The First Joint Mock Battle Simulation (5)

In the corner of the waiting room, I sat staring blankly at the electronic display. How long had it been? The only thing filling my vision was the glaring red [ANNIHILATION] signal flashing relentlessly.

"Next, Group 5, enter."

The heavy air in the despair-filled waiting room rippled faintly. Group 5. After the total collapse of the three Rank 1 teams, these were the other aces that the rest of the freshmen were pinning their last shred of hope on. Min Se-hee's team, renowned for their razor-sharp spearmanship. And Kwak Ki-tae's—no, wait, Hwang Seong-jae's team, known as the greatest shield-bearer among the first-years.

'If it's those guys... maybe they can actually break through?'

No matter how hellish the difficulty, they were still the top Rank 1 students. Even I found myself staring at the tightly shut iron doors with a small spark of expectation.

But it took less than twenty minutes for that hope to be brutally crushed.

Min Se-hee's display bled crimson. Nineteen minutes and three seconds. It was the longest survival time so far, but the devastating result of ANNIHILATION remained unchanged.

One more minute passed. Then a heavy buzzer sounded, signaling that the twenty-minute time limit had expired.

Even Hwang Seong-jae's team had failed to clear it. The steel doors opened, and the two leaders who emerged looked utterly wrecked. Min Se-hee's usually proud shoulders were slumped, while Hwang Seong-jae, gripping his massive shield, was gasping for breath. Their faces were thick with regret and frustration, but what dominated most was sheer, bone-deep exhaustion.

At the same time, in the monitoring room.

The other professors kept clicking their tongues as they watched Group 5's battle logs on the screen. Though they had failed, the talent displayed by the top students was more than enough to ignite the professors' greedy scouting instincts.

"Ugh, what a shame. Such a shame."

Choi In-ho, the spear specialization head professor from the Weapon Combat Department, approached the monitor as if to stroke it and let out an admiring sigh. "Did you see the trajectory of that thrust from Min Se-hee? Even under the crushing pressure of the swarm, her point of impact didn't waver by a single millimeter. That's not the skill of a first-year. I need to scout her immediately for the second-year advanced spear research team and take her under my wing. It's a lifelong regret that she couldn't hold out for that final minute and got caught by a monster."

"Oh my, Professor Choi. You're quite the greedy one, aren't you?"

Beside him, Associate Professor Kang Soo-young from the Shield Guardian Department crossed her arms and snorted. Her gaze was fixed on Hwang Seong-jae's log—he had held his shield firm for the entire twenty minutes. "To me, only Hwang Seong-jae stands out. Even as the battlefield completely collapsed, he kept the boss's aggro locked on himself until the very end and endured the full twenty minutes. That iron-wall spatial control and defensive maintenance is worthy of being added to our Vanguard special operations reserve list right now. I'm definitely taking him."

The two professors passionately traded praise, each trying to claim the aces for their own departments. But behind them, Park Tae-soo, the full professor and head of the Tactics Department, frowned and dropped a cold dose of reality.

"You two are so excited about snatching up students for your own majors. But let's look at this objectively from a tactical standpoint. What good is it if Hwang Seong-jae holds the line with his shield? Their teamwork was the worst I've ever seen."

A short silence fell over the monitoring room at Professor Park's pointed criticism.

"Look there. While Hwang Seong-jae was tanking hard enough to break his own bones, the rest of that ragtag bunch couldn't land any meaningful damage. They just panicked and got swept away by area attacks. In reality, it was basically just Hwang Seong-jae taking hits like a sandbag the whole time. That result is no different from annihilation. A one-man show from the leader alone can never clear this simulation."

The professors nodded with regret. An implicit agreement spread through the room: no matter how outstanding an individual's ability, the shallow teamwork of first-years could never overcome this hellish difficulty.

However, Professor Ma Jin-tae—the very man who had designed this hellscape—stood with his arms crossed, looking down at the waiting room through the coated glass window. A faint smile played on his lips.

"It's flowing perfectly according to my plan."

This situation had thoroughly flattened the arrogant noses of the elite students. The smile suggested he was quite satisfied with this despairing scene, one that hammered home the truth: no matter how overwhelming one's individual power, survival was impossible without the interlocking gears of teamwork and utility.

Back in the waiting room.

After Group 5's failure, even Cha Yu-na's team from Group 6 was annihilated in just eighteen minutes, and Kwon Ha-eun's team from Group 7 left in dejected silence after timing out. There were no more ace teams left worth hoping for.

Once every single one of the first-years' celebrated geniuses had tasted bitter defeat, the atmosphere in the waiting room turned into complete, uncontrollable chaos.

"Hey, are you kidding me?! If you're just going to fail everyone like this, why even bother with the evaluation?!"

"Exactly! When my brother was a first-year here three years ago, the success rate for the first mock battle was at least fifty percent! This is clearly a failure in difficulty balancing!"

Complaints and grievances erupted from every corner. But the interesting thing was that even as they raged and vented their dissatisfaction, not a single person spoke about what exactly had happened inside the simulation.

'They're probably keeping quiet because they're ashamed of getting beaten so badly...'

I glanced around and clicked my tongue inwardly. No matter how much they pretended to band together to curse the faculty, the two hundred people in this room were ultimately fierce competitors. There wasn't a single fool in Gaon Academy willing to hand over valuable information—like monster patterns or gimmicks they'd experienced—for free to the teams coming after them.

Soon, the alarm sounded to signal that all of Group 7's simulations had ended.

'Looks like it's almost our turn.'

Preparing for our spot as Group 10, I turned my head to gauge the mood of our party.

"Haa... haa... Just trust the shield... just the shield..."

Yoon Jung-woo, just as tense as I was, kept swallowing dryly and muttering to himself.

"Hic... sob... What do we do? Everyone's coming out drenched in sweat... I don't want to go in there..."

Song A-rin had completely lost her nerve from the vicious atmosphere and brutal difficulty. She hugged her staff tightly, looking like she might burst into tears at the slightest touch.

"Huuuum—! Puuha—!"

Kwak Ki-tae was at least a little calmer than the explosive mania he'd shown in the cafeteria, but he was still huffing through his nose and obsessively stroking the bombs in his arms. It didn't look good.

And finally, our party's proud top student and pillar. Party leader Han Seol-ah.

"......"

Leaning against the wall, Han Seol-ah kept sneaking glances at me while carefully observing her surroundings. Her usual cold, haughty face had sticky chocolate crumbs smeared around her mouth, though she didn't seem to realize it.

The moment our eyes met, she flinched, then whispered in an incredibly tiny voice.

"Um... Do you... happen to have one more chocolate bar?"

Asking for a chocolate bar refill in the middle of this insane tension. I stared at her blankly for a moment, my brain momentarily frozen, then hurriedly rummaged through my pocket.

"Uh...? Yeah, yeah. Here. Take it."

When I handed her the second chocolate bar I'd kept as an emergency supply, Han Seol-ah's silver eyes sparkled for an instant. She snatched it up, quickly turned her head away from the others, and faced the wall. Then she ripped the wrapper off in one swift motion and shoved the whole thing into her mouth.

Chomp chomp.

It sounded like a squirrel cracking acorns behind the Ice Queen's back.

Right then, as Group 8's simulation ended and Group 9 moved to wait in front of the iron doors, a mechanical announcement echoed throughout the waiting room.

The call had finally come. Yoon Jung-woo, Song A-rin, Kwak Ki-tae, and I stood up with solemn expressions that said, 'It's here.'

Our leader, Han Seol-ah, also pushed off the wall and turned around, but—

"...Mmph."

Because she'd shoved the chocolate bar into her mouth without finishing chewing, both her cheeks were puffed out like a chipmunk's. Trying to hide her swollen cheeks, she looked slightly embarrassed, lowered her eyes, and quickly took the lead toward the armory with brisk steps.

Watching her unbalanced back, I barely managed to swallow the chuckle that almost escaped me.

'Yeah. If she eats that well, she'll probably carry us somehow.'

I checked the weight of the weapons dangling all over my back and waist one more time, then followed the top student with her puffed-out cheeks toward the massive armory.

The scale of the armory beyond the giant steel doors far exceeded my imagination.

"Whoa..."

An involuntary gasp slipped from someone's mouth. This wasn't just a warehouse with ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a few weapons stacked up. It had the grandeur of an enormous national library housing tens of thousands of books, or an entire weapons museum containing the history of an entire continent, all moved here intact.

Swords, spears, bows, blunt weapons, shields, magic staves, magitech firearms—everything was on display. The neat organization by type and characteristics created an oddly overwhelming presence.

'Where should I start?'

I quickly scanned the armory's overall layout and mapped out a farming route in my head. Meanwhile, our party members scattered to their respective weapon sections and began their serious shopping spree.

The first one to catch my eye was our leader, Han Seol-ah. She stood in the longsword section, carefully and sharply examining the blades, testing their balance and weight. Her cheeks were still slightly puffed, meaning she hadn't fully swallowed the chocolate bar she'd crammed in earlier, but her attitude while selecting weapons was that of a perfect professional.

In the shield section beside her, Yoon Jung-woo wore a grave expression, lost in deep contemplation.

"Haa... Should I go with a medium shield that allows counterattacks? Or a large tower shield? Or maybe a spiked shield that can deal reflected damage..."

It was the fierce dilemma of a tank standing at the crossroads of survival, trying to decide which shield would let him live.

On the other hand, Song A-rin—who had been trembling and on the verge of tears just moments ago—was nowhere to be found. From the magic staff section came a voice in a completely different tone.

"Heee! There are so many staves here! Wow, this one has insane mana amplification, and this one has casting speed correction?!"

A-rin was swinging the staves around, looking utterly thrilled as if she were in a luxury department store. The terror of the vicious simulation seemed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to have been temporarily deleted from her mind.

And the one who underwent the most dramatic change was, of course, Kwak Ki-tae.

"Huuuum... I can't use my wonderful, beautiful, artistic handmade bombs. This is a tremendous loss for Gaon Academy... Huh? Wait, what?!"

The moment his gaze landed on the throwing and explosives section, despite his earlier depression over the no-personal-weapons rule, a manic gleam sparked in Ki-tae's eyes.

"Mana Fragment Grenades! High-concentration Elemental Grenades! White Phosphorus Incendiaries! My god, they've stocked every beautiful toy by type!"

Ki-tae began frantically sweeping the bombs off the shelves, huffing wildly through his nose. At first he loaded them into the provided auxiliary bag, but when it filled up, he started strapping them all over his body—waist, thighs, calves, everywhere. He had literally become a walking powder keg.

'Good, everyone's grabbing what they need. Then it's my turn.'

I began looting the armory in earnest. The first thing I picked up was a small 'Mana Calculation Assistance Pendant' to compensate for my ambiguous Rank 2 magic casting speed. After hanging it around my neck, I headed straight for the blunt weapon section.

Given our party's composition, we needed heavy impact to support our main dealer, Han Seol-ah. I chose a massive war hammer capable of smashing monster skulls and a long spear for dealing piercing damage from a safe distance, then secured them in an X-shape across my back.

Next came auxiliary weapons for utility and creating variables. I densely packed throwing daggers and kunai on both thighs and calves, and wrapped a steel chain sickle—kusarigama—around my waist to create irregular trajectories in close combat.

Finally, the front of my body. I fastened a sturdy combat net across my chest to bind the boss or mobs, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and slung a magitech automatic rifle diagonally over it for mid-range fire support.

Large weapons on my back, a gun and net in front, hidden weapons on my lower body. When I looked in the mirror after finishing my setup, I looked exactly like a peddler who had scavenged random junk from a battlefield and was now trying to sell it.

It was quite heavy, but I nodded in satisfaction.

"Um... Do-woon. Isn't that a bit... excessive?"

"You'll collapse before the monsters even hit you..."

Yoon Jung-woo and A-rin, who had finished their own shopping, stared at me in horror. Even Kwak Ki-tae, covered head to toe in bombs, clicked his tongue and said, "That's even crazier than me."

Other teams passing by the armory snickered, saying things like "Pfft, what the hell is that guy?" and "He's doing a Thousand-Armed Kannon cosplay." But our leader, Han Seol-ah, reacted differently.

She carefully examined the balance of all the weapons hanging off me, then offered advice in a surprisingly serious voice.

"It's not too hard to move, right? If your body gets sluggish and you can't dodge, it's pointless. Only take what you can handle without straining yourself."

It didn't sound like sarcasm. She genuinely seemed worried about my body weight and mobility. I grinned and replied.

"Don't worry. It's lighter than it looks."

It wasn't bravado. Thanks to wearing an insanely heavy weighted vest and running laps around the training ground under the blazing sun throughout the entire break, plus the training that forced me to squeeze out every drop of mana, I had learned how to circulate mana through my body with extreme efficiency and minimal waste. Operating at this level didn't strain me physically at all.

In truth, I could have carried more from a stamina standpoint, but I'd stopped here simply because there was no more space left on my body to hang additional weapons.

When our fully armed party left the armory and stood in the Group 10 waiting area, the waiting room—watching us through the monitors—immediately erupted with blatant mockery and whispers.

"Hey, look at Party 38's setup. One's a walking bomb, the other's a weapons peddler."

"Now that I look, they're the only party with just one Rank 1—Han Seol-ah. Poor top student, what a shame."

"Is that peddler trying to sell weapons to the boss or something? He's carrying so much junk. Can he even run away with all that weight?"

"Want to bet on when they'll get annihilated? I'm betting under nine minutes."

It was the typical pattern of extras who, despite clearly being doomed to fail themselves, tried to escape reality by tearing someone else down. I let their mockery wash over me like pleasant background noise and lightly tapped the handle of the hammer on my back.

Meanwhile, at the same time.

In the control zone monitoring room.

The central monitor displayed the ongoing simulation footage of Group 9, but the professors' attention wasn't on it. Group 9 was floundering in the same predictable pattern as all the previous teams, so the professors had long since lost interest in their pathetic party play.

What had actually captured their attention was a small sub-monitor in the corner showing the queue in front of the armory. More precisely, it was the bizarre sight of Kang Do-woon, covered head to toe in all sorts of junk.

"What on earth is that student doing? Did he come for the simulation evaluation or to open a junk shop?"

"No matter how you look at it, a magitech assault rifle, a hammer, and a chain sickle? Carrying such a random assortment won't do him any good. The weight alone will eat up all his stamina."

While the other department professors clicked their tongues and whispered, Professor Ma Jin-tae's brow twitched faintly. He had been standing with his arms crossed, wearing a smug smile the entire time.

'What kind of lunatic is this one?'

It was too light-footed to dismiss as mere attention-seeking behavior. Even with the extreme weight of a magitech assault rifle and a war hammer hanging from him simultaneously, Kang Do-woon's steps and center of gravity showed no sign of strain. It was as if that weight had always been a natural part of his body.

Intrigued, Professor Ma picked up the tablet on the table and immediately pulled up the roster for Group 10, Party 38.

A bomb-heavy party with grotesquely broken balance. It was a mystery why the swordsmanship top student, Han Seol-ah, had formed such a trash-tier party. Professor Ma snorted and flicked to the last member's profile with his finger. He wanted to see exactly who this bizarre weapons peddler was.

And in the next moment, Professor Ma's eyes widened slightly.

"...What the hell is this report card?"

An involuntary gasp escaped Professor Ma Jin-tae's lips. Students who entered Gaon Academy usually poured everything into one or two main weapons they specialized in, earning Rank 1 or at least high-tier scores. But this student named Kang Do-woon was different. Every subject, every weapon system, even magic and tactics—without a single exception, everything was lined up perfectly at the awkward middle ground of Rank 2.

Nothing stood out, but on the flip side, he was a freakish all-rounder who could handle everything.

Professor Ma alternated his gaze between Kang Do-woon's profile on the tablet and the image on the monitor of Kang Do-woon covered in weapons. The look in his eyes had shifted from cynicism to deep interest.

"Hoh."

The corner of Professor Ma's mouth curled up into a strange smile.

"This party might turn out to be quite an entertaining spectacle after all."