Chapter 29: A Spar and a Secret

A girl with dark blue hair gestured, and icy thorns erupted from the frozen ground, hurtling towards a girl with fiery red hair. The red-haired girl twisted and weaved, dodging the projectiles, deflecting or shattering those she couldn’t avoid with the sword in her hand.

Having dealt with the icy barrage, she dashed across the magically slickened ice as if it were solid ground, closing the distance between herself and her opponent. The dark blue-haired girl spoke.

“You’re definitely different from last time, Euru.”

“It has been several months.”

Euru reached Sayoreinne in a flash, her arm tensing as she prepared to swing her sword. Sayoreinne, unwilling to be caught off guard again, unleashed a concussive blast of magic, just as she had during their first sparring match.

Euru, remembering their previous encounter, wasn’t about to fall for the same trick twice. As planned, she braced herself, anchoring her feet to the ground with magic, withstanding the force of the blast. However—

Sayoreinne hadn’t simply repeated her previous tactic. She had intentionally allowed Euru to get close before unleashing the blast, ensuring that it affected her as well. Protected by a magical barrier, Sayoreinne suffered no injury, but the force of the impact propelled her backward, creating distance between them.

‘At this range, it’s my turn again.’ Just as she thought this, something whizzed towards her. Euru had thrown her sword. Sayoreinne swiftly gathered the mana threads she had been using for her spell, using them to deflect the projectile. It hadn’t been a particularly powerful attack, easily deflected even without the barrier.

‘That can’t be all.’ Sayoreinne saw Euru preparing another spell. Euru extended her hand, and a volley of fireballs shot towards Sayoreinne. Sayoreinne mirrored the gesture, summoning her own fireballs, launching them to intercept Euru’s attack.

Boom! Boom!

The identical spells collided, creating a series of explosions, the heat melting the icy battlefield. Sayoreinne immediately dispersed her mana, preparing her next spell. The spell formed instantly, hurtling towards Euru.

Euru dodged, blocked with a shield, and countered with her own magic, steadily advancing towards Sayoreinne. She couldn’t win a pure magic duel, so she had to close the distance and force a physical confrontation. Euru kicked off the ground with explosive force, while Sayoreinne calmly unleashed a barrage of spells.

The match ended swiftly.

“Good work.”

“Haah… I can’t beat you, as always…”

“Was I that much harder to fight than last semester?”

Euru, exhausted, collapsed onto the ground, letting out a long breath. This was their first proper spar since the one that had landed Euru in the infirmary. While there had been sparring sessions in Practical Magic class, they hadn’t been paired together since then, making this a rematch four months in the making.

‘She’s definitely improved.’

Reinforcement mages had to fix their mana to specific body parts, while mages needed to circulate their mana constantly, creating a flow. These opposing methods meant that mastering both required not only hybrid aptitude but also talent and rigorous training in both disciplines. Most hybrids eventually hit a wall, choosing to focus on their stronger aptitude.

‘In the game, only Emelly and Euru could truly utilize their hybrid abilities effectively.’

“Don’t try to flatter me. You were going easy on me.”

“I won’t deny that… but this is a training exercise, not a competition. You need to learn something from it.”

The spar had effectively ended the moment Sayoreinne effortlessly blocked Euru’s thrown sword and her subsequent fireballs. If Euru had been able to transition between Reinforcement and magic more quickly, the outcome might have been different. But her mana conversion was still too slow, giving Sayoreinne ample time to react.

After their spar, Sayoreinne and Euru retreated to a secluded bench at the edge of the training grounds, watching the other students spar as they rested. While manipulating mana to cast spells was physically taxing, and the tension of combat added to the fatigue, Sayoreinne was still relatively unscathed.

Euru, on the other hand, was visibly exhausted after her repeated attempts to close the distance, dodging spells and casting her own. Beads of sweat glistened on her forehead. Sayoreinne pulled out a handkerchief and began wiping Euru’s face.

‘Ah…’

Her body had moved without conscious thought. The act of retrieving the handkerchief from her pocket and reaching for Euru’s face had been entirely instinctive. The moment she registered what she had done – reaching out to touch a beautiful girl’s face – a wave of intense shyness washed over her. She could feel her cheeks burning.

Thanks to the original Sayoreinne, she would sometimes act in ways that Juseong never would have. These actions, usually directed towards Ahrin, Euru, or Nell, were often the kind of intimate gestures that made her, with her limited experience with women, incredibly flustered.

These incidents were becoming so frequent that she was starting to worry about permanently staining her cheeks crimson.

“Sayoreinne? Why did you stop?”

Euru, her previously exhausted expression replaced by a gentle smile, urged her to continue, her hand lightly encircling Sayoreinne’s slender waist. Flustered by the touch, Sayoreinne quickly turned her head away.

“I thought you had changed before, but lately, you’ve become a completely different person.”

“It’s not… that drastic.”

Sayoreinne hastily finished wiping Euru’s face, quickly retracting her hand and attempting to pull away.

However, Euru’s arm around her waist prevented her from escaping. Euru didn’t seem to be applying much pressure, but Sayoreinne’s weak physique was no match for it. Resigned, she allowed herself to be held.

‘Is this normal for girls?’ She had engaged in even more intimate acts with Ahrin, though technically, it hadn’t been her. And Nell had also been surprisingly physically affectionate, holding hands, linking arms. Thinking about it that way, this level of contact shouldn’t be a problem, but… it was just too much for her. Yet, she was afraid of damaging their friendship by rejecting their advances.

‘I just need to get used to it.’ She wasn’t sure when that would happen, but…

As she pondered, she felt herself being pulled closer. Euru rested her head on Sayoreinne’s shoulder, her soft, red hair tickling Sayoreinne’s skin. Startled, Sayoreinne glanced at Euru’s face. Her eyes were closed. ‘Was she that tired?’

Sayoreinne felt a pang of guilt, wondering if she had pushed Euru too hard during their spar. But more than that…

‘This is going to give me a heart attack.’

Euru’s shampoo and her natural scent mingled, assaulting Sayoreinne’s senses.

Thump-thump-thump. Her heart hammered against her ribs. She was sure Euru could hear it.

She closed her eyes, trying to calm her racing heart, to redirect her focus away from Euru.

According to the academy schedule, practical combat training against captured magical beasts would begin next week. They would probably start with the weakest creatures, slimes. The academy seemed to be following the game’s progression quite closely, so that seemed likely. They would gradually face stronger opponents, eventually venturing to the deliberately neglected gate near the academy in their second year.

She needed to become as strong as possible before the second year, when the main events of the story would begin to unfold. With her, one of the main antagonists, now allied with Emelly, things should be easier, but there were always unforeseen variables. She needed to maximize her magical abilities.

Lost in thought, Sayoreinne drifted off to sleep.

Euru liked women. It wasn’t something she had realized at a particular moment. From the beginning, she had been drawn to cute and pretty maids rather than handsome knights or dashing attendants. However, as a princess, she couldn’t express these feelings openly.

While commoners and lower-ranking nobles were relatively tolerant of same-s*x relationships, the higher nobility frowned upon them, and for royalty like Euru, it was even more taboo.

So, she had decided to bury her feelings deep within her heart. If she kept them hidden, nothing would go wrong.

She had lived as an ordinary royal, until she and her twin brother, Astes, awakened their magical abilities. She saw this as an opportunity. She liked women, and she had no desire for a political marriage. A life on the front lines, fighting magical beasts, seemed preferable.

She had persuaded her parents, appealing to their sense of noblesse oblige and the potential for increased public support for the royal family, and they had finally agreed to let her enroll in the academy and participate in the war effort against the magical beasts. She hadn’t anticipated that Astes, worried about her, would insist on joining her.

He had readily relinquished his claim to the throne, showing no hesitation in following her, even though the front lines, despite their relative stability, were still dangerous. Euru felt a pang of guilt.

So, on their seventeenth birthday, the twins entered the academy.

Euru was assigned to Class A, while Astes was placed in Class B. Astes had seemed concerned about their separation, but Euru assured him that it was fine.

And as she entered the classroom, she met someone who, for the first time in her life, made her heart race. Her name was Sayoreinne Meirel, the daughter of the Marquis Meirel.

‘Why is my heart pounding like this?’ She briefly placed a hand over her chest, pondering. Then, she looked at Sayoreinne again. Her heart skipped a beat. She finally understood.

Sayoreinne Meirel… her face was exactly Euru’s type.