The Opening Ceremony Begins
Everyone, surely, had a little romance in them when it came to new beginnings.
Maybe it was buying a new game console and spending days getting lost in all the games it had to offer. Or going off to a new school and imagining the kind of school life they’d always dreamed about.
And of course, plenty of people came to the prestigious academy of Sielm with those same expectations.
- I wonder how beautiful the professors are. Do they look better than the idols from out west?
- I heard from the graduates that a lot of the professors are so gorgeous they could slap an idol across the face.
There were those who liked to imagine what the professors at Sielm looked like.
- Can we actually talk to the kids from the great houses here? Or are they so far above us that they might as well be in another world...
- No matter how you cut it, we’re all students here. You can’t just avoid them forever. If you talk well enough, maybe they’ll warm up to you.
There were also those who dreamed of speaking with the scions of noble families while attending an academy that wasn’t quite so grand.
- If we get good grades here and graduate, they say guilds will scout us right away! I’m definitely going to do it~
- Huh? You? Yeah, right. Just don’t get expelled halfway through. If you quietly graduate, somebody will take you.
And there were many who spoke of their own futures.
One after another, they all talked about the life awaiting them at Sielm, about novelty, about dreams.
That kind of romance would make excellent fuel for a boring academy life, so I didn’t bother dousing their hopes; instead, I talked along with them.
Each of them was carrying a different thought, a different dream.
* * *
“Paran, say ahh~”
“Eek... I-It’s embarrassing... Riae...”
“Taking care of being fed isn’t embarrassing. It’s admirable. Come on, ahh~”
“...Ahh.”
I was still being fed by Han Riae.
Now that I thought about it, wasn’t this incredibly embarrassing?
A small, delicate boy was curled up in the arms of a tall girl, being fed bite by bite.
And not just any girl, either—this was Riae Meliton, famous for her ice-cold iron wall of a personality.
With a girl like that wearing such a happy expression while feeding me, there was no way other people wouldn’t notice.
She was already one of Sielm’s famous rising stars, and here she was, doing something like this the moment she arrived in the banquet hall...
It was only natural that people would have something to talk about.
And so, amid the many voices floating around the opening ceremony, most of the students had taken their seats at the tables.
Clang— clang—
A huge bell, hanging at the very top of the banquet hall, rang out.
Everyone knew what that bell meant.
That was when—
“Are you enjoying the opening ceremony, freshmen?”
The true beginning of the ceremony.
The bell that announced the appearance of Sielm’s vice principal, Mahiel.
“The total number of freshmen seated today is... 600. Thank you all for coming.”
Mahiel spoke in a voice a little firmer and higher than the one I’d heard the day I first met him.
“First, let me congratulate all of you who passed Sielm’s entrance exam, those who came through recommendation, and even our special admissions student. I’ll begin with a brief welcoming address.”
He stepped up onto the highest stage in the banquet hall.
Once he was there, the vice principal slowly swept one hand through the air, and every scattered candle flame in the hall lit at once, bright and steady.
Seeing him stir the mana of this enormous banquet hall from the floor all the way to the ceiling, most of the students burst into applause and cheers.
It was impossible not to be amazed. He’d controlled such a vast spread of mana—something even first-rank hunters would struggle to handle—and lit only the candles without the slightest mishap.
“Mm, that’s much brighter now. Then let me begin the real address.”
With a single gesture, he settled the restless students down and began his speech.
“Three hundred years ago, the world was filled with chaos. Portals, dungeons, and towers rose from every direction, and the monsters born within them attacked human beings. Some of them gathered in packs and swept across the land.”
Though he spoke gently and calmly, mana spread through the vast banquet hall, filling every corner and carrying his voice to the farthest edges.
Even now, his mastery of mana was astonishing.
“It was an era in which another person dying nearby was nothing unusual at all. Families you had spoken with just yesterday were torn apart by monsters, and there were so many people starving to death that not even a single piece of bread could save them.”
Three hundred years ago, when the great mana stone fell, that power became a tremendous help to humanity, but it also took much away.
Mana stones brought vast energy, giving mankind the chance to advance—but only for a moment, before the monsters from stories and nightmares began to appear.
Weapons even military-grade firearms couldn’t stop. A force so far beyond human common sense that it slaughtered people without end.
Even after ten years, twenty years, the chaos showed no sign of settling.
Monsters, dungeons, portals, towers.
Mana, awakening, unique abilities, skills.
Humanity gained all sorts of powers as if to answer the threats springing up everywhere, but even that was nowhere near enough to bring peace against monsters that possessed overwhelming might.
This blood- and corpse-soaked world was barely being held together by the existence of hunters, but the hunters were still too weak, so they decided to build places of education.
Yet in a world filled only with destruction, there was nowhere safe or proper to raise the next generation of hunters.
And yet—
“But... humans are the ones who find answers.”
The vice principal’s voice, little more than a whisper, sank deep into the ears of everyone present.
“The hunter Celiel, who conquered the Tower of Growth, became its tower lord as the reward for her conquest and established Sielm around that tower.”
Space, time, observation, adjustment, growth.
Unlike the other towers, which endlessly spewed out monsters, these five towers had simply stood tall, waiting for challengers.
Celiel became the first to conquer one of those five towers, the Tower of Growth, and in doing so took its power and became its tower lord.
Before she ever conquered a tower, she was already running herself ragged, saving countless people all across the continent from danger.
Then, by conquering the tower and gaining its authority, she became its lord and devoted herself to raising heroes who would follow in her footsteps.
She sincerely prayed that heroes would be born—heroes who would bring peace to this chaotic, fear-ridden world.
She never once used the power of growth for herself, pouring everything she had into Sielm alone.
In return, she became a star among the heavens, and for that reason the founder—and now the headmistress—was praised as a great figure.
As if to repay her grace, after she had traveled all over the continent saving people, and then as tower lord poured all her strength and power into the heroes of the future, gifted talents from every corner of the land gathered here and became heroes themselves, slowly pushing back the dangers threatening the world.
“Sielm. A place that shines brightly and proudly to nurture and raise heroes, a place that holds the path of those heroes within it—this place, with that meaning, is the prestigious hunter-training academy Sielm.”
Thanks to all of that effort, about fifty years ago, the great houses joined forces and cleared the last remaining S-rank dungeon, declaring an end to the continent’s age of chaos.
“...”
I glanced around with a sidelong look.
There were many students whose emotions seemed to be welling up inside them, as though something in their hearts had been stirred.
Plenty were trembling, shoulders quivering as they fought back tears, just like I had when approaching people.
The mood around me was overflowing with immersion and emotion, but I wasn’t swept up in it.
Maybe it was because I’d only woken up two weeks ago, knew almost nothing about this world except a few scraps of history, and had heard this same kind of speech so many times in the Sielm opening ceremony videos I’d watched.
And on top of that, because I’d entered through special admission, I felt a little guilty too.
Everyone else had probably worked themselves to the bone, or somehow managed to stand out through blood-and-sweat effort, to get into Sielm. I’d only been admitted because of mana erosion—which, right now, didn’t even hurt all that much.
“Therefore, I sincerely hope that all of you who have entered Sielm will one day become wonderful heroes who create a bright future, and I would like to announce that Sielm will provide you with limitless support in your growth.”
After finishing his words for a moment, the vice principal observed the students’ reactions.
Some looked burdened, some were so moved they wept, and others made bitter faces as they listened to the history being recited.
With a faint, wry smile, the vice principal went on.
“Ah... It seems I’ve gone on too long with such weighty talk at a lighthearted opening ceremony. I’ll stop here and finish with a few announcements. The proper academic schedule will begin in two days, and details will be delivered to each student’s bracelet. So today, more than anything else, I hope you’ll look back on all the hardships you’ve endured until now, rest yourselves, and prepare for the next schedule.”
The vice principal finished speaking and slowly swept his gaze across the hall.
Then his eyes stopped somewhere.
It wasn’t as though he stared openly, but I could still feel that he had looked at me.
“...Then I hope you all enjoy yourselves.”
The vice principal walked away at an unhurried pace and gave a casual wave of his hand.
In that instant, his figure vanished, leaving behind only a small trail of light.
- Whoa... what was that? Was that teleportation?
- Hey, how is that teleportation? That was clearly invisibility.
- No, but even if it was invisibility, I didn’t feel a trace of mana at all... what on earth was that?
The students were marveling at the spell they’d just seen, analyzing it from every angle.
There are many unique abilities on the continent.
Some can tear space apart to create portals. Others can manipulate an opponent’s mana from afar and restrict their movement.
But Vice Principal Mahiel was not someone who could be so simply categorized.
Of course, spatial abilities and mana suppression were both extremely difficult, top-tier techniques in their own right.
But the vice principal was someone who could use any technique as easily as breathing.
In fact, he could demonstrate examples of every kind of skill just by using his own magic.
That was how high-level a mage he was, and so the speech didn’t continue much longer after that.
Then, the excessively bright candles went out all at once, and the waiting orchestra began to play.
But my attention wasn’t on the music.
The small white light that had appeared when the vice principal vanished.
That light was made of highly concentrated mana.
The pure mana within my mana erosion sensed the surrounding mana and told me that light had been made of extremely dense mana.
And I’d felt the exact same mana when he appeared, too.
Maybe that white light was some kind of medium for movement...
If I thought about it a little more, maybe I could find a clue—
“Pa-Paran.”
“Eek!”
I was so deep in thought that when someone suddenly spoke close by, a strange little sound slipped out of me.
“Are you hurt somewhere? You look a little pale.”
“N-No, I’m not... I was just thinking about something for a bit...”
Han Riae worried over me for a moment, then let out a relieved smile when she saw my reaction.
“Then could you stay here by yourself for just a little while? I’m going to talk to Hwayeon and the others for a bit. If you want, you can come too.”
Han Riae looked at me with concern.
“Yes, it’s fine. Please go talk as much as you like.”
Thinking of all the consideration she’d given me so far, I quietly accepted her leaving.
“Then, here—”
She suddenly crossed her bracelet against mine, and—
[Entering...]
[Contact: Han Riae (Meliton) has been registered.]
Her contact information had been entered.
So it can do that too...
I could only marvel at it.
“If anything happens, contact me! I’ll be going now!”
Han Riae moved away from me, waving as she walked off.
I sat at the table for a moment, dazed and blank, and then...
“Hi, are you Lim Paran? Um, if you don’t have anyone with you now, do you want to hang out with us?”
Ah.
Dammit.
Suppressing the warning signs erupting inside me, I continued thinking.
Right. This was Sielm’s opening ceremony, a welcome party for the freshmen—a stage set up so we could shake off the fatigue from everything so far and get to know the people around us.
In a place like that, whether the attention was positive or negative, I, as the special admissions student, was bound to be the hottest topic in the room.
I could feel my fear of people flaring back to life the moment Han Riae left my side.
And then I remembered what she’d said earlier.
If I stayed near Han Riae, wouldn’t I be less likely to have a panic attack? Wouldn’t she have blocked most of the people trying to approach me anyway?
Ah... I should’ve gone with her...
As always, regret came only after the act was already done.
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