The next day, after his classes had concluded, Cæ headed to the student council meeting with a serious expression. The meeting was being held with the sole purpose of choosing the representative of the Elendir Institute of Magic in the Vertir Combat Competition.

He knew that even though he had won the selection process, it was quite unlikely that he would be chosen as the representative of the magicademy, but it was still worth a try. Given that he had decided to ultimately participate in the Magic Contest in the interest of the fame that it would give him and the opportunities that he would obtain, he had decided that he might as well have gone all out in procuring the best outcome.

Of course, given that he had a personal stake in the matter, he wouldn't have the opportunity to impact the decision in any way. The same, of course, was true for Vice President Virlyd. The two of them would simply be spectating and making a case for themselves.

Of course, Cæ truly didn't want to make a big fuss of trying to convince the members of the student council that they ought to choose him. If it weren't for his personal interest, he would have chosen Virlyd all day, every day, over someone like himself. In particular, he didn't think of himself as worthy of the seat and felt a little embarrassed at even being considered.

'I'll just have to bear with it for the sake of my personal interest.'

STEP

He arrived at the Student Council Headquarters in the executive wing of the magicademy.

CLACK

He opened the door, making his way to the conference room on the second floor. Through the glass door, he could see that almost all of them had already gathered, taking their seats across the long table in the spacious conference room.

STEP

He drew the attention of every single member the moment he set foot inside the room. Each of them directed a pointed gaze at him in silence, sizing him up as he ignored them, walking to an empty seat opposite Melia.

"Welcome, Cæ," President Mileila smiled at him from the head of the table.

"Thank you, Mileila." His eyes softened as he nodded at her.

STEP

The room grew even quieter as Virlyd entered, closing the glass door of the conference room behind.

"I apologize for being late," he declared formally.

"No, no, we haven't started yet, so it's not that big a deal." Mileila smiled at the giant man, gesturing to her side. "Come, take your seat, and then we can soon begin."

Cæ shifted his gaze to the gargantuan man as their eyes met for just the briefest of moments.

He didn't sense any hostility or displeasure from Virlyd.

The man truly didn't hold anything against Cæ for taking a spot that he might have simply assumed was his by virtue of being the strongest.

And yet, he didn't appear to be happy with the course of events either. He likely blamed himself for his own defeat and was perhaps most frustrated by his own shortcomings to know that someone as weak as Cæ could have obtained victory against him in those circumstances.

With a single glance, Cæ could tell that he was taking it much harder than he deserved to. It truly was asking too much of even Virlyd to win a six-versus-one against the six next strongest mages in the magicademy. On top of that, he had come remarkably close to winning nonetheless and had successfully bested five out of the six of his opponents.

And yet, the man's own humility didn't allow him to simply brush off the defeat as something that he couldn't have helped. He was likely wracking his brains, wondering what he could have done differently to win and what he needed to train on to ensure that something like that would never happen again.

A small smile momentarily cracked at the edge of Cæ's mouth uncharacteristically.

It was precisely that attitude that had allowed him to become a powerfully strong student.

"Now then," President Mileila's powerful voice seized attention in the room as she leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table before steepling her fingers. "Let us commence the meeting to choose the representative of our magicademy for the Vertir Combat Competition of the Magic Contest. Allow me to open this meeting by stating firmly that my opinion is that we should choose not the winner of the selection process, but instead Vice President Virlyd Mir as the representative of our magicademy."

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Vilyd's eyes flew open at those words. "…What?"

Cæ, on the other hand, was entirely unsurprised.

President Mileila directed a firm gaze at him, signifying that she was not sorry about her decision. Cæ simply shrugged lightly at her words, heaving a deep breath at what he had already expected.

It was unfortunate that he wouldn't be able to make use of the opportunity to gain some fame and credibility as someone extraordinary, even among the elite talents of the Elendir Institute of Magic. However, he knew that it made sense, so it wasn't even worth fighting against. From the looks of it, there wasn't even going to be any possibility of remaining in contention as a tentative candidate.

"I second the President's opinion."

"As do I."

"I, too, believe that the Vice President should be the one to represent our branch of the Elendir Institute of Magic in the Magic Contest."

Cæ wasn't even surprised when most of the members of the Student Council supported Virlyd.

"Ha!" one member snorted. "He lost the battle. I don't care how strong he is nominally; I think the winner of the selection process should be chosen."

The member shirked, earning the glare of everybody around him. Cæ was even surprised there was a single person who supported him over Virlyd. Though there were contrarians on every topic, so perhaps it wasn't surprising after all.

The one who was most against it was none other than Virlyd himself.

"What is this farce?" he growled. "I was defeated fair and square in a selection process that we all agreed upon. Choosing me instead of the winner is absurd."

His gaze shifted to Cæ.

"You should be the one to represent our magicademy."

Cæ heaved a sigh, shaking his head.

It was unlike him not to fully support his own interests, but in this circumstance, he couldn't help but scoff at what Virlyd had told him.

"You're kidding me, right?" Cæ raised an eyebrow. "I barely defeated you after you had already been a bit tired against the six strongest mages in the magicademy. I am clearly weaker than you under ordinary circumstances. If we had a one-on-one magic battle now, you would defeat me rather straightforwardly. I am not stronger than you."

Many of the student council members nodded with approval. They had feared that Cæ would desperately push his victory as a reason to try to be chosen as the representative of the magicademy. It would be difficult to deny him on official grounds even if all of them were of the opinion that he was not fit.

However, unexpectedly, the resistance, which should have been a straightforward decision, was unexpectedly strong from none other than Virlyd himself.

Despite Cæ's display of class in his advocacy for Virlyd, the latter was still not satisfied.

"I don't know if I can defeat you if you choose a similar strategy like you did in our battle," Virlyd replied with a serious tone. "I may have indeed been a little drained of mana, but I had pushed both my mana-motive force and my eidos mastery to the very limit in my battle against you. Your mastery of the six elements, your ingenuity, and your grit are why you defeated me."

Cæ shook his head.

"I beat you with a trick. The same trick will not work twice once you are aware of it."

Virlyd sharpened his eyes. "Someone who is capable of coming up with that trick is capable of more than just one trick. You are a tricky fighter. That isn't something that can be boiled down to one trick."

Cæ frowned. "You don't know that. That was the only trick I was able to come up with after going through all the data I was provided with."

"Now that you have fought me, I would imagine you have even more knowledge, and you should be able to come up with more than just a trick or two, should you not?" He raised an eyebrow.

"We would have to duel many times for that to possibly be true," Cæ countered. "You can't just assume that in my favor."

"Perhaps we should, though, with your rate of growth, we would have to continuously do that over the year before the Magic Contest."

"That's a level of generosity that would never be treated as the norm."

"It's not about generosity, Cæ. It is about ascertaining the truth about who is more fit for serving as the representative of our branch."

"If we had a fight right now, I would probably lose. That's more than enough for ascertaining who is the strongest."

"But at your rate of growth, that doesn't mean much. In less than year of training, you are already this strong, by the time the Magic Contest arrives, there's no telling how powerful you will have become."

The rest of the Student Council simply watched silently as their eyes shot back and forth between Cæ and Virlyd, debating who was more fit to serve as the representative. A wry, amused smile emerged on President Mileila's face as she watched the two of them insist on why the other should be the representative of the Elendir Institute of Magic.

She found herself agreeing more with Cæ, who insisted that Virlyd was better than him, even if he won the battle. The fact that he had the integrity to put aside his personal gain was something that had earned him her respect.

On the other hand, she found herself confused by Virlyd's humility.

She had known him since they were children, as children of affluent families, and he had always been humble, but this time he had gone extremely far just to negate credit for himself relative to Cæ as a candidate for the representative of the magicademy.

The Student Council simply took a backseat as they watched Cæ and Virlyd debate each other over the topic.

Normally, they wouldn't be allowed to have such a large say in the decision-making process, but given that they were defending the other, not a single person felt the need to rein in the two candidates.

"Enough." President Mileila raised a hand.

Cæ and Virlyd stopped, heeding the instruction of the president as they directed their attention to her.

"Thankfully, the final date for registration is just one week before the Magic Contest," she remarked. "The only reason we are having the selection process this early is so that we can start hyper-specialized training for the chosen representative as soon as possible. However, in this case…"

She leaned forward, shifting her gaze between Cæ and Virlyd.

"…We can delay the registration to ten days before the final date or so. We can decide after you have both undergone a year of hyper-specialized training for the Vertir Combat Competition. We hold a final battle between the two of you, and whoever wins will be chosen as the final representative. Is that clear?"

Cæ and Virlyd stirred at those words, falling into thought for a while before nodding.

"That is an acceptable arrangement."

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