At first, the Bronze Golem Senior thought it might be a joke.

But the junior’s eyes were completely serious. Pressured by that gaze, the Bronze Golem Senior answered as best as possible.

“Ah... I think that would be quite difficult. It’s hard to predict divination mages more skilled than yourself.”

Divination magic was fundamentally created to peer into an uncertain future, so its foundation was fragile and unstable by nature.

Even predicting a relatively smooth future required meticulous preparation. Then what about a future involving several divination mages, each of them an unpredictable variable?

From that point onward, the burden placed on the caster increased dramatically.

And that was without even mentioning the difficulty of predicting a divination mage more skilled than oneself.

Ugh.

Lee Han trembled in frustration.

“...The more magic I learn, the more horrified I am by how imperfect the discipline is.”

“Good words.”

The insane duplicate, passing by, praised him with satisfaction.

Lately, he had been rather pleased to see his disciple stop paying attention to pointless nonsense and devote himself to magic.

Perhaps the boy had finally come to his senses.

I want to hit him.

While Lee Han stared irreverently at the back of his master’s head, the Bronze Golem Senior hurriedly called him over.

“Junior. Come here. I’ll teach you with the passion of a newborn star’s flames.”

“...You don’t have to take that seriously. Please just forget it.”

But the Bronze Golem Senior had already made up his mind.

From the Bronze Golem Senior’s perspective, there wasn’t much difference between the Skull Principal and the Skull Principal’s insane duplicate.

Both were archmages, both were eccentric, and both seemed likely to cause trouble if their words weren’t followed.

If ordered to teach enthusiastically, then enthusiastically it would be.

“Wandering stars are naturally harder to observe than ordinary stars.”

“I figured.”

Lee Han answered in a voice full of resignation.

If they had been easier to observe than ordinary stars, there was no way the insane duplicate would have assigned this task.

“But they can also divine destructive and irregular futures. Many of the divination mages who left their names in history were skilled in astrology using wandering stars. At times, they were able to foresee futures other mages could not.”

Lee Han wanted to ask how many of those mages had contracted with the wandering star Arna, but he held back.

He had a feeling the answer would only make him sad.

“If you learn to read signs of the future from the movements of wandering stars, you’ll be able to avoid all sorts of misfortunes later on.”

“Misfortunes like Master approaching me?”

“As I said, it’s hard to predict divination mages more skilled than yourself.”

The senior was coldly realistic, just like a golem. No impossible thing would be carelessly described as possible.

“Now. Hurry and take the observation artifact, then search for traces of a wandering star. Otherwise, who knows what the Principal might do?”

Excellent divination mages did not rely on magic. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Without using a single divination spell, the Bronze Golem Senior predicted the future.

Of course, that prediction was not especially helpful to Lee Han.

I miss Senior Diret...

To think a senior would bow to authority and sell out a junior.

Then again, Senior Diret was the unusual one. The Bronze Golem Senior wasn’t exactly bad.

How could any Einroguard student defy an order from the Skull Principal’s insane duplicate? Even Lee Han obeyed when ordered.

Lee Han stopped grumbling and picked up the elongated telescope-like artifact, the .

Thanks to the Serpent King, he at least knew how to use it.

The thought that the serpent bastard might later take credit for this irritated him.

Is that it?

As Lee Han manipulated the artifact, he discovered a star moving with a long tail.

Its movement and appearance were clearly different from the surrounding stars.

However, even after he found the star, the future did not immediately appear. Lee Han did not rush and observed it slowly.

Hm... I think I can see something.

The comet’s movement twisted, as if creating an illusion. Lee Han blinked and realized the comet itself had not changed at all.

Only his own vision had changed.

He had definitely just discovered a fragment of divination.

...Was it always like this? It isn’t as difficult as I expected.

Contracting with stars had been far harder than this.

Back then, he had needed to search among countless stars to find one willing to form a contract with him.

And even after Lee Han had found the wandering star Arna through great hardship, that had not been the end.

He had still needed to endure that burning power until the contract with Arna was fully established.

It was fortunate his mana had been able to withstand it. Otherwise, Lee Han might have burned up with it.

Compared to that, using astrology to divine the future through the movement of stars was far easier.

All he had to do was find a star, observe its movement, and wait until a vision foretelling the future appeared.

I should look again.

—&@$^(!*!&!

—$@%%$&#!

?

Noise came from somewhere far away.

Since such noise had no place in this quiet sea filled only with stars and darkness, it had to be coming from the lecture hall.

Lee Han broke his concentration, turned off the artifact, and looked around.

“What happened?”

Whoooosh!

“Aaaaaah! It’s a rebound! A rebound!”

“That’s why I told you not to stare too long at hot stars!”

“...”

One of the seniors was on fire because of a star’s curse.

Astrology was fundamentally a branch of magic with strong rebounds, and borrowing the power of stars did not remove that danger entirely.

If one became careless, severe consequences like this could occur.

The Bronze Golem Senior extinguished the junior’s flames and said,

“This is why I told you to stay transformed as a flame agwi this month.”

“B-But that’s too ugly...”

“Oh dear. Junior, was it too noisy?”

The Bronze Golem Senior noticed Lee Han’s gaze and asked. Lee Han shook his head.

“I was just wondering what happened.”

“You didn’t miss any traces because of this, did you?”

“No, that’s not it.”

Still hasn’t found any, then.

The Bronze Golem Senior assumed from Lee Han’s answer that the junior had not found traces yet.

That was not strange.

Wandering stars were among the most difficult stars to find, and finding one compatible with one’s own spirituality was even harder.

The senior never imagined Lee Han had already contracted with the most powerful wandering star.

Unfortunately, when Lee Han had come with the professors to report the matter last time, the Bronze Golem Senior had fled outside the workshop.

At the time, Professor Paserlet had been furious because of ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) Professor Verdus, so there had been no helping it.

In reality, Lee Han had already passed the stage of tracking traces and had begun seeing visions from the star’s movement.

As the insane duplicate had said, this was possible because wandering stars loved him.

“Ah. Senior. What happens if you’re seeing the future after finding a star, but you get interrupted halfway through?”

The Bronze Golem Senior stared blankly at Lee Han.

Predicting the future through the movement of stars was still a form of astrology. So what happened if astrology was interrupted midway?

If the caster was lucky, it would end with simply failing to see the result. If unlucky, the caster would suffer a rebound.

“To ask a question like that... You’re a third-year—no, you’re not a third-year. Sorry.”

“Too much chatter.”

“Sorry. Everyone, return to your positions!”

The Bronze Golem Senior, who had been about to explain, quickly sent the underclassmen back to their places at the insane duplicate’s words.

Lee Han tilted his head.

I suppose it isn’t serious.

When he had stopped earlier, there had definitely been no problem. Lee Han picked up the artifact again and searched for the comet he had seen before.

As he focused, the familiar vision slowly began to bloom.

—&$$$*^!

—$&#$@%%!

Ah. What now?

At the noise from the lecture hall, Lee Han stopped concentrating again.

Beyond simple curiosity, he had started wondering what kinds of rebounds mages experienced while observing stars.

If he knew them in advance, wouldn’t it be possible to prepare?

As Lee Han turned off the artifact and stood up, the distant comet flickered faintly.

It was surely just a coincidence, but somehow that flicker seemed to carry displeasure.

***

“...Did you find any traces?”

As the lecture approached its end, the Bronze Golem Senior lifted up a collapsed student—one who had unfortunately seen a future of failing to graduate—and approached Lee Han.

“Yes.”

“Excellent! ...Wait. What’s wrong? Did something happen?”

The Bronze Golem Senior realized Lee Han’s expression was unusually serious.

He was staring intently at a set of scribbles drawn on a piece of paper.

“What are these scribbles? Surely they aren’t drawings of... star traces?”

“I simply drew the future I saw.”

“...”

The senior stared at the scribbles, trying to understand the picture. Lee Han offered an excuse.

“I drew it roughly. If you give me time, I can make it much clearer.”

“Let’s handle it with magic... Draw what you wish to show!”

After sprinkling black powder and chanting an incantation, the powder spread across the white paper and formed an image.

The contents of that image were truly shocking.

In the picture, the Skull Principal in human form was facing Lee Han.

“...”

The Bronze Golem Senior was so shocked that the fact Lee Han had not merely found traces of a wandering star but had already glimpsed the future slipped by entirely.

Normally, this should have been astonishing in itself, but the picture before them was several times more shocking.

What in the world was this?

“Is... is that really the Principal, or is it a projection?”

“Does that matter?”

“Of course it matters... Hm. No. Perhaps it doesn’t.”

The Bronze Golem Senior understood what Lee Han meant.

Indeed, if one glimpsed a future of death, what mattered was why one died, not whether the killing blade came from the mountains of the western Empire or the mountains of the eastern region.

“I tried looking at the star again to divine the future once more, but it wouldn’t show me anything else.”

“Star divination reveals the future when the star wishes to show it, not when the mage wishes to see it. It belongs to the more passive side of divination... Wait. You found a star and saw the future?!”

“Senior. Is that what matters right now?”

“That... that’s true.”

The Bronze Golem Senior felt wronged, but could not argue.

Honestly, what could possibly matter in front of a picture like this? Even if an earthquake struck the workshop, the senior might have ignored it.

“Senior. Please help me.”

“H-How could I...? If I faced the Principal, I’d be turned into a bronze ingot with one finger.”

“...I’m not asking you to fight in my place. I’m asking for advice on how to change the future, like last time.”

Lee Han was serious.

In truth, he was not as shocked as the Bronze Golem Senior.

That picture, surprisingly, had several possible interpretations.

For instance, the insane duplicate might explode in anger because Lee Han kept focusing on useless Einroguard exams instead of magic, then attack him until he learned properly.

Since similar things had happened several times before, the degree of shock each of them felt was inevitably different.

Of course, from the Bronze Golem Senior’s perspective, that was also horrifying.

To remain sane after seeing a future like this... Is this what a genius is like?

If it had been the senior, the Bronze Golem Senior would already have run out screaming, “The end is coooooming!”

Yet this junior stayed so composed after seeing such a future.

Perhaps taking every school of magic had already driven Lee Han mad. The Bronze Golem Senior nodded with firm resolve.

“Right. You’re correct! There’s no point trembling in fear.”

“This time, I’ll definitely be careful. Even if you tell me to avoid the Imperial Family...”

Lee Han was sincerely prepared to swing his staff every time a member of the Imperial Family came near him this time.

“No. That won’t work like last time.”

“What? Why not?”

“This future was predicted much more clearly and strongly than the last one. Changing something like this with a few restrictions involving gold won’t be easy.”

Seeing Lee Han’s face darken, the Bronze Golem Senior quickly continued.

“But that doesn’t mean there’s no method. A true divination mage relies not on magic, but on wisdom. The answer lies in the future you saw, Junior.”

“!”

“Now. Look here.”

The Bronze Golem Senior pointed to the upper-right corner of the picture.

A strange starlight was shining down over Lee Han’s head.

“A symbol like this can be interpreted in two ways. Either you formed a contract with a star in order to face the Principal, or you fell into a star’s trap. It can’t possibly be the former, so it must be the latter. That means you should be careful not to fall into a star’s trap in the future...”

“...That’s the star I contracted with.”