Chapter 48
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 48
Chapter Title: Wrapping Up the Mist Forest's Demonic Hand
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"Hmm... So that's what happened. You must have gone through a lot!"
Having heard the full explanation of the situation, Amelia nodded energetically and reached out toward me.
At the same time, an enormous amount of holy power enveloped my body, healing every part that even the highest-grade potions couldn't touch, along with any lingering pain.
I stood up, checked myself over, realized my body was fully recovered, and offered my thanks.
"Wow... Thanks so much. Honestly, things looked pretty serious, so I didn't tell Wol Ha-yeon, but my whole body was in agony."
"It couldn't be helped! One of the effects of Wol Ha-yeon's unique trait is that it continuously burns the struck area with moonlight mana. Didn't you know?"
"I knew, but I've never taken a hit from it before, so I didn't realize. It hurt like hell."
'I thought I was gonna die.'
Wol Ha-yeon's unique trait, the only existing SS-rank trait, [Eclipse Realm].
True to its reputation as the strongest SS-rank unique trait, it possessed a variety of additional effects incomparable to my own Mana Sensitivity Genius.
One of them was the presumed S-rank auxiliary trait called [Eclipse Mark], which she had used when unleashing those dozens of slashes earlier.
In the setting materials, it was described something like, [A silver stigma left on the place cut by the moon. The wound never heals.] So I had no gauge of how painful it would be...
If I had failed to deflect even some of them and taken the full brunt, I probably would have passed out while standing.
'That's how much it hurt.'
Anyway, thanks to the holy power, I had successfully recovered completely. I turned to Amelia, who was gazing at the spot where the demons' corpses were scattered.
"By the way, how did you end up coming all the way to the center? From the scoreboard earlier, it looked like you were busy hunting monsters and students."
"Right! I was hunting super diligently. I successfully smashed the thick skulls of over a hundred students, just like I aimed for!"
"Uh... I, I see? But didn't I tell you last time not to use 'thick skull' and to use a more refined word instead? Why do you always pick the crudest words with that pretty mouth of yours?"
"Pretty mouth... Ahem, before that, let me correct one thing first! The word you told me not to use was 'blockhead,' not 'thick skull'! I learned 'thick skull' just the other day from a new friend!"
Amelia clenched her right fist tightly and continued her explanation.
"Se-yeon told me! She said since there are a lot of seniors and classmates targeting you these days, if they try any funny business, smash their thick skulls with this fist!!"
"Hmm... You have some really excellent Korean teachers and friends around you, huh? That's fortunate."
I've felt it since last time, but I can't tell if this girl is surrounded by good people or weird people.
Anyway, as we chatted briefly, a sudden curiosity arose.
So, looking at Amelia, who was still gripping her right fist tightly and swinging at the air, I asked very cautiously.
"So, even if I tried some funny business with you, would you smash my thick skull?"
I asked this absurd question purely out of curiosity.
Now that the game had become reality, it was impossible for me to see the heroines' affection levels with my own eyes.
I suddenly wondered what Amelia's affection toward me was like.
And at my sudden question, she began pondering seriously, placing a finger on her chin and tilting her head.
"Hmm... Putting aside how sudden it is, I'm curious about the intent of the question! Does Hyun-sol have interest in me?"
"What do you think?"
"Doesn't seem like it at all! Not just your attitude in conversation, but the way you look at me is so different from other boys!"
"... Really? How is it different?"
'Interesting. What's different about it? I feel like I stared just as intently as the other guys.'
As I asked back with an intrigued expression, Amelia seemed slightly flustered, then blushed faintly on her cheeks and shouted.
"Th-that... You don't need to know the details! Anyway, just know it's different! The boys, including you, Hyun-sol, might not get it, but all the girls know!"
With that shout, Amelia vanished into the mist like she was fleeing.
And after staring at her retreating figure for a moment, I turned and headed in the opposite direction.
"... Come to think of it, I didn't hear why she came all the way to the center? Well, whatever, it doesn't matter much."
About 30 minutes had passed since the artificial dungeon evaluation began, making it roughly 1 hour and 30 minutes total.
An alert sounded from the watch on my wrist, and the professors' voices echoed throughout the dungeon.
"We'll end the evaluation here. Students still inside the dungeon, please be cautious of the impending teleportation magic."
Exactly one minute after his announcement ended, blue light enveloped my body and spat me out of the dungeon.
"Ugh... So dizzy."
I never get used to this dungeon nausea.
Actually, it'd be less nauseating if I just exited through the dungeon gate normally, but being forcibly dragged out by teleportation magic makes it worse.
Anyway, after about five minutes of holding my head and complaining of dizziness, I finally came to my senses and looked around.
Judging by the professors' and assistants' demeanor, fortunately, no students had met with accidents inside the dungeon.
At the same time, the realization that without Wol Ha-yeon, it would have been a catastrophe made my whole body shudder once more.
Of course, even if elite demons had descended in their true forms, the casualties would likely have been limited to dozens at most.
The students weren't pushovers, and above all, the more chaos they caused, the quicker the professors would notice the anomaly.
The only question was how they infiltrated the artificial dungeon without any administrators noticing...
Well, Wol Ha-yeon seemed to have noticed something, so she'd handle it herself.
"Ah~ I finally spotted Hyun-sol. Too bad."
"...?"
Turning at the familiar voice, I saw Sophia waving happily as she approached me from the side.
"What's that supposed to mean? Did you go looking for me or something?"
"Of course! I wanted to meet up and test the performance of my new lightning spell, but it's a shame."
Yoon Seo-rin, approaching alongside her, chimed in.
"I was a bit disappointed too. I was planning to show you some really cool mana bullets."
"... Kids, I'm not some living target for experimenting with your magic, you know? Why treat me like that...?"
These scary friends... I got excited for a second thinking they came looking for me, but to think their goal was just to kill me like Amelia—chills ran down my spine again.
"More importantly, you two tied for 2nd and 3rd? For about 20 minutes earlier, your scores weren't rising, so I thought you got eliminated."
"Ah, about that."
At my question, Sophia glanced sideways at Yoon Seo-rin, who was standing blankly beside her, and explained.
"We happened to run into each other near the dungeon center, so we figured we'd test the hot bonds of female friendship with a fight. Very seriously!"
"Oh... Hot bonds of female friendship? Anyway, what was the result?"
"Unfortunately, we couldn't settle it. We were too evenly matched."
"Really? That's impressive."
Sophia and Yoon Seo-rin had such opposite personalities that clashes between them weren't uncommon, so the fact that they fought inside the dungeon wasn't that interesting.
But at this point in time, for them to be evenly matched was quite noteworthy.
Normally, Sophia should be much stronger than Yoon Seo-rin right now.
Plus, through our joint research, I'd been giving Sophia indirect hints about formation magic circles and various spells bit by bit.
So she should have been far stronger than the Sophia I knew from the original.
Yet Yoon Seo-rin had matched her like that.
'Did she get some kind of influence too?'
In the original game, there were no events like waking up early every morning for training.
It just skipped from sleeping at night to morning class scenes or sub-quests.
But now, with daily morning mana bullet training sessions with me, she might have been influenced in the process.
Or maybe I'd never seen Yoon Seo-rin go all out at 100% until now.
Either way, the conclusion was that both were changing from the original—in a good way, with no downsides.
If they grew stronger faster and more reliably than in the original, their chances of dying would decrease accordingly...
"Haa..."
Lost in thought for a moment, I looked up at the two female students and asked.
"What are you up to this afternoon? I heard Mana and Magic Understanding is canceled today."
Since both took that class too, their afternoons were probably wide open like mine.
"Hmm, I was just gonna spend the whole day in the library continuing my magic circle research. I found something fun recently."
"I didn't make any plans..."
Yoon Seo-rin swiped her smartphone screen once and continued.
"But the association said someone will visit this afternoon. Seems like they have something to tell me, so I'll probably hang around nearby and head over then."
"I see."
The association agent's visit was likely for countermeasures regarding the demon from the artificial dungeon.
And with Sophia primed like that, better not to get too close...
After a brief deliberation, I decided to make a quick exit.
Come to think of it, someone I needed to meet right away came to mind.
"Just asked out of curiosity. See you tomorrow. Bye!"
I quickly said my farewells and left.