The Mage of the Abyss Episode 15: "Created Fire" | Creative Awards 2026 | Fantasy Novel Category | Light Novel |
This is a story of approximately 5,000 characters.
The training grounds the next day were filled with more spectators than usual.
The reason was clear.
Generative magic tools.
The latest type of auxiliary magic tool, partially permitted for use in official magic academy matches.
They reproduce, assist, and optimize magic that relies on talent and intuition into a formal spell structure.
It was being called the technology of a new era.
Some say it is the future of mages.
Others frown, calling it too dangerous.
But everyone wanted to see it.
Just how close man-made magic could get to human magic.
Flower Mandy felt the buzz of the spectator stands and touched the white flower brooch on her chest.
The air today felt stiffer than usual.
It wasn't just anticipation.
It wasn't just anxiety either.
It was the unspeakable heat that arises when something new appears.
"I have a bad feeling about this."
When Flower said this quietly, Lavy Christail nodded.
"Yes. The smell of the fire is a little different."
"The smell of fire?"
"It's not real fire."
Lavy's eyes were directed toward the opposing team's waiting area.
Of the four people standing there, two were equipped with magic tools.
One was a pale, lantern-shaped device.
The other was a bracelet type.
Both had thin magic circuits engraved on them.
The flame glowing inside was different from Lavy's fire or Flare's fire.
It was pale, uniform, and had little flicker.
It was beautiful.
But the temperature was invisible.
"...It's not anyone's fire," Lavy muttered.
Her voice was mixed not only with disgust but also with a faint pain.
The memory of having her fire stolen by Flare.
The moment her own flames ceased to be her own.
She could feel that pain reacting quietly within her.
Heine Berserk was also looking at the opponent's magic tools.
The depths of his sleepy eyes were narrowed just a little more than usual.
"Heine-san."
Flower called out to him.
"Yes?"
"Is that fire dangerous?"
"More than the fire itself, the judgment is dangerous."
"Judgment?"
Heine adjusted his hold on his black grimoire.
"Magic tools choose the shortest path to their objective. If the victory condition is to destroy the pendant, they take the optimal action to destroy the pendant. If it's to destroy the crystal, they head there by the shortest route."
"Doesn't that just mean they are strong?"
Lavy asked.
"They are strong."
Heine did not deny it.
"But the shortest path isn't always safe."
Flower gasped slightly at those words.
Chloe closed the bracket table.
"The opponent is here to win."
"That goes without saying."
"Yes. However, there is a possibility that they are leaving 'what not to look at' to the magic tool in order to win."
"What not to look at..."
Chloe looked at the opposing team.
"The spectator stands. The physical strain on allies. The margin of the protective barrier. The moment an opponent feels fear. Things like that."
Flower's chest felt a little cold.
"But... this is a match."
"Precisely because it's a match, they might attack within the range permitted by the rules."
"Isn't that a foul?"
Lavy asked.
"I don't think it's a foul."
Chloe's voice was quiet.
"But it's dangerous from a human perspective."Flower looked at Chloe at that phrasing.
Chloe was not a cold person.
She just looked cold.
She properly said that it was dangerous from a human perspective.
She felt relieved by that.
"Third round, first group. Lavy Christail's team and the 'Blue Style Research Team,' please proceed to the transfer circle."
The teacher's voice echoed.
The magic circle glowed white.
The scenery changed.
This time, the field was a wide urban type.
Low buildings lined the streets, and the roads branched off in complex ways.
Phantoms of the spectator stands were also placed.
They weren't real.
But it was an area treated as a protected target during the match.
The opposing team had already started moving.
The boy with the pale lantern touched the magic tool with his fingertip.
The fire inside the lantern flickered.
No, rather than flickering, it changed shape as if calculated.
"Target response, four."
The boy said.
"Pendant position, estimation complete."
The girl wearing the bracelet-type magic tool answered flatly.
"Shortest destruction path, generated."
At that moment, a pale line of fire shot out.
It was fast.
Flower couldn't react.
The line of fire headed straight for Lavy's pendant.
Lavy tried to intercept it with fire.
But the pale line of fire changed its angle just before impact, as if it had measured her firepower.
"They read us, didn't they?"
Lavy's voice dropped.
Chloe said immediately,
"Don't trade shots head-on."
"I know that!"
Lavy folded her flames.
She made the fire smaller.
She erased her response.
Then, the trajectory of the pale line of fire wavered for just an instant.
"Magic power response, decreased."
The opposing girl said.
"Recalculating."
That instant.
Flower called for water.
There was a drainage channel at her feet in the urban field.
She could use the sensation she learned yesterday.
She spread a thin film of white flower water around their pendants.
Not to block it.
But to sense the trajectory of whatever touched it.
The pale line of fire grazed the water film.
It was cold.
Even though it was fire, it was cold.
"Right, from below!"
Flower shouted.
Lavy's lamp was placed to the lower right.
The pale line of fire advanced, avoiding the lamp.
Chloe was standing ahead of it.
Chloe shifted to the side by just one step.
The line of fire cut through the air and pierced the wall behind her.
The wall scorched.
Deeper than expected.
Flower gasped.
"If that had hit..."
"It might not have ended with just the pendant," Chloe said.
"But it's still not a foul under the rules."
The opposing team didn't stop.
The bracelet-type magic tool generated a pale barrier.
The lantern type fired a line of fire.
The two magic tools worked in tandem, automatically switching between attack and defense.
Optimal spell structures were generated immediately to match their movements.
Measuring the output of Lavy's fire.
Reading Flower's defensive range.
Predicting where Chloe would move.
Only Heine's magic power response was displayed as an abnormal value, so the opponent didn't approach.
"How troublesome."
Heine said.
"That sounds heavy coming from you," Lavy replied.
The pale line of fire now struck outside of Flower's defensive range.
A place where the white flower water film couldn't reach.
From there, it changed its angle to aim for the pendant.
Flower tried to spread it in a panic.
But Chloe's voice flew at her,
"Don't spread it too thin!"
Flower's hands stopped.
If she tried to protect everything, it would become thin.
If it became thin, it would be pierced.
Look at the one necessary point.
The purpose of the line of fire was the pendant.
Then, just that one point.
Flower didn't spread the water film, but bloomed a small white flower right in front of the pendant.
The line of fire touched the flower.
The white flower scorched in an instant.
But the trajectory shifted.
It didn't hit the pendant.
"Good...!"
The moment she felt relieved, another line of fire shot out.
The target wasn't Flower.
It was the phantom of the spectator stands.
It was a protected area.
Originally, there was no point in aiming directly at it.
But if they sent a line of fire there, their evasion route would be restricted.
It was rational.
To win, it was correct.
But.
"No!"
Flower moved reflexively.
She spread the white flower water film toward the spectator side.
A place that wasn't a victory condition.
A place that didn't originally need to be protected.But she felt she couldn't let it be burned.
The pale line of fire hit the water film.With a hiss, the white flower scorched.
She blocked it.
However, because of that, the area around their own crystal became thin.
The opponent immediately struck there.
"Inefficient action confirmed."
The opposing girl muttered.
"Defense dispersed. Crystal destruction probability increased."
Lavy's eyes turned cold.
"Inefficient, you say?"
Fire lit up at her fingertips.
It wasn't large.
But it was a fire of quiet will, not anger.
"Flower-san, I'll leave the spectator side to you."
"But the crystal..."
"I'll burn that down."
Lavy ran.
She wasn't burning the opponent's line of fire.
The debris the line of fire sent flying.
The collapse of the wall.
The magic fragments that bounced off the barrier.
She burned only those things accurately.
Fire that wasn't an attack.
Fire that erased only dangerous things before they could hurt anyone.
Lavy's ear cuff glowed golden-vermilion.
"Change of plans," Chloe said.
"What's the path to victory?"
Lavy asked.
"We will win while protecting the spectators."
"What's the difficulty level?"
"It has increased," Chloe answered immediately.
"But it's better than having the spectators burned."
Flower looked at Chloe for just a moment at those words.
A profile that looked cold.
But her voice didn't waver.
She hadn't abandoned her humanity.
Chloe properly didn't mistake what needed to be protected.
"Flower-san, please maintain the protected area."
"Yes!"
"Lavy-san, please shift the opponent's aim. You don't need to destroy it. Just keep making the magic tool recalculate."
"Understood."
"Heine-san."
"Yes?"
"Please deflect only the dangerous shots."
"Understood."
Heine didn't open his black grimoire.
Instead, he created a small wind at his fingertips.
Just before the pale line of fire grazed the spectator barrier.
The wind shifted its trajectory just a little.
Just a basic wind spell.
But the place he used it was too precise.
The opposing boy frowned.
"Anomaly. High-precision interference via basic magic."
"Re-analysis."
"Analysis impossible."
Heine said sleepily,
"It's basic magic."
"That's not very convincing," Lavy replied immediately.
Flower maintained the water film.
Spectator side.
Crystal side.
She couldn't protect everything.
But she didn't mistake the one point to protect first.
Every time a line of fire headed toward the protected area, she bloomed a white flower.
It scorched.
But she bloomed the next one.
Lavy placed her lamps in detail, throwing off the opponent's aim.
The line of fire aimed for the shortest path.
Then she created a path so that the shortest path would change little by little.
Chloe watched that and said quietly,
"The opponent is rational."
"Yes."
"That's why they are weak to the outside of rationality."
Flower bloomed one more white flower.
That flower bloomed in a place that wasn't the opponent's attack target.
A place unrelated to the victory condition.
But the opponent's magic tool ignored it.
As a result of ignoring it and advancing, the trajectory of the line of fire touched the thin thread of water extending from that flower.
It shifted just a little.
Lavy's lamp was placed there.
Recalculation.
It shifted again.
Heine's wind.
It shifted even further.
Chloe said,
"Now."
Flower sent a white flower toward the enemy crystal.
The opponent's magic tool tried to shoot it down by the shortest route.
But Lavy's lamp was placed on that shortest route.
The line of fire avoided the lamp.
Beyond where it avoided was Heine's wind.
Beyond where it shifted further was a small magic fragment Chloe had placed from the beginning.
The pale line of fire was deflected into the enemy's own barrier.
For an instant, the opponent's defense was disrupted.
The white flower reached the crystal.
Crack.
A crack appeared in the enemy crystal.
Furthermore, Lavy's small fire accurately burned only that crack.
Not fire to destroy, but fire that reached the opened place.
The crystal shattered.
The match-ending bell rang.
Cheers went up.
But Flower couldn't smile right away.
Scorched marks remained on the spectator's protective barrier.
Even though it was a phantom, the protected area was almost caught in the attack many times.
If these were real spectators.
If the barrier was a little weaker.
If she had been a moment late.
They won.
But she was scared.
Lavy was also looking at the opposing team.
"...That fire."
"Yes," Flower answered quietly.
"It didn't belong to anyone."
Her voice was quiet.
But there was anger in its depths.
The students on the opposing team didn't look sorry.
Rather, they looked puzzled.
"The magic tool just produced the optimal path."
"There shouldn't be a problem under the rules."
"It was within the tolerance of the protective barrier."
They were saying things like that.
There was no malice.
That was why Flower's chest felt cold.
Even without malice, people might get hurt.
Even with correct calculations, someone might cry.
"Flower-san."Chloe called out to her.
"Yes?""You defended well."
That was all.
But that one word was enough for now.
Heine was watching the pale lantern being collected from the opponent.
He put a little strength into his fingertips holding the black grimoire.
"Created fire..."
That voice wasn't meant for anyone to hear.
Around that time.
At the top of the spectator stands.
Dr. Shinji Mido was smiling quietly while watching the match's recording crystal.
Beside him was Shinku.
Silver hair.
A red eye on only one side.
Deep within that eye, a pale ring of light was swaying.
"Defensive action, irrational."
Shinku said.
"But effective."
Mido narrowed his eyes happily.
"Interesting."
His gaze was directed toward Flower.
"They try to protect things other than the victory condition."
Shinku tilted her head slightly.
"Inefficient."
"That's right."
Mido nodded.
"But human."
Shinku's red eye slowly reflected Flower.
Next, Lavy.
Then, Heine.
Finally, Chloe.
"Observation continued."
Shinku said quietly.
"Flower. Fire. Abyss. Time."
Mido moved his eyebrows slightly.
"Time?"
Shinku didn't answer.
She was just looking at Chloe.
The girl with a thin presence.
At that profile that should have been hard for anyone to notice.
Deep within her red eye, multiple rings rotated quietly.
"Uncertain element."
Shinku muttered.
In the training grounds, the cheers were still continuing.
But beneath those cheers.
The coldness of the generated fire was beginning to spread quietly.
To be continued in Episode 16.
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