Chapter 46
Chapter 46
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 46
Chapter Title: The Meaning of an Instructor's Apology
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***
Thud.
Clack.
The sounds of their different footsteps echoed, interlocking with each other.
The atmosphere between the two of them was truly strange.
The instructor kept hesitating, her lips trembling as if she were constantly gauging the cadet's reaction, while the cadet, in response to her attitude, walked with a rather composed stride.
It was a strange situation, as if their roles had been reversed.
“...”
Kalli and Cheon-seong were walking together in a peculiar atmosphere. How long had it been since they started? Kalli opened her mouth with extreme caution.
“Cadet Han Cheon-seong.”
“Yes, Instructor.”
As Cheon-seong answered immediately as if he had been waiting, Kalli stopped in her tracks and looked directly at him.
The two were heading to Kalli’s personal training room. But before they even got there, Kalli stopped walking.
She felt she had to apologize as soon as possible.
It felt like she couldn’t go on otherwise.
The mental preparation for it had taken far too long.
Was it her pride as an instructor, or was it simply that she wasn't accustomed to apologizing?
Not even Kalli herself knew the right answer.
But one thing was certain.
That she had to speak her heart and apologize to him now, before it was too late.
“...”
“...”
As their eyes met, Cheon-seong looked back with relative composure at Kalli’s wildly trembling gaze.
Ever since they had started walking together, Cheon-seong had been waiting for Kalli to speak first.
The moment they had called out to each other in the lecture hall.
When Kalli had met his gaze with those strange eyes, he felt his own thoughts had lost their meaning.
As the instructor and cadet held each other’s gaze at an odd time, a few cadets in the area where the Class A lecture halls were located glanced at them casually.
Just then, Kalli spoke.
“To Cadet Han Cheon-seong, I am truly… truly sorry. I believe I did something an instructor should never do, something incredibly foolish. Without any consideration for you… I was swept up in my own emotions and did something stupid. My words and actions today… I want to properly apologize for all of it.”
“Instructor…?”
Cheon-seong, who had been staring at her, was greatly surprised.
—An instructor was apologizing to a cadet.
A sincere apology, completely different from the words she'd tossed out during training before.
Considering the authority and position of an instructor within the academy, this apology was utterly unthinkable.
For a moment, Cheon-seong didn't know how to respond.
Moreover, they were in a space where other cadets were present. Yet she was offering a direct apology like this.
“For rebuking you after entering the lecture hall today… I truly have no excuse. At the very least, I shouldn't have said such things in front of all the other cadets. I may have said I wasn't trying to blame you, but… thinking back on it now, I believe I spoke with the intention of reprimanding you. It was a foolish thought and the wrong course of action. Even between an instructor and a cadet, there are lines that must be respected. I completely crossed that line.”
Kalli spoke in an extremely cautious tone.
Along with her trembling gaze, her voice was shaking as well.
Despite that, Kalli did not look away.
Though her eyes and voice were both shaking violently, she did not avert her gaze from Han Cheon-seong.
She felt pathetic for not having apologized sooner, for only now offering a proper apology.
She believed Cheon-seong must have been greatly disappointed in her, and blaming her own foolishness, Kalli had been in constant turmoil.
"..."
Cheon-seong, who had been meeting Kalli's gaze in silence, let out a small breath.
“Instructor Kalli. It's alright. It's understandable that you would misunderstand me based on the rumors, and I think it's possible you wouldn't see me in a good light if such rumors were circulating at the beginning of the academy year.”
Instead, it was Cheon-seong who regained his composure before she did.
“When I think about the shame and humiliation Cadet Han Cheon-seong must have felt at that time… I have no words, even if I had ten mouths. I’m truly… sorry.”
As Kalli, who had been speaking so cautiously, finally even bowed at the waist.
“...!”
Gasps of shock escaped from the Class A cadets who had been watching, wondering what was happening.
And that included… Han Cheon-seong, who was standing right in front of her.
“...”
His mouth hung open in a daze.
In that moment, even Han Cheon-seong was at a loss for words.
‘Why is she going this far?’
Looking at Kalli bowing to him, the only thoughts that came to mind were questions and astonishment.
Who was Kalli, exactly?
She was known by the title ‘Crimson Dawn,’ one of the key figures who could be called a pillar of this world.
Her powerful supernatural trait, ‘Vibration,’ and her overwhelming performance on the battlefield, like a one-woman army.
Besides that, she was highly regarded in the Empire for her well-rounded character and passionate attitude… and she was now bowing to me.
And in this open space, where other cadets were clearly watching.
She was setting aside her position and authority as an instructor, facing me as one person to another.
“Cadet Han Cheon-seong. I’m truly sorry.”
Her repeated words finally seemed to snap him out of his trance.
Then, his body moved before his mind could think.
Step.
Taking a step forward, he blankly raised his hands.
He placed his hands on the shoulders of the bowing Kalli and very slowly helped her stand up. He thought they needed to get out of here first.
Kalli's attitude in the lecture hall had certainly been bewildering, and in that moment, he'd felt wronged.
But.
Even so… this wasn't right.
She shouldn't be apologizing to him to the point of bowing her head.
“Instructor Kalli.”
He called her name firmly and composed his breathing.
After their spar in the training room last time, he had always assumed she didn't think well of him.
But that had been nothing more than a ridiculous misunderstanding.
On the contrary, it was because Kalli thought well of him. Because she saw him in a much better light than other cadets, that she had treated him so emotionally, so unlike herself.
That was why she was able to offer such a sincere apology.
“You don't need to apologize to that extent. I'm no longer upset. As I said before, I think you had every reason to act that way. I'm actually grateful to you for apologizing like this.”
Admitting one's mistake and apologizing was a much more difficult and arduous task than one might think.
Even among friends or close family members who shared blood, relationships often soured because one party couldn't accept it.
How much more so between an instructor and a cadet…
Setting aside her position and authority to offer a sincere apology to a mere cadet like him was something no ordinary person could ever do.
“...Cadet Han Cheon-seong.”
At his words, she called his name blankly, and a small laugh escaped him. He didn't know the exact reason why he laughed.
He just laughed seeing Kalli's utterly dazed expression.
To think she had taken it this seriously and felt so sorry toward him.
It was amazing to think that he was someone who could make Kalli act this way.
When he was called out in the lecture hall and heard all those negative things, he had felt truly dismal.
But thinking about it, that was a reality made possible only because he was receiving that much expectation and attention.
Kalli originally never even spoke to cadets who didn't try or achieved average grades.
She would either ignore them or treat them as if they didn't exist.
For her to act like this now was the same as saying she considered him important.
“Instructor Kalli. I'd like to talk somewhere else first. It would be quite burdensome for both me and you to talk here."
As he calmly removed his hands from her shoulders, he could feel the piercing stares.
He didn't want to damage Kalli's authority any further.
***
Click.
Even as she entered the training room with Cadet Han Cheon-seong, her mind was blank.
Her thoughts would connect sporadically, only to scatter and disappear again.
Still, she opened her mouth blankly.
“Well then… Cadet Han Cheon-seong, rest for a moment. I’ll go get the magitech items right away.”
Even as she spoke, she found it strangely terrifying to meet the cadet's eyes.
“Yes, I understand.”
As she headed to one side of the training room as if to escape, her heart pounded wildly.
Thump.
Her heart, her very being, felt strange.
It was beating in a completely different way than usual, and her thoughts kept connecting only to scatter.
‘What’s wrong with me…?’
She felt as if she had become a fool for the entire day.
She had been in turmoil the entire way to the training room before finally offering her apology, but even that felt strange to her now.
She couldn't tell if her apology had been proper, or if the cadet had felt it was sufficient.
Her mind had been blank ever since.
However, the moment Cadet Han Cheon-seong helped her up, she felt an immense sense of relief.
The cadet she thought would be disappointed in her. Because he had looked at her with a gentle smile.
Afterward, when he had led her with such consideration, she had simply matched his steps, as if being pulled along.
Rustle.
As she rummaged through the magitech items in her view, her focus wouldn't sharpen.
The variously colored magitech items glittered brilliantly in her vision, scattering and continuously disorienting her.
It felt… particularly severe today.
“...”
Eventually, she stopped what she was doing, placed a hand on her chest, and took a deep breath.
Thump.
Her heart wouldn't calm down.
…She needed to help Cadet Han Cheon-seong with his training next. But in this state, she felt she wouldn't even be able to do that properly.
Why was she like this?
She felt strange.
‘Was I that shocked about apologizing to a cadet?’
She wondered if she had received such a great shock, but… she couldn't be sure.
The outcome was good, which was a relief, and that should have been the end of it. So why wouldn't her heart calm down?
And why did her mind feel so floaty…?
“Um, Instructor Kalli?”
Then, a voice reached her, and she jumped in surprise without realizing it.
“...Cadet Han Cheon-seong.”
She turned her head to meet his gaze.
The pounding in her chest… grew even more intense.