"Scared? Can't even get a word out."
Oops. This isn't the time to be admiring it.
I stopped being moved by the first delinquent event of my life and pondered how I should get through this crisis.
'Should I just run away with Shadow-Stepping?'
It was night now, and there were streetlights around. It was an environment full of large shadows with even a little movement.
So escaping itself was nothing at all. The problem was what would happen after escaping.
"Chosen by a Legend-Grade or whatever...... it's really f*cking sickening to watch."
Meanwhile the cadet who had blocked the path closed to within three steps or so.
I decided to watch a little longer for now. This was a necessary act for the sake of an easy escape too. If the opponent's shadow overlapped with mine, my movement radius widened.
"Not answering? I said aren't you going to answer."
"......I don't know what I'm supposed to answer."
That was not even a sentence that demanded an answer in the first place, was it?
Around the time I was about to become sincerely curious, the Twin Dragon Swords called me.
『Master.』
『Behind.』
The moment I heard that I chose to plunge into the shadow.
My field of view flipped over and a world where I could not breathe spread out. The ones I had seen when I first used this ability were still not visible.
No, were they really not visible?
I saw something whose whole body was bound. It looked rather like a cocoon. Between the cloth wound around its whole body, the only chromatic color was visible.
By position it seemed to be...... eyes. For some reason I was only certain that it was a chromatic color; what color it was did not register.
『You must not go to that place.』
『Cross over and you will simply die.』
If I went closer could I make it out. But the Twin Dragon Swords dissuaded me. In fact, even without their dissuasion I would not have been able to go that far.
'The space permitted to me is.......'
I looked at the shadow of the living world. I could see the cadet who had tried to jump me from behind and the cadet who had blocked my path looking bewildered.
The shadows they made kept changing position.
"——y just vanished, does that make any......!"
"——ever touched him, you! Behind!!"
I returned to reality at the coordinates behind the cadet who had blocked me.
My legs hurriedly backed away at a closer distance than expected, and the delinquent-playing cadets also chose to hold off for now at the unexpected turn of events. Meaning they moved away from me and clustered together.
"Whoa, whoa."
The distance opened, but I gained room to breathe. So I lifted both hands slightly to mean calm down and measured the distance.
The nearest cadet, seven steps. With positions changed, the encirclement is broken.
The conditions were far better than before. In exchange I had earned their wariness.
"Don't creep up on me from behind like that. You startled me."
"You f*cking son of a——"
If you are going to swear at me for suddenly appearing behind you, why did you sneak up from behind yourselves? Isn't this exactly 'when I do it it's romance, when you do it it's an affair'?
"Hey, just take it off him!"
"He's nothing without the Twin Dragon Swords, the son of a——!"
Meanwhile, the creeping up from behind had really been in order to take the Twin Dragon Swords. A chill ran all down my spine.
'If I hadn't dodged that would have been a disaster.'
If it had been an attempt to throw a close-range punch I would have taken it as it came. But they tried to touch, of all things, the Twin Dragon Swords?
Would the Twin Dragon Swords really just sit and watch an unqualified person seize them? And what about the moment they ended up more than 5m away from me while held by someone else?
There were things I had asked of the Twin Dragon Swords and promises I had received. And the cloth wrapped around the Twin Dragon Swords, while unable to suppress the Twin Dragon Swords themselves, had proper anti-theft measures laid on it.
But if I could have lived trusting only that, I would not have been assigned separate quarters.
I shook my head as I looked at the cadets lunging at me. Naturally I did not forget to run from them either.
Though those bastards were childishly playing at being delinquents, that was not a crime worth dying for.
'I'll just get away from them suitably.'
Stepping outside the streetlights' glow, I glanced quickly for where to escape to. The decision was not hard.
I decided to flee by way of the rear garden toward the dormitory building. My judgment was that once I got inside the building there would be plenty of kids and a discipline officer too, so those bastards would not be able to act aggressively any longer.
"What on earth is this——"
Splash.
But at the moment I was entering the underworld, one voice cut in.
'Huh.'
That voice just now, it sounded like Pyo Do-hyeok.
Thinking that the drawback of not being able to hear the living world's sounds once you enter the underworld was bigger than I had expected, I flipped the world over again.
"——are you doing right now. Don't tell me several of you were tormenting one person?"
Sure enough, the one who had cut in was Pyo Do-hyeok.
By the direction, the one presumed to have walked out from the rear garden strode right into the middle of this mess.
"Uh. Um, I'm fine, though."
"Regardless of your safety, I cannot stand by and watch a cowardly and dishonorable incident like this."
If I had been alone I would have bolted clean away; a third party cutting in made it awkward.
If the person who cut in were at least close to me I could have said let's run for now, but Pyo Do-hyeok was not that either.
"Ha, who the hell are you......"
"Hey, that's Pyo Do-hyeok. Do-seok's brother."
"F*ck, you think I don't know that? And what's it got to do with anything. Has Do-seok ever looked after his own brother?"
"No, but still......"
I was not the only one for whom things had become awkward because of Pyo Do-hyeok cutting in.
The delinquent cadets who had been pressing me also stopped at a suitable distance and showed irritable reactions.
"Hey, Do-seok's brother. Get lost. It's not your business to get involved in."
"Whether I get involved or not is decided by me. Not by you."
"He's being really irritating. A son of a bitch who couldn't even get selected by a Phantasm......"
"Whether I was selected or not and what you are doing right now are separate things. Don't muddy the point."
"F*ck, listen to the son of a bitch who got into First Platoon on family connections."
Crunch. The moment his family was mentioned Pyo Do-hyeok clenched his fist hard. He gripped it so hard that the muscle drew taut and you could even hear the sound of bone and tendon rubbing.
"That. Also. Has no connection whatsoever to the present situation. I say again, don't muddy the point."
Pyo Do-hyeok chewed out each word and spat it. At that unyielding attitude the delinquent cadets' expressions gradually worsened too. It did not look like a good sign.
"Hey, let's just not deal with them and pull out."
The dormitory is right in front of us and a discipline officer is definitely on standby, so is there any reason to do this here?
I offered what seemed the wisest suggestion. But Pyo Do-hyeok expressed his refusal by whipping his head aside.
'......This son of a bitch?'
Am I supposed to thank him for helping, or ask why he cut in if this is how it's going to be.
"Ah, this is so frustrating I could die! Just hit him! Vengeful Spirit, go!"
『Un, unpleasant, unpleasant. Why, why, why is it only you——!!』
"W-wait. You're going to use a Phantasm?"
"You lot send yours too! What are you doing!"
"Uh, ugh, Gy-Gyeongsang-yeoyanok!"
Woof!
"......!"
Just then some of the delinquent cadets began to cross the line.
The Shadow-Stepping I had used was at least for the simple purpose of escape; they had given their Phantasms an attack order.
"Insane!"
Cadets trading blows with each other ends in a suitable level of disciplinary action. But fight while mobilizing Phantasms as well and expulsion becomes possible.
Astonished at whether they were doing this knowing that fact, I seized Pyo Do-hyeok. The cadets' Phantasms had closed to within arm's reach in an instant.
"Hold your breath!"
"What——"
Shadow-Stepping permitted entry to the underworld to anyone it was in contact with as well.
The world flipped over.
"Run!"
Fortunately the place where Pyo Do-hyeok and I had been standing was inside a patch of shade.
Grabbing Pyo Do-hyeok, who was bewildered by his overturned field of view, I ran in the direction where the dormitory was.
"Where on earth is—— Khh!"
"You can't breathe here!"
Even an ordinary person can hold their breath and run for about ten seconds.
Checking the sight of the living world reflected on the ground, I dragged Pyo Do-hyeok and moved to reality at a suitable timing.
"Haah!"
Experience it for the first time and Shadow-Stepping is just the thing to make you nauseous. But the situation was a little too poor for me to be considerate of Pyo Do-hyeok.
"Run!"
The Phantasms, which had temporarily lost their target, began to chase us the instant we appeared.
Among them were some that belonged to the beast-type and were faster than us.
"Hold your breath!"
"Kh!"
I flipped the world over once more.
A dog shaped like a deer brushed past the empty air where we had been a moment before.
"We're moving."
"......Right."
Whether because he had experienced it once. Pyo Do-hyeok's expression was better than before. He seemed to have properly swallowed a breath too, because he was no longer panting.
"Here is. Ahem."
【Does moving from here get reflected in reality too?】
If anything, he seemed to have grasped Shadow-Stepping's principle in that brief span, and even asked me a question by phone memo.
I nodded my head.
【Then this way.】
Pyo Do-hyeok pointed in the direction where the delinquent cadets were standing, rather than the direction of the dormitory.
I wondered why that way of all places, and then caught his meaning.
Right now the cadets had almost no Phantasms beside them. It was because they had sent most of their Phantasms to chase us.
Even the ones they did have were non-combat types or belonged to cadets who were themselves of the 'using a Phantasm is a bit much' sort.
In this situation the delinquent cadets' side was safer than the dormitory's direction. All the more so considering that the rear garden was wider than expected and had many streetlights, so the shadows were connected in a half-hearted way.
【When all my fingers are down, we flip.】
Having folded down three raised fingers one by one, I flipped the world over.
Our bodies surged up out of the shade near the delinquent cadets. Near the delinquent cadets in word only; with a thicket in between, it was a position where, done right, we could stay out of sight.
"F*ck, why aren't these sons of bitches coming out?"
"They didn't already go inside the building, did they?"
The ploy worked properly.
Because I deliberately held a crouching posture when moving to reality, the thicket concealed my body properly. Meaning the delinquent cadets could not find us.
"This is no good. I'm going to have to use it."
"Wait, hey!"
"Are you insane? That's not even at a level you can gloss over!"
Then one cadet took out a small jar. A bamboo jar that was ominous just to look at.
『Lamentable beyond words.』
『Accursed foolishness.』
At the same time the Twin Dragon Swords revealed their displeasure. It was not on the level of light irritation. It was a displeasure containing loathing and contempt welling up from deep in the chest.
"Ha, the Hwadam Army's famous for having no manpower; you think it'd really go as far as expulsion?"
"No......"
Which means that bamboo jar is no ordinary individual.......
"......Yeommae?"
"What?"
Then Pyo Do-hyeok muttered a certain word. My body sprang up reflexively as if flung.
"Stop that at once!"
"Wh-what the——!"
"What, why is he here——"
While the other cadets were only startled by my appearance, the cadet holding the jar simply grinned. The cadet's hand opened the bamboo tube's lid.
『You opened it?』
"Uh......?"
And the thing that shot out of the bamboo tube met that cadet's eyes.
『You opened it, didn't you?』
It was a baby. It was a thing that had been a baby.
Skin sagging by the measure of its starvation and hands stretched long by the measure of its greed for food braced against the cadet's shoulder, face, and arm.
It was of a size so huge you could not believe it had come out of a small bamboo tube.
The baby's mouth gaped wide open.
"You really are out of your mind!"
But before the baby's gaping mouth could swallow the cadet's head, the bundle of Twin Dragon Swords I swung struck the cadet's hand and the bamboo tube in that hand upward.
WHUMP!
"Agh......!"
SNAP!
The struck arm sprang upward and let go of the bamboo tube holding the Yeommae. It was so light that it floated up into the air.
Thanks to that, the baby that had come out of the bamboo tube also floated up, and its bite failed to reach the head and chewed nothing but air.
The bamboo tube holding the Yeommae fell onto the grass a little way off. The grass, which had overcome even the winter, rotted away in an instant.
"Fall back at once! If you don't want to die!"
Wrapped in cloth it might be, but the shock of being struck by 10kg of metal would be considerable. Still, even if this blow had wrecked his hand bones, it would be far better than having his head deleted.
Hoping the moron cadet would grasp this fact, I grabbed the one who had caused it by the collar and threw him backward.
"Ugh, ugh-uh."
"Wh-what is this......"
Fortunately the rest had a passable grasp of reality. Trembling with bewilderment and fear they might be, but the judgment to back away bit by bit still remained in them.
"Ya-hwi! You fall back too! That is not a level a cadet can handle!"
"You think I don't know that?! Tell those out-of-their-minds sons of bitches to clear out first!"
Yeommae. A curse made from a starving baby.
Because the related tale is so cruel, it did not appear in the original comic. But the tale itself is so famous that I came across it any number of times when researching strange beings and apparitions.
That I could react the instant I heard the name was entirely thanks to that.
『Hungry, hungry.』
Meanwhile the Yeommae that had fallen onto the grass raised its body. It had no legs, but its arms were so numerous they could take the place of legs.
A monster looking rather like a spider, or a centipede, bent its face and twisted its joints.
『Huuuuungry!!!!』
Yeommae is one of the most dangerous curses, and if that tale was reflected as it is, the Phantasm's Grade would be high too.
In other words, without someone to buy time, it would not be strange for every cadet here to die.
"Damn it—— I will bring an instructor!"
"Bring one fast!"
Instead of dodging the Yeommae lunging at me, I put the Twin Dragon Swords forward and blocked.
There was no helping it. Right behind me there was still one cadet who, like a moron, had not gotten away. That fellow I had grabbed by the collar and thrown backward.
Even if he was the one who caused the incident, standing by and watching him die was a bit much. I gritted my teeth and received the Yeommae's charge.
THUD! A weight that plainly should not have existed traveled up my arm muscles and through my whole body.
『Hungryhungryhungryhungry!!』
Along with it the baby's teeth chattered and chewed at the cloth bundle holding the Twin Dragon Swords. The dozens of arms not blocked by the Twin Dragon Swords seized the Twin Dragon Swords' body or clutched at my forearm beyond them.
Skinny, bony arms, and yet their grip was so strong it hurt. The academy uniform, said to be made of sturdy material, crumbled away bit by bit.
"Run!"
Fortunately the presence behind me disappeared. Pyo Do-hyeok had quick-wittedly pulled out with the floundering fellow.
In that moment I changed my position through Shadow-Stepping. Having changed coordinates by way of the underworld, I surged up directly behind the Yeommae.
『Hungry, hungry......!』
The Yeommae, which had momentarily lost its target, turned its body around at once. It seemed to have registered me the moment I came out into reality.
Grotesquely bent arms rotated its body with a creaking.
"......Ugh, that's revolting."
『I said I'm HUNGRY!!!!!!!』
The Yeommae came at me again.
It was the start of a bullfight with my life on the line.
Tab 23