I Refuse the Tragic Ending

The dark energy surged toward the last remaining stone pillar.

Seraphina immediately raised her hand, her expression tightening as she watched the approaching attack. The dense mass of dark magic tore through the air, leaving a trail of distorted shadows in its wake. Its target was clear. If the pillar fell, the protective formation surrounding the students would collapse, allowing the undead hordes to pour into the area without resistance.

“Everyone, concentrate your attacks on the incoming spell!” Seraphina shouted. “Do whatever you can to divert its trajectory. We cannot allow it to reach that pillar!”

Her urgent command snapped the students out of their stupor.

The senior students who still possessed enough mana immediately began chanting their spells. Several students raised their staff, while others formed magic circles with trembling hands. Elemental energy gathered around them as they unleashed everything they had left.

Fireballs, ice spears, and concentrated bolts of lightning streaked toward the incoming darkness. Wind magic followed, attempting to push the attack away from its intended destination.

For a brief moment, the combined assault seemed to slow the dark energy.

Unfortunately, that was all it accomplished.

The enemy’s spell swallowed the incoming magic one after another. Flames disappeared into the darkness, ice shattered before making meaningful contact, and lightning flickered out as though someone had extinguished a candle.

Their combined efforts barely altered the attack’s trajectory. The dark energy continued advancing toward the pillar.

Seraphina’s expression grew increasingly grim.

What kind of power is this?

She had already witnessed the difference between ordinary students and experienced mages during the ongoing battle. However, the enemy before them was operating on an entirely different level.

Its control over dark magic was precise, its mana reserves were seemingly inexhaustible, and its attacks possessed enough destructive power to overwhelm the combined efforts of numerous students.

This was not simply a matter of having a larger mana pool. The enemy understood how to use its power.

Every spell it cast carried a purpose, and the density of its dark energy suggested years of experience refining its magic. Even the senior students, who had received more advanced training than the younger ones, could barely interfere with its attacks.

They were students who had spent years studying magic, but the enemy was a caster who had survived long enough to turn its knowledge into a weapon.

The difference between them was painfully obvious.

The students watched helplessly as the dark energy approached the final pillar.

Some clenched their weapons, while others stared at the incoming attack with pale faces. A few attempted to gather more mana despite their exhausted bodies, only to discover that their reserves were nearly depleted.

They had already fought against each other then came the undead.

Before the crimson sky appeared, they had been competing against one another for the examination. Now, those same students struggled to remain standing.

If the final pillar fell, they would have to face the undead without the protection it provided.

And judging by the number of creatures gathered beyond the barrier, that would be a disaster.

“Move away from the pillar!” Someone shouted.

However, the warning came too late. The dark energy was already upon them.

Just before the spell could strike the remaining structure, a figure suddenly leaped into its path.

The movement was so abrupt that several students barely had time to register it.

A figure with black hair and silver eyes landed between the incoming attack and the pillar. He held a sword in his hand, its blade reflecting the crimson light that illuminated the battlefield.

It was Kael Grayford.

“Kael?” Seraphina exclaimed, her eyes widening.

She had not expected anyone to approach the attack, much less someone who had already spent a considerable amount of energy rescuing everyone.

“Get out of there!” One of the senior students shouted. “You’ll be killed!”

Kael did not respond.

He simply adjusted his grip on the sword. There was no elaborate incantation, no complicated magic circle, and no overwhelming surge of mana.

Instead, a faint layer of energy gathered around the blade.

It was so subtle that most of the students failed to notice it. Compared with the dark energy surging toward him, the mana surrounding Kael’s sword was practically insignificant.

Then he swung.

The blade struck the incoming darkness at an angle.

For an instant, the battlefield seemed to fall silent.

The next moment, the dark energy abruptly changed direction.

Rather than colliding with the pillar, the massive attack veered away from its original trajectory and shot toward the sky. It traveled several dozen meters before exploding on its own.

BOOM!

The explosion shook the surrounding area below. The ground trembled beneath the students’ feet.

However, the last remaining pillar stood untouched.

The protective formation remained intact.

And Kael was still standing in front of it, his sword lowered at his side. For several seconds, nobody spoke.

The students stared in the air where the dark magic exploded before slowly turning their attention toward the young man who had caused it.

Their expressions ranged from disbelief to outright confusion.

“What… just happened?” A student finally asked.

Another student shook his head repeatedly, as though trying to convince himself that he had not imagined what he had seen.

“Did he actually deflect that attack?”

“That’s impossible! Even our combined spells couldn’t stop it!”

“Maybe the enemy weakened the attack before it reached him?”

“That doesn’t make any sense. Why would it do that?”

Confused voices spread through the exhausted crowd.

Some students attempted to reconstruct what had happened, but the result was so difficult to believe that they instinctively searched for a more reasonable explanation.

Perhaps their combined magic had weakened the dark energy more than they realized.

Perhaps the enemy had lost control of its spell.

Or perhaps Kael had simply been standing in the right place at the right time.

Any of those explanations sounded more believable than the possibility that the weakest student had accomplished something their combined efforts could not.

After all, Kael Grayford was hardly someone they considered exceptional.

Even among students who had entered the academy with weak abilities, became average when compared to him.

Some of them had barely remembered his name before this incident.

Now, that same student had deflected an attack powerful enough to overwhelm numerous senior students.

Naturally, they found it difficult to accept.

“Maybe we weakened it enough for him to redirect the remainder,” a student suggested, sounding more hopeful than convinced. “That must be what happened.”

Several others nodded.

They desperately needed an explanation that would allow the world to make sense again.

Unfortunately, the person who had launched the attack was not nearly as willing to accept their reasoning.

The dark caster stared at Kael from beyond the remaining students.

Its expression had changed.

Until that moment, it had regarded everyone as little more than insignificant obstacles. Their resistance had been amusing at best, and their attempts to stop its magic had barely warranted attention.

But what it had just witnessed was different.

The dark caster knew the strength of its own attack.

It had carefully condensed its dark mana before releasing the spell. Its trajectory had been precise, and the force behind it had been sufficient to destroy the pillar in a single impact.

There had been no loss of control.

Its magic had not weakened.

And the combined spells of a group of inexperienced students could not possibly have reduced its power to such an extent.

Yet the young swordsman had redirected it with a single swing.

The caster’s fingers curled into a fist.

Who is that brat?

It scrutinized Kael from head to toe, searching for some indication of what had happened.

The boy’s sword did not appear particularly special. There was no visible enchantment, and the faint mana surrounding its blade was so weak that the caster could barely understand how it had interfered with the spell.

More importantly, Kael himself did not look like someone capable of producing such a result.

His breathing was slightly heavier than before, and his clothes bore the marks of the ongoing battle. He was clearly tired.

Yet he had redirected an attack that even the senior students could not withstand.

The caster’s pride took a severe blow.

Years of relentless cultivation, countless battles, and painstaking mastery of dark magic had brought it to its current level. It had devoted itself to becoming stronger, refining every spell until its control approached perfection.

Now, a human child has made its efforts look insignificant.

The caster found the thought intolerable.

It must have been a fluke.

That was the only explanation it was willing to entertain.

Perhaps the boy had accidentally struck a weakness in the spell. Perhaps the angle of his sword had redirected the magic through some unusual interaction.

It did not matter.

One successful deflection meant nothing if the caster could overwhelm him with a stronger attack.

Its eyes narrowed.

Let’s see you do that again.

Dark mana began gathering around its body.

Unlike the previous spell, this time the energy accumulated much more rapidly. The surrounding air grew heavy as dense strands of darkness twisted together, forming a mass considerably larger than the one it had launched earlier.

The crimson light above the battlefield seemed to dim around the gathering energy.

Several students instinctively stepped backward.

“What is that thing doing?” Someone whispered.

Nobody answered.

They could all feel it.

Even without possessing a sophisticated understanding of magic, the students could sense the oppressive force radiating from the caster. It was as though the air itself had become heavier, pressing against their chests and making every breath more difficult.

The dark energy continued to expand.

Seraphina’s face lost what little color remained in it.

It’s preparing another attack.

She immediately understood the caster’s intention.

The first attack had failed to destroy the pillar, but the enemy had learned something from the encounter. Rather than relying on the same amount of power, it was now gathering enough mana to overwhelm whatever resistance the students could muster.

Seraphina glanced toward Kael.

She still did not understand how he had redirected the previous spell. She had seen the faint mana surrounding his sword, but its quantity had been far too small to explain the result through conventional magical reinforcement.

Perhaps he had discovered some unusual technique.

Perhaps his swordsmanship possessed a property she had never encountered.

Whatever the explanation, she could not afford to assume that he would be able to repeat the feat indefinitely.

Especially not against an attack of this magnitude.