Part 2 – Premonition, Start

After the small commotion, two more people (a male and female pair) show up and complete our circle of friends. They were late due to Asahina Shiroko’s (female of the late pair) equipment needed to be placed on the arena grounds beforehand. Our group divides into male and female divisions, where we discuss the situation while the females do what they usually do when welcoming new people.

“I see” I mutter after listening to Tadashi, Kuromine Asuta (the one with a troubled expression), and Alistair Lancaster (male of the late pair). They have just finished explaining to me what the notice board commotion was about.

As for the girls, they are… frolicking (?) among themselves nearby. By the way, there are 11 of us, including me and Altina, who are forming the group. Five of us (Me, Altina, Tadashi, and a male and female pair) weren’t assigned a reaction adjective previously because of various reasons, while the pair arrived after the cat commotion.

Additionally, Altina is still wearing the cat-ears with a distressed look, Shiina-san petting her like a cat, Talia-san trying to keep Shiina from going overboard, and the four others; Tenjou Suzume (the curious), Veronica Briel (the amused), Akemi Kirika (the one who feigned disinterest), and Asahina Shiroko were discussing the cat ears with serious (except Suzume-san) expressions.

As for the explanations they needed to give, it seems that some important VIP’s are coming to observe the assessment tests. I’m not really sure what they want to see from greenhorns, but I’ve grown tired of questioning the political agenda of mortals. The mechanics seems to be the same from last year, the instructor vs recruit scenario. Well, I guess I’ll take this opportunity to observe my comrade’s abilities. Oh and I’ve started calling them comrades because it seems that we’ll be stuck with each other until our mandatory military service is over.

“Ah right, Alistair. Are you getting an exemption?” Asuta asked the quiet assassin type. As the smart academic achiever, it seems that he’s compelled to supplement information wherever appropriate. With his inborn magical capacity, he’s well on his way on the path of a mage. He’s not the class president though, since it seems that most if not all our classmates look up to me like some walking advice machine. Really, they’ve forced me to take both the class president and the match maker positions. Not that I can refuse since they earnestly asked. There’s some kind of persuasion power mortals have when they have sincere, beneficial, and morally (on my standard) sound wishes.

“As long as… I hold back… its fine, they said.” Alistair said. The quiet assassin is well known for being the elite bodyguard for the industrial princess, Asahina Shiroko. I have a hunch that he’s blessed by the God of Assassins that seem to dwell in this realm. On the brighter side, it seems that there are negotiations between their families for their engagement. A rich noble lady and her assassin bodyguard… I think I’ve heard this story before, but theirs’ seem to be less tragic.

“I just hope… that nothing bad happens.” Tadashi muttered as we watch the girls acquaint themselves. He’s a peace and quiet loving person, but I can sense that he’s not a dense protagonist that refuses to kill his enemies and doesn’t blindly believe in justice. Fumu, my 7 years of effort didn’t go to waste on cultivating this knight apprentice. By the way, he comes from a long line of knights that came all the way from this world’s equivalent of the medieval ages. I wonder how they got convinced on using cyber age exo-skeleton armors and weaponry. More mysteries for me to solve later!

…

The assessment tests weren’t very special, as we were only tried for potential talents. The tests lasted for two days, which on the first day only consisted with a light spar with the knight instructors or target practice for magic users; with the natural consent that anyone who isn’t capable of combat skipping that part, and a free-for-all obstacle course for everyone. I don’t have any preferences to holding back, but using my divinity to exceed mortal limits doesn’t sound nice on a middle school basic testing activity… so I just went with the results of my endeavors on my mortal body.

As for our group of achievers, everyone went through the first test after chatting and deciding to take the obstacle course together on the next day. First up on the melee test were Tadashi and harem, whose members were Ishihara Shiina, Tenjou Suzume, and Veronica Briel. As a Knight-Apprentice hailing from a family of knights, he had the typical long sword and shield combat style. He lasted for a bit of a while before the instructor sent his shield flying, prompting him to surrender.

Shiina-san, on the other hand, could be described as a female samurai that relies on speed. We were expecting a flashy fight, but due to the Knight-Instructor’s battle experience, she was disarmed at her fourth dash attack. Still, her cool demeanor in normal situations and battle is a complete 180 from her cat-lover mode… can’t blame Tadashi for being unable to resist her. Gap-moe, banzai!

Suzume-san was a Cleric-Apprentice, so she went in the melee test with the typical mace and a few active self-buffs. A good choice I must say, since I have proven countless times that you need a blunt force to be effective against the undead, especially skeletons which is the standard undead minion. Holy weapons and secondary elemental weaknesses not included of course… but using fire inside underground caves where undead usually lurks is very stupid, so I implore you that you go undead bashing with a mace or a hammer instead of a flaming sword or fireballs. As for her actual test; at first, her first time swinging a mace wasn’t very impressive as she ran to the Knight with tears in her eyes. The Knight-Instructor had a complicated expression while he was dodging the mace she swung down while she tripped. The disbelief of everyone (including me) and the fear on the Knight-Instructor immediately showed on our face as the mace made contact with the ground and produced a small crater and a loud booming sound. The Knight-Instructor immediately tried to suppress his fear and disarmed her before any more damage was done.

Veronica-san was a bit flashier with her spirit summons and barriers… until the Knight-Instructor walked while breaker her barriers and sending the summoned creatures back where they came from. The test finished when she surrendered after the Knight-Instructor reached her. The Knight-Instructor had an expression of ‘he just realized that he accidentally bullied a child and that he has to do it a few more times today’.

Next up were the Asuta and harem, with members Talia Veinhaus and Akemi Kirika. Asuta, with his natural affinity for magic, rained down spells of varied elements on the Knight-Instructor. He didn’t have the fire power to break through the Knight-Instructor’s shield and armor, but he did at least keep him at bay until he ran out of mana. He did make it quite flashy at the end with melded magics ‘Steam Explosion’ and ‘Lightning Showers’. The Knight-Instructor was still unscathed though.

Talia Veinhaus is from a family of rangers (the archer kind). The fight was quite ok with her speed and accuracy, but eventually she ran out of arrows and went for a knifing attack… but trying to attack an armored knight with a knife isn’t the brightest of ideas. She was promptly disarmed and lectured why someone shouldn’t attack a knight with a knife from the front.

Akemi Kirika’s round was awe-inspiring for the hot-blooded warrior-types as she, also a Knight-Apprentice, exchanged heavy blows with the Knight-Instructor. While the Knight-Instructor was conflicted between awe for her endurance, and complicated emotions for attacking a child whose likely half his age, I could definitely see something terribly wrong with Kirika-san’s expressions. It may be the result of how she was brought up, but each blow she receives are met on an angle that reduces damage either by distributing the impact force or glancing it off with her armor. But I can definitely see it with each blow that lands on her, her expression briefly changes to that of ecstasy! The hitting match ends when she collapses after fatigue (orgasm). The medics promptly brought her out of the arena, while the Knight-Instructor had the thoughts of ‘what have I done?!’ plastered all over his face… Though without a doubt, I know that he misunderstood something.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

Asahina Shiroko was next, riding her 1.5m tall exo-suit, or in layman’s terms a piloted robot, with a long rifle and side arm for equipment. She put up a good fight due to her piloting experience from her family background, but eventually lost because of the Knight-Instructor’s much more extensive battle experience. It’s really hard to bring a gun to a sword fight when you’re not experienced enough.

Alistair’s fight didn’t last long, as he promptly disappeared in a black puff of smoke when the match began, and reappeared instantly at the Knight-Instructor’s side with a practice knife pointed on his throat. For some reason I’m not entirely sure about, but I sense a bit of a will for revenge somewhere on his face.

As for Altina, I noticed that the instructor was more serious than the previous rounds during their bout. Altina’s style revolved mostly on spamming the most basic magic spell, ‘Mana Arrow’ (spin + varied elements version), due to my efforts to my (divine) intervention. Sure it’s good to have a variation of spells in a magic fight, but you need to get your basics straight. It’s faster and more cost effective (mana and mental fatigue wise) to just spam ‘Ice arrows’ than cast something like ‘Hail Storm’ due to the complexity of the larger spells. It’s not like Altina can’t spam larger spells… but against a single human-sized enemy, I don’t think you should be spam-casting something like ‘Meteor Fall’ in the middle of civilization just for something like that. So with that reasoning in mind, I had her train with magical arrows on top of her mobility training during one of our consultation sessions.

As for the assessment test, well… everything went better than expected? The Knight-Instructor managed to shrug off the countless magical arrows by tanking them, but he got sent flying when she teleported behind him and unleashed ‘Shockwave’, an air-fire synthesized spell that detonates a fire ball in a pure, highly pressurized oxygen sphere. The Knight-Instructor probably anticipated her retreat, instead of a teleport behind him. He was fine, but due to Altina’s over-the-top ‘Shockwave’, his armor was falling apart and his shield had a huge dent on it.

Lastly, it was my turn to go into the fight… but we had to wait as the Knight-Instructor needed to have a spare armor to be delivered to him, since all other Knight-Instructors are busy with the other classes. As we were quietly waiting for the Knight-Instructor’s new set of armor to arrive, someone came walking out of the VIP stands, heading towards us. Her knee-length layered golden blonde hair, with a pair thin rabbit-styled twin tails at the sides, swaying and fluttering with the wind as she walks. Her beautiful unblemished face wearing a mysterious smile that hints of purpose but with a dash of sensuality. A figure of a girl of my physical age; comparable to that of a finely crafted doll, adorned with a majestic black and white dress armor, which achieves balance between risqué and conservative. Her beautiful crystal-like emerald eyes, staring directly at me… which probably looks like fierce and focused eyes that inspires awe to most others, but to me they look like she’s thinking something like ‘Finally, it’s my turn!’…

As she walks with grace, all eyes are focused on her. There, I noticed that a familiar sword is sheathed at her waist, the ‘Sword of Calistros’. Nostalgia comes to me as I remember memories of her from the previous lives… I hope she doesn’t find that that it’s definitely my fault that she’ll eternally end up as a loli after I tampered with her soul a few lives back…

Yes, it wasn’t just from the last life. I’ve been watching her for a number of her lives already. I’m not purposely stalking her, mind you! It’s all part of my Hikaru Genji project, God version. Sure there are more than a billion gods out there in the multiverse, but none of them fits my preferences… Somewhere along my infinite life, I found her, fitting all my preferences; and decided to embark on this journey to grow my own wife goddess. It was depressing on the first few lives as I had to meet her ‘for the first time’ quite a number of times.

It was during that time that I tried to modify her soul, and found out that a soul must naturally strengthen itself before a god could grant the ability to reincarnate. It was a breakthrough, since we gods didn’t know the exact requirements on artificially granting the ability to reincarnate. At that time, we only knew that reincarnation occurred naturally and artificial reincarnation sometimes failed due to not knowing the specific requirements for reincarnation. On a side note, after the multiverse started to progress again, a community of gods dedicated to researching magic granted me an award for the discovery of the specific requirements for reincarnation. It was the last life that fulfilled the conditions that let me grant her actual reincarnation, and then fast forward until now. Anyways, I now must wonder how and why did the ‘Sword of Calistros’ follow her here even after death. I think I should analyze her again later after this ‘event’.

For my method of ‘finding’ her, I’ve set my soul so that it would follow her to the next world automatically, then appear before her as a mysterious person when I’ve raised my mortal self enough… or at least, that’s how I’ve done it until now. Now that I think about it, I’ve been using the name ‘Servo’ to refer to myself these past few lives. Does it mean that her true reincarnation was a success? *sigh* Too many questions to answer. Time for the ‘let’s wait and see’ strategy that has worked most of the time. But really, coming out of the VIP stands… I sense something ominous, and the dreaded comedic kind at that.

‘She’ stops near the Knight-Instructor, and assumes a commanding pose while still staring intently at me. I could only wear a wry smile and see what happens next.

“Knight-Commander Pegasus, I request to assume my position as assistant Instructor and conduct the test for this man.” ‘She’ said in a formal and commanding tone. Wait, why is a Knight-Commander conducting the test for a bunch of middle school kids? Aren’t they supposed to be training… you know… elite troops instead?

“As willful as always eh, Princess Alicia. Very well. As your highness commands, I, Knight-Commander Pegasus, hands over the conducting authority of the assessment test for this batch of recruits to Assistant Knight-Instructor Alicia Forterra… it’s the last one though.” The Knight-Commander states, while switching between casual and formal speech.

So she ended up as Princess Alicia Forterra huh. I’m not surprised, with all that positive karma she owned with her sufferings as a ‘Hero’ and that final deed. Still, she was named ‘Alicia’ this time too… how fitting for her. That name, which was also her name from the first time I ‘met’ her, definitely suits her.

“Good…” Princess Alicia smirks, and launches a surprise energy slash at me. I promptly deflected it with a horizontal drawing slash without flinching. Hmm, now that I remember it, I think she said something like “I’ll definitely defeat you on our next duel!” to me a few days before we went to defeat the Demon Lord from the previous life. Is she still angry at me for not letting her win with our training spars?

“This time, I definitely will defeat you!” She shouted out as she dashed towards me, with parts of her dress armor lighting up like golden neon strips. Is her armor a miniaturized exo-suit? I parried her strike and warded her off with my counter-slash. She jumped back while her sword was glowing brightly with a golden light. Oh man, this is bad.

“Ex-!” She shouted as she gathered colossal amounts of mana on her sword for the finishing move.

“Hey, that’s plagiarism!” I retorted loudly, with all my emotional effort.

“Not exactly! –Calistro!” She replied and executed the finishing move while shouting the skill name. I sighed inwardly with all my might, as I prepare to teach this reckless person some manners.

…

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Author Notes: Please consult Hasegawa Kobato-chan’s hairstyle if you are kind of short on the properly descriptive terms on hairstyles, like me. If you have questions about the plot, please wait for the next 2 parts of Chapter 3, as they’ll most likely be answered. Also, something was mentioned but not mentioned until now. Whoever notices it before I release Part 3 gets a cookie instead of a kouki.