Chapter 6: The Master
There were certain actions I had repeated countless times since the day I decided to become a master of martial arts.
First, throw a punch.
Ten thousand times a day, until the shoulders bracing both arms went numb.
Then, kick at some phantom enemy in the empty air.
Within the limits of what my lower back and hips could endure without breaking down, I sought the meaning of the martial path on my own. I was never the kind of genius who could master ten things at once, so I had no choice but to hammer every fundamental of combat into my body, one by one.
I believed that if I kept at it, someday I would grow strong.
So I refused to give up,
and clenched my fist all the harder.
"No. That's not it."
I smashed my fist into empty space with everything I had.
"Hmm... not that either."
And I repeated it, over and over again.
After all, constant effort would surely yield better results than standing still. I knew that today's me was better than yesterday's, and that tomorrow's me would be stronger than today's.
So I never faltered. I ran without pause.
But that alone was never a guarantee I could surpass anyone.
"You're using too much force," she said. "Giving your all is fine, but at this rate your body will break down long before you ever reach the summit. Your physique and your internal energy are both still unrefined—rather than trying to overwhelm everything with raw power, you should be working to control every tool at your disposal."
The woman, barely a single year older than I was, tapped my shoulder with a gentle smile. "Don't be so impatient."
She was my temporary master—a warrior who had reached a realm of skill so far beyond my own that the me who had yet to be expelled could never have dreamed of touching it. No matter what happened, she was someone I could never bring myself to speak ill of. My master. Before I collapsed, worn down by my own futility, she was the only one who ever pointed me in the right direction.
And yet, back then, I couldn't understand her at all.
"Now, follow along."
Why had someone so supremely gifted taken a failing student like me as her disciple? How had she endured my every foolish mistake, waiting patiently time after time? Why was she showing me this scene now? Watching her back, always from behind, I harbored those questions somewhere deep in my chest.
"You can do it."
The woman drew her foot down through empty air, and along her trajectory, motes of light bloomed into being. The martial principles woven within them were so far beyond my grasp that I couldn't comprehend a thing—but the result, at least, was unmistakable.
She extended her leg.
—And the sky and the sea split in two.
As casually as if it were only natural.
'You can do it.'
Even now, I still cannot understand her.
Consciousness came surging up to the surface all at once, and I opened my eyes.
"Oh, you're awake?"
"...What the—"
I blinked. An unfamiliar ceiling was strange enough, but for a moment I couldn't fathom why she of all people was standing here. Cheon Yuha, somehow looking impossibly young, was peering down at me, waving a hand in front of my face. "Hello? Hello-o? ...Hah! Nurse, I believe this fellow has gone blind as well."
What on earth was going on? Was I dreaming?
Flustered by the unexpected situation, I blinked slowly and began piecing my memories back together, my gaze drifting around the room starting from Cheon Yuha's wide, round eyes. And the moment I recognized the familiar scenery of a school infirmary—the kind I'd visited plenty of times back in my own school days—it finally clicked.
'...Right. I came back.'
I had no idea why, but one thing was certain: I had returned to the past.
I squeezed my eyes shut. Today was my first day of school—and I'd just realized exactly what kind of situation I'd woken up into.
"Evan-deh."
Yeah, this was e-ba—beyond just bad.
Staring down at the casts sealing both of my arms tight, I grimaced. I'd greeted my first morning of school in a hospital bed, arms wrecked.
"Mm-hmm-hmm~ mm-hmm~ heh-heh~"
Professor Pumpkinhead—pumpkin-headed tenured professor of the Shamanism Department—was in an exceptionally good mood today. After all, today was a lecture-free day, which meant he could spend the entire day in his laboratory.
Research from morning till night, and whenever boredom struck, he could dump an assignment or two on his graduate students. It was going to be a truly blissful day.
"Hmm-hmm~♪ Hmm-hmm~♬"
Humming to himself, Professor Pumpkinhead set off for work while planning out his perfect day. And at last, when he came face to face with his workplace—the research building—
"...What the hell."
Thud—! His legs gave out on the spot, and he crumpled to the ground. Staring at the wreckage with unfocusing eyes, he murmured hollowly, "...Why?"
The Special Research Building had been blasted apart in a perfectly straight line from the entrance inward. The absence of the statue that was supposed to stand at the entrance didn't even register—because beyond that direction lay something far, far more important. His own laboratory.
"WAAAAAAAAGH!!!"
The moment the truth dawned on him, Professor Pumpkinhead seized his head and screamed. He wailed. His workplace had been destroyed today. No—perhaps it had been yesterday. His laboratory, his research data, everything, utterly annihilated.
It was a morning of screams from countless faculty members across the academy.
And there was also someone who had to answer for it.
"A total clusterfuck, isn't it?"
WHOOSH—! Every time breath escaped his mouth, the surrounding air came to a rolling boil. His secretary beside him watched anxiously, visibly worried the room might catch fire at any moment.
"...Tell the repair crew to fix that first. Complaints are already piling up from the utility tunnels."
"Yes, sir. Right away."
Having issued his orders, the Red Dragon seemed to decide there was nothing more worth looking at. He shattered the magic mirror with a WHAM, drew a deep breath, and lowered himself into his chair. CRREEEAK—! The chair screeched violently under the strain, but it held. It had to—furniture and indeed the entire room had been custom-built to accommodate a master whose frame was larger and heavier than a fair-sized hill.
Feeling for all the world like a visitor in the land of giants, the secretary ventured carefully, "How severe should the disciplinary measures be?"
"...Being an educator involves a hell of a lot of thinking. The headmaster is off galavanting somewhere while I'm stuck dealing with this. Why me."
Each time Vice Principal Andrei Dragonov heaved a sigh, a small pillar of flame spewed forth—though thankfully, no actual fire broke out. Poking idly at the armrest of the poor innocent chair, he fell into a long silence before finally answering.
"One week."
"On-campus service, sir?"
"Off-campus."
"Understood. I'll see to the disposition shortly."
"One more thing—is only one name listed?"
The secretary nodded. The vice principal ran a clawed hand over his scaled, gravelly jaw, then added, "Being alone is a lonely thing. Send them both."
And so, their fates were decided.
"I nearly died back there."
By the time I'd first arrived at the infirmary, apparently, the shockwave had fractured my entire body, and my arms had been twisted up like pretzels—so badly that amputation had been on the table. I'm fairly certain golems aren't supposed to swing their livesword around like that, but somehow I got the feeling that's exactly what happened...
"Well, I suppose I did push myself too hard."
In any case, Seondo's miracle-working infirmary had proven, beyond all doubt, the saying that here, even those who wanted to die couldn't manage it. That most precious of treasures, an elixir, had been poured into my body by the droplet.
'Unlimited support for the strong and the victorious.'
That was Seondo's signature policy. Keep winning, and they'd keep treating me and showering me with benefits indefinitely. The moment I failed to prove my worth, though, I'd be expelled on the spot.
'Can't complain about that.'
All I had to do was keep winning.
With a shrug, I strode out of the infirmary, head held high. The instant the door slid open—SCREEECH—a delinquent lunged straight into my face.
"Ohhh! Thank goodness the treatment took! You looked like a corpse about to drop dead at any second—I was worried sick about you all through the night!"
It was my red-haired classmate, Cheon Yuha—the girl who would one day ascend to the throne of the Heavenly Demon, a fanatic obsessed with sparring and martial arts. She circled around me noisily, chattering away. "It seems we never properly introduced ourselves yesterday, so allow me to do so again! I am called Cheon Yuha. Ahem—your final moves yesterday were nothing short of astonishing. Which brings me to the matter of... hmm? I say! Why are you not answering me? Don't tell me your ears have stopped working now too!"
She'd always been on the friendly side, even back in her student days, but this innocent? This scattered? I remembered her as nothing like this flighty—her mind was utterly chaotic.
I forced myself to ignore her and pulled out my phone to check the time. 'Whoa, cutting it close to morning assembly.'
Which meant I had to hurry. I picked up the pace immediately.
"Hey! Wait! Why are you ignoring me?!"
Cheon Yuha called after me, frantic, but I kept ignoring her. Here I was with both arms in casts, while the person who'd been perfectly fine the whole time was walking around healthy as a horse—and honestly? It stung a little. Made me want to mess with her a bit.
The one who got dragged in at the very end nearly died, and she gets to walk away without a scratch?! Seriously?! Yeah, this was not the duty of a comrade-in-arms. How come you're the one waking up with Super-Peak healing, huh?!
...Of course, that wasn't the only reason.
'She's a little—a LOT—overwhelming.'
Takatak—takatakatak—!
Running in the school corridors violated the code of conduct, so I was making my desperate escape using nothing but Lightfoot steps.
Tap—tunk—tap—tunk!
And Cheon Yuha pursued me, relentless. This girl was pulling off an absurd trick: every time she took a single step to walk faster, space itself folded beneath her feet.
Worse, the look in her eyes as she stared at me was anything but ordinary.
'Geongondaenayi! Geongondaenayi!'
I could somehow read the thought glowing in her bright, sparkling eyes. A hundred percent chance I was right, too. The moment the atmosphere relaxed even slightly, she was absolutely going to ask about yesterday.
'...I was so focused on beating the guardian that I never planned how to explain it.'
Had the Mad Heavenly Demon's reckless, charge-first personality infected me? I'd just barreled straight in without thinking. I racked my brain for a way to explain how a mere First-rate martial artist had defeated a golem at the very threshold of the Super-Peak Realm—then quickly clicked my tongue. 'No good answer.'
Resolved to simply ignore her, I quickened my pace even further. But shaking off a Super-Peak martial artist with a First-rate body was an utterly impossible task. Cheon Yuha maintained a distance of exactly one meter behind me the entire time, shouting all the while.
"I say! Stop! I swear I won't lay a finger on you! I only need a moment of your time!"
"......"
What do I do? For now, I'll just keep running until she calms down. With that thought, I fled, tuning out her words, and Cheon Yuha chased me down.
That absurd race of alarm-bell-worthy footwork finally came to an end only when I reached the door of my homeroom class—Class 3.
Class 3, First Year — The Path of the Asura
"...Hmm."
I hesitated a moment in front of the classroom door as an old memory surfaced. Heavenly Path, Human Path, Asura Path, Beast Path, Hungry Ghost Path, Hell Path.
The academy's six homeroom classes were named after Buddhism's Six Paths of Reincarnation, and each name reflected its teacher's temperament. Put simply, the homeroom teacher of Class 1—Heavenly Path—was an absolute angel of a person, while Class 6—Hell Path—was presided over by someone who might as well have been a demon.
Which meant the homeroom teacher of Class 3, the Asura Path, was someone who loved nothing more than starting fights.
The way a dogfight promoter sets pit bulls against each other, that sort of thing. And that tendency held no exceptions for the first day of school—a brawl was scheduled to break out today, as a matter of course.
'I got beat to a pulp on day one, last time.'
Well, given that my past-life self had been ranked among the weakest weaklings in the entire school, it was only natural. If this was my chance for revenge, so much the better—except, hold on? My arms are broken, aren't they?
I gazed quietly down at the casts sealing both arms, then twisted my lips into a grin.
"Still... like hell I'd lose."
Not to a bunch of snot-nosed kids.
Seondo Academy, General Student Council Building. The Vice President's office.
Scratch—scratch—
A woman was diligently scribbling something into a notebook, the smile playing across her face refusing to fade, as if nothing in the world could bring her more joy. The way she occasionally twirled her hair absentmindedly or rested her pen against her upper lip made her look less like a master of any discipline and more like an ordinary student.
Knock knock—
At the sudden knock, a lock of hair slipped free and brushed across the desk. Her aide opened the door and entered, bowing his head with crisp professionalism. "Madam Vice President, it's time for your class observation."
"...Already?"
Only then did the woman glance at the wall clock. She gave a soft laugh and rose from her seat, accepting the coat her aide held out and slipping it on with a bright, carefree smile. "It's true what they say—time flies when you're playing."
"In all my years, madam, you are the only Vice President I have ever seen enjoy studying non-combat academics."
"Oh, come on. That's only because it's something I've never done before. People are always most comfortable doing what they know best."
Seondo's Student Council Vice President, Lee Chung, traced her own chin with a finger and smiled. "Which is exactly why I wonder—when will I ever get used to this?"
"You are the finest Vice President I have ever known."
"Oh, stop with the flattery—"
"Then where shall we head first?"
"You're changing the subject, huh?"
"...So, where shall we head first?"
"Hmm."
After a moment's thought, Lee Chung gave her answer.
"The Asura Path. Let's start with the ones obsessed with fighting."
Because that would be the most entertaining, of course.
The woman murmured to herself and stepped forward without a shred of hesitation.
And with every stride she took, motes of light bloomed in her wake.