I Hate the Professor (3)
I Hate the Professor (3)
I hate alcohol and cigarettes.
Alcohol turns anyone short of a genius into a beast. It's a vile drug that gleefully tears down whatever minimal boundaries remain.
Cigarettes turned people into wrecks. They ruined my nose and throat even before A-rin did. I never understood why anyone would pay money to burn garbage and inhale it.
Even after childhood, I still had to work to survive.
It was a rough patch, but not truly unbearable.
Without a proper education to speak of, my only options were manual labor and odd part-time jobs.
Since I was physically weak, I was rejected from every single manual labor position. The one job I finally managed to land, barely, was at a convenience store.
At a convenience store, the most popular items are always alcohol and cigarettes.
I hate alcohol and cigarettes. I hate catching sight of them, I hate their smell and taste. I just hate their very existence.
That is merely my own opinion, based on my own experience.
Others can think differently. Plenty of people get plastered and go on rampages. Plenty of people smoke like chimneys every single damn day until it kills them.
But just as many people can drink without issue, and plenty of smokers live perfectly fine lives.
I hate consuming them or smoking them myself. I hate the smell, and I hate the sight.
I never forced that view on anyone else. Frankly, if no one was offering it to me, I figured it wasn't my business.
Even if Professor Atra drinks, even if she goes around puffing away at her cigarettes, it is not my business.
Of course, the scent clinging to her might grate on me and put some distance between us, but I'm not about to butt in and tell her to stop.
Besides, catching a faint whiff isn't enough to make me faint. I had seizures from it before, but now I've adapted to where it's merely unpleasant.
So what the hell was that just now.
I folded away my spatial perception and wrapped myself tightly in my blanket, thinking.
When I first woke up, I nearly panicked, but after I folded away my spatial perception and the world turned black, enclosed in the soft, warm blanket, I gradually calmed down.
Memories from right before I fainted came flooding back. Leaving my team after the dungeon dispersal... then running into Professor Atra on my way to the library.
And then... that utterly foul memory.
'Ugh...'
My stomach lurched. A stabbing pain in my gut came as a bonus. The one small mercy was that there was nothing left to vomit. I'd already emptied out everything in the middle of the street.
My breathing trembled. My body, beyond my control, shivered on its own.
I curled up. I shrank myself as small as possible and pulled the blanket closer, eliminating every gap to form a snug space.
'Adapt.'
Getting hit hurt. So I adapted. The next time I got hit, it hurt less.
Hearing abuse stung my heart, but as I gradually adapted, I became okay.
I could adapt to the blurring of my vision too. I adapted to the pain in my arms. I even adapted to having my throat hurt so much it was hard to speak.
When a drunk driver hit me and my leg was temporarily wrecked, I got used to that as well, with time.
Adaptation (適應).
Living things always adapt to their environment. Since the environment changes every moment, living things must change with it.
I was no different. No matter how much I railed against my circumstances, it wouldn't change anything. I had to accept them and adapt.
That's what I need to do now, too.
"Hoo, hooo..."
I inhaled, feeling my lungs expand tight with air, then slowly exhaled. I repeated this.
'It's okay.'
The current pain, the headache stabbing into my skull, the lurching in my stomach, the revulsion...
I can adapt to all of it. It's a task I've performed countless times before. If I can't adapt, I'll only collapse and fall behind. To survive, I have to overcome this.
As I repeated the deep breaths, the queasiness gradually subsided. I braced myself and shed the blanket.
"Cadet Lee Ha-yul...?"
'Ugh...'
Through the gap that opened as I pushed the blanket aside, Professor Liana's voice slipped in.
Even with my spatial perception folded away, my body crumpled at that familiar, repulsive presence.
'It's fine...'
This is merely something I already overcame in the past. For some reason it's relapsed like this, but I've already crossed it once. Can't I cross it a second time?
I cautiously spread out my spatial perception. Not widely, just enough to encompass the inside of the infirmary.
First, I saw Professor Liana standing a little distance from the cot. She was looking at me with a complicated expression.
"Are you alright? You didn't look well just now."
Her voice was full of worry. I breathed an inward sigh of relief as I carefully pulled my head out from the blanket.
A moment ago, I shrank back on instinct and immediately regretted it—I'd been rude to someone who was worrying about me.
[I'm fine. Sorry about that.]
"No need to apologize. I'm just glad you're feeling better."
Professor Liana observed my condition, then spoke in a cautious tone.
"If you don't mind me asking... could I ask what happened?"
It was a question I'd expected. I thought for a moment, then tapped at my smartwatch.
[Before that, may I ask one thing?]
"Yes. Of course."
[By any chance, did you drink last night?]
Liana froze on the spot. She blinked her eyes a couple of times, then tilted her head, seeming at a loss.
"...D-Drink? I did drink last night... how did you know?"
At that, my hands paused.
How did I know... I wasn't sure how to answer.
By the smell? No. My sense of smell is sealed thanks to the curse.
[I just knew.]
"Huh...? Just knew?"
But I could tell. I couldn't smell it, but my body reacted. Faster than my spatial perception or mana affinity could.
At my reply, Professor Liana's face stiffened. Then she stealthily brought her wrist up to her nose.
"...Did I, perhaps, smell of it?"
[You didn't smell.]
It wasn't a lie, since my nose isn't functional and I couldn't smell a thing. Looking unconvinced, Professor Liana began checking her body here and there with a grim expression.
"I showered the moment I got in...? I-I even cast cleaning magic over and over..."
[You didn't smell.]
Mana surged around Professor Liana and formed a spell formula. It was cleaning magic. Cast dozens of times in an instant, the cleaning magic enveloped her body.
As I dazedly perceived that with my spatial perception, I cautiously turned my head toward a direction I had deliberately avoided paying attention to.
Directly in front of the cot. Professor Atra was there, leaning her back against the wall. Her expression was subtly different from her usual indifferent one. It was a trivial difference, but my spatial perception allowed me to notice.
'.......'
A cold sweat broke out. I recalled the memories just before I lost consciousness.
Meeting Professor Atra... then vomiting right in her face. Unwittingly displaying my aversion, stepping backward, and vomiting as I fainted in front of someone who had been worrying about me.
How foul must it have felt from Professor Atra's point of view? Just imagining it made my head spin. What a disrespectful act that was. It was the kind of crap that would make anyone's goodwill evaporate entirely...
[I'm truly sorry.]
I wrote that much, but my hands stopped. What else was there to say? Sorry I vomited right in your face?
"Enough with the apologies."
Just as I was agonizing over it, I heard those words. My shoulders flinched involuntarily. Did it mean she didn't even want an apology? Frankly, I deserved that kind of response.
Just as I was gauging her mood, Professor Atra, who seemed to have been carefully studying my face, averted her gaze and asked,
"...Are you okay?"
[Yes, I'm fine.]
"Good. If anything feels off, tell me immediately."
[Yes.]
We exchanged words I hadn't expected. Flustered, I examined Professor Atra a little more closely. Her expression was different from her usual one, but there was no sign she was upset.
'What's going on?'
"Now that you've woken up, it's fine. I'll be going, so contact me if you have anything to say."
Professor Atra turned away. After asking just a few questions about my condition, she walked out of the infirmary without a moment's hesitation—without even asking why I'd reacted that way.
...What's going on?
.
.
.
Only after Professor Liana came to her senses—having cast cleaning magic well over a hundred times—did I briefly explain my situation to her.
That I had bad memories involving alcohol and cigarettes, that for some reason the repulsion had been especially severe this time, and that I didn't know the details of why.
"Hmm... so might it be a psychological issue, then? Do you have the results of a psychological evaluation on hand? They should've tested for most things."
[What's that?]
"Huh?"
[Pardon?]
A few facts came to light during the conversation. Ordinarily, a psychological counseling session is conducted alongside the entrance exam, but I hadn't done it.
The purpose was supposed to be screening for potential mental health issues, yet somehow I'd skipped that entirely before coming in.
"...Euh?"
Professor Liana tilted her head.
"Uh... didn't they say it's because he's a special admission? No, even so... such a standard procedure...? Agh, I don't even know."
Scrubbing her hair roughly, uncharacteristically for her, Professor Liana let out a sigh. It was a sigh loaded with complexity.
"Let's take the test together sometime next time. It can't hurt to have it done."
Having said that, Professor Liana suddenly checked the time on her smartwatch.
Lunchtime was already almost over.
"What would you like to do? You're cleared to leave, but would you like to rest a bit longer?"
[Yes, I'll rest just a little while before I go.]
"All right. Then I'll be on my way. You have to contact me the moment any problem arises, okay?"
With a final admonition repeated several times to contact her if anything happened, Professor Liana also left the infirmary.
"......"
Finally, I was alone. I let go of the tension I'd been barely holding onto. My body sank backward. A soft sensation wrapped itself around my whole body.
"Euh, ah-h..."
I'd barely held it in. I tried not to let it show, but inside, my emotions had grown so intense I wanted to run away on the spot.
Professor Atra's presence still felt terrifying and repulsive. As for Professor Liana... it was less so than Professor Atra, but I still felt a sense of rejection.
'Exhausted...'
It had only been a few hours since I left the dungeon, and what a state I was in. Sighs kept welling up. I grabbed a pillow and hugged it fiercely, then spread the blanket out and pulled it over my head for good measure.
Like that, I calmed my mind for a short while. Perhaps because both of them were gone from the vicinity, my condition gradually started to improve.
'...What do I do.'
I'd been about to go straight to the library, and this is the state I'm in. I was too emotionally drained. Walking all the way to the library was out of the question. I was in such a state I might seriously pass out on the way.
But I didn't have the leisure to just kill time, either.
The dungeon practice had just ended, but a far more important schedule was set for the very next week.
Entry into the Tower of Growth.
The event where the snowball really starts rolling in the original story. My future growth curve would be shaped by how many proper gains I could seize here.
I'd planned to immediately check on the anomalous magic phenomenon and then jump straight into preparation, but... the schedule got all turned to shit.
Today is Tuesday, and entry to the Tower of Growth is on Monday of next week.
At most, I had six days. Time was tight.
The other cadets were probably in the same boat. They'd be preparing for next week's schedule, half with worry and half with anticipation.
But I needed to prepare even more than them. Specifically, because of the label of Special Admission Cadet.
This time, the whole first year was entering the tower.
The problem wasn't the full participation.
Inside the tower, competition between cadets was permitted. Inside, you only feel a tiny fraction of the pain, and wounds are nothing but illusions, so the intent was probably to tell us to compete properly.
Here, the label of Special Admission was the problem.
In short, it was an extension of what happened with Aiden.
Aiden had told me his motive when he apologized. He said he was curious.
A Special Admission Cadet? Just how great could he be? What kind of a guy are you to get in through special admission? I have no idea.
So let's test and see.
Cadets with that exact thought were going to come pouring in at me.
That's what had happened in the original.
Main Story Part 1. In the early stages, it was a hazing event carried out by cadets whose affection toward the player was low...
If I succeed here properly, my growth curve will slope upward to the right. If I fail... it'll be delayed.
There's less than a week until a major event like that, and I'm like this.
Only sighs kept coming out.
I couldn't bring myself to do absolutely nothing, so I projected a magic textbook I'd downloaded beforehand onto my smartwatch as a hologram.
.
.
.
- Knock, knock... Drrrk.
"Ha-yul, are you okay...?"
'Ah.'
It wasn't long after Professor Liana had left that Hong Yeon-hwa came to visit me in the infirmary.
After a careful knock, Hong Yeon-hwa popped her upper body in through the slightly opened door.
In the bag she held in one hand, a nutritional supplement infused with mana was packed full.
I couldn't feel the slightest bit of unpleasantness or rejection at the sight of her.
In her blinking red eyes, I vividly felt overflowing worry and a warm, cozy aura.
It was a soft, fuzzy emotion that was hard to put a definite label on.