Chương 192

The air in the upper reaches of the Silverpeak Mountains was thin enough to make a normal man gasp for breath, much less be alert for the countless dangers they held, but for a Tier Two mage with a decent filtering spell, it was just crisp. Orion hovered fifty feet above a steep ridge, the wind whipping his lab coat around his legs. He adjusted the output of his [Flight] spell, fine-tuning the mana flow to counter the unpredictable updrafts.

Flying on a broom had become something of a second nature by now, though he was still determined to figure out how to maintain the same level of maneuverability without relying on an artifact. Three weeks, he thought, scanning the snow-covered valley below. Three weeks of teaching, studying, and hunting. And I still feel like I'm not doing nearly enough. He wasn't wasting time, he knew.

He'd already done a lot to lay the groundwork for his friends to cast using the scientific method, and he'd even achieved a couple of breakthroughs during his own training sessions, but compared to the scope of the danger, they felt insignificant. Dorian was the easiest to teach. He didn't care about what it would take to get there; he just wanted results, and once Orion explained a concept enough times for it to sink in, he could repeat it in his sleep.

Incorporating that knowledge into his spells shouldn't be too hard, though he expected he wouldn't have as easy a time with more complex magic. Luna was harder yet also the most successful. She kept trying to feel the magic and guide it by instinct, and that was a hard habit to break. But yesterday, she managed to create a focused beam that burned a small hole through a straw dummy instead of just illuminating it. And Selene…

She seldom spoke, but she absorbed everything, and sometimes Orion thought she had already grasped a particular concept before he even explained it. Whether it was because she had seen the lessons in her dreams, or because she had absorbed the information by tagging along with him over the years, he didn't know, but he'd bet on a mixture of both. She still hadn't tried casting anything, but he was hopeful she would this week.

It was about time they put the theory into practice, especially if they wanted to attract more students. Focus, Orion chided himself. Mom literally only agreed to let me out into the wilds because I said I'd be careful and not get lost in some tangent. He crouched lower, scanning the glittering snow for any movement. His SDGs were very useful in this situation because they only responded when a living being was detected, but he first needed to locate them.

The danger level of today's mission wasn't high, but there was a reason adventurers and even witches preferred facing yeti colonies over what he was currently hunting. He was after something smaller, faster, and arguably more annoying: Crystal Hares. Individually, they were barely a threat. Tier One pests with diamond-hard fur and a nasty bite that could, at most, grow to Tier Two. But they never traveled alone.

They moved in swarms, becoming a localized ecological disaster that stripped mountains bare of mana-rich vegetation and anything else that caught their eye, and kept reproducing at increasingly alarming rates, until something much bigger and stronger took offense and wiped them out. In this case, the infestation was spotted on a peak known to house a slumbering Frost Wyvern, so people thought it would be taken care of.

However, either the wyvern had perished in the past year or, somehow, the Hares had overcome it, because few, if any, trees remained. Before the swarm moved on to the next mountain, a mission was issued. A mission that Orion had gladly taken, as he wanted to test out a few things away from prying eyes. A flash caught his eye, and when he looked, he saw that a chunk of the snow cover was rippling. For a moment, he truly believed an avalanche was about to begin, before he narrowed his eyes and examined the situation.

[Crystal Hare — Lv. 38] [E-rank] [Crystal Hare — Lv. 47] [D-rank] [Crystal Hare — Lv. 39] [E-rank] [Crystal Hare — Lv. 41] [E-rank] [Crystal Hare — Lv. 40] [E-rank] [Crystal Hare — Lv. 40] [D-rank] …... The list kept going and going. It was so long that Orion forcibly turned off the HUD to prevent his vision from being blocked, then tilted his broom down. As he flew closer, he raised his right hand, channeling mana into what was rapidly becoming a signature spell of his.

"[Gravity Cannon]," he intoned, wrapping the spatial distortion around the air itself instead of the pebbles he needed to use during the campaign, aiming for the center of the swarm. Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. The spell hit with a concussive thrum as gravity collapsed into a single point, and the accelerated air burst outward all at once.

A dozen hares were crushed together, their crystal hides shattering under the sudden pressure, while two dozen more were sent flying in every direction. +13, 400 Exp It wasn't much, especially considering how many of the little buggers he'd taken out in one hit, but then again, not everything could be compared to wyrms, and this whole excursion wasn't about earning experience, even if he wouldn't turn it down.

The swarm quickly figured out where the attack was coming from, and with a collective screech that sounded like grinding glass, they unleashed their ranged attack. At least fifty shards of razor-sharp crystal shot into the air, forming a glittering cloud of shrapnel aimed directly at him. Orion stopped his descent, hovering in mid-air, and visualized the fabric of space around him not as empty air but as a stretched rubber sheet. It wasn't like a true black hole, but it would distort gravity enough to bend paths.

He had already successfully cast a basic version of it in the cave to fend off the crossbow bolts, so now it was just about refining it. r_s = 2 G M_eff ∕ c² where r_s ≪ r₀ By defining the space around himself as a curvature, he was able to bypass the resistance expected from a wall. Φ(r) = − G M_eff / √(r² + ε²) Once that was established, he could even influence the direction of anything that entered his warped space.

a_t ∝ v × (∇ × g) Γ(r) = 1 + Φ(r)/c² And finally, by clearly defining the Gaussian envelope, he could prevent knock-on effects, reduce mana expenditure, and minimize the need to monitor his surroundings. Ψ_EH(r) = exp[− (r − r₀)² / (2σ²)] Γ® From that, the formula came together pretty smoothly. Ψ_EH(r) = exp[− (r − r₀)² ∕ (2 σ²)] × (1 − G M_eff ∕ (c²√(r² + ε²)))"[Event Horizon]."

The cloud of crystal spines reached him, but instead of piercing his skin, they followed the curve of the field, swerving violently and arcing around him like comets orbiting a star. They missed him by inches before losing momentum and clattering harmlessly to the valley floor behind him. Orion let out a sigh of relief, although the mana draw made his pulse quicken.

"It's still inefficient for what it does, but it's promising. [Light Shield] and [Light Exoskeleton] might be more useful in specific situations, but when it comes to all-purpose defenses, this is hard to beat," he muttered. The hares, seeing their volley fail, began to charge up the ridge, digging into the stone with their claws. They were fast, blurringly fast. Orion floated backward, maintaining his distance, and jabbed a finger down.

"[Infinite Laser]." A beam of light hissed out, striking the lead hare directly. The creature squealed as a black burn mark appeared on its side, but it kept running. The crystal fur bent the laser, dispersing the heat before it could reach vital organs, showing exactly why most witches didn't bother taking on such missions. Damn it. Tier One output just isn't enough.

Orion frowned and poured more mana into the spell, trying to tighten the beam and push it toward the gamma spectrum where the crystal transparency wouldn't matter. It wasn't an approach he'd attempted before, but maybe the solution to his problems didn't require incredibly complex calculations like he'd feared. The beam brightened, shifting from white to a harsh, blinding violet, and with a buzzing sound, the lead hare's head vanished, vaporized instantly. That's an improvement, but it's still too limited.

It's hardly worth calling it an alteration, though I should keep it in mind if I encounter more monsters with similar refraction abilities. It had taken him three seconds to boost the power, and against a swarm that could actually reach him, three seconds was an eternity. He needed that power immediately, without any delay. Another volley of spines zipped past his ear as his focus faltered. Move. Think later.

Orion reengaged [Flight], banking sharply to the left, and maneuvered through the air, dodging the next volley with simple acrobatics rather than magic, relying on [Event Horizon] to shield him from any strike that might have gotten lucky. I need better crowd control. Something between the massive spells that leave me out of the fight and those that are only effective against single enemies. Pulling back, he flew over the swarm, waiting until they clustered together to chase him.

This time, instead of wrapping the air into a gravity bundle, he pulled out a heavy iron ball from his lab coat pocket, one he had taken for this exact purpose, and cast [Gravity Cannon] on it.

"Not the most elegant method, but I'm willing to bet this will give them pause." A moment later, the ball accelerated to the tune of ten times the gravity and hit the center of the pack like a meteor. BOOM Rock and crystal shattered as the shockwave pulverized the hares, throwing large amounts of snow into the air. The entire mountain's flank shuddered briefly, and Orion looked around, worried he might have awakened something he shouldn't have. Luckily, it didn't seem to be the case, so he went back to the swarm.

+67, 500 Exp Once the cloud of dust and snow cleared, he could finally see what was left.

"Well, it's a good thing no one asked me to bring some back intact," he said once he saw the state the poor creatures were in. The return trip to the Sanctum was smooth. Orion soared high, using the updrafts to conserve mana, while his mind wandered back to the laser problem. If I use a series of mana-lenses floating in front of my finger, I can instantly increase the frequency, like a cascading amplifier. It should work based on the principle of mana refraction, but can I do the same without using actual crystals?

He was so lost in thought that he nearly collided with the barrier around the Sanctum. He flared his mana just in time, and the wards hummed as they allowed him to pass. Given what had recently been discovered so close to the coven, it was no surprise that several Veil Priestesses demanded stricter security measures, but that didn't mean they weren't inconvenient.

He arrived on his family's apartment balcony, stepped inside, and peeled off his wind-stiffened lab coat, not bothering to announce himself since he doubted his mother would be back before sunset. I desperately want a hot shower and a very large cup of mou. However, when he entered his room to drop off his bag, he noticed something on his desk that wasn't there when he left.

It was a small, perfectly folded paper crane, sitting on top of his notes about the laws of thermodynamics that he'd been assembling for the next lesson. Orion didn't reach for it right away, instead scanning the room. But the wards on the door hadn't been tripped, and the window had been locked until he opened it. Teleportation? Doing that within the Sanctum, especially considering the high alert, means only a few witches could have managed it.

He approached the desk slowly, activating [Hypotheticism] and scanning the paper, searching for any clues. Unsurprisingly, there were no obvious curses, nor were there any spells of any kind, just the faintest hum of power that had once touched it. Seraphina? He thought, though he couldn't say why he'd done so. As soon as his skin touched it, the crane unfolded itself, flattening into a neat square of paper, and an elegant, flowing script appeared on the page.