A Small War on Bukhan Mountain
The number of people we needed to find had grown to three.
We decided to head for the mountain summit first, where the shelter was. Anyone with half a brain would gather in the same place.
While we were deep in conversation about the gate crisis, Rudi suddenly raised her hand.
"Um, excuse me…"
Even in a situation like this, asking for permission to speak was pretty shocking — but honestly, I was just grateful she was being well-behaved.
Elaine answered.
"Yeah?"
"Over there… isn't that a person?"
In the direction she pointed, someone was limping toward us. The moment they spotted us, they started waving both arms wildly.
It was none other than our missing leader.
"Thank goodness! You're alive!"
Up close, his arms and legs were covered in scrapes. They didn't look like cuts from a weapon — more like he'd been torn up by thorns.
"Senior, are you okay?"
"I'll stop the bleeding!"
While Elaine went to meet Choi Junsu, Rudi quickly pulled out a healing potion and bandages.
"Sit here, Senior."
"Thanks."
Choi Junsu collapsed onto a rock, wiping the sweat from his forehead. He let out a long breath, finally releasing the tension he'd been holding. The look of a man who'd been running from something was written all over him.
"What happened? Did you run into a monster?"
At Elaine's question, Choi Junsu nodded with a grim face.
"I did."
"A golem? Or a goblin tribe?"
Choi Junsu was estimated to have roughly upper C-class mana. For someone like him to run, the enemy had to be either numerous or a powerful golem.
But Choi Junsu shook his head.
"Neither. Listen, Elaine. You're from a magic family, right?"
"That's right."
"Did you hear anything about this training exercise? Like B-class or higher monsters showing up?"
Elaine tilted her head.
"What do you mean?"
"You're sure there's nothing beyond what's listed in the survival manual?"
"Yes. Anything D-class or higher is left out because people could get hurt. For C-class and above, the only things in here are the training golems."
"…Then we need to report this."
"What? Why?"
Choi Junsu's face twisted.
"I think I ran into a high-rank monster."
"…!"
Heaving a heavy sigh, Choi Junsu told us what he'd just been through.
"The truth is, a little while ago I got separated and was wandering around on my own when some woman came up and talked to me."
"You alone?"
"What?"
"Ehehe, don't be so on edge. I got separated from my party too. Hey, do you happen to know where the Ether Stones are?"
…
Choi Junsu felt something was off.
Messy hair, a face so gaunt the bones showed through, and robes black from head to toe. She looked like a teenager, but the overall vibe was nowhere near that of an Academy student.
The woman smiled sweetly.
"Are you ignoring me?"
"…I don't know where the Ether Stones are."
"Oh, okay! Then want to look for them together and get out?"
…Not a student.
It occurred to him that maybe an instructor was pulling a prank. He'd heard rumors that they sometimes intervened directly to adjust the difficulty. With thirteen students from prestigious families among the current enrollees, it was entirely possible.
Either way, Choi Junsu agreed to go with her. Being alone was scary. He'd keep his guard up, and if they ran into other students, he'd just join them — that was the vague plan.
"Huh? Aren't you Junsu?"
Fortunately, they ran into a party of classmates. Being a group of experienced hunters, they'd already found two Ether Stones in just over thirty minutes since entering.
"Ha… thank god."
"Ehehehehehe!!"
At that moment, the woman's eyes rolled back at the sight of the Ether Stones, and ten long nails shot out from her fingers. They punched straight through the female leader's abdomen.
Pwaak—!
"……!!"
"I don't remember anything after that. I just ran like hell."
His party members had all counterattacked at once, but they never stood a chance. The tanker's shield shattered from a single headbutt, and those elongated nails tore through the party members behind him without mercy.
Elaine's face went ashen as she listened.
"Gray, glowing nails… messy hair. Don't tell me — a Wraith?"
Choi Junsu nodded.
"I'm sure of it. Near the end, its face started changing on its own. Completely demonic. Its body even went hazy."
Wraiths got their name from their ability to turn invisible. Pale skin like a vampire's and nails that could grow dozens of centimeters were their trademarks, and they could even crudely alter their appearance with reverse-form techniques. They were high-risk monsters ranked from B-class to A-class.
So the cult finally made a move. I knew something felt off.
They must have been furious after all the interference with their operations. By now the magic circles inside the Academy were probably being wiped out one by one, so a counterattack like this wasn't surprising.
"Come to think of it, what about the other two? That skinny kid and the one with glasses?"
At Choi Junsu's question, Elaine's eyes went wide and she clenched her fists. Her hands were trembling.
"…We have to find them. No — not just them. We need to gather everyone in one place."
Rudi hesitated, then asked,
"Um. But wouldn't it be fine if we just don't go near the stones? That seems to be what they're after."
"……."
Elaine bit down hard on her lip, and Choi Junsu answered for her.
"The stones are the ritual cores that control the maze. If those things take them all, a rescue from outside becomes impossible. Sure, some of the instructors have stones of their own, but…"
By now those instructors would have been eliminated. Or the instructors themselves were spies. Either way, if the cult wasn't stupid, they wouldn't have left them alone. They needed to shut down the maze as fast as possible and use it as a bridgehead for their invasion.
Things must be chaos outside too.
An operation of this scale required executive-level cult spies. Considering how long they'd been operating in the shadows, this was essentially a declaration of war. I didn't know the details, but the Academy getting completely flipped must have stung. Or maybe the Bureau Chief's spy purge had finally kicked into high gear. Either way, we'd landed a solid hit.
"Elaine. Hold up."
I grabbed Elaine as she was about to bolt off without thinking. Half in tears, she looked at me, and I spoke gently to calm her down.
"Relax. Don't think so pessimistically. The maze is complex and vast. Even if they took all the stones, finding every single student would be hard."
"But there might be friends dying right now."
I shook my head.
"I don't think so. As long as they don't resist too hard, they'll be used as sacrifices."
"Sacrifices…?"
I could only hope this was the work of a single faction within the cult. To offer Mental Power directly to its true master, you had to kill the sacrifice inside a designated magic circle.
Let's see… if it's a Wraith, that would be the fifth one.
I couldn't let that thing run free. Even if the current protagonist and his party members ganged up on it with everything they had, it would be a hard fight to win.
I glanced once at Choi Junsu and once at Rudi, then brushed the back of my right hand against Elaine's flushed cheek.
"It's hard to explain in detail. But the situation is urgent… so I'll specially cast some magic for you. To keep our good Elaine from getting hurt."
Elaine let out a hollow laugh.
"What are you talking about?"
Elaine was a true noble who protected the weak. She would be an important talent in the world I was going to build — so while I was already making a scene, I might as well earn some points.
Codename: Take Credit for Stuff You Were Going to Do Anyway.
I gave my left arm a light sweep to the side.
Ding—
Summoning the Amusement Park Legion.
Kuuung!!
"Kh…!"
Kang Jihun blocked the Wraith's headbutt with the flat of his blade and was driven back a good distance. Just as he tried to recover his stance, he heard the sound of something cutting through the air behind him.
Kwajik!
…These fucking brutes!
This time he didn't even have a chance to block before his back was slashed open. Mana reinforcement kept the wound from going too deep, but as he tumbled across the ground, those long nails came sweeping into his vision again.
Kang Jihun feinted a parry with his sword and snagged a Wraith's ankle with his left hand.
"Got you, you son of a bitch!"
Puh-puk— puk!
The Wraiths' nails punched into his abdomen in several places. But it was fine. That was what the abs and mana reinforcement training were for.
Gritting his teeth, Kang Jihun swung his sword with his free hand, and a mass of fire-charged mana slammed into the Wraith.
Puh-eong!
But the Wraith's ankle had already slipped free of his grip. Even with real force behind the blow, it did no damage at all. Worse, the reckless mana expenditure briefly weakened his reinforcement — and in that gap, the Wraith's elongated nails punched clean through both of Kang Jihun's thighs.
"Khhhk!"
"Kihhihihihi."
Kang Jihun swung his sword a beat too late. The Wraith yanked its nails free at the last second and vanished, mocking his sluggish movements with its signature invisibility and quick footwork.
Damn it. The others got away clean, right?
Kang Jihun raised his sword and scanned the surroundings. He knew full well a single fighter couldn't take down an A-class monster — and right now there were two of them. He was only holding out because he was a brainless tank type. Eventually going down was just a matter of time.
All he could do was hope the party members who'd fled first would come back with the instructors.
"Hihi? Not moving? Then I guess we'll go kill those ones instead."
But the Wraiths had already read his mind. The moment the female of the two coiled to sprint, Kang Jihun roared and launched himself forward. Even if he died, he would not let them go after his party.
But his speed had dropped dramatically. Before his blade tip could even graze the female, the male's nails carved a deep gash across Kang Jihun's back.
Chwaak!!
"Khuk!"
At the same time, the female's neck stretched out and drove a headbutt straight into Kang Jihun's chest.
Kwa-kwang!
"Ihihihihi! Finishing blow!"
Kang Jihun tried to stand on shaking legs and collapsed. The impact had nearly driven him into the ground, and he'd lost far too much blood. Forget defending — even moving was a struggle.
All he could do was watch the nails descending toward his eyes.
This is it. To things like these.
Chae-aeng! Chaeng!
But in that instant, something flicked those long nails aside with blinding speed. No — more precisely, they had been severed. The body of that powerful A-class monster had been cut clean through.
"……!"
Kang Jihun stared blankly at the gray nails lying on the ground. Had an instructor arrived?
Eyes wide, Kang Jihun looked behind him. Standing there was a single toy soldier, rapier held perfectly straight.
"My, my. Two against one? How unsporting."
The toy soldier's mouth split in a grin that stretched all the way to its ears.
"From here on, let's make it a tag-team match."