EST Ch 19

The plan was to destroy the capsule to thwart the links, but the students’ souls were inside the capsule. Though the souls had gathered after death, to Lee Donghun, breaking the capsule felt like killing them a second time.

Shock from realizing the truth, contempt for the links, and sorrow for the sacrificed friends overwhelmed him. Trembling, Lee Donghun touched the capsule, seemingly forgetting the numbers he had seen moments ago.

“….”

Hae Gijun blinked slowly.

He thought he was piecing together the clues, but suddenly, nothing fit. It felt like holding a puzzle piece that didn’t belong, as if the very foundation of the puzzle was wrong. A sense of chaotic confusion settled over him.

What’s not fitting? To understand what he was missing, Gijun carefully reviewed everything he had learned.

The other world. A place with the power to control the flow of reality, allowing the links to experiment until they achieved the desired results.

And his own repeated experiences at the training camp.

“…Baek Sunwoo.”

Hae Gijun slowly turned to look at Baek Sunwoo. What did the zero that appeared when he touched the machine mean? Why was he avoiding eye contact?

— Krkkk…

But before Gijun could ask, a heavy sound came from above. The door with the changed password had been forced open.

Links poured down, attacking immediately. Chhk! The sound of mana guns and abilities echoed loudly through the space.

“Ah…!”

Lee Donghun stumbled back in surprise. A mana bullet struck right in front of him. The bright blue sparks filled his vision with fear. He had almost died.

Gijun also looked up in shock. He hadn’t expected them to use mana guns near the capsule. But the links advanced boldly, and as the three retreated, the attacks intensified.

Whoosh! Even a fire-attribute ability user hurled a fiery barrage at them. Gijun bit his lip and retreated. Baek Sunwoo was in no condition to fight, and they had no weapons. They needed to find shelter first.

Gijun’s gaze fell on the control panel behind them. A few minutes ago, he had seen the control panel containing mana from the other world explode violently in the fire in the monster summoning room.

Gijun quickly cut the wires connected to the control panel and shoved it towards the stairs. The link’s ability user hurled another fire barrage to block the sudden attack, but just as Gijun had anticipated, the control panel exploded with a massive boom.

— Kaboom, bang!

The explosion was so loud it made their ears ring and filled the area with smoke. It melted part of the descending stairs and sent debris flying everywhere, adding to the chaos.

Lee Donghun, fleeing, glanced back at the capsule with wide eyes. Did he hope it was broken to thwart the links’ plan or that his friends’ souls were safe? His eyes were filled with conflicting emotions.

Gijun also looked at the capsule with mixed anticipation and unease.

“…”

It remained completely intact, without a single scratch. Though it had been caught in the explosion’s aftermath, it suffered no damage.

If even an explosion couldn’t break the capsule, what were they supposed to do? Feeling suddenly overwhelmed, Gijun blinked in confusion.

— Pzzz! 

The sound of a mana bullet sparking nearby and the sight of bright blue filled his vision.

“Gijun!”

Baek Sunwoo screamed and pushed Hae Gijun aside.

Gijun, who had fallen, stared at Baek Sunwoo in shock. It wasn’t the link’s ambush that surprised him, but the fact that Baek Sunwoo had rushed over from where he had been hiding, and in doing so, injured his arm to save him.

Gijun’s expression hardened. Baek Sunwoo had saved him, but Gijun had been prepared to take a hit.

“I told you to stay safe…”

Gijun instinctively began to scold Baek Sunwoo, but then he felt the air vibrate. At the same time, Baek Sunwoo’s eyes glowed red. Though exhausted, he was pushing his strength to the limit, driven by some compulsive purpose beyond his control.

Just then, a binding attack was launched from the stairs, aiming to ensnare them with a net of mana.

“Don’t touch him!”

As Baek Sunwoo’s crimson energy burst forth, he was flung against the wall.

His ability didn’t stop at defense. Transparent red mana chains, about a dozen of them, rose around Baek Sunwoo like mirages and began attacking the enemies. It was practically a massacre.

The mana chains bound the links, throwing them against the walls, slamming them into the ceiling, or making them collide with each other. The sound of bones breaking and crunching echoed chillingly through the space. The ceiling bore marks like the claws of a giant beast, and blood dripped down. Broken lights dangled, their wires swaying.

It took only a few seconds for all the links to be taken down.

“Ugh…”

As soon as he finished them off, Baek Sunwoo coughed up blood and collapsed forward. Hae Gijun caught his upper body, his face hardening.

Lee Donghun, who had been watching from a distance, blinked in shock. He had been hiding under a table, his fingers trembling, but he quickly regained his composure and stood up.

“I-I’ll try to block the door more…!”

They couldn’t waste the opportunity Baek Sunwoo had created. They had to block the door before more links arrived. Whether by resetting the password or piling objects in front of the door, Lee Donghun gritted his teeth and ran. He believed that Hae Gijun would find the right path in this situation.

“….”

But Gijun’s eyes were filled with shock. It wasn’t about the intact capsule or the gate. He had already seen Baek Sunwoo’s ability in the corridor, so the current situation wasn’t surprising.

This place felt familiar.

It was as if he had seen this scene before. The chaotic space, the bodies piled on the stairs. The pools of blood forming on the floor.

‘…Time… twelve times…’

Yes, in the dream where he heard that whisper.

“Baek Sunwoo, you… wait, your shoulder is injured!”

Gijun, his face frozen, was about to ask something when he noticed Baek Sunwoo’s injury. His white sweater was already stained, but now his shoulder and chest were slashed, bleeding. It was a wound inflicted during the struggle with the chained links.

Seeing the wound extending to his chest, Hae Gijun panicked. He moved to stop the bleeding, but his actions suddenly halted. His hand trembled in mid-air.

Amidst the blood, he saw something. Not a wound, but a number.

“Hey, what the… what is this?”

The number 12 was engraved on Baek Sunwoo’s chest.

It was in the same spot where Gijun had found the number 11 on his body a few hours ago.

Gijun’s trembling fingers grabbed Baek Sunwoo by the collar. His widened eyes were filled with shock, confusion, and even betrayal. Baek Sunwoo, coughing up blood, was in terrible condition, but Gijun no longer cared and demanded an answer.

“Gijun…”

“I asked what this number is!”

“This is… my last time…”

Baek Sunwoo’s voice trembled as he spoke. It was hard to tell if he was swallowing blood or tears. As he declared it was his ‘last,’ he weakly moved his hand.

Gijun stared blankly at the object Baek Sunwoo forced into his hand. It was a concealment artifact.

“I can’t… do it anymore. You have to escape…”

He spoke faintly, saying there was a mana passage connected to the back mountain, and Gijun should sneak out and hide in the mountains. It was the third day, and if he held out for a few hours until morning, rescue might come. He believed Gijun could survive alone until then…

Suddenly, Hae Gijun felt detached from all his senses. Was it because the shock was too great, or did the situation feel so unreal that he was distancing himself from reality?

He only knew that Baek Sunwoo’s pleading voice was familiar. He felt like he had heard Baek Sunwoo’s sobbing voice before.

In the dream that led him to the underground clue. In the place where he heard the whisper of twelve times.

No, was that really a dream?

“….”

Hae Gijun blinked slowly. It wasn’t a dream. As he accepted this, he recalled a ‘memory’ he had forgotten, a moment he hadn’t even known existed.

Gijun’s head slowly turned to the side. The mana seeping from the gate was now approaching him, flickering as if it would engulf him. In the midst of this unsettling déjà vu, Gijun looked at the capsule.

The capsule still shimmered with a terrifying beauty, and his faint reflection appeared on its surface. Though there wasn’t a drop of blood on his face, Gijun saw himself as he had in the dream, covered in blood.

His face was pale and expressionless, looking as if he were dead.

“…Ah.”

So, I had originally died.

* * *

Memories flooded in.

The foundation of Hae Gijun’s rationality, the reality he stood on, crumbled, sweeping him into a vortex. Memories from a certain point in time surged in like sharp shards of glass. It felt like his head was shattering into pieces.

First loop.

It wasn’t the loop where Hae Gijun first witnessed Baek Sunwoo’s death, but even earlier. Moments that had been obscured like spilled black ink gradually came into view. They emerged like the memories of a third party.

A blood-stained phone found at an abandoned rest stop. The tense journey to the training camp with Baek Sunwoo. The monster that appeared in the annex auditorium, and Lee Donghun’s death right before his eyes. Being frantically led by Baek Sunwoo, stopping in the corridor to catch his breath.

And then, the monster that attacked.

The memory and sensation of that moment came back hazily. The memory of dying in the place where Baek Sunwoo had first died was confusingly mixed. Gijun had been impaled by the monster’s large fangs, rolled down the side stairs, and hit his head.

Through the blood-red vision, he saw Baek Sunwoo running towards him, and then Baek Sunwoo holding him, crying that he couldn’t die.

It didn’t feel like his own memory. It was like seeing multiple reflections in a shattered mirror, with many moments surfacing simultaneously.

Baek Sunwoo’s hands turning red as he tried to stop the bleeding, denying reality, and then crying and apologizing when their eyes met. Even then, Baek Sunwoo’s face was a mess of guilt, thinking it was his fault for following him from the rest stop to the training camp.

How had he reacted back then?

He hadn’t lied by saying it was okay. There was nothing to say in that situation, and no need to, but Baek Sunwoo cried so sorrowfully. So, absurdly, he had wished Baek Sunwoo would cry less and had patted his hand to comfort him.

Just as Hae Gijun had once expected, he had only felt a detached sense of bad luck about his death as he closed his eyes.

After that, all memories were cut off.

It felt like floating in pitch-black darkness. He couldn’t distinguish between ground and sky, or even tell if he was standing properly, wandering in a space devoid of reality. He walked aimlessly, flipping over sharp shards of mirrors on the ground. Memories surfaced.

He had thought he was dead but was barely alive. Baek Sunwoo treated him and moved him to a safe place, visiting occasionally. Each time, the smell of blood on Baek Sunwoo grew stronger.

Barely able to open his eyes, he faintly felt Baek Sunwoo kneeling beside him, resting his head in his hands.

‘Gijun, I think I’ve found a way. So please… just hold on a little longer. I’ll figure something out…’

It was a plea he couldn’t understand. Hae Gijun stood at the brink of death, gradually accepting the approaching darkness.

But at the end of the darkness, Hae Gijun felt a blinding sensation. It seemed like dozens, hundreds of light particles were shimmering brilliantly before him. He struggled to open his eyes and saw it, the ‘capsule.’

The capsule was filled with fantastical light spheres. But beside it was a gate emitting ominous dark red light, and he saw Baek Sunwoo standing nearby.

In the shattered space, Baek Sunwoo was covered in blood. Whether the blood on his hands was his own or from carrying him down here, he couldn’t tell. Desperately and earnestly, Baek Sunwoo touched the machine and muttered in front of the gate.

‘Let Gijun leave this place alive.’

A voice that sounded like sobbing. There were more words, as if he were conversing with someone, but the memory was faint. By then, Hae Gijun was already dying.

In his memory, it felt like a ‘bargain.’

‘It doesn’t matter if it’s my soul, my potential, anything, please.’

The ground shook. Through the blood-red vision from his head wound, he barely saw Baek Sunwoo looking down.

‘I have twelve chances to turn back time…’

Baek Sunwoo’s gaze was fixed on the panel measuring the potential of souls. Even in the faint memory, Baek Sunwoo’s potential had originally been a very high three-digit number, but now it had dwindled to just 12. However, Baek Sunwoo didn’t seem to care at all.

A slow smile spread across his pale face.

The massive door behind him slowly opened, and mana began to pour out. Baek Sunwoo’s figure was completely engulfed by the dark mana, and it even obscured Hae Gijun’s vision.

The world flickered.

“….”

Faced with the truth he had finally realized, Gijun momentarily lost his sense of reality. Though he had witnessed countless deaths, the fact that he had also died struck him anew.

Gijun slowly turned his gaze to the side and realized that the mana flickering around the door had now reached him. It seemed to have brought back his first memory.

Blinking blankly in a daze, he finally shook his head. Being paralyzed by shock wouldn’t help at all. He struggled to combine the memories of the first loop with the clues he had gathered so far, reestablishing the situation. Though questions about Baek Sunwoo’s actions kept arising, he suppressed them and focused on the objective facts.

The other world, with the power to control the flow of reality. The power to continuously reset the world until the desired outcome was achieved, ultimately creating that ‘reality.’ And the material needed to fuel this process was souls.

Baek Sunwoo had traded his soul with the other world to save the dying Hae Gijun. He had a strong and pure soul, giving him many potentials, but the difficulty of reviving Gijun from the brink of death and the complexity of the input values reduced his potential to just 12.

The exact value Baek Sunwoo had requested was…

‘Let Gijun leave this place alive.’

Here, the subject was Hae Gijun, not Baek Sunwoo. This explained why Gijun retained his memories throughout the eleven loops.

So what about Baek Sunwoo? Had he remembered from the beginning?

But throughout the loops, Gijun had never sensed such a thing from Baek Sunwoo. Now, he felt shocked and even a bit betrayed by the truth Baek Sunwoo had hidden, but it didn’t seem like he had been lying all along.

Suddenly, Gijun recalled when Baek Sunwoo’s attitude had changed in this loop. It was right after he had been swallowed by the monster. In other words, when he had nearly died in front of Baek Sunwoo.

Countless events he had seen and experienced flashed through his mind. Baek Sunwoo rushing to him when he was in danger just moments ago. The blind, compulsive way he ran.

Gijun had seen that behavior several times. Every time he repeated the eleven loops. Whenever Baek Sunwoo saved him from danger and died. And it was the same as the links ‘subjugated’ to Baek Sunwoo, trying to protect him in the corridor.

“Baek Sunwoo, what did you do to me?”

Hae Gijun asked in a trembling voice. When all the information combined, it pointed to one answer. And as he realized it, Gijun saw something strange.

The reality reflected in his eyes, which saw through the truth…

A red chain wrapped around Baek Sunwoo’s neck, connected to his own hand. It was as if he was holding Baek Sunwoo’s leash.

…It seemed Baek Sunwoo was subjugated to him.

Hae Gijun’s face hardened. Was subjugation a power that shackled the soul? Was that why Baek Sunwoo reflexively ran to him whenever he was in danger, and why he lost his sanity when he couldn’t save him from the monster a few hours ago?

He could speculate that the shock of nearly losing the subjugated person in front of him had triggered Baek Sunwoo’s memories of the past. Whether it was the first loop or all moments, it was certain that he had recalled the past.

Finally, Gijun grabbed Baek Sunwoo’s collar again. The truth that had rushed in all at once felt like it was shattering his head. No, it felt like he was barely holding together something already broken.

“Why didn’t you say anything if you remembered? If you had remembered earlier…”

“Because my path was wrong.”

“…What?”

“All the choices I made failed. So I couldn’t say anything, fearing I might hinder your choices. Your path would be the right one.”

Baek Sunwoo sobbed. His words, completed despite coughing up blood, echoed strangely in Gijun’s ears.

In that moment, Gijun recalled the state of the capsule he had seen in the forgotten first loop. It had been filled with far more light spheres than now. This meant many more students had died, possibly the entire school.

“But this path doesn’t seem right, Gijun. Please, if you escape alone, you might survive.”

In a trembling voice, Baek Sunwoo pleaded. He explained the way to escape through the mana passage again, saying that if Gijun hid in the dark forest on the back mountain and used the concealment artifact, he could avoid the links’ pursuit. With good night vision, he could also avoid the monsters, and if he held out until morning, H.N. would take action…

At that moment, Hae Gijun had an unpleasant realization. The truth he had just uncovered was so shocking that he had momentarily failed to connect one of the puzzle pieces. The plea from Baek Sunwoo to escape now aligned with what he had wished for in the first loop, revealing another truth.

Hae Gijun sighed blankly.

“…It wasn’t you.”

Baek Sunwoo wasn’t the criterion for the time loops. It wasn’t that time rewound every time he died; the other world turned back time for another reason. It created another reality to achieve the desired value.

‘If the probability falls below 1%, it seeks a new value.’

Until now, whenever Baek Sunwoo died, they hadn’t known about the links’ existence or the teachers’ betrayal. Moreover, to push into the underground, Baek Sunwoo’s power was indispensable. His powerful obedience ability was needed to handle dozens of people at once.

But not now.

All the truths had been uncovered, and even though Baek Sunwoo was now on the brink of death, time hadn’t rewound. This meant the probability of achieving the ‘value’ hadn’t fallen below 1%.

Baek Sunwoo understood this and kept telling him to run.

“….”

— Boom!

Suddenly, a loud noise erupted from above. The sound of the door breaking made Gijun look up. He belatedly remembered that Lee Donghun had gone up to block the underground entrance.

“Hey, Hae Gijun! I can’t… hold on much longer!”

Lee Donghun shouted in a strained voice. But Gijun couldn’t say anything. Lee Donghun seemed to believe he would somehow resolve the situation, but how?

Gijun was confused. Even setting aside the shock of the truths he had just learned, he had no idea what to do with the capsule. There was no open-close button around it, and it was too solid to be damaged by an explosion.

— Bang! Boom!

“Gijun, please. You have to run. Before it’s too late…”

The commotion from above grew louder, and Baek Sunwoo kept urging him to run. Hae Gijun stared blankly at the concealment artifact in his hand. His thoughts weren’t functioning properly.

Baek Sunwoo, barely able to stand, began to lead Hae Gijun towards the mana passage. Though he was coughing up blood and struggling to stay upright, his grip on Gijun was desperate. The mana passage was on the opposite side of the underground entrance, requiring them to climb the stairs.

— Beeeeeep!

— Kaboom!

At that moment, a loud ultrasonic noise was followed by a series of explosions. The links had broken through the door.

Lee Donghun, who had been blocking the door, was caught in the explosion and tumbled down the stairs. Thud, thud, thud. He rolled several times, groaning in pain before collapsing. Blood dripped from his fingertips.

— Swish! 

As soon as the links entered the underground, they fired a restraining weapon at Baek Sunwoo. The mana gun, shaped like a long rifle, glowed white-hot as the restraining rope flew towards him. It was a tool used to bind high-level monsters, and it restrained Baek Sunwoo.

Thud! Baek Sunwoo, climbing the stairs, was caught and fell to the side. Even as he fell, he pushed Hae Gijun further towards the mana passage.

“….”

As Gijun stared blankly down, he heard footsteps from the opposite side. A long sigh accompanied them.

“Gijun. Why are you going to such lengths?”

Yeon Mijeong.

She was slowly descending the stairs on the opposite side. Her eyes, observing the commotion in the space, were filled with deep fatigue.

Gijun was now right in front of the mana passage. A few quick steps, and he could escape into the passage. As he stood still, the links focused on fully subduing Baek Sunwoo.

Yeon Mijeong, approaching, suddenly stopped and communicated with someone through her earpiece.

“What? More kids are coming in through the main entrance? Really… Why is everyone working so hard?”

More students were entering through the path the student council had cleared, causing further commotion. The actions of Hae Gijun and Baek Sunwoo had gradually spread, leading others to come and help. Yeon Mijeong sighed as if she had a headache.

Meanwhile, Baek Sunwoo struggled to lift his head.

“Gijun…”

Baek Sunwoo was restrained, with his arms pinned and his back pressed down by a knee, unable to get up. In that position, he barely managed to lift his head to look at Gijun. His desperate expression conveyed his plea for Gijun to escape. If Gijun ran now, they would pursue him, but they wouldn’t know he had the concealment artifact, so their search would be less thorough.

Hae Gijun suddenly found the situation incredibly strange.

He had only intended to save Baek Sunwoo, yet everyone had followed him on this path as if it were the way to save all the students. They willingly threw themselves into danger as if it was the right thing to do.

But now, Baek Sunwoo, the kind and responsible Baek Sunwoo, was telling him to run away alone and survive, as if he were the only one that mattered.

“…”

If he ran as Baek Sunwoo said, he might survive, but Baek Sunwoo would surely die. Not only that, the students who had come underground and those still above ground would also die. But if he escaped alive, Baek Sunwoo’s bargain would be fulfilled, and that would become the ‘reality.’

And if he entered the twelfth loop… what would happen to Baek Sunwoo then?

Hae Gijun’s gaze shifted from the number 12 engraved on Baek Sunwoo’s chest to the measuring panel next to the capsule. A moment ago, when Baek Sunwoo had touched it, his soul’s potential had registered as 0.

Would Baek Sunwoo exist in his twelfth loop? A chilling intuition gripped his heart.

Baek Sunwoo was no longer the criterion for Hae Gijun. Saving him wouldn’t break the cycle of repetition, and in fact, abandoning him was now the way to escape the training camp.

But in this moment of clarity, Hae Gijun felt a confusion that threatened to shatter his mind. The shock of realizing he had died, the disillusionment that Baek Sunwoo wasn’t the key. The fragile rationality he had painstakingly gathered seemed to slip away like sand through his fingers.

Hae Gijun had never been particularly kind and was generally indifferent to others. He had started caring about Baek Sunwoo because he thought he was the key to the time loop. He had helped other students first to prevent the responsible Baek Sunwoo from getting into danger because of them.

All the reasons Hae Gijun had acted were because of Baek Sunwoo.

The revealed truth told him that everything was a misunderstanding, and the reality pointed out that he had to abandon the principles he had held onto. But still… no, because of this…

Gijun decided to face his reality and truth head-on. Even if it was a misconception, he had relied on the compulsion within that misunderstanding to persevere, using the memories gained from a nonexistent reality as milestones to reach this point. The path he had walked while focusing solely on Baek Sunwoo had become a path that all students shared. Without their help, he wouldn’t have made it this far.

His eleventh loop was possible because of the second chance Baek Sunwoo had given him.

“Damn it, why should I run!”

Gijun decided to take responsibility for it.

He grabbed the stair railing and jumped down near the gate. The links who had cautiously climbed the stairs to capture him were startled. Gijun began running towards something, leaving them behind.

A few minutes ago, as soon as Gijun had come down here, he had assessed the space. While looking for a way to open the capsule, he had also examined the machine that functioned as the gate. His gaze was fixed on it.

“What is he trying to do?”

The sudden action left the links bewildered. There was no escape route in the direction he was running, so they didn’t know what he was doing.

But soon, a link who realized where Gijun was heading shouted.

“Stop him!”

There was a forced opening button.

A button that temporarily opened the gate wide. If the gate opened further, mana would flood the area. More monsters would pour out, and the barrier surrounding the area would grow stronger.

But the mana that would pour out when the gate opened would be enough to create chaos here for a while. Though the button would ultimately kill the students at the training camp, it could create immediate havoc. Everyone thought Gijun aimed to do just that and tried to stop him.

Dodging the agents, Gijun finally pressed the button with the end of a pole. The button was pressed with a decisive click.

— Rumble, rumble, rumble!

The massive gate opened, and mana surged out violently. The flood of mana like a tidal wave toppled the links, some crashing into the walls.

In the midst of it all, only one figure stood firm.

Hae Gijun, deciding not to run but to return here, had finally completed the last piece of the puzzle the moment he chose Baek Sunwoo. The truth that emerged when he gathered the pieces he had previously overlooked was clear.

The attributes of the monsters that appeared at the training camp. Their forms and the folklore they were based on. It had all been aligned to awaken the prophesied child.

The moments of incongruity Gijun had felt while facing them. The paradoxically cold sensation when he was almost engulfed in flames. And the mana that took shape, following his will to find a way when he resolved to pierce through the monster…

The shape of ‘horns.’

Hae Gijun’s ability was the eyes that could see through darkness, the power to discern truth from lies.

In Eastern folklore, there was a divine beast that judged right from wrong and discerned good from evil. It would find those who spoke falsehoods and pierce them with its horns, protecting the truth. It was a being that upheld justice and condemned evil. It symbolized the righteousness of Joseon and protected the dynasty from ‘disasters.’

— Swoosh…

The mana pouring from the gate felt like the resonance of the sea. It also felt vast and majestic, like the moment a waterspout formed on the ocean’s surface.

“….”

Hae Gijun stood before the gate. Now he understood why the other world had responded to Baek Sunwoo’s bargain. Why it had agreed to turn the axis of this world for Baek Sunwoo, even though it only granted a fraction of its power to the links. Whose blood had stained Baek Sunwoo’s hands, and who he had tried to save.

Why the will of the other world aligned with Baek Sunwoo’s.

The world beyond the wide-open gate shone brilliantly. Dozens, hundreds of lights emitted their own colors. Like a cluster of flowers blooming and withering, like galaxies being born and dying…

Though the gate was temporarily open, it should have closed soon, but it didn’t. The mana pouring from it connected with the presence before it, allowing it to step closer to this world. The other world revealed itself as if to entice the desirable being before it.

Finally, Hae Gijun slowly turned around.

Even amidst the dark red mana pouring out, his eyes shone bright blue, and two horns extended from his forehead, glowing with a transparent blue light. The thick, sharp-ended horns curled outward, making him look like a sacred ram.

The divine ram, known as Haetae in this land.

“…It was you.”

Yeon Mijeong’s voice trembled with shock and exhilaration. The links around her knelt on the ground, unable to rise. They were either overwhelmed by the mana of the other world or reverently bowing to the divine beast that had finally returned to this land.

The prophesied being had finally accepted the call of the other world and stood before them.

[The one who prevents the ‘disasters’ of this land…]

The whisper of the other world echoed faintly in the space.

The mana pouring from the wide-open gate swirled around Hae Gijun. It seemed to want to touch him but couldn’t reach his feet. Yet, the mana continued to move endlessly, as if being trampled by the sacred aura.

[We have waited for you to awaken for a very long time…]

The voice was much clearer than the one he had heard in the annex auditorium. It was thick with excitement and desire at finally encountering the long-awaited being.

[If you take our hand, we will restore your justice to that land.]

It wasn’t a language he could understand, but a communication through mana, conveying will. The whisper of the other world felt like it was sticking to his brain.

They continued to speak to Gijun, but his only response was a sigh.

“Ha, stop it. My head is ringing…”

His voice was filled with deep irritation. The links, who had been listening reverently to the other world’s words, looked at him in surprise. The prophesied being, the one who had awakened the ‘horns,’ had spoken with unrefined emotion.

Ignoring them, Hae Gijun held his forehead and took a deep breath. From the moment he fully awakened, his entire body’s mana had been surging. His nerves were so heightened that he could feel the blood rushing through his veins. If he didn’t control it, it felt like his blood would reverse flow.

Gijun had deliberately received the mana of the other world.

Combining all the clues, he had reluctantly accepted that he was the ‘prophesied child.’

So he had gambled by forcibly opening the gate. The other world strongly desired the prophesied being, so he expected that receiving the mana filled with such desire would inevitably lead to awakening.

And as predicted, the moment he faced the flood of mana, all his senses awakened. He vaguely recalled feeling this sensation when he was very young.

‘Child, there will come a time when you must open your eyes.’

Yes, at the moment he had heard those words.

As a child, Hae Gijun couldn’t handle his ability. The power that naturally manifested from the moment he began to think was too much for a child to control. Seeing the good and evil, the truth and lies in people before him, he had to run away from those who appeared pitch black. So his grandmother had suppressed his ability, and over time, he had gradually forgotten it.

But now, Gijun decided to accept it of his own will. The sensation of the power he had forcibly avoided and suppressed bursting forth and coursing through his body was unfamiliar. If he wasn’t careful, he felt like he would be swept away and lose consciousness.

Yeon Mijeong approached the place where Gijun stood.

“So it was you. That’s why it all happened.”

Her eyes gleamed with excitement. She quickly continued, saying that if Hae Gijun was the prophesied being, his actions to uncover the truth made sense and she should have realized it sooner. She was extremely excited.

Finally, Yeon Mijeong stopped in front of the gate. She clasped her hands together, trembling with joy at the sight of the fully open gate.

“Gijun. I’ve been exploring spaces for a long time…”

Yeon Mijeong’s ability, space exploration. It was known as D-rank at Shin Hae High School, but in reality, it was A-rank. From the moment her ability manifested, she had explored various spaces. She could sense what was in those spaces and what kind of power permeated them. Yeon Mijeong could feel it all.

Her world was deeper and broader than others, and over time, she grew more ambitious. She wanted to learn about more worlds, to feel hidden powers. She traveled the world, but her interest was not in this land. Only the mana felt in spaces connected to the other world excited her. A strong pull toward unknown power.

From then on, Yeon Mijeong began to explore the ‘other world’ in earnest. The Ability Management Agency forbade exploration beyond a certain point, but Yeon Mijeong was already tired of trivial investigations. The current world held nothing interesting for her.

“The more I studied this land, the more I realized it was hopeless. Mana is scarce, resources are limited, and selfishness is rampant.”

It had already been a society where the distinction between good and evil was blurred, and justice was trampled. In such a situation, abilities emerged, and with rankings assigned to ability users, competition intensified, leading to many dirty deeds born of jealousy and envy. Whether they were ability users or ordinary people, it was a world obsessed with power, strength, and wealth.

In contrast, the other world was filled with abundant mana, rich resources, and unknown possibilities. While researching that place, Yeon Mijeong finally heard the whispers of the other world.

[I will set the value of that world right…]

The whispers of a place with the power to shake the world.

“Ah, finally…”

Yeon Mijeong shed tears of joy in front of the gate. The other world, which had spoken to her one day after she had been searching for power for a long time, was a world with the strength to turn this hopeless land into a utopia.

“Now a new world is coming.”

She seemed very happy, but Hae Gijun’s reaction after hearing her story was strange.

“Is that why so many villains are scientists…”

He muttered somewhat disdainfully. The Ability Management Agency had circulated warnings to be wary of the whispers of the other world, and the person they should be most cautious of was undoubtedly a researcher. He had witnessed firsthand someone who, while researching the other world, fell for its temptation—in the worst-case scenario.

Noticing Gijun’s indifferent reaction, Yeon Mijeong turned her body. She then spread her arms wide and shouted,

“Gijun, can you feel this power? It’s the power to control the world as you wish.”

“But it uses souls as the material?”

“…I understand that you’re shocked by your friends’ deaths. But Gijun, if you can use that energy to create a better world, wouldn’t your friends be happy? It’s doing what couldn’t have been done otherwise.”

Individual students didn’t have great potential in their souls. That potential pointed to the ‘future’—how many futures an individual could create, how much that existence could function as a variable in reality.

The potential, or influence, of Shin Hae High School students to change the future was minimal. Even if they lived and worked together, their future wouldn’t come close to the world the other world could create. Yeon Mijeong emphasized that point, calling it a worthy sacrifice.

“In a city with a water shortage, do you think having the entire student body of Shin Hae High School carry buckets of water would solve the problem? Will bringing food to a starving city make it prosperous? No. But with the power of the other world, that place becomes rich in an instant. Many more people benefit.”

Things that they couldn’t even imagine became possible. But to the elated Yeon Mijeong, Gijun asked in a cold voice,

“If you can create any reality, can you make one where the students are revived?”

“…”

Yeon Mijeong didn’t answer. She merely gave him a look as if to say, why are you talking nonsense when there’s an opportunity to achieve greatness right in front of you?

Reading the answer in her silence and gaze, Hae Gijun turned his eyes away. He hadn’t expected anything from the start. Moreover, there was a paradox: to revive the students, their souls had to be used.

Seeing Gijun’s gaze quietly settle on the capsule, Yeon Mijeong spoke in a gentle tone, as if to dispel his lingering attachment.

“Gijun. The kids now have the opportunity to create a better future. They’re contributing to that future. If you don’t use the kids in the capsule, they will just disappear meaninglessly.”

“…Disappear?”

“Yes. If they leave the capsule, their souls will just disappear. You could say they’ll wander aimlessly before heading to the afterlife.”

Yeon Mijeong explained this kindly, knowing that Gijun had tried to break the capsule a few minutes ago. She suggested that the choice was between using the souls of the already deceased students meaningfully or discarding them in vain. It seemed like she was giving him only these two options.

“Stars…”

Noticing that Hae Gijun’s reaction remained unchanged, Yeon Mijeong softened her gaze. Her voice was filled with pity and regret.

“You seem confused because you haven’t yet felt the true power of the other world…”

She shook her head as if to express the weight of her responsibility as a teacher and then reached up. Black mana began to surge from her fingertips.

“The other world shared a bit of its power with me as a condition for finding you. Seeing this will resolve your confusion.”

— Rumble…

As the black mana spread like smoke, the ceiling shook. Though the space had an unusually high ceiling, the vibration from above was clear. It was as if the other world was also lending its power to Yeon Mijeong, with the surrounding dark red mana converging on her.

Then, with a thunderous crash, the ceiling completely collapsed.

The force Yeon Mijeong emitted caused the entire space to explode. Since this location was connected to the back mountain, the broken ceiling allowed the rain to pour in.

Boom, crash! The sound of thunder echoed through the space.

In the pitch-dark early morning without a hint of moonlight, black clouds gathered in the sky. The sight of lightning flashing through the dark clouds was terrifying. It looked as if lightning bolts could strike at any moment.

— Grrr…

Through the storm clouds, a vague shape of a creature could be seen. It seemed as if the clouds were churning, and the sky was trembling. Hae Gijun’s eyes pierced through the darkness, seeing the creature clearly.

An Imoogi-type monster, a venomous dragon with fire attributes, was flying through the sky.

“Ha…”

Gijun sighed softly. He thought it wasn’t surprising that a dragon would appear as the final monster, given the Eastern folklore basis of the previous monsters. Yet, the monstrous sight made him laugh wryly. The monsters summoned at the training camp had at least been matched to the level of Shin Hae High School students.

The dragon was enormous, too big to fully capture in his view. Even from a great distance, its sinister aura was palpable. It felt like it could wither the land and drain all life force in an instant.

He understood Yeon Mijeong’s intention in summoning the dragon. It wasn’t just to show that she could control such a monster but to threaten Gijun that if he didn’t accept, she would kill the remaining students at the training camp.

“Can you hunt that too?”

Yeon Mijeong asked with a gentle smile. No matter how much Gijun had awakened as a divine beast, fighting a flying monster was not easy. It was virtually impossible. Such a monster would require several S-rank ability users to handle. Even the links trembled with fear at its presence.

In the past, Yeon Mijeong had received power directly from the other world and found people to share her vision. For this school trip, she had given them tattoos to attune them to the other world, making them less likely to be targeted by monsters.

But the monster summoned now was vastly superior, even among other world creatures. Some of the links even struggled to breathe and collapsed under its aura.

By now, Hae Gijun was also retreating, causing Yeon Mijeong to step closer to him. It seemed they could finally have a calm conversation.

“Gijun. If you take my hand…”

“Ha.”

At that moment, Hae Gijun let out a short breath. It sounded like a sigh, but it was the sound of scoffing. Yeon Mijeong looked at him curiously.

Hae Gijun smirked and asked,

“Do you really not know why I opened that gate?”

He mumbled to himself, noting how he had worried about her figuring it out. Yeon Mijeong slowly moved her eyes and realized where he was standing. The black mana swirling like mist around him had obscured her view.

“Capture those two!”

Somehow, Hae Gijun was now next to Baek Sunwoo. Taking advantage of the links’ hesitation when the monster was summoned, he had approached him.

Though the links moved quickly at Yeon Mijeong’s shout, Hae Gijun swung his staff. To create distance, the end of his staff shimmered with blue mana. For a moment, it took the shape of horns before disappearing.

“Cough. Damn it, this is hard.”

Blood mixed slightly with the cough Gijun spat out. He had tried to shape mana into a weapon, but it only briefly formed a shape. He had previously received a brief explanation about mana shaping from Baek Sunwoo and thought it would be easy after his awakening, but it wasn’t at all.

It felt like gathering the mist around him, solidifying it, and molding it into the shape of a weapon. He was amazed at how Baek Sunwoo had managed to create over a dozen mana chains.

But even that brief mana shaping was enough to threaten the links. They hesitated, unable to accurately gauge the awakened one’s power.

Gijun bit his lip and cut the rope binding Baek Sunwoo. Even drawing on mana briefly made him dizzy.

“G-Gijun…”

Finally freed, Baek Sunwoo looked up at him with a bewildered expression. Though the horns that had appeared on Gijun’s forehead when he awakened had vanished, Baek Sunwoo had clearly seen them.

Hae Gijun was an awakened one and the prophesied being.

“Baek Sunwoo, I need your help.”

Gijun said, wary of the approaching links. Baek Sunwoo, though unsteady, nodded firmly as he stood up.

As Gijun outlined his plan, Baek Sunwoo’s eyes grew clearer and filled with determination. Seeing this change, Gijun frowned. He sensed the resolve Baek Sunwoo had made.

“Whatever it takes, I’ll-”

“Hey. Do it with the will to live.”

Gijun interrupted coldly. Baek Sunwoo’s eyes looked like those of someone prepared to die. In his current state, if he acted with the resolve to die, he would indeed die. It was absurd to see the determination of someone who had even sacrificed his soul to save him.

Reflecting on this, Gijun suddenly asked a question that seemed out of place.

“I know this is a random question… but why did you try to save me instead of yourself?”

The other world had ultimately agreed to the bargain because Hae Gijun’s life, the life of the prophesied being, was at stake. But at the time, Baek Sunwoo hadn’t realized Gijun was an awakened one and had still pleaded to save him.

Hae Gijun found it strange. Why had Baek Sunwoo asked to save him instead of himself? Even in his memories, Baek Sunwoo had nearly wiped out the links. The search party would have found him if he had just stayed there…

Baek Sunwoo blinked slowly. He seemed a bit surprised and flustered by the question, his lips moving slightly.

“…Because I couldn’t bear to lose you too…”

He mumbled so softly that it was barely audible. Gijun still didn’t understand, but his attention was drawn to the approaching links.

Moving back while holding Baek Sunwoo, Gijun spoke.

“Then do it with the resolve not to lose. If you die, you lose everything, so stay focused.”

His firm voice sounded cold, but Baek Sunwoo held his breath and looked at Gijun. A faint smile appeared on his pale face. Though he didn’t answer aloud, Gijun read the response in his smile and turned his gaze away.

— Swish!

A restraining spell flew towards them. Just as it had bound Baek Sunwoo earlier, a white mana rope shot out to bind them both.

Gijun lightly leaped to the side to avoid it and sighed.

“At least they’re not shooting…”

— Snap! 

As he spoke, a mana bullet flew towards him. The blue spark in front of him made Hae Gijun curse and tilt his head back. He had jinxed it.

The links used mana guns and abilities in succession to capture them. As they dodged the attacks, they naturally separated, and the links moved to capture Hae Gijun, the biggest variable in the current situation.

At some point, they realized that Baek Sunwoo was nowhere to be seen.

“What the…!”

“Find him quickly!”

They knew Baek Sunwoo was exhausted, but they couldn’t let their guard down completely. An S-rank ability user affiliated with H.N. Baek Sunwoo was the one they had been most wary of while preparing for this school trip.

The events in the underground corridor a few hours ago came to mind, chilling them. Having seen and heard what had happened, they each tensed up, instinctively searching for Baek Sunwoo first. Though Hae Gijun was an important target, their instincts made them wary of the source of their fear.

“You idiots…!”

Yeon Mijeong bit her lip and stepped forward. If Baek Sunwoo recovered and caused chaos like in the corridor, it would be a problem. Even if a few fell under his control and tried to kill each other, it would create a melee. It might be better to use a monster instead of humans. With that judgment, Yeon Mijeong summoned the monster below.

— Rumble… 

The rapidly descending venomous dragon looked as if the sky was falling.

As the monster approached, the air grew hotter, and the entire space vibrated. The building shook as if it would collapse, and the overwhelming presence made the links tremble. Even knowing the monster’s attack wasn’t directed at them, the natural fear of facing the top predator enveloped them.