Conquering the Academy with Just a Sashimi Knife (Novel) - Chapter 107 - Night of Purge (6)

Chapter 107 – Night of Purge (6)

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Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Time was relative.

It was something I had let go in one ear and out the other during middle school science class.

To be honest, since I was never the type to smell much of ink and books, I didn’t really know the deeper meaning.

Still, even without taking a scientific approach, I had experienced that saying for myself. No, not just me. Most men in South Korea probably had.

You know the saying that time moves slowly under the Ministry of National Defense.

Even the same amount of time could feel long or short depending on the situation you were in. In other words, maybe this was exactly that.

The time I had been allowed was roughly 8 seconds.

Even that was a generous estimate. There was a high probability it was less than 8 seconds.

It wasn’t as if I’d implanted a timer in my brain, after all.

‘I should estimate it as somewhere between 7 and 8 seconds.’

It was an absurdly short span. Under normal circumstances, it was the kind of moment that would be gone by the time you yawned once and patted your mouth shut.

But right now, in a desperate moment that would decide life and death.

Right now, when the two bastards I wanted so badly to kill were right in front of me.

Right now, when the Blessing of the Sword God was manifesting.

Then even within an 8-second span that short, there would be much I could .

After all, even as I was rambling like this, not even 0.000001 seconds had passed.

I drew in a breath. I calmed my mind into icy stillness.

If I wanted to waste no time, I had to set my plan in concrete detail.

I replayed the scene where the professor had cast his spell.

The thread woven from magic that linked the condensed air bomb to the caster.

Snapping his fingers must be the signal that triggered the detonation.

Of course, there was no guarantee that bastard would cast only that air-bomb spell.

Still, there was something strange I had noticed after fighting quite a few villains.

The demonoid mermaid had been able to use water-element magic in a variety of ways, but the villains had each shown only a single kind of spell.

Villains were human by nature. Even if they were granted magic power by a legion commander, they were fundamentally different from demonkind, so perhaps they were limited to one castable spell.

That could be brushed off as coincidence, but every bastard I’d met had been that way. The circumstances were pretty clear.

I stared at the professor. If my assumption was right, then that bastard would cast nothing but air bombs.

I had already shown a way to break it a moment ago. The shock of that was precisely why the professor was standing frozen like a stone statue.

‘…Still, this is annoying.’

If he introduced even the slightest bit of variation into his casting timing, I’d get hit. And if I was late in cutting the red line, I’d get hit as well.

Troublesome and dangerous.

Even for Altair and Nox, who specialized in speed battles, the cast time was so short and the area so wide that it would be hard to evade.

I suddenly let out a small scoff.

‘What, am I worrying over nothing?’

Before he had the chance to show any irregular movement, I cut him down.

If I trample him with an overwhelming speed he could’t even perceive, he won’t be able to do anything.

‘I have to move faster than usual.’

I cut my breaths short to reduce unnecessary breathing, then stepped wide to close the distance all at once.

The judgment I made immediately became action.

There was no point in turning my brain any further. It wouldn’t make the solution any sharper. In that case, I moved my feet instead. Counting silently.

‘8 seconds.’

Tadak!

My sole left the ground. Time, which had been stopped, began to flow again.

“……!”

The professor’s pupils swaying wildly left and right instantly came into view. I had only put a little more load into my legs, yet I arrived in a single bound.

The professor’s fingers twitched once.

At the same time, I manifested the Blessing of Transference. Right after that, I spread the sensory field sharpened by the Blessing of the Sword God through the ground as a medium.

In an instant, the surroundings were dyed pitch-black. It was a strangely familiar scene.

It resembled the moment on the very first day of enrollment when my blessing had first manifested.

I felt the artificially writhing atmosphere rising from my flank.

That professor bastard, his face was full of panic, yet even in that state he was aiming for my blind side. As expected, he wasn’t an ordinary opponent.

‘7 seconds.’

I planted my step. I forced strength into my waist, which had been about to pitch forward under inertia, and held it up.

Tududuk.

Muscles all over my body screamed.

A faint groan slipped out, but I clenched my teeth and endured it.

A moment of weakness connects straight to death.

Tak- the professor snapped his fingers. A stream of magic flowed out, ran along the translucent line, and rushed toward the air bomb.

‘5 seconds.’

It was a distance my arm couldn’t reach. If this continued, it was instant death.

At that moment, my arm moved without passing through my brain.

Shuik!

My right hand, gripping the cord, shot Murasame forward. Even though it had been an unconscious throw, there was no waste at all in the blade’s path.

Bursting with light, the blade cut through the blackness and one after another dug into the red lines drawn across the air spheres.

-Pang!

The transparent spheres shattered apart just before detonation.

A shockwave rose, and the current of air buckled once.

“What the hell is this!?”

The professor spat out a curse. His eyes were hazy, perhaps because he had been thrown off more than a little. Somehow his aura when he first appeared was that of a final boss, but his reaction now was that of cannon fodder.

He frantically snapped his fingers over and over. Countless transparent spheres rose and cluttered the field of vision.

It would be impossible to cut through all of the spells appearing here and there within the remaining `3 seconds.`

But at times like this, you had to keep your eyes on the enemy. I quickly turned my gaze forward.

As if he’d cast too recklessly, blood was dripping from the professor’s eye sockets. With a face full of panic, he suddenly rubbed at the corners of his eyes.

A single idle movement. I sensed that it would be the thing that ended this battle.

Gripping the cord of Murasame tightly, I flicked my wrist.

Hwiriririririk-

The sashimi knife floating in the air traced an absurd trajectory like a whip and swept through every spell.

The vibration of the blade remained vivid at my fingertips through the cord. Like a living creature, it was fresh and freewheeling. The blade dragged light across the empty air.

Pang, pang, pang, pang, pang-!

Explosions sounded one after another. The air bombs filling the hall to the brim burst mercilessly apart. Ripples spread through the atmosphere, and hot wind blew.

At last, the walls and pillars that had barely been holding on caved in with a crash. It was the moment the annex, which had reeked of money, became a complete ruin.

“……!”

Altair’s and Nox’s faces, watching the battle, filled with countless emotions.

From their perspective, it made sense that they would have no idea what they were watching when in the span of roughly 3 seconds the place had abruptly turned into an asura field.

Still, one fortunate thing was that neither of them moved their legs.

It wasn’t that I doubted Auditore’s skill, but if they had tried to help clumsily, the movement lines would’ve tangled.

And besides, true style was always a solo act.

“…No, h-how.”

The professor’s voice trembled. To his eyes, this phenomenon had to be something far beyond logic.

I forced strength into my calves, which had already torn and broken once. A blazing pain that made my jaw tremble shot up from my feet.

Instead of spitting out the pain, I kicked off the ground and lunged. A more violent boom than before exploded out.

My feet lifted slightly from the ground and my body surged forward. At that horrifying speed, the sound of air tearing brushed past my ears.

Shishik.

I stepped behind the professor. He tried to turn his head quickly.

But to me, whose hang time itself had changed, his movement looked unbearably slow.

It felt as though I alone was standing in a different world. I laughed briefly.

‘A different world.’

That phrase struck deep into my chest. Even if the meaning was different, I had become strong enough to have room for leisure in a situation like this.

Just before I swung my arm, recent events passed before me like a lantern reel.

The bastards who had slandered me and tried to kill me were standing right in front of me.

And in the end, even the club members who believed in me and followed me had been dragged into these bastards’ schemes and hurt.

I felt the inside of my mouth dry out and blood vessels rise in my eyes.

The professor turned his head halfway. Even now, every one of his movements was slow.

On the side of his face, no emotion remained except fear.

Instinctively, I wet my lips. When I drew in a deep breath, my chest swelled tight.

I wound my waist clockwise like a discus thrower. My side immediately tightened hard.

Kkugugeuk- at the sound of muscles folding into themselves, I twisted my upper body counterclockwise. The trajectories of the twin blades in both my hands drew the shape of a perfect full moon.

Sararararak.

The blades, loaded with rotational force, dragged a bright sound behind them as they touched flesh.

Seo-geok-!

The blue-white blades passed smoothly through his cheekbone and slipped out the other side. The professor’s pupils, which had been looking at me from the side, opened wide and round.

It seemed the fact that he had been cut had not yet reached his brain.

Looking directly at him, I murmured:

“1 second.”

Thud.

Damian never managed to close his eyes, even in death.

* * *

“…Hah.”

After standing silent for a long while, Altair finally let out a breath.

He tried to pick a fitting response, but in the end only a faint groan came out.

His back had broken out in cold sweat without his noticing, soaking his clothes damp.

The old man suddenly glanced to the side.

Nox’s face was calmer than expected. Of course, shock was there as well, but compared to himself, who had been openly shaken, the boy’s outward reaction was composed.

“…Nox, you’re calmer than I expected.”

“N-no, Patriarch.”

At the praise, Nox awkwardly scratched his cheek. Then he let out a small sigh and turned his eyes forward again. His gaze landed on Kang Geom-ma.

Keeping his eyes fixed ahead, Nox spoke to the patriarch almost as if he were talking to himself.

“If you were startled, Patriarch, do you think I wasn’t? It’s just that I’m a little used to it now.”

“…Used to it? Used to what?”

Nox paused for a moment, then slowly swept his gaze over the traces of battle. Sword cuts carved here and there through the asura field, and a dense smell of blood.

Memories he had wanted to forget stirred vividly to life. Nox let out a faint hollow laugh and went on.

“As you’ve heard, at the start of the semester I personally took that bastard’s blade. Even now, when I think about it, it’s embarrassing. I picked a fight with him first out of pointless bravado. I knew I shouldn’t have, and yet I provoked him by calling him lowborn.”

“……”

“They called me a genius within the family, and yet I couldn’t inflict even a speck of a wound on him. Even after the duel, I ground my teeth for days from sheer humiliation.”

Nox, who rarely ever opened his heart even among the members of the family. Altair was inwardly surprised, but he silently accepted his grandson’s words.

“…But as time passed, I came to understand. Why Chloe clings so tightly to that bastard. Of course… I still want to tear her away from him immediately. But Chloe, that one is absurdly stubborn, isn’t she? And she has rather unusual sides to her too. Though that is part of what makes her cute.”

At the mention of `cute,` Altair nodded. For a moment, the sight of his granddaughter wielding a blade with hollow eyes came back to him. From the perspective of an assassin, how could she not be adorable and precious? Chloe had held a dagger even at her first-grab ceremony.

Altair was about to sink into old memories, but quickly pulled himself back to his senses. The shock of the battle still hadn’t faded, and he was in the middle of a serious conversation with his grandson.

Altair turned his gaze back toward Nox. And as if he understood everything, he smiled gently.

At that benevolent reaction, Nox awkwardly scratched the back of his neck.

“…Chloe said something like this. That that bastard Kang Geom-ma alone was stronger than the whole House Auditore put together. At first I dismissed it as nonsense, but now I have no choice but to admit it. Kang Geom-ma is far stronger and more exceptional than anyone I have ever seen.”

A sharp light flickered through Nox’s pupils. The pitch-black and muddied air from before was nowhere to be .

“And he knows how to use that strength rightly. I think that’s what Chloe was moved by in him.”

“Nox.”

Altair weighed his next words. Looking the patriarch straight in the eyes, Nox spoke first.

“There is something you have emphasized to me again and again, Patriarch. Value the duty of the family, but if your convictions are firm, then follow them.”

“……”

“I intend to become that bastard Kang Geom-ma’s shadow.”

Altair looked at Nox. The face of his grandson, now stripped of childishness and carrying conviction within it. Suddenly, the old man asked him:

“…Will you not regret it?”

“No.”

Nox answered at once. Altair laughed hoarsely and stroked his beard. Because there was no grandfather who would fail to take joy in his grandson’s growth.

When their conversation ended, a faint cry, something like a groan, came from ahead of them. The two turned their heads toward the source.

Cladi was hanging his head low, his shoulders trembling.

“……”

Silence fell between them for a moment.

Sreung- sreung-!

Then each of them drew their weapons.

Along with assassination, torture too was one of Auditore’s family trades.