Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy Chapter 977

Chapter 977

At first, the golem senior thought it was a joke.

However, the junior's eyes were very serious. Overwhelmed by that gaze, the golem senior answered to the best of his ability.

"W-well, I think it would be difficult. It's hard to predict a divination mage who's more skilled than yourself."

Basically, since divination magic was created to peek into uncertain futures, its foundation was weak and precarious.

Even predicting a relatively smooth future required meticulous preparation, so what about a future involving multiple divination mages who were difficult variables to predict?

From that point, the burden on the mage increased dramatically.

Not to mention predicting a divination mage more skilled than oneself.

'Ugh.'

Yi-Han trembled with regret.

"...The more magic I learn, the more I tremble at the imperfection of magic as a discipline."

"Well said."

The passing mad doppelganger praised him with satisfaction.

He was quite pleased with how his disciple had been focusing on magic lately instead of paying attention to useless things.

Perhaps he had finally come to his senses.

'I want to hit him.'

While Yi-Han was irreverently staring at the back of his master's head, the brass golem hurriedly called his junior.

"Junior. Come here. I'll teach you diligently, like the heat of a newly born star."

"...You don't really need to take those words seriously. Let's just forget about them."

However, the golem senior had already firmed his resolve.

In fact, from the golem senior's perspective, there wasn't much difference between the skull principal and the skull principal's mad doppelganger.

They were both great mages, were eccentric, and were likely to cause trouble if not listened to.

Since he was told to teach diligently, he had to teach diligently.

"Wandering stars are naturally harder to observe than ordinary stars."

"I thought so."

Yi-Han answered in a resigned voice.

If they were easier to observe than ordinary stars, why would the mad doppelganger have ordered it?

"But they also allow for divination of equally destructive and irregular futures. Among divination mages who left their names in history, many were skilled in divination using wandering stars. They could sometimes foresee futures that other mages couldn't see."

Yi-Han wanted to ask how many of them had contracted with guest star Arna but held back.

He felt that hearing the answer would only make him sad.

"If you learn to read omens of the future from the movements of wandering stars, you'll be able to avoid various misfortunes you'll face in the future."

"Like Master's approaches too?"

"As I said, it's difficult to predict a divination mage more skilled than yourself."

The senior was cold like a golem. He wouldn't say something was right when it absolutely wasn't.

"Now. Quickly grab the observation artifact and try to find traces of any wandering star. Otherwise, who knows what the principal might do."

Outstanding divination mages knew not to rely on magic.

The brass golem senior predicted the future without using divination magic.

Of course, it wasn't particularly helpful to Yi-Han.

'I miss Senior Direth...'

For a senior to submit to power and sell out their junior.

Well, it wasn't that the brass golem senior was bad, but rather that Direth was unusual.

How could an Einroguard student defy the skull principal's (doppelganger's) orders? Even Yi-Han was doing as told when ordered.

Yi-Han stopped grumbling and grabbed the long telescope-shaped artifact, <Star Guide>.

Thanks to the Yaksha King, he knew exactly how to use it.

He felt unpleasant at the thought that that Yaksha guy might later claim credit for this.

'Is this it?'

While manipulating the artifact, Yi-Han discovered a star moving with a long tail.

Its movement and appearance were distinct from other nearby stars.

However, even after discovering the star, the future didn't immediately appear. Yi-Han observed slowly without rushing at first.

'Hm... I think I can see something.'

The comet's movement distorted as if creating an illusion. Yi-Han, who had been blinking, realized that the comet's movement hadn't changed.

What had changed was only his vision.

He must have just discovered a fragment of divination.

'...So this is it? It's not as difficult as I thought.'

Contracting with stars was much more difficult than this.

One had to search through countless stars to find a star willing to contract with oneself.

Though Yi-Han had found guest star Arna after great hardship, that wasn't the end.

He had to accept that burning power until the contract with Arna was completely formed.

It was fortunate his mana endured, otherwise Yi-Han might have burned up too.

Compared to that, performing divination to foresee the future through star movements was much easier.

One just had to find a star, observe its movement, and wait until visions of the future appeared.

'I should look again.'

-&@$^(!*!&!

-$@%%$!

'?'

Noise was heard from afar.

Since there couldn't be such noise in the quiet sea full of only stars and darkness, this must be noise from the lecture hall.

Yi-Han stopped concentrating and turned off the artifact. Then he looked back.

"What's happening?"

Whoosh!

"Ahhh! It's a rebound! A rebound!"

"That's why I told you not to stare at hot stars too much!"

"..."

One of the seniors was burning brightly due to a star's curse.

Divination was basically magic with strong backlash, and even borrowing the power of stars didn't completely eliminate that.

If one was too careless, they could suffer such harsh consequences.

The brass golem senior put out the junior's fire and said.

"That's why I told you to transform into a Hungry Ghost this month."

"Th-that's too ugly..."

"Oh. Junior. Was it noisy?"

The golem senior noticed Yi-Han's gaze and asked. Yi-Han shook his head.

"I was wondering what happened."

"You didn't lose the trace because of this, did you?"

"No, not that."

'He must not have found it yet.'

The brass golem judged from the junior's answer that he hadn't found a trace yet.

Well, it wasn't strange.

Wandering stars were hard to find even among stars, and finding one that matched one's spiritual nature was even more difficult.

The golem senior couldn't imagine that the junior had already contracted with the most powerful wandering star.

Unfortunately, when the junior had come with professors to report last time, he had fled outside the workshop.

At that time, Professor Parsellet had been in such a rage because of Professor Verduus that the golem senior had no choice.

However, the junior had already passed the stage of tracking traces and was seeing visions from the star's movements.

It was possible because, as the mad doppelganger said, he was loved by wandering stars.

"Ah. Senior. What happens if you're interrupted while seeing the future after discovering a star?"

The golem senior was dumbfounded at the junior's question.

Predicting the future from star movements was also a type of divination, so what would happen if divination was interrupted?

If lucky, it would end at not seeing the result, and if unlucky, there would be rebound on the caster too.

"To ask such a question. You're in 3rd ye... no, not 3rd year. Sorry."

"The chatting is long."

"I apologize. Everyone to your positions!"

The golem senior, who was about to explain, quickly sent the juniors back to their seats at the mad doppelganger's words.

Yi-Han tilted his head.

'I guess it's not a big deal.'

Indeed, there hadn't been any particular problem when he just interrupted it. Yi-Han grabbed the artifact again and found the comet he had seen earlier.

As he concentrated, a familiar vision slowly rose.

-&$$$*^!

-$$@%%!

'Ah. What is it this time?'

Yi-Han stopped concentrating again at the noise from the lecture hall.

Beyond simple interest, as a mage, he was curious about what kinds of rebounds one could suffer while observing stars.

Wouldn't it be possible to prepare if he knew in advance?

When Yi-Han turned off the artifact and stood up, the distant comet flickered faintly.

Though it was surely a coincidence, somehow a dissatisfied emotion could be felt from that flicker.

  *

"...Did you find any traces?"

As the lecture was ending, the brass golem raised up a collapsed student (who had unfortunately seen a future of not graduating) and approached Yi-Han.

"Yes."

"That's great! ...Wait. What's wrong? Did something happen?"

The golem senior realized that the junior was wearing a very serious expression.

He seemed to be staring intently at a doodle drawn on paper.

"What's this doodle? It can't be... traces of a star."

"It's a simple drawing of the future I saw."

"..."

As the senior stared intently at the doodle trying to figure out what it was, Yi-Han made an excuse.

"It's like that because I drew it simply. If you give me time, it will come out much better."

"Let's just handle it with magic... Draw the form you want!"

After sprinkling black powder and chanting a spell, the powder spread across the white paper creating an image.

The content of that image was truly shocking.

In the picture, the human form of the skull principal and the junior were facing off against each other.

"..."

The brass golem senior was so shocked that he completely missed the fact that the junior hadn't just found traces of a wandering star but had even peeked into the future.

Normally this should have been very surprising, but the picture in front of him now was several times more shocking.

What on earth?

"Is this the r-real principal or the doppelganger?"

"Is that important?"

"Of course it's impor... Hmm. Maybe it's not."

The golem senior understood the junior's meaning.

In fact, if one glimpsed a future of death, how one died was important, not whether it was by a sword from the western or eastern mountains of the empire.

"I tried to look at the star again to divine again, but it wouldn't show me anything else."

"Star divination shows the future when the star wants to, not when the mage wants to. It's magic that's among the more passive types of divination... Wait, so you found a star and even saw the future?!"

"Senior. Is that important right now?"

"W-well, I guess not."

The golem senior felt wronged but couldn't refute.

Honestly, what could be important in front of such a shocking picture? He would probably ignore it even if an earthquake hit the workshop.

"Senior. Please help me."

"H-how can I...? If I face the principal, I'll become a brass ingot with one finger."

"...I'm not asking you to fight instead, but to advise me on how to change the future, like last time."

Yi-Han was serious.

In fact, Yi-Han wasn't as shocked as the golem senior.

That picture surprisingly had several possibilities.

For example, the mad doppelganger might explode because Yi-Han kept focusing on unnecessary Einroguard exams and attack until he learned magic...

Since it had happened several times before, the level of shock they received had to be different. Of course, from the golem senior's perspective, this too was shocking.

'To not go mad after seeing such a future. Is this genius?'

Such calmness even after seeing a future that would have made himself run away shouting 'The end is cooooming!'

Perhaps it was because he was already mad from taking all schools' classes. The golem senior nodded with firm resolve.

"Right, you're right! There's no point in just trembling."

"I'll definitely keep it this time. Even if told to avoid royalty..."

Yi-Han truly resolved to swing his staff whenever nearby royalty approached this time.

"No. It won't work like last time."

"Huh? Why not?"

"This is a future predicted much more clearly and strongly than that time. It's not easy to change something like this with just a few prohibitions."

Seeing the junior's face darken, the golem senior spoke again.

"But that doesn't mean there's no way. A true divination mage relies not on magic but on wisdom. The answer is in the future you saw, junior."

"!"

"Now. Look here."

The golem senior pointed to the upper right corner of the picture.

Strange starlight was shining down on Yi-Han's head.

"Such a symbol can be interpreted in two ways. Either you contracted with a star to face the principal, or you fell into a star's trap. Since it can't be the former, it must be the latter. Then you should be careful of falling into a star's trap in the future..."

"...That's actually my contracted star."