---

Titania couldn’t make sense of the situation.

The joyful everyday life vanished in an instant, and from the moment it transformed into a scene filled with violence and screams, she struggled to regain her composure. However, the decisive moment came when she learned that a Scarred Man had been targeting her.

“From the very beginning, he was gunning for me? Why on earth?”

Titania’s heart darkened with fear and guilt. Though she couldn’t comprehend the reason, it was certain that men were after her. This also meant her precious friends and instructor were in danger because of her.

She knew Instructor Ion was strong, but she had no idea of the extent of that strength. That made her anxious. Thanks to her high spirit affinity, she had the ability to read people’s emotions. It was only a vague understanding of what the other person felt, but still…

The men standing before Ion exuded a terrifying and savage aura, reminiscent of a killer who had taken many lives.

In contrast, Instructor Ion’s presence was like a placid lake. So calm that it was impossible to discern what thoughts he was harboring or just how strong he truly was.

Opposite to Titania’s anxious expression, Osnia remained remarkably calm. She seemed to show nothing but frustration at her inability to help in this situation, as if she didn’t even consider that Ion could be in danger at all.

Titania couldn’t understand Osnia’s confidence.

“Knife fight?”

One of the gathered men scoffed.

“What’s this guy yapping about? He doesn’t even have a knife!”

“Right? He’s unarmed, isn’t he? It looks way too easy.”

Despite the mocking laughter of the men, Ion showed no reaction whatsoever.

He simply gazed intently at the sword wielded by the man mocking him.

Perhaps that gaze provoked the man’s temper; he no longer hesitated and charged at Ion, yelling.

“You bastard… die!”

Ion merely observed the sword-wielding man rushing at him without any weapon, his expression utterly indifferent.

At the moment Titania thought Ion would be harmed, suddenly his body spun like a bolt of lightning, delivering a powerful kick to the charging man’s jaw.

“Ugh!”

And Titania witnessed a human flying through the air.

The man hit in the jaw almost soared three meters into the air, yet, proving that humans can’t actually fly, he plummeted back down abruptly. The sword he had held also shot up and whirled down, landing precisely in Ion’s palm.

Ion looked at the men as he had from the start.

The only change was that one had fallen in the brief moment, and now he held a sharp sword in his hand.

“Ah…”

Though Titania couldn’t see Ion’s face, she felt a sense of stability from his steadfast back. There were no clear reasons, but somehow, looking at that back gave her the feeling that everything would turn out alright.

The Scarred Man’s expression twisted dramatically. He had sent one in to test Ion’s abilities, but the fight ended so quickly there was no time to confirm anything, and now he wore an expression filled with rage.

“This one’s not an ordinary guy.”

But it seemed he had no intention of simply backing down because his opponent was strong.

“Boss. What should we do?”

“Don’t be scared. It’s just one guy. How can one sword block four?”

Still, the Scarred Man hesitated to approach Ion. The other four men eyed him tensely, undecided about their attack.

“Not coming?”

As the standoff dragged on, Ion smirked and said, “Then I’ll go.”

At his words, all the men inhaled sharply, tightening their grips on their swords. They remained tense, prepared for Ion’s assault, but couldn’t even track his movements with their eyes.

“Ugh…!?”

The moment they thought Ion had merely planted his foot lightly, he had closed the distance to a few steps ahead.

In a flash, Ion deflected the sword of the man who had been standing there with a stupid expression, then swung the sword at his defenseless body.

However, the trajectory of the sword hesitated in the air for just a moment. Perhaps realizing that students were watching from behind, Ion forcefully altered the path of his blade, merely grazing the tendons in the man’s wrist.

“Guah!”

Yet, that alone was enough to incapacitate the man. As he clutched his bleeding wrist in horror, the expressions of the other men shifted to furious.

“Now’s the time! Get him!”

The flowing blood riled up the remaining three men. They yelled in a rage and charged at Ion all at once.

Titania gasped and shouted, “Instructor! It’s dangerous!”

In stark contrast to Titania’s tense voice, Ion swung his sword with astonishing composure. His movements were precise with not a hint of error, and with each strike, he effortlessly disarmed the men of their arms and legs.

Though it was a scene drenched in blood, Titania couldn’t help but admire Ion’s efficient and restrained moves.

“Ahh! My arm!!”

“Guah!!”

In the blink of an eye, all the men collapsed in a pool of blood. The Scarred Man was no exception; due to the wound on his wrist, he dropped his sword weakly to the ground.

The Scarred Man chuckled in disbelief at the fact that his entire group had been overpowered by just one person.

“Ha, ha… What kind of monster are you…?”

Ion, after effortlessly subduing five men, asked calmly as if he felt nothing unusual about it. “What’s the purpose of targeting Titania?”

“What do you want with that Elf girl? Heh heh… k, krhh…”

The man smirked bitterly, holding his head down as blood poured from his wounds.

Suddenly, the mood around the Scarred Man changed. Dark blue mana exploded from his entire being, and the injury on his wrist swelled with muscle, sealing itself.

Titania didn’t know that this was a technique known as “Body Strengthening Art,” reserved for the few masters among sword practitioners, where one used mana to enhance their physical body.

He tore his blood-soaked clothes apart in one motion, exposing his upper body. On his shoulder was a tattoo of two crossed swords. Ion seemed to squint his eyes, recognizing that tattoo at once.

“So you’re from the 5th Legion.”

“That’s right! We served as meat shields in front of those damned Dark Elves! If you recognized this mark, you probably know our fate!”

“… The 5th Legion was disbanded after suffering catastrophic losses in war.”

“Just stating that isn’t enough to explain the hell I went through!”

The Scarred Man unleashed his magic and charged rapidly at Ion. Though he no longer held a sword, his body, enhanced by magic, had already become a sharp weapon.

“They poisoned wells! Dug pits with the corpses of comrades! Tortured captured comrades just for fun! Hauled their guts all over like it was art!! Even raised the dead as Undead so that the dead devoured the living in that hell!! If you’ve experienced that!!”

The man lunged at Ion, striking with reckless punches, and Ion calmly blocked each one. However, with every swing of the man’s fists, gusts of wind battered the air, whipping Titania’s hair wildly.

“You must understand my hatred! Don’t you!! Ugh!?”

The Scarred Man clasped his fists with both hands and slammed them down onto the ground.

Boom! The floor cracked like spiderwebs and dust billowed into the air.

However, Ion had already retreated, evading the man’s onslaught.

The man gasped heavily from the swirling dust and said, “Huff, huff… They say that now that the war is over, it’s a peaceful world, yet here’s an Elf princess enrolling at the academy. What a peaceful world, huh? My dead comrades can’t even come back, burned as corpses in that hell…”

The Scarred Man glared at Titania with a deadly glare, filled with an unfathomable hatred never before experienced, causing Titania to freeze, unable to even breathe.

Ion stepped in front of her, blocking the Scarred Man’s line of sight.

“Titania is not a Dark Elf. You can see that, can’t you?”

“Ha, ha… So what? When the Dark Elves sided with the Demon King’s Army, did the Elves cling to humanity? No, right? They holed up in forests, watching others suffer, doing nothing until the war ended!”

As the Scarred Man slowly steadied his breath, he readied himself for battle again.

His voice was as cold as ice.

“If you’re a soldier, you’ve lived through that hellish war, so you should know. Different races aren’t human. They’re ultimately our enemies. More so than monsters.”

Ion stood silently with a grim expression. The longer his silence stretched, the more anxious Titania became.

Before a man discussing the extreme dichotomy that differed from his own thoughts, Ion slowly opened his mouth.

“Yeah. I lost my family to war too.”

“Was it the work of monsters? Or was it due to a different race? If you’ve dealt with such matters—”

“No, humans.”

The atmosphere froze at Ion’s words.

Osnia and Titania wore expressions of shock and horror, while Ion himself appeared remarkably calm and collected.

“My hometown was far from the front lines. So I felt safe. As long as I was fighting on the front, my family wouldn’t be in danger.”

Ion continued to speak with composure.

“I was ambushed by a band of robbers made up of deserters. By the time I arrived, it was nothing but ashes.”

“… You bastard. What are you trying to say?”

Ion smirked mockingly.

“No one asked for your sob story.”

The Scarred Man’s face twisted beyond recognition. He gasped as if his reverse scales had been touched, and now, unable to contain himself, darted at Ion with all his strength, swinging his fists.

“You bastard!! I’m going to kill you—!!”

Ion’s arm moved like lightning. His sword slashed cleanly through the man’s thigh.

Even in a frenzy, the Scarred Man didn’t dodge the blade. He thought a sword without mana couldn’t penetrate the Body Strengthening Art.

But.

Crash!!

“Ugh!!”

Ion’s sword shattered into splinters, and the broken, sharp fragments pierced the man’s thigh. His body, enhanced by the Body Strengthening Art, had been sheerly cleaved away by pure force, causing the blade to lose its battle against Ion’s strength and shatter instead.

It was nonsense, something that wasn’t feasible unless one were a giant, yet the Scarred Man had no choice but to accept that it actually happened.

He was truly face to face with a monster.

“Speak.”

Ion leveled the half-broken sword at the Scarred Man’s neck.

“Who’s the true mastermind behind the movement to target Titania?”

 

---