The Premature Dawn
"I have no excuse... I am so sorry..."
"It's fine. Please don't worry about it."
Angelica was uncharacteristically dejected. No, "dejected" didn't even begin to cover it. She grit her teeth so hard they threatened to shatter, hanging her head with a shadowed face. Her bloodshot eyes looked ready to spill tears at any second. Given her fierce pride, she was likely suppressing her emotions to avoid the humiliation of crying in front of her students. But if she had been alone, wouldn't she have broken down sobbing? On top of that, she couldn't even walk on her own right now and was being piggybacked by her student, which must have made her feel utterly wretched.
"I... I was supposed to protect you... but instead, I was the one protected..."
"You did your best, Teacher. You protected me with everything you had. So please, don't say things like that."
"..." Angelica silently leaned her head against my back. Yeah, let's just leave her be for now. She needed time to process her feelings. A teacher who was supposed to protect her student had ended up being protected by them. Moreover, that student had been trembling in fear, going so far as to grovel on the ground before the enemy, begging them to spare her teacher. I was the one who did it, but... Angelica's self-esteem must have shattered into a million pieces in that exact moment. That desperate cry of hers. Mmm... honestly, it was incredibly hot. It was a tragedy of epic proportions that I couldn't see her face because my head was bowed. Just what kind of look did she give me? The mere thought of it made my body shiver. Ah... I want to self-harm. I want to chop off my knuckles.
Angelica's ordeal didn't end there. Escaping that crisis was also thanks to her student's help. What would have happened if Yujin hadn't arrived then? Well, considering how easily Astaroth backed down, Angelica would have been fine, but I wouldn't have been. And if I had been dragged away, that would have been Angelica's defeat. Angelica had been protected and saved by her students twice in a row. It must sting terribly, but I believed she would use this bitterness as nourishment to grow even stronger. Angelica was just that kind of person. In the novel, she constantly surpassed her limits and grew to protect her students, so why would it be any different here?
No, actually, I can't trust the novel at all anymore. Not when Astaroth has already made an appearance... I sighed inwardly. What I had wanted all along was simple: follow the plot of the "original work" to the letter and secure a happy ending. After that... well, I had a modest dream of forfeiting my human rights to become a punching bag, but let's put that aside for now. Astaroth, who wasn't supposed to appear until much later, had already shown up at the very beginning of the story. This meant that the world and the plot of Dawn Swordsman had diverged significantly. On top of that, she had openly mentioned "loops," heavily implying regression. Astaroth said she had died multiple times. But... there are more than a few questionable things about her words and actions. If the situation weren't so urgent, I would have taken my time to chew over those doubts and organize them, but there was no time for that right now.
I stared at the back of Yujin, who was running a few paces ahead of us. If it weren't for Angelica, who could barely move, and me, who had been tortured with that mask, Yujin would have already reached Class 1-A. He had slowed down to match our pace because he couldn't just leave us behind. We had already wasted precious time convincing him not to carry the heavily injured Angelica himself, so we had to hurry. Still, we couldn't saddle our main fighter with extra baggage. What if a monster suddenly jumped out? I was technically a combatant too, but since I was far weaker than Yujin, it was better for me to carry Angelica.
Come to think of it, Yujin... has gotten insanely strong, hasn't he? Apparently, he was already at the threshold of Awakening. He hadn't fully Awakened yet—he had merely opened the door to it—but his growth rate was absolutely absurd. It made no sense. Awakening wasn't some neighborhood dog's name; how could he reach it so easily? Even if Awakened users popped up in droves later in the novel despite the setting claiming they were rare, an Awakening was still an Awakening. An Awakened user was, in essence, "one who approaches godhood." They were those who realized the true nature of their Supernatural Ability and drew close to the Source. It was a realm where one polished the grace bestowed by the gods to challenge their domain. That was Awakening. A realm that should have taken until at least the midway point of the story to barely reach... and he was already there?
Stepping onto the threshold of Awakening didn't guarantee one would actually achieve it. Most Supernatural Ability users only managed to open the door, unable to take a single step beyond. Even Class 1-A's assistant homeroom teacher, Siul, was currently at the threshold of Awakening. She simply hadn't been able to climb higher, remaining stuck at that level. Even taking that into account, Yujin's current growth rate was unprecedented. No matter how much of a genius he was, this was too fast. It was abnormal. It was like a crawling infant suddenly sprinting before they could even walk. Astaroth's sudden appearance, and Yujin's rapid growth... I didn't have the luxury of pondering it deeply right now, so I decided to think about it once this whole ordeal was over and we returned to the Academy.
"I see them...!" Yujin shouted. I narrowed my eyes and looked ahead. ...Ugh, there were so many. An absolute horde of monsters. And they were all wearing masks... Just how many of those things did they bring? Since these were monsters captured by the research institute, they were inherently weak, meaning there should be a limit to how strong they could get even with the masks. If Angelica were in top shape, she could probably trap them with golems and wipe them out instantly with a wide-range attack. But in her current state...
"Thank goodness. Everyone is safe." As if blocked by an invisible wall, the monsters were merely surrounding the students, unable to attack. Oh... it wasn't just a metaphor; there really seemed to be a physical wall. They were slamming against it, pressing their faces up to it in a desperate frenzy to break through. This Supernatural Ability... was it Assistant Teacher Siul? Thank goodness. She was safe too. When Astaroth grabbed her by the face and threw her, I was genuinely worried she might die.
"There are too many of them. Defeating them one by one would be highly inefficient. Besides..."
"A high-ranking monster," Angelica murmured as Yujin trailed off. Indeed, among the massive horde of monsters, there was one entity that drew everyone's attention. It was a lizard-like monster currently being held off by a woman with light green hair. Wait... was that actually a lizard? It had the face of a dragon, the body of a lizard, and the legs of a leopard. Huh, I felt a strange sense of déjà vu. That guy... was it the one from the novel? The one that was supposed to be the main antagonist of the field training episode? The lizard monster that had escaped the research institute after growing stronger by cannibalizing other monsters?
"Siul should be more than capable of defeating a high-ranking monster. If she couldn't even manage that, she wouldn't deserve to be an Academy teacher. The problem is..."
"She's wasting her strength trying to protect the students."
"Yes. With her power and attention divided, it might be a bit too much for her." Angelica let out a low groan and slid off my back. I tried to support her, but she waved her hand to dismiss me. "Do not worry. I have recovered to some extent." You don't look recovered at all. Injuries were nothing to me since I had Super Regeneration, but that wasn't the case for her. It was painfully obvious she was biting her lip to endure the agony. Forcing herself to move would only reopen her wounds. Even if Supernatural Ability users were superhuman, they were still human at their core. Fighting with such severe injuries could end disastrously.
"You two stand back. First, we will sweep away the other monsters, and then the high-ranking—"
"No," Yujin said, shaking his head. He gripped his hilt tightly with both hands. The veins on the back of his hands bulged as intense heat gathered along the blade. "I'll do it." Red Sword. Normally, he compressed fire within it to increase its cutting power, but this time was different. He enveloped the blade in flames that far exceeded its capacity. Using the sword as an axis, an uncontrollable vortex of fire began to rage.
Wait...? Was that... that? Yujin's ultimate move? The one he only conceptualized in his head during the early stages of the story, and barely managed to complete after his abilities grew? He was using it now? Already? Later on, he would develop higher-tier techniques and the power scaling would shoot up, turning this move into a mere basic attack, but it definitely wasn't a skill he should be using at this point in time! I could practically hear the plot tangling itself into knots. It was drifting further and further away from the novel I knew. Was this okay? Was this really going to be okay? It felt so unfair. I hadn't even done anything...
"I don't know if it'll work well since it's my first time trying it..." Yujin took a step forward. As he raised the Red Sword high, the vermilion vortex grew even more violent. It spun and compressed. The flames that had towered like a spire gradually shrank in volume, gathering around the blade and spinning like a gear. It rotated like a disc, condensing a colossal amount of power to push its cutting force and destructive capability to the absolute limit.
Single Slash
Sshhk. I felt the illusion of hearing a sound that shouldn't have been audible. The wind held its breath. All noise vanished in an instant. A brief void. After a short silence that lasted no more than a few seconds... KABOOOOOOOOOOOM!!! A delayed explosion roared. It sliced through the horde of monsters in a single stroke, and without stopping there, triggered an explosion that tore their corpses to shreds. Dumbfounded by this absurd, godlike technique, I stared at Yujin's profile. Yet, Yujin himself was frowning as if dissatisfied.
"Not even half... barely a third. I guess wiping them all out with this is impossible..." He sure had a lot to say for someone who had just halved dozens of monsters in a single blow. Some of us only had Super Regeneration, meaning our ultimate move was dragging things into a muddy brawl. Seriously, this is why protagonists are the worst. They're so greedy.