Enrollment (1)

"Aaagh!"

Yu Haneul, age sixteen, first-year student at the Academy — early admit.

She slipped in her house slippers, cracked her head, and remembered her past life.

As a bonus, she also remembered that this world was the one inside the novel Academy Battle Mage.

Beep-beep. Beep-beep.

The alarm hammered against my ears. My submerged consciousness began to surface.

"Nnngh…"

Half-asleep, I flailed an arm until the noise died, then staggered into the bathroom and turned on the shower.

Whoosh—

After dredging up my past-life memories last night, I had spent the small hours tangled in every philosophical debate imaginable about the self, and now my eyes refused to open properly.

…Of course, a blast of cold water would have fixed that instantly. But that was a little much.

I'd washed in hot water, so even after the shower I still wasn't awake. I dried my hair in a daze. By the time my mind had sharpened enough to notice, I was already wearing my school uniform skirt and had finished a light layer of makeup.

"Ah."

Looking at myself in the mirror, all the fretting about identity that had filled my head the night before suddenly felt meaningless.

Yesterday, when I cracked my skull, the memories of my previous life had come flooding back. Thanks to them, I now knew this world was the setting of the novel Academy Battle Mage.

A modern academy novel about a veteran gamer who controlled a regressor character — and then woke up inside that game's world. Even after a night's sleep, the plot remained crystal clear in my mind. In exchange, every other memory of my past life had gone hazy.

A day earlier, recalling those memories had shifted my personality and values a little, but the core of who I was hadn't shaken. Part of that was because the past-life memories were so blurred I couldn't even remember my own name — but that wasn't the only reason. Something more fundamental than continuity of self or gender had taken over my thoughts.

If this world was a novel's world —

was I nothing more than a clump of printed type?

was this entire reality someone else's idle fiction?

were the bonds I would form from now on not people at all, but mere characters?

Those were the questions that had kept me awake.

Clear answers were almost certainly impossible.

Even so, I wanted to find them.

Not some absolute truth that would define the existence of this world — just enough ground for me to accept it without flinching.

So that I could affirm the existence of the person who had put down roots here: me.

I stood in front of the mirror for a long time, turning last night's looping conclusions over in my mind.

Then I gathered my things and stepped out the door.

Today was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Academy's entrance ceremony.

I left the girls' dormitory and headed for the main auditorium where the ceremony would be held, taking in my surroundings as I walked. Inatium Academy. An academy on an artificial island in Incheon, ranked among the world's top five institutions for Awakeners — and, when the field was narrowed to education for minors, number one on the planet.

And, of course, the central setting of the novel Academy Battle Mage.

Naturally, as with most academy stories, nobody actually graduated; they all dropped out halfway through.

If the original cast had managed to finish, this place might have become the greatest academy in the world.

Tall glass buildings lined my field of vision. The futuristic, urban sprawl felt less like a high school and more like a brand-new city of its own.

I didn't know the way, so I simply followed the other students. After about five minutes a rather magnificent building came into view — a massive structure that blended modern lines with Baroque and Gothic touches of medieval Europe.

…Wasn't this Korea?

And a newly built one at that.

"Hmm…"

I passed through the great front doors and claimed an empty seat toward the back. There was still a little time before the ceremony began. Sitting there, I opened my status window.

The status window every Awakener could see. Until yesterday it had been something I'd have been embarrassed to show anyone; after I cracked my head, it had gotten a little dazzling. Once my past-life memories returned, the title slot that had only ever displayed static as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠■■■(■■) shed its noise and revealed an Ex-rank title — and I picked up an Ex-rank skill for free.

The title description made no sense whatsoever, but the skill looked genuinely useful. I wouldn't know the amplification rate until I actually fired something, yet I refused to believe an Ex-rank skill would turn out to be trash.

It was a shame I still had no offensive skills of my own — but even Lowest-Grade Heal (E) ought to deliver solid recovery if I triggered it through a gun.

As for why a gun-related skill had appeared at all…

Aside from the novel itself, almost the only clear memory left from my past life was the last one: a bullet buried in my heart as death closed over me. That had to be connected.

"……"

The moment I started thinking about it, the memory of dying rushed in and began to swallow my mind whole.

What pulled me back out was a voice rolling through the speakers around the hall.

— Ahem.

I looked up. The entrance ceremony had already begun.

The principal stood at the podium with a microphone.

— Good morning. I am Shin Heeyoung, principal of Inatium Academy. First of all……

A woman with striking dark navy hair.

She looked to be in her twenties, but she was well past fifty.

Shin Heeyoung, principal of the Academy, was one of the characters from the novel —

and, following the cliché, she was destined to die in the mid-section of the story.

I tried to listen to her speech.

It was thoroughly boring, but she was the first novel character I had actually met, so there was no harm in paying atten—

Clap clap clap clap—

"……?"

Applause yanked my sleeping mind awake.

"Ah."

…I hadn't even made it past the first paragraph of the speech before the sandman claimed me.

Guess I really was short on sleep last night. Yeah.

The closing formalities had already finished. Students were rising from their seats one after another. I watched groups drift off together and tried to read the room, but I had no idea what I was supposed to do next. So I snagged a nearby boy who looked like the studious type as he walked past.

"Hey, friend."

I hadn't put any thought into the form of address.

Whoever he was, if he'd sat through the same entrance ceremony, he was a first-year.

First-years were friends. Obviously.

"Uh— huh?"

He jumped and flushed the second I grabbed him and spoke. I ignored the reaction and asked what I needed to know.

"I kind of dozed off. Do you happen to know what we're supposed to do now?"

"Ah— th-that, um, e-everyone g-goes to their c-classrooms, I th-think."

He stammered so badly it was hard to follow, but I was a mature intellectual, so I refrained from pointing it out.

"Classrooms?"

"Y-yeah, th-the, ah."

"Friend, if you talk like that, I'm going to have trouble understanding you."

…Correcting someone's mistakes was also part of being a mature intellectual, wasn't it?

That was my position, anyway.

"S-s-sorry…"

At my words his face went even redder, and his tongue seized up worse than before.

Maybe this friend had a few gaps in his communication skills?

"Haa…"

I couldn't hold back a sigh. His eyes immediately went shiny and wet.

Those were the eyes of someone who would dissolve into tears if I so much as poked him.

For his sake, I needed to wrap this conversation up quickly.

"So basically, I just go to the classroom for the class I was assigned on the notice, right?"

"Y-y-yeah…"

Apparently mortified by his own catastrophic communication skills, he managed to answer three whole times this round.

"Great. Thanks, friend! See you around!"

Like the mature intellectual I was, I expressed my gratitude for the favor and made my exit. The "see you around" didn't mean anything in particular. We went to the same school; we'd bump into each other eventually, wouldn't we? Of course, even if we did, I wouldn't be the one starting a conversation.

My assigned class was Class 1-A.

Fortunately, that put me in the same room as the novel's main cast. Had the original "Yu Haneul" also belonged to Class 1-A?

There was no way to check. "Yu Haneul" was an extra who never even got a name drop in the novel.

Especially since class assignments here were completely random, not ranked by grades.

In the world of Academy Battle Mage, healers were vanishingly rare — practically an endangered species. The transmigrated protagonist's party didn't have one. The regressor's group didn't have one either.

In fact, none of the major cast members were healers at all.

Awakeners in this world leveled up by hunting magical beasts and clearing dungeons and gates. At the moment of Awakening, each person locked into their own skill tree; every level simply unlocked higher skills along that fixed path.

Mine was a healer tree, so leveling would open recovery and support skills. But no matter how high I climbed, I probably would never unlock an offensive skill on my ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠own.

That applied to every healer in this world. In other words, every healer was someone who could never awaken any skill outside healing and support by their own power. And experience points here scaled with the damage you dealt to magical beasts. Without attack skills, healers had a miserable time leveling. So they simply refused to set foot on the battlefield. Growth stalled; their abilities froze at a weak baseline.

That was why healers had vanished from the mainstream.

On top of that, this world even had potions, so combat classes on the front lines didn't particularly go looking for healers either. Potions had their own problems, of course — but still.

…Left to my own preferences, I would have been happy to coast in the rear and suck honey all day. But now that I knew the forbidden truth — that this world was living on borrowed time — I couldn't afford to give up on growing stronger.

I wasn't carrying some grand cause or noble conviction. I just wanted to do everything I could to stay alive, so I wouldn't have any regrets.

Chasing those thoughts — and the crowd — I managed to reach the classroom in one piece. I checked the Class 1-A nameplate above the door, then slid it open with a rattle.

A sea of multicolored heads filled my vision. I toyed with my own black hair — it fell all the way to my waist — and scanned the room for an empty seat.

"Hmm…"

My absolute favorite spot, the back seat by the window, already had an occupant. Still, a little smooth conversation got them to yield it. I settled in and happily watched the wide stretch of sky through ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the glass right beside me.

A bright start to the semester. The omens were good.