Several days had passed since Rei began serving as a mock battle instructor at the Officer Academy, and on that day as well, the Fourth-year S-Class students were making their way toward the gymnasium.
"Ugh... not again. Another mock battle with Rei today. Word is if you land even one hit, you get top marks for the class, but there's no way any of us can touch him."
"I know, right? We've launched attack after attack, and not a single person has even grazed him. Is that man even human? No matter how you look at it, he's got to be something else entirely."
"Tell me about it. He knocks arrows flying at him from behind right out of the air without even looking. What are we supposed to do when blind-spot attacks don't work either?"
"I know, I know. But at least that's a ranged arrow, so it's somewhat understandable? When I went at him with a short sword, I got hit with a counter the instant I moved."
"If we're playing that game, what about me trying to use magic? The second I start chanting, he charges straight in. If the vanguard could hold him off even a little, I might be able to manage something—"
A student dressed in the typical mage's outfit—robe and staff—grumbled to the group. The other students who overheard, mainly the vanguard fighters, chimed in with visible frustration.
"Don't ask for the impossible. He's already hard to hit because of his small stature, and on top of that he moves ridiculously fast. We try to block him and he blows past us before we can even react."
"Yeah, seriously. That speed is something to envy. As a fellow fighter, I wouldn't mind learning a thing or two."
"Wait, isn't he not just a regular warrior but a Magic Warrior? Though he hasn't used any magic in the mock battles."
"Magic, huh. That's the thing, isn't it? What made Crimson famous isn't his skill with a weapon—it's his magic. And the Gryphon."
"A Gryphon, huh... I wonder what an A-Rank monster is actually like. Kind of want to see one at least once."
"Ugh. An A-Rank monster? That reeks of nothing but trouble, no matter how you slice it."
"Pass for me too. An A-Rank monster would be a handful even for professionals, wouldn't it?"
Chatting back and forth like this, the Fourth-year S-Class students entered the gymnasium—and what awaited them was...
"Guruuuuuuu!"
Set, overjoyed to stretch its body freely outside the stables for the first time in a while.
Set had grown a fair amount over the past two years. What had once been a body roughly two meters long was now somewhere around two and a half meters in length.
To have a Gryphon of that size appear before their eyes so suddenly—it was no wonder all forty students froze where they stood.
"Guruu?"
Hmm? What's wrong? Set tilted its head.
To anyone who knew Set's personality and charm, it would have been an adorable gesture. But to students seeing a Gryphon in the flesh for the first time, it looked like nothing so much as a predator sizing up its prey.
Facing the Fourth-year S-Class students—paralyzed by shock, fear, and awe—the first to speak was, naturally, Rei, standing at Set's side.
"Glad you all made it. As you can see, today's mock battle will have Set helping out. I'm sure the word 'Gryphon' stirs up plenty of fear, but let me put your minds at ease on that front. Set is fundamentally a friendly creature. As long as you don't turn genuinely hostile, you won't be on the receiving end of a real attack."
"......"
Rei was giving an explanation, but the students were in no state to hear it.
They were shaken badly enough that the situation could have tipped into full-blown panic at any moment.
The reason they didn't actually descend into panic and start screaming was largely thanks to three things: Rei standing there as composed as ever, completely unfazed; Set nuzzling its head against him like an overgrown pet; and Grink—their actual instructor—showing no particular alarm either.
When Grink had first seen Rei bring Set in, even he had worn an unusually wide expression of surprise. But once he was told that proper permission had been obtained from Erinde, he'd had no choice but to accept it.
And besides...
One of the students let their gaze drift to the far corner of the gymnasium.
Samarun was standing there, watching Set with barely contained excitement on his face.
Samarun had a deep interest in magic, but the fact that Set was Rei's Tamed Monster had sparked an equally strong fascination with the creature itself.
Thanks to the presence of these instructors, the students managed to hold themselves together.
Though, truth be told, a fair number of them hadn't even noticed Samarun was there.
"Now then. Originally, I was planning to have you do mock battles against Set in groups of five, same as usual, but—"
The students flinched. Reflexively, involuntarily.
It was only natural. The Fourth-year S-Class students generally possessed ability on par with an E-Rank Adventurer.
In other words, what Rei had just proposed was tantamount to telling five E-Rank Adventurers to challenge an A-Rank monster Gryphon.
That was light-years beyond what Officer Academy students could handle.
Of course, if that was the standard, then mock battles against Rei himself—who had enough skill to hold his own against an S-Rank Adventurer—were equally absurd. But the fact that Rei at least looked human made all the difference.
"Wait—"
One of the students started to shout almost involuntarily, but Rei cut in before the words could fully form.
"However, Grink raised the objection that that would be too unfair."
At that, the students cast grateful looks toward Grink.
The man receiving those grateful looks, however, wore an expression of mixed feelings.
But whatever relief the students felt evaporated the instant Rei's next words landed.
"Besides, what I did for this class's very first session was one-on-one mock battles, one at a time..."
Is he telling us to fight the Gryphon alone? The thought flashed through every student's mind. Faces drained of color, turning pale, then white.
This was true even for the noble-born students—those who clung fiercely to their aristocratic pride and refused, or rather refused to accept, that Rei was their superior. Especially Insula, who had been the first to face him.
"However, that idea was also vetoed by Grink. So after some discussion, we settled on a match between all forty members of the Fourth-year S-Class and Set."
The students let out a collective breath of relief.
"A-all of us... not five, not one, but all of us. Then maybe we can manage..."
"R-right. With this many people, we should be able to pull something off."
At their words, Rei let a small smile creep across his lips—just the corner of his mouth curving upward.
Make an outsized demand first, let the shock settle in, then appear to make a modest concession while pushing through what you'd wanted all along.
It was a well-worn, frankly trite negotiation tactic. But the initial impact of being confronted with a Gryphon—an A-Rank monster—had hit so hard that everything unfolded exactly as Rei intended.
And before the students could fully collect themselves, Rei spoke again.
"I don't know how many of you are aware, but Set isn't your ordinary Gryphon. It's a Rare Species. Normally it can use several skills, but as a special exception, it won't use any this time."
"......"
The students had nothing to say.
Even an ordinary Gryphon was an A-Rank monster—something a person might be lucky to see once in their entire life.
An A-Rank monster that was also a Rare Species would, for all practical purposes, be treated as S-Rank.
Weighing all that, there was no way they believed they could fight it head-on and win.
But Rei, paying no mind to their dawning despair, opened his mouth once more.
"Alright then, let's get started. You ready?"
The one Rei turned to and asked was Insula—a student Rei had various connections with, and one who was easy to single out.
Ignoring the look of sheer astonishment on Insula's face at being called out so abruptly, Rei went on.
"Come on, the rest of you—get your mock battle gear ready. ...Well? Aren't you going to prepare?"
Seeing Insula still standing there dumbfounded, Rei glanced toward the baskets of practice weapons lined up in the corner of the gymnasium.
That was apparently enough. The students judged that nothing they said would stop this from happening, and scrambled to arm themselves.
Once everyone had a weapon in hand, Rei gave Set a light pat on the body. The Gryphon was practically vibrating with happiness at getting to move freely for the first time in ages.
"Alright, the mock battle begins!"
"Guruuu!"
At Rei's signal, Set launched off the floor and charged straight toward the nearest cluster of armed students.
They had their weapons ready—yes. But seeing a two-and-a-half-meter Gryphon barreling directly at them at full speed was another matter entirely.
The sheer presence of the thing was overwhelming, to put it mildly.
Had it been Rei charging at them, they might have managed some kind of response; at least he was humanoid, like themselves.
But a Gryphon bearing down on them? There was no fighting the panic that surged up.
"U-Uwaaaaaaah!"
The first to crack was one of the vanguard fighters carrying a longsword. As a vanguard fighter, he was the one who had to meet Set's charge head-on—and the tension had simply become too much to bear.
He brought his practice longsword crashing down toward Set.
"Guruuu!"
Set kicked off the floor, dodging the strike with ease, and put some distance between itself and the man.
Under normal circumstances, a single swat from a forepaw would have knocked him cold. But Rei had instructed Set not to dispatch opponents too quickly, so it was sizing things up, holding back.
"We can do this! We can! It's not going all out—if we move now, we can make this work!"
Insula's shout rang out across the gym. The others seized on his words—seized on them, clung to them—and threw themselves at Set in a wave.
Longswords, spears, halberds, bows, and everything in between.
Every one of them hurled themselves at Set with desperate ferocity.
It was as if they were driven by the compulsion that giving Set even the sliver of an opening would mean instant, total defeat.
(They're not wrong about that, though.)
Watching Set casually pin a halberd's sideways sweep to the floor with a single forepaw, Rei muttered to himself.
As that exchange made abundantly clear, it was virtually impossible for students at this Officer Academy to inflict any meaningful damage on Set.
Even so, Rei had his reasons for pitting Set against them. Partly it was that he and Set had been spending less time together, and he wanted to give the creature some exercise and a chance to bond. But more than that, it was about the students: he wanted them to learn how to face a clearly superior enemy without falling apart.
That was precisely why Grink hadn't objected when Rei proposed using Set for the mock battles. He understood the reasoning, and had quietly accepted it.
"...It's cruel, isn't it."
At Grink's low murmur, Rei shook his head.
"I wouldn't say that. If anything, I was surprised they had the nerve to challenge Set at all. I fully expected at least a few to lose their nerve and try to run."
"If we're crediting anyone, it should be Hazusuru. ...The student who attacked Set first."
"Ah, the one near Insula. ...You're right. His reckless lunge broke the tension for everyone else. That much is fact."
The image of the student—charging at Set with reckless abandon—flashed through Rei's mind.
...Though at that very moment, said student was having his legs swept out from under him by Set's tail as he tried to raise his longsword.
A heartbeat later, a hind leg caught him square and sent him hurtling through the air.
Even pulling its punches, this was still Set—still a blow amplified by magic items.
Someone with genuine skill might have managed to deflect it. A run-of-the-mill student had no chance whatsoever.
The longsword-wielding student bounced across the gym floor two, three times before crashing into the cluster of evacuated students in the corner. He didn't get up.
Several others had already taken hits. Those still on their feet had dwindled to barely half.
"Guruu?"
Ready? Set rumbled.
Of course, the only person in this gym who could read the intent behind that sound was Rei.
Back in Gilm, Set was doted on by everyone; plenty of people there could get the general gist of what it was trying to say.
The two women whose devotion to Set put all others to shame went without saying.
"C-Come, then! A noble never turns his back on an enemy!"
Insula leveled his longsword at Set and shouted—but Set seemed to take that as its cue. It exploded off the floor, charging not at Insula, but past him. A forepaw strike to the bow-wielding woman behind him dropped her where she stood. A hind leg blow to the spearman beside her did the same. Then, with one flick of its tail, it sent Insula's longsword spinning from his grip.
Disarmed, Insula still tried to resist—tried to throw himself at the creature barehanded—but it was futile. One final strike from Set, and the world went dark.
And so... this brutally one-sided affair became an experience that every last remaining student would come to know firsthand.