Chapter 31: Preparation (6)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 31: Preparation (6)
In the principal's office of Joaquin Academy, Medea narrowed her eyes as she stared at the Sword Emperor, Siegfried. He was deep in thought, stroking his chin. His graying hair caught the light of the setting sun, sparkling like sand on a white beach.
Medea let out a deep sigh and called out to him.
"What's on your mind?"
"Ah, my apologies. It is nothing."
"Ha!"
Dumbfounded, Medea let out a scoff of disbelief. In the fifty-plus years they had known each other, she had never heard the Sword Emperor apologize. Yet she had heard it twice today alone.
His behavior was so uncharacteristic that she genuinely wondered if he was going senile. Medea crossed her arms and legs.
"So, what was that all about earlier? It's a good thing one of the instructors reported to me that you and Geomma were sparring. What would you have done if I hadn't stepped in? And on top of that, unleashing the Blessing of the Sword Spirit against a mere cadet? Say something, you old geezer!"
Medea fired off her questions in a rapid, sharp volley. The Sword Emperor smirked faintly, took a sip of his tea, and finally spoke.
"If I hadn't unleashed the blessing, I wouldn't have been able to gain the upper hand."
"...What?"
Thinking she had misheard, Medea cleaned out her ear with a finger before staring back at him. But his steady tone held no trace of a lie.
What did I just hear? Did those words really come out of the mouth of the fiercely proud Siegfried? To begin with, the mere assumption that he "might have lost" was an incredibly foreign concept to Medea.
Though his hair had turned white and wrinkles lined his face, she knew his strength better than anyone.
Because of his stubborn, uncompromising nature, he had never neglected his training for even a single day. Despite his aging body, the Sword Emperor's blade only grew more precise and sharper by the day.
Of course, she was well aware of Kang Geomma's natural genius. But no matter how gifted a prodigy was, there should still be a limit to what raw talent could achieve against decades of experience.
"The boy has already reached the realm of the Mindscape."
"What? Already?! You only began to touch upon that realm when you were nearly thirty. Even the Spear Saint didn't reach it until he was forty. And a seventeen-year-old can use it? Do you honestly think that makes any sense?"
Medea stammered in disbelief. The Sword Emperor took another sip of his tea and set the cup down on the table.
"I do not know either. However, if he possesses something capable of offsetting that gap in experience, then it is a different story."
"My god..."
Medea let out a soft groan, pressing a hand to her forehead. She recalled Kang Geomma's face during the duel.
His face had shed its childish softness. A chilling bloodlust had emanated from his pitch-black eyes. It had caused even Medea to flinch instinctively at the time.
She hadn't let it show in front of the cadets, but a sudden shiver had run down her spine.
A feeling she hadn't experienced in half a century stirred something deep within her. Though she had retired from the front lines to serve as the academy principal, there was no way she could ever forget that sensation.
The very feeling that had consumed her body the moment she first realized her own utter helplessness.
It was humanity's oldest and most powerful emotion: fear.
A suffocating, piercing fear.
She had caught a faint glimpse of the same spine-chilling dread she felt when she first faced Basmon, the 6th Corps Commander, in Kang Geomma—who was supposed to be a mere cadet. It made her feel like a rabbit standing before a jackal.
...Is it because of the 'Demon' in his name?
Medea massaged her temples. Her mind was a tangled mess. To think that she, an educator, had felt fear toward a student...
Even to herself, it sounded utterly absurd. She had known Kang Geomma was an exceptional cadet ever since his admission.
But now, she couldn't even begin to fathom the true depth of his potential. Medea wrinkled her nose in annoyance.
A heavy silence settled over the room. The Sword Emperor quietly sipped his tea, savoring the flavor. Watching him, Medea spoke up with a displeased expression.
"So, who won?"
The Sword Emperor's right eyebrow twitched. He set his teacup down, the bottom clinking sharply against the table in irritation.
"Why ask such an obvious question? Good grief."
"You gave such a vague answer, so why wouldn't you tell me the result? Don't tell me... Sieg, did you lose? Even after unleashing the Blessing of the Sword Spirit and your Aura?"
"Of course not! No matter how gifted Kang Geomma is, he is still no match for me. Besides, my armament wasn't even in perfect condition at the time!"
"Whoa, why are you flying off the handle? And isn't it incredibly pathetic for someone who always preaches that 'a true master never blames his tools' to make excuses about his armament? If we're going by that logic, our Geomma was using a discount-store sashimi knife."
"Y-You...!"
Flushed with anger, the Sword Emperor bolted upright from his seat.
Medea nonchalantly cleaned her ear with her pinky finger. Deflated by her reaction, the Sword Emperor crossed his arms and slumped back onto the sofa.
"Did you lose, or did you win? Just give me the straight result."
"Of course I won."
Medea narrowed her eyes, studying him with a skeptical gaze. The Sword Emperor broke into a cold sweat, avoiding her eyes. Medea smirked, curling one corner of her mouth.
"Bullshit."
"You... you wicked bitch...! You refuse to believe a single word I say!"
Their bickering, a mix of angry shouting and giggling, only quieted down after two hours.
* * *
Staring blankly at the dormitory ceiling while mentally reviewing my battles had somehow become a habit.
The ceiling, which had felt so foreign when I first entered the academy, had now become my most comforting shelter.
I stroked my chin, lost in thought, mulling over the extraordinary event that had occurred earlier today.
I had accepted the Sword Emperor's provocation and drawn my sashimi knife. Up to that point, it wasn't much different from my usual routine.
"Was that... the Mindscape, or whatever they call it?"
I muttered, staring blankly at the ceiling.
The Mindscape Domain.
Before the world of Miracle Blessing M was thrown into utter chaos, the Sword Emperor had passed down various teachings to Leon.
From basic fundamentals like stances and drawing techniques to the profound principles of the sword and the efficient utilization of blessings. Among those teachings were explanations of abstract concepts like the Mindscape Domain.
A supreme realm that only peak-level masters with exceptional sensitivity could hope to enter.
An active space that manifests when one's mastery and understanding of their armament surpass a certain threshold.
Even within the game's lore, the number of heroes who could freely enter and exit the Mindscape Domain could be counted on both hands.
Of course, after three years of one-on-one tutoring with the Sword Emperor, Leon eventually managed to step into the Mindscape Domain. I knew this precisely because that was the exact point where I had quit the game.
The Mindscape Domain was a realm of mastery that only those who had spent their entire lives honing a single weapon could enter. Yet Leon had mastered it in just three years, leaving his teacher, the Sword Emperor, and everyone else utterly speechless.
So why was I able to access the Mindscape Domain instantly—a realm that even Leon, draped in protagonist buffs, had to grind away two years of his youth just to barely grasp?
After a moment's thought, the answer came easily.
Including my past life, I had spent over twenty years earning my living by the blade. And I hadn't just been scraping by; I was a master of the sashimi knife, hailed as the nation's best swordsman.
When it came to sashimi knives, it was only natural that my understanding and mastery were at the absolute peak.
On top of that, every time I activated the Blessing of the Sword God, it granted me a level of concentration that transcended human cognition...
My tangled life in this world and my past life were harmonizing in various ways to help me overcome these situations. At that thought, a strange sense of exhilaration made the corners of my mouth twitch.
Snapping out of it, I bolted upright and got out of bed. It wasn't that I intended to do anything productive; I was just trying to break my habit of constantly burying myself in bed.
Right. Looking back at everything that had happened so far, running away only made things worse. Instead of being passively dragged around, I might as well take things step-by-step by doing what I was best at.
Without drawing attention to myself, of course. After my duel with the Sword Emperor, the other cadets had been looking at me with complicated expressions. Their faces were a mix of jealousy and fear. It wasn't a particularly pleasant feeling.
On a whim, I grabbed my two sashimi knives, thinking I might as well do some training.
Although the blades of my Daixo sashimi knives were completely chipped and ruined, I couldn't bring myself to throw them away. I had grown attached to them, and more than anything, my single-minded devotion to the sashimi knife had actually been quite helpful in my academy life.
If I were to clumsily handle a longsword and break it, like during my duel with Chloe...
I shuddered at the memory of the excruciating pain that had tormented me for nearly a week.
I would rather exceed the forty-second time limit of the Blessing of Painlessness and end up hospitalized than break a blade by swinging a longsword incorrectly. If that happened again, I'd probably waste away like a consumptive patient, reduced to skin and bones.
Besides, I had somewhat let go of my skepticism toward the Blessing of the Sword God.
Honestly, without this blessing, I would have crossed the River Styx several times over by now.
Plus, in two days, I would finally receive the reforged Murasame. I was already so excited to see how it turned out that I kept waking up in the middle of the night. And for good reason—this wasn't just a simple oiling of the blade, but a full-fledged armament enhancement. As a swordsman, it was only natural for my expectations to skyrocket.
Armament enhancement.
According to my experience as a gamer, Miracle Blessing M was quite generous when it came to weapon enhancement and failure.
Even if a refinement or enhancement failed, the item's rank would only drop by one or two tiers. It didn't completely shatter items that players had poured hundreds or thousands of dollars into, unlike other mass-produced mobile games.
If it had been one of those shameless, cash-grab games, I wouldn't have even started playing it. My money is precious, after all.
It was a blessing in disguise, and I felt a wave of relief that the world that had swallowed me was this one. Though that didn't change the fact that the game itself was still incredibly infuriating.
Forcing a smile, I grabbed the knives from the table. Since things had turned out this way, I planned to head to the training ground and try to manifest the Mindscape Domain.
If I could control the Mindscape at will, I would be able to conduct combat training without having to rely on the Blessing of the Sword God.
Although I had gotten better at managing the forty-second time limit than before, it was still a fleeting moment of less than a minute.
It was a double-edged sword of an ability, carrying far too much risk to rely on in an emergency.
Just as I gathered my things and was about to turn off the lights and leave, a sudden thought flashed through my mind.
Well, there's no harm in trying it once.
The dormitory room plunged into pitch-black darkness as the lights went out.
I drew a sashimi knife from my waist.
In the pitch-black room, I didn't even need to close my eyes to concentrate. My sensitivity and focus regarding the sashimi knife were practically engraved into my entire body.
Somehow, I felt certain that those two ingredients would be more than enough. I focused all my senses on the hilt gripped in my hand. Suddenly, the sensation of the hilt wrapped in my palm felt entirely new, as if my senses were blooming.
In the darkness, there was only a single blade and myself. As I cleared away the worldly thoughts cluttering my mind one by one...
Recalling the sensation of facing the Sword Emperor, my expanded physical senses fractured into tiny pieces before recombining, shaping themselves into an intangible mass. Then, a shimmering blue energy surged down my hand, clinging to the sashimi knife like a blazing fire.
A moment later, unable to withstand the power, the sashimi knife crumbled into dust in an instant. I muttered with a dazed expression.