Week 1 PvP (4)

Late that night, Song Cheon-hye settled comfortably into the chair in her room, still in her pajamas. She spun slowly left, then slowly right, letting the swivel chair drift beneath her before pulling up the student shop. The moment she paid 200 points, two replay crystals dropped into her palm.

Song Cheon-hye had watched Kim Ho's placement exam as a spectator. From start to finish, he had done nothing but endure Hong Yeon-hwa's magical baptism—until, at the very end, he sent out a single hummingbird.

Hummingbird was a spell that even outsiders with no ties to the Topaz Magic Tower could learn. The tower tolerated this because, while the spell was easy enough to pick up, true mastery was extraordinarily difficult. It was a low-grade spell anyway, and anyone who learned it would never manage to put it to real use, so the tower simply left it alone in a go-ahead-and-try sort of way.

Which was exactly why she couldn't help but feel her curiosity stir at the sight of Kim Ho handling the hummingbird as if it were second nature. As it happened, she had been his next placement exam opponent, and she had intended to experience it firsthand—

"I'm going to forfeit."

"Let's just call it your win."

But the man had slipped away, trotting out the transparent excuse that his condition wasn't good. She had tried to talk him around, but he'd seemed entirely uninterested in both the outcome and the points. Setting aside any criticism that he lacked the spirit befitting a hero, her curiosity about the Hummingbird had never gone away. And since there wasn't the slightest chance of her, at 900 points, ever facing Kim Ho, stuck in the 300s, in a PvP match, buying the replays was the next best thing.

His opponent was a spear-wielding martial artist by the name of Yang Jihong. From what she remembered, he had been her own second opponent in the placement exam. He'd been turned down by Kim Ho right before that match, so he seemed to have put a little too much force into his swings, partly to vent his frustration.

That was the extent of her memories of Yang Jihong. Now, at last, came the part she'd been waiting for—the matches themselves. Cradling her fluttering anticipation, Song Cheon-hye fixed her gaze on the crystal.

She started the replay and was just settling into focus when—

"Huh?"

...The match was already over.

The instant it began, Yang Jihong charged, took a Hummingbird square in the body, and dropped into paralysis. Kim Ho mercilessly beat down the immobilized man, and that was that. The second match followed the same script. The only addition was a single, belated attempt to dodge—and he took the Hummingbird between the shoulders almost immediately. End of match.

Both replays put together didn't even amount to a full minute. Short was one thing; this was absurd.

My 200 points...

Somehow she felt like a victim of false advertising. All that, for a showing as measly as this, and he'd still had the gall to charge a full 200 points? Where was his conscience? It was exactly like one of those chip bags stuffed with nothing but nitrogen!

And while Kim Ho—whose only offense was having saved the replays in the first place—took the verbal beating, the crystal kept right on cycling through the matches.

"...?"

But as she watched with a sullen face, Song Cheon-hye's eyes gradually took on a different light. At first it had looked no different from her own Hummingbird, yet the longer she watched, the more she sensed a subtle something she couldn't put into words.

What was it?

She clung to the crystal for a long while, watching intently through dozens of repetitions, but she never did pin down the source of that elusive quality. It was like a novice watching a master's technique—vaguely certain it was impressive, yet unable to say precisely what made it so. If anything, her brain began to overload; every time she traced the hummingbird's trajectory, her mind seemed to fog over a little more.

Still, it felt as though just a little more watching would crack it, so she couldn't stop. By the time her head was roughly eighty percent fog—

Could I do that too...?

Song Cheon-hye cast the spell without ever realizing it. A structural formula bloomed in the empty air, electric currents gathered, and a hummingbird took shape. The Hummingbird flew across the room. Song Cheon-hye herself never noticed—but the bird was reproducing, stroke for stroke, the very trajectory she had been burning into her eyes only moments before.

CRASH! CLATTER!

...right up until every last piece of furniture in the room went down. Jolted wide awake, Song Cheon-hye bolted out of the room.

Song Cheon-hye was not the only one running those replays on repeat at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that hour. Two replay crystals sat before Lee Su-dok as well. On the large screen, photographs scrolled past one after another—burst captures of the few seconds between the Hummingbird's launch and its impact on Yang Jihong, sliced thinner and thinner. The expression of the man staring at them was grave ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠indeed.

His control has reached its absolute peak.

In every single frame, the hummingbird faced a different direction. Proof that he had adjusted its course dozens of times within those few seconds. No matter how Yang Jihong had responded, the outcome would never have changed. That fool probably didn't even realize what an extraordinary technique he'd been caught by.

The second match was no different. Yang Jihong must have believed he'd dodged the Hummingbird, but in truth the bird had already changed course before he ever leapt aside. It had been meant to sail past him from the very start and strike from behind.

He toyed with the man like a cat with a mouse.

The finish was clean, too. A mage setting aside perfectly good magic to club his opponent with a staff—and not just any staff, but a low-grade piece of equipment like the Staff of Earth—made for a comical sight at first glance. And that comedy was, in fact, a cunning smokescreen; the first time through the replay, even Lee Su-dok had overlooked it and moved on. Examined closely, there was not a shred of wasted motion in Kim Ho's stance or in the way he swung. Had Yang Jihong somehow shaken off the paralysis early and thrown out a surprise counter, Kim Ho would have shattered him head-on. It was enough to make one suspect the magic was mere misdirection, and the man a hidden grandmaster of the staff.

And yet his Hummingbird proficiency was far too high for that theory to hold. There were more problems besides. With a light wave of his hand, Lee Su-dok brought up a new set of photographs: close-range captures of Seo Ye-in's Magic Bullet. First, the ones from the placement exam. Back then it had been nothing more than a clumsily clumped lump of mana, hardly a Magic Bullet at all. Slow progress, certainly—but nothing strange for a brand-new student. Then the photographs taken exactly two days later, in the PvP match against Gwak Ji-cheol. A Magic Bullet formed to flawless, unimprovable perfection.

Could a person really change this drastically in two days?

A genius.

It was hardly rare for a hero's dormant potential to explode once they enrolled at Dragon Slayer Academy. Seo Ye-in was most likely another such case. But the one who had supplied the catalyst was probably—

"Magic Bullet bestowal, they say."

When she said those words, Seo Ye-in had pointed at Kim Ho without a moment's hesitation. Meaning that Kim Ho had a stake—large or small—in the formation of that Magic Bullet. The knowledge only tangled further the knots already filling Lee Su-dok's head.

What in the world is this boy?

It would be no exaggeration to call magic, staff arts, and marksmanship entirely separate domains. And who was there who had mastered all three at once? He combed back through the villains, the active heroes, even the humanoid named monsters—and not a single name came to mind. The awl in the pouch had indeed begun to poke through, but the part showing was one he had never seen before. Irritation creeping in at last, Lee Su-dok furrowed his brow.

If I went at him forcefully...

Poke at him once, and surely something would come out. But he soon erased the thought. He could hardly mistreat a student of Dragon Slayer Academy on a whim, and prodding without solid evidence was the very opposite of how he worked. So the conclusion circled right back to where it had started: for now, all he could do was keep watching. To complete a puzzle whose outline hadn't even emerged, he needed to gather more pieces. It looked like the replay analysis would be continuing for some time.

"Tch."

And since that prospect pleased him not at all, Lee Su-dok clicked his tongue. Why was he heaping trouble on himself this year of all years? He'd taken on a teaching post that never suited him in the first place, and now here he was, dutifully reviewing replays because one student seemed suspicious.

The mighty Human Butcher, reduced to this.

With that thought, Lee Su-dok switched off the screen and swept the replay crystals away as well.

Swish-swish-swish—

A blue-glowing hand probed here and there across the cube at tremendous speed. Every time a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠fingertip touched down, the arrangement of the nearly one thousand tiny cubes shifted without pause.

Click, click—

At some point, the hand working the cube began to slow, little by little. In exchange, each movement grew more deliberate, more precise. It swept slowly over the cube, checking and rechecking, until the moment the final piece slotted home.

Vmmm—

The cube shivered and resonated with a low hum. Even after my hand went still, it went on assembling itself of its own accord, hollowing out its core, until at last it became a small box with a lid that could open and shut. The moment the box was complete, a vivid green light welled up from within, and through every tiny seam, all manner of plants sprouted and burst into bloom. The greenery swiftly swallowed the cube whole; to an unknowing eye, it might have passed for a box woven from tree trunks and vines from the very beginning.

It's done.

The Life Cube's effect was exactly one: it amplified the potency of any stored life-attribute item by 1.3 times. If, say, the base effect of the Totem of Recovery was "heals allies within range every 10 seconds," then simply placing the totem inside the cube cut that to 7 seconds, with the amount healed increased as well. The Processed Emerald boosted the power of earth-and-wood magic, and stored in the cube, its boost was multiplied by 1.3—a 20 percent increase became 26. What's more, the box could hold multiple items at once, up to the limits of its capacity. A frankly broken item, no other way to put it.

Even so, it fell somewhat short of the S-rank Life Cube obtained through the proper route, by clearing every quest in the linked chain. The S-rank version's multiplier was a full 2 times. Mine was a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠prototype blueprint forcibly brought to completion, which was why both its rank and its effect ran a notch lower. But it was more than enough.

Even at 1.3 times, it's monstrous.

This was an item more than capable of stirring up a full-scale storm at Dragon Slayer Academy. The Four Major Factions would be drooling over it in particular. Whichever club I brought it to would hand over a Season Pass without a second thought. That alone would honor my promise to Go Hyeon-woo without a hitch, but—

That's not enough.

I had no intention of being satisfied with a single Season Pass.