Adventurer of Flash - 03 - About This Pretty Dangerous Unique Magic

Chapter 03: About This Pretty Dangerous Unique Magic

For a while, I spent my days immersed in the grand library, the study, and the training grounds of the knights and the magic division.

Previously, my father had said,

“Shall I hire tutors for both magic and swordsmanship like I did for Lloyd? If I ask, anyone would agree to teach you.”

But I replied,

“I can do everything on my own. Thanks to the Marquis family’s influence, I can freely enter the grand library and the Marquis military training grounds to learn on my own. I don’t want to be disturbed by anyone. Besides, it’s not like we can hire a tutor for someone awakened like me. For swordsmanship and body strengthening magic, I can learn from the knights, including you, Father.”

“I see. But remember, in the empire, it’s mandatory to enroll in the academy at fifteen. Until then, spend your five years as you like. If you need anything, come to me right away.”

“Got it, thanks. Oh, by the way, you don’t need to hire a tutor to prepare me for the academy entrance exams either. I looked at past exam questions, and I can handle it on my own.”

“O-Okay.”

‘Well, that’s Al for you.’ The conversation ended on that note.

Don’t underestimate the advantage of a past life!

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About a month after the selection ceremony, I started planning what I could achieve with my unique magic, “Light”, based on my previous life’s knowledge.

The first thing that came to mind was focusing light to instantly evaporate and cut through a target. 

Yes, a laser beam.

Just focusing light on an enemy’s eyes for a moment would blind them. The enemy would remain blind until healed by a potion or water-based healing magic. It’s extremely dangerous.

Next was photosynthesis, which my brother mentioned. This is impossible because we don’t have chloroplasts.

However, awakened beings can do something similar. Normally, living beings recover magic power just by breathing or eating, as magic is present in the air, plants, animals, and all living things.

The important part is that awakened beings have a high affinity for their unique magic’s attribute. For example, an awakened being with the unique magic “Lightning” wouldn’t be harmed by lightning and could quickly absorb the magic power in it.

What I mean is that I can absorb many times more magic power than a normal person when exposed to sunlight during the day. Since becoming an awakened, I’ve felt incredibly good when basking in sunlight, and I believe this is due to this trait.

I became a walking solar panel. With my magic control, I could focus nearby sunlight onto myself, allowing me to absorb magic power continuously during the day, like bathing in a waterfall of magic recovery potion (usually, you’d drink it).

At night, I could still use the moonlight to increase my magic recovery speed by focusing it, although it’s much less efficient than during the day.

Next is the highly anticipated optical camouflage. By manipulating the refraction of light around me, I could theoretically make the scenery behind me visible, making me invisible. Like the laser beam, I haven’t tested this yet.

I could also sense places where light is present within the range of my magic control. This is akin to light detection. 

Though I haven’t practiced this yet, I believe that as I grow, I’ll be able to more clearly discern the amount, size, and shape of the magic, and even expand my range.

In combat, using swordsmanship and martial arts, these two abilities are expected to be explosively effective:

Light-speed thinking and light-speed reflexes. As the names suggest, they make the transmission speed of my brain and nerve signals reach the speed of light.

With light-speed thinking, the world’s speed in my view slows down, allowing me to think carefully and fight in what feels like a nearly frozen world.

The pinnacle is light-speed reflexes. If an enemy’s attack reaches my body, I can deflect it with light magic in an instant. I can also focus an enormous amount of magic power to enhance my body, stopping the attack.

I tested these two abilities while training with the knights. Since I’m still not used to them and my proficiency is low, you could say I have “somewhat light-speed thinking (and reflexes).”

Now, let me ask everyone: Is light limited to what we can see with our eyes?

“No, it is not!”

Light includes invisible ultraviolet and infrared rays. Some of you might have guessed by now.

Yes, this means I could potentially apply infrared cameras, infrared communication, and infrared traps. My past life’s knowledge is pretty amazing, right?

By using infrared, I can detect heat and clearly see objects even in darkness. Also, infrared traps, commonly seen in movies from my previous life, can automatically detect intruders.

With time, I might be able to apply infrared communication and ultraviolet light in some way.

“Alright, let’s try out the laser and optical camouflage during the day, and experiment with infrared in the mansion’s garden at night.”

Since it’s currently daytime, I entered the empty magic training grounds and gathered a bit of magic power in my fingertips. 

First, I focused the light I created and aimed it at a target. The spot I hit scorched. Next, I concentrated more magic power and fired again. This time, it nearly pierced through the target and the training ground’s outer wall, so I quickly canceled it.

I decided not to use my full magic power or utilize sunlight because I anticipated something extreme would happen. 

I imagined what it would be like to gather more light, send it upward, reflect it with magic, and let it rain down to the ground.

“Damn. This is seriously dangerous. I think I understand why awakened beings are a deterrent to nations.”

By the way, I could easily perform optical camouflage. Since living beings absorb light with their eyes to see, this works even at night.

At night, I used infrared to see in my room, and it worked as expected. The higher the temperature of an object, the more clearly I could see it, which was a bit fun. 

I managed to create an infrared trap, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t work if I set it up far away.

However, there’s no need to worry.

“It’s a bit of a hassle, but I’ll decode the magic structure of the infrared trap and create a new magic circle.”

In this world, magic circles can be activated even from a distance.