city die today. Protecting the people of this city is what it means to be a Sky Wizard.

With quiet, unshakeable resolve in his eyes, Kanata led Misora and her squadmates toward their designated evacuation guidance sector.