Chapter 48
Terminally Ill, but It's Okay — Episode 48
A night when clouds hid the moon.
Light leaking from a laptop lit the dark room.
[Any results from the investigation yet?]
[It's nearly wrapped up, miss. Nothing suspicious so far. Only the third son remains now.]
[I see.]
[But is this fellow really a wolf? His usual conduct is proper, and....... Anyway, I don't think you need to worry too much.]
[Understood. Contact me right away if anything comes up.]
Joo A-rin set down her phone and pressed her temples, closing her eyes for a moment.
The so-called wolf hunt.
She was trying to root out the mole.
Fortunately, there were no suspicious circumstances.
But the more they investigated him, the more suspicious details surfaced.
Was a fortune, in the end, just a fortune?
Joo A-rin hoped it would all end without incident.
.......
But the unease lingering in one corner of her mind refused to fade.
For some reason, she could not simply let that person's words pass her by.
Park Ha-yul kept surprising her, and his judgments often turned out to be right.
"Today's sparring was like that too......."
And every time that happened, the same suspicion returned.
Everyone dismissed it as something that happened because Cheon Seo-yoon was not in good condition, but Joo A-rin thought differently.
"He's definitely not ordinary."
Her gaze swept downward and stabbed into the floor.
There were too many things she had noticed to dismiss them all as an effect of his Armament.
"Is he hiding his skill? Why on earth?"
She idly flicked the edge of her desk with a finger.
Then soon gave up on the thought.
It was an answer too difficult to reach through assumptions alone.
"It's already this late."
Confirming that it was now past 10 p.m., Joo A-rin saved the file she had been working on and closed her laptop.
With the urgent work finished, she had roughly an hour left before bed.
Joo A-rin looked toward the refrigerator out of habit.
Gulp.
She forced herself to swallow and turned away.
Still, living like that did not seem fair to her body.
Joo A-rin flung herself onto the soft bed as if fleeing.
She picked up her phone to distract herself, and her hand naturally went to her photo gallery.
She took the photo while keeping a wary eye on the person beside her.
Roberto Vanessa.
He was one of the hottest names in the contemporary art scene.
Booking him was notoriously difficult.
But to think she would see him at Taehak. And not just once, but for a whole month.......
His voice and appearance were both overly slick.
She had liked the structure of the lectures themselves, too.
Bzzzz.
And right then, her phone vibrated.
[Everyone, how was today's lecture? This is Roberto. It feels a little strange discussing art at the world's greatest military academy, but even I.......]
Joo A-rin flinched in surprise, then shook her head.
Were all celebrities like this?
Would he really keep up this kind of personal outreach for a full month?
* * *
The transformation of space was a fusion of magic and science. A product of magical engineering.
Even so, that physical reshaping accounted for less than a tenth of what I could see.
The rest was magic, expanding the space I perceived.
I was soon seized by the illusion that I had been dropped into a remote field.
Before I knew it, green grass had sprouted from the floor, and the gray ceiling had been dyed blue and now held clouds.
They were rendered images rather than reality, so they did not feel completely real.
Still, with the grand background music and fantasy scenery, it was immersive enough.
Field setup complete.
You have become a human hero facing a vicious horde of orcs head-on.
Beginning Monster generation.
Please wait a moment.
I became not Park Ha-yul but a human hero and waited for a moment.
Green-skinned Monsters began appearing throughout the field.
And at the end of the space.
Atop a lavishly built platform, an orc shaman in golden ceremonial robes appeared, raised a staff, and roared.
At that, the underling orcs hoisted axes, spears, swords — all manner of bladed weapons — and roared in kind.
Was this what the final boss of a virtual reality game would look like?
Maybe my jaded emotions were getting in the way.
A sudden competitive spirit quickened my heartbeat.
Preparation is complete.
Objective: eliminate the orc shaman, Kron.
Once the countdown ended, the mission began.
May fortune fill your path ahead.
10
9
.
.
I took a calm, deep breath and fixed my gaze on the orc shaman's forehead far away.
The goal was to kill the bastard with the first move.
Gauging the distance, roughly 250M? Or 300M?
It was quite far, but when I focused and heightened my vision, I could make out even the fine hairs on the bastard's face.
No, I could even see the coarse black hairs bristling from it and swaying in the wind.
7
6
I slowly wound the enhanced Cheonjam Thread around my right wrist.
It could now extend up to 300 m, though at the moment it was still just over 1 m long.
At its end, I materialized Yeon Gaesomun's First Sword and attached it.
Performance limit 40%, materialization time 10 seconds.
5
4
With preparations mostly done, I now drew the picture in my head.
I replayed the scene of a single ray of light extending from my hand and piercing the shaman's forehead two or three times.
2
1
Begin.
And the instant it began, I wound up.
In truth, the throwing speed of the dagger was influenced by the speed at which the Cheonjam Thread extended, so I could have simply thrown it.
But that was just how people thought.
It was hard to shake the feeling that putting more strength behind it would somehow make it faster.
I started with the rotation of my waist, channeling the force through my shoulder, arm, and hand in sequence.
I made full use of it and hurled the sword.
BOOM—
With a sharp crack through the air, the First Sword shot forward.
The effect of Absolute Accuracy opened the path, and my will sustained it from behind.
The First Sword threaded through the countless orcs and drove straight toward its target.
Its trajectory, straight as if drawn with a ruler, became a single bolt of lightning piercing the atmosphere as it hurtled toward the bastard.
The result appeared in less than the blink of an eye.
The shaman had made a dramatic entrance and managed only a single roar.
Shnk.
The merciless, unerring First Sword pierced the orc shaman squarely between the eyes.
The shaman froze there, arms still raised as he muttered something.......
Then he died.
"......That's it?"
Mission cleared.
Time taken: 3 seconds.
Calculating final score by combining safety, technique, and time scores.
.
.
Your score is 300 points.
Congratulations. You are the first perfect scorer.
'Buhansi' has achieved 1st place in the real-time rankings.
I was glad, but I was also dumbfounded.
All I had done was throw one sword, yet I had gotten a perfect score.
As far as I remembered, Baek Sa-young had taken first place in the original with 295 points.
With ghostlike movements, he had practically put on a cooking show—pan-frying, stir-frying, deep-frying, and boiling them.
And even after that whole one-man show, his score had only been 295.
"Well, damn."
Time and safety aside, I had not expected even technique to be a perfect score.
Was it because I took him down in one blow?
Anyway, I seemed to have gotten a score that was almost only possible in theory.
I figured there would be some controversy.......
Well, what was the point of worrying about something that had already happened?
Anonymity was guaranteed anyway, so people would have no way of knowing whose score that 300 was.
What mattered was how satisfied I was with the Cheonjam Thread's new function.
1st Buhansi [300 points]
2nd Ildoyangdan [291 points]
3rd 10CircleMageLOL [290 points]
4th IAmLegend [287 points]
5th chlrkdals02 [282 points]
Still, having my name at the very top felt strange.
And looking down at the protagonists from above wasn't a bad feeling either.......
"Now let's get some rest."
Anyway, I considered it a satisfying finish and was about to leave when it happened.
In a flash, the ranking window flickered and changed again.
1st Buhansi [300 points]
2nd Ildoyangdan [291 points]
3rd 10CircleMageLOL [290 points]
4th IAmLegend [287 points]
5th Everyone-Bashing Doll [284 points]
Seeing the new nickname enter at fifth was both surprising and reassuring.
Everyone-Bashing Doll. That was Cheon Seo-yoon.......
The provocation seemed to have worked perfectly.
Since she had appeared earlier than in the original, it looked like she had returned to her old training-addict ways.
The fact that her motivation was anger at me was a little....... Huh?
"Wait, she's at the training ground at this hour?"
Taehak had several comprehensive training grounds, so I knew the odds of running into her specifically at the Third Training Ground were low.
But hadn't my first meeting with Cheon Seo-yoon also been at the Third Training Ground?
The moment my thoughts reached that point, I quickly opened the door and bolted out.
Still, I wanted no part of meeting her today—especially one-on-one.
* * *
[Remaining Time: 22 days 4 hours 15 minutes]
The next morning, 5:30 a.m.
I woke a step ahead of my alarm and headed to the physical training ground.
Following my set routine, I worked my shoulders and thighs hard, then returned in a thoroughly refreshed mood.
I entered the dormitory building, planning to wash up quickly and get ready for morning classes.
That was the moment an envelope sticking out of the mailbox caught my eye.
"What's this?"
There was no reason anyone would send me a letter, and utilities were free, so it could not be a bill either.
Without much thought, I tore open the envelope and checked the document inside.
But.
Advance Notice for Potential Summer Remedial Class Students
Recipient: Park Ha-yul
Period: June 30 - July 30
.
.
My refreshed mood instantly flew off to a galaxy far, far away.
Supplementary classes.
There were several episodes that took place outside during summer vacation, and I was supposed to hole up in the dormitory and attend classes?
"No, what kind of X—ed-up setting is this......."
Just as curses were about to burst out on their own, a related setting suddenly flashed through my mind.
"......It existed."
It had. Thinking it over carefully.......
I had simply forgotten because the original never covered it.
No, what protagonist would sit around attending supplementary classes?
If I had known it would be like this, I would have managed my grades in advance.
Having acted like someone transcendent of grades all this time, the bitterness in my mouth was worse.
Just yesterday, hadn't I coolly even taken penalty points?
......Damn it.
I crumpled the document, shoved it into my pocket, opened my water bottle, and gulped down the water.
To calm my agitation, I emptied the entire bottle without leaving a drop.
Anyway, what mattered was how to deal with it.
Fortunately, I was still only a potential candidate, not yet officially subject to remedial classes.
Remedial classes were probably recommended for anyone ranked 650th or lower out of 750 students. If I started paying attention now, I still had a way out.
If I did well on this week's formative assessment and held my own through midterms and finals, I could probably climb about a hundred places.
"Now I even have to worry about grades, of all things."
Honestly, it wasn't difficult. It was just annoying.
I was moving my feet with a sigh when it happened.
The view ahead suddenly warped.
As I tilted my head, recognizing the familiar sign of the phenomenon, letters engraved themselves in the empty space ahead.
[Inter Quest]
[Objective: Achieve a comprehensive rank within the top 650, recalculated after the formative assessment]
[Reward: 10 days added to Remaining Time, 20SP provided]
"Well, that changes things."
It was something I had to do anyway, and they were even giving a reward — who would refuse?
I happened to need SP too, so this worked out.
It would draw attention, but it couldn't be helped. Right now, I had to survive.