-You have to make a living using your brain.
That was what my parents always told me.
-Are you quick on your feet and good at your work? Are you perceptive? Are you strong?
-Your only choice is to study hard and make a living from it.
Mother. Father.
You were both wrong.
It turned out that studying took more than brains. It also took perseverance.
‘No. Do I really lack perseverance?’
To be honest, back in Korea, I had none to speak of.
However, after finding myself inhabiting the body of a student in this godforsaken , I had worked myself to death.
And look where that had gotten me.
“This is insane…….”
I felt my stomach.
The blade Professor Arthur had driven into my back was protruding through my abdomen.
My breath caught, and cold sweat beaded across my skin. With trembling fingers, I felt for the tip of the blade jutting out above my navel. It still did not feel real.
“Hngh!”
With the grunt from behind me, the blade slid free.
“Uh, ugh…….”
I instinctively clutched my stomach. Something warm soaked my hand as my body rapidly gave way.
Mom.
Dad.
I suppose all three of us were wrong.
Brains? Perseverance?
Those were not enough.
It turned out that succeeding in academia also required the right connections.
“This is insane... Who stabs... his own student... this hard……?”
I should have found a better professor.
CLANG.
The blade fell to the floor. Arthur’s hands trembled as he tried to pick it up, only to drop it again.
“I... regret that it came to this.”
He rambled on without meeting my eyes as I lay collapsed on the floor.
“Mr. Choi, I will put your research to good use for the advancement of imperial magic.”
Hah. A hollow laugh escaped me.
Then again, spouting utter nonsense came as naturally to him as breathing.
-Mr. Choi, I will pay you ten gold coins, so accompany me to the Eastern Magic Society as my assistant. What? Ten gold coins will not even cover your travel expenses? Is that the full extent of your devotion to scholarship?
It was already infuriating enough that I had spent more than ten years slaving beneath a bastard like him. Now, after working myself to the bone, he was stealing my research and stabbing me for good measure.
‘What is this? This is ridiculous.’
I felt blood pulsing out between the fingers pressed against my stomach. It was not only blood. My magic power was draining away with it.
“……I see.”
I muttered under my breath.
“Arthur Blanco... there was never any chance... you would approve my degree.”
Even now, my words came out tangled, which only made me feel worse. The professor took a few faltering steps backward.
“Look. This is not my fault.”
“…….”
“Do you think the Empire would recognize a summoning circle devised by a foreigner who cannot even speak properly?”
“…….”
“This is a sacrifice for the advancement of imperial magic. Magic like this will be put to far better use in my hands than yours!”
I coughed up blood and glared at the completed summoning magic circle behind him.
‘Damn it.’
Where had it all gone wrong?
Had I chosen the wrong patron, or had choosing to remain at the academy been the mistake?
Or had my mistake been playing that damned game in the first place?
.
It was an ordinary idle tycoon game.
Had I known this would happen, I would have chosen a character packed with powerful traits in a game with an enormous story and raised them to the maximum level.
Instead, I had played a mass-produced idle tycoon called , the sort of game that only required logging in once a day. If I mindlessly pressed whatever it instructed me to, it built structures, conducted classes, admitted students, and developed all by itself.
Therefore, was it not obvious?
When I somehow ended up inside that game, the sum total of the game knowledge in my head was, ‘Students graduate after attending the academy.’
Even the person whose body I had possessed was nothing more than Freshman No. 1.
‘For now, I should remain at the academy.’
That was the conclusion I had reached at the time.
If leaving the academy would reduce me to a foreign laborer without a shred of knowledge or a single connection, would it not be better to endure life at the academy?
After all, if I held out long enough, I would eventually graduate. By the time I graduated, I would have adjusted to the world somewhat.
I had thought I could then find a job and settle down. Surely an academy graduate could find a position somewhere.
“I was a fool…….”
I muttered.
The plan, which had seemed plausible enough, was effectively doomed from the moment I discovered that the world did not come with a language patch.
I had always been terrible with foreign languages, and learning the language of this world had been an agonizing ordeal. Even after years had passed, I could speak only haltingly.
Naturally, my inadequate language skills also prevented me from finding employment. I failed both the examination for low-ranking imperial officials and the examination for low-ranking mages.
The bastard who lured me in was Arthur Blanco.
-Mr. Choi, I have noticed that although your speech may be clumsy, your mind is exceptional. Why not become my assistant and open the future of summoning magic with me?
‘I should never have fallen for that.’
I forced my fading consciousness back into focus.
Arthur Blanco was a textbook example of a selfish, despicable professor. Desperate to gain recognition from the academic community and secure power within the academy, he treated his assistants and the students in his department like slaves.
“I was a fool…….”
At my muttering, the professor nodded.
“You were. After creating such a revolutionary summoning magic circle, did you truly believe you would be able to present it under your own name?”
“I should have... presented it outside the academy first.”
“Indeed. I was afraid you might do exactly that, so I opened every piece of mail addressed to you.”
“I knew that.”
The professor’s eyebrows rose.
“You knew?”
“How could I not have known?”
How many years had I spent laboring beneath him?
The professor’s expression hardened when he realized that I had been keeping something from him.
“Then why did you remain silent?”
I had been waiting for the right moment to destroy him myself.
I had not expected him to attack first like this, though. I smiled bitterly and forced the words out.
“To... humiliate you.”
“……Humiliate me?”
“When you presented it... the summoning magic circle would respond only to my magic power. Your demonstration would fail.”
Arthur Blanco’s face gradually turned crimson as he understood what I meant.
“You inserted a spell formula that makes the summoning magic circle respond only to your magic power? You intended to humiliate me when I presented it?”
“Correct.”
“How dare you do that to me!”
The professor shouted.
“You cannot even speak properly, yet I took you in as my assistant! You are lying, are you not? There is no way the summoning circle responds only to your magic power!”
I chuckled low in my throat.
“If I die... you cannot use the summoning magic circle.”
The professor had dug his own grave.
Had he not stabbed me, he would still have had a chance to acquire the summoning magic circle, even after suffering public humiliation.
However, if I died like this, he would no longer be able to claim the summoning magic circle as his own achievement.
His face twisted as though he were being strangled, and he shrieked.
“Impossible! How could that even be—!”
WHUMMMMM—
Behind the raging professor, the summoning magic circle began to glow.
“No... No!”
Professor Arthur Blanco flinched violently and looked back and forth between me and the summoning circle.
“You cannot use it.”
My magic power drained away explosively, making every blood vessel in my body feel as though it were burning, but a feeble grin spread across my face.
I had never surrendered first place at the academy when it came to magic power.
Now, I was wringing out the last of my life to summon the strongest being I was capable of calling forth.
“But I can.”
Professor Arthur Blanco’s face went pale as he realized what was happening.
“You... s-summoned something?”
“I did.”
“Was that why you explained everything to me?”
“It was.”
“S-stop, Mr. Choi. If you stop now, even now, I can—”
I grinned.
“Why?”
Blood surged up, and I vomited it out. The last flame of my life flared, scorching a path from my stomach to my throat.
Mana flashed above the summoning circle.
The air in the laboratory warped as an unknown entity began to manifest.
Overwhelmed by its unreal, crushing presence, I blinked slowly. My vision blurred, but I could still clearly see the professor’s dumbstruck face, frozen in terror.
He had never imagined that his slave of an assistant would do this to him.
A foolish smile escaped my stiffening lips. I spat the words at him.
“Let’s die together.”
That was how I died.
I was certain of it.
“……What is this?”
I woke again in a soft bed.
It was not my room back in Korea, but the bedchamber of the Holy Empire’s Third Imperial Prince.
***
Year 1017 of the Divine Era.
The capital of the Holy Empire had been unsettled since the beginning of the new year.
“Did you hear? They say a demon ran amok in the north.”
“What? Again? What is the Order of Holy Knights doing if it cannot even kill a single demon?”
“Shh.”
The citizens whispered anxiously among themselves.
“You should not say such things carelessly.”
“That is right. It is only because they risk their lives that we can live without incident.”
Someone lowered his voice.
“And this is only something I heard... but you know the demon that emerged from the academy five years ago? Apparently, there were two of them, not one.”
“What? Are you saying that two demons dare to roam freely within the Holy Empire? What in the world……?”
The whispering citizens turned their gazes toward the Imperial Palace at the center of the capital.
“……His Majesty the Emperor will resolve it, will he not?”
“Of course. He carries the blood of God.”
“It was His Majesty’s divine power that sealed the academy where the demons appeared. The imperial family will resolve everything in the end.”
The Holy Empire was said to have been founded by the descendants of God, and its imperial family had inherited an extraordinary measure of divine power befitting that bloodline.
They would ultimately defeat the demons, just as they had done for the past thousand years.
As though answering the faith of the capital’s citizens, the golden spire of the Imperial Palace flashed beneath the sunlight. The devout clasped their hands together and prayed at the sight.
Beneath that golden spire, a council was in session inside one of the palace’s council chambers.
“We must wipe out every demon in the academy!”
The Chief Justice shouted as though he were spitting blood.
“Are those who call themselves the leaders of the Holy Empire not ashamed before the God of Light?”
“Is there anyone here who does not believe in the God of Light?”
The Minister of Finance fired back.
“Are you ashamed only before God, Chief Justice, and not before the people? The Order of Holy Knights has already suffered countless fatalities merely trying to kill two demons! If those creatures decide to break out into the Empire, will you stop them?”
“Bah! Since when have you cared so deeply about the Order of Holy Knights? Do you think I cannot see through you? You are already thinking about how much money a holy war would require!”
“What did you say?!”
It was a council in name only. In reality, it had devolved into chaos.
The other high-ranking officials seated around the chamber also joined the argument.
“We must do something about the demons in the academy. They are a threat to the Empire.”
“Quite right. A hostage situation like this within the Holy Empire, ruled by the descendants of God, has gone far beyond what can be tolerated.”
“Arpad Academy has already been defiled. We must cleanse it in holy fire and burn it to the ground!”
Seated amid the chaos, Third Imperial Prince Julian—Choi Ui-hyeon, who had been known as Assistant Choi in his previous life—felt a cold sweat break out.
‘Have these bastards lost their minds?’
Apparently, he was not the only person who thought so.
“Silence.”
As the proposals grew increasingly extreme, Crown Prince Ilias, seated at the head of the table, raised one hand. The chamber instantly fell silent.
“So.”
Crown Prince Ilias’s low voice settled over the room.
“It has been five years since the demons were summoned into the academy and the blockade began. Is that the only solution you have devised? Setting the academy on fire?”
“…….”
The high-ranking officials fell silent. His lips twisted derisively.
“I had not realized that those called the brains of the Empire amounted to so little.”
The Crown Prince shifted his gaze.
“Commander of the Holy Knights, if the Order mobilized, would you be able to enter the academy?”
“My apologies, Your Highness. It would be impossible even if every one of us sacrificed our lives.”
A heavy silence drifted through the council chamber.
“…….”
Julian swallowed hard.
Five years had already passed since he had died as Assistant Choi.
He had died, only to awaken five years later as the famous Third Imperial Prince, Julian Barnabas Istvan.
Several days had passed since he awoke inside the Third Prince’s body, but it still did not feel real.
‘And what? Demons appeared at the academy around the same time?’
Cold sweat trickled down his back as an ominous possibility occurred to him.
‘……Those demons were not summoned when I died, were they?’
Julian anxiously licked his lips.
Now that he thought about it, just before his consciousness had faded, he seemed to have heard a voice in the distance that did not sound human.
-Darkness shall devour the light…….