Chapter 336: No, I Said Let’s Just Enjoy the Festival Normally! (8)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 336: No, I Said Let’s Just Enjoy the Festival Normally! (8)
“This is troublesome.”
The Doctor sighed even as she hurried toward the Chairperson’s office.
Now that the two people she had hoped would never meet had finally clashed, she had to at least minimize the damage.
She had warned her to show restraint, telling her that nothing good would come of a meeting. She should have known something was up when the woman started worrying as if she were looking at a newborn baby.
Fine. Fortunately, Leilan seems to be in her office, so I can ask for help.
“Leilan, I’m sorry to bother you when you’re busy, but I need your help with—huh?”
When she hurriedly opened the door to the Chairperson’s office, the Doctor momentarily thought she had entered the wrong room in her haste.
The reliable friend she always trusted never wore such a dazed, vacant expression.
“…Leilan?”
“Oh, uh. Doctor. What’s the matter?”
“…Are you really okay? If you’re feeling unwell, I’d like you to tell me now. I’ll have to go find someone else to ask.”
“No, I’m perfectly fine now. It’s just, well… I was just indulging in some delusions unbecoming of my age for a moment.”
“Delusions…? I don’t know what you’re talking about, but as long as you’re okay, that’s fine. The situation is urgent. We have to stop those two from fighting. It might be too much for you alone, but if we mobilize the Academy’s personnel…”
“Stop them? That looks like Seo Ye-hwa out there.”
“That’s right.”
“I don’t know who that masked person is, but with Ye-hwa there, it won’t escalate into a major disaster. And honestly, while I’m grateful they settled the Academy’s incidents, it might be better for that person to be captured now, before an official villain rank is assigned.”
“No, it’s not that simple. I can’t explain in detail right now, but if those two fight, there will be trouble.”
“…Trouble?”
Fortunately, Leilan’s expression turned serious at the mention of trouble.
The Doctor had worried that, in the worst-case scenario, she might have to explain that the villain’s identity was her own nephew, or reveal the relationship between her sister and Seo Ye-hwa.
She felt guilty toward Leilan for trusting her so easily, but honestly, this was information that needed to be kept secret if possible. She wanted to move past it without saying a word if she could help it.
“What do I need to do?”
“First, regroup with Cathy and stop the fight. I’ll take care of the rest.”
“…You make it sound so simple. Stop that fight?”
Leilan wasn’t sure if ‘fight’ was even the right word for it, but it was certainly something that others couldn’t easily interfere with.
“…Is it impossible after all?”
“No. A hero can’t easily say something is impossible. Being a hero isn’t exactly a profession for doing rational things, is it?”
Manipulating the wind to slowly rise into the air, Leilan looked at the two figures battling in the sky and contacted Cathy.
* * *
It looked as though I had shredded that pretty face with the Dragon’s Shadow, but sure enough, she stood there perfectly fine without a single scratch.
It was just like the first time I fought her.
No matter what attack I used, no matter how powerful it was, she handled it with nonchalance.
Whether she dodged, blocked, or neutralized it—most attacks simply didn’t work on her.
And for good reason. She was, without question, one of the most broken characters in this novel’s world.
Just looking at her talent alone was nonsensical, and the traits added on top of it were enough to make one laugh in disbelief.
Price of Choice.
An SS-rank talent. It was the power to regress to twenty-four hours prior, provided certain conditions were met.
It couldn’t be used consecutively, and there were other minor restrictions and penalties, but the mere fact that she could turn back time whenever she wanted made it an absurd ability.
Furthermore, despite having such a broken talent, her traits and the artifacts she used were even more over-the-top.
Through the trait ‘Future Sight’—born from countless regressions and battles—she could predict an opponent’s movements with near-prophetic accuracy. And the fortuitous encounters she had gained from resolving various incidents were all extraordinary items.
I didn’t like it.
I didn’t like how she stood there without counterattacking after effortlessly dodging all my strikes, and I especially hated the way she still looked at her attacker with those pitying eyes.
“…Stop this. I didn’t come here to fight.”
[Oh, really? Then you shouldn’t have dared to bring up that name in front of me.]
I knew all too well from my pre-regression experiences that she wasn’t good with words.
I also vaguely knew that the look in her eyes came from a place of genuine worry for me.
But even if everyone else in the world could, she—and only she—had no right to look at me with those eyes.
To reiterate, her talent was limited regression.
It was the power to make an event that had already happened as if it never existed.
And for reasons I didn’t know, she had stood by and watched my mother die.
She had arrived late to save me and my dying mother, but she could have come sooner.
She could have saved her.
She could have stopped it if she wanted to.
Oh, of course, I knew.
There was the drawback of not being able to use that talent consecutively, and perhaps some specific conditions hadn’t been met.
Or maybe she was afraid of the penalty she had to pay each time she used it. Perhaps a larger incident was scheduled to break out that day, and she had moved to prevent that instead.
So, I didn’t resent her.
It was ridiculous to even use the word ‘resentment’ since she wasn’t the one who killed her, but I tried to let it go, telling myself that things happen.
Even her looking at me with those wretched eyes—I didn’t like it, but I could have let it go, thinking it was just pathetic guilt.
But not this.
Whatever feelings she had toward me, she should never have dared to mention my mother’s name in front of me.
No matter the reason, she had ultimately let her die. She had no right to act like she knew anything.
So, I would make her pay the price.
She probably thought she had all my movements figured out because of her Future Sight, right?
She probably thought that even if some unexpected accident occurred, she could just regress.
There was indeed a gap in power between us so vast it seemed insurmountable, so it was only natural for her to think that way.
But here’s the thing.
Even if I couldn’t defeat her right now, I could at least make her blood run cold.
In the end, I was the one who won before the regression.
— Do you feel a bit better now? Since it’s the end, won’t you listen to my story for just a moment?
That gaze she gave me right until the very end, just before I lost my life—it was exactly the same, wasn’t it?
Let’s see if she can keep that up this time.
As if sensing the change in the energy I was emitting, she straightened her posture. However, in the end, the two of us didn’t collide.
Just before I lunged, a single swordsman stepped between us.
Kang Ho-in.
He wasn’t a hero and thus had no rank, but he was clearly a powerhouse on par with the upper echelons of S-rank.
I had already explained the situation since he was with my father and Cheon Mu-jin, but it seemed he had come to stop the fight after sensing the ominous atmosphere.
However, while I expected him to point his blade at me while standing by Seo Ye-hwa’s side, for some reason, he slowly turned his back to me and pointed his drawn sword toward the world’s strongest hero.
“I won’t ask why you’re looking like that for now.”
…Huh? What is he saying? Why is he acting like he knows exactly who I am?
“I knew you were hiding a lot, and seeing what you’ve been doing, it doesn’t seem like you truly intend to become a villain. I can hear the details later.”
He spoke so calmly, as if he were certain of my identity, that I checked to see if my mask had fallen off. It was still firmly in place.
“However, it seems most people, including my daughter, don’t know your identity. I’ll need an explanation of how this all happened once everything is over.”
No matter how I looked at it, he wasn’t just guessing. He sounded certain…?
The shock caused my head, which had been freezing with rage, to turn lukewarm.
It wasn’t exactly cold, but my reason had returned.
No, but seriously, how on earth did he know…?
* * *
During his active years, Kang Ho-in’s nickname was ‘The Swordsman Who Cuts the Essence.’
The secret family swordsmanship he took pride in had been developed long ago for humans to fight against things that were not human, and it possessed the trait of cutting through the opponent’s essence.
To cut the essence, one naturally needed the power to grasp and see through what that essence was, did they not?
Therefore, as one practiced this swordsmanship and reached higher levels, they would naturally awaken a type of Mind’s Eye.
The higher the level, the more things the Mind’s Eye could see through. Upon reaching maturity, one could easily see through spirit-type monsters—usually considered a weakness for swordsmen—or artifacts that suppressed one’s presence.
Whatever that mask is, if it’s at a level that can’t deceive my eyes, it’ll be useless soon enough.
This naturally applied to the mask Kang So-hyun was wearing.
Even with his reinforcement effects, the mask itself was merely a hero-grade artifact.
Actually, at first, he had considered just feigning ignorance.
If the boy hadn’t lost his cool until the end, he probably wouldn’t have intervened.
But to think that the boy, who had held onto at least a shred of reason while beating that brat Keras, would suddenly lose it upon seeing Ye-hwa.
He had thought the boy had become a bit more mellow since the day they first met, but it wasn’t that he’d mellowed out—he was just hiding it well.
…Come to think of it, it was a bit pathetic.
No matter how he looked at it, the boy was far too lacking for his daughter. But unfortunately, among those of a similar age, there wasn’t anyone stronger than him, from a good family, handsome, domestic, and good with kids.
How could there be no one better than a guy like this?
Even now, seeing him dither about what to do was just frustrating.
“…If my daughter hadn’t said she liked you, this never would have happened.”
Regrettably, there were no better candidates, and his daughter was head over heels.
[That… well, Father-in-law. You see.]
“Who are you calling ‘Father-in-law’? You haven’t even had the ceremony yet.”
Even if just for Ha-ni’s sake, he couldn’t let the boy fall apart.
Considering the boy’s state and the opponent, it was right to stop things here.
“Ye-hwa, you stop here too. I don’t know what you’re thinking, but…”
But suddenly, looking at the face of the woman he was facing, the atmosphere felt unusual.
Should he say she looked like she was displeased with something?
“…My voice wouldn’t reach him no matter how much I pleaded. Yet you calmed him down so easily, Mr. Ho-in.”
“Your voice is full of dissatisfaction. Surely you aren’t thinking of taking me on?”
…Well, honestly, that would be troublesome. They weren’t exactly strangers, and he had thought she would stop if he stepped in, out of respect for their old bond.
Even in his prime when his heart was fine, he had never managed more than a draw against her when she was still inexperienced.
Now, he had a time limit on combat due to his injury, and she had grown into a mature hero, undoubtedly stronger than the version in his memories. He would be lucky to hold out for a short while.
Looking back, the fool was still preoccupied with him and, fortunately, hadn’t taken a combat stance. But if Ye-hwa attacked him, it was obvious the boy’s eyes would flip again in an instant.
…Seriously, what is it about children that makes a father have to look after even his daughter’s unattractive boyfriend?
“…What else could it be? He’s a treasure.”
The moment he gave up and took a stance.
The situation took a turn for the worse.
Chairperson Leilan and Professor Cathy had burst onto the scene.
…Ah, well. Those two probably didn’t know the masked person’s identity was Kang So-hyun, so they likely wouldn’t side with him as he had.
If those two joined in, he wouldn’t be able to hold out for even a moment with his injured body.
“Wait, let me explain…”
So, although he felt sorry for the boy, he intended to give a brief explanation of the situation.
“Seo Ye-hwa. Please step back. This is a formal request from me as the Chairperson of the Academy and an S-rank hero.”
However, the situation began to unfold in the opposite direction of what he had expected.
Professor Cathy and the Chairperson had also sided with them.
…Fortunately, it seemed he wouldn’t have to expose the boy’s identity just yet.