The First Gate (1)
By the time every student had finished choosing their weapons and even the simple aptitude test meant to gauge each one's skill had wrapped up, Jin Soyoung spoke.
"Those who wish can receive additional training from me after class. You'll get training far harder and more grueling than the regular lessons. Volunteers so far: Yeon Hajin, Yu Haneul, Yoon Chae-ah, Lee Hayun, Chae Yujeong, Han Yeoreum—six in total. Anyone else?"
Just like in the original, Yeon Hajin had signed up for the special training as well. Aside from me and Yeon Hajin, the remaining four were the heroines. He must have talked up the benefits of the training and gotten them to join, same as in the original story.
"If not, that concludes our first combat techniques class."
No one else volunteered. Even the simple test they'd just gone through had been exhausting—and now something harder than that? Not an easy choice. Only doomsday theorists who believed the world would end within three years would sign up for something like that.
Once Instructor Jin Soyoung left, the students sprawled across the ground began to stagger to their feet.
Split into two groups by gender, they shuffled like zombies toward the locker rooms.
There was a brief commotion in the girls' locker room afterward, but we made it back to the classroom in one piece.
The already brief break vanished like melting snow, and the next class began at once.
"……Following the first gate that appeared in Seoul, our society changed rapidly………"
Letting the history teacher's explanation wash over one ear, I gazed out the window at the sky and thought about my after-school plans.
According to the original story, Yeon Hajin would take two of the heroines to an unregistered gate today. It wasn't a gate with any special hidden pieces—just a place where a few tricks let you farm a ton of experience. A choice meant to strengthen the heroines' combat power. In the low-level range, simple leveling outstripped most hidden pieces. Raising your level alone granted status points and new skills.
Of course, thanks to the exploits, today's gate wouldn't involve any real injury or danger, so a healer wasn't strictly necessary….
But that was true for the other heroines as well. The gate was a level Yeon Hajin could clear alone in the first place.
So wouldn't they make room for one more person—me?
I had no intention of becoming a heroine, of course, but Yeon Hajin wasn't taking them along to romance them either. He was strengthening future party members. Securing a healer resource like me would be good for him too.
In the original, Yeon Hajin had lamented the lack of a healer more than once. Of course, on the battlefield itself the problem had been the sheer absence of healer stock, so it hadn't been something he could solve.
While I was mulling over how to approach Yeon Hajin about it—
"Then, Cadet Yu Haneul, would you care to answer?"
Hearing my name from the history teacher's mouth snapped me fully awake.
"...Excuse me?"
Even at my blank reply, the history teacher only stared at me without elaborating. She'd clearly noticed I wasn't paying attention and was calling on me.
Okay, so I hadn't been listening properly….
But couldn't she at least repeat the question…?
I pleaded with my eyes for a moment, but the teacher was either bloodless or tearless—she held her silence.
In the suffocating quiet that followed, I casually swept my gaze around the room, broadcasting silent pleas for help in every direction.
Then my eyes met Baek Woohyun's.
Honestly, I hadn't expected much from him. Expecting that kind of favor from someone who was clearly even more bloodless and tearless than the teacher was impossible for any reader of Academy Battle Mage.
I was about to look away and search for someone else when Baek Woohyun's mouth moved.
Tower of Beginning
He hadn't spoken aloud—just shaped the words with his lips—but it was enough to understand.
"The Tower of Beginning…?"
"Hm…. Correct."
With the teacher's affirmation, the tension drained from my stiff body.
"Please focus better on the lesson from now on."
Of course the teacher added a line, having clearly noticed my cheating, but she didn't make an issue of it beyond that.
I turned my gaze back to Baek Woohyun.
He had already looked forward again, so I only saw the back of his head, but I still fired a gaze of gratitude into the back of his skull.
Last time, he'd noticed a stare drilling into the back of his head just fine.
I'd been pretty moved just now.
It felt like that stray cat that always hissed at you had suddenly sat down calmly and made bright, clear eye contact?
Because I hadn't expected anything at all, the emotion hit twice as hard.
Of course Baek Woohyun wouldn't know.
What it meant to me that he was acting differently from his original depiction.
A quiet smile rose to my lips as I looked out the window at the blue sky.
That scenery, that blue—it felt so much sharper than just a moment ago.
A brief break after class.
Continuing my earlier fretting, I kept turning over how to broach the subject with Yeon Hajin.
I couldn't exactly walk up and say, "Hey, you're going to a gate today, right?" so my thoughts dragged on.
Should I just hit him with "What are you doing after school?" What if he got the wrong idea?
How long had I been agonizing when someone spoke to me.
"Hey, you're Yu Haneul, right?"
I turned toward the voice and met Yeon Hajin's eyes.
…Don't tell me?
A flicker of anticipation rose, but I kept it off my face and answered.
"Yeah. And you're Yeon…. Um, Yeon Hajun?"
"It's Yeon Hajin."
"Ah, right. We met at the training ground yesterday. Of course I remember."
Yeon Hajin's expression wavered for a moment, as if recalling yesterday, but I pressed on without caring.
"So what's up?"
"If you've got time after school, want to hit a gate with us?"
"...A gate?"
"Ah, I found an undiscovered gate recently. The difficulty's pretty low, so I figured it'd be good for some of us from class to party up and go in."
Undiscovered gates, by principle, gave the first discoverer priority on clearing them. Only if they judged it beyond their ability would they sell the rights to the Association.
"Just students? Isn't that too dangerous?"
But that didn't mean it was fine for students to casually stroll into a gate.
Technology had advanced and plenty of research had been done, but gates were still bundles of variables.
I knew thanks to the original that this one wasn't that dangerous, but saying something like this to a normal person was a great way to get labeled suicidal.
So if Yeon Hajin truly wanted to persuade me, he needed to pull out an appropriate excuse……
"No risk, no growth. If you're scared, it's fine to refuse."
…Look at this guy?
I stared straight into the eyes of the faintly smiling Yeon Hajin.
Behind that light smile, a gaze trying to read me.
From Yeon Hajin's perspective, I must have been curious. A character who never even appeared in the game, yet possessed unusual, high-performance skills—and who'd signed up for Jin Soyoung's special training today on top of that.
Joining Jin Soyoung's special training meant interest in growth, and further, interest in the battlefield. A character with interest in the battlefield and a one-of-a-kind skill who somehow never appeared until the end of the original? Whether to take her as an ally or not was secondary—he'd need to figure her out just to eliminate the variable.
And from the start, I didn't look like an extra. I'd seen the faces of several heroines by now, and I still hadn't met anyone prettier than me.
The world's most beautiful girl never mentioned in the original? By genre-novel logic, that was a variable you absolutely had to investigate.
So he was using a gate that wasn't some irreplaceable hidden piece—just one that gave a lot of experience—to size me up.
"...Alright. Right after school?"
It wasn't a bad situation for me either.
I had nothing to lose.
Getting a pile of experience was only good for me.
"Get ready and meet at the fountain in the central plaza at five. That's where we'll gather."
There wasn't much to prepare. Not much I could prepare, either.
In comfortable clothes, with only the sniper rifle and handgun I'd received that morning in my inventory, I left the dorm.
In the original, today's gate run had been done with three people total.
Yeon Hajin, Yoon Chae-ah, and Chae Yujeong.
Yoon Chae-ah was the granddaughter of the Sword Star, one of Korea's elder Awakeners, and in the original she filled the loner assassin-class heroine slot. With talent that was pitiful for a Sword Star's granddaughter and a weak personality, she suffered under her older brother and branch relatives; later, like a proper heroine, she would blossom under the protagonist's help.
Right now she and I were classmates who'd seen each other's faces a few times over the past two days.
Meaning we hadn't spoken once.
Premature approaches could be seriously harmful to a loner type, so I'd kept my distance for now—but I planned to open a conversation this time.
The other one, Chae Yujeong, was the heiress of the world's number-one potion brand, Asis, and in the original she filled the cool, chic, sharp-tongued villainess archer-class heroine role.
In the early story, before the protagonist influenced her, she showed a somewhat destructive personality, but I didn't think that was my problem to worry about. The protagonist would handle the personality correction himself.
On the way to the agreed meeting spot at the fountain.
Rounding the last corner brought the fountain into view, and I came face to face with the waiting party of Yeon Hajin, Yoon Chae-ah, and Chae Yujeong.
A flow different from the original.
The piercingly blue sky behind them was so vivid that my mood lifted on its own……
"A healer? Do we really have to waste experience on her? Just use potions. You said it wouldn't be that dangerous anyway."
…Has this girl lost her mind.