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My name is Friere Iazick. The second daughter of the Iazick family, I made a name for myself as a young B-rank hunter. I am now widely renowned, but when I first announced my intent to be a hunter, my parents were vehemently against it. It was because, while I do have talent for it based on my Job, they could not approve of me taking a path where I might die at any time.

Furthermore, since the Iazick family is similar to a noble house in other countries, and I have another noble lady as my disciple (the details of which I shall omit), they might be concerned that I would cause trouble. Perhaps, they also see value in me as a child of nobility. However, due to the fact that I have an outstanding elder sister who is also a noble, and a capable younger brother, they eventually permitted it.

The reason why I wanted to be a hunter is simple, it is because I imagined it to be the fastest way for a woman to gain a decently high standing. When speaking of the hunters, while they might be a gathering of low-class non-permanent workers, their large organization holds influence in many nations.

In particular, upon reaching A-rank, I would obtain more influence than the Iazick family itself. I simply didn’t want to live and die as just another daughter of nobility, that’s all.

Had my Job not been “Advanced Flame Sorcerer,” I may not have pursued this goal. Nevertheless, due to this, I’ve become a B-rank hunter even at a young age, which the Iazick family seemed to appreciate. Earning the fitting moniker of the “Scorching Hot Princess,” it may seem like my life as a hunter is going well. However, there is one thing that I cannot tolerate, and that is the presence of Carol, the “Ice Witch.”

We became hunters at roughly the same time and we rival each other in rank, but I have yet to win against Ice to this very day. She’s always one step ahead. She was the one who reached B-rank first and now, she’s even reached A-rank. It should’ve taken at least 5 more years, 10-20 years for normal cases, but she just left me in the dust.

Ice’s passion towards sorcery is praiseworthy. I personally can’t study sorcery to the same extent. Generally speaking, I’m not good with meticulous tasks, you see.

Though, in exchange, I’ve put great effort in practical training and experience… Moreover, lately it seems as though my apprentice Viviana may be about to reach my level.

With the sudden growth of my contemporaries, as one would expect, I’m feeling a bit pressured. By all rights, I’ve achieved enough already so feeling pressured is rather unnecessary, but this is this and that is that.

I cannot accept being left behind by Ice more than I already have.

Then, as this was happening, I heard from Viviana about a certain hunter that has risen through the ranks at the fastest pace ever. Just as this made me reflect on how there’s always someone better, I also had a hunch that this hunter might have played a role in the growth of my peers.

◇

And now, I found this person in question. With white hair and a delicate figure. I pay considerable attention to my beauty, but her skin is much fairer than mine. While there is an age gap between us, even if I were as young as her, hers would still be far fairer than mine. Now the barrier shielding this girl, who seems rather uncharacteristic of a hunter, is not nearly as charming as the girl herself.

A dome shaped barrier is enveloping her threefold. The outermost layer appears to have the defensive capacity to block attacks from C-rank monsters. Beyond that, it’s difficult to tell, but the closer to her the layer is, the more robust it seems.

If that’s the case, then how strong would the innermost layer be?

Moreover, this barrier is so pristine. Her magic power flows uniformly without any inconsistency. To break through that barrier, the only way would be to purely overpower it. After all, even that Ice can’t make a barrier as pristine, so the fact that she can do such a thing is telling of her skill.

At the very least, she isn’t someone a small fry like the one presently barking at her can handle. Perhaps this would serve him the good lesson to never judge by mere appearances. Although, there’s no telling how much of that lesson will cost him.

Nevertheless, now that I’ve been shown a barrier such as that, I can’t just sit quietly myself. Still, if I challenged someone to a fight just to satisfy my curiosity, both the Hunter Guild and the Iazick family would be livid. There, I came upon a brilliant idea.

And to enact it, it would be best to first be her acquaintance. I should be able to converse without arousing her caution.

For that, sorry small fry, I’ll be dealing with her in your stead. Find someone else to teach you a lesson, alright?

「She isn’t someone the likes of you can simply lay a hand on. If you prefer not to die, pull back that hand of yours.」

Just from those words, he ran off. Being a hunter, I would’ve preferred if he showed a bit of a backbone, but if he knows of me, then it’s understandable. After all, it seems like people normally prefer not to stir up trouble with high-ranked hunters. I just crush everyone and everything in my path though.

「I was fine.」

As the man was gone, I heard a brusque reply from the girl. Rather than her bearing something against me, it feels more like she has no interest in people.

「I know full well that it wasn’t a problem for you. Looking at your barrier, it’s easy to guess that you’re a B-rank hunter. So you’re the record breaker for the youngest to reach B-rank Viviana was talking about?」

Confirmation is important. Once in the past, I learned this the hard way. I faintly recall it being how Ice and I met, but just remembering it annoys me. No, this now’s not the time for that. Thinking about that woman is wasting my time.

「You’re, Viviana’s acquaintance?」
「Ah! I haven’t introduced myself yet, haven’t I? I am Friere Iazick. A B-rank hunter called by others as the Scorching Hot Princess. My relationship with Viviana, correct? I am her mentor!」

Having your name remembered is highly important. Whether you’re a hunter or a noble, this doesn’t change. Perhaps because I named myself, the girl before me spoke somewhat miffed.

「I’m Cielmer.」
「Cielmer, is it? I no longer care about the small fry from earlier, can I ask you of a request?」
「What?」
「Could you have a mock battle with me?」

If picking fights with people isn’t good, then why not just make it a request? Since I’ll be paying for it and there’s mutual consent, I’m sure that it won’t be an issue. I’ve made it so that it’s somewhat harder to refuse, but this should be acceptable still. Just as it seemed to me that Cielmer was silently staring at empty space, 「The conditions?」 she curtly replied.

「Thank you for accepting. First of all, the reward. How about 50 gold coins, regardless of the outcome?」
「For a B-rank request, too much.」
「True. But I consider the experience to be worth this price.」

To begin with, the opportunities to have a mock battle with hunters B-rank and above is quite rare. If I can buy such an opportunity with money, then I won’t hesitate. After all, this is an uncommon chance to grow stronger. Moreover, this time it’s with an individual that urged Viviana’s growth… or at least that’s what I assume. Hesitating here will only be to my loss.

「The battle rules will be that of the usual hunter rules. No killing allowed and try to keep large injuries to the minimum. The opponent’s surrender or incapacity to continue and/or the landing of a solid blow will determine the victor. How about that?」
「Understood. The witness?」
「Celia, I’d like to ask this of you.」

Being an acquaintance and well-experienced, Celia should be a perfect witness. As I nominated her with this in mind, 「I’ll do it.」 I heard that annoying voice from behind me.

Why did you come to this place? To sell me a fight? That ticks me off, so I’m absolutely not taking it.

「What are you here for, Ice?」
「I have business with that girl. Been a while, hasn’t it? Cielmer.」
「Carol, long time.」

As I thought, these two appear to be acquaintances. Moreover, they seem rather friendly with each other. While this proves my guess that this girl, Cielmer, is related to my peers’ rapid growth, Ice’s presence is irking.

「I’ll have a long, thorough conversation with you later. For now, it’d be refreshing if you beat up the red one there for me.」
「Are you selling me a fight? I’m not buying it.」
「Yeah, yeah. You’re fighting with that girl, right? It’s a great opportunity, so go ahead and suffer a complete utter loss.」
「Since you’re saying that much, then I’ll show you a decisive victory. Don’t come crying later!」

She really is such an annoying woman. I’ll absolutely make you apologize later.

「That being the case, if you want to blame anyone, blame it on Ice over there.」

Right, right. I’m sorry about this, but I can no longer hold myself back. Though, I didn’t plan to do so from the start.

◇

We move to the place where we are to battle. There should be space at the Hunter Guild to conduct mock battles but, for some reason, we exited town. The location Cielmer guided us to was a wide grassland a distance away from town. Perhaps this is because, unlike in town, here we can fight with all our strength.

I’m rather glad I don’t need to limit myself.

Cielmer and I stand facing each other, while Ice is watching us from a fair distance away. While I’m still not happy about Ice being our witness, in the sense that she probably won’t die even if she gets hit by stray spells, she might not be a bad choice.

「Are you ready?」
「Anytime.」

Cielmer replied so, but she’s only looking at me without making a move. Does she mean to hand me the first move? Or is she perhaps aiming for a counter?

Either way, she’s expecting me to simply test the waters, isn’t she? However, I’m not holding anything back today. It’ll take me some time, but since I’m given the opportunity to attack first, allow me to muster my all. This is a sorcery special amongst the sorceries I use, the only one amongst the sorceries I’ve created that was bestowed a spell name.

Burning red fire hotter and hotter, reaching the pale blue world.

At a slightly higher elevation than my shoulders, a total of four pale blue flame clusters levitate. This is an advanced flame spell that takes several seconds to prepare even with chant omission and I rarely make use of it. After all, in most cases those several seconds can be the difference of victory or defeat.

Even so, its power leaves nothing to be desired. I’m sure that this area will end up a burning wasteland, but I’ll leave the fire fighting to Ice.

Even as I finished, Cielmer stared at me without any change in expression. I’ll have that seemingly complacent look of hers warp in an instant. And perhaps even have Ice whimper in surprise.

「Feel free to dodge as you like.」
「……」
「Nothing to say, is it? Fine then. Take this. “Blanse Fregerium”¹.」

Invoking its name, the sphere of flame flew and surrounded Cielmer. Cielmer showed no signs of evasive action, she simply stared at the flame. Does she merely see it as some ordinary flame? Then that would be a let down.

Contrary to its appearance, this blue hellfire houses a vast amount of magic power. No, it’s precisely because such a vast amount is encapsulated in such size made this capable of burning wyverns and wyrms whole. This flame has such heat that any superficial resistance is meaningless against it.

The flames connect to Ciemler’s barrier and burn through it.

And in an instant, the flame spread. What was once grassland is now a sea of flames. These flames do not inflict damage on me, so I don’t have to worry about myself but seeing Ice completely able to protect herself ticks me off. Couldn’t you at least have light burns?

And now looking at my opponent, her barrier is still burning. Which layer is it now? Whichever it is, there’s nothing that the blue hellfire can’t burn away.

That was what I expected. But, at the next instant…

I felt a chilly breeze.

The vestiges of blue hellfire, the ever spreading flames, were overtaken by a field of ice.

And in the middle of that frozen space, at its source… Cielmer was just looking at me, as if nothing had happened.

Author’s Note: Since the battle scene might be more interesting from the opponent’s POV, I tried doing it that way.
And as a result, it took a while to reach the said battle scene in question.
Translator’s Note: And right you were, seeing the near invulnerability of AinCiel from the attacker’s POV is all the more terrifying.

Hiya~! Allow me to apologise again for the delay. Continuing on, it’s a nice change of mood to have another POV chapter and this time, it’s not an interlude, which is quite rare for POV chapters now that I think of it. Actually, if I hadn’t had so much delays, it’s much more easier to see how many POV chapters there are in this arc, just a lot.

This chapter, we’re introduced to Friere Iazick in more detail. I honestly like how she’s basically somewhat of a musclehead-type character. First of all, the fact that she ran away to be a hunter basically because being a daughter of a noble is such a chore and boring, while still retaining an air of bombast that characterizes the usual Noble Villainess-type (I’d know from Commoner Villainess, lol). She’s pretty prideful, considering how she sees her rivalry with Carol and her reaction to her peers growing faster than her, but from her offhand comment of how not to underestimate people, she’s not so stubborn that it’ll get in the way of her learning, in actuality, she is into the learn what you can from anyone thing, it seems. Also, the way she thought “Sorry bud, find some other guy to beat you senseless” was hilarious, lol.

All in all, I just like the proud (maybe even prideful) but not arrogant noble type, and moreover it seems like her main mindset is “hit it until it breaks” instead of the usual scholarly mage one … I honestly love straightforward characters like her. Anyhow, to the battle. She used her strongest attack (Which actually read as “pale blue” flame in one instance, so maybe it’s whitish-blue or bluish-white) and it burned through Ain’s barriers… but there’s more to our duo than just barriers, and it immediately painted the landscape with the chill of ice. Now, the stage is ready, and the performers are, in my opinion, quite warmed up.

Now then, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please feel free to comment. Stay clean, stay safe, and have a nice day~!

1. Blue Hellfire