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Not long after becoming a third-year student, a Lich mage awakens somewhere in the academy.
A Lich is a mage on the verge of death who cannot let go of their attachments to life, using their accumulated magic power and willpower to revive.
It's an ambiguous being, neither human, monster, nor typical undead.
Strictly speaking, it would be classified as undead, but it's distinctly different from typical undead that move solely on instinct without any intelligence.
Its existence is ambiguous, but its power is not.
No matter how strong the attachment to life, it's impossible to even attempt to become a Lich without considerable skill.
Because the soul is altered as it merges with magic power, it exhibits completely new tendencies regardless of its personality and beliefs in life.
Along with the desire for 'strength' that all mages possess, only the desires for 'destruction' and 'domination' control the Lich's body and mind.
For that reason, any mage with a sound mind would not choose to become a Lich at the moment of death.
And.
Professor Billian Discipulus, a mental magic professor who is just now opening his textbook.
He is the chief disciple of the Lich who will awaken in two years, and the instigator of the Lich mental magic crisis.
A figure who helps with the Lich's resurrection and the completion of widespread mental magic due to his misguided obsession with his revered teacher.
At the beginning of the 4th playthrough, Davian considered eliminating Professor Billian in advance, planning for the future.
However, he couldn't carry out that plan for two reasons.
First. He's not yet sure he can actually win.
The opponent is none other than a full professor of magical engineering at Elton Academy.
Second. Even if he succeeds in the assassination, he wouldn't be able to clear the main quest, 'Academy Graduation', if he were caught as the culprit.
That would be like burning down the house to catch a rat.
So, Davian chose to think about how to solve the Lich mental magic crisis more easily, rather than assassinating Billian Discipulus.
Even so, he can't help but feel displeased with that villain teaching the class right now.
"...As explained earlier, all thinking creatures have certain brainwaves. And the brain uses a kind of magnetic field to send commands to various parts of the body. If you spread mana waves with the same amplitude as brainwaves, the mana wave will interfere with the brainwaves, causing a drift phenomenon. The drift phenomenon means that brainwaves and brainwaves or brainwaves and mana waves are connected. By applying this method..."
Luna cautiously called out to Davian, who was sitting on the left.
"Davian."
"Yeah?"
"Do you understand what this is about right now?"
"No."
Even after the 4th playthrough, he can't understand the mental magic class at all.
It wasn't because Professor Billian's teaching style was too difficult and rigid.
It's because mental magic itself contains very deep and profound content.
In a way, it might be a good thing.
Mental magic can control human brains at will.
If any mage could use this at will, the history of the human realm would have changed.
Luna, who seems to be quite comfortable now, spoke to Latia, who was sitting one seat away.
"Latia, what about you? Do you understand?"
Latia, who had been fixedly staring at Professor Billian, slowly shook her head.
"Wow. Even Latia doesn't understand the class. Mental magic is definitely not something anyone can use..."
Luna then turned to the right.
"Liber, how about you?"
Liber didn't move and just whispered, "Just a moment, Luna. Let's talk later. I'm a little confused about this part right now."
Luna's eyes widened.
Davian, who heard Liber's whisper, also turned his head to look at Liber.
'What? Confused? Did he say he's confused right now?'
Being confused means that he understands it to some extent.
Suddenly, Professor Cirims' words about Liber came to mind.
'A genius that comes along maybe once every few hundred years.'
'He got a perfect score on the mid-term written exam this time too. His practical skills are terrible, though.'
Is Liber, who is teased by Bellum every day, really a genius?
Enough to understand this difficult class after hearing it once?
However, Liber's status at the academy is not very high.
No, it's safe to say that he's almost buried.
First of all, his mana affinity is below average.
Since the amount of magic power he can accumulate in his body is small, the power of his magic cannot increase.
And his skill in handling mana is also terrible.
Just as academic ability and athletic ability are different, the skill in handling magic power is also a separate ability.
Like an aptitude for art or music, it's an area that cannot be explained by academic ability or athletic ability.
Liber Specula.
He has an overwhelming brain, but his mana affinity is low, and he has no aptitude for handling magic power.
'So, at first, I just thought of him as a source of information.'
But today.
It suddenly occurred to me that Liber's value might be somewhere else entirely.
'Liber, you bastard. Maybe you can use mental magic?'
The thought that he might become a very unique asset made Liber's eyes, which were focused on the class, sparkle brightly.
Protagonist, me.
Tanker, Nubes Arbo.
Healer, Luna Pueri.
Ranged dealer, Latia Meridiem.
Melee dealer, Bonita Fortis.
Party member recruiting specialist, Bellum Amandria.
Spirit mage to join next year, Bellus.
And...
Liber Specula of mental magic.
Various battle scenes were drawn in Davian's head.
'Not bad. I'll definitely graduate this time.'
In the meantime, Professor Billian was filling the blackboard with writing.
He drew a shape of a rat's brain on the upper left, and on the right, he drew the brain's waves on a coordinate plane with horizontal and vertical axes.
Below that was an extremely complex formula for manifesting mental magic.
On the right were the types and characteristics of materials that can be used as mediums.
And below that was the graph of mana waves that must be generated by manipulating magic power.
Preparation process for the wave and drift point.
How to generate a magnetic field through the brain that has completed the drift.
Even the rat's behavior and physical changes according to the generation and change of the magnetic field.
Rustle, rustle.
The classroom was filled with the sound of students busily transcribing the writings that they didn't even know what they meant.
Although he was planning to do tremendous villainous deeds in two years and was teaching a class that no one could understand properly, Professor Billian's passion for the class was worthy of recognition.
Some students who had given up on the class completely ended up giving up on even taking notes and just sat there blankly.
And there was one student who was not taking notes for different reasons than them.
Liber Specula.
He wasn't even holding a pen, just repeatedly scanning the blackboard with his eyes.
Davian shook his head as he watched him.
'This bastard. He's memorizing it all right now... that thing.'
After the writing was finished, Professor Billian gave the students some time to finish taking notes and then gestured to the teaching assistant.
The waiting teaching assistant opened the classroom door, and the staff placed a cage on each of the students' desks.
Inside the cage was a white laboratory rat.
Professor Billian opened his mouth.
"Of course, I know. Most of you here won't be able to keep up with my class. But if I explain everything one by one, it won't be enough even if I teach for 100 years. No, I don't know how many students will be able to manifest even basic mental magic even if I teach that way for 100 years."
Sighs erupted from the students here and there.
Even knowing that it's not going to work, they have no choice but to learn as much as they can for the sake of their grades.
"However. Again, someone may understand this class and be able to manifest mental magic. So, even if it's so complicated and difficult, I can't stop the class."
Professor Billian paused for a moment and looked around at the students in the classroom.
"Now, this is the first practical exercise in three months."
Billian turned his upper body slightly and tapped the blackboard with the pointer.
"If there's anyone who understands even a little, try to give an order to the rat in the cage, anything will do."
Squeak, squeak.
Startled by the sudden change in environment, the rats were busy moving around the cage to figure out the situation they were in.
It wasn't just the rats in the cage who were at a loss.
Most of the students in the classroom were also at a loss and could only stare at the rat in the cage.
There were some materials next to the cage.
Uranium ore, a substance that emits waves on its own.
Specially processed magic stone.
Rat bugs, insects that have relatively similar brainwaves to rats, although they are different in size.
A magnet with three poles, etc.
"Choose a medium that you can handle from the materials next to you and try to manifest mental magic. You can try using each one to find the one that suits you."
Both mental magic and telekinetic magic are magic that uses mana waves.
However, mental magic, which requires creating much more precise and complex waves, requires a medium.
This medium helps maintain the same wave as the brainwaves of the person being targeted by the magic without shaking.
Davian heard Latia groaning on his left.
She's trying to do it as she learned, but it's not easy because she doesn't understand it well enough.
Luna was also trying to do something, but she didn't seem to know exactly what to do.
Davian also read the mana and created waves.
He placed the uranium ore in front of the cage and sent waves through the medium.
Then, using magic power, he pushed the waves towards the test rat.
He tried to use mental magic as he had learned and practiced repeatedly during the 4th playthrough.
In fact, he has never succeeded even once yet.
'Will it work this time somehow? I couldn't use telekinetic magic properly until the last playthrough, but I'm doing it this time.'
Davian calms his mind and focuses.
His feeling of reading mana has become quite sensitive, and he could vaguely feel the waves spreading to the rat.
But the problem is the amplitude of the waves and the stable traveling wave.
There is no scientific calculator, and all of this must be solved in real time through mental arithmetic.
Of course, not even a fraction of an error is allowed.
He somehow succeeded in sending similar waves, but the rat showed no reaction.
It was still sniffing and anxiously moving back and forth inside the cage.
'Damn it. Is it a failure again this time?'
"Ugh."
Latia was also just groaning continuously.
That was then.
Squeak!
A rat's cry that was somewhat different.
Davian turned his head to the right.
Davian's eyes widened.
'Liber! You crazy genius!'
Inside the cage placed in front of Liber.
The white laboratory rat was doing somersaults in place in succession.
Liber tapped Luna, who was sitting next to him, on the shoulder.
"Hahaha! It worked! Luna! Look at this! Whitey's fancy somersaults!"
"Kyaa! What is this! Cute!... But Liber, you... did you use mental magic right now?"
Liber looked at Luna with a bewildered expression.
"Huh? Of course Whitey's doing this because I used mental magic."
An expression that asks what the problem is since it's obvious.
Liber didn't know that no one in this classroom had even come close to manifesting mental magic.
That's because he had only gotten perfect scores on written exams and had never stood out in practical skills, so he didn't know how great of a feat he had achieved right now.
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