On Thursday during 8th and 9th period, there was a class called the Endurance Mountain March.
Kang Han-byeol and I went to the Cultivation Hall, just as the syllabus stated, since the first session was being held there.
“Knowing Instructor Su Ho-guk, he won’t end the first day with nothing but orientation. Beginner Swordsmanship I started on day one, and so did Villain Response Training.”
If the Dimensional Hall was a facility built with classes inside artificial gates in mind, and the Academic Affairs Hall was used mainly for morning lectures and theory, then the Cultivation Hall was designed for multi-purpose instruction.
Because of that, its classrooms didn’t follow a single standard layout.
In the room I stepped into, a massive sheet of glass cut straight across the open space, dividing it into two.
Tap, tap.
Sitting down on the floor to wait would make me stand out, so instead I lightly knocked the glass with my knuckles.
It didn’t look like ordinary glass. It was probably reinforced, specially made to endure even magic.
Other students seemed curious too, touching it and studying it the way I was.
That was when Su Ho-guk, the instructor for this class, entered the room.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Su Ho-guk, and I’ll be teaching this course. Some of you may have seen me in other classes. I already recognize a few familiar faces.”
The Punishment Sword, Su Ho-guk.
Only a few years ago, he had been the kind of hunter who made villains grit their teeth in terror.
Even in the game, he appeared as a character who was strong and reliable.
“Though his screen time wasn’t great.”
To make the protagonist, Kang Han-byeol, and her party shine, the game loved delaying the support cast at the most convenient moments.
Su Ho-guk, a full-fledged instructor rather than a student, was the clearest example.
Outside of class hours, he tended to show up after Kang Han-byeol had already solved the problem.
[Su Ho-guk]
…Was I too late?
Or he would arrive right when the crisis peaked.
[Su Ho-guk]
I’m sorry. I’m late. But don’t worry now. I’m here.
Or he would appear for the scene where students evacuated.
[Su Ho-guk]
I’ll hold them here! Take the injured and fall back!
He showed up with perfect consistency as a supporting piece of the story.
Because of that, some players couldn’t help seeing him as incompetent for an instructor who was supposed to protect students.
Later in the story, he even admitted it himself.
[Su Ho-guk]
Even without me, those kids will do just fine. So we should believe in them and pray they return safely.
Su Ho-guk was a supporting character. He was never allowed to play the lead.
Players pitied him for it.
Online, he even became a meme. People called him the “Late Sword” instead of the Punishment Sword.
Because I remembered that.
“Poor guy.”
Before admiration, what I felt first was sympathy.
No matter how dignified his lecture was, parodies of him floated into my mind on their own.
“…Hang in there, Instructor.”
Still, this world wasn’t a game. It was real.
Su Ho-guk wouldn’t be mocked and ridiculed like that here.
I listened closely as he continued.
“Endurance Mountain March is a class designed to improve stamina and defensive capability. During the semester, you will enter gates and complete high-intensity mountain marches.”
No one spoke.
“But throwing you into marching with no preparation would be forcing danger on you. For a while, we’ll be doing various drills to build bodies that can keep up with the course. Today’s class is part of that training. Look over there.”
Su Ho-guk pointed at the glass wall.
All of us turned our attention.
“Beyond that wall are devices that fire rubber balls in rapid bursts. You will enter and endure for ten minutes.”
The room went still.
“You may dodge, or you may take hits. However, aside from the soles of your feet, no other part of your body may touch the floor. The manifestation of internal mana is prohibited. I want you to rely purely on physical ability.”
According to his additional explanation, he planned to split the class into four groups.
Two periods made a total of one hundred minutes.
We had spent roughly twenty minutes already. Assuming we had eighty minutes left, each group would train twice.
“Hm. Enduring a barrage of rubber balls. That won’t be too hard for me.”
The groups were divided simply by student number.
Since my surname was Do, my number placed me near the front, and I ended up in Group One.
Kang Han-byeol was in the same group as me.
Not long after, Su Ho-guk finished preparing and called us forward.
“Group One, go inside.”
The glass wall rose smoothly upward.
I stepped into the space that had been sealed off, along with the other students in Group One.
As soon as we were all inside, the glass descended back into place.
“Ten minutes starts now.”
The moment Su Ho-guk gave the signal, the devices hidden in the chamber activated.
Holes opened without warning across three walls, from the floor, and from the ceiling, everything but the glass.
Rubber balls shot out in countless numbers at frightening speed.
Whip.
There were too many to track with my eyes.
With internal mana forbidden, my body felt heavier, duller than usual.
Worse, the balls were absurdly elastic. They didn’t lose speed after impact. They bounced off surfaces and ricocheted in every direction.
If anything, they seemed to accelerate.
“…That one came back after hitting the wall.”
Force is proportional to mass and speed.
If the balls were moving faster, the impact would be harder.
I dodged one coming from my peripheral vision and clicked my tongue.
The students, including myself, couldn’t help but panic.
Dodging every single ball in this situation was close to impossible.
Snap.
But not for me.
It felt impossible, but I could do it.
Ten minutes was worth attempting.
“I can dodge them.”
I let my body follow instinct.
I moved as if possessed, slipping through the storm, avoiding the rubber balls one after another.
As time passed, the number of rubber balls increased, and their speed climbed.
Without manifesting internal mana, there was always a limit to how long someone could avoid the barrage.
At first, you could focus purely on dodging, refusing to be hit at all, but eventually a moment would come when that was no longer possible.
That was when you had to change strategies.
Dodge what you can, take what you can’t.
“Dodging isn’t the only answer. Sometimes you have to take hits efficiently to create openings.”
That was the essence of the class.
That was why Su Ho-guk told them to endure and survive inside for the full time.
As the instructor, Su Ho-guk expected students to act in accordance with that intent.
He simply didn’t expect it right away.
“Has one minute passed?”
No one voluntarily seeks pain.
Avoiding harm is a basic instinct of living things.
It was unreasonable to expect students who had only just entered the academy to understand how to take hits strategically.
For now, being hit at all would be enough.
They could build toughness by taking some hits, and later learn how to take them on purpose, properly.
From beyond the glass wall, Su Ho-guk watched the students struggle.
“Ghk!”
“W-wait, don’t come, don’t, ugh!”
“Three minutes. Nearly half of them can’t dodge anymore.”
Faces that had looked composed at the start were now stripped of all ease.
They were failing to keep up as the difficulty rose.
And in a situation like that, one mistake, one hit, was enough to trigger disaster.
The moment their balance broke, their bodies staggered, and then they were swallowed by the barrage.
Some people hadn’t been hit yet, yes, but no one got hit only once.
As time went on, more and more students were struck down until their bodies touched the floor.
And during the drill, they couldn’t leave the chamber. They had no choice but to remain exposed.
Students with slow reactions, students with clumsy movement, and students with large frames that made them easy targets were being hammered early and relentlessly.
“Five minutes.”
By then, there were no students left who hadn’t been hit.
No, there was exactly one.
Su Ho-guk’s gaze fixed on that student.
“So it’s him. I didn’t expect to see him again in this class.”
Do-gyeon-woo of the Divine Sword Do family.
He had stood out from the entrance exam onward, enrolling as a runner-up.
And among all the trainees, he alone had not allowed a single strike to land.
“…Impressive.”
As if he knew where every ball would come from, Do-gyeon-woo placed his steps like flowing water, letting rubber balls skim past him by a hair’s breadth.
That wasn’t all.
“What on earth is he doing?”
The floor was littered with rubber balls that had already struck the students.
Everyone had to be careful not to step on them by mistake.
Yet Do-gyeon-woo timed his movements precisely, kicking those balls to cancel out the ones flying toward him.
He even accounted for the angles at which they would rebound off the walls.
A ball he kicked forward bounced off the glass wall, struck the ceiling, then fell at just the right moment to collide with another ball approaching him.
“He calculated that…?”
By the seven-minute mark.
The number of rubber balls had grown overwhelming, and their speed had become vicious enough to leave serious bruises on impact.
In a situation like that, the only thing one could rely on was instinct.
There was no room to think.
And yet Do-gyeon-woo remained calm, responding with deliberate calculation.
Su Ho-guk clicked his tongue without realizing it.
Even he wouldn’t be able to move like that.
Unless he manifested internal mana.
Even so.
“A dead end.”
Do-gyeon-woo’s skill was astonishing, but there was no way to avoid rubber balls attacking from all directions at once, endlessly.
There was no escape route for him.
That was what Su Ho-guk thought.
Whish!
Suddenly, Do-gyeon-woo shrugged off his blazer jacket.
He swung it wide, snapping it through the air to knock away the rubber balls rushing in.
“….”
Su Ho-guk doubted his own eyes.
In what had seemed like a cornered situation, an escape route had opened up.
Do-gyeon-woo immediately dashed through it, pulling a metal plate from his waist.
“Device on.”
The metal plate returned to its original form.
With a sword sheathed in deep navy blue now in hand, he blocked attacks that weren’t worth dodging.
And then.
“…Clever.”
As he moved through the space, Do-gyeon-woo sometimes used other students as shields, slipping behind them to avoid incoming balls.
He was using his environment intelligently.
“It’s not what I intended… but still, impressive.”
In an exam, that would have been grounds for point deductions, but this wasn’t an exam.
Su Ho-guk felt nothing but admiration.
At the same time, a question surfaced.
“If he can think that clearly, shouldn’t he know that taking hits strategically would be better…?”
“Is he afraid of being hit because he’s never experienced it?”
Just how carefully had he been raised?
Su Ho-guk couldn’t understand it.
That day, across two rounds of training, Do-gyeon-woo never gave the slightest opening.
Following the student council’s guidelines.
Club promotion activities were held across the campus during designated periods.
Among them were briefing sessions where clubs set up dedicated spaces to explain themselves in detail, as well as trial events where students could experience activities firsthand.
“Everyone’s here except Ha-neul, right? Then let’s go.”
That day, the Mystery Exploration Club briefing was scheduled.
Kang Han-byeol, Go Eun-bi, and Yong Hae-rang were all present, naturally.
I had even persuaded people who never joined in the game, so I went with them to attend the briefing.
Yeon-ha-neul planned to join us on-site.
She was coming together with Cha Eun-sol.
“Ha-neul did a great job. I didn’t expect her to actually reel Cha Eun-sol in.”
In the game, Kang Han-byeol recruited Cha Eun-sol into her party by feeding her three times while she was starving.
Players jokingly called it the “three visits” event.
However, the game never specified exactly when or where the two first met.
“You could only infer the timing vaguely from the story.”
Because of that, all I could do was wait for Kang Han-byeol to eventually cross paths with her.
If Yeon-ha-neul hadn’t become close to Cha Eun-sol, that’s what I would have had to do.
Grateful for Yeon-ha-neul’s help, I eagerly looked forward to meeting Cha Eun-sol.
And finally.
“Guys, this is Eun-sol, the one I told you about from the entrance exam. Eun-sol, these are…”
“Hi. I’m Cha Eun-sol. Yum.”
At the Mystery Exploration Club briefing.
Through Yeon-ha-neul’s introduction, I finally greeted Cha Eun-sol.
She gave a brief self-introduction and pulled out a sausage to eat.
Her face, framed by striking green eyes, remained expressionless, giving no hint of what she might be thinking.
“She’s probably spacing out again.”
Knowing her personality, it was an easy guess.
Then she suddenly turned her gaze to me and spoke.
“So you’re Ha-neul’s childhood friend.”
Cha Eun-sol looked straight at me.
Her eyes, like gemstones carved from nature, felt as though they were piercing right through me.
In truth, she was probably peering into my soul through them.
That was why I didn’t avert my gaze, even though it felt heavy.
She was judging whether I was someone worth being close to.
“There’s no way she knows I reincarnated. I’m not possessed or anything. I’m still me.”
After a moment, Cha Eun-sol spoke again.
“I can see why Ha-neul likes you.”
“E-Eun-sol! What are you saying!?”
“Well, it’s true. I am a likable guy.”
As expected, Cha Eun-sol hadn’t noticed my reincarnation.
Meanwhile, Yeon-ha-neul’s rabbit ears stood straight up as she showed visible embarrassment.
Had Cha Eun-sol said something strange?
It didn’t seem like it to me, but I wasn’t sure.
Deciding not to dwell on it, I changed the subject.
“By the way, we’ve met before, haven’t we?”
“Hm?”
This wasn’t actually my first time meeting Cha Eun-sol.
We had crossed paths during the entrance exam when I defeated the Doll-Eared Maiden, Lee Ga-hyeon.
“Really? I don’t remember.”
“We met on the last day of the entrance exam.”
“Maybe….”
We had exchanged a few words back then.
Still, Cha Eun-sol clearly didn’t remember meeting me.
That suited her, considering how little interest she usually had in other people.
I said it plainly.
“Try to remember my face from now on. You’ll be seeing it a lot over the next three years.”
“Okay. Yum.”
She nodded while chewing on her sausage.
Whether that response was sincere or half-hearted was impossible to tell.
Given her personality, she would probably forget again soon.
I resolved to remind her every time we met.
That was when it happened.
“Ah!”
“Huh?”
A voice suddenly rang out from the entrance.
It sounded familiar.
I turned toward the sound.
The moment I did, my thoughts froze.
“Gyeon-woo, Gyeon-woo! I was just thinking I wanted to see you, it’s been so long!”
“….”
A short girl with an immature, youthful look.
Her curly grey hair framed bright violet eyes.
It was Nam Yu-ri of the Soft Star Nam family.
“Why is she here?”
This hadn’t happened in the game.
I could only feel thrown off.
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