Rewinding slightly, in the control room, Miyuki maintained a calm facade, but Tatsuya saw through her restless undercurrent. He wasn't her brother for nothing—he knew the cause.
A ping from Miyuki's terminal broke the silence. Reading the email, she visibly relaxed. "Miyuki, from Yugen?" Tatsuya asked.
"Yes," she replied. "He's watching with Fujibayashi-san."
Yugen likely obscured his Mitsuya-Defense Forces ties, but Miyuki had worried he'd spectate with Shizuku. Watching from the monitor room could upset Shizuku, risking her performance. Tatsuya marveled at Yugen's tightrope act. Kyoko was a trusted ally to both, so it was fine, but Miyuki's mood swings—warm with Shizuku, prickly over perceived favoritism—drew a faint smile from Tatsuya.
"Onii-sama? Something wrong?" Miyuki asked.
"Just impressed at how honest you've become," he teased.
Shizuku and Honoka were in the stands, not here. As Tatsuya spoke, Mayumi, Mari, Kei, and Kanon entered. Mayumi explained Katsuto had returned to First High's tent, sparing Tatsuya questions. With Miyuki preparing, they headed to the monitor room.
When Miyuki stepped onto the turret, the crowd buzzed. Even Mayumi's group was struck, but Tatsuya treated it as background noise, deftly prepping the monitors. By his third time, his movements were polished. The chatter centered on Miyuki's outfit: a white kimono top with scarlet hakama, her long hair tied back with a white ribbon. Her striking beauty made it a perfect fit—she'd look mythic wielding a staff, bell, or broom.
"She's too perfect," Kanon said. "It's almost unfair."
"Is the outfit strategic?" Mari asked.
Mayumi and Mari assumed it was Tatsuya's ploy, but he clarified, "No, Miyuki asked Yugen to arrange it. His sister Kana handled the measurements."
The Uesugi family, Yugen's maternal line, was known for New Shadow Style swordsmanship but rooted in Onmyōdō magic, tied to a shrine on their ancestral mountain. Mayumi, aware of this, nodded. "With Yugen's Uesugi ties, it makes sense he could pull it off."
Yugen had captivated the crowd with his presence. Now, Miyuki commanded their gaze. As Mayumi's group debated her outfit, Tatsuya's eyes stayed on Miyuki, certain she and Yugen would dominate this event.
Unaware of the monitor room's buzz, Miyuki took deeper breaths to steady herself. Emotional surges could trigger her magic prematurely, risking a false start. She knew this, suppressing the excitement other athletes might channel.
Thinking of Tatsuya, her engineer, eased her. Yugen's choice of outfit fueled her resolve to meet his expectations, cooling her nerves further. As red lights flared on the field's poles, she opened her eyes, fixing a steely gaze on the arena.
Her mere action drew sighs from the stands. Near the venue's wall, a young woman in sunglasses, watching quietly, murmured, "My, she's grown beautifully."
Smiling, the woman—Chihime Kagurazaka, per prior context—observed as the pole lights shifted to yellow, then blue. A brilliant surge of Psions enveloped the field.
Miyuki projected spell formulas onto both arrays of pillars. Her side chilled with arctic cold, while her opponent's shimmered with heatwaves, melting their pillars. Soon, her array was cloaked in icy mist, the enemy's in sublimating vapor.
"Inferno," a mid-scale vibration spell, slowed vibrational and kinetic energy in one area, redirecting it to heat another, balancing entropy. A grueling A-rank license exam spell, it was child's play for Miyuki, a vibration magic expert.
Her opponent's cooling spell failed. The pillars, riddled with air bubbles, cracked under heat-induced expansion. Miyuki switched spells, compressing and releasing air to shatter her opponent's pillars cleanly.
Chihime, satisfied, slipped away unnoticed, a faint smile lingering.
In the women's Ice Pillar Break second round, Emi won the first match, advancing to face Shiori in the semifinals. Shizuku, in the third match, secured her spot with steady play. Yugen's men's second-round match (fifth) and Miyuki's women's match (sixth) were initially simultaneous, but due to "interval issues," the organizers shifted Yugen's match to follow Miyuki's at the same venue, with First High using the same monitor room.
Yugen focused in the control room. No issue for me, but they could've planned the blocks better… No, rookie data's too sparse for predictions.
Various stakeholders likely influenced this, but after his first-round match, officials requested his CAD for inspection. He complied, knowing his safeguards—excluding "Meteor Line" and Tenjin magic from his competition CAD—were ironclad. In the first round, he'd used hardening magic to stall, prepping "Lightning Order" to hold "Meteor Line" and "Resonance Rift" near activation, setting up "Meteor Rift."
Rules allowed CAD-free magic if lethality was within bounds (otherwise Mayumi's "Multi-Scope" or Mototsugu's and Subaru's "Perception Inhibition" would violate). Yugen used compound spells, including "Phase Shift Armor" (a hardening variant, non-lethal), to mask this. "Kaleidoscope" could trigger it instantly, but that was a last resort. His semester-end exam—deploying a ten-step spell under 100ms—made low-spec CADs more limiter than aid.
Inspectors returned his CAD with an embedded "Electronic Silkworm." Consulting Gōzō, Yugen got permission to counter it. His spell erased the "Silkworm," inducing overwhelming drowsiness in the caster, disguised as fatigue. No copied spell traces were found, confirming his security. Exposing new spells like "Silkworm" risked the organizers' credibility with the Ten Master Clans—self-inflicted ruin, Yugen thought.
Recalling the original timeline, the flight magic debacle was "childish." Anticipating similar tampering, Yugen had urged Tatsuya to rig strict "safety measures" for the Silver Blossom Series CADs, optimized for flight magic in the finals.
Kana and Mika later told Yugen that his Speed Shooting athletes (Shizuku, Tōya) winning sparked rival schools' wariness, swelling the crowd. He shrugged—let them come.
Checking the monitor, Yugen muttered, "What absurd results for Men's Cloud Ball…"
He'd predicted Tōya's dominance, with the other two First High athletes placing if they stayed loose. Instead, both lost in early rounds, while Tōya reached the finals. The issue was his score: 250–20 in the first set, forcing his opponent to retire before the third. Tōya's qualifiers ended similarly—opponents quitting by the second set, averaging a 210-point gap. His magic-only qualifiers and racket-based finals baffled rivals, cementing his Mayumi-level prowess.
As cheers signaled Miyuki's match, Yugen changed and watched via monitor. She controlled "Inferno" flawlessly, replicating her first-round win. During the interval for pillar reinstallation, Yugen headed to the turret, passing Miyuki returning to her control room. Her joy was palpable as she approached.
"Congrats on the semis, Miyuki," Yugen said. "No issues with 'Inferno.'"
"Thank you! I was worried I'd miss your match…"
Overdramatic, Yugen thought, patting her head. She squinted happily, and he couldn't help treating her like a sister. Releasing her, he said, "After your spectacle, standing out's tough, but I'll manage."
"Good luck, Yugen-san!" she called, heading off.
Yugen steeled himself, entering the turret's platform room. Closing his eyes, he focused. The announcer's voice echoed, and the platform rose.
Men's Ice Pillar Break, second round, fifth match—the day's final bout. The crowd watched, breathless. Red pole signals shifted to yellow, then blue. Yugen's eyes snapped open. His CAD activated, encasing his pillars in impregnable hardening magic. His opponent's spells struck, but the pillars remained pristine.
Raising his free right hand, Yugen summoned twelve spell formulas above the enemy array—unlike the first round's setup. His opponent scrambled to reinforce defenses, but Yugen swung his palm downward.
The formulas merged into one colossal construct. A dragon of light, wreathed in lightning, plunged into the enemy array. On contact, a blinding flash engulfed the venue. Spectators flinched, shielding their eyes. As the light faded, the enemy pillars were gone—obliterated.
The opponent stood stunned, as did most onlookers. Only those with Psion perception or spirit magic expertise could grasp the spell's complexity. Yugen had unleashed "Tenjin Invocation," the pinnacle of Tenjin magic: "Tenrai Shinryū" (Thunder God Dragon), a light- and metal-attuned strike. A pointed retort to Headless Dragon's "Electronic Silkworm," its intent was clear only to Yugen, Gōzō, and Mototsugu, privy to the context.
The buzzer sounded, followed by a delayed roar from the stands. Military and VIP seats radiated awe and unease. Yugen advanced to the semifinals, unscathed.
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