The high-tier spell: [High Accelerator].
Taught to him directly by Dieble, this technique was a sublimation of [Physical Enhancement] and [Accelerator], combining them into a single, refined composite form.
The speed it granted was far superior to—and much more efficient than—activating the two component spells in parallel.
As a high-tier spell, mastery was a daunting task. Its mana consumption was staggering, easily exceeding ten times that of [Physical Enhancement] or [Accelerator] alone. Even Dieble, the man who had taught Rest the spell, could only sustain its activation for a few fleeting seconds.
"That's impossible! No one can maintain that level of acceleration!" Nick’s voice echoed behind him as Rest tore away, propelled by [High Accelerator].
The straight-line distance from their current position to the Marquis Rosemary mansion was roughly fifty kilometers. If Rest burned through his resources this aggressively right at the start, his mana was bound to run dry long before the finish line.
(Wasted concern, really.)
Rest's mana, however, was infinite. With an inexhaustible reservoir at his disposal, sustaining the spell was child's play. It was a feat of pure magical brute force that only he could achieve—and he had no intention of holding back. He intended to demonstrate the sheer difference in their calibers.
(As if I’d slack off in a challenge meant to prove my worth to Viola and Primula. I’ll win this with everything I’ve got—with my heart and soul...!)
Losing wouldn't technically dissolve his engagement, but the mere thought of the other mages whispering that he was "unworthy after all" rankled him. A mere victory wouldn't suffice; he needed a complete, overwhelming triumph.
(Still... even I find the sheer velocity of [High Accelerator] hard to steer. It’s pretty much unusable unless I’m moving in a straight line.)
"Damn it... I won't lose!"
"He can't keep that up forever!"
"We'll close the gap once he bottoms out!"
Nick and the other young mages desperately tried to keep pace, but the gap only continued to widen—until a massive obstacle loomed ahead.
"Is that... a forest?"
A dense woods appeared directly in his path. Cutting straight through would shave a massive distance off his trip, but the thick foliage and trees would likely slow him down and cost him more time in the end.
"[High Accelerator]... Deactivate."
The distorted sense of time compressed by the magic snapped back to normal. As he decelerated, the distance between him and his pursuers briefly narrowed, but only for a heartbeat.
"[Fly Drive]!"
"What in the...!"
A chorus of gasps erupted from the mages in his wake. Kicking off the ground with a thunderous leap, Rest used the air itself as a platform, vaulting high over the canopy of the forest.
He was utilizing the high-tier spell [Fly Drive], a technique that conjured invisible footholds in mid-air, allowing the caster to literally run across the sky.
While flight is often the first thing people imagine when they think of fantasy magic, it was, in reality, a peak-difficulty discipline. Nullifying gravity, levitating objects, riding the wind, or manifesting aerial platforms as Rest was doing—all were technically feasible. However, almost no one could truly master the art of flying through the sky with total, uninhibited freedom. In this world, even for a mage, the heavens remained out of reach.
([Fly Drive] eats even more mana than [High Accelerator]. You have to compress the air until it’s solid, fix it in space, and maintain it long enough to support a person's full weight.)
To be blunt, the efficiency was so abysmal that almost no one bothered to use it. Dieble had admitted that while he knew the theory, he had virtually never put it into practice. Regardless, he had passed the knowledge on to Rest, suspecting his student might be the only one capable of utilizing it.
(Even a Court Mage would reach their limit after making two or three steps. But with my infinite mana, I can generate these footholds indefinitely. I can literally keep on flying!)
He felt like a character in a video game, traversing a level by hopping across floating blocks. A fall would be catastrophic, but since he could just manifest a new platform if he slipped, the experience lacked any real sense of danger.
"Alright, this should be good enough."
Once he cleared the forest, Rest descended back onto the main road. From here, the path led straight to the mansion in the Marquis Rosemary Territory. His pursuers were nowhere to be seen, and even their shouts had long since faded into the distance. He couldn't say for sure how many kilometers he had put between them, but there was no way they were catching up now.
(Still, I won't get overconfident. I’m not about to take a nap like the rabbit in the fable.)
"[High Accelerator]!"
Complacency had no place in Rest's heart. Aiming to leave his pursuers in the dust once and for all, he vanished down the paved road, a streak of motion far too fast for the naked eye to follow.