Necromancer Academy’s Genius Summoner

“The winner is… Simon Polentia of Class A!”

Cheers both big and small broke loose from the audience. Rather than enthusiastic, the cheers were closer to stupefied ones.

“……Awesome.”

“As expected from the Special Admission No.1”

“Where is that guy planning to go? When we graduate, let us—"

“Oh my, brother. I don’t think Kizen will let him go if he has that much skill.”

“How long has it been since an ace appeared from a Summoning aspirant? That’s quite interesting.”

While officials from various institutions and organizations were exchanging their opinions, the students in the front seats suddenly stood up.

“Simoooon! Well done! You’re the best!”

“Ugh, honestly! Putting people’s hearts in their mouths!”

“That was a great big picture! Bwahaha!”

Camibarez, Meilyn, and Rick were shouting and waving. Simon also smiled and waved as he saw those three.

An official of an organization crossed his arms.

“Our kids are looking cute.”

“Oh, brother. By that, you mean—”

“Oh, you crazy bastard! They are my juniors!”

“Ah… Right. You’re from Kizen, after all.”

After waving to his group mates, Simon turned his head. Haren, who was stuck in the wall, fell, and the medical staff carried him on a stretcher.

Hearing what the medical staff said, he had no injuries thanks to the protective suit, but his body was startled by the big shock.

Haren also was blinking his eyes with a blank expression on his face.

“Haren.”

Simon approached him.

“……”

“I don’t know what kind of reason you got for hating me, but…”

Simon smiled and continued.

“You can never defeat me with such a power when it isn’t yours.”

“……!!”

Haren strained his eyes upon hearing that.

“Now, now, let’s go.”

Haren, whose face turned pale, was carried away on his stretcher.

Simon lightly brushed off his hands and turned his back. When he saw the wind blowing from one side of the wall of the indoor stadium, he belatedly felt embarrassed.

‘I know it can be fixed quickly with magic, but I feel bad.’

Disassembling the golem here would cause even more trouble, so Simon took it out of the stadium.

In the meantime, the referee proceeded to the next match.

“Simon!”

Before he knew it, Camibarez and his groupmates were running out of the stadium.

“Are you hurt anywhere?”

“I’m fine.”

“Hey! What’s wrong with you?! You scared us!! You never told us anything!”

Simon awkwardly laughed at Meilyn’s shouting.

“Sorry for making you worry.”

“Ah, what?! I never worried about you or anything!”

On the other side, Rick approached the mud golem with a look of admiration.

“Dammnn. So this is Simon’s golem!”

As Rick tried to reach out and touch the golem, the golem leaned back and glared at Rick. Rick flinched and stepped back.

“Hello? Good boy~”

This time, Camibarez approached and stroked the golem.

The golem didn’t refuse her touch. Rather, it bent its body slightly and took a posture to make it easier for her to stroke it.

“………”

Rick made a bitter face.

“………That bastard might not be a golem.”

“Whatever.”

“Simon! Can I try riding on this?”

Asked Camibarez, eyes twinkling. Simon was just smiling while sweating profusely.

“……?”

“Cami.”

Said Meilyn as she ran her hand through her hair.

“Maintaining a Golem consumes jet-black. I believe Simon will be dried up and dead in a little while.”

“Ah! Ahh! I’m sorry! I was being insensitive……!”

Camibarez quickly hopped off the golem. 

Simon then finally let go of the connection and stopped the operation of the golem, it collapsing like a mountain of dirt.

Simon approached the mountain of dirt and pulled out a large, marble-like object. This was the golem’s core.

“So that’s how it looks like, huh?” 

Camibarez and Meilyn squatted down and carefully touched the core.

Then a ting came from the surface of the core. Camibarez let out a short scream and backed away.

“It’s fine.”

Said Simon with a smile.

“Sometimes it pulls pranks when it’s in a good mood.”

“Ah……”

“By the way, isn’t this super expensive? How did you attain it?”

Simon smirked at Meilyn’s question.

“I somehow got it with the money I earned from the mission and getting it on my tab.”

Simon earned 500 gold from the last mission, and in return for clearing a mountain range and dealing with the gray orcs, he received 200 gold as an additional commission fee from Lord Raymond.

And a few days ago, when he went down to Rochest to buy a skeleton archer, Simon used 90 gold to buy three sets of skeleton archers.

He had 610 gold left after that.

“The golem core starts off at least 700 Gold.”

With the words of the shop owner, Simon was about to give up.

Then, the shop owner made a new offer.

“Well, this isn’t really a cheap item, so I’ll give you a special discount and make it 650 gold and have 50 of that gold go on a tab. Why don’t you take it with you for 600 gold?”

Completely taken by the shop owner’s words, Simon ended up purchasing the golem core.

‘It feels like I spent too much, but eh.’

Still, the golem did its money’s worth. Even ignoring the combat power, it was worthwhile because, unlike skeletons, it could be used for a long time.

Simon carefully put the core back into the subspace.

“By the way, Rick, when’s our next mission period?”

“……What’s with that all of a sudden?”

He wanted to go out again and earn money.

Necromancy was all about money. Simon smiled as he thought about it.

* * *

All the morning-session Duel Evaluations were over.

After having a light lunch, Simon and his friends moved to the 4th Stadium, where Rick, Meilyn, and Camibarez would be taking their Duel Evaluations.

Rick, who was first to duel, went to the waiting room to prepare.

“Cami, are you sure you’ll be fine without eating anything?”

Asked Simon.

Perhaps because of the tension from the upcoming Duel, she was giving a tough smile while curled up into a ball.

“……Yeah, it’s fine. I can’t really eat anything right now.”

“What about you? Are you really alright?”

Meilyn folded her arms and stared at Simon.

“Don’t push yourself to watch our match. Just go to sleep.”

“It’s fine, I’m okay. My tiredness went away because of the duel earlier.”

“……Good grief.”

“Ah, there, Rick’s coming out!”

* * *

* * *

It was as Camibarez said. Rick, wearing a protective suit, was walking toward the center of the arena, the opposing student entering too.

Rick’s opponent was a female student named Legang Chopra. She had dark-brown hair tied into a ponytail, and a bit of a dark complexion.

“Eh, another female opponent, huh?”

Muttered Rick while supporting the back of his head with his arms. Hearing that, Legang quickly frowned.

“What did you just say? I’ll beat the shit out of you, so you just wait.”

“Alright, alright.”

Rick gave a sly smile and shook her hand. As the two of them stood a distance apart, the mana projector displayed the barrier gauges.

[Rick Hayward: 100%]

[Legang Chopra: 100%]

“Are the two of you ready?”

“Yeah!”

“Yes.”

The referee nodded.

“Well then, we’ll begin the Duel Evaluation between Rick Hayward and Legang Chopra.”

The referee lowered his arm.

“Begin the duel!”

Rick immediately opened his subspace, took out a sleek sword, and held it in his hand.

‘Enchant.’

A magic circle spread out on the sword, and the sword was dyed black. Rick took his fighting stance after swinging it lightly.

“Just that?”

Legang scoffed and opened her subspace. A whopping twenty swords came out and scattered onto the floor.

Clamors of wonder broke loose from the entire audience.

“What’s that?”

“……Can she even use all of them?”

Meilyn and Camibarez also added their opinions.

A magic circle spread over the bundle of swords at that moment, and the swords all began to turn black at once.

‘Multiple enchantments……!’

It was coincidentally a battle between enchanters.

Rick looked relaxed, even at the sight of twenty swords getting dyed at once. Unlike Legang, he was stacking up enchantments on one sword.

“Fufu. It seems like you don’t know much about Enchanting. The amount of jet-black you place determines the performance of the enchanted weapon. Multi-enchant is a skill that should be avoided unless you're at a professional level.”

“Just shut up and watch!”

Legang opened out her hand. Then, the twenty swords trembled and floated into the air as if alive.

Woah…

Exclamations and screams broke loose from everywhere. The swords danced as if escorting her.

If you looked closely, there was a jet-black string attached to each sword's tip which was used to lift them up into the air.

“Drop dead.”

Spat out Legang as she spread her fingers. The three swords floating in the air flew toward Rick at a fierce speed.

“Huzzah!”

Rick ran while stepping on his jet-black, swinging his shortsword.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

With every sound of metal clashing, sparks flew, and the swords fell to the floor.

Swowowowowowop!

As though finished aiming, ten swords flew in from different directions this time.

“Woah, this one’s gonna be tough!”

Rick dropped his sword to the floor and pulled out an object with a handle from his subspace. He knelt down on one knee and held it straight in front of him.

‘Enchant!’

Slaaaaaaaaaaaaaash!

Rick’s jet-black spread out like an umbrella. The swords flew fiercely and collided in front of it.

The deafening sound of clashing metal rang out.

The corner of the jet-black shield was torn, unable to block all ten of them. Swords grazed Rick all over.

“Rick!”

Camibarez shouted anxiously and looked at the mana projector’s screen.

[Rick Hayward : 69%]

[Legang Chopra: 100%]

Rick, whose barrier gauge had fallen, staggered before stepping back.

“Whoa, that was a close one! But now it’s my turn to…… Hm?”

The swords on the floor trembled and returned to Legang after attacking Rick. Rick opened his mouth and gave a hollow smile.

“Pretty good~”

Legang frowned.

“You still have the energy to talk around like that?”

“Of course, of course! Shall I show you how much more I can talk?”

Rick took a deep breath in.

“Name, Legang Chopra. And the actual name is Priyanka Chopra.”

“!!”

Legang’s eyes widened.

“A native of Shahed Kingdom’s Depack territory. The Chopra surname was your mother’s, and the core was developed by the town's wise man. It took 1 year from developing the core to your first jet-black, and your specialty is hunting. Cooking is your hobby.”

“Wh-What are you doing?!”

“After entering Kizen, you were placed in Class G, the average score of your subject tests is around 70, and the first friend you made was Narsha Abra. You're a Mechanics of Jet-Black aspirant but are starting to have some interest in Combat Magic. You have a minor injury on your knee. Your height is 163 cm, weight is 61kg, waist size is—”

“Shut up, you crazy bastard!”

Shouted Legang Chopra as her face turned all red.

Embarrassed by the fact that they were in the same group, Meilyn covered her face with her palms, and Camibarez lowered her head.

“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”

Rick smiled and opened his subspace, five metal stakes sticking out. He took one and nailed it to the floor.

“It’s my creed. First of all, I know better than anyone else that I’m weak, you know~ So I’m very interested in knowing others.”

“Stop talking and just die already!”

Legang launched ten swords at once. Rick placed his palm on the metal stake and infused his mana on it.

‘Enchant!’

Mana got into the metal stake. Then, all the swords flying toward Rick started sticking to the stake.

“……!”

“It’s some sort of electromagnet. If you activate it with jet-black, it absorbs metal of the same properties. Your swords are a mixture of carbon steel and amarinium, right?”

“H-How did you find that out……?!”

Rick pulled out a note from his pocket, opened it, and smiled.

“This is a list of things you bought from the Rochest weapon shop.”

“……!”

“Apparently, you purchased twenty swords as soon as you got the money from this mission period. And there’s something else that you can know with this information.”

Rick tossed the note behind his back and rummaged through his pockets, pulling out a single silver coin. The coin was dyed black, seemingly enchanted.

“Looks like you didn’t buy any shields or armor, huh?”

Rick spread out two magic circles, one across the palm of his right hand, and one on the coin. Then, he clenched his fist tightly after making the two magic circles face each other.

“I don’t know if you lowered your guard because I’m a pure enchanter, but in that case……!”

Rick raised his left leg as he raised his arms behind his head. Soon, he landed on the floor and naturally shifted his center of gravity forward.

At the same time, the palm of his right arm, which he flung forward and spread out, the two magic circles contacting making a spark.

“You should be vulnerable to accelerating ranged attacks!”

Sheeeeeeeeeeeeewk!

The coin shot out like a flash of light, creating a fierce sonic wave.

‘……I-It’s fast! I can’t dodge it.’

Legang hurriedly moved the surrounding swords in front of her, but the coin was faster. It pushed through and crashed into her forehead. 

Pooooow!

A shockwave splashed off, starting from her forehead and rippling out. It was blocked by the barrier of the protective suit, but her eyes rolled back from the momentary shock to her head.

Thud!

Her body fell to the floor.

[Rick Hayward: 69%]

[Legang Chopra: 35%]

The power of the enchanted coin wasn’t enough to defeat her in one hit, but Legang lost consciousness from the shock. The referee checked her condition and said,

“Match is over! Legang Chopra has lost consciousness. It’s Rick Hayward’s victory!”

“Kyahah!”

Rick clenched his fists with a joyful smile.

——