A C-Rank Magic Student Who Deludes Himself into Thinking He Is SSS-Rank

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?!” Eliza approached Shion, who was lying on his back near the edge of the arena, with evident fury.

Shion, having been slammed against the arena wall by Eliza’s “Giant’s Frozen Fist – Groß zu Frielen,” fell to the ground and conceded defeat, declaring his loss.

It seemed like a logical conclusion to the battle, but Eliza was not satisfied. She couldn’t believe that Shion, if he were serious, wouldn’t have been able to avoid the “Giant’s Frozen Fist.”

The man who had performed the miraculous feat of dodging every arrow in the “Annihilating Whirlwind Rain Shot – Mieszuurchbohren Wirbelwind Regenschuss,” even if by surprise, couldn’t have failed to avoid a magic spell as simple as the “Giant’s Frozen Fist.”

To Eliza, the “Giant’s Frozen Fist” was intended merely as a threat.

It was her way of saying, “The fight isn’t over yet,” a statement against Shion’s self-declared “checkmate.” She never intended to hit Shion with the spell in that situation.

Furthermore, Eliza, ranked third in her school year and a powerful magician, did not believe that a person with such unfathomable power would be easily taken down by “Giant’s Frozen Fist.”

Her ultimate technique, “Annihilating Whirlwind Rain Shot – Vindisch Sturm Lanze,” could not possibly be dodged by anyone else of A-class in magic, let alone anyone in her class.

During the duel, the man who had remained utterly calm in the face of Eliza Loredo’s powerful magic, could not possibly have been at his limit just dodging attacks. It was inconceivable that he didn’t see her magic as a threat at all, given his composure.

Therefore, judging from the strength Shion displayed during the duel, his capabilities must be A-class or even higher.

Magicians possess a defense against magic called “anti-magic power,” proportional to their own magical power. Therefore, it was natural for Eliza not to think that Shion, clearly an A-class or higher magician, would be defeated by a single hit of the “Giant’s Frozen Fist.”

Yet, the man was thrown against the arena wall by the “Giant’s Frozen Fist” and fell to the ground, declaring his defeat quite readily.

His tone was so nonchalant it seemed like he still had plenty of leeway.

Considering all these factors, Eliza Loredo came to one conclusion.

Shion had intentionally taken the hit from the “Giant’s Frozen Fist,” conceding victory to Eliza while still holding back his true strength.

This conclusion greatly agitated Eliza, who took great pride in her ranking and strength.

Driven by her emotions, she approached Shion, who was still lying down, straddled him, grabbed his collar, and shouted angrily.

“Are you making fun of me?!”

“What are you talking about?”

Eliza glared at Shion with a look of fury, but he remained expressionless.

She became even more infuriated.

“Don’t play dumb! You deliberately didn’t dodge just now, didn’t you? You dodged all of my wind arrows, but I won’t let you say you couldn’t dodge the ‘Giant’s Frozen Fist’!”

“No, it was impossible to dodge that. It was almost at point-blank range

Shion answered without changing her expression.

Indeed, Shion had been almost in contact with the magic circle of the “Giant’s Frozen Fist.” The ice fist had hit him almost simultaneously as it was conjured. His reasoning made sense.

“You could move like that, so you had enough time to dodge from the moment I deployed my magic circle to the execution of the spell…!”

“Certainly, if I had used the magic I employed to dodge your wind arrows, it might have been possible to avoid it”

“But,” Shion continued

“I had already stopped deploying my magic, thinking the duel was over. I didn’t expect you to cast a spell from there and was completely caught off guard. Avoiding it at that point was truly impossible.”

”……!!”

It was a false accusation, but Eliza hesitated, having to admit that the content itself was rational.

…But right after that…

“So what are you saying then?”

Eliza turned a sharp gaze on Shion.

“Are you saying it’s my fault for not admitting defeat gracefully…?!”

Eliza raised her voice as if to strongly deny her own fault, but she was well aware that this was a defensive reaction.

After evading all of her powerful magic and ultimate techniques with energy to spare, presenting his palm to her, it was as if Shion had completely defeated Eliza’s magic.

It could be said that everything she had built up until now was thoroughly defeated in front of Shion.

Eliza understood that she was struggling to accept this reality. She understood, yet she still refused to admit defeat.

She vehemently denied the idea that it was her poor grace in defeat that led to this unsatisfactory conclusion.

“Is it because of my poor grace in defeat?”

“Is it because I refused to admit my loss?”

In response, Shion replied,

“No, that’s absolutely not it.”

Shion, who had maintained his composure despite Eliza’s yelling, suddenly looked at her with a firm gaze and declared,

“No matter how much you’re beaten down, no matter the gap in strength, no matter how desperate the situation becomes—as long as you don’t give up, it’s not a loss.”

His words carried an unusual weight.

Eliza inadvertently flinched under the pressure of the man looking up at her.

“Even if I had continued with my magic, you might have been able to dodge it, or block it. Or even if it hit, it might not have been effective. At that moment, you were definitely not yet defeated.”

With that, Shion continued speaking even further.

“No matter how unfavorable the situation, if you didn’t think you had lost, then it’s not a loss. I got complacent, thinking I had won, and you took advantage of that. That’s why it’s my loss.”

“!?”

Shion calmly explained his defeat and Eliza’s victory.

“If I were you, I would have done the same thing. Well, it’s true that at that moment, I hoped you would give up and concede,” he added.

“What’s that supposed to mean?! After all that grand talk, why are you admitting defeat so easily? You can still fight, can’t you?”

Elisa spoke reproachfully toward Shion.

“Don’t be unreasonable; I can’t go on anymore.”

“What do you mean you can’t? You still seem to have plenty of energy left!”

In contrast to Shion’s matter-of-fact reply, Eliza refused to listen.

“Seeing is faster than explaining”

With that, Shion, still straddling Eliza, began to remove the upper part of his combat outfit.

“Huh!? H-Hey!! Why are you stripping again…?”

Eliza panicked, recalling Shion’s previous wild behavior in the equipment storage.

“…Eh?” However, her face turned pale and drained of color when she saw a particular part of Shion’s upper body.

“What… is that?” In Eliza’s view was Shion’s skin around the right chest area, abnormally discolored to a dark blue-black.

“This, my rib is broken,” Shion said, pressing the discolored area on his right ribs with his finger.

As Shion pushed his finger in, it sank unnaturally deep into his flesh with a muffled crunch.

“No, no, no, no, no, no!”

Elisa screamed at the abnormal behavior.

“Y-You!! What are you doing? Stop it!! H-Hey, doesn’t it hurt?!”

“A broken rib is obviously painful. Are you out of your mind?”

“That’s my line!! If it hurts, stop it!! Are you insane!?”

“No, I thought it would be easier to tell that it’s broken like this.”

“Understood, understood! Now take your finger off!”

Shion complied, “If you understand, that’s good,” and removed his finger, leaving a visibly unnatural indentation in his upper body.

“You’re… really insane…”

Eliza said, realizing the extent of Shion’s abnormality.

Indeed, his resilience to pain was part of his essence. Even if all his bones were shattered, it wouldn’t compare to the pain of a magician running out of magic power.

Shion, who frequently pushed himself to the brink of magic exhaustion during training, did not find the pain of a few broken ribs unbearable. It wasn’t that he was numb to pain; he endured it despite feeling it.

He had demonstrated this extreme pain tolerance to quickly prove to Eliza that his rib was broken.

“You see now. I can’t fight anymore, and having sustained such a fatal injury, I’ve lost this duel.”

Shion stated, still maintaining his calm demeanor as he admitted defeat.

“I said that as long as you don’t admit defeat, it’s not a loss, but I have no reason to risk my life to win this duel, and this is enough for me to admit defeat. Or do you think that what you’ve done so far isn’t enough, despite saying you wanted to beat me up for seeing your underwear?”

Eliza was at a loss for words. Despite her somewhat arrogant nature, Eliza Loredo had a minimum level of decency.

She couldn’t demand the duel to continue against a man who had sustained serious injuries from her magic. Instead, she was visibly shaken by the extent of her own excessive violence.

“It wasn’t my intention to go this far…”

Shion commented on the potential lethality of her wind arrows, to which Eliza defensively responded that she had adjusted their piercing power so they wouldn’t be fatal.

Shion glanced briefly at the arena wall, marked with significant destruction from her magic, thinking to himself about the potential fatality but chose not to voice it.

As Shion contemplated how to respond without angering Eliza further, she suddenly began to cast a healing magic over his injuries.

“…? What are you doing?”

“Shut up. Just be quiet.”

Confused, Shion was silenced by Eliza’s sharp retort as she continued her healing.

“There, it’s mostly healed now. Put your clothes on.”

After a while, she stopped her healing magic, and Shion’s skin had returned to its normal color.

“You don’t plan to continue the duel now, do you?”

“Of course not! I just, well, I went a bit too far, and uh…”

Eliza’s subsequent words were weak and barely audible to Shion.

“…What was that?”

“Ugh! You’re so annoying! Do you have a problem with me healing you?!”

Flustered, Eliza suddenly looked up and lashed out in anger.