Volume 01
Prologue: An unorthodox Swordsman
“…Damn, I’m late.”
The boy— Satsukiba Sorata had entered high school in this spring and on a glance, his appearance was pretty much like any other normal high school boy’s.
It wasn’t all that different from the average height of a Japanese male.
Still, someone with a keen eye might be able to discern his abnormal talent.
It stood in contrast to his overall slender body.
Satsukiba Sorata was a swordsman.
While the extra-long sword dangled on the belt of his uniform, Sorata ran around in search for his destination: The classroom of class 1-A.
“Hey, could it be that boy is the rumoured…?”
“So it was really true that a boy enrolled in our academy…”
The nearby female students started to make a ruckus when they saw Sorata.
This place, the Enbu Academy, was established with the goal to foster people, who fought in mechanical armours powered by magic, also known as artefacts: The [Sky Knights]. The academy was well known as a girls-only school, which never had accepted a boy until Sorata enrolled here.
It was human nature to gossip when the boy with such a background passed by in front of their eyes.
“Hah… What a drag. I don’t care about him being a special swordsmanship student or whatever, but I heard that he has absolutely no aptitude for magic. What’s a guy like that doing at our academy?”
“I know, right! To begin with, an outdated art like swordsmanship isn’t going to get you anyway these days!”
Some girls gave cutting comments in regards to Sorata’s enrolment.
It would be no exaggeration to claim the present age as the golden age of [magic].
No matter how much talent you were born with for [swordsmanship] or [martial arts], it proved to be absolutely worthless in this age, where the talent for [magic] meant everything.
And Sorata understood that better than anyone.
“…Fuh. I somehow made it in time.”
He had managed to find his classroom somehow or other while slipping through the gazes aimed at him from all directions, and made a sigh of relief.
Three minutes before class started.
He was already standing out enough due to his status and it would be unbearable if he were to get labelled as a troublemaker for coming in late for his first class on top of that.
While thinking about such things, he stepped into the classroom—
For some reason, there was skin as far as he could see.
Sorata’s vision fell onto the unbecoming appearance of over thirty or so girls.
In face of the all too sudden happening, Sorata just stood there with his mouth gaping half-open.
The girls were reacting the same way.
As a side note: Sorata would come to know about this later, but the students of Enbu Academy never had to be careful about peepers when “undressing in the changing room”, because the girls had been among themselves for a long time.
And then.
The girl with black hair, standing the closest to Sorata, broke the silence from both sides.
“KYAAAAAAAA! A pervert! There’s a pervert!”
After that hell broke loose.
“A boy!? Wh- What’s a boy doing here!?”
Some desperately tried to cover their body with their arms and legs in shame.
And some ended up crying from the shock of being seen in their underwear by a boy.
Sorata finally comprehended the situation he was in, but it was already too late.
The odds to escape from the classroom without punishment was infinitely close to zero.
“Excuse me. I think you’re… called Satsukiba Sorata?”
Before he noticed it, a girl had come to in front of him.
With beautiful hair in a flaming red colour and a strong-willed look that oddly charmed the viewer, she was a pretty girl with a bewitching sex-appeal that make you mistake her for a Goddess from some legend.
“Th- That’s our Felicia-sama! She behaves so confident even in such an unforeseen situation… Wonderful! I’m deeply moved!”
“…..”
Sorata’s brain brought such a stupid doubt into question that right away, but he asked a different question first.
The red-haired girl laughed while scrunching her nose for a bit.
“…..”
He had been prepared to some extent when he moved here, but it even came as a surprise to him that his name had already spread so far.
Sorata was often teased for his slow-wittedness by others, but even he understood that she wasn’t talking about grilling a mere steak.
(A wrong answer and I’ll be burnt to the ground!?)
Felicia approached him step by step with her rapier regalia in hand, which was equipped with the core method of the fire domain.
How could he soothe the angry girl?
“C- Come on! Don’t get so angry! It ruins your cute face.”
Felicia blushed her cheeks from the unexpected utterance.
Or at least, that method had a hundred percent chance of success for his little sister Airi.
“Yep. You’re cute. And quite beautiful.”
Felicia’s cheeks reddened like a boiled octopus when the stranger boy, who had suddenly showed up in the classroom, showered her with praise.
The other girls couldn’t hide their surprise as they saw Felicia act like a girl their age.
“No way!? Our Felicia-sama is on the defence…”
“I never thought I would come across a girl as beautiful as yourself on this Earth. On a personal note, your healthy and well-fleshed body impressed me the most! It’s practically picking a fight with the recent diet boom.”
At the moment, Sorata failed to notice it.
“To begin with, the models on TV these days are way too skinny. Men are originally more attracted to women with an appropriate amount of meat on the bones than the skinny types!”
“You’re perfect in that regard! My personal favourite is your ass! These plump and child-bearing hips instinctively make me want to borrow my face into them… Truly the ideal shape for a man. I dare to say your body is rather wonderf…!?”
The girl in front of him was giving him a ruthless look like a cattle being sent to the butcher.
If there was a flaw with Sorata’s strategy, it would be that his little sister had a particular inclination unlike a normal girl.
His little sister Aira was the kind of girl, who would be brought to tears from joy when her brother told her: “Your plump and child-bearing hips instinctively make me want to borrow my face into them.”.
“…Have some shame, you damn pervert.”
While mumbling that in a bass voice filled with bloodlust, Felicia let her rapier regalia shine in her hands.
The regalia in her hand produced a spherical light and Sorata’s vision instantly was engulfed by crimson flames.
Due to that, everyone present thought the boy would suffer burns so grave that he would have to be brought to the hospital at once.
“… Whew, close call.”
But that didn’t happen.
Felicia realized the absurdity first and showed a doubtful expression.
So, how did this happen?
The only clue she got was the mysterious movement the boy had shown right before the magic hit him.
However, that was no real reason as to why he overcame this pinch unharmed just now.
Therefore swordsmanship, which was bound to the laws of this world, had no way to oppose magic, even if it was performed by a heretic [swordsman], who enrolled in the previously girls-only academy with flying colours.
She wracked her brain over various possibilities regarding this event, but her thoughts were interrupted by the voice of one classmate.
“Nuh! D- Don’t get the wrong idea!”
“No! This underwear… coincidentally reached me from the blast, so I caught it in the spur of the moment… I wasn’t aiming for it or anything!”
The underwear girls surrounded Sorata at once with their regalia equipped.
(…Guess I was over thinking it. This happy-go-lucky guy could never break my magic.)
Felicia heaved a short sigh in light of this ridiculous development.
Namely, that her own inexperience must have brought about this incident.
She didn’t think that there had been a mistake in her formulated script, but she couldn’t think of another reason to explain this outcome, so she settled for that conclusion for now
(For some reason… I am feeling rather disappointed now. I guess I was stupid to cherish any expectations of this guy for even a moment.)
As a matter of fact.
Suppose for a moment that there was a secret [sword skill] that could defeat the almighty concept of [magic], which now controlled the world instead of [science]—
Other people would surely sneer at her if they were to hear this— But she had expectation for such an impossible future.
“W- Wait. Hear me ouuuuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!?”
Afterwards.
Good grief… How did things end up like this?
Everything had started roughly one week ago.