Predator (1)
Knock, knock.
“Come in.” A voice heavy with exhaustion drifted from inside the room.
I opened the door and stepped into the counseling office. “...Pardon the intrusion.”
Despite the name, the space was thick with the sour reek of old cigarettes and stagnant air. The first thing I noticed was a young professor slumped behind a massive desk. Horn-rimmed glasses sat on his nose, and his long hair had been carelessly tied back. Stubble darkened his chin and sideburns. He looked thoroughly unreliable.
“Sit over there and wait a moment, lad. I’ll be finished soon.”
Professor Kwon Chan-yeol, instructor of Monster Physiology and Magical Chemistry, spoke without sparing me a glance. His fingers never stopped pounding the typewriter. Several pens floated around him, scribbling across sheets of paper on their own. It had to be a type of telekinetic magic—the same kind the headmaster had demonstrated. Still, this professor appeared to be around the same age as the squad leader. Hadn’t the headmaster said that mastering telekinesis was difficult even for the elderly? What exactly was the difference between them…?
“...My apologies. Admission season is the busiest time of year for professors. I barely sleep three hours a night, yet the work never ends.”
Only after I had listened to the furious clacking of the typewriter for a good ten minutes did we finally exchange our first proper words. A mountain of documents had already piled up in front of him. The deep, bruise-like circles under his eyes made me feel tired just looking at them.
“Right, then. Shall we begin?”
The professor snapped his fingers. The curtain behind him slid aside on its own, revealing a massive stone tablet that resembled an ornate rug at first glance. At its center sat a spherical stellarite resonance stone glowing soft green. Four main circuits stretched diagonally from the stone toward each corner of the tablet. From those primary lines, countless smaller circuits branched out like roots, giving the impression of four enormous trees growing from a single glowing core.
All four primary circuits are glowing.
No secondary branches display any magical flame.
“Your reaction is milder than I expected. Most students lose their minds the first time they see the Attribute Compass because of its bizarre appearance. Have you seen one before?”
“...Yes. I underwent a simplified examination once in the past.”
“Ah, I see. Not many places have a full Attribute Compass slab. You must have had quite the experience. Did you serve in the military beforehand? Heh heh…”
Professor Kwon chuckled at his own lame joke.
“Anyway, let’s move on. All your other tests are complete, and today’s Attribute Compass examination is the last one, correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You should have already heard the explanation for the attribute test. If you’ve forgotten the procedure, I can go over it again…”
“That won’t be necessary. I remember it clearly.”
“Good. That saves time. My throat was already sore from repeating everything to the slower students. All right, step forward and stand in front of the slab.”
Following his instructions, I rose and approached the tablet. The green resonance stone at its center sparkled like an eye. I placed my palm against it, closed my eyes, and channeled particles through my hand.
Whoooong…
A resonant vibration soon spread from the stone. It continued for about five minutes before gradually fading.
“That was quick… Wait, what?”
The moment the vibration stopped, Professor Kwon—who had been reviewing my documents—turned to look at the tablet. His eyebrows drew together in clear confusion.
The four great trees of the Attribute Compass represented the broad categories of known magical attributes, while the smaller branches subdivided them further. Under normal circumstances, only one of the four primary circuits should have lit up. Flames of magic should have then appeared at the tips of certain secondary branches, indicating the attributes best suited to the examiner. Mages typically chose their major based on those results. Those with talent could learn some magic from adjacent trees, but they could never handle attributes from completely opposing ones.
Yet right now, all four trees before me were glowing.
Even stranger, none of the smaller branches showed any trace of magical fire.
“Ha, why is it doing this again?”
A flustered Professor Kwon gave the slab a few light taps. I knew it. I let out a small internal sigh at the sight. The result was exactly the same as when I had tested with the squad leader. The device was supposed to react to internalized particles tailored to an individual; pouring raw atmospheric ether into it naturally produced this outcome. I had tried to avoid the mandatory tests, but as a new student there was simply no way to skip them.
“Could… it be an overload? Since it’s been used continuously…”
“Maybe… That does seem the most likely explanation…”
Professor Kwon nodded at my cautious suggestion, muttering to himself.
“It’s been in use for over fifty years, so it was bound to break down eventually. Still, this is the first time it’s shown the same symptom twice in one day. Actually, today is the first time any anomaly has appeared at all…”
One of his mumbled words caught my attention.
“Twice…?”
“That’s right. It malfunctioned earlier with another student as well. I thought it was just a temporary error at the time…”
“Which student…?”
“Brat. Don’t ask about things that don’t concern you. You’re far too casual about inquiring after someone else’s personal information.”
Professor Kwon cut me off sharply. Was it really just a breakdown? After all, how many people besides me could inject pure ether into the device? The other student he mentioned must have simply experienced a genuine malfunction. It was convenient for me that a believable explanation had presented itself. There was no need to complicate things further.
“Ha, what am I supposed to do about this…”
Professor Kwon scratched his head in obvious annoyance.
“Um… I still remember the results from my previous examination. Could those be used instead?”
“What?”
The professor’s face brightened instantly at my suggestion.
“Of course that’s possible. Come, sit down. We’ll record those figures for now and schedule a proper retest later.”
He returned to his desk, pulled out the typewriter again, and began typing.
“So, your primary attribute?”
“Infectum-Calor.”
“Circulation system as your main aptitude, then. Which branch numbers…”
I recited the answers I had prepared in advance.
“Hmm. So you intend to major in Circulation magic at the Cradle as well?”
“Yes. I’m already learning a unique magic of the same lineage, and I’m more comfortable using my body directly…”
“What? You’re learning the Predictive Eye of the Black Lotus Sa family?”
It was near the end of our five-minute Q&A. I had been answering steadily when the professor suddenly cut me off, his face full of astonishment.
“Are you perhaps a hidden bastard son of the Sa family? Is that why you wear a mask everywhere?”
He muttered to himself, then cleared his throat. “No, no. That devoted husband would never do such a thing. Ahem, my apologies…”
He steered the conversation back on track.
“The Predictive Eye, is it? May I ask how far you’ve progressed?”
I hesitated briefly but decided there was no need to reveal my full achievement. The Cradle’s regular classes focused on general magic anyway, while unique magics were usually passed down privately to direct descendants or sponsored students like myself. After some thought, I gave an answer slightly lower than my actual level.
“I recently entered the fifth stage…”
“The fifth stage at your age??”
Professor Kwon stared at me in disbelief. Had I made a mistake? Maybe I should have lowered it even more. The squad leader had told me not to be arrogant because my achievement was nothing special…
“Impressive. No wonder you received a recommendation after eighteen years and were even taught a unique magic. And here I thought he was quietly living in seclusion, but apparently he’s been scouting gems like you behind the scenes…”
The professor muttered for a moment before turning back to me.
“It’s awkward to say this myself, but if your skills are genuine, there may not be much for you to gain at the Cradle. You already seem to have achieved more than enough at your age.”
From the way he’s speaking, it really does seem only the headmaster knows I was in the military. Yet Yeon had used her family’s intelligence network to uncover that fact separately. It drove home just how immense the power of that family truly was.
“I’m fairly confident in physical combat, but my theory is practically nonexistent…”
“Your theory is lacking, yet you reached the fifth stage of a unique magic? Does that even make sense to you?”
“...It just sort of happened.”
“...”
“And I was told to make plenty of friends while I’m here…”
Professor Kwon, who had been giving me an incredulous look, finally let out a small sigh after hearing the rest.
“...Well, if that’s the case, I suppose it’s not entirely incomprehensible. Socializing is also one of the Cradle’s founding purposes, after all…”
He signed the document and slid it aside.
“All right, this counseling session has been sufficient. You’ve worked hard balancing classes and examinations. Once you pass the first test, you should be able to breathe a little easier. Ah, is today the day we announce the test topic?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Time really flies. You can head straight to Lecture Room 1. Understood. You’re dismissed.”
Professor Kwon glanced at the clock and waved me out.
Perhaps because the counseling had run a little long, the students from the Magic Department had already packed Lecture Room 1 by the time I arrived. The sound of the door opening drew everyone’s attention for a moment. The emotions behind those gazes were varied—envy, indifference, anger, curiosity…
It had already been a week since I enrolled at the Cradle. While I was somehow keeping up with the studies, my personal relationships had made almost no progress. The incident at the previous social gathering had probably spread. The rumor that I had openly clashed with Yeon—the most popular student in the Cradle—combined with my unsociable personality and the strange mask I wore, were more than enough to overshadow the topic of my recommendation from the Black Lotus Sa family after eighteen years.
If I had joined Yeon’s circle like many others that day, things might have been different… but that was never an option for me.
The only people I could even call friends were two.
“Hyeon~!”
Yena spotted me the moment I entered and called out from across the room. A short distance away, Seungheon gave me a light nod in greeting. Yena was the first person I had met after coming up to the capital, and Seungheon had continued to speak to me regularly despite our awkward first conversation, never seeming to avoid me. It was probably because his older sister Sehwa was a member of the squad leader’s unit and had an especially kind, warm personality that he took after.
In contrast, seated beside Seungheon was a female student shooting me a displeased sideways glance. Her prim, arrogant features immediately suggested she came from an excellent family. I believe her name was Mun Yeoul. She was from a prestigious house and publicly engaged to Seungheon, if I remembered correctly. But why on earth was he dating someone like her? She looked positively vicious—the type of person I hated most in the world. Human tastes really were incomprehensible.
“Hehe, you just came from the attribute test, right? Must’ve been tiring~”
Yena smiled brightly as I sat down beside her. Her attitude hadn’t changed at all even after learning about my background and my conflict with Yeon. She had only looked slightly intrigued for a moment. The stares around us grew even sharper. Yena wasn’t exceptionally skilled, but her bright and cheerful nature made her fairly popular among the freshmen. The fact that someone like her kept associating with me probably didn’t look good to the others…
“Haha, everyone’s full of energy. I like it.”
Right on time, the front door opened and a familiar young female professor entered. It was Professor Shin Jae-yu, who drilled the freshmen every dawn in Physical Training and Magical Combat. She nodded at us with a satisfied expression and began to speak.
“You’ve all worked hard adjusting to this unfamiliar environment. As previously announced, today I will be informing you of the topic for the first test that will take place in one week.”
She activated the projector installed in the lecture room. A map soon appeared on the wall behind her. At the center was a vast forest drawn on an enormous scale—easily dozens of times larger than the Cradle’s grounds. The Cradle and the capital were marked at the top, indicating the location lay somewhere south of the academy.
🏞 Type: Vast Training Forest
⚔ Scale: Dozens of times the Cradle grounds
📍 Location: South of the Capital
💀 Objective: First Practical Examination
The sudden appearance of the unfamiliar map caused quiet murmuring to break out among the students. Professor Shin seemed to enjoy the commotion; the corner of her mouth curved into a sly smile. The words that left her lips next poured fuel on the fire.
“Your first test will be a practical exercise conducted right here.”