Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei - Volume 13.5 - SS - Chapter 1.1

SS 1: Prisoner of the Dragon God

( August 13, 2096 )

The evening of the ninth day of the Tournament of nine schools in 2096. The joint dinner among the participants of the competitions from the First school took place in high spirits, unlike the previous days, when they had dinner in suspense.

- Mitsui-san, congratulations on your victory.

“Your second place, Satomi-san, is also an amazing achievement.”

- Really. Finishing in first and second place, you repeated the victory in the newcomers division last year!

Students surrounding Honoku and Subaru from the third year of school showered them with congratulations.

“Nakajo-san also worked hard.” As expected. It was a great setting, allowing Satomi-san to make the most of his strengths.

“Thank you very much, Isori-kun.” But in the end, I still lost to Shibe-kun.

- It's not scary, because we are one team, right? Plus, it's a little different.

Isori and Canon supported and encouraged Azusa.

“Sheba, you did a good job.”

- Skill was at its best, as always.

Hattori thanked Tatsuya in a slightly restrained manner, and Kirihara standing next to him with a smile (perhaps even a friendly one) praised Tatsuya's skills.

Now not only their company, but everyone around the table animatedly discussed the competitions held today. This was quite obvious, given the joyful mood around.

At the end of the fourth day, First School was in second place with 390 points. In the first place was the Third School with a margin of 60 points.

As of yesterday, the First School had 575 points, the Third - 580 points.

And now, at the end of the ninth day of the Tournament, the First School had 655 points against 600 points of the Third School. The First School finally got ahead of the Third School, which took first place from the second day of the Tournament.

It was assumed that the First School will have a hard time after the sensational "strongest generation" left the school. And indeed, the struggle was very intense. Naturally, for many, this struggle caused a manic state.

“Hattori, it's too early to calm down.” Because tomorrow we will enter the stage.

From behind Hattori, the voice of third-grader Minakami Carey was heard. When Tatsuya, who was sitting next to Hattori, picked up the tray and got up from his seat, Carey sat down at that spot, saying "I'm sorry."

“Yoshida, you have a seat too.”

Sawaki, who was sitting in place next to Carey and opposite Hattori, went to thank the efforts of the first year students who participated in the newcomers division. Mikihiko followed Carey's advice and obediently sat in the indicated place.

- If we screw it up, then the victories that the girls won hard will be in vain.

- I understand. Tomorrow we will win everything we can. And then the common victory of the First School will be decided by us.

If tomorrow they win the Monolith Code, and if the Third School takes second place, then there will be 95 difference points between them.

At the moment, such a distribution of points almost guaranteed a general victory, despite the fact that, according to the rules of this year, depending on the occupied places in Cross with obstacles, the opportunity to lose first place still remained.

In the circular format of the Monolith Code, after half of all matches, that is, after five out of ten rounds, the First and Third schools each had 4 victories and not a single defeat. Both schools did not have a match in the first round. They were equal in all respects.

- Yes. Tomorrow, finally, there will be a direct confrontation with the Third School. We will win at all costs.

In response to Hattori's encouraging words, Carey also announced the winner in advance. After that, he turned to Mikihiko.

“Yoshida, I hope you will be the same as today.”

- I will try to.

Despite a sudden appeal to himself, Mikihiko answered firmly. According to his expression, he was also inspired by the enthusiasm for confidence in victory, as were his two senpai.

◊ ◊ ◊

Psions joined CAD. They were further converted into psionic signals equivalent to electrical signals passing simultaneously through the Eidos induction stone, which is a key part of CAD. Thus, the deduced activation sequence was sent to the zone for calculating magic through the body.

- ... Yeah, everything is in order. The setting is excellent as always, Tatsuya.

- This is my job. Tatsuya answered dryly to Mikihiko's praise.

Mikihiko knew that Tatsuy’s behavior was not to show off. Since his work itself was already pride, he did not need to be too proud of it. Moreover, this was only one of many of his special skills. Tatsui's specialization was building magic systems at a deeper, more basic level, and CAD tuning was just one way to do this.

“In fact, I would like to use the same interface as in the help device that you, Mikihiko, usually use.” I ask you to suffer some inconvenience from such differences.

“No, that’s enough for me.” Compared to students in other schools who, instead of their usual CAD, are forced to use devices that are several orders of magnitude worse, I’m blessed.

It was not a pretense on his part. He started using that fan-shaped device from last winter. This folding fan was made of metal talismans fastened at the base. Using a cord made of an induction alloy used in engraving magic, the base of the fan was connected to a psion generator, made in the form of a wrist bracelet. It was a kind of help device, which is a hybrid of a mascot and CAD.

In the traditional model of using talismans to activate magic, commands to spirits (sequences of magic) are built independently with the help of symbols drawn on talismans. Further, these commands are projected onto the talisman, and the call of the spirit occurs.

In this help device, on the contrary, from the symbolic drawing on the mascot, the activation sequence in the form of an encoded signal is output to the generator, and from the generator, by contact with the skin, psion waves are sent to the zone for calculating magic. By doing so, you can give commands to the spirits in a semi-automatic mode, when, starting from a certain moment, the process is no different from ordinary work with projecting a spell on the talisman. This allowed the use of magic through familiar talismans at a speed comparable to that of magic performed using CAD.

Unfortunately, the rules of the Nine Schools Tournament limited the part responsible for extracting the psionic signal from the talismans in this case. There was even an idea to make a bundle of specialized CAD in the form of cards containing one spell each, but spare parts providing such a shape in the form of flat cards also contradicted the rules. As a result, one could be content only with changing the software settings of commercially available CAD.

Tatsuya was unhappy with this result. But Mikihiko felt that this was enough for him. He had already used Tatsuya's customized CAD when he had to become an urgent replacement in the beginners' division last year, and he did not feel any discomfort, even though he was only provided with a hasty decision. Last year, he still doubted whether the ease of use could depend only on the skills of one engineer, but this year everything was different. He could activate magic without stress and with complete comfort.

“If I complain about this, then I cannot escape divine punishment.” From this moment begins the responsibility of the competitor, and not the engineer. Here I have to try.

- Wow. Miki, quite an encouraging speech.

Tatsuya and Mikihiko looked at the entrance to the van with the tuning equipment, from where a suddenly interfering voice came. There they saw Erica's face peering outside into the back of this van.

- Erica, did something happen?

- Yeah, I thought that you finished working because the radiation of psionic waves stopped. Do you want a seagull? The rest are already waiting.

- That is, you came to call us?

- Why so? We are sitting nearby.

After exchanging words with Erica, Tatsuya turned to Mikihiko.

“Mikihiko, what will you do?” Your part of the work is already finished. Do you want to go back to the room and relax?

- No, I will go to the others too. After that, it will then be easier to fall asleep.

- Accepted.

Erica stuck her head out of the van. Tatsuya and Mikihiko followed her out.

Next to the van was a sliding table with folding chairs around it. Above the table was a "roof" in the form of an awning extended from the roof of the van. It looked as if a camping camp had been set up here.

Two places have already been prepared. They sat in such a way that Mikihiko and Miyuki were on both sides of Tatsui, and Tatsuya and Mizuki were on both sides of Mikihiko.

“Onii-sama, you worked again until such a late time.”

Miyuki poured coffee into Tatsui's cup.

“Um, Yoshida-kun, here you are.”

Mizuki poured green tea into Mikihiko's cup.

“Ah, you even considered my special preferences when you prepared.” Thanks, Shibata-san.

Like Mikihiko said, he only had green tea.

- The preparation of tea was done by Pixie.

“Yoshida-kun only notices Mizuki.”

Now there were already 2 tables. Because so many people participated in this tea party that it no longer fit at one table. And these voices came from the next table.

- Subaru! And Aimee, don’t say such evil words!

- Honoka. These two are just jealous.

- N-indirect! This is not zavivst or something obscene! *

[Speaks in a hard-to-translate dialect. The “mistakes” in the words were made intentionally to convey how roughly her words sounded for the Japanese]

“Amy, calm down ... You say that you are very difficult to understand.”

“And really, where did you learn to say that?” Your dialect ...

- Dialect, you say ...

Mikihiko listened from the next table with a reddened face and a wry smile.

“What is it, Mikihiko?” Aren't you relaxed? I thought you needed to keep fit.

Mikihiko shook his head in response to the words of Leo sitting on the opposite side of the table.

“I'm not relaxing.” How to say it ... When necessary, fighting spirit comes by itself, in a natural way. I feel that I’ll “definitely win”, even if I don’t think about anything.

- Hey ... Mikey, you're serious.

Hearing what Mikihiko said, Erica showed great surprise.

- It’s infrequent to see you in this state. If these feelings are really real, then this is not like you. But if so, then tomorrow you can expect a lot.

- Yes. I will certainly win.

Although Mikihiko said so, he felt pressure inside. But compared to those days when he would not even have been taken to the competition, now he felt much more confident.

"That's right. I thought that I would never remember this feeling of perfection again. I would have thought the same way, if that incident had not happened even that day ..."

Now he understood this. That incident was not an accident. Now it seemed to him that this was a test that he had to overcome, and with which he sooner or later had to inevitably face.

After the incident that day, six months before the entrance exam to the high school of magic, he could no longer normally use magic. Although it was not a complete failure, but he could not get the emblem with eight petals and was forced to be content with the status of "weed". After that, he considered himself miserable and insignificant.

But he believed that there was a will of heaven. As a student of the second stream, he was able to meet such friends. And I was able to meet him .

And it was an unexpectedly good acquaintance. It was much more valuable than any emblem there. And now he was sure that fate had prepared him for this from that day. Now he felt confident that the challenge he had that day was not a mistake.

This happened on August 17, 2094. The seventh day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar, Tanabata, evening. The memories of that day caused Mikihiko a surge of strong emotions ...