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Inside the bustling practical training ground, I sat on top of the stone slab supported by two people and shouted loudly.

“One!”
“”Never again!””

“Two!”
“”We won’t be late!””

“One!”
“”Never again!””

“Two!”
“”We won’t be late!””

Arin and Kana were doing squats while holding the stone slab I was sitting on, barely bending and stretching their creaking legs.
It was a regrettable action for the two, but it was an unavoidable demonstrative punishment.

Of course, since I had lowered the punishment by their standards, the stone slab Arin and Kana were holding now was about 100kg. If you add my body weight to the stone slab, which was a removable tile from the floor, it was only about 150kg in total.

Although Kana was lacking compared to Arin, she still had the strength to easily lift at least 70kg, so this stone slab would at most be just a bit heavy.

In other words, it only looked heavy on the outside, and it wasn’t that difficult of a punishment.

“Never again!”
“We won’t be late!”

So, when they had done about 50 squats, I got down from the stone slab.

“Alright, that’s enough. I’ll let it slide today since it’s the first time, but there won’t be a next time. Understood!”
“Yes!!”
“Yesss!!”

Arin and Kana answered, straightening their bodies at my shout. I put the stone slab they had put down back in its original place, then turned my gaze slightly back to take in the students and glanced at the clock.

The time they arrived was 2:10, and we spent 10 minutes on the punishment just now. In other words, there was only 1 hour and 40 minutes left, so I had to start the class quickly.

I couldn’t become a salary thief who just takes money without doing any work.

“Now then, I’ll start the class, but… before we begin, let me show you what you should aim for when taking my class.”
“Aim?”
“What does that mean?”
“It doesn’t seem ordinary, at least…”

I had asked Dean Mira in advance yesterday to prepare this in the practical training ground, so I have to use it properly.

Muttering inwardly, I walked towards the storage attached to the practical training ground, leaving behind the students who had started murmuring again at my words.

And when I opened the storage door, inside were huge spherical stone boulders. Boulders prepared to match the number of students.

Although they looked about 3m in diameter, I casually rolled one out of the storage, and the expressions of the students who saw the boulder I rolled out started to harden.

“…Don’t tell me that?”
“No way…”
“It must be a joke, right?”

Most of the students were muttering to themselves as if they wanted to deny the reality before their eyes, but where are you trying to turn your eyes? Look at it straight on, you fools.

I smiled at the faces of the students who were on the verge of falling off a cliff and pushed their backs.

“Your immediate goal is to cut this stone. The aim is to cut it purely with technique, without using mana.”
“Um, excuse me…”
“What is it?”

A student cautiously raised their hand at my words. When I turned to look, the student who had raised their hand showed me their sword and said:

“If we strike such a stone with this sword, won’t the blade be damaged?”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ve prepared several thousand mass-produced swords. If you want, I can prepare tens of thousands more, so use those.”
“Se-several thousand?!”

At my words, the boy who had raised his hand opened his eyes wide, and the surrounding kids seemed relieved that they didn’t have to hit the stone with their own swords.

But at the same time, their eyes were full of concern, as if thinking how they could possibly cut this stone with a sword, and I tilted my head.

“You all seem to be misunderstanding something. I clearly said this stone is your immediate goal. In other words, this isn’t the only thing you’re aiming for in the end.”
“Eh?!”
“No way!”
“It’s almost impossible to just cut the stone, Professor!”

Students screamed and half-collapsed at my words. Did these guys really think they’d be satisfied with just cutting this?

I laughed at the students’ unbelievable thoughts, then drew a sword from my waist.

“This is something you should finish within a month if possible. Once you can cut this, the next is a rock twice this size, then a cliff, then a mountain, then the deep sea. I can’t believe you thought you’d graduate from my class with just this much.”

Swish───

After finishing my words, I swung the sword towards the stone without much effort, feeling as if I was cutting through cotton candy, then put the sword back in its scabbard.

Then, belatedly, with a rumble, the boulder crumbled into 10 pieces. The students watched the boulder I had sliced with their eyes almost popping out, and I nodded towards the dazed students and said:

“What are you doing? Go get your own stones and start immediately.”

At my chilling voice, the students finally snapped to their senses and started running to the storage.

There are enough swords, so swing them until you drop, you future slaves! Then I’ll correct everything from start to finish!

“Huff… hah…”

Calluses form blisters, and wrists ache from the impact. The once steady breath had long since become irregular, and the sweat flowing like a waterfall made the gym clothes uncomfortably damp.

Clang──

Already the twelfth sword’s teeth had completely fallen out and been discarded on the ground. However, despite swinging twelve swords consistently, Arin sighed at the boulder in front of her that only showed scratch marks.

She thought Professor Aria’s class would be difficult, but she never imagined it would be such a Spartan, hardcore class from the first day.

“I wonder if Kana and the others are similar…”

If there was any consolation, it was that Arin wasn’t the only one in this situation. Right next to her, Kana, and the other kids around, all had similar faces, unable to even scratch their boulders.

However, just as she was feeling relieved thinking others were no different, Arin drew her thirteenth sword and glared at the boulder in front of her.

“I can’t stay on the same level as others…”

It’s not particularly arrogance. It’s not looking down on others either. It’s just that for Arin, being on the same level as others meant she hadn’t put in more effort than them, so Arin gritted her teeth and gripped her sword.

Because Arin had reached her current state through innate talent and tongue-biting effort, the desire to take one step further than others was boiling inside her.

And with that desire suppressing the pain felt in her hands, Arin recalled the sword strike that Professor Aria had shown earlier.

‘The legs tense, the waist twists, the shoulders rotate, and all the way to the fingertips…’

Concentrate all the muscles of the body to one point. It’s like the very basics of martial arts.

Of course, Professor Aria had used only one hand to swing a ‘knife’, so it was different from Arin swinging a ‘sword’ with both hands, but the method was still the same.

No, it might even be easier for Arin if she does it the same way. She just needs to swing her raised arms, so there’s no need to adjust the direction of muscle power transmission.

Arin slowly moved her body, reflecting the professor’s form onto her own, one by one.

“Legs, waist, shoulders, and finally… arms!!”

Slowly tensing the muscles, then accelerating in an instant. The overworked muscles screamed, but Arin endured the pain by biting her teeth and swung the sword, and as a result.

Thud───!!!

“Kughk?!”

Arin lost her grip on the sword and fell backwards from the impact, incomparably stronger than anything before.

Fallen Arin looked at the sword that had flown and landed beside her, and realized the cause of her failure from the vibration still felt in her arm.

Because she had drawn out muscle power with much more concentration than usual, the resulting recoil was that much stronger, and Arin’s arms, which had been overstrained, couldn’t withstand that impact.

“Damn it…”

Was it too presumptuous to think she could imitate it after seeing it just once?

Arin blamed her own arrogance as she gripped the sword and stood up. It could only be called arrogant to try to perfectly imitate Professor Aria’s form, which showed an incredible amount of effort, after seeing it just once.
Professor Aria, who had done this as easily as breathing, must have put in an unimaginable amount of time and effort.

So, just as she was about to swing the sword again, determined to keep trying until she succeeded, someone grabbed Arin’s sword-holding hand.

“Your posture was perfect, but you lacked speed and confidence. Let me help you.”
“Pro-Professor?”

Looking at the owner of the hand, it was none other than Professor Aria with her light red hair flowing. Arin was surprised and tried to pull her hand away without thinking, but her hand, already caught in the professor’s grip, wouldn’t budge.

So instead of resisting, Arin muttered inwardly, recalling what she had just said.

That her posture was perfect, Professor Aria had said so.

Barely suppressing the corners of her mouth that were about to smile involuntarily, Arin entrusted herself to Professor Aria’s guiding hand.

“Now, lift it up firmly and look straight at the target. Think of it like the vaulting horse you might have done when you were young. The moment you hesitate even slightly, you won’t be able to cut that stone.”
“Yes!”
“Good answer. Then do exactly as you did just now.”
“Understood!”

Professor Aria finished speaking and let go of her hand. Arin took a deep breath, then firmly glared at the boulder and repeated the exact same posture she had done just before.

Twisting the muscles in order from the lower body to the upper body, and releasing it all at once at the fingertips. Arin swung the sword accurately without the slightest error, glaring at the boulder until the last moment, and at that instant, Professor Aria’s hand pushed her back.

“Whoa?!”

Of course, Arin half-collapsed as her balance was disrupted by the sudden intervention of a third party’s force.

Swish──

Arin was about to shout asking what she was doing, pushing her suddenly, but at the sensation felt at her fingertips, different from pain, and a sound different from before, Arin opened her eyes wide and looked at the boulder in front of her.
It was definitely a boulder covered in scratch marks just a few seconds ago. It had been like a wall of lamentations that she couldn’t cut at all.
However.

“I-I cut it?”

What Arin saw there was the boulder split exactly in half, fallen to both sides.

An unbelievable sight. Arin fumbled with her sword, trying to revive the sensation from just a moment ago that seemed like it would disappear any second, and behind her, Professor Aria grinned and said:

“The first person to pass on the first day. Congratulations, Arin.”

Such a joyful single sentence.