Black Iron Magician

「Glass Twister!」

In the center of the stage, a tornado suddenly formed. It’s a great magic that sucks and swallows everything in the surrounding area, a level 80 wind magic. This magic is Karua’s trump card and she was saving it for the battle against Weerel. So, why did she use it in the first round? …… The answer is simple.

「――This is the fifth checkmate.」

Karua had been defeated four times in this match. And this is the fifth time. Without fearing the power of the tornado, Chinatsu stood behind Karua and pushed the bottom of her staff against the back of Karua’s head. She just pushed it without hurting her opponent. Karua swings her staff to resist, but Chinatsu steps back easily and waits for the next magic to be cast. That course of events has been repeating in this match.

「Are you fooling around!? If you feel like it, you can make me fainted or push me out of the stage easily, right!? In addition, you are faster than my chanting! You intentionally wait for me to use my magic, evade it, and make me cornered…. And yet, why are you not trying to win!?」

「………」

Chinatsu doesn’t answer Karua’s shout. Chinatsu understands that this kind of treatment toward someone who is seriously trying to win is an act of trampling down the pride. But at the same time, Karua’s magic is just right for warming up, and in fact, Chinatsu has been warmed up moderately by ascertaining the approaching wind and evade it at the last minute. Chinatsu is full of gratitude and apology for Karua. After all, if Karua were to give up in the middle of the fight, Chinatsu wouldn’t be able to warm up this far.

However, Karua is already at her limit. The glow from Karua’s staff is faint and she herself seems to be out of breath. She’s barely able to stand by putting her weight on her staff. This is enough. While having a feeling of gratitude toward Karua for resisting until the end, Chinatsu goes around behind Karua.

「I got you!」

From the attack patterns so far, Karua predicted that Chinatsu would go behind her. Another tornado is formed under the feet of Chinatsu who went behind her. It’s a bold move from a very close range that will swallow even the user. While hurting her own body with the blade of the wind, Karua smiled with the conviction of her victory―― and when she realized it, she is lying on the grass outside the stage.

「――Ha?」

Karua, who let out a puzzled voice while looking up at the sky, saw the tornado she had just created at the edge of her field of vision. While enduring the pain in her body, she moved her view little by little. There, she saw Chinatsu lowered her head deeply just like before the match.

「O-Out of the stage! The match is over. The winner is Chinatsu Rokusai…!」

While everyone at the venue was dumbfounded, the announcement of the end of the match echoed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

「Chinatsu-chan~!」

「…Haruna?」

When Chinatsu was walking through the passage, she heard a voice from the distance. ……But then, the source of the voice, Haruna, is already near Chinatsu. Recently, the sense of distance is uncertain since they are fast.

「Congratulations on getting through the first round! At the last moment, it was amazing when you instantly turned around again to the other side as soon as you turned around behind the opponent! It was like, whoosh whoosh? Anyway, you were really fast!」

「I’m still not as fast as Touko, though. In addition, the initial action of the attack was slow and I hit her so that she could avoid it on reflex if things get dangerous…」

「Ahaha, you somehow seem to be distressed… W-Well, it was like a warming up, I guess?」

「Yes… I feel bad that it was as if I was making a fool of my opponent, but I wanted to grasp the feel while I can. Maybe I should have stopped it after all?」

「No, you did it because you thought it was necessary, didn’t you? Chinatsu-chan, you took that action and apologized so much to your opponent, so I won’t deny it. Giving your all to win the championship doesn’t mean that you have complete it in that single match. After all, motivation, condition, and concentration―― it seems that it’s normally difficult to maintain all of them!」

「Uhh, Haruna’s smile makes my stomach hurt…」

「Ehh, why!?」

While maintaining those things that are normally difficult, Haruna pushes forward in a straight line toward her goal without minding about her surroundings. For Haruna, who does such things on a daily basis, it was very difficult to go along with normal senses. Thanks to the efforts of her best friend, Chinatsu, Haruna now understands those normal senses. Still, when she was a child, it was a constant struggle. Especially when doing something in cooperation with people, such as club activities, was fatal.

(Well, I guess it can be said that carrying some burden is my daily life… On the contrary, I would feel restless if there’s nothing. Yep, together with Haruna makes me calm down after all…)

One of the few common sense people, Chinatsu. Just a little, she was starting to deviate.

「By the way, Chinatsu-chan. That staff…」

「Oh, this? I got this from Shishou. Apparently, this is more or less a staff.」

「Rather than a staff… it’s that no matter how you look at it, right?」

「Yes, I thought the same thing. But, don’t say it anymore. Shishou forbade me to speak after all.」

Haruna and Chinatsu stare at the wooden staff. It’s very similar to the thing that they always held in their club activities. On a closer look, the staff has a borderline as if to announce that there’s some kind of gimmick built into it.

「W-Well, it’s not something familiar to people in this world, so it’s okay, I guess?」

「I hope so… Really, I don’t know how it can be approved as a staff.」

「Shishō said that it’s okay as long as we hit the magic item used for inspection to the part with the nature of a staff.」

「T-That inspection is full of holes, huh…」

To avoid trouble, it seems that Deris hit it to the handle of Haruna’s Doggan Staff and Nell hit it to the surface of Chinatsu’s staff. Well, this method is quite well known and Therese also used it, so there was no complaint.

「As for me, I won’t use Doggan Staff until I fight Chinatsu-chan, so I will get through with my fist and kick!」

「I-I see, good luck with that…」

In other words, she won’t hesitate to use it against Chinatsu. When Haruna takes out Doggan Staff from her pouch, it gathers the attention of the surroundings due to its bizarreness. ‘Ahh, the blade is sharpened today too, and it looks like it can cut anything easily just like Haruna’s favorite knife,’ Chinatsu thought so and her stomach hurts again.

「It’s time to start the match. For the fifth match, Haruna Katsuragi and Noct Norland, please move to the stage.」

「Ah, it’s time. See you later! Let’s meet in the final!」

「Yes, see you later…」

While holding her stomach, Chinatsu saw off Haruna who started running.