Conquering the Academy with Just a Sashimi Knife (Novel) - Chapter 122 - King of the Dead (1)

Chapter 122 – King of the Dead (1)

===================

Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

======================================

The next morning.

At exactly nine o’clock, our group gathered at the front desk on the first floor.

“Did you sleep well?”

At my question, Abel flinched in surprise. Avoiding my gaze, she fumbled out a reply.

“…O-Of course I did. No matter if it’s only a D-rank dungeon, I never let my guard down.”

I narrowed my eyes and looked at her. Her complexion looked stiff enough that it was obvious she had tossed and turned instead of sleeping.

She said that, but a strange emotion still leaked into her voice.

‘Abel, this girl really is terrible at lying.’

Even so, that quality of hers, how the front and back matched so perfectly, felt remarkably fresh to me.

I did not bother adding anything.

“Lady Abel, Lord Geom-ma, if you’re ready, shall we leave right away?”

Shail asked. At that, Abel’s expression stiffened for an instant before she nodded.

“Yes.”

A short reply with many things packed into it.

I looked at Abel’s profile. Her pupils were burning cold.

* * *

Since it had taken a full day to cross the border and come here, the distance from the lodgings to the dungeon was not that far. Around thirty minutes by car.

We traveled the same way as yesterday, by taxi. Thanks to a driver familiar with the local terrain, we arrived at our destination quickly even at a speed that felt like a snail crawling.

The driver left us with the words that he would come to pick us up before sunset, then headed back down the mountain like a turtle once more.

Standing right in front of the entrance, I looked around ahead of me.

‘…So this is the Undead Dungeon.’

Dungeon ranks were assigned by the Association, which used various composite criteria to classify the level of danger that suited a dungeon with letters of the alphabet.

〈D〉, 〈C〉, 〈B〉, 〈A〉, 〈S〉. In broad order, that was the sequence from the lowest rank upward.

Officially, there were only those five, but unofficially people sometimes attached a plus or minus after them.

Among them, the Undead Dungeon’s danger rank was D-minus.

It was the very bottom of the barrel. It was not even popular, so there was not even a permanent checkpoint set up here.

As I said before, the rewards were not much, and the magical beasts that came out were just walking corpses.

Heroes were people who regularly subjugated magical beasts with sharp horns or razorlike fangs.

But “undead” that resembled humans were enough to trigger the uncanny valley.

That was how the Undead Dungeon achieved the triple crown of rock bottom: “low rank,” “unpopular,” and “effectively neglected.” But.

“…This is the Undead Dungeon, right?”

Abel muttered blankly. With a dumbfounded face, Shail answered:

“I’ve checked several times and verified the route too, so this is definitely the place. However….”

Shail could not finish her sentence. As if she could not understand it, she kept checking only the GPS app. Even so, the location shown by the app remained the same.

I took my eyes off the two of them and looked toward the road entrance again.

‘Why does this place have such dungeon presence?’

This place ought to have been a bottom-tier dungeon.

Even if an S-rank magical beast were sleeping inside, the entrance alone was already pouring out tremendous pressure.

Its scale was almost like that of a fortress.

A frigid air reminiscent of a haunted mansion drifted about. Even though the sun was high in the sky, the surrounding scenery was gloomy and barren.

It had a vicious presence that reduced the C-rank Buffalo Dungeon to a neighborhood amusement park.

‘So there was a reason the driver went racing back down like he was escaping.’

The smell of death stung my nose.

I moistened my dried lips with my tongue. Then I reflexively felt around inside my coat. My sashimi knife was close to my heart.

“Let’s go in first.”

I spoke first and jolted the other two back to their senses.

“Uh… yes.”

“My apologies, Lord Geom-ma. It seems even I was briefly flustered, since this is my first time in a place like this.”

Abel and Shail each gave their own replies. Then we approached the entrance.

Once we got close, the grotesque atmosphere became much stronger, and a chill ran down my spine again. A cold wind licked across my cheek as it passed by.

A gate of human bones messily assembled from skulls and bone fragments.

The cobwebs hanging in tangled clusters everywhere completed the final touch.

As the three of us stood there overwhelmed, a tall shape formed at the edge of my vision.

“…A monument?”

It was a stone monument a little under two meters tall.

Some sort of phrase had been engraved into the surface. But the letters were not Korean.

“There’s something written there, isn’t there?”

“Y-Yeah, you’re right.”

Before we knew it, all our attention had gathered on that stone stele.

I asked Abel:

“But I can’t tell what language it is. Do you know?”

“Hmm, not sure… If it’s a language used somewhere in Europe, I usually know it roughly, but I have no idea what this says….”

“Hmm, it feels a little unsettling to just pass it by.”

While Abel and I narrowed our brows and observed it, Shail, who had been silent, spoke up.

“I think it’s probably runic.”

“Runic?”

Abel’s eyes widened. Shail nodded gravely.

“It wouldn’t be strange for the two of you not to know it. Runic was a language used from the mythic age until seven hundred years ago. It’s been a dead language for a very long time now.”

…A dead language.

This was a sinister place where there was not even a speck of life to be seen anywhere.

“But how do you know it’s runic, Miss Shail?”

I asked. Smiling slightly, Shail answered:

“I developed an interest in ancient languages while I was attending the academy. I learned a bit of runic back then. Of course, since I taught myself, I’m not an expert.”

“Then is there any chance you can decipher what it says?”

“Hmm, well. It was just something I picked up to amuse myself….”

Shail trailed off a little. Abel stared at her with sparkling eyes.

Shail gave a small smile.

“I can’t guarantee the accuracy, but I’ll try as far as I can.”

There was a chance that this inscription had left behind some clue about Draugr. Even a trivial hint would . To me, even that was desperately needed.

“Please.”

“Yes, Lord Geom-ma.”

Resting one hand against her chin, Shail peered at the inscription.

Beneath her lowered eyelashes, her pupils moved slowly up, down, left, and right.

Soon, Shail’s gaze turned toward us. She spoke.

“For some reason, the upper part has been deliberately damaged so that no one can read it. As you can see, it looks like someone scored through it over and over with something like a sword.”

“……”

Even though her expression turned downcast for an instant, for some reason a bright smile floated at the corners of Shail’s lips.

“Even so, I think I can pick out a few words from the latter part.”

“…!”

“There’ll be a lot of paraphrasing mixed in, but please keep that in mind as you listen.”

Ahem. After clearing her throat twice, Shail recited the contents like a poem.

The one who disturbs the rest of the dead.

That one too shall become the same.

The one who grants rest to the dead.

That one shall be the King of the Dead.

“…Hmm.”

It was a little chilling. Like some kind of curse.

If there was anything I could infer… then “King of the Dead” was probably referring to “Draugr,” king of the liches.

But the link connecting it to those three lines was vague.

‘…This is a little ambiguous.’

While I stood there for quite a while chewing it over, Shail spoke awkwardly.

“This is about as much as I could make out. Even if I wanted to tell you more, it’s beyond my ability. I’m sorry.”

“Not at all. It helped plenty.”

If Shail had not been here to begin with, we would have just passed it by.

In front of a language that had gone extinct seven hundred years ago, Abel and I were no better than illiterates. We had benefited from Shail’s help several times on this journey already.

‘Let’s go in first.’

The more precise clues were always on-site anyway.

I immediately shoved the gate open with force.

Grrrrrooooooan.

As the gap widened, the gate let out an ominous noise. At a glance, it even sounded like a human scream.

I took the first step inside. Air steeped in foul signs billowed out like a tidal wave.

“……”

I forcibly turned my stiffened neck back toward the others.

“…Let’s go in.”

* * *

Step, step.

A space without even a handful of light. We were walking through a corridor draped in blackout darkness.

Since we had brought flashlights for exactly this reason, moving around was not a problem.

Unlike the exterior, which had been vicious enough to make your hair stand on end, beyond the doors there was only silence.

The entrance had wound our tension all the way up. On the other hand, the inside had the still and solemn atmosphere of a graveyard. That only made the tension leak out of me instead.

‘Is that why this place is D-minus…?’

The scream-like noises that rang out now and then were pretty unpleasant, though.

Still, since the three of us were together, it did not feel like a big deal.

Abel only let her shoulders tremble slightly, and Shail silently watched the rear.

‘Won’t something jump out around here?’

It was right around when I was starting to feel bored.

…A little later, a group of shapes stirred within the abyssal darkness. A primitive disgust ran through my whole body at the sight.

“Keurghhhrrrghhhrrrghhrrrggghhh.”

A crushed and twisted shrieking cry rang through the chamber.

‘Undead.’

Five corpses staggered toward us. Undead swaying this way and that with both arms stretched straight out like mummies.

They were not threatening in the slightest. Still, I was deeply unwilling to let them come near.

Bits of flesh clinging here and there to bare bones. Maggots crawling over skin that had rotted and collapsed, the joints of their limbs hanging loose.

True to the phrase walking corpses, they were extremely grotesque in appearance. If a weak-willed weapon user saw them, they would probably shriek and collapse backward.

I shifted only my eyes slightly to the side. There was a trace of surprise on Abel’s face. But she quickly brightened and drew her sword.

Kiri-ring.

A clear sword tone slid out from the scabbard.

Holding the hilt at an angle, Abel took one step forward.

“My lady, I’ll handle this.”

At Shail’s words, Abel slowly shook her head.

“I’ll do it first.”

“But….”

Shail’s pupils shook wildly with concern.

Leaving aside the level of danger, undead were something people wanted to avoid. She was worried that a chunk of rotten flesh might stick to Abel.

Abel smiled faintly at Shail. In a gentle voice, she soothed her.

“Shail, I’m always grateful for your concern. But today is a battle of endurance, right? It’s just that I have priority for now. Once my stamina runs dry later, it’ll be your turn to step in, so get a good rest for now. All right?”

“…Yes, if that is milady’s wish.”

Abel smiled in satisfaction at the answer.

Her gaze passed over me for only a brief moment, then shifted toward the dead.

With quiet eyes, Abel stared at them intently.

The face she was searching for was not among them.

…In that case.

Step, step.

Her footsteps carried blade intent. Her hair fluttered blue.

Abel twisted her sword.

A faint halo of light wrapped around the blade. It was not aura. It was simply momentum honed and contained with exquisite precision. The fruits of effort had gathered upon the steel.

At last, Abel came within reach.

“Krrrraaaaaaahhhhhhghhh!”

The pack of undead let out a roar. It was the cry of the dead.

Closing and opening her eyes once, Abel murmured softly:

“…Forgive me.”

Slash.

A single horizontal cut.

The blade swept across all five necks in one stroke.

Thud.

After a brief moment of silence, the heads rolled across the ground.

“…Hah.”

I could not help letting out a hollow laugh.

It was a perfect sword strike without a single wasted motion. Hard to believe it came from the level of a seventeen-year-old.

‘But I don’t think she was this good in the game.’

…Wait.

Abel had originally been the top student. But the main story had been twisted a little, and I had stolen that spot.

Then for the proud descendant of the Sword Saint, that would have been enough of a stimulus to kindle her competitive spirit.

The conclusion was that because of me, Abel had grown several times faster than in the original story.

Abel looked down quietly at the ground. It was like a silent prayer for the repose of the dead.

‘…She’s incredible.’

Just as I moved my lips in a mutter to myself, Abel suddenly turned her head.

“……”

For thirty seconds, we held a staring contest. Abel huffily withdrew her gaze and took the lead.