Chapter 9
Chapter 9
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 9
Chapter Title: Teaming Up
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“Why?”
“There are two reasons.”
Two reasons why we have to team up.
Lee Seojun felt a strong surge of curiosity at his unpredictable words.
“Alright, let’s hear them.”
“First one. I’m dead last in the entire 2nd year.”
That was his reason. A chuckle escaped at the unexpected statement.
“Pfft. That’s your reason?”
“There are adjustment scores in all the school’s joint tests. If the top student in school teams up with someone like me who’s at the bottom, you can score even higher.”
Ah, so that’s what he meant. It definitely made sense.
But that alone wasn’t enough reason to take on the risk of teaming up with the bottom-ranked student.
“That’s not enough of a reason. Even with adjustment scores, it’s meaningless if your teammate can’t contribute anything.”
“Second one.”
Kim Sunwoo flashed a confident smile.
“It’s about Yoo Ara’s team composition. She’s put two low-rankers on her team for this dungeon exploration—149th and 148th place.”
“......What?”
Yoo Ara?
Lee Seojun already knew she saw him as a rival. He also knew she was putting in every effort to take the top spot from him.
But even so, to think she’d actually put two near-bottom students on her team.
“As you know, Yoo Ara specializes in wide-area magic. She’s specialized for multiple opponents over 1v1s. Even if she’s dragging along two low-rankers into the dungeon, I doubt it’ll be a big problem for her.”
“......Hmm. Now that you mention it, that does give me something to think about.”
As Lee Seojun muttered, Kim Sunwoo spoke again.
“Third one.”
“What? You said two earlier.”
At Lee Seojun’s question, Kim Sunwoo gave a meaningful smile.
Lee Seojun nodded upon seeing that smile.
“Fine. Third one. Let’s hear it.”
“I’m pretty decent for someone ranked last.”
“What?”
Laughter burst out of Lee Seojun at those words.
“Heh heh heh... Ah, that’s funny.”
It might just be a simple joke, but Lee Seojun didn’t think he was saying it without any basis.
Where on earth does that confidence come from?
Now he was curious enough to want to team up just to find out.
“Alright, good. Let’s team up. But I have a condition.”
“A condition?”
“The rest of the team members—I’ll pick them. That’s fine, right?”
I nodded at Lee Seojun’s words.
All I needed on the team was Lee Seojun anyway. That alone guaranteed at least top three.
“Yeah, no problem.”
Lee Seojun smiled at my answer. That smile was annoyingly handsome, which soured my mood.
“Oh, right, I wanted to ask something. Your main specialty is Manifestation, right?”
“That’s right.”
“What’s your sub-specialty? Oh, Enhancement, obviously?”
A sub-specialty refers to the secondary one among the four magic systems that you train in as support.
Usually, Enhancement users take Support as sub, and Manifestation users take Enhancement as sub.
Of course, it’s not absolute. There are exceptions, after all.
For reference, Summoning and Support are both high-difficulty with highly unique skills, so very few people make them their main specialty.
“Yeah, Enhancement.”
“Then we’ll need to recruit someone who can handle Support.”
Lee Seojun is a special case who has Enhancement as main and Manifestation as sub. He wields the top-tier technique ‘Synergy,’ which uses Enhancement and Manifestation simultaneously.
So that means this team needs someone who can handle Support magic.
Lee Seojun pondered alone for a bit before nodding as if he’d sorted out his thoughts.
“Alright. Let’s do well for the first semester.”
Lee Seojun held out his hand. I shook it.
[Character ‘Lee Seojun’ feels deep interest in you.]
[You acquire 2,000 points as a reward.]
After all classes ended, I headed to the mana training grounds.
Since it was still the first week, a lot of people were gathered, chatting away.
I had no idea why they were socializing here instead of the school lounges or cafes, but I ignored it and entered the training grounds.
As I entered, I felt eyes on me.
“That’s the guy.”
“Ah, the test video?”
“What a disgrace to the school. For real.”
Some whispered, while others openly sneered at me.
It pissed me off, but I ignored them and headed to a private room.
“Whew.”
The tightly shut door of the private room.
I held my smart student handbook up to it, and the door opened.
—Beep!
Stepping inside, I saw a long, straight empty space.
At a glance, it reminded me of a personal baseball field or bowling alley. In fact, Manifestation magic has a lot in common with a baseball pitcher.
Ball speed, velocity, control. They emphasize those three things quite similarly.
There, I operated a Summoning magic tool.
[Generating target.]
[Setting target movement.]
[Setting target movement to ‘Fast.’]
With the notification, a ‘doll’ made by the magic tool was summoned.
The humanoid doll that evoked the image of a human began leaping madly left and right.
I manifested magic. And like in the public test before, I compressed the mana.
Of course, if I compressed it as much as last time, I’d fail to release it again, so I reduced the amount of compressed mana a bit.
The next step was release and control.
Yesterday, I’d failed at release due to insufficient mana capacity.
The reason I came to the training grounds was to experiment with this.
How much mana do I need to compress to release it without major issues?
“Haat!”
I launched the manifested magic straight at the target.
—Whoosh!
The released mana orb sliced through the air.
I felt my body’s mana draining rapidly.
An uneasy feeling crept in, but I focused on ‘release.’ Then, as the flying mana orb neared the target, I entered the ‘control’ phase.
—Crack!
The target’s head shattered, and a score popped up.
[96 points]
“......Phew.”
Fortunately, the first shot was a success.
The score was pretty good too.
This seems to be the max compression I can manifest.
Without the mana recovery and growth from the ‘Regressor’s Wristwatch,’ even this would’ve been iffy.
“The next one’s the problem.”
Having used too much mana at once, I couldn’t even imagine casting another spell. Still, I had to. Objectively assessing my current level—that was most important.
[Generating the same target.]
[Increasing target count to 3.]
This time, I used normal manifestation without compression.
The destructive power was much lower, but with my remaining mana, this was all I could do.
I gathered mana and fired again. This time, I rapid-fired three shots in succession.
—Whoosh!
Three magic orbs flew quickly toward the targets.
Each magic orb left a vivid blue afterimage as it hurtled toward its goal, like living things.
—Crack! Crack! Crack!
Starting from the front, the dolls’ heads exploded one by one, and scores appeared.
[78 points]
[68 points]
[51 points]
“......Tch.”
The last spell failed at control due to mana shortage.
My limit was one compressed shot and three normal manifestations.
It was woefully insufficient for combat, but using the mana recovery from the Administrator’s Wristwatch, I could probably squeeze out a bit more.
“Whew.”
Now that I knew my level, time to do some mana cultivation.
[Mana increased by 0.02.]
[Great Nature’s Blessing adds 0.03 more mana.]
[Great Nature’s Blessing proficiency increased by 12%.]
After about two hours of mana cultivation, I opened my eyes.
Finally felt like I’d safely made it through the day. I stood up happily, stretching.
“Huuuuh!”
Ah, feels good. Thinking of heading back to the dorm to rest already made me happy.
‘Ah, a cold beer when I get back would be perfect.’
Just imagining it feels great.
But I’m a minor right now. No way to get beer even if I wanted to.
Plus, if the school caught me, it’d be at least a warning.
“Tsk.”
I smacked my lips in regret.
I’d have to figure out a way later.
I opened the door and left the mana cultivation room.
Past 11 PM, the training grounds were empty, giving it a eerie vibe.
As I walked through, one private training room door opened.
Out came a familiar face—a woman. It was Yoo Ara, her sweat-soaked hair tied back tightly. Our eyes met at the same time.
Her coldly glaring eyes. Yoo Ara’s gaze was chillier than usual.
She looked like she had a lot of complaints.
Feeling awkward for no reason, I spoke first.
“Hey.”
No reply. Just a cold stare.
“......Uh.”
With that, she left the training grounds.
I watched her back and thought.
‘Did she get mad because I said she has no friends?’
Wednesday morning.
I went down to the dorm cafeteria for breakfast.
The line wasn’t as insanely long as yesterday, but still pretty long.
I waited dazedly, and when my turn came, I grabbed a tray.
The magic academy dorm cafeteria operates as a buffet. True to the setting of a wealthy school with great student welfare, there’s tons of food, taking time to choose.
“Ah, where is it?”
I kept wandering the cafeteria looking for one dish.
Mana shrimp stew.
That was the dish I was after.
This fantasy dish packed with ocean mana suited my tastes perfectly even before regression, so I always grabbed it during meals.
But it seemed everyone else had taken it all—I couldn’t find any.
‘But I’m not the type to give up like this.’
With my shrimp obsession, I circled the cafeteria for two minutes and finally found some.
“What the.”
Had rumors of the shrimp’s taste already spread through school?
In the large bowl, only a single shrimp remained.
No choice.
I’d take this one.
“Tsk. Too bad.”
I filled my plate with food and scanned the cafeteria.
Yesterday it was packed with no empty seats, but today there were spots here and there.
Seems like everyone’s adapted enough to skip breakfast.
I plopped down at a random empty seat.
As I ate, I felt a slight stir around me.
No, more like the air flow changed?
‘What’s that?’
Following the students’ gazes, I saw two male students and one female with trays of food.
Familiar faces.
The main characters: Lee Seojun, Lee Hyunjoo, and Shin Youngjun.
Then, as Lee Seojun moved with his tray, our eyes met by chance.
“Kim Sunwoo.”
Lee Seojun called out to me, sounding glad.
He soon sat in the seat across from me.
“Why are you eating alone?”
Lee Seojun was followed by Shin Youngjun and Lee Hyunjoo, who also sat down.
Suddenly dining with the main characters caught me off guard.
Shin Youngjun glanced at me and smiled.
“You’re Kim Sunwoo, right?”
“Huh? Yeah.”
Shin Youngjun looked at me with a beaming smile before asking Lee Seojun.
“When did you two get close?”
“Us? Yesterday.”
“I don’t think I saw you two together yesterday.”
“We’re teaming up for tomorrow’s dungeon exploration.”
At Lee Seojun’s words, Shin Youngjun nodded with an “Ah.”
“But why just you two? Aiming for adjustment scores or something?”
“Yeah. He’s last place, so he suggested it to me first.”
“Hmm.”
Shin Youngjun glanced at me again and said.
“But you’re confident in top spot even without adjustment scores.”
“Yoo Ara’s team looks suspicious.”
“Yoo Ara? How’d she set up her team?”
“She added two bottom-rankers.”
At that, Shin Youngjun shook his head with a groan.
“She’s really ruthless.”
“Not ruthless—just hardworking at everything. It motivates me too, which is nice.”
“......You’re so positive. I’d be exhausted.”
As I tried to focus back on eating, I felt a strange gaze from across the table.