Since classes would begin in earnest tomorrow, I was worried in one sense.
According to the guidebook, the Korean Academy had a deeply practical bent.
‘How will it be used?’
However, because mana was what represented the force of a Hero’s own body, now that I possessed the special ability called mana absorption, anticipation was pushing my worry aside.
I said that, but I was still in the infirmary.
Because Elena, who had brought me here and waited for me, was still asleep.
“How long are you going to stay like that?”
I had said it just in case, but instead of slowly waking up, Elena sat up at once.
“What? Since when did you know?”
How was I supposed to know? I only said it because I felt stiff. Anyway.
‘Her eyes look a little wrong, don’t they?’
Elena’s overall gaze was wary of me.
I understood. It must have been a chaotic day for her too. Rather, it would be hard for her to dismiss it as just an ordinary experience.
“If you have anything to ask, ask. Then we can go back to the dormitory.”
There was no need to hide anything from Elena anyway.
Moreover, I had never had a friend until now, nor had I ever told anyone a secret, so this felt new in its own way.
After much thought, Elena opened with her first question.
“What exactly was that? Below the neck...... it was human, but a horse-man.”
I looked at Elena in considerable surprise.
‘She saw it?’
That was genuinely unexpected. Reading my eyes, Elena added to her words.
“Ah, I saw it when you grabbed me for a second. After that, I couldn’t see it again.”
“Oh, really?”
Then did that mean Elena could also see Divine Beasts when she was in physical contact with me?
‘She isn’t lying, and it seems like it’s because she’s spirit-type.’
Thanks to a lifetime of being deceived, I possessed keen senses when it came to lies.
‘Right. Mom and Dad weren’t like that.’
Because of that, the potential of the Heroes called spirit-types stood out to me.
“The horse-man you’re talking about is a Divine Beast called Kubanda, but it’s a bit ambiguous. He was originally a magical beast.”
“......?”
Elena spaced out for a moment. I wondered if I had left something out, but that was not it.
‘Well, how much am I supposed to tell her?’
Moreover, I had never talked about things like this with anyone before, so I had no sense for it.
“I see.”
Contrary to what I expected, Elena understood. More precisely, she seemed to have given up on understanding and simply accepted it.
‘It won’t be easy.’
Just as I was about to speak again, Elena blocked me by covering my face with her palm.
“Enough. It’ll just make my head hurt more. Ah! But there’s something else I don’t understand. How did you absorb my mana?”
It was a rather self-centered question-and-answer session, but when I thought about it, I had been encountering Divine Beasts since I was young.
In other words, at her current age, when her emotions and common sense were already established, it would be hard for her to accept, so perhaps it was a natural reaction.
“The mana absorption was Kubanda’s Authority...... though now it’s my special ability too.”
“Well, okay!”
She was a truly strange girl. One moment she had been wary, and now she had brightened again.
In any case, since she was stretching as if relieved, I also got off the sickbed.
Before leaving the infirmary, I gave Elena my thanks.
“Thanks. For bringing me all the way here.”
If not for Elena, I might have become a rock out in the field.
A terrible incident might have occurred where I went to my first class in the morning with dew settled on me from the temperature difference caused by the cool air.
Elena gave a fresh smile.
“I should be the one saying that. Thank you, Wonwoo.”
Even having someone call my name was something unfamiliar to me.
***
And so, the next day came.
The notice delivered in the morning shattered my expectations.
‘No, what kind of school doesn’t hold an entrance ceremony?’
According to rumor, the Academy’s president treasured the barrier at the main gate greatly.
And perhaps because he had usually been keeping retirement in mind, the entrance ceremony was canceled outright.
Once I learned the full story, instead of disappointment that my expectations had been shattered, I only felt sorry.
‘He seems like he’d be an eccentric old man.’
Because the Academy was full of peculiar people like this, it always deviated from an ordinary person’s common sense.
My long-awaited first lecture was [Understanding Mana].
I did not know what kind of class it would be, but with my special ability called mana absorption, it would surely help me in some way.
‘This is the right place, isn’t it?’
The class called [Understanding Mana] was held in a separate dome-shaped building.
“But why is it so dark?”
I had barely managed to find it by looking at the map, but stepping through the entrance was not easy.
Because even though the sun was blazing behind me, not a single ray of light entered the inside.
“Ah...... this is seriously suffocating.”
Just as I was hesitating, I heard a voice from inside that sounded suffocating just to listen to.
“What are you doing? Get ahold of yourself.”
Negative words continued to come from inside. It was natural to feel reluctant, but to me, they only served as words that stimulated my curiosity even more.
So it meant people were not dying.
‘I can’t believe I’m thinking this while going to class.’
In any case, Heroes really were different.
I crossed through the entrance to uncover the truth trapped behind the veil.
RUMBLE!
In an instant, a weight as if weights had been fastened to my whole body pressed down on me.
‘Is all of this mana?’
That was the kind of place it was, flowing with such an overwhelming concentration of mana that it made that illusion arise.
It was a strange place where gravity applied differently inside and outside the dome.
Just as the class name said, high-concentration mana could help in understanding mana.
‘Wouldn’t this be the opposite?’
Even so, I could not help thinking that it was making us unable to do anything so that we could not understand mana at all.
It was likely not just me.
“Haah...... If it’s like this from the first day, what are we supposed to do?”
The students of Dormitory A were children of prestigious families that steadily produced high-grade Heroes, or heirs to prestigious guilds.
That was information I had come across while returning from the infirmary to the dormitory.
‘They’re like people from another world.’
Even kids who had received elite education from birth and had lived solely to become Heroes were struggling.
Perhaps this was why the Academy rated Dormitory A so highly.
‘Phew...... Let’s sit down first.’
However, perhaps because they were graduates of the Hero kindergartens I had only heard rumors about, everyone was forming groups of three and five.
‘Ah, there she is.’
Not everyone was like that, so I tried to head toward the familiar back of a blonde head.
“Could you move aside for a moment?”
The deep, heavy voice I heard in that instant caught my feet.
‘A teacher!’
That was what I thought because it was clearly the voice of a middle-aged man. Because of that, I bowed at the waist in greeting.
“Hello!”
Since I was bowing, I could see his feet, and the huge feet would have made even an elephant envious.
However.
“There is no need to speak politely. We are the same age and classmates, after all.”
“......”
Because of the words that came back to me, I had the rare experience of my focus blurring even though my eyes were open, and my vision being dyed black.
I raised my head toward the feet disappearing in front of me.
‘If someone says we’re the same age, I feel like that’d be strangely upsetting. And...... he talks like an old man.’
A massive build I could not believe belonged to a seventeen-year-old passed by me. His uniform shirt, which looked as if it might burst at any moment, was almost pitiful.
“Twenty-nine minutes...... Thirty minutes.”
At the words coming from the center of the dome, I had no choice but to sit in the seat closest to where I was standing.
Once again, a sharp tone rained down on everyone. The fact that it was sharp despite being low was simply strange.
“I am Kwon Oseong, and I will be overseeing [Understanding Mana] from now on.”
As if a veil had been lifted, Teacher Kwon appeared at the center.
‘Dark.’
The only word that came to mind to describe him was darkness. In fact, the more he moved, the more his surroundings seemed to be dyed black.
“......”
“......”
Normally, the kids should have responded to his greeting. However, since they were being crushed under high-concentration mana, the more time passed, the less they could even open their mouths.
Teacher Kwon also did not stop it in particular, as if this was always how it went.
However, I was discovering something new about my body.
‘Hmm...... Why am I used to this?’
For reasons I did not know, I had finished adapting to the mana concentration. It felt like I might even be fine if it were higher.
Soon, a strange sensation arose, as if my usual self had been moved into this place and newly applied.
‘Ah, this is it.’
Without realizing it, I recalled Dad coming home heavily drunk. At times like that, Mom would send him a stinging glare.
When I went out to the yard the next day, the window would be cracked or the outer wall would have fallen apart.
It seemed the concentration back then had been higher.
‘How am I supposed to explain this if someone asks?’
It was one embarrassment and awkwardness after another. If someone later asked me how I managed to endure it so well......
-When Dad comes home drunk?
No, I would protect Dad.
Soon, after briefly looking around, Teacher Kwon began an evaluation that did not sit well.
“They said this cohort was different, so I was looking forward to it inwardly. But I am somewhat disappointed.”
Like sharp daggers, his words dug into the hearts of those who each held their dreams.
“I will begin the class.”
“How are we supposed to have class in this sta-.”
THUD!
A student not far from me collapsed onto a small desk while spiritedly talking back.
Was this student the first domino?
THUD! THUD! THUD! THUD!
An uncontrollable chain reaction began.
“To think I’m in the same cohort as kids like this.”
“......Wipe the sweat off under your nose.”
Of course, there were kids who were holding out, but to my eyes, they were all much the same.
“What is your name?”
Because Teacher Kwon suddenly called on me, I hesitated for a moment.
“I’m Lee Wonwoo!”
After clearing my throat once, I spoke with composure, thanks to which I avoided an awkward voice crack.
“Lee Wonwoo...... I have heard quite a bit about you.”
It had only been one day since I entered, so how much did he have to hear for the words “quite a bit” to come out?
‘It’s because of the barrier, right?’
Teacher Kwon, who had exchanged questions and answers with me, continued the class as if that had never happened.
‘Who is this class even for?’
Students were fainting in real time. I could not have imagined a class proceeding in the middle of this.
‘That guy is eating something?’
While looking around to see how many were left, I saw an astonishing sight.
The male student with the impressive, robust build was opening a lunchbox and eating.
“......Looks like that’s allowed too.”
What was even more surprising was that Teacher Kwon did not stop him at all. There was no way he had failed to see it.
I nodded to myself, gaining a realization alone.
‘If you want to listen to class...... you need the qualifications. And if you have the qualifications, it doesn’t matter what you do.’
Naturally, the midterms, finals, and dormitory placement evaluations would be based on the classes.
Students who could not endure this environment would naturally have poor grades.
The Academy did not only have practicalism.
A cold meritocracy was hiding within it.
***
Teacher Kwon’s class was fascinating, in that every word he said naturally applied itself to me.
Thanks to that, I was deeply immersed in Kubanda’s special ability.
‘If it’s mana created by a person, can I absorb all of it?’
For example, the sword aura of martial-type Heroes or the magic of magic-type Heroes.
“Then, I will cast magic in order, so resist it in your own way.”
“......?”
I was not even given time to understand the situation.
“Innate Magic, Iron Chain.”
With the following chant, an ominous black magic circle floated beside Teacher Kwon.
‘Wait.’
Soon, three or four chains created from the magic circle surged toward the student beside me.
The time it took for this to happen was exactly the same as it took for the words to end, making it truly a swift attack.
“Aaaaargh!”
The student, bound by chains in an instant, thrashed about. The more he did, the more the created chains tightened around his body.
Teacher Kwon said, unconcerned.
“Iron Chain is beginner magic, and with a little talent, even a martial-type Hero can perform it. Even if you cannot use magic, by experiencing it firsthand, you will learn the countermeasures and responses suited to you.”
Teacher Kwon paused for a moment, and the area around him began to be dyed black.
“Teacher......? No. I am merely someone who will teach you how to survive.”
If that was the case, why did you not just name the lecture “Survival Against Magic”?
“......Iron Chain.”
In an instant, a magic circle spread toward me. It felt as though a gun barrel had been aimed at me.
However, because of the environment I had grown up in, I had a side that was numb to fear, and a side that was relaxed.
‘Right. I can just try it, can’t I?’
I had already been curious, and I had wanted to try it.
‘At the same time as the chant, a magic circle is drawn with mana, and the chains are created using that as the medium, right?’
It would be difficult to notice such things in a mere instant. However, my eyes were already warping everything reflected in them.
CLATTER CLATTER CLATTER!
So toward the surging chains, I stretched out my hand.
“Reclaim.”
It was a chant far removed from Teacher Kwon’s, which had gone through the stage of establishment.
However, the one who had passed down my second special ability had said this.
‘Will is what matters.’