When Five People Gather, One of Them Is Bound to Be...? (1)

On the monorail bound for Seonggwan Academy, I glanced down at my crystal tablet — and the headlines blooming across the screen left my mouth hanging open.

Baek Sal-jon? What the hell kind of garbage is that?

I'd only killed four people, and only because I had no other choice. On top of that, the moniker was wildly overblown. The real problem, if you asked me, was giving villains cool-sounding aliases in the first place. If they'd called the strongest man in the world "the Loser of His Age" from day one, he'd have been too embarrassed to even show his face.

Anyway, I sighed and shut the tablet off. Ha. At least the Baek Sal-jon infamy shouldn't pile any higher from here. Um. I hereby resign as Baek Sal-jon…

Until the Namgung dojo was rebuilt I had nowhere to stay, so I'd decided to use the dorms. Thankfully the insurance company had promised a swift response, but between replacing household goods and covering living expenses I still needed to save money. Either way, Namgung would have to be raised back up by the two of us — me and Senior Sister Ran.

More importantly, what's with today?

The second I stepped off in District 8, home of Seonggwan Academy Station, the looks coming my way were anything but friendly. If this were about the attack on Namgung, I'd have expected sympathy. What I was getting instead was suspicion and envy, thick enough to choke on.

"That's him? I watched the duel with the Yongso princess. He was a total mess afterward."

"Think he hacked the academy AI?"

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"Can a person even hack Hesed?"

My bad feeling became reality.

The five honor students selected for a special seminar taught by the Seven Asterisms — the seven pinnacles of the jujutsu ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠world — were posted in elegant brush calligraphy. And there, sitting bold as brass among the selectees for a lecture I hadn't even applied for, was my name. As the top-priority candidate, no less.

There is only one person in the world who could pull a stunt like this. Absolute purity — and therefore, the strongest. It's her. Yeah. About time she showed up.

The next instant, the sky was painted over in black. The world… changed. That's not a metaphor. That's not hyperbole. A moment ago, the students and I had been standing in front of that beautifully lettered notice. But in the blink of an eye, the scenery around us had transformed — into a starry night whose edges no one could see.

"Wooow. Must be an event from the principal. It's like we walked into an observatory."

"So romantic. Look, a shooting star. Should we make a wish?"

"Yeah, oppa. May our love last forever♡"

A sickeningly lovey-dovey idiot couple was rubbing it in everyone's faces. These were the same freeloaders who used to swoop in for the last hit whenever I beat a Nephilim half to death. They didn't even realize what was happening?

I grabbed the sword at my hip in a horizontal-thrust grip with my right hand and shouted.

"What are you standing around for? Get ready to defend, or at least cover your heads!"

"Swordsman, you trying to kill the mood?"

The girl half of the idiot couple squawked at me.

"As long as you're inside the Domain Eunha created, think of yourselves as specks of dust in a vast cosmos."

The words had barely left my mouth when a meteor shower came screaming down from the sky.

───KRA-KOOM!

Scattering debris and starlight reminiscent of a van Gogh masterpiece painted a thoroughly alien atmosphere. Only now did the students' faces go ashen as they activated their innate cursed techniques. I let out a short grunt and swung my blade, weaving through the falling stars.

Once an innate cursed technique surpasses a certain peak, a sorcerer can reawaken a Domain — a space centered on themselves, dyed in the colors of their inner landscape.

Originally, the Creation Type innate cursed technique Cheonrangranran — Twinkle Sirius — which manifests stars, expands in range until it realizes the cosmos itself as a Domain. No, just making stars is already broken enough! Tone it down a little, would you?

A celestial being descended from the sky. Hair that caught the starlight and shimmered in a color that was neither gold nor silver. A pair of prismatic, hyperchromatic eyes. One of the three strongest beings in Jujutsu Gwi-hwan, holder of the Seven Asterisms' Tanlang First White Water Star—

"Everyone's totally freaked out. Did you really have to make an entrance like that?"

—was none other than my childhood friend, Hwi Eunha.

She knocked me flat before I could even resist and climbed on top of me, the same way she used to back at the orphanage. Then she drove a curved blade into the ground beside my head so I couldn't run. A sword-type object: the Seven Asterism Treasure Blade. It wasn't originally a combat cursed tool, but in Eunha's hands it easily surpassed the Changgun Sword or even the Five Swords Under Heaven. This was a genuine "who the hell gave her a knife" situation.

"—Ah, since it's been so long."

"You planning to wreck the academy while you're at it? Miss Botan will cry tears of blood."

"Aww, my Beomie is so sweet. You really don't have to worry about that."

Eunha laughed with an "Ahaha" so bubbly that if you wrote it down, you'd have to stick a ☆ at the end. Underneath it all ran a self-absorbed arrogance that couldn't care less whether anyone else got hurt. Even in the original Jujutsu Gwi-hwan, her personality was uniquely the worst among the Seven Asterisms. Two-faced. Extremely self-absorbed. An arrogance that didn't even regard other people as the same species. A chronically affection-starved narcissist.

Then again, I was the one who misread her.

The moment I learned Eunha was from the same orphanage, I launched a personality-correction project — but my efforts were for nothing. What I got instead was a monster with all those flaws plus a love for me, in the pet-owner sense of the word. She'd even gotten far stronger than she was at the time of the side stories. This was supposed to be the period when she was still attending Seonggwan Academy, but she'd already risen to the supreme Seven Asterisms. As long as I could stop the Grand Cursed Technique Reaching the Forbidden, that was all that mattered — but watching the original plot go off the rails still hurt.

"You okay?"

"About what?"

"I heard Namgung got ambushed—"

Eunha let out a sigh, as if she actually felt bad about it. This was the first time she'd ever given a damn about something like this. Though the way she added, "That gunslinger unnie is weak, so of course she got hit," was exactly what I'd expect.

"Other than Senior Sister Ran being in the hospital a few more days, we managed to wrap things up reasonab—?!"

I tried to gloss over it, but Eunha's hands were already peeling back my uniform and lifting my undershirt. What sat along my side was the wound from when Chameleon had stabbed me with a fruit knife. The marks Reaper left had already vanished, so I'd let my guard down. Eunha's fingertips moved as if to ask what this was, stroking the skin. It had already healed, but a faint, stinging ache still lingered.

"No, no, this is an old wound. Don't worry about it."

"I see—well then, that's a relief."

"Okay, great, now drop the Domain already…"

I was completely done for. Never mind that my bare side was now on display for the entire world — grumbling erupted from the students still trapped in Eunha's Honcheonsegwae.

"What's this? Lady Tanlang said she knew the swordsman, didn't she?"

"Must be nice having connections. Got into the academy because he's a disciple of a famous clan, and now he's in the special lecture because he knows Lady Tanlang!"

It was completely unfair from my perspective, but the students were already nodding along, convinced. An indescribable expression flickered across Eunha's face for a moment — and then the Domain's starlit night was sucked away as if down a whirlpool, and the original world returned.

I straightened my rumpled clothes and asked,

"So what's this about? Lady Tanlang didn't come all this way just to worry about someone like me."

"Work wore me out, so I thought I'd come get healed by Beomie. I'm happy just seeing your face."

She giggled, and her expression turned a little spoiled, a little clingy. I must not mistake this for romantic interest. Eunha is a being beyond the heavens who doesn't even see other people as the same species. This was the feeling of venting about your day to a pet dog or a favorite potted plant.

"You already saw me during the duel with the Yongso princess, didn't you?"

"I'm saying work is hard. I want to go to the academy too."

"Seonggwan Academy has its own headaches, you know? Though I'm glad just seeing my face is enough to heal you."

In my case, I'd fallen right into the credit trap. I shook my head.

"Ahaha☆ Then I have one little favor~! Could you praise me like you used to? Tell me I did a good job?"

"Huh? Sure. Eunha, you did a great job! Keep it up starting tomorrow, I'm counting on you…!"

It had ultimately failed, but I recited the verbal formula I'd designed to treat her chronic affection deficiency. Eunha nodded as if steeling her resolve, her prismatic eyes sparkling.

"Yeees! Thank you! I'll do my very best as the short-term special lecture professor~. This is how I get to go to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the academy with my Beomie."

No. That's what you came here for in the first place!

My mind snapped into focus and I pressed her.

"So you did rig the selection results."

"Nay. On that matter, I should like to ask thee. What hast thou done, boy?"

The principal of Seonggwan Academy. Eunha's master. And another of the Seven Asterisms. Miss Botan — who looked like a little girl but was hundreds of years old — made her entrance astride an eight-legged horse shikigami.

"Hesed! The Seven Asterisms special lecture is supposed to be selected by credits and everyday conduct. Why was this fellow chosen first? We are a meritocracy, I'll have thee know."

At the principal's thunderous command, a hologram flickered to life with a crackle of static.

"That's why I'm asking thee to explain why."

I thought my heart had stopped. My eyes flew wide at those sudden words. I'd been found out so easily — by two of the pinnacles of the jujutsu world.

The fact that I had slain Byeoljubu Minogame.