Hateful Gabriel
With every last item on the career experience schedule finally behind us, we boarded the bus bound for the academy once more.
There was just one problem.
"Is that so? To think you would refuse to show yourself in the human realm for hundreds of years simply because one contractor died?"
"To the likes of you it may be merely one contractor. Demons cherish their contractors, you old pigeon hag."
"Listen to the cute little hippo—her tongue has taken flight far higher than any pigeon."
Even though we were on a completely different bus, Behemoth and Gabriel were carrying on a remote conversation.
"A few hundred years is hardly a long span of time. To us transcendent beings, time is nothing more than a fleeting instant. Besides, the years I spent without a contractor were longer still."
Marbas had suddenly launched into something that sounded suspiciously like self-praise.
Because the exchange was happening through their contractors, no one else on the bus could hear a word of it—leaving only me, Kim Gabyul, and Moon Seyeon to suffer in silence.
Still, there was nothing to be done about it.
I hadn't chosen this demon myself, so all I could do was grit my teeth and endure through sheer spite and stubbornness.
Come to think of it, Kim Gabyul hadn't chosen her angel either.
If Gabriel had taken residence the moment she was born, that was no different from having an extra parent.
In other words, Kim Gabyul had three parents!
Hmm. Moving on.
Strictly speaking, Moon Seyeon was the only one among us who had actually chosen her own demon.
I envied her that chance to choose.
Of course, I had been the one who showed her the black magic I'd learned from Marbas and laid out the benefits of forming a contract, and Behemoth himself was a demon of such high rank that there hadn't really been much of a choice at all—but at least on the surface, an opportunity had existed.
I, on the other hand, had been forced into a contract out of nowhere.
While the three transcendent beings continued their chat, the bus wound its way along the mountain road.
Yet the farther we drove, the more an uneasy feeling settled over me.
It felt as though I had forgotten something important.
Had I forgotten something?
I racked my brain, but nothing particular came to mind.
We had done everything we needed to during this career experience.
Moon Seyeon had successfully contracted with Behemoth, and we had prevented the mountain itself from collapsing when Behemoth awakened.
Yes. We had clearly achieved the purpose that brought us this far.
And yet the nagging sense that something else crucial had been involved refused to leave me······.
If it was bothering me this much, it had to be an element that appeared without fail in the original work.
At the same time, the fact that I couldn't recall it suggested it probably hadn't been all that important.
Let's think this through carefully.
In the original novel, The Reincarnator Wants to Live, the protagonist had been Seong Hyeon.
Nearly every incident and accident Seong Hyeon encountered either revolved around him or dragged him in against his will.
And in the original, something was always exploding around Seong Hyeon whenever things got too quiet.
The career experience had been no exception.
On the second day a catastrophe had struck that collapsed the entire mountain, after all.
Because of that, the bus that should have returned to the academy today had only been able to depart weeks later.
As I was thinking, the bus entered a tunnel.
Right—there had been a tunnel.
In the original, the bus that finally set out for the academy weeks later had tried to pass through this tunnel, only to find it collapsed, with people hard at work on the repairs.
When asked when it had fallen, the answer came back: the very day Behemoth awakened.
On the second day of the career experience the ground had shaken and the tunnel had come down.
They had been forced to take a long detour.
What about now?
In the original timeline, Seong Hyeon would have arrived at the academy weeks later after a successful career experience; this time he had boarded the bus returning on the original schedule.
The tunnel had not yet collapsed.
And among the people riding this bus was Seong Hyeon.
We're fucked······.
The tunnel was absolutely going to collapse right now.
The only question was how to respond.
I immediately began drawing up as much mana as I could.
The moment the tunnel came down, I would need it to protect the bus.
"What the hell all of a sudden?"
"What is happening?"
When I suddenly started pulling mana, Hwang Ju-hyeon—who had been sitting beside me with his eyes closed—jerked in alarm.
"Are you planning to hurl this entire bus into the air? I cannot say I recommend it."
Marbas seemed to be under some sort of misunderstanding, but there was no helping it.
If the tunnel collapsed, we were the ones who would take the damage.
When is it going to fall?
"What is it? What's going on already?"
The tunnel still hadn't collapsed, but since I had no idea when it might, I kept every muscle tensed.
All the while the bus barreled forward and before long we were past the midpoint of the tunnel.
I still couldn't let my guard down. It could always come down at the very last second.
At last the bus emerged from the tunnel unscathed.
?
What? Why didn't it collapse?
The protagonist Seong Hyeon was riding through this tunnel—shouldn't it have fallen for sure?
Now it just looked like I'd drawn up all that mana for nothing.
Whatever. Better safe than sorry.
A tunnel that didn't collapse was the best possible outcome.
No need to waste effort, so it was actually a relief.
I let the tension drain from my body and settled comfortably back into the seat.
That was the last of the tunnels. We would reach the academy soon.
"Seriously, what was that all about all of a sudden······."
When I suddenly relaxed again and lounged in the seat, Hwang Ju-hyeon muttered in disbelief.
"It's nothing. Think of it as a kind of mana stretching exercise."
"What kind of crap······."
Whatever Hwang Ju-hyeon was grumbling about beside me, I closed my eyes and focused on meditation.
We are the proud descendants of Behemoth.
Not descendants in the blood sense.
Descendants in the spiritual sense.
We revere Behemoth, and we have inherited His contractor's legacy.
That is why we continue our lives upon this mountain.
According to legend, a colossal beast once rampaged in these parts, and light and darkness clashed in battle—records of it remain.
The light was surely the hateful Gabriel.
The darkness that stood against her must have been the proud contractor of Lord Behemoth.
The colossal beast was probably a summoned creature called forth by the contractor, or else an incarnation of Behemoth Himself.
If that colossal beast was indeed Lord Behemoth's incarnation, then we must find it.
Because we are the rightful successors.
Because we are the worshippers who revere Him.
In that sense, we missed our chance.
Kim Gabyul, contractor of the hateful Gabriel.
That very Kim Gabyul passed through the mountain we live on.
And she did it through the tunnel right beneath us.
Why?
Why did we not kill her?
True, in terms of combat strength we are at a disadvantage—that much is fact.
Against Kim Gabyul alone, contractor of the hateful Gabriel, we might have managed somehow, but fighting an entire group of students would have put us at a severe disadvantage.
Even so, if we had at least collapsed the tunnel, we could have dealt her no small amount of damage.
Naturally, my gaze turned toward the man standing before us.
The one who leads us and proclaims the greatness of Lord Behemoth.
Cult Leader Lee Muhyeong.
Leader of the Behemoth Cult and proxy of Lord Behemoth Himself.
I turned my head to the side.
Many people came into view.
The exact count, including myself, was twenty-five.
Including the Cult Leader, twenty-six.
We had more than enough people.
If he had ordered us to collapse the tunnel and kill Kim Gabyul, this place was packed with those who would have carried it out without a moment's hesitation, staking their very lives.
So why had the Cult Leader given no such command?
"······Um, Cult Leader."
"What is it?"
Someone with courage stepped forward, and the Cult Leader slowly turned his head toward him.
"······Why did we take no action even though the contractor of the hateful Gabriel appeared?"
At the man's question, the Cult Leader offered a leisurely smile.
"Hmmmm. It seems none of you were able to sense it."
And the words that followed from the Cult Leader were more than enough to plunge me into thought.
He slowly surveyed us all before speaking again.
"From that bus I could feel the aura of Gabriel—the hateful Gabriel. Yet at the same time, I also felt the auras of the Great Ones."
"Huuuh······."
"If that is true······."
After closing his mouth and gauging our reactions, the Cult Leader smiled with his eyes and continued.
"Those auras were so immensely powerful that they could only belong to demons of the highest rank.
There is but one angel, yet there are many demons. Had we acted rashly, our plan to seize Gabriel's contractor would have gone awry, and we might instead have earned the censure of Those Ones."
"So that's······."
"How can this be······!"
"As expected of the Cult Leader····."
So that was it!
I trembled as I looked upon the Cult Leader.
Truly, he is the Cult Leader.
To so easily sense the auras of transcendent beings that the likes of us could not feel at all.
The Cult Leader smiled at his ease and went on.
"There is no need for concern. Gabriel alone can never stand against those demons. Our priority is to remain here and search for traces of Lord Behemoth. Do you understand?"
"Yes!"
"Yes!"
"Yes!"
"Yes!"
The people around me answered with vigorous shouts.
I too answered at the top of my lungs, as if my throat might tear free.