Meteor, a Grand Spell.

In a world where magic was classified into Basic, intermediate, Grand, and Absolute, Meteor stood near the peak of magical prowess.

While it may have seemed simple in name and principle, the execution was nigh impossible for one who was not at least a dual Earth and Fire elemental mage.

First, create a convergence point using aberrant spatial magic, or telekinesis as a substitute. Then, gather and compress Earth fragments until the mass has reached a size that can fully block the smaller of the two suns. Finally, ignite it all, and have it descend onto your opponent.

In the hands of the Sage of Four Elements, this magic was akin to a natural disaster. In the artificial space where the combat arena stood, it was the same as telling everyone present to go and die.

Still, for mages, there was something that could easily trump the fear of death.

Awe.

The mages in the audience looked up and their eyes seemed to shine with pure awe.

A woman with golden hair took off her hat. "What a masterful use of telekinesis…"

An older man stroked his beard and licked his dry lips. "To ignite this entire mass all at once, truly marvelous…!!"

A young apprentice nearly jumped with excitement. "A seamless fusion between the two elements!"

A Professor began furiously scribbling in his notebook. "Wonderful! What parameters must have been created to make this possible!?"

As for Hoshino, she stayed silent.

She was gaining enlightenment. She had never seen her master cast such advanced magic before, but now that she had, unimaginable insight into her own magic flowed through her.

It was to the point her eyes almost seemed to glow in a faint blue hue.

The only one who wasn't feeling this sense of amazement was Verity. In some part, it was due to his lack of knowledge when it came to magic. To him, it only seemed like a large sphere of flaming rocks was plummeting toward him.

But in reality, it was mostly because Verity was now looking down. He was staring at his master.

Evangelina closed her eyes. 'Freeze me in place, trap me with the stone hands, and what's this? Have you softened the ground below my feet?' She looked up. 'Escape seems impossible… it's both heading straight for me and pulling me toward it… Truly, you're one scheming bastard Aurelius.'

The thought was both praise and insult. Evangelina sighed. It seemed she had no choice. In front of someone like Aurelius, and in such a dire situation, she was forced to get at least somewhat serious.

In a moment, her entire body was enveloped in a thin silver hue, and in the next, all of the spells around disintegrated, utterly destroyed.

Evangelina winced slightly. 'It's always unpleasant to use it like this, but there's no choice.'

Evangelina exhaled sharply, and the silver hue which had covered her body previously made its way to her spear and immediately enveloped it whole.

Verity watched with wide eyes as an indescribable sense of dread filled him. No, perhaps dread was the wrong word, but when he laid eyes on that silver hue, Verity clearly felt something that he had never felt when facing his master before.

It was almost as if it was trying to tell him something, or to convey it in some way. The more Verity started at it, the more he felt as though it was… alive.

This time again, Evangelina locked eyes with her disciple, and she mouthed something.

"This is the second most destructive attack of the Nine Hell Style. Watch well."

The silver hue around Evangelina's spear grew, but not in size, it grew in depth. As she gathered energy, Verity felt as though the meaning behind the silver hue became clearer and clearer, nearly screaming at him, but because of his poor talent, he still could not hear it.

Evangelina knew this, yet she smiled. That was enough. If it helped her disciple advance even half a step, then that was enough.

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She gripped the spear with both hands, and she raised it to face the Meteor.

'Nine Hell Spearman ship Fifth Stance - Wrath'

She gathered Aura to her feet and she jumped. Next to the meteor, she was like a speck of dust, but she wore a smile on her face, and without any hesitation, she struck the flaming mass of stone.

'Ruin.'

As soon as the tip of the spear came into contact with the terrifying spell, the Meteor itself was forced to bend to the cold will of Evangelina's attack.

And the attack had but a single will.

Destruction.

The entire space which contained the arena shuddered, and the meteor exploded into hundreds of smaller pieces.

'Tsk, how much did you enhance it that I couldn't even disintegrate it?' Evangelina thought as she fell back down.

'Dammit… I thought it would be able to at least contest her strike… was I too hasty?' Aurelius thought as he continued floating in the air.

The two looked at each other and smiled.

Meanwhile, the rest of the arena, faced with what could as well have been a Meteor Shower spell, was finally panicking.

"B-Barriers! The arena's barriers will save us!!"

Archmage Roderick shook his head. "No… The Tower Master's spell disrupted the mana greatly, the barriers will take some time to recover."

He rubbed his hand over his face, and waved two red wands in the image of a conductor.

"O Earth on which we stand,

Earth that guides our path and grows our crops

Earth that shelters and Earth that enriches

O Earth that stands firm beneath us, rise for me - Reinforced Earth Barricade!"

Massive Earth pillars rose from the ground, covering half of the entire arena. This was the power of Armchage Roderick, the Fortress Mage, possessing greater affinities in both metal and earth, he had invented a spell that greatly resembled the reinforced concrete of modern society.

Beside him, Irina pinched the bridge of her nose. She was not a mage, so she had no way to protect so many people over such a large area. She thought deeply. Perhaps if she strained herself, she could destroy eighty percent of the falling fragments thoroughly before they hit the ground, but she did not know what to do about the remaining twenty percent.

As for Verity and Hoshino, they had already both snapped out of their trance. A rather large fragment was plummeting straight toward them.

Verity bit his lip. 'Could I… replicated what Master just did…?' He then shook his head. 'Yeah, right, even I'm not that stupid.'

He turned to Hoshino. "Hoshino! Can you do something about this!?"

Hoshino's face crisped. "...One of the very few things ight cannot do is shield ...Haha," she told him.

"What about other types of magic!? There has to be some kind of barrier magic, no!?"

Hoshino looked away. "Didn't I already tell you? Basic magic is not exactly my… forte."

Verity laughed hollowly. "We're doomed…"

Verity thought that if he had any plot armor at all, it should have been activating any time soon.

As if someone had heard him, an older woman with auburn hair stepped beside him and Hoshino. "This is why you ought to pay more attention in my class, Magus Hoshino."

Professor Mary Vandervite waved her long wooden staff only once. "Barrier."

A shimmering hemisphere extended overhead, covering nearly a quarter of the entire stadium

In the First Magic Tower of the Empire, even fourth-class mages could only be assistant professors at most.

How, then, had Mary achieved the rank of full Professor despite being only a fourth-class mage?

The answer was simple. When it came to Telekinesis, Disrupt, and Barrier, Mary was akin to a seventh-class, disaster level mage. Though Fifth-class and below rarely obtained epithets from the magic society, Mary was unofficially called the 'Genius of Basic Magic'.

Irina smirked. "Well now you've made it easy for me," and she moved at a speed that the eye could not track. 'Dreadmoore swordsmanship first stance - Crescent Moon.'

With that sole attack, she obliterated the fragments falling toward the remaining quarter of the arena, and most of those falling toward Mary's section.

At last, before Evangelina and Aurelius could resume their duel, they were stopped by Archmage Roderick and Dragon Knight Commander Irina, who put their lives on the line to stand between them.

–

Verity sat by himself in the Sanctuary of Knowledge, or in simpler terms, the library. He was flipping through the pages of its sole book pertaining to the subject of runic magic.

He'd had enough time to settle down after the duel. He had even swung his spear a few hundred times in an attempt to grasp what he had seen before it slipped through his fingers.

Unfortunately, he hadn't managed to gain anything in terms of the spear, but he was not exactly disappointed. He had already gathered that he was dull, so he would not become frustrated for such a small thing.

If he swung enough times, it would surely come to him, or at least that is what he believed.

After putting his spear away, he'd had Hoshino show him where to find the book on runic magic, and after showing it to him, she promptly left the library, mumbling something or other about magic, formulas, and whatnot.

Verity had now been reading through it for the last three hours, and was nearly done with the first half which had already been translated.

It was surprisingly straightforward.

Runic magic required three essential components to activate.

The first was a medium that could handle the power of the runes. It could really be anything, as long as the material was strong enough to withstand the burden. Verity imagened that the chamber with the teleportation array must have been made from special stone.

The second was 'intent'. The intent of the runic sorcerer could make two identical runes have vastly different effects. The example they used was the simple rune Glow, which simply put, made things glow. The intent of the sorcerer could define in which color it would glow, from which side, the type of glow, and even the perceived intensity of the glow from soft to blinding.

And this very concept made the third requirement somewhat confusing.

Calligraphy.

When performing runic magic, there was no room for differences in handwriting. The book referred to runes as 'true script', meaning that they must be written as intended with no deviation whatsoever.

While a rune with a subpar medium, and lacking intent may activate granted the third requirement is met, a poorly written rune would never activate regardless of the other two requirements.

Verity found this last condition to be quite shocking, and imagined that he would have to spend some time practicing his handwriting, however ridiculous that may have sounded.

"Mana, Glow, Accelerate, Weight, and Attach." Verity mumbled.

These were the five runes which had been translated in the book. Each looked different and Verity could find no discernible pattern in the way the strokes were performed onto the page.

"Hardcore memorization it is then…"

When Verity reached the second half of the book, he was disappointed despite knowing what it would look like.

He couldn't understand a word.

The only thing that drew his attention was a single page where nine different symbols that seemed to be runes were transcribed.

It truly gained his attention, or rather, one of the runes in particular did. The second one from the top. Complex, yet simple all at once.

Verity stared at it for a long time.

Perhaps too long even.

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