Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy Chapter 758

Chapter 758

"Still, I'd like to hear the lecture content I missed."

"Which lecture?"

"Um... <Divination Magic Good for Going Crazy>."

"Huh? This should be a 3rd year lecture?"

"That's right."

Yi-Han answered the senior's question with a bitter voice.

"Even if you're taking all schools, there's no need to rush divination magic."

The senior gave sensible advice and then asked.

"What kind of divination did you learn, by any chance?"

"Last year, I mainly used stone divination."

'As expected, it seems hard to keep up...'

The reason divination mages used divination was to protect themselves.

Peeking into the future was something that brought enormous burden to mages.

Divination protected the mage's mind by breaking down this future into uncertain and metaphorical fragments.

It protected the mage by peeking at fragments of fragments that revealed the future, rather than directly peeking at the future.

Of course, there were drawbacks to that extent. Accuracy decreased and the difficulty for the mage to read increased.

The stone divination that 1st year students practiced last year was a relatively easy divination that could answer simple questions, and even then, there were several students who had decreased accuracy or suffered major rebound.

The senior doubted whether a junior who had only learned stone divination could learn <Divination Magic Good for Going Crazy>.

"Senior. May I ask one thing?"

"Go ahead."

"...Why are you in the form of a golem?"

Yi-Han couldn't hold back and asked the question.

Although all kinds of rare races could be seen in Einroguard, he had never seen a bronze golem race.

He had tried to stay quiet as a junior since the senior acted as if it was nothing, but he couldn't bear it any longer.

"It's due to divination magic side effects."

"Is there divination magic where you have to become a bronze golem as payment?!"

"Not that. You have to pay a price for peeking into the future, and if you take it with your bare body, you might die. It's better to be in bronze golem form for a while."

"...I see."

Yi-Han felt he understood why the divination magic school had so few people, comparable to the dark magic school.

No matter how confident the seniors were, they probably wouldn't want to become bronze golems or go crazy.

"Bronze golem sen... no, Senior, what is your name?"

"Ah. I can't tell you."

"?"

"This week is an ominous week if I introduce myself."

"..."

Yi-Han decided he should just call the other party Bronze Golem Senior.

He became afraid of getting too close if he learned the name.

"Golem Senior. But you can tell me the lecture content, right?"

"Of course. Honestly, I doubt if it'll be alright, but since the professor allowed you to hear it..."

The golem senior gestured with creaking bronze fingers for him to come in.

As Yi-Han was about to step forward, the senior quickly stopped him.

"Wait."

"?"

"Could you step with your right foot first? For the next three days, you'll have good luck if you step with your right foot first."

"Yes."

Yi-Han accepted without being flustered anymore.

He wasn't naive enough to be flustered that one more crazy senior had appeared at this point.

While following behind with steps starting with the right foot (the golem senior whistled sideways once every five steps), Yi-Han carefully asked.

"Can you explain a bit more about these... um... strange... no... anyway, these actions you're doing now?"

"It's not difficult."

The golem senior explained relatively kindly to one of the few juniors.

Divination magic school mages practiced methods to read the uncertain future as accurately as possible with various and complex divinations, while simultaneously considering ways to use that future as beneficially as possible.

One of those was the method of 'avoiding futures unfavorable to oneself and advancing towards favorable futures'.

"Is such a thing possible? The more concretely you see the future, the greater price you'd have to pay..."

"You don't directly see the future. You just find out the restrictions. Actions that avoid misfortune and bring good fortune."

The golem senior was an outstanding divination mage.

To figure out which actions brought good fortune and avoided misfortune, he used three divinations and five magics every week.

'Amazing.'

Yi-Han was amazed hearing the senior's magic theory.

He knew divination magic was particularly unstable and bizarre among the empire's magic schools, but to think even this was possible.

"How effective is it?"

"This week I found fewer lucky actions so it might be insufficient, but..."

The golem senior rummaged through his pocket, found dice and threw them repeatedly. Five sixes came up in a row, then a different number on the last throw.

"Oh dear. If it had been last week, more would have come up."

"...!"

Yi-Han was shocked.

The luck was much more powerful than he had thought.

Crack!

Suddenly, the workshop ceiling collapsed and bricks tried to strike the golem senior's head.

Instinctively swinging his staff, Yi-Han blew away the bricks with telekinesis.

"Are you alright?!"

"How did you...? More importantly, dodge!"

"?"

As soon as the words ended, a spirit whirlwind phenomenon occurred inside the workshop and brought back the bricks that had been blown away by the gust.

Finally, the bricks struck the golem senior's head.

Clang!

"Kuk. As expected, I found too few lucky restrictions this week."

"What on earth was that just now?!"

"Luck and misfortune are like two sides of a coin. If you use luck, misfortune gathers. Don't worry about it. I became a golem in preparation for this. Here. This is the lecture content from <Divination Magic Good for Going Crazy> this week."

The golem senior waved his staff and extracted this week's lecture content from a book.

<Divination Magic Good for Going Crazy> lecture will deal with complex and powerful divinations beyond simple and intuitive divinations... (omitted)... Divinations a divination mage might try are as follows...

Spirit Gold Coin Divination

-Throw five specially processed gold coins, and offer the coins that come up heads to the summoned spirit. The more coins offered, the more accurate the spirit's prophecy becomes...

'What a terrible and cruel divination.'

Five Demon Divination

-Summon a demon dwelling in the future and record five prophecies. If you fail to guess the two false ones among those prophecies, you receive a powerful curse of misfortune...

'Oh. This is much better.'

The golem senior opened his mouth, perhaps uneasy about the junior who was taking notes diligently.

"You don't practice or learn this all at once, but first learn that such advanced divinations exist. There's no need to rush ahead unnecessarily. Understand?"

"Yes. I'll keep that in mind."

"Don't practice alone, practice in this Irrational Number Hall. Speaking of which, want to try one now?"

The golem senior didn't trust the junior that much.

It wouldn't be strange for a student hungry for magic and knowledge enough to take all schools to go back to their personal room and experiment with those divinations one by one.

Yi-Han, who had no intention of practicing alone at all as the senior said, thought inwardly.

'As expected of an Einroguard senior, how harsh.'

To force practice right after saying there's no need to overdo it.

Indeed, the words of Einroguard seniors couldn't be trusted.

"I'd like to try practicing the Five Demon Divination."

"Hmmmm. Alright."

Seeing the junior deliberately choose demon divination instead of gold coin divination, the golem senior's suspicions solidified even more.

Mages were originally divided into two types.

Those who challenge easy magic first and those who challenge difficult magic first!

And unlike other schools, the divination magic school had a higher dropout rate for the latter. They needed to be watched very closely.

"Arrange the following materials and try summoning a demon dwelling in the future. Since summoning the demon itself is quite difficult, absolutely don't rush. Understand?"

"Yes."

Yi-Han took out the reagents one by one as written in the book.

Fly agaric mushrooms harvested on a new moon, bone fragments obtained from the demon realm among dimensions, writing the name of the future with cinnabar...

"In exchange for my misfortune, I seek five prophecies, tempting demon. Come forth."

"Try again slowly."

Seeing the junior consume accurate movements, incantations, and mana, the golem senior thought he might go through less trial and error than expected at that level.

He had worried whether he could keep up with 3rd year lectures, but it seemed there was indeed a reason the professor had allowed him to listen.

"Senior. Isn't this summoned?"

"What?"

The golem senior turned his neck using creaking bronze joints.

Then he was shocked to see the demon's mouth flickering in the center of the magic circle.

"?!?!"

Surprisingly, this junior had summoned a demon in one try!

"Do you perhaps have even a little demon blood mixed in your lineage??"

"Not that I know of."

"Is the Wardanaz family perhaps deeply connected to demons?"

"Um... A little...?"

Yi-Han answered, wondering if capturing demons and using them as slaves counted as being deeply connected.

At those words, the bronze golem senior understood a bit.

Mages with demon blood mixed in their lineage or families with connections to demons tended to be more advantageous when using related magic.

The same principle applied as spirit-blooded mages being advantageous in spirit magic.

...Although summoning on the first try was still quite amazing...

"I didn't expect you to summon on the first try. So that's why you chose demon divination? Clever?"

"Haha. Thank you."

Although that wasn't particularly the reason, Yi-Han nodded, wanting to give a good impression to a senior from the same school.

"I thought you were someone who recklessly rushed into magic risking your life like the professor, since you're taking all schools and even came to hear the lecture you missed."

"..."

Yi-Han inwardly cursed the bronze golem senior.

Perhaps because he had a cold metal heart, he was incredibly rude.

"Then slowly. Try asking it to tell you the prophecies."

"Tell me the prophecies."

-You will face an ancient being...-

"..."

"Isn't this false?"

The golem senior guessed from the side.

Even in Einroguard, meeting ancient beings wasn't common.

-You shall not wander outside during the day, nor at night...-

"Hmm. This also seems false."

This corresponded to restrictions among prophecies, but the content was too harsh.

The golem senior threw a suspicious look.

Of course, he also imposed various restrictions to increase luck and suppress misfortune, but wasn't this restriction too broad in range?

-You will trample the mages of other cradles miserably...-

"Isn't this false?"

Yi-Han, who had been listening quietly, asked.

The golem senior shook his head.

"This seems the most likely among the 3 so far. Cradles probably mean other magic schools. You tend to meet them quite often."

"Regardless of meeting them, why would I trample those people..."

"That's how mages' pride works. Be quiet. We'll miss the prophecy."

-You will become addicted to tombstone powder...-

-A spirit will tempt you...-

"The first and second seem like it."

"My thoughts are a bit different. Demon, the fourth and fifth are false!"

"?!"

-How disappointing... I'll be waiting for your arrogance and ruin...-

The demon disappeared into the future, openly expressing disappointment.

The golem senior blinked his lens apertures in amazement at the junior's surprising talent.

'The professor didn't leave it because she was lazy!'

When Professor Parsellet had left the card saying 'The student can sufficiently keep up with the progress without needing to ask about what he missed', he had thought she left it out of laziness, but it turned out to be true unexpectedly.

"Senior. I want to learn ways to change the future that came out in the prophecies!"

"Oh my. Don't rush. The more you rush, the more dangerous it becomes."

"But it seems more dangerous to just stay still now..."