Academy's Savior
“Ryu Hana. Here. You said you wanted it, right? Take it.”
I held out the wrapped Suzaku Sword to her.
“I can’t accept it.”
“Why not? It’s the sword you wanted.”
“…It’s far too expensive to just take as a casual gift. And I can’t understand you. No matter how I look at it, this sword isn’t worth three hundred billion. Even a hundred billion would be too much. I kept quiet because I didn’t want to meddle in someone else’s business, but… you took a loss. Go back and get a refund right now.”
Three hundred billion.
She spoke of a sum that would be absurd to any ordinary person as if it were three million. It said a lot about her sense of money.
Well, with the power of the Northdia Clan behind her, three hundred billion would be pocket change.
Except Ryu Hana refused to lean on the Northdia Clan’s power. All the way until she graduated from the academy, she intended to live by her own strength alone.
“You think this is just an ordinary sword?”
“No. A C-rank sword isn’t ordinary. It’s at least a famous blade. Still not worth three hundred billion.”
“You have no idea what this sword is actually worth. No eye for blades at all.”
“…….”
A crease formed between Ryu Hana’s brows. For someone who cared about swords more than anyone and took them seriously, even my mild provocation hit her like an insult to her parents.
“…Again. Show me the Suzaku Sword again.”
“Sure. That’s easy enough.”
I unwrapped the Suzaku Sword. Ryu Hana examined it with intense focus.
She had more than enough eye for swords. She had been the one to notice it first, after all. She had been staring at it through the shop window.
“You can pick it up.”
“…Didn’t the shop owner say not to touch it because of the heat?”
“You’ll be fine.”
“…….”
Ryu Hana hesitated, then closed her hand around the hilt. Her eyes flew wide. Her mouth fell open and her body trembled. She stared blankly into empty air. I waited quietly for her.
As long as she has her trait, Sword’s Shaman (SS), no sword will ever reject Ryu Hana.
Holy sword or demon sword—it made no difference.
“…Seong Yujin. You knew from the start. This sword… is worth more than three hundred billion.”
“Can you reveal the Suzaku Sword’s true form?”
“Yes. But…”
“What are you hesitating for? Do it right now.”
“…This sword is yours. And you’ll get dragged into it.”
“I already told you I’m giving it to you as a gift. And I can’t even touch it myself. Instead, mind if I watch the process of you being recognized by the sword?”
Ryu Hana slowly nodded. Then she raised the blade in her hand. The moment she stirred her mana, the Suzaku Sword responded as if it had been waiting. Whoosh. Flames coiled around the blade and blazed. For an instant the fire took the shape of a vermilion bird before settling back into ordinary flames.
The space in front of Ryu Hana warped. The distorted space swallowed her whole. I hurriedly laid a hand on her shoulder. The two of us were pulled into the space together.
You have entered the Special Dungeon, ???.
I twitched an eyebrow at the floating notification window.
Different.
It was different from what I knew.
If a special dungeon’s name came up as ???, there was only one reason. The original dungeon had been corrupted.
Did it change because I came in with her? What a pain in the ass.
Ryu Hana and I stood atop a Seoul skyscraper and looked down.
The night view of Seoul was a little different from the one we knew. Buildings that should have towered high were low, and parts of the roads were closed off. Few people were out. The Seoul that ought to have been full of life carried a strangely eerie atmosphere.
“Is this… the past?”
“That’s right. A past reconstructed by the dungeon. Roughly twenty years ago? Could be nineteen, could be twenty-one.”
I spoke vaguely, recalling the original work.
“Ryu Hana. You received the Suzaku’s trial, right? What was the content?”
“…Find the enemy and defeat it.”
“Finding it won’t be hard. The enemy will be looking for you too.”
“How do you know so much?”
“I’ve been through something similar once.”
I wasn’t talking about the original game. In my first run I had forcibly taken the Suzaku Sword, Azure Dragon Spear, Black Tortoise Armor, and White Tiger Blade, awakened them all, and used them. I hadn’t kept them long, though. They had been especially picky with me, so I had offered them as sacrifices to Destruction (S).
I had also learned in that first run that you could bring someone else into this space with you.
“It’ll be annoying, but not difficult.”
“…Where are you going?”
“Just something I need to check. Oh, right. Just in case, I’ll say this—dungeons aren’t reality. They’re not even based on reality. One of the parallel worlds has been reconstructed. You know parallel theory?”
“…A world of possibilities that might have existed.”
“Simply put, someone who lost a presidential election could be president here, and someone who died could still be alive in this world. Whatever it is, it has nothing to do with us, so don’t get shaken.”
After finishing my advice to Ryu Hana, I ran down the rooftop wall to the ground. Landing lightly, I walked out onto the road.
Screeeeech!
A car that had been speeding slammed on its brakes at the sight of me. I walked toward the stopped vehicle.
I smashed the driver’s side window with my fist and forced the door open.
“Aaaaaaah! Who the hell are you?!”
A salaryman with fatigue plastered all over his face screamed. I grabbed him, hauled him out, and tossed him onto the road.
“This car is mine from now on.”
I shut the driver’s door. The man only rolled his eyes in terror. Ignoring him, I floored the accelerator. I ran red lights without a care. The roads turned chaotic because of me alone, and traffic accidents happened, but so what? This wasn’t reality—it was a dungeon.
Wee-woo wee-woo wee-woo.
“Heh. Fucking cop bastards.”
It had been a while since I’d had a city chase, and I was starting to get excited.
I yanked the wheel for a flashy drift to show off to the police—and slammed the car into a utility pole.
“Haha. My mistake.”
It was fine. There were plenty of cars. I stopped another one that was driving, stole it, and floored the accelerator again to continue the chase.
Police sirens blared noisily.
“Get out right now if you don’t want to die!!”
Up ahead, a man blocking the center of the road shouted. A hero. This world was one that had heroes.
“Nobody can stop me.”
KRA-KOOM!
Lightning crashed down on the hero who had blocked my path. He couldn’t even dodge and took the hit full-on. He didn’t die, but he staggered. I floored the accelerator with everything I had and rammed him with the car. The hero went flying far away and tumbled across the ground.
“Haha! You dumb bastard!”
I summoned a bomb and tossed it behind me. Watching the police cars that had been chasing me take to the sky made me laugh out loud.
“Today is Seoul Firestorm Day!”
I got out of the car. It was a residential alley packed with houses, and through an open window I could hear a radio.
That really took the edge off.
I smirked and walked down the alley.
Shaking the heroes and police after that heated chase had been easy. All I’d needed was a spatial transfer scroll.
Hm?
The place I had come looking for was Seong Ha-ri’s house. More precisely, the house where Seong Ha-ri and I had lived together until I entered the academy dorms.
It wasn’t this run-down back then.
I sensed people inside the house.
I opened the door and went in. It had been locked. I broke the doorknob with raw strength and stepped inside.
“……?”
“W-who are you?”
A middle-aged man and woman watching TV stared at me. I looked hard at their faces. Nothing. No memory of them. People completely unrelated to Seong Ha-ri. I glanced around. An unfamiliar interior.
My face appeared on the TV.
The middle-aged couple looked back and forth between the screen and my face, and their complexions went deathly pale in an instant.
I turned around and walked back out the front door.
“Kyaaaaaaah!”
“P-police! Police!!!”
I ignored their flustered voices and scratched my head.
Seong Ha-ri said she got that house after I was born… Is this an era before I was born?
Since it was one of the parallel worlds, it might be a world where I simply didn’t exist at all.
Ah, right. If I check the year, I can roughly calculate what Seong Ha-ri is doing right now.
I turned back and went into the house again. After threatening the middle-aged couple, I learned the time period.
Ha. Of all things, it’s not even the period when Seong Ha-ri was attending the academy.
My destination was decided.
Jinryeong Seong Family.
I stopped in front of the Jinryeong Seong Family estate. It was one of Korea’s long-standing prestigious clans. If I charged in with my current strength, I would be the one getting subdued.
This dungeon was a fake that reconstructed a parallel world, but my life was not fake.
I activated Spirit Eye and Heavenly Eye at the same time.
I peered straight through the interior of the Jinryeong Seong Family. Barrier? Since I wasn’t going in personally, it didn’t matter. It wasn’t a barrier strong enough to block Spirit Eye and Heavenly Eye anyway.
Still full of spirits. Seong Han-gu and Seong Myeong-saeng are… sitting side by side watching TV.
Seong Ha-ri was nowhere to be seen. She didn’t seem to be home.
I sat down on a nearby bench.
The reason I was looking for Seong Ha-ri was to dig into the secret of my birth. Even if this dungeon’s background was a parallel world, if I was lucky, the things related to Seong Ha-ri might not have changed.
But the moment I learned the year, I realized it had been a meaningless effort.
It’s way too far in the past. Not only was I not born yet—Seong Ha-ri hasn’t even entered the academy.
Even so, I had come to the Jinryeong Seong Family simply because I wanted to see Seong Ha-ri once. In the end I hadn’t even managed to meet that Seong Ha-ri.
She’s either somewhere else… or this is a world where Seong Ha-ri doesn’t exist at all. Ryu Hana should be doing fine, right?
According to the original, Ryu Hana would be fighting herself. And she would win without much trouble. Even in the original the difficulty had been fairly easy.
I suddenly looked around. Lower-rank spirits had gathered around me.
Lots of spirits because we’re near the Jinryeong Seong Family.
They had been drawn by my high spirit affinity.
I considered driving them off, then decided to leave them alone since they weren’t trying to harm me.
Mocha and Makina came to mind. This dungeon was special enough that I couldn’t summon Mocha or Makina.
Time outside the dungeon is probably frozen. More precisely, it’s flowing so slowly it might as well be stopped.
The axes of space-time were different enough that this dungeon was special.
Maybe rest a bit and then go wild again. Or finding a beauty and screwing her wouldn’t be bad either.
I was still mulling it over when I felt someone’s presence.
I lifted my head and looked toward the source. Under a streetlamp, a girl was walking this way. A black school uniform different from the academy’s, black bobbed hair that just barely brushed her shoulders. Something long—over two meters—hung diagonally across her back.
“Wow. There are so many kids gathered here. Are you a spirit tamer too, oppa?”
She was short. Her chest was only just beginning to swell. Baby fat still clung to her face.
The moment I saw her, I knew.
She was Seong Ha-ri in her middle-school years.