Chapter 248: The Sage’s Swordsmanship

Seira led me to the place where Elmia held her swordsmanship training.

I took a peek and —

“Come on, hurry up and stand up! This shouldn’t be enough to wear you out!!”

A few dozen boys were lying on the ground around Elmia,

Every single one of them were totally battered.

W-What kind of training were they doing?!

“Tsk…You all charged at me at the same time, but nobody even landed a single blow!”

Apparently, their set-up was a one-to-many actual combat, with Elmia fighting against those students at the same time.

By the way, Elmia was using a wooden sword, while the rest of them were using real ones.

And yet, they didn’t even land a single blow on her, and got beaten instead with a single wooden sword. That meant her combat skill wasn’t something to scoff at.

As expected of a Holy Knight, a tertiary occupation, huh.

Oh, wait, it’s also possible that the students were just way too weak.

They passed the academy entrance examination, so they should definitely be quite proficient with magic.

However, even if Elmia’s training was open to all those who wanted to participate, it’s unlikely that there would be anyone among them with a natural talent for swordsmanship.

This is an academy of magic, after all.

“Oh, Seira, you came! Halt, too.”

Elmia noticed Seira and me while we’re observing near the entrance of the training hall.

“Elmia, good work.”

“Good work. So you’re also working here at the academy, huh, Elmia.”

“Eh, yeah, that’s right, but…Didn’t I tell you?”

“Nope, didn’t hear about it.”

“R-Really. Sorry ‘bout that. Should’ve asked for permission first from m-my h-husband, right…”

Elmia turned beet red while calling me husband, even though she’s the one who brought it up.

Seemed like Elmia was still unused to a lot of things.

Well, that innocence of hers was quite good.

“I’m pretty sure it’s boring to stay cooped in the mansion even with the chores, so it’s totally fine even if you work at the Academy. Tina knows Elmia is working, right?”

“Yeah, I told Tina-sama. I need her letter of recommendation to work here, in the first place.”

Elmia used honorifics for Tina and the others in our family, but she completely dropped them when she’s talking about me.

It wasn’t a bad thing, though.

According to Seira, it was Elmia’s attempt to hide her embarrassment, and it was quite adorable.

“I see, then there’s no problem.”

If Tina’s aware about everything, then that’s okay.

That overly talented exclusive maid of mine could handle almost anything even if I leave it to her.

“T-Teacher Elmia…who are they?”

One of the guys stood up while propping himself on his sword.

“Oh, you’re finally awake. Okay. lemme introduce you. This guy here is none other than the man I’m always talking about — the guy who can easily win against me, a Level 160, without even using magic, a genuine Bakemono through and through.”

“—What!? T-That guy? But based on his robe, he’s just a second year, isn’t he?”

The student looked at me, totally flabbergasted.

H-Hey! What’s with that introduction, huh?!

Wait, are you always referring to me as Bakemono, huh?!

“Ah, right! You all come at him, and if anyone of you managed to land a blow on Halt, then I’ll accept that meal affair that you’re babbling about.”

“I-Is that true!?” (All students)

All the guys that fell on the ground lifted their heads.

“...Elmia, what’s this about a meal?”

“These guys were pestering me and inviting me out to eat. I said I’ll agree if they can hit me. Even just a single blow is fine. It’s just that nobody managed to do that even up to this day.”

Hey, wasn’t that a given, since their opponent was a Level 160?

“We just have to land a blow on him, right?”

“Whoooo! We got this!”

“I-I didn’t want to hit Teacher Elmia with a real sword, but… i-if it’s a guy, then —”

“Hihihi, let’s do him in. We'll definitely do him in! For the sake of a date with Teacher Elmia!!”

Oh, all the students seemed all fired-up.

Ah, no, they’re eager to kill me off.

I didn’t say I’d do it, though…

Hmm, the idea of Elmia, my wife, dating somebody other than me didn’t sit well with me, and there’s also the possibility of these guys shadowing her around, so let’s just go along with it.

“Halt-sama, are you really going to fight against them?”

“Yup. I’m also curious about how strong the students here are.”

I had never clashed swords with the students from other classes before, so I think it’s a good opportunity.

“Seira, I’m leaving the healing of these guys to you.”

“Eh…I-Is it really alright?”

“Yeah. I want to experience all they got for myself.”

Elmia had beaten them black and blue, and they were standing out of sheer will, so it wouldn’t amount to anything if I win against them as they were.

“I understand. Then —”

Seira released Divine Bless within the training hall just like she did back at the first-aid clinic.

“W-Whoa, this is!”

“Amazing…I’ve totally recovered my strength.”

“We’ll be able to do it with this!!”

“Thank you, miss!”

Everyone was fired up more than before.

“Seira, thanks for healing those students. Alright, I’ll explain the rules. First, those who will participate in my training are free to use body-strengthening magic. All other attack spells are prohibited other than that. And Halt, you’re not allowed to use body-strengthening magic at all, either.”

It was not a normal rule, but there’s no point in me doing body-strengthening magic anyway.

“Got it. That’s fine with me.”

I agreed to Elmia’s rule and took the wooden sword from her.

This was my weapon of choice.

Elmia’s students didn’t have any qualms about the rule, and they started casting body-strengthening magic on themselves and their comrades.

Afterward, seventeen boys took their weapons and surrounded me, ready to go any time.

It seemed that they were ready.

I let Elmia know that I was ready, too.

“Begin!”

“Take this!!”

The moment Elmia gave her signal, one of the students standing diagonally right from me came charging at me while shouting.

However, this was just a decoy.

Sounds of swords slashing at me from the left rang in my ears.

“Oopsie.”

I bent down a little to avoid the student attacking from behind me.

“What?! Ugh!!”

The student was so dumbfounded that I evaded his attack, so I kicked him in the stomach while he was standing stupefied.

One down.

The others were wielding their swords with no hesitation whatsoever, so this must be a result of Elmia’s training too.

They didn’t hold back even for a bit.

Their coordination was pretty good, too.

Perhaps they turned out this way after training with Elmia, given the overwhelming difference in ability between her and them.

Such thoughts crossed my mind while I beat the arms and ankles of the guy who was first to charge at me.

Using his momentum when he jumped on me was enough even for a Level 1 guy like me to get enough power.

I didn’t have to hold back either, since Seira, the walking hospital, was nearby.

A dull sound of something breaking rang out.

The student sank to the ground, unable to move anymore.

Okay, two down.

Fifteen left.

My combat experience and skills all came back along with my memories of my time as the Guardian Hero.

I already fought against more than 10,000 demons, and that experience had taught me two techniques.

I fought against swarms of more than a hundred monsters back when I was the Guardian Hero. There was no way I could last fighting against that many monsters, my stamina would definitely be unable to keep up if I fought using my own power.

That’s the reason why I developed a technique that would help me use the momentum and power of the monsters attacking me against them.

Let the attack slide past me and use that to hit another foe.

Else, I would deliberately accept the attack and use that power to retaliate using my sword.

Because of this, I managed to defeat my enemies while using the minimum amount of power I could.

This was one of the two techniques — [Channel] power.

The second was to [Discernment].

It was the ability to predict the enemies’ next move based on the center of gravity and their muscle and eye movements.

Discerning their next move would make it possible to channel their attack.

The stronger the enemies’ attack, the stronger mine would be.

Moreover, since I could see through the weaknesses that the enemies would subconsciously defend and use their attack power to my advantage, I could kill most of my enemies with just a single blow.

I already annihilated a wide plethora of monsters

These students currently surrounding me were all humans. The body structure of humans were generally the same among almost all individuals, so of course their vital points also had the same locations.

This was different from the troublesome monsters, where each individual had different weaknesses even within the same species.

Stopping the movements of these students were easy as pie.

“What’s wrong? You wanted to date Elmia, right? Come at me.”

It’d be better if you just attack me.

I could use your power as my own.

I repeatedly taunted them and easily defeated them one after the other.