Chapter 39
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 39
Chapter Title: En Route to the Plains
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Monday morning.
The area in front of the dormitory was chaotic at a glance.
It wasn’t hard to understand. This was the first time the entire first-year class was heading out.
‘Half excitement, half tension.’
Abel, who had finished preparing early and come out, thought as he watched the cadets.
On the day of departure, the proportion feeling tension had risen, but overall, the atmosphere was buoyant.
‘Well, it’s better than everyone trembling in fear.’
If they were floating on air, he could at least give them a warning, but if they were sullen from fear, there was nothing he could do.
As Abel thought positively like that.
Someone placed their chin on his shoulder.
“Abel! How long have you been out here?”
It was Daniel.
His hair was half-wet, as if he had rushed out.
“Quite a while. What were you doing to be late?”
“I was practicing body techniques and lost track of time.”
“You went to the training grounds again today? Don’t you ever run out of stamina?”
“Yeah.”
Abel was momentarily speechless at the bright reply.
Shaking his head, Abel said.
“Let’s not talk about it.”
“Huh? Why?”
No matter how much he said, it would only hurt his own mouth, so Abel didn’t respond.
“Now, now. Everyone, stand straight!”
Soon after, the instructors appeared and quickly took control.
The cadets instantly formed neat ranks, and in about ten minutes, everything was perfectly organized.
After checking attendance, the instructors shouted in loud voices.
“Everyone, move out!”
The cadets began following the leading instructors.
The destination was none other than the academy’s main gate, where rows of transport vehicles were lined up.
They were vehicles called mana cars or automatic carriages.
“Alright, Class A, board in order!”
They boarded by class.
Abel followed the others onto the leftmost vehicle. Soon, the assigned instructor boarded as well.
Since this was an outing, each class had its own instructor, and for Class A, it was none other than Kaul.
“Sit down quickly! We’re departing soon!”
At Kaul’s words, clenching his fist, the cadets sat as if on cue.
Wooooong-!
Soon, a loud mana resonance echoed.
There were no windows to see outside, but he could feel it slowly moving forward.
‘Like I felt last time, it really feels like an armored car.’
In this world, these mana-powered transports were mostly military vehicles for now.
It meant they prioritized efficiency over comfort.
‘There are comfortable ones, but they wouldn’t use those for first-year cadets.’
Normally, he wouldn’t complain about such things, but considering the destination of this field training, he couldn’t help but sigh.
Because it took at least twelve hours to reach the Telif Plains.
In other words, he had to sit in this hard, cramped seat for twelve hours straight.
“We’ve departed. It’ll take quite a while to get there. We’ll probably arrive around late evening.”
At that moment, Kaul spoke up.
He shot a sharp gaze at the cadets and said.
“Once we arrive, there won’t be much time to rest comfortably until the training ends. So, no chit-chat on the way. Just sleep.”
That alone wouldn’t have been very persuasive, but Kaul added one more thing.
“Anyone talking gets demerits.”
That was very effective.
Having silenced the cadets, Kaul crossed his arms and closed his eyes.
Abel, who had no intention of chatting anyway, quietly closed his eyes as well.
But sleep didn’t come even after time passed.
Because he had gone to bed early the previous night for today.
‘I’ll meditate instead.’
Abel gave up on sleeping and began meditating.
He had often meditated to clear his mind even before, but after learning the mana breathing technique, he did it almost every day without fail.
The Optium Breathing Method emphasized two things.
Assimilation and inner contemplation.
The former was directly tied to accumulating mana, the core itself.
The latter was a bit ambiguous.
According to the book, through inner contemplation, the practitioner could come to know themselves better.
The more they knew themselves, the more efficiently they could perform the same actions.
And during training, they would instinctively know how to proceed.
Up to that point, it seemed to have tremendous effects, but the problem was that it didn’t resonate much.
Naturally, since he couldn’t grasp what properly contemplating the inner self meant.
‘It’s probably because my training is still lacking.’
With that thought, Abel slowly began the stages of meditation.
The first step was to clear stray thoughts.
Erase the thoughts wandering in his mind.
Then erase the thought of focusing on meditation. And finally, even the thought of meditating.
Empty everything.
Once he created a blank canvas like that, he began drawing something on it.
It was Abel himself.
As if observing from a third-person perspective.
This was the part many struggled with, but Abel didn’t have much trouble here.
Because, to some extent, Abel’s existence was like that of another person to him.
How often had he observed his own body since opening his eyes in this place?
Who the original owner of this body was. How they had lived. What they had done.
He had observed his body obsessively to find out.
And the result of that observation was now before him.
‘Abel.’
An orphan wandering the streets.
That was all he knew. Or more precisely, that was the only thing he knew.
Abel’s gaze turned to the pattern engraved on one side of his body.
This didn’t exist in the game. He had never heard of or seen it.
So he speculated.
This must be a new clue related to Abel’s identity.
-It appeared when he first encountered the Blade Tail.
-He absorbed its power when he defeated the Blade Tail.
That was all he knew currently. More unknowns than knowns.
That was why Abel had some expectations for this training.
It was a chance to encounter far more types of Gigadeus Fragments. Of course, he had worries too.
Abel set aside such expectations and worries, focusing on examining his body.
Beyond just the surface, to check the interior.
What is contemplation?
It means observing something with a calm mind, detached from subjectivity.
So Abel erased the trivial information and preconceptions in his mind, looking ahead with clear eyes.
Even the fact that he was an orphaned boy.
Even the possibility that he hid some special secret.
After erasing those, only a chillingly unfamiliar boy remained before him.
He gazed at the boy for a long time.
Then, at some point, his gaze turned to the pattern on his chest.
He tried to look away several times, but it was like a magnet pulling his eyes; he couldn’t.
At that point, Abel gave up forcing his gaze away and let the flow take him.
In Abel’s eyes, the pattern began to grow larger.
Growing, and growing more.
At some moment, it was no longer on his body but engraved on a massive wall.
A wall so huge he had to crane his neck almost all the way back.
Thump-.
As he looked at the wall, a heartbeat-like sound echoed from somewhere.
Thump, thump-.
Abel stepped forward. He reached out toward the massive wall.
Swoosh-.
The moment his fingertips touched the wall.
The heartbeat roared into his ears like thunder, loud and deafening.
The moment the pattern saw Abel and Abel saw it.
An indescribable presence pressed down on him.
“Hup!”
Abel involuntarily sucked in a breath.
Right after, the crushing presence, the massive wall and pattern, even his own body—all vanished in an instant.
When everything disappeared and his eyelids lifted on their own.
The first thing that entered his eyes was dim light.
Rolling only his eyeballs in that state, he saw boys and girls dozing off.
Not immediately grasping the situation, Abel just blankly stared at the scene.
Soon, Abel recalled that he was traveling by vehicle for outdoor training.
‘This is inside the vehicle.’
Those sitting around were his classmates.
Turning his head a bit more, he saw Kaul sitting near the entrance.
Right. This was inside the vehicle.
Realizing that, Abel let out a sigh of relief without thinking.
“Abel. You okay?”
Then, Daniel, sitting beside him, whispered in a small voice.
Abel nodded slightly and replied.
“Yeah.”
“You were sweating and looking like you were having a nightmare for a long time.”
“Me?”
“Yeah.”
Abel touched his forehead at those words.
It felt clammy with cold sweat. A beat later, he felt sweat inside his clothes too.
A sticky discomfort enveloped his whole body.
‘For a long time?’
Feeling doubtful, Abel asked Daniel.
“What time is it now?”
“Huh? I don’t know the time, but the instructor said meal time is soon.”
“Soon for meals meant at least three hours had passed.”
It was shocking for Abel.
He had only meditated briefly, yet three hours had flown by.
Abel brushed it off to Daniel as having a short nightmare and recalled the meditation memory.
‘Something was different.’
He had consistently done inner contemplation before, but this was the first time something like this happened.
No, this was the first time he had concentrated so deeply.
Usually, his focus lasted at most an hour before he woke up.
Considering that, seeing the pattern and wall must have had the biggest impact.
Normally, he would visualize his body and that was it.
‘The strangest part is that wall.’
At some point, the pattern was no longer on Abel’s body but on a massive wall.
And it felt like a real wall, with worn and broken traces here and there.
Abel had never imagined anything like that before.
‘A pattern on a massive wall.’
It might be a clue related to the true nature of the pattern on his body.
Abel recalled a passage from the breathing method book.
-Through inner contemplation, the practitioner may come to know even what they didn’t know about themselves. Beyond body and mind, what lies deep in the soul.
Perhaps it was a memory of this body called Abel surfacing.
He discreetly wiped his face with one hand.
Pondering unresolvable questions right now was a headache in many ways.
As usual, Abel shoved the question to a corner of his mind for now.
Excluding meal time, the vehicle kept moving nonstop.
The sun, high in the sky, sank beyond the horizon, replaced by a bright moon.
“We’ve arrived!”
Kaul shouted loudly, and the cadets disembarked one by one following the lead.
Abel got off with the others and looked up at the sky.
The round moon hanging there somehow carried an ominous glow.