I Just Didn't Like the Underground Waterway
The next morning, I stood behind the academy’s main building.
In front of me stretched a staircase leading down into the underground waterway. Damp, cold air rose from beyond the old iron door. Overhead, a cloudless blue sky spread out without a single cloud in sight.
And the place I had to go was the exact opposite of that.
Do we really have to start from the bottom?
Wouldn’t it be better to investigate upstairs first?
When I first agreed to join the investigation, I’d had a reasonably solid resolve. If I wanted to figure out why I was here, I needed to start by checking out whatever was happening outside the original story.
That resolve took a serious hit the moment I saw the stairs heading underground.
“Couldn’t we investigate from the top first?”
When I asked, Selene answered while inspecting the seal on the iron door.
“Reason?”
“In situations like this, the opposite direction—up—is usually more suspicious, right?”
“The confirmed traces are below.”
“That could just be bait to draw our attention.”
Selene’s hand paused for a moment as she examined the seal. She looked at me once, then opened her notebook.
“I’ll record the opinion.”
“Then from the top—”
“We investigate the underground as planned.”
I thought that actually worked.
Selene simply wrote down the participants’ names in her notebook.
Cheongha.
Selene.
Lydia.
Erika.
And Noel’s familiars.
Three black dragon familiars were folding their wings in front of the iron door. One shared senses with Noel; the other two were for scouting, apparently.
Noel’s actual body was, of course, nowhere to be seen.
“You’re not coming on the investigation yourself?”
When I asked, the middle familiar lifted its head.
“The underground is dangerous.”
“So you only sent the familiars?”
“Yeah.”
“What about us?”
“Do your best.”
She really was just cheering us on.
Erika cracked her knuckles in front of the iron door.
“If there are demons, we just catch them.”
That side was overflowing with motivation.
Lydia was fastening the buttons on my cloak.
“It’s easy for body temperature to drop underground. If you feel even a little cold or dizzy, you have to tell me right away.”
“My cold’s already gone.”
“Being fully recovered and catching it again are two different things.”
The buttons were done all the way up to my neck. It felt stifling. I was already short of breath before even setting foot underground.
The Mana Manipulation Professor delivered the final precautions.
“The closed waterway has been in use since the academy’s early days. The structure is old, and there may be sections that don’t match the maps.”
He handed Selene a red crystal.
“If you confirm any abnormal signs, withdraw immediately. We’ve confirmed that the rescue signal connects properly this time.”
This time.
That phrasing did not inspire confidence.
The professor looked at me.
“Student Cheongha.”
“Yes.”
“If you sense that the flow has changed, report even the smallest thing at once.”
What if I don’t feel anything at all?
I wanted to ask, but held it back. That lie had been my own creation.
Selene released the seal on the iron door.
Creeeak.
The rusted door opened with a slow, grinding sound. Darkness yawned open like a mouth.
“We move.”
I looked up at the blue sky one last time.
Then I went underground.
The closed waterway was wider than I’d expected. The ceiling was high enough that Erika could spread her wings without touching it. Old magic lamps burned at regular intervals along the walls, and clear water flowed slowly down the central channel.
The problem was that there was no sky.
Obvious, of course—but it still mattered.
I gripped the Yeouiju and tried to sense the surroundings.
Damp air.
Flowing water.
Lydia’s warm mana.
Erika’s hot mana.
Selene’s cold mana.
The gloomy mana coming from the familiars.
Beyond that, nothing.
No flow of approaching danger. No traces of demons. No omens. Nothing grand like that registered at all.
“How is it?”
Selene asked.
Right from the start.
“Still ordinary for now.”
“For now.”
Selene wrote it down exactly as said.
“I just mean it’s ordinary.”
“An expression that includes the possibility of change, I see.”
“Don’t interpret it that way.”
My words were already no longer mine. The moment I phrased anything even slightly vaguely, it grew into a completely different meaning inside Selene’s notebook.
Two of Noel’s familiars flew ahead first. One skimmed low over the waterway; the other hugged close to the ceiling. The middle familiar perched on my shoulder and shared the other two’s vision.
“Thirty meters ahead. Fork.”
Noel’s voice came through.
“Left continues as the waterway. Right is a maintenance passage.”
“Traces?”
Selene asked.
“None on either side.”
We stopped in front of the fork. The left path was a narrow stretch with water flowing through it. To the right was a dry passage that climbed gently upward.
Selene looked at me.
Lydia looked at me.
Even Erika looked at me.
All three familiars looked at me too.
Why.
“Which way?”
Selene asked.
How am I supposed to know? Go ask a demon.
I glanced back and forth between the two passages. The left was dark and narrow, water up to the ankles. The right was relatively wide and less dark. More importantly, it rose upward—even if only a little.
“Right.”
I answered without hesitation.
“Reason?”
Because I want to go home faster.
Because I hate narrow, damp paths.
Because I want to get even one step closer to the sky.
I couldn’t say any of that.
“Water flows downward, right?”
I pointed at the channel.
“I figured whoever was trying to hide would have gone against the flow and headed up.”
Even I didn’t know what I meant after saying it.
Selene looked at the right passage for a moment.
“That has merit.”
It does?
Noel’s familiars flew right first. We followed after them.
About ten minutes of walking later, one of the lead familiars suddenly stopped.
“Found it.”
Noel’s voice dropped lower.
A faint black stain remained on one side of the wall. Selene examined the area around it with a gloved hand.
“Mana residue.”
Lydia cast a golden light. Over the ordinary stone wall, a black pattern emerged. It was part of a magic circle someone had hastily tried to erase and left behind.
Everyone’s gazes turned to me again.
“You were right.”
Lydia murmured in quiet admiration.
No.
I just picked the wider path.
“Well, you can tell if you look at the flow.”
It was already too late to come clean. I lifted my chin naturally.
Noel’s familiar nodded beside me.
“Foreshadowing payoff.”
“What foreshadowing?”
“The protagonist is different from the very first choice.”
This better not be a Magical Dragon thing.
It seemed wiser not to ask.
While Selene recorded the wall pattern, Erika scanned the surroundings.
“Feels like someone’s watching us.”
The moment those words ended, every magic lamp went out.
Clack.
Clack.
Even the last light vanished. The entire waterway sank into darkness.
Lydia’s golden light immediately illuminated the area around us.
“Everyone stay close.”
The black pattern left on the wall moved. The stain flowed down like liquid and spread across the floor. From within it, black arms surged upward.
“Behind me!”
Erika leapt forward. A red fist burst the first shadow apart. Black smoke scattered in every direction.
But new shadows kept crawling out of the waterway walls and floor. Humanoid shapes. Arms stretched unnaturally long. Instead of faces, a single purple light was embedded in each one.
Curse-made thralls.
“Noel!”
Selene called.
“Analyzing.”
All three familiars took flight at once. Black chains unfolded in midair and bound the shadows’ arms and bodies. Noel’s black mana tangled with the enemy shadows. The colors were so similar it was hard to tell which side was ours.
“The three on the right are enemies.”
Noel said.
“And the left?”
“Mine.”
Even after the explanation I was still confused.
Lydia’s golden wave swept through the waterway. Our familiars were fine. The enemy shadows, on the other hand, screamed as their bodies melted on contact with the light.
Purification.
The remaining shadows fled the light and crowded toward the water channel. And then they surged up right in front of me.
“Cheongha!”
Lydia tried to raise a barrier. But this time I moved first.
There’s no sky.
I can’t call the clouds either.
That doesn’t mean I can’t do anything.
Right beside me, water was flowing.
I thrust the Yeouiju toward the channel.
“Rise!”
The water of the channel surged up like a wall. I wouldn’t let the scale run wild the way it had at the lake. This time, only exactly as much as needed.
A blue stream of water slammed into the shadows head-on.
KRA-BOOM!
The black shapes were swept away by the current and smashed into the opposite wall. I twisted my wrist. The stream of water changed direction with it, herding the fleeing shadows into one place.
“Lady Lydia!”
“Yes!”
Golden light erupted. The shadows caught in the water burned white all at once. The purple eyes winked out one by one.
A moment later, only the sound of dripping water remained in the channel.
I lowered my hand. The water that had risen returned quietly to the channel. The walls hadn’t collapsed. The floor hadn’t flooded. No one had been launched into the air.
Perfect control.
I hugged the Yeouiju to my chest and let the corner of my mouth lift.
Even underground, this much is easy.
A true powerhouse doesn’t care about the location.
“I didn’t cause an accident this time.”
When I said it proudly, Selene checked the surroundings.
“Yes. You moved only as much as necessary.”
That was praise. I thought it might be the first normal compliment I’d ever received from Selene.
Lydia smiled brightly too.
“You did wonderfully, Cheongha.”
Erika looked a little disappointed as she stared at the spot where the last shadow had vanished.
“It ended before I could smash them all myself.”
Noel’s familiar shook water from its wings.
“Magical Dragon aquatic form.”
“It is not.”
The reviews were all over the place.
Selene investigated further inside the erased magic circle. Frost thinly coated the wall and then flaked away. Beneath it, a small metal plate was discovered. On its surface were black lines identical to the magic circle we’d seen at the lake.
Looking closer, it was a simplified map of the academy. A single black line ran from the underground waterway upward—through the main building, the lecture halls, and finally to the tall central spire of the academy. The line ended there.
Selene looked down at the map.
“The bottom wasn’t the starting point after all.”
I quietly kept my mouth shut. Saying nothing at all was the safest option.
“Cheongha.”
Selene called my name.
“You suspected the spire from the beginning, didn’t you.”
Everyone looked at me again. Even silence wasn’t safe.
I just didn’t want to go underground.
I hesitated for a moment, then nodded.
“Well… directionally speaking.”
Selene’s pen moved.
The lie was diligently growing again today.