Dragons and Novels
An unexpected uninvited guest had been added to the mix, but one way or another the Jeju Island school trip had begun.
And not just any school trip—this was one thoroughly upgraded by throwing money around without restraint.
Every second-year student at our high school had been paired into groups of four. Each group got a driver and a seven-seater SUV, along with a corporate card that could be used anywhere, for anything.
For the record, there were no restrictions on spending at tourist spots, food, or souvenirs. But every purchase would later be reported in full to the homeroom teachers, so nobody was likely to go completely off the rails.
Not that it would have mattered either way. There was zero chance of any of it denting our company's finances.
Unless someone tried to buy the entire island of Jeju, maybe.
The other kids were going to have a great time regardless, so I decided to clear my head and focus on this trip for real.
It was a little—no, more than a little—annoying, but Rhea was right. With her around, I could put more of my attention on Ha-yan. There probably wouldn't be any other problems, but ever since the Mana Stone, my nerves had been running a bit sharp. That much was true.
"I was a little puzzled by the first place you all chose, myself. Going to Hallasan on day one, of all things."
Just as Rhea said, while every other group had headed off for easy tourist spots or horse ranches, the first destination we had picked for day one was none other than Hallasan.
Not Baengnokdam, of course. We would climb near the summit, but our actual goal was an oreum a little below the peak.
"Still, you researched it reasonably well. If you'd gone for the summit route as absolute beginners, today's hike might have been the end of your entire school trip."
"Huh? Why?"
Do Ji-yeon asked at Rhea's words.
Rhea glanced back over her shoulder at Do Ji-yeon as she answered.
"Because your whole body would have been screaming with lactic acid. The course you're taking is the best one for beginners. If you'd aimed for Baengnokdam… I might have had to stop you myself."
"Ahh. Got it."
"But the Yeongsil Trail you picked is short, beginner-friendly, and at this time of year the flowers are blooming, so it's a lovely course for a day out."
With that, Rhea turned her full attention back to the road.
And in the meantime, Ha-yan—
"Whoa… weather's insane… the views are insane… these photos are insane…"
—had her face pressed right up against the car window, relentlessly firing the shutter of the DSLR I had brought along specially.
She was right. The weather was perfect, and with midterms just over, this was the ideal window when spring flowers were starting to stretch and bloom in earnest.
How much time passed after that?
We arrived at the trailhead—a fairly large parking lot already filled with buses—and climbed out of the car.
Lush greenery and a faintly damp little ticket booth greeted us.
After texting our homeroom teacher to confirm our group's arrival, Rhea spoke up.
"I'll be enjoying some quiet time down here, then. Getting up to Witseoreum and back should take you a good three hours more, yes?"
"Yeah! But you're not coming up with us?"
Ha-yan tilted her head at Rhea's decision to stay behind alone.
Rhea smiled brightly as she answered.
"I need a little time to myself, you know. And now that we're here, there's something I need to look into."
She delivered the last part through mana so only Ha-yan and I could hear it, still smiling.
"Right. So there is something. What part?"
I asked Rhea through mana voice as well. Of course. There was no way she would have followed us all the way to Jeju without a purpose.
But Rhea only left a single mana-voice reply—that she hadn't properly discovered anything yet, and that she would report later—before vanishing from our sight along with the car.
Even so, I quietly injected a thread of my mana into the departing vehicle.
I needed to know where she was going, at the very least. We bickered constantly, but she was still a child I had created. And she probably already knew I would do it, right?
"Hoo. Master really is something else. Sharp as ever."
Rhea immediately sensed Cha Siu's mana clinging to her departing car.
He might not have known she was coming to Jeju in the first place, but now that she was here, slipping completely out of his perception was impossible.
And the time was coming when Cha Siu needed to know, sooner rather than later.
She had been leading the investigation herself, but the limit of what she could keep hidden had arrived, and there was no real reason left to hide it.
The Mana Stone. And knowing full well she would get an earful from Cha Siu once the investigation was over, she had still followed them all the way to Jeju.
Carrying a tension she had never felt in her few years of life, Rhea drove off toward her destination.
After about thirty minutes of driving, she arrived.
A quiet rural village, a slightly raised hill-like terrain.
Reaching an oreum in a countryside village on Jeju, Rhea carefully lifted a bag from the trunk and cast a transparency spell over it.
The true nature of that Mana Stone, uncovered through repeated research. And the largest volcanic terrain on the Korean Peninsula that one could actually reach.
There was no need to go all the way to Baengnokdam. Terrain like this was scattered all across the land of Jeju.
Going to Baengnokdam might have produced a more dramatic reaction from the Mana Stone, but that was not her purpose right now.
She only needed to confirm whether the part she had been thinking of purely as 'theory' would actually function in reality.
The oreum she had chosen was the spot she had determined—after hacking into the National Institute of Geological Research—would let her feel the magma closest.
Pushing through the undergrowth to the summit of the oreum, Rhea set the 007-style briefcase she was carrying onto the ground and carefully took out the same Mana Stone from before.
The moment the Mana Stone left the bag—
Fwaaah…
"Oh my. So the novel wasn't just fiction after all? What the hell is with this crazy planet?"
A faint but unmistakable reaction pulsed from the Mana Stone in Rhea's hand.
And the theory she had been entertaining was confirmed as reality.
"Even if it's a short course, this is pretty tough."
"That's because you're always out thrashing people left and right, so of course your stamina's good. Look at Ha-yan behind us."
"You want another beating?"
"No. I most emphatically decline."
After nearly three hours of hiking, we made it back down to the entrance.
The weather had been spectacular, the scenery flawless, and the people around us all perfectly pleasant.
The one real regret, if you had to name one, was that it was still a little early in the season—the flowers hadn't quite reached full bloom.
Still, we had come away with a pretty solid haul of our own.
"See? Good camera, good subject—look how insane these shots turn out. Check this out. You'd never get scenery like this on a phone. Ha-yan, you admit it, right?"
"I admit it, but it's way too embarrassing! Why is it nothing but pictures of me?! You could've taken some of the others too!"
"A phone is more than enough for the others. That way it's easier to share the photos with them later, right? If I shoot them on this, take it home, pull the data, and then try to send them, I guarantee I'll forget a hundred percent of the time."
"Ha-yan! Don't worry! We don't need those kinds of photos anyway! They say photos are what you have left, but getting shot by a pro camera like that? Hard pass! At least a phone lets you edit—this thing doesn't!"
While Ha-yan and I were bantering back and forth, Do Ji-yeon latched right onto Ha-yan and chimed in.
She had said it from the start, after all. Just focus on Ha-yan. She and Choi Hoon wouldn't feel even one percent left out if I paid them zero attention, so I shouldn't worry about it.
Since Do Ji-yeon was the one who had said it, I was simply cooperating enthusiastically.
We slowly flipped through the photos from the mountain as we reached the parking lot at the entrance. Rhea, wearing sunglasses with her arms folded, walked over and spoke.
"Did everyone enjoy the hike? Being young really is something—three hours of climbing and you still look completely fine."
At Rhea's words, Choi Hoon suddenly gave me a light shove and stepped forward.
"Ahaha. We've got stamina to spare, yeah. What were you up to in the meantime, Noona?"
"…What the hell is this guy doing all of a sudden?"
He had pushed my shoulder aside and planted himself in front, so I could only stare blankly at Choi Hoon with a face full of pure disbelief.
Ha-yan, wearing an expression that said she had already figured it out, whispered into my ear.
"What else would it be? He's about to drop the 'love at first sight' line right here, isn't he?"
"Oh for crying out loud. I'm gonna lose it."
I knew Choi Hoon fell hard and fast, but I never expected the target wouldn't even be human. No—actually, Choi Hoon had no way of knowing whether Rhea was human or not either way.
"Just leave him. No need to snatch his hope away. Rhea will handle it herself."
"That girl is the type to toy with someone else's friend in her own little fishing pond and then dump them without a second thought, you know? Want to bet on it?"
"Come on, don't be like that."
Ha-yan worked to soothe my rising irritation and told me not to get between the two of them.
It wasn't as if I could just announce right here that Rhea's true form wasn't human, that she was a doll made of mana, so I settled for a mild warning through mana voice.
"Don't overdo it."
"Heh heh. Of course not. I have absolutely no intention of doing anything like that to Master's friends."
Yeah, that was reassuring.
We climbed back into the vehicle and set off to tackle the next part of the schedule.
We had burned through stamina and internal energy on the hike, so now it was time to replenish.
Strangely, though, I felt a little less hungry than usual.
Not that I had any intention of skipping a meal. We were holding our company's corporate card, and that company was mine—what else was I going to do?
When she received our next destination, Rhea looked at us with genuine surprise.
"You're going somewhere this expensive? Didn't they say the receipts go to the homeroom teacher?"
"Don't worry about it and just drive. We've got a plan."
I told Rhea to quit fretting and focus on the wheel.
She shrugged at my reaction and started the car.
"Fine. I'm just the driver who gets paid well. And if you're treating me to food this expensive, I have no intention of refusing. Shall we head out again?"
"Woohoo~~!! Let's go eat Jeju black pork!!"
"Yeahhh~~"
"Y-yeah… yeah!!"
The two of them were fired up, and Ha-yan joined in a little awkwardly, stretching her arms overhead as the vehicle pulled out once more.
Hmm. That aside, later I was definitely going to ask what she had been doing alone for three hours at some rural oreum.