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The Villainous Noble Who Kept Rewinding After Death: The Story Somehow Changed When I Committed Suicide

Chapter 183: Learning

It was the fifth day of the tournament. Perhaps because the finals were happening today, the spectator seats were completely packed from the morning, with even people standing to catch a glimpse of the matches.

“Wow, there are so many people.”

“I know, right? I guess it’s because the winner will be decided today. It feels even more crowded than yesterday.”

“Yeah, thank goodness we’re students so we get to sit comfortably. Standing is the worst.”

It seemed the general audience had been lining up since morning to grab their seats on the final day of the tournament, but there were special seats already set aside for students at the academy, allowing us to sit down without much wait.

“Yawn~ Good morning!”

“Hm? Oh, you finally showed up.”

The voice that greeted me was Kamael, who had been missing since day one, accompanied by a particularly relaxed yawn.

“I got bored of sleeping. I thought I might as well come see the matches.”

“Oh, I see.”

When I asked him what he had been doing the past few days, he revealed he had been holed up in his room, sleeping most of the time, only going out to grab food from street vendors when he got hungry.

“Sounds like you had quite the enjoyable time.”

“Well, yeah. I like sleeping, you know. But I thought you might be feeling lonely since I’m not really fond of this noisy place.”

With a teasing grin, Kamael said that, seemingly eager to see how I would react.

So, I leaned closer, locking eyes at a close distance, and watched as Kamael’s expression shifted to one of surprise while I replied.

“I wasn’t lonely, but I do appreciate you coming.”

“Ugh… stop it. I’m not getting the reaction I wanted from you, no matter what I do.”

“Ha ha. That’s unfortunate.”

Kamael said that while looking bored and plopped down next to Shuvina, slouching deeply against the backrest.

“If you want to see the reaction you’re looking for, why not try a surprise attack?”

“Surprise attack, huh? But since the one being attacked is suggesting it, it feels like it’s not a real surprise.”

“I’m not always on guard, you know. If you catch me off guard, I might just give you the reaction you want.”

“Ugh, well, whatever. It seems like the match is about to start.”

Kamael sighed with a hint of exasperation and turned his gaze toward the stage.

Then, with Lime’s lively introduction of the contestants who had been energizing the matches all this time, Iris and her opponent stepped up onto the stage and faced each other in the center.

“Huh. Your fiancée’s vibe has really changed, hasn’t it? She’s mastered magic much better than before.”

Despite the match not having started yet, Kamael could instantly tell Iris had improved just by sensing her magic, proving he was also a strong one, just like me.

As Kamael continued to gaze at Iris intently, the first match of the day began.

Iris’s opponent was a male student from the third-year S class, wielding a massive axe.

“Iris. This doesn’t look like a good match-up.”

“Yeah, with water against an axe, her magic might just get nullified with brute strength.”

As Fiera and the others pointed out, water magic wasn’t solid like ice magic; being fluid meant it could be overpowered by someone wielding a massive weapon with confident strength, making it a tough match-up for her.

Iris started with water blades and water arrows to test the waters, but all of them were deflected by the giant axe’s strikes, and any surprise attacks were blocked using the broad axe as a shield.

Moreover, even when Iris tried to defend against the boy’s attacks, a single swing of the powerful axe blasted her water shield away, making it look like her magic was ineffective.

No matter how skilled Iris was at manipulating her magic or how high her magic density was, when it came to physical attacks, defending against them was incredibly difficult. Right now, she didn’t have enough power to withstand an opponent’s strike, who was confident in their strength.

“She’s interesting. Despite her magic not working at all, she doesn’t seem flustered at all.”

“Yeah, it almost seems like Iris has a certain composure.”

From the perspective of the audience around, it appeared Iris was being pushed into a corner, and those who expected her to win were shouting encouragements for her to do her best.

However, Iris maintained a remarkably calm expression, devoid of any sign of panic or resignation.

“‘Fog’!”

As Iris cast her fog magic, the stage became shrouded in mist, rich in moisture.

The boy showed a moment of confusion as his visibility diminished, but perhaps due to his sensing ability, he quickly located Iris’s position and charged at her with no hesitation, his axe raised.

“Increase water pressure!”

Just as Iris was about to step into his range, the boy suddenly knelt down and collapsed to the ground as if crushed by something.

“Now that’s clever.”

“Yeah, I didn’t expect her to use the moisture in the fog magic to pin him down. She’s definitely gotten stronger.”

What Iris had done was a simulation of ocean depths— the deeper you go, the greater the water pressure, and the heavier the burden on the body, eventually crushing it.

That’s why humans need to use barrier magic to envelop themselves when diving deep into the ocean, requiring a pretty robust and advanced magic manipulation to create that barrier.

By reproducing oceanic pressure using her fog magic, Iris’s opponent couldn’t withstand the sudden increase in pressure and got pinned to the ground.

(I get the logic, and theoretically, it’s possible. But trying to pull that off requires quite a bit of magic manipulation.)

Once a magic was activated, adding another layer of operating instructions was quite challenging. Only after years of training in magic manipulation could one hope to achieve such high-level techniques.

This was due to the nature of magic: when using magic, you need to clearly define the imagery and effects of the spell in your mind.

For instance, when Iris used her fog magic, she had to visualize the area of effect, what phenomenon to create, and what effects it would have—those three things, while using the magic.

When Iris cast her fog magic, she must have pictured the area being just the stage, the phenomenon being the generation of the fog, and the effect of obscuring visibility.

The magic she activated based on these specifications worked exactly as she envisioned, but adding an instruction for increased water pressure on top of that would raise the level of magic manipulation to a degree far beyond regular spellcasting.

It’s like trying to alter a completed painting to create a new piece of art, and the difficulty level is not something to scoff at.

Moreover, in my entire experience, I’ve never encountered a wizard considering adding water pressure after using fog magic, and there wasn’t even a mention of such a thing in any books about water magic.

In other words, that technique was original to her; she conceived and perfected it all by herself.

(Since I can use dark gravity magic, I’ve never even considered adding water pressure with water magic. That’s quite a fascinating technique.)

While I thought I knew everything about magic, watching Iris’s use of magic revealed to me that the world of spells was still incredibly vast, making me smile in joy.

“It’s over!”

As I was analyzing Iris’s magic, I found out that during that time, she had managed to encase her opponent’s face in a water sphere, knocking him out in a most merciless way, with Fiera informing me of her victory.

After that, the unconscious opponent was carried away by waiting teachers, and Iris bowed on stage before slowly making her way back to the waiting room.

Thus, with Iris easily claiming victory in the first semifinals match, she advanced to the finals before Sharueina and Sonia.

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If you’re interested, please check out the concurrently serialized “The Former Hero Becomes a Demon Lord and Devotes His Life to the World”!

https://kakuyomu.jp/works/16817330663836544021

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