Conquering the Academy with Just a Sashimi Knife (Novel) - Chapter 86 - Festival - Contract (1)

Chapter 86 – Festival – Contract (1)

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Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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“Phew, now I can finally breathe.”

Once the sun dipped beyond the ridge, the heat eased off somewhat. Even so, the crush of people was still stuffy, so I looked for a place with fewer people around.

The spot I chose was the bench I used to sit on often. The place where I had first met Abel.

I hadn’t come back here since that day. But hardly anyone passed through, and since it sat along a winding path, I thought it would be the perfect place to watch the fireworks.

It bothered me a little that I had left the club members behind to come enjoy a prime spot like this alone… but from what I saw at a glance, they were having plenty of fun even without me.

I didn’t want to ruin the mood, and wandering around alone suited me to begin with. If anyone asked where I’d been, I could just roughly brush them off by saying I went to the bathroom. And Chloe, who had been sulky at first, seemed to have been swept up in the atmosphere too, because her expression had brightened, which put me at ease.

I let myself drop back onto the bench. It felt as though all the tension and fatigue from the past three days drained away in an instant.

Rubbing my stiff neck, I pulled up my status window as a kind of mid-point check.

Pa-at.

== ==

[Blessing of the Sword God]

If you cut, it would be severed.

◎ Rank of the Flesh: (12 ▶ 14) ▷ The standard for swords was relaxed.

◎ Rank of the Mind: (8 ▶ 10) ▷ Your words and actions gain an aura of intimidation.

◎ Rank of Equipment: (5 ▶ 6) ▷ When the Blessing was manifested, pain was reduced by 2.5 stages.

☆ Synchronization Rate: (21.3 ▶ 24.7)%

▷ You could read 2 lines of 【???】’s line(s).

▷ You faintly detect the voice of 【???】.

→ [Upon reaching 25% Synchronization Rate, the next unlock condition will be fulfilled.]

★【???】

[※ The Blessing only activates when the sword is 39 cm or shorter and less than 10(+1) cm wide.]

==

“Why does it feel like it gets longer every day?”

The simple line from the first day, `If you cut, it will be severed,` kept having bits and pieces added to it, and now the interface looked, at a glance, more and more like something out of an actual game.

Since I could see my growth so intuitively, the sense of motivation doubled. I felt like I understood how game companies stimulated players’ desire to grow. Even I could feel the corners of my mouth lifting in private satisfaction.

“The synchronization rate has gone up a lot again too.”

The synchronization rate always traced an upward curve. The spar with Mao Lang had probably influenced it.

To the point where simply getting caught up in a small incident was enough to fulfill an unlock condition.

I still didn’t know whether the synchronization rate would turn out to be a lifeline or a poisoned chalice, but one thing was certain: it was closely tied to the Blessing of the Sword God.

‘It went up back when I had that dream too.’

I stared at the status window for quite a while. The ranks of the flesh and mind had risen evenly, and more than anything, even the most important rank, the rank of equipment, had gone up thanks to Permafrost, which I had received from Mansur. So there really was a difference in class between discount-store junk and luxury goods…

“If I just keep going like this, will that be enough?”

The indicators seemed to say that I could continue the way I had been so far, but somehow it left me with the unpleasant feeling that `someone` was guiding me toward that very point. As if they were urging me to keep growing faster and faster.

“……”

I closed the status window and looked around at the scenery.

The orange glow had completely vanished behind the horizon, and even the commotion of the parade had died down a little. But excitement still shimmered in the eyes of countless people.

“Is it almost time for the fireworks now?”

Unlike the cramped parade, I had been quietly looking forward to the fireworks. If I hadn’t cared about even this, I would’ve just gone back to the dorm and slept. Seeing celebratory fireworks burst across the night sky was something that made even adults feel excited.

‘These days I really do get confused about how old I actually am.’

I leaned my head back and looked up at the sky. The stars that had been hidden by the sun slowly began to shine, and the faint moon gradually took on a clear shape.

In this world full of monsters, superhumans, and magic, this was at least one sight that resembled Earth. It wasn’t as if I particularly missed Earth now that I was here. It had been a decent life, but whether I could call it a satisfying one… well.

If anything, it had been a life full of rough winds and waves. I had been called the greatest swordsman in the land, but in the end I was just a commoner who happened to know how to use a knife a bit well, or rather, even less than that.

From the obnoxious bastards who, whenever they got upset, muttered that I was nothing more than a fish butcher, to the family members who constantly nagged me for money.

Honestly, those things had played a big part in how quickly I came to settle into this place.

If reality was shitty, there was no way I could grow attached to it. On top of that, the only real human relationship I had ever had was with my first master.

“Come to think of it, it’s been more than twenty years since I last saw that old man.”

My first master had thrown me out the moment I became able to handle a sword to some extent. He said there was a clear limit to teachings simply handed down from above. That there was no lesson more valuable than real combat, and he kicked me out without so much as a single letter of recommendation.

At the time, not understanding why, I had been furious, but after wandering all over the country, I naturally came to understand what he meant.

More important than mastering techniques was the ability to respond to variables. There was no better school than real combat, where everything felt vivid and immediate. Thanks to that, independence and composure had been carved into me, and I had been able to blend into this world well.

‘In being oriented toward real combat, this Academy and that potbellied old man are exactly the same.’

…Still, the part where he shoved me out with nothing but a travel bag was a bit much. If I was supposed to be his disciple, the least he could’ve done was give me a little travel money. He was the kind of guy who understood the ways of the world and was sly enough to have plenty of savings too. It’s because his personality was so stingy that his hair kept getting thinner.

As I sat alone on the bench grumbling like that.

“……”

Suddenly, I sensed a chilly presence. It was still the festival period, and there were plenty of outsiders around, so that in itself wasn’t strange.

But it was an extremely alien and unnatural sensation, something that felt like a person and yet not quite like one.

‘It’s similar to when I ran into the mermaid.’

That said, the distinctive prickling at the back of the neck that came when magic was detected was faint. As though their energy had weakened. If this place hadn’t been relatively empty, I might not have noticed it at all.

I manifested the Blessing of Transference and scattered my senses through the dirt ground as the medium. The sensitivity honed by the Blessing of the Sword God counted as a blessing too, which made transference possible. I remembered using something similar back when I was a player, so I tried applying it here as an improvisation.

It was as if ultrasound were ringing out from my ears; everything within a thirty-meter radius around me was etched into my mind in clear form. If I had to compare it to something, it felt like a three-dimensional blueprint was being drawn in real time inside my head.

‘This is insane.’

The effect was even greater than I had expected. A sensation that seemed to transcend the five senses. Maybe this was what it felt like to awaken a sixth sense.

The momentary surprise at myself lasted only briefly.

I detected a figure approaching me.

I immediately gripped my hilts.

Murasama in my right hand, Permafrost in my left.

I shifted into a reverse grip so that with just a slight flick of my wrists, I could bare steel immediately.

‘It’s getting closer.’

On Avalon Island, thanks to the bizarre terrain, it had been easy to dispose of evidence, but this was Hoakin Academy.

I couldn’t act rashly on campus. A bloody incident without solid proof could work against me later. If I was lucky, I’d just be expelled; if I was unlucky, I’d be brought before a hero court. Moving as carefully as possible was the right approach.

‘…Or at least, that’s what I would normally think.’

Caution was merely the second-best choice when certainty was lacking. Thanks to manifesting two blessings at once, I was able to pinpoint the target’s defining feature exactly.

‘Purple eyes.’

Slowly, I closed my eyes. Focusing all my nerves into one point. Then I slowly raised my eyelids again. A shadow appeared at the edge of my vision.

I lightly stepped forward.

Pa-ang!

The sound of the air exploding rang out, and only an afterimage remained where I had been standing.

Kiriririk.

The noise of air being torn apart by metal. The distance had narrowed to point-blank in an instant, and I saw pupils shrink into circles. A woman with murky purple in her eyes and a blank expression on her face.

“W-wait a sec…!”

The woman opened her mouth a beat too late. She threw both hands up to show that she had no hostility. She was completely defenseless, but.

Pook.

The blade, driven by momentum, plunged straight into flesh.

The woman looked back and forth between my eyes and her own stomach. Her pupils began to widen.

“Guhk!”

A single-syllable scream. Clutching her abdomen, she rolled across the ground.

“Aigoooo, I’m dying!”

“……”

I was startled. I had been expecting a counterattack, but because she had stopped so abruptly, I ended up stabbing her in the stomach.

At first I wondered if she might be an ordinary person, but judging by the purple blood she was spilling, she was definitely a villain.

Villains were treated as a subspecies by both demons and humans, so the color of their blood was different. Besides, even the stab wound from just now was already healing. I let out a sigh of relief.

‘She’s definitely not human.’

Still, her regeneration was far slower than what I knew. The woman, after having a good roll around in the dirt, grumbled.

“Seriously! No matter what, who starts by stabbing someone?!”

What was this? This woman was obviously a villain, yet she was the one getting angry instead.

“I came because I thought maybe we could talk. Is this the kind of treatment Lord Agor got from those hands too…?”

The woman muttered while letting out groans of pain. I only lowered my eyes slightly and looked at her.

Her shoulders trembled faintly. Her gaze was fixed on my sashimi knife. Even at a glance, it looked as though she had already frightened herself.

“Um, could you maybe put that down first… sir? Mr. Geom-ma?”

The woman called my name familiarly. A feeling of irritation welled up inside me, and I narrowed my eyes sharply.

“For someone who came here on her own two feet, you sure talk a lot.”

When I leveled the tip of the blade at her, the woman recoiled backward. Then, as if she had given up, she quietly dropped to her knees.

“I came to make a deal.”

“A deal?”

The woman nodded. When I gave permission to speak with a jerk of my chin, she hesitated, then said.

“If you spare me, I’ll give you information on the ones targeting you… Geom-ma… sir.”

* * *

Kang Geom-ma sat on the bench with his arms crossed. Right in front of him, the villain Choi Seol-ah knelt on the ground. Keeping her head lowered, she stole glances only at the tips of Kang Geom-ma’s shoes as she thought.

‘He’s even crazier than I imagined.’

Choi Seol-ah had lived by clinging to strength. That was why she had become a villain.

Rather than be devoured by the strong as one of the weak, she had chosen to become strong herself at the cost of her humanity.

If she could wield magic, then humanity was a cheap enough price to pay. Thanks to that, even an Elder, a high-ranking official, bowed his head before her power and handed over money.

The amount of power Choi Seol-ah had wanted had only ever gone that far. She had no ideology overflowing with evil, nor any grand resentment toward humanity.

But not long ago, the power that had sustained her vanished along with the lord she had served. Villains who were human by birth borrowed magic power from legion commanders through contracts. So if the source of that magic died, it was only natural that those beneath it would lose their power as well.

She had built her position by relying on magic, and it had all collapsed overnight. And at the hands of the cadet right in front of her.

‘Like I expected things to turn out like this!’

Her approach to him had been, in its own way, a gamble. She had lost her place on the villains’ side, and there was nowhere left for her to retreat to anymore.

‘That professor bastard doesn’t look like he’d let me die cleanly.’

If that was the case, then she might as well beg Kang Geom-ma for her life! That had been her thinking when she came here… and yet the moment she saw him, she had nearly gotten a hole punched through her stomach.

Choi Seol-ah glanced sideways, trying to read the situation. Kang Geom-ma sat there silently organizing his thoughts.

‘I’ve spilled everything I know except the things connected to that professor bastard.’

Kang Geom-ma pressed hard against his temple, then opened his mouth.

“So what you’re saying is that villains are hiding all throughout the Academy.”

“Yes, that’s right!”

“For information on that level, you’ve tried to kill me too many times to think you can beg for your life.”

Kang Geom-ma looked at Choi Seol-ah with fierce eyes. Her lips trembled as she rubbed her hands together.

“I didn’t want to do that either. I think I got taken in by the temptations of that devil bastard who’s dead now, no, that bastard who deserves to be dead. I’ve truly committed a sin worthy of death.”

Go as low and pathetic as possible. Coming this far had been a gamble anyway.

When she said that, Kang Geom-ma narrowed his eyes. He lightly gripped the base of the hilt and waved the blade back and forth. The sashimi knife swung like a pendulum from side to side before her eyes. The hot pain from her abdomen a moment ago came flooding back.

‘Still, we’re on Academy grounds, so he won’t just kill me without thinking.’

At last, Kang Geom-ma spoke again.

“Aside from that last part, you don’t seem to be lying about much. I could slice you up right here and it wouldn’t matter. But considering the things you’ve done, that would be too light.”

“……”

“Do you want to live?”

“What? Ah, yes, yes.”

Choi Seol-ah nodded fiercely. She had to appeal to his emotions.

Then suddenly, Kang Geom-ma pointed the tip of his blade at her left ear. An earring dangled there with a pale pink crystal no larger than a drop of water.

“Hand that over to me.”

Choi Seol-ah’s heart dropped. She forced herself not to show it and put on a foolish expression.

“Huh? This earring? This is the kind of thing only women wea-”

“Hand it over.”

Kang Geom-ma cut her off at once.

“I’ll spare your life. But leave that behind.”

“……”

Choi Seol-ah trembled all over under that gleaming stare. Kang Geom-ma aimed the tip of his blade precisely at her ear and said.

“The mark of the broodmare.”