I Became a Genius Mechanic at the Academy

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“Start the acquisition!”

At that moment, the announcer signaled the start of the match.

The soldier and Enya simultaneously leaped into the water.

The soldier grinned and focused on Enya’s chest.

‘Should I hit her in the solar plexus first?’

Although it was a behavior worthy of condemnation, the best way to humiliate a female knight was through sexual harassment.

It was about striking a specific area to induce shame.

This was, after all, proof that he had the upper hand, enough to toy with her while engaging in such harassment.

‘Feel the fear of drowning in shame!’

Thus, the Clendor soldier immediately executed his thought.

Using the ‘Underwater Stance’ employed in underwater combat, he charged at Enya and jabbed her with a thrust to her solar plexus.

-Wwhoosh!

However, Enya effortlessly dodged his thrust.

The soldier’s eyes widened in shock.

-Swish!

Then, with fluid grace, she drew her sword and aimed for the soldier’s waist.

The flustered soldier hurriedly tried to evade, but ultimately allowed the attack to land.

The edge of his waist was lightly cut.

“Guh!”

In a situation where he had allowed an unexpected attack.

The soldier decided to create some distance.

After widening the gap using the underwater stance, he thought to heal his waist with a healing spell…

-Whew!

But.

An unbelievable sight unfolded before the soldier’s eyes.

Enya swiftly matched his ‘Underwater Stance’ and quickly closed the distance.

‘Wha, what!’

Then she began to unleash a flurry of slashes.

The Clendor soldier could avoid most of the continuous cuts with Clendor’s unique underwater stance, yet he still allowed one attack.

His thigh was cut.

“……”

And the academy students watched in bewilderment.

Having been unable to effectively move in the water from Top.20 to Top.16 and losing, Enya was swimming through the water as freely as a mermaid.

Why was Enya not constrained by underwater combat?

‘…I forgot Enya is a genius.’

That’s precisely because Enya was a genius.

The reason Enya could be a prodigy in swordsmanship was due to her innate ‘analytical ability’ and ‘implementation ability’ that allowed her to grasp things with just a single movement.

In other words, Enya possessed a ridiculous talent that allowed her to copy even the tiniest muscle movements.

She didn’t even need to activate her clairvoyance to see the flow of mana; just the opponent’s movements would allow her to stretch her imagination and think, ‘This would work.’

‘Right. That’s the Enya we know.’

Moreover, Enya was not using sword techniques in underwater combat.

She was applying her original talent, executing fluid sword combinations to pressure her opponent.

For this occasion, she had set aside her insistence on sword techniques and focused more on ‘learning’.

Of course, the Clendor soldier was also dodging Enya’s attacks with a more advanced underwater stance, but astonishingly, Enya’s underwater stance was also evolving.

It was a matter of time before she caught up.

‘Damn it! Since it has come to this!’

Thus, the Clendor soldier pulled out his trump card.

He used a wave spell to create ‘water currents’.

-Whoosh!

A giant torrent of water surged at Enya, causing her to be swept away.

The soldier didn’t stop there; he approached Enya and kicked at her.

With a dull thud, Enya was flung far away.

Seizing momentum, the Clendor soldier generated several more water currents, tossing Enya around.

Being swept by six torrents, Enya merely spun around, getting tossed with the currents.

‘Soon, she should faint. From then on, I’ll have my fun with you.’

The Clendor underwater tactic was to disorient the opponent with water currents until they fainted.

The soldier grinned as he waited for her to lose consciousness.

Having tortured him, he intended to deliver an even more humiliating defeat to make up for it.

“Is this how it’s done?”

But at that moment.

As Enya swung her sword, the soldier’s torrents were nullified.

Enya, already familiar with sword techniques utilizing waves, countered the currents using the same techniques.

-Whoosh!

Then, she began to mimic exactly what the Clendor soldier had just done.

After nullifying the currents surrounding her, she sent waves back at the soldier.

‘No way!!’

The Clendor soldier, who had trained for four years to master water combat, found himself completely outmatched.

But Enya had copied it in just three minutes.

She had mastered the intermediate course of water combat with a single experience.

“Guhhhh…”

As a result, against everyone’s expectations, Enya emerged victorious.

She finished off the Clendor soldier, who had fainted from her waves, with sword techniques.

Of course, since she struck with the flat of the blade, his body was spared from being cleaved in two.

““Waaahhhhh!!!””

As Enya claimed victory, the academy students cheered.

Many students who admired her called for Enya to abandon sword techniques, recalling her past.

Some even revealed their hidden fan hearts shouting, “Enya without sword techniques is the strongest!”

“Damn it! How did this happen? Didn’t they say Princess Cruel would win easily!?”

Meanwhile, Leon was furious at Enya’s victory.

He had planned to capture the dismal defeat of his nemesis, a child of the Cruel family, but that plan had gone awry.

“I’m s-sorry… But surely… Princess Cruel was on a continuous decline…”

“Shut up! Before I tear your mouth apart.”

“……”

Leon slammed his hand down on the table, heaving ragged breaths.

He felt sickened by the failure to deliver what could have been the highlight of the academy’s underwater battles against the Cruel family.

“Absolutely. We will win. From now on, only send out soldiers of upper underwater combat level.”

“Yes!”

With that, a venomous Leon ordered the output of only top-tier soldiers.

As a result, they all suffered disastrous defeats, from Top.14 to Top.13, Top.12, and Top.11, and the losing streak continued into the next day.

Only Charlotte, who was in Top.8, made a noteworthy resistance.

Wearing a mask created by Edgar, she transformed into the ‘Witch of the Dark Forest’ and claimed a certain area of the pool as her domain.

“It’s useless!”

However, her opponent was a top-tier soldier in underwater combat.

A seasoned veteran who had dealt with countless sea monsters since childhood.

Charlotte, having just awakened as the Witch of the Dark Forest and still in the early stages of learning, couldn’t handle a veteran in underwater combat.

She fought bravely but ultimately was defeated.

“…Damn.”

The same fate awaited Claire, who was in Top.7.

She belonged to the Bernhardt family, specializing in buffs from the start.

There was no way she’d excel in this kind of one-on-one combat.

And then, as they faced Top.6, after suffering consecutive defeats from Top.14 to Top.6, it was now the last day of the competition.

“We’re down to the final five. Crush them!”

Leon Clendor deployed his finest elite soldiers.

Although an unexpected event had prematurely caused Princess Cruel to lose, he could make up for his mistake by trampling all those ranked from Top.5 to Top.1, the pride of the Empire.

He would simply edit out and skip the scene of Princess Cruel’s defeat.

***

“At last, Clendor seems dead serious.”

Meanwhile, at the same time, Ed had just heard the news about Clendor from Adela.

And the report that all students besides Enya had lost was enough to ignite a fire in Ed’s heart.

When he had heard the details, he could vaguely picture the petty methods Clendor might have employed.

‘That bastard Leon Clendor.’

Leon Clendor was always one of the main villains who had fallen to the Demon Church, leading the entire Clendor Kingdom into a den of demons.

Of course, his outcome could change depending on events, but nine times out of ten, he ended up as the villain.

Ed had no good feelings towards Leon Clendor.

“…I’ll just delay departure by three hours.”

Thus, Ed decided to postpone their departure.

He needed to prepare perfectly for underwater combat.

However, the preparation he had in mind was less about “being ready to fight the enemy” and more about “being ready to crush the enemy.”

Having seen his peers suffer terribly, he needed to repay them with a solid counterattack.

“Heh heh. Let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll join you at the academy.”

And as Ed’s angry expression revealed his thoughts, Adela, brimming with anticipation, spoke to him.

Then, Ed nodded and returned to his container box.

Fix, sitting in the top seat as a steward, tilted his head, looking at his master.

Then Ed said.

“Fix, we have something to take care of together. I need to do some adjustments on the suit.”

“Wooow~?”

“You know that version I was working on the other time, the ‘Leviathan’ version?”

“Wooow!!”

“Let’s do that now. The time to use it has come.”