Luca was sitting at his desk in the academy, a piece of paper laid out before him, his brow furrowed in concentration, his arms crossed. Eugen, one of his friends, approached him.
“Yo, Luca. What’s with the long face? …Whoa, what is that?!”
Seeing Eugen wince at the paper on the desk, Luca looked at him with a puzzled expression.
“What do you mean? It’s a magic circle.”
“Are you an idiot! I can tell it’s a magic circle just by looking! The problem is these messy patterns!”
Eugen, too, was a student at the academy. He had learned the basics of magic circles properly. He could discern the effects of a certain level of magic circle, but the magic circle written on the paper had surpassed that level.
At a glance, the symbols used were only the basic ones taught in class, but their sheer number and complexity made it difficult to decipher. It is said that to decipher a magic circle, one needs not only to know the meaning of the symbols but also to consider the intricate connections between them, which requires a certain knack.
It was already known among Luca’s classmates that he could decipher the magic circle easily. That was why they were only relieved to hear Luca’s next words.
“Messy? It’s true there are many symbols, but this isn’t that difficult.”
“Listen here. Don’t compare me to you, who can teach the teachers. This is, by any means, a difficult level!”
The other people who had been listening to their conversation nodded in agreement with Eugen’s words. Seeing this, Luca shook his head once.
“No. It’s true. Besides, everyone knows this magic circle.”
“Huh…? No way. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Luca’s words surprised Eugen and his classmates. Luca had been staring at the magic circle since morning, so others besides Eugen had also taken a look at it, curious. However, after a brief glance, they quickly decided it was beyond their ability and stopped thinking about it.
Seeing the reactions around him, Luca shook his head again.
“No, I’m serious. This is the magic circle for a ‘barrier,’ which we learn after learning simplified characters.”
“EEEEEEH?????!”
At Luca’s words, everyone present exclaimed in surprise, and their gazes converged on the magic circle.
The magic circle for a ‘barrier’ is widely used to protect against monster attacks at night. The strength of this magic circle varies depending on the level of the caster. Unless created by someone of considerable skill, it only offers a superficial effect. Nevertheless, it can prevent minor surprise attacks from low-ranked monsters, so it is mainly used to protect the goods of traveling merchants.
As it is a generally known magic circle, it was one of the first magic circles taught in the advanced section of the academy.
“No, no, that’s impossible! Why is such a simple magic circle so complex and bizarre?”
In response to Luca’s words, the paper on the desk was passed around to his classmates, and Eugen roared in disbelief. The classmates who were examining the magic circle on the paper had similar expressions to Eugen.
“No. It’s possible. If you change all the simplified characters and basic simplified characters of the ‘barrier’ magic circle to basic characters, it becomes like this.”
“No way…?”
“I’m serious.”
To the doubting Eugen, Luca shook his head from side to side in denial.
Later, his classmates verified the magic circle and confirmed that it was indeed a ‘barrier’ magic circle. Once the original was known, it was relatively easy to revert it to basic characters. Of course, this was on the condition that one knew how to do it, but at the academy, they were properly taught the method. It’s like changing all the Kanji in a sentence to Hiragana; it’s not that difficult. However, as their reactions indicated, unlike a sentence that can be read even if converted to Hiragana, a magic circle cannot be deciphered at a glance.
“…I can’t believe it was true…”
“I told you it was true.”
To the glaring Luca, Eugen clapped his hands together.
“My apologies, my apologies.”
“Well, it’s fine, I guess.”
Luca had no intention of scolding him, so he quickly stopped glaring.
“So? Why were you looking at such a magic circle?”
Eugen, looking at the magic circle on the paper, asked Luca why he had gone to the trouble of changing a simply written magic circle back into basic characters.
“…It’s a task from my master.”
The master Luca referred to was Kousuke. Luca had been directly taught about magic circles by Kousuke for some time. He hadn’t explicitly told his classmates who his master was. He knew that if he did, a flood of people would rush to become his disciple.
“A task? …This?”
“Yes. I have to simplify it from this form into something different from what is generally known.”
“I see. …Can you do it? Something like that?”
Eugen, who had almost understood Luca’s words, looked at the magic circle with suspicion.
“When I told that to my master, the reply I got was, ‘I don’t say I can’t do it.'”
“Who is this master…?”
Eugen replied with a tone of exasperation, and Luca could only offer a wry smile.
Magic circles are generally made by simplifying complex patterns; they are not typically made by taking something simple and returning it to its original form before reassembling it. Moreover, magic circles like ‘barriers,’ which are known even to the general public, are considered the ultimate (?). Therefore, few people attempt to recreate them. However, if the number of people creating and researching magic circles increases, such attempts might also increase. But currently, such a trend is almost non-existent. That is why it is natural to find the instructions Luca received strange.
“Yes. Well, it’s certain that he’s not an ordinary person.”
“Well, that’s probably true.”
Luca meant he wasn’t an ordinary person literally, but Eugen interpreted it in a more abstract sense. Not wanting to reveal that he was being directly tutored by an Avatar, Luca just smiled vaguely and brushed it off.
“So?”
“Hmm?”
“Can you complete the task from that eccentric master?”
To Eugen’s question, Luca sighed and replied.
“If it were something I could do easily, I wouldn’t be bringing it to the academy.”
“Hahaha. I figured.”
When Luca showed a troubled expression in the academy classroom like this, it usually meant he had encountered a difficult problem. This time, too, it was a difficult problem for Luca.
“Simplifying it further than the existing simplified magic circles is difficult…”
Luca said so and looked at the magic circle again.
Confirming this, Eugen shrugged his shoulders and said,
“Well, don’t push yourself too hard. In your case, you might end up bumping into a wall while looking at that paper.”
“Okay.”
Seeing Luca’s half-hearted response, Eugen became convinced that it was a lost cause and walked away to find his other friends.
This was Luca’s story. He is earnestly tackling the task assignments from Kousuke. …Perhaps he is concentrating a little too earnestly, but please attribute that to him being Kousuke’s son lol.
