Chapter 15

Chapter 15: The First Lecture (1)

"That...... goddamn bastard."

Song Seokhwan lay on an infirmary bed. After being humiliated by Cha Eunwoo, he'd lost consciousness on the spot.

It was unforgivable. A professor? Nothing but a Theory-type professor with no field experience.

Those kinds were just desk-warming dregs who'd gotten mediocre marks in field exercises at the academy, graduated, and planted themselves behind desks. Awakened who dodged the battlefield─gutless cowards.

That was why Song Seokhwan refused to acknowledge professors who weren't former Heroes. And yet, before Cha Eunwoo, he'd been powerless.

"Damn it!"

He slammed the bed sheets in fury. Should he file a complaint with the academy? But that was humiliating. Everything was shameful─from the fact that he'd been jealous of someone like Seo Dayun to the fact that he'd lost to some Theory-type professor.

On top of that, even now, just thinking about Cha Eunwoo's eyes from that moment made his arm─healed by restoration magic─throb.

Fear.

It was consuming Song Seokhwan from within.

"Fuck, seriously...... a bastard who isn't even worth shit."

Not wanting to admit he was scared, he put on a brave front even if only to himself. The fear wouldn't fade just because of bravado, but admitting it felt like everything would crumble.

The whole situation was suffocating.

"Ryeoun!"

When Song Seokhwan barked the name, a human figure rose from the shadows.

A B-rank Hero of the Bisang Guild. Class: Assassin.

He was Song Seokhwan's personal bodyguard and direct subordinate.

"While your master was going through all that, what exactly were you doing?"

It had been suspicious from the start that some mere professor had dared lay hands on Song Seokhwan. Preventing exactly that was the reason Ryeoun was assigned to him.

"My apologies. There was interference."

"Interference? From who?"

"......Chancellor Ryu Jeonga."

"What?"

Ryu Jeonga? Why was that name coming up here?

There was no reason for Ryeoun to lie.

"Why would she─?"

"My apologies. I wasn't able to determine that much......"

Ryeoun was a man who'd cast aside his real name to live in the shadows beneath Bisang.

Even so, like any skilled operative, he'd once been raised at Florian. Then and now, Ryu Jeonga was an untouchable star in the heavens. He hadn't even had the courage to ask why, and had simply withdrawn.

"Fucking hell......"

What kind of bullshit situation was this? If Ryu Jeonga was truly shielding Cha Eunwoo, there was nothing he could do. He'd assumed the man had no backing─Ryu Jeonga, of all people.

Then what if he killed him somewhere Ryu Jeonga's eyes couldn't reach? The more he thought about it, the more feasible it seemed.

"That bastard's course─it was dungeon clears, right?"

"Yes."

"Hah, good. That old hag Ryu Jeonga never leaves the academy grounds anyway. We kill him during a dungeon practicum evaluation. Can you do it?"

Kill someone. Words too terrifying to believe they'd come from a first-year academy student.

A seasoned Hero who'd seen it all might be different, but for a typical academy student, death was supposed to be a foreign concept. Yet Song Seokhwan had issued the order to kill as naturally as breathing.

"Understood."

Ryeoun, too, saw nothing strange about it.

***

In the days that followed, several changes occurred within the Combat Magic Department.

Rumors spread that the professor and Song Seokhwan had spoken privately during the Dungeon Research and Practicum course.

Nobody knew what had transpired between them, but they could guess. Song Seokhwan, who'd looked ready to devour Seo Dayun at the mere sight of her, had begun to ignore her entirely.

As a result, Seo Dayun's position in the department was left in limbo. The fear of retaliation from Song Seokhwan was gone, but things had grown awkward in various ways. It would take a little more time for Seo Dayun to settle in.

The ones who'd volunteered as Song Seokhwan's lackeys were the real casualties─left high and dry overnight, like abandoned ducklings on the Nakdong River.

Song Seokhwan had kept them around out of convenience, but once they'd outlived their usefulness, he'd discarded them. Already branded as trash who'd ganged up to bully a girl, they had no one to associate with but each other.

"I'm glad. Everything worked out."

"Thanks for worrying about me."

With the fear of being entangled with Song Seokhwan gone, Seo Dayun no longer pushed An Seri away.

Since Seo Dayun wasn't fitting in well with the other department kids either, An Seri seized the opportunity to close the distance rapidly.

"Whew, I still can't figure out magic. I got scolded in class again today because I couldn't keep up."

And in doing so, An Seri began to understand why Cha Eunwoo had praised Seo Dayun so lavishly.

She might be unremarkable now, but the claim that she could one day surpass Park Seohu resonated completely.

"You said you formed your Mana Heart about a year ago, right?"

"Hm? Yeah, that's right."

This girl was a monster.

Others took a full year to form a Mana Heart, but she'd reportedly done it in just one week before taking the entrance exam. Was that even possible?

On top of that, most mages had been building their foundations long before entering the academy. That was why professors preferred to skim through the basics quickly and blaze through the early material.

But Seo Dayun was keeping up with classes without any foundation whatsoever. Her growth speed was nothing short of monstrous.

"Don't rush it. Time will sort everything out."

"Uuugh, that's easy for you to say, Seri! While I'm floundering alone, everyone else looks so relaxed. At this rate, I'll be the only one falling behind...... Everyone's a genius except me."

Watching Seo Dayun whine, An Seri felt the urge to smack her.

Good grief, you silly girl. They've been doing nothing but this for years─of course they can manage.

"That's it. Let's go to the library!"

"Again? We already went during the morning free period......"

"If someone like me wants to beat geniuses, all I can do is work harder."

On top of everything, she was a ferocious hard worker. This girl would one day become a Hero who'd change history. The kind of person An Seri couldn't reach even if she were reborn a million times.

Before enrolling at Florian, An Seri had believed she was chosen.

A talent that far surpassed her self-proclaimed prodigy brother, An Sehyeon. She'd mistaken it for something great, not realizing she was a frog in a well.

She'd believed she would become a great Hero someday, like her father or Chancellor Ryu Jeonga.

But after arriving at the ocean called Florian, she realized it had all been a delusion.

The first time she hit a wall was the entrance exam.

Park Seohu.

He'd seemed to mock her very existence. The future Sword Saint, who'd torn through the exam hall single-handedly, looked like a real Hero come to life. In truth, Park Seohu already possessed the skill to overwhelm even graduates.

Next came Cha Eunwoo.

She'd challenged him with confidence, only to be thoroughly crushed. A true genius who saw from a different vantage point, who thought on a different plane.

And now, Seo Dayun was right before her eyes.

The girl she'd assumed was at the very bottom had actually been a hatchling serpent, freshly broken from its egg. Having spent her whole life looking only upward, she'd never imagined being overtaken by birds ascending from below.

An Seri confronted an uncomfortable truth.

Seo Dayun wasn't the only genius. Ranking fourth on the entrance exam was merely the benefit of the education she'd received as the child of a major guild─not an achievement earned by talent.

Going forward, Florian's countless geniuses would spread their wings, and An Seri could do nothing but watch helplessly.

Ah, I hate this.

An Seri had always worn a mask when dealing with others.

She'd ruthlessly killed her emotions and played the model student. It had become so second nature that fake expressions came naturally in front of others.

But today, the mask felt unbearably heavy.

"Let's go somewhere other than the library."

"Hmm...... a cafe, maybe?"

"No, not a place like that."

Until now, she could only remove the mask in front of people she truly trusted. But recently, an exception had appeared.

Professor Cha Eunwoo.

Ever since her mask had been stripped away during their first meeting when he'd caught her off guard, she found herself strangely unable to act in front of him. And that seemed to put her at ease.

Come to think of it, this whole melancholy mood had started because of Cha Eunwoo in the first place.

So she decided to impose on him for a while.

***

"Do you people think my office is a study hall?"

My office had been bustling lately. In the mornings, Lee Yeeun would drop by; in the afternoons, An Seri and Seo Dayun would come to use it as a study room; and in the evenings, Lee Yeeun would return to give her research report.

Honestly, it was annoying. For a shut-in security guard who'd spent a year holed up in his apartment doing nothing but gaming, sharing a space with people other than family was exhausting.

An Seri replied nonchalantly, as if she couldn't see the problem.

"What's the big deal? Don't you get lonely being alone, Professor?"

"I prefer being alone."

"Oh, sure you do."

The most bothersome one was An Seri.

In the game, she'd always worn a mask and kept walls up around everyone. Yet the attitude she showed in front of me was strangely relaxed. Maybe even that was a mask-crafted expression, though.

"Dayun, what do you think about my privacy being violated like this?"

"Y-Yes! That's...... I, um."

"......Never mind."

Seo Dayun couldn't even make eye contact with me, and yet she kept tagging along. I'd given up on befriending her for the time being, seeing how she recoiled like a small animal whenever I tried to talk to her.

Still, it wasn't that she disliked me.

Ding!

─Mentor's effect activates. A small amount of EXP gained. (Target: Seo Dayun)

Seo Dayun was essentially a lottery ticket.

At first, I'd tried to kick her out when she came all the way to my office to study, but the message windows popping up before my eyes changed my mind.

Seo Dayun, a genius who'd only recently started learning magic. Needless to say, she was growing at a staggering pace. Just providing a space and occasionally explaining things she didn't understand was enough to trigger the Mentor skill, steadily accumulating a decent amount of EXP.

The EXP from Seo Dayun was especially noteworthy.

───────────────

<Skills>

▼ Magic Missile

: Offensive magic. Materializes a mass of mana and launches it.

▼ Magic Barrier

: Defensive magic. Creates a wall of mana for defense.

▼ Slow

: Debuff. Reduces the movement speed of the targeted enemy. This skill does not stack.

Remaining PT: 40

───────────────

It seemed my magic worked differently from everyone else's.

In Florian Rhapsody's lore, you learned magic by interpreting and understanding magic circles, and had to draw one every time you cast a spell.

Of course, that was just lore─in the game, you learned magic with skill points and activated them with hotkeys, like any RPG.

And now I had a skill window too. Just like the game.

On top of that, while PT could be earned through training, it could also be gained through Seo Dayun.

Then what if it wasn't limited to Seo Dayun?

What if I gathered dozens of talented kids and turned them into my EXP supply line?

An ability I'd written off as garbage actually held boundless potential.

I glanced at the textbook Seo Dayun was reading. As expected, the explanations were complex and arcane.

Just like difficult fields of study in the modern world, magic textbooks weren't exactly reader-friendly either. Dry theory transcribed as-is, impossible to understand easily.

That made her the perfect student to teach.

"Dayun, how about trying a slightly different approach there?"

"......A different approach?"

"Yes. Don't try to think of it all at once─break it into steps. With magic, visualization is key. For example, instead of simply thinking 'I'm shooting a fireball,' first construct the framework, then fill it with mana, then set the direction, and fire."

Seo Dayun tilted her head, then asked back in an uncertain voice.

"Um, but in theory, that's considered the most dangerous approach. Magic is supposed to be a single simultaneous process where all steps happen at once......"

"I'll say it plainly. That's bullshit."

There were two schools of thought on magic.

One held that magic, along with mathematics, was a pure discipline capturing the laws of the universe as created by the gods. The other held that magic was a tool for killing, no different from a gun or a sword.

In truth, calling them "two schools" was generous─the former was overwhelmingly the mainstream view.

Obviously, because everyone loved gilding their own reputation. That was why they valued tradition and formality, and didn't welcome practical change.

But I had no intention of playing along with their games.

The world was on the brink of destruction─what did tradition or formality matter? I had to teach as efficiently as possible.

"Then...... Ah! I think I get it."

Ding!

─Mentor's effect activates. A small amount of EXP gained. (Target: Seo Dayun)

"Good job."

She seemed to have grasped it well.

When I affectionately patted Seo Dayun's head, she lit up like a puppy. An Seri looked at me with a suspicious expression.

"Professor, were you actually a former Hero?"

"I wrote papers and got a doctorate."

"That's weird. Theory-type professors especially don't just dislike efficient methods─they outright despise them, don't they?"

"They would. They have to find their authority in things like that."

"Weird, no matter how I look at it."

An Seri, on the other hand, wasn't a useful EXP source.

She already knew so much that there wasn't much I could teach her at my level. She probably knew the lore-related stuff far better than I did.

That was why getting Clairvoyance into her hands quickly was important.

That way, I could benefit from the EXP she'd gain through Clairvoyance.

Of course, accessing Clairvoyance was impossible for now.

"Ah, time's up. Let's go to our next class."

"Already? It feels like we just started."

"Professor, we'll be heading out."

"Sure."