Conquering the Academy with Just a Sashimi Knife (Novel) - Chapter 88 - Playing Catch the Thief (1)

Chapter 88 – Playing Catch the Thief (1)

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

Translated by Jinmu

Read only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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

== ==

[Announcement for the 2034 First Semester Final Practical Exam]

Due to certain circumstances, we were informing you that the contents of the previously scheduled practical final exam had been changed as follows.

◉ Change: External dungeon raid ▶ Team competition.

Test period: 2034. 06. 02. (Tue) ~ 06. 06. (Wed)

Test location: Hoakin Academy Special Hall

Team composition: one second-year cadet, two first-year cadets. (Randomly selected.)

………

……

…

[※ Team assignments will be sent by text message the day before the exam.]

[※ The exact details of the exam will be announced orally immediately beforehand.]

== ==

“No, fuck. They’re saying the test is getting changed with only three days left?”

Weapon spoke while rubbing his swollen cheek. Just like before, his slurred pronunciation and the teardrop gathered at the corner of his left eye made him look strangely pitiful.

‘Why does this guy keep getting hit these days?’

Chloe must have put a surprising amount of force into it. But she said there had been a fly stuck to his cheek, and somehow there wasn’t a speck of anything left on it. What was that about…?

‘That’s not what’s important right now.’

Shaking off the stray thought, I stared directly at the message. To be honest, even if I hadn’t shown it, I was just as flustered as everyone else.

‘The exam contents have changed from the original storyline.’

Up until now, most of the variables had stemmed from human relationships.

The incidents where I had been entangled with major figures in the story, such as Leon, the Sword Emperor, Abel, and Rachel. Back then I had grumbled because it felt uncomfortable, like I was interfering with the original plot.

To be frank, by this point I understood it. Since I, Kang Geom-ma, was an anomalous existence to begin with.

Other than Agor’s death, the story had not strayed far from the game’s plot.

But this situation was different.

Under normal circumstances, this final exam should have been to clear the Goblin Dungeon located in Gapyeong. There weren’t any monsters carrying magic stones there, but it was a dungeon with decent materials, so I had been looking forward to it.

‘…So the story is finally starting to change.’

Then again, considering everything I had done up to now, this was the inevitable order of things. If anything, it would have been stranger if there had been no changes at all in the gaps between such major incidents.

‘……’

The fingers holding my phone trembled slightly. I had prepared myself for it, but actually facing it like this made my head spin.

‘Did I just throw away the biggest advantage I had, my play experience from Miracle’s Blessing M, with my own hands?’

The anxiety that the first cracks appearing in the original storyline might widen into a major rupture flashed through my mind. All because of a single notice text message, countless unknowable possibilities passed before my eyes.

I stared at my phone with a stiff expression. Seeing that, Ryozo looked at me with strange eyes and threw out a comment.

“What, why are you getting tense like this? That’s not like you.”

Her clear voice sounded like it was loosening the tightness in my chest. Pretending to be surprised, I turned my gaze toward her. Ryozo smiled faintly and continued.

“I’m surprised the test contents changed too, but if you think about it a different way, it’s not a totally unreasonable way to handle things, is it? Think about it. During the last midterms, a demon popped out, and during the deserted island survival training, even the Sword Emperor got injured. Every time training is held outside, some kind of incident happens, so from the Academy’s perspective, changing the location is the proper procedure. There isn’t any place better than the Academy itself when it comes to keeping cadets safe, right?”

“……”

Ryozo even scribbled with her pencil as she explained it to me. It felt like she was waking up my head, which had gone dull from the shock. For a moment, my reason had been pressed down too hard for me to reflect properly. If I had been alone, I probably would’ve spiraled through all kinds of thoughts.

But with Ryozo smartly retracing the logic for me, the situation gradually began to make sense.

That was right.

The original storyline was changed by people. This wasn’t some artificial adjustment, but a natural flow.

It was just a shift in perspective, yet it made my head feel clearer. As always, she was carrying out her role perfectly as the character who kept things from turning into a frustrating mess.

‘But why is a girl like this with Weapon?’

Weapon was definitely a good friend too, but the way he acted these days was a little… too light, you could say.

Well, maybe from a girl’s point of view he had a different kind of appeal. They said women liked men who were humorous and kind. Before I knew it, I found my gaze drifting toward Weapon.

Weapon was pathetically rubbing his swollen cheek. Chloe had hurried off to the infirmary to get a cold compress pack.

‘……’

After shaking off the idle thought, I nodded toward Ryozo.

“Now that you put it that way, I think you’re right.”

“Right?”

Ryozo set her pencil back down. When I kept staring at her, she drew her body back with a deliberately embarrassed look.

“W-why are you staring like that?! You’re making this awkward.”

“You helped me sort things out. Thanks.”

Ryozo stammered so much her lips trembled. Her pale blue eyes spun in circles. Feeling oddly fond of her, I smiled with my eyes.

“I-it’s not like I said it because I was worried about you!”

Ryozo suddenly raised her voice. It was the kind of line I’d heard somewhere many times before. Then she pointed a slim, long index finger straight at me.

“Kang Geom-ma, if you’re flustered, then I get confused too!”

“You do? Why?”

At my question, Ryozo’s face flushed even redder. Even though it was summer, it looked like steam was rising from the top of her head.

“No, I mean me included, all of us! The members of our travel club! You’re the president. If the president acts like a fool, then everyone’s discipline falls apart!”

“Ah.”

So that was what she meant.

It was a remark that reminded me, without leaving anything out, of the sense of responsibility I carried as president. Today in particular, she was being dependable in all kinds of ways.

I let out a small sound of admiration. Ryozo looked at me with a strange expression and then gave a long sigh.

‘Ah, right.’

While talking with Ryozo, I remembered there was something I needed to ask of her.

“Ryozo, there’s something I want to ask you.”

“Hm? What is it?”

“Before that, you know that Academy personnel list you hacked before? Do you still have a saved copy of it?”

“Uh, I deleted the saved copy because of data tracing, but I do have a printout on paper.”

Ryozo answered in a bewildered voice. I spoke again.

“If you have that, then this gets a lot easier.”

“Huh…?”

Ryozo tilted her head, looking like she didn’t understand what I meant. When I gave her a faint smile, she let out a quiet groan.

“What’s with that expression?”

There was something oddly fun about the way her shoulders shrank in.

“Ryozo.”

“Yeees?”

“Hack the Academy network one more time.”

* * *

Little by little, I explained what I had heard from Choi Seol-ah.

The core of it was that villains had taken jobs in disguise within the Academy. However, I left out the fact that Leon was their target.

I judged that dumping too much information on her at once would not be a good idea.

It wasn’t that I intended to hide it, but it was still too early. Final exams were right around the corner, and it could lead to needless misunderstandings about Leon, the person directly involved. It wouldn’t be too late to reveal it after I had clearly established the facts.

After hearing the whole story, Ryozo closed her eyes and tilted her head, as if organizing the information. Soon enough, after finishing her thoughts, she asked me.

“Mmm, so basically, you want to compare the list from before with the list now, is that what you’re saying?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

Originally, my plan had been to go running around on foot with the club members. But after thinking it over, I concluded that it was physically impossible.

‘There’s nowhere near enough time left before vacation.’

Once finals ended, vacation would begin immediately after. During that period, not only the cadets but also most of the staff, aside from essential personnel, would go on leave.

‘Realistically, there’s no way to check all of them before then.’

There were hundreds of staff members, and only about a week remained.

I had to settle this before vacation, or else the plan would inevitably be pushed back to the second semester.

On top of that, there would never be a more fitting moment than now, when I had only just recruited Choi Seol-ah, so I revised my plan from walking around and checking people in person.

“…Geom-ma, if what you’re saying is true, then comparing the lists really is the most efficient method. The staff information gets updated monthly. If we narrow things down to the people who weren’t on the previous list, the field will naturally get smaller.”

“Yeah, even if we cut it down from hundreds to dozens, it’ll get way easier. And during the exam period, classes end before fourth period too. And then-”

“-And since the entire staff gathers together in the faculty office to grade exams, we can save ourselves a bunch of unnecessary effort, right?”

As expected, Ryozo pinpointed my intention exactly. I nodded.

At Hoakin Academy, staff information was automatically updated every month. Borrowing Ryozo’s words, it was something about backup data in a subspace and a cloud hub or whatever.

Put simply, the monthly renewal of staff identity information worked like an automatic save system. By Earth’s standards, it was a fairly contrived setting.

But the basic base of Miracle’s Blessing M was a mobile game.

To keep the file size as small as possible, it had been designed with short branching points.

They would need to update saved states periodically to reduce dummy data. Among players, that was what was commonly called optimization.

Of course, I was probably the only one who viewed these phenomena from that perspective.

‘Even if the original story has changed, the experience I gained from playing is still definitely useful.’

Instead of clinging to a story that had already gone off the rails, I could exploit the system’s blind spots. It was another way to use the memories I had from when I was a player.

If anything, now that I had let go of my obsession with the narrative, I could feel my thinking becoming more flexible. Smiling in satisfaction, I added.

“Anyway, I think that’s the best we can do.”

“Yeah, I agree with that too.”

“Then getting back to the main point. Until when can you do it?”

When I said that, Ryozo narrowed her eyes. Her lashes lowered halfway. She spoke in a somewhat suspicious tone.

“Helping you isn’t difficult, but aren’t you making me do too much work by myself?”

“……”

I had no response, because what she said was completely right.

I had gotten so used to it that I had forgotten just how much I had benefited from Ryozo’s abilities. The hacking, of course, but also the festival club-booth promotion and the way she had tracked down Weapon through the CCTV cameras.

Ryozo’s role and abilities were valuable. Valuable enough that it felt like a waste to work her to the bone just because we were in the same club.

Naturally, I was always grateful inwardly for her efforts. The reason I didn’t say it out loud was.

‘Because it’s embarrassing.’

But there were obvious limits to getting things for free. People worked better when they had achievements or rewards. That was even more true within the same community, where proper treatment mattered all the more.

‘…But the problem is.’

I had nothing I could give Ryozo. Think about it.

Ryozo was the daughter of Japan’s lifelong prime minister.

Could a mere commoner like me really talk about giving anything to a princess who had grown up without ever lacking for something? Money, status, honor, I had none of it. The only thing I could do was swing a sashimi knife a little. A passing dog would laugh.

‘What do I do?’

After a moment of silence, I cautiously opened my mouth.

“Well, is there anything you want?”

“…Something I want?”

Ryozo opened her eyes wide at what had been, essentially, a formulaic question. She even pressed a hand to her brow and thought about it hard. Soon enough, she slowly raised her head and spoke.

“Then later, grant me one favor too.”

“……”

For some reason, I suddenly felt tense. Since she was the kind of girl whose inner thoughts I couldn’t read, there was no telling what she might ask for.

Would it be something like a whole box of sweet jelly bars? But considering the insane prices at the Academy, even that would be a pretty heavy burden for me.

“Don’t worry. It’s not a material favor.”

“…What kind of favor is it, then?”

An unreadable smile appeared at the corner of Ryozo’s lips.

“I’ll tell you when the time comes.”