Obtaining a Cheat-Level Trait and Restarting (2)
Obtaining a Cheat-Level Trait and Restarting (2)
Two weeks passed.
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Name: Seo Yujin (20 years old, Male)
Title: Indomitable (百折不撓)
Stats: Strength [3.53] Agility [3.11] Intelligence [3.12] Luck [8.42] Mana [3.80]
Innate Talent: Complete Hypnosis (Lv. Max), ㅁㅁㅁ ㅁㅁ (Lv.???)
Skills: None
Trait: Unyielding
Current Status: Hypnosis, ???
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The stats displayed before my eyes were what was called the Status Window.
Information visible only to the awakener themself was laid out in a clear, organized list.
There were plenty of things I couldn't understand, question marks and all, but I set those aside for now.
What mattered at this moment was the Trait.
It was a reward I'd earned by literally grinding my bones to dust and breaking my body.
『Unyielding (不屈) (S Rank) - Immunity to negative physical Status Effects. Reduces physical attack damage by 90%.』
'I might survive getting shot even without armor.'
One of the Hidden Pieces I'd discovered in the game. Unyielding.
You couldn't call this Trait anything but broken.
The truly troublesome monsters were mostly physical types.
The creatures that would appear fifteen years from now were also physical-attack-focused.
But with this one Trait?
A hit that should deal 100 damage would only deal 10.
It was the best Trait among all the Hidden Pieces obtainable before entering the academy.
It was by no means invincibility, since it was limited to the physical category...
『Complete Hypnosis (EX Rank) - Dominates the soul.』
'For mages, you just land your CC with this and beat them down.'
What covered that weakness was the player's skill—and the Innate Talent I, Seo Yujin, had awakened: Complete Hypnosis.
Against mages, it was enough just to hypnotize them with this.
They wouldn't go down easily, sure, but they'd falter trying to resist.
Close in during that opening, and game over.
A laugh escaped me at this perfect start.
—Grin.
'Worth doing all that crazy shit for....'
"What are you laughing about, Yujin? You're in the middle of treatment. It should hurt."
"Ah."
...Laughing in the middle of treatment was a bit weird, right.
I shut my mouth out of pointless embarrassment.
I found myself watching her reaction too.
"Really though, thanks, Suyeon. Thanks to you...."
"I told you not to call me by my first name, didn't I?"
The person I was reading the room for was an A-rank Awakener who'd retired from the front lines and opened a private clinic.
She was Ryu Suyeon, known as the 'Angel in White.'
But for now, she was busy glaring daggers at me.
—Dagger glare.
"I have never had a little brother who was insane enough to want to die."
"...Tsk."
'If I hadn't saved her daughter, she would've slapped me ages ago.'
Well, fair enough. I'd hate it too, if I were her.
I mean, a healthy grown man kept showing up looking like a shredded rag.
She probably regretted promising to treat me for free for life in return for saving her daughter.
'Still, I got hundreds of millions of won worth of treatment for free with one little hypnosis. So it was a win.'
But that was her side of things.
As the patient, I was simply glad.
A daughter who'd become a wreck due to PTSD caused by her father?
Cured instantly with one "click" of my hypnosis.
The result: recovery worth hundreds of millions of won, completely free.
A perfect world where everyone was happy...
I really didn't get why she kept scowling like that.
It wasn't like using my ability wore me out, either.
Feeling a little hurt, I grumbled.
"Haven't we gotten pretty close? Hayoung even asked me to get along with her mom."
"We're over fifteen years apart. What do you mean, close? Don't say such creepy things."
"......."
'You were the same age as me before I regressed, you know?'
But her frosty attitude remained unchanged.
Right after that, she smacked me on the back.
—Whack!!
"Ow, owie~."
"Don't fake that it hurts. Know this: if you show up hurt again, I really won't treat you."
"Cheh."
'I really milked that for all it was worth.'
It was a little disappointing, but her Affection toward me seemed to have reached its ceiling, so there was nothing I could do.
I rose to my feet, putting my disappointment behind me.
I smiled at her.
"Still, don't worry too much. I won't go around self-harming anymore."
"......What?"
"I told you. This was all to train my body before entering the academy."
"Ah."
"I start at the academy tomorrow, so you won't be seeing me for a while. Suyeon."
For some reason, Suyeon's expression turned a little odd.
"W-well, still, come by once in a while. You seem like you'll get hurt a lot, Yujin."
"Oh? For real?"
"Yes. As long as you don't get hurt doing something stupid to yourself, I'll be happy to treat you anytime."
'Oh. Jackpot.'
I'd thought she looked like she needed to piss, but it seemed she still felt indebted to me for healing her daughter.
The promise of free treatment made me feel rich.
"Thanks, Suyeon."
"We're more than fifteen years apart, so stop calling me by my first name..."
"How could I call a pretty woman like you 'auntie'?"
"......!!!? Y-yesh!!!?"
'Flattery works wonders.'
A lesson from the 35-year-old Breeding Guy.
With women, it never hurt to lead with a compliment.
"Then I'll see you around, Suyeon."
"W-well, that's... yes......."
I quietly turned my back.
I prayed that her Affection, which I'd thoroughly tanked to rock bottom, would recover at least a little.
—Murmur murmur.
"I've been watching from the start... Hmph. So? You want to remarry soon too, right, Mom?"
"Wh-what are you talking about? Look at the age gap between him and me, and anyway, marriage is...."
"Your eyes were practically dripping honey..."
'The moment I left, she started giggling with her daughter. She really must hate me.'
Well, it'd be tough.
* * *
A little time passed, and the next day arrived.
It was enrollment day at the academy.
—Bustling chatter.
'Everyone's all worked up. Heh heh. Ah, youth.'
I felt nothing in particular, but the new students around me all seemed so excited they didn't know what to do with themselves.
...Well, of course they were. This was the academy, after all.
Forty years ago, anomalous phenomena began appearing all across the country.
Monsters began surging out of dimensional portals humanity had named Gates.
And at the same time, people began awakening special abilities, as if out of a fantasy.
The academy I was now heading to was an institution that gathered and educated such 'Awakeners.'
'They're all dreaming of golden futures, aren't they?'
Awakeners were treated exceptionally well in society.
After all, Awakeners were the only ones who could contend with monsters that were nearly immune to firearms.
Being an Awakener was an essential profession for maintaining society.
On top of that, monsters dropped valuable energy sources when killed.
These things, called Cores, were immensely valuable.
Even a C-rank Awakener averaged a yearly salary of 300 million won.
It was a very high-paying profession that also brought fame, so it was only natural for newly awakened students to be excited.
'...Though it is a little off-putting, honestly, that most of them are women.'
Unfortunately, only a tiny fraction of people became Awakeners.
Among them, male Awakeners were especially rare.
A sex ratio of roughly 1 to 9?
Once someone awakened, ability didn't vary by gender, and ordinary men and women weren't especially different either.
So it wasn't enough to call this a 'gender-role reversal'...
Still, actually being surrounded by a crowd of women made me uncomfortable.
'They're almost all in their early twenties, right? Ugh, feels like I'll get arrested just for looking.'
My body was twenty, but my mind was thirty-five, you see.
A middle-aged guy stuck among a bunch of young ones, what a pain.
Unlike in the First Round, when the scent of women excited me, now it was honestly just an ordeal.
I sought out an empty spot as if I were fleeing.
—Trudge, trudge.
'I'll just take a stroll and kill time until the entrance exam....'
My feet carried me toward increasingly deserted paths.
Only then did my mind feel a little more at ease.
Ryu Suyeon was mentally the same age as me, so that was fine, but being around girls who were so much younger was a bit... yeah.
'...They'll all be young now, too. Except for Master.'
Thinking of women naturally led to thoughts of my wives.
Those women, who had likely lost all memory of being with me.
They too would mostly be in their early twenties now...
Which meant I had to make a move on them.
The thought of a thirty-five-year-old man hitting on them didn't sit well with me.
'Well, I'm still gonna do it. I can't stand the sight of them getting with another man.'
Of course, that was something I'd have to endure if I wanted to reconnect with them.
I slapped my cheeks to steel my resolve.
When I met them again, I wanted to show them my best side if I could.
—Murmur murmur.
'...Noisy. Who comes all the way to a corner like this on entrance day?'
A commotion reached me while I was pointlessly killing time.
Something was odd.
This was a walking path far from both the entrance ceremony hall and the open field where the entrance exam would be held.
It was not exactly the place to be causing a ruckus on entrance day.
But who on earth would come all the way over here and do this?
I hurried toward it.
"...Are you an otaku or something?"
"N-no, it's not... this is, well...."
"Looks like our friend's dream is to be a plumber, not an Awakener."
"That's not it either......."
The closer I got, the clearer the voices became.
Two low voices and one distinctly quiet, high-pitched voice.
My footsteps quickened.
'It was faint, so I couldn't be sure, but was that voice...?'
—Stomp, stomp.
A voice that quivered like the legs of a newborn fawn.
The timidity palpable in its long, drawn-out tone.
And most of all... the slightly clumsy way of speaking, even from just a passing listen.
———Alice. Alice Littenwood.
It was unmistakably the voice of one of my wives.
My brisk steps soon turned into a sprint.
—Thud-thud-thud-thud.
'Which bitch is messing with my Alice...!!!'
Her, who still had a long way to go in overcoming her shyness.
My beloved wife.
Who dared to threaten her?
My head burning with fury, I ran in a daze.
I ran toward the supply shed, one of the academy's most secluded areas.
I didn't stop until I reached a lone vending machine.
"Hey, you mind if we take a look at your clothes, huh? You're obviously a foreigner at first glance, and if you go out dressed like that, the reporters will... hm?"
"——Hey, you lot. What do you think you're doing to a scared girl?"
Even I had to admit it was a pretty cool entrance.
The two women who had been surrounding the girl slowly turned around.
Their eyes asked, 'Who is this guy?'
"Huh? And what are you supposed to... oh?"
"Whoa, damn. Now this is what I call a country."
They seemed to say something, but I didn't bother listening.
My wife, Alice, was the top priority.
As they turned, my eyes met Alice's between them.
It was our first meeting in the Second Round.
"You... are......?"
Her clothes made me doubt my own eyes...
'...What the hell are those clothes.'
They were an utterly wretched sight.