101. My Buff is a Drug
101. My Buff is a Drug
A special room occupied the top floor of the swordsmanship training hall.
An exclusive training chamber accessible only to A-ranks and above.
It was a space surrounded by reinforced walls designed to endure even the most unrestrained Sword Aura rampages.
A woman sat kneeling on the floor.
Meditating, tracing the sword path, refining her mind and body.
— You've never once cut a person.
Then a presence disrupted her meditation.
"......."
— You still lack experience, don't you? The experience of cutting a human being directly?
'Is that wrong?'
— It is wrong. Utterly wrong.
— How can one speak of the true sword without ever having cut a person?
— Simply clashing blades is not even a single step toward true life-or-death combat.
'What meaning could simply killing someone hold?'
— Simply killing? You're mistaken.
— By killing a swordsman, you absorb their experience.
— The training they sweated over for countless years, their battle experience, their Enlightenment.
— Caught on the boundary between life and death, you seize it from them.
— Only then can you touch the true sword.
— Only then can you glimpse the Mastery Stage.
— You, who cannot even cut a person in your imagination, will never reach the pinnacle, no matter how you train.
The voice echoing through her head clicked its tongue.
— What a waste of talent.
That single remark shattered the woman's concentration completely.
'No matter how much you prattle on, I have no intention of listening to your nonsense, Evil Spirit.'
— How foolish. Foolish.
— How long has your Mastery Stage been stalled? Quite a while now, hasn't it?
— Training and chopping up monsters will only take you so far. That's the limit.
— Surely there are swordsmen in this era far stronger than you.
— Do you honestly think those people have never once cut a person?
'Be silent. The era you lived in is not this one.'
— You weren't born into the wrong era.
— You simply refuse to do what other strong ones are managing to do somehow.
— So naive, so stupid.
— At first I thought it a pity... but in the end, this is simply reaping what you've sown.
— Your stagnating swordsmanship Mastery Stage.
Seong Yu-ran, a second-year, had spent her entire life having words like "talented" drilled into her ears.
When she put in effort, the results matched proportionally. Every single day was spent faithfully devoted to that effort, accumulating Mastery Stages.
Only two years since her Awakening. A-rank, achieved purely through swordsmanship training.
She deserved to be called the swordsmanship world's most promising prospect.
Yet lately, something felt wrong.
No matter how hard she trained, no matter how she swung her sword until she collapsed from exhaustion, there was no progress. She couldn't even feel like she was moving forward.
For the first time in her life, effort was betraying her.
Everyone hits a plateau eventually, or so they said.
But this was the first plateau Seong Yu-ran had ever faced in her life.
It threw her into chaos.
Could that Evil Spirit be telling the truth?
Were all swordsmen who reached high Mastery Stages really cutting people?
She had heard that in the Middle East, killing among Awakeneds happened as casually as eating a meal.
Did that truly mean you could never see the end of the sword without killing a human?
'That can't be. I won't listen to the ramblings of a murderous demon.'
She didn't know why something like that had latched onto her.
But she could overcome it.
If she ignored it and forged her own path, one day it would surely disappear.
Seong Yu-ran believed that firmly.
She rose and began to swing her sword.
Swish!
The blade slicing through the air was more violent than usual.
-
August 4th (Sat) 3:31 PM
In front of the girls' dormitory
"Hye-yong~!"
Seo Ha-yoon burst through the dormitory main doors and ran out, waving her hand cheerfully.
"Hey."
"Yeah, hi! But what's going on? Asking to meet just the two of us."
"Should we walk and talk?"
"Yeah!"
Seo Ha-yoon was shy around strangers, but once she grew close to someone, she gave a lot of her heart to them.
So even though Hye-yong had called her out without explanation, she came right away and greeted him warmly.
'Time to start trying things out.'
The reason Hye-yong had called Ha-yoon out separately today was, simply, to treat her condition.
Seo Ha-yoon was someone who fainted dead away at the sight of blood.
She still hadn't been able to overcome that constitution of hers.
Which meant she could only raid when she was receiving Hye-yong's buff.
Of course, there were Heterogeneous Species that didn't bleed, but how could you possibly know which ones and pick only those every time?
If they had to raid more than twice, could she just go, "Ah, I'm going to pass on the bleeding monsters" and skip out? No, she couldn't.
'She won't be able to grow easily if she only runs daily raids with our party. Ha-yoon's dependence on me is way too high. She needs to occasionally run as a mercenary and do other things.'
Of course, considering the Seed, the stronger her dependence grew, the better.
Firmly implanting the belief that without his buff she was nothing, making her beg and plead, would benefit him in the long run.
But Hye-yong didn't want to do that.
He didn't want to be cruel to Seo Ha-yoon in the slightest.
She was a friend he'd known since the moment he'd first arrived in this world.
From start to finish, she had treated Hye-yong with nothing but kindness.
Hye-yong knew better than anyone that Ha-yoon's gentle nature was her genuine heart.
She was far too innocent and angelic, a friend he'd known too long and too closely to torment and string along the way he had with Lanfang or Kwon Jin-ah.
Which meant he'd grown enormously fond of her.
Hye-yong made his judgment, clear and simple.
Letting his own mental state be damaged by tormenting Seo Ha-yoon was a worse loss than some half-assed Seed growth!
So instead, he would help her learn to stand on her own two feet.
And that wouldn't stop the Seed from growing either.
It just wouldn't show dramatic change. Treating her well would still let the Seed grow, slowly but surely.
'First, let's try fixing that constitution of hers.'
Seo Ha-yoon's fainting-at-the-sight-of-blood constitution was most likely rooted in psychological factors.
Honestly, a gene that makes your mind go hazy the moment you see blood? That couldn't possibly exist.
So, slowly.
He decided to train her, slowly raising her tolerance so she could endure the sight of fresh, bright-red blood.
Hye-yong had suddenly started thinking about this after hearing that the team of Na Hee-yeon, Seo Ha-yoon, and Chae Hwa-ra hadn't managed to win a single match.
He knew that from their perspective, they just needed to work hard from now on and graduate properly, but still, it honestly bothered him.
They weren't exactly the worst problem children... but Hye-yong felt a small sense of responsibility toward them anyway.
After walking for a bit, Hye-yong spoke.
"Ha-yoon, about that constitution of yours."
"Huh? My constitution?"
"Yeah. The one where you get dizzy and faint at the sight of blood."
"Ah... what about it?"
Hye-yong paused slightly for effect, then said it.
"Don't you think it's about time we tried fixing it?"
"Mm."
Seo Ha-yoon's face dimmed a little.
"Originally, the problem was that your stats weren't growing either... but now your stats are growing just fine, right?"
"Yeah, they are."
"You've finally got the foundation for a normal Awakened life. Wouldn't it be unfair to give that up because of a constitution? You kept pushing through and enduring during the second semester because you didn't want to give up either, didn't you, Ha-yoon?"
"I suppose so...."
It was undeniable.
The Synchronization Procedure affected your life far more than one might expect.
Because a span of seven years and two months is by no means short.
You yourself might not feel a huge difference, but when you looked at the people around you, the traces of passing years were unmistakable.
If your parents were ordinary people, their aging would be visibly noticeable. If you'd had a young sibling, they'd have grown up considerably.
Friends you'd known before the procedure would all have become working adults, with occasional wedding announcements trickling in.
It was no exaggeration to say she had staked everything on becoming an Awakened.
She had made that choice because being an Awakened, a Hunter, was an attractive profession, so being unable to become a proper Hunter would be unspeakably bitter.
Seo Ha-yoon wasn't unaware of that fact.
She had simply gotten used to avoiding and running away, so she'd stopped thinking about it.
Hye-yong's words today made her think about it again.
'All this time, I've just been turning my eyes away....'
She'd thought that if time just passed, things would get better.
Nothing was easier than turning away and running.
Seo Ha-yoon realized anew: she had always chosen only the easy path.
'My abilities have finally just started growing. My stats went up, I gained new skills... it's way too much of a waste to be unable to live a proper Awakened life just because I can't handle seeing blood.'
Just as she was thinking that, Hye-yong's voice reached her.
"How about it, Ha-yoon. Want to try training with me?"
"Training...?"
"Yeah. Let's do some proper training to get used to seeing blood!"
Training.
She did feel the need to do it.
But he was bringing this up, all of a sudden?
"Wait, Hye-yong, did you... call me out just to talk about this?"
"Yeah, Ha-yoon. I'm worried about you."
"W-worried about me?"
"Of course I'm worried. We're friends, aren't we?"
A flicker of fluster crossed Seo Ha-yoon's face.
Being worried about when something bad happened was natural, but being worried about when things were otherwise normal was deeply unfamiliar to her.
She was usually the one doing the worrying, not the one being worried about.
"R-right. Friends...."
"Ha-yoon, listen carefully. Right now I can use my buff to keep you from fainting, but there will be times when you can't get my buff. We can't be in the exact same party for three whole years, can we?"
"Right...."
"Even if that doesn't happen, what are you going to do after graduation? If you don't fix this now, things will just get harder for you in the end."
That was something Seo Ha-yoon worried about too.
Right now, she was happy, going on raids with like-minded friends without much worry and steadily accumulating Points.
Seo Ha-yoon was the type who, even when she worried about others, was reluctant to worry about herself.
She'd wanted to enjoy the happy moments, so she'd deliberately erased the thought, but in this instant she had no choice but to face it squarely.
The only reason she could run proper raids right now was thanks to Hye-yong's exclusive buff.
If Hye-yong ever went to a different party, she would immediately become a useless dead weight.
Thinking about it was so terrifying she had buried it deep inside her head, but now was the time to dig it out.
"I want you to be able to do well on your own. I consider you a close friend, so as a friend, I'm worried. So if there's anything I can do, I want to help as much as possible."
"Hye-yong...!!"
Seo Ha-yoon pressed her fists to her chest and looked up at him, her face completely overtaken by pure emotion.
"Let's try the training, together?"
"Yes, yes! I'll do the training! I'll work hard at it!!"
"Good. Then let's head to the Sparring Ground."
"Okay!"
Why they were going to the Sparring Ground didn't matter to Seo Ha-yoon right now.
She was, at this moment, engulfed in a crucible of deep emotion.
'I never knew Hye-yong thought about me like this....'
She'd felt this way for a while now, but Choi Hye-yong was truly a good person.
He was considerate, he gave solid encouragement, and his skills were good, making him incredibly reliable.
And now, to learn he'd been worrying about her like this all along on top of everything else.
'To repay those feelings, I want to work as hard as I possibly can!'
She wanted to hold her head high and tell Hye-yong thank you, that she'd been able to overcome this thanks to him.
Seo Ha-yoon steeled her resolve internally.
-
Sparring Ground.
Hye-yong and Ha-yoon went to a private sparring room and stood facing each other.
They decided to start by exposing her to blood first.
Hye-yong pulled out the fruit knife he'd brought in his front pocket.
He removed the sheath, tucked it back into his pocket, and brought the sharp point to his thumb.
[ Pain Reduction ]
Pain Reduction Level 10
He didn't like pain, so he'd invested some Cost into Pain Reduction.
"H-Hye-yong? What are you doing?"
Seeing this, Seo Ha-yoon's face turned slightly pale.
"First, I need to see how severe your condition is."
Pshk!
Hye-yong jabbed his own thumb.
With the Pain Reduction buff active, it was only a faint sting, so after stabbing it, he gave it a little twist.
"H-heuup...."
In that instant, Seo Ha-yoon averted her eyes.
Blatant self-harm!
For an ordinary person, doing that could leave a scar and risk infection, but since they were Awakeneds, it was fine.
Anyway, Hye-yong could create healing buffs, so there was no problem at all.
Drip... drip....
Droplets of blood falling onto the sparring ground.
Sparring inevitably involved at least some bloodshed, so he could let the blood fall without worry.
"Ha-yoon... you have to look. I stabbed my finger to help you. It hurts."
Uuu-uuu!
Ha-yoon wanted to avoid it, but forced herself to turn her head.
'H-he stabbed his own body for my sake. For my training, to draw fresh blood....'
She figured it would be discourteous to run away when he'd gone this far for her.
In the end, Seo Ha-yoon forced herself to look at Hye-yong, bleeding.
Drip... drip....
'Ugh, it's flowing.'
Drip... drip....
'Bright-red blood.'
Drip... drip....
'A puddle of blood....'
Sway!
Seo Ha-yoon clutched her head, visibly dizzy, and began to stagger.
"Haaah...."
Then, she fainted on the spot.
"...It's worse than I thought."
Hye-yong muttered to himself without realizing it.
Could he really fix this?