Chapter 41
I opened my mouth in front of Park Siwoo.
“A rat had come in.”
The footsteps of the one who had his back to me stopped, thunk.
And a faint tremor could be felt.
At the sight of him looking more intact than I had expected, I quietly clicked my tongue.
He ended up only trembling when facing a Demon.
Normally someone would at least piss themselves.
Demons emitted an energy commonly called magi or demonic energy, and that magi came with a built-in debuff that gnawed away at the opponent’s mind.
In that regard, Park Siwoo’s mental strength was excellent.
Even if he wasn’t fully matured yet, he was a Playable Character after all.
He slowly turned his head and faced me.
He inhaled as if overwhelmed.
For a moment he inspected me, then his gaze went to my left hand.
His eyes widened and he shouted.
“Seongwoo!”
In my hand I held a dummy made from a 【Dark Relic】.
At the very least I had to avoid having my identity suspected.
It was Yoo Sung-woo who had called him, and with only the Devil Knight — a Demon — there, wouldn’t it look like Yoo Sung-woo had lured Park Siwoo here?
His face twisted as he glared at me with a murderous look.
Of course I also knew that revealing a Demon’s form at the Academy was not a wise choice.
But one upcoming event forced me into doing this.
In <Become a Hero>, when Seo Da-hee died, the Playable Character Park Siwoo’s mind also collapsed and he couldn’t pull himself together.
There was an event that snapped Park Siwoo back to his senses: the field trip event.
There, encountering a Demon for the first time, Siwoo would be pushed into crisis and awaken.
But, as always, the difficulty of Become a Hero was miserably brutal.
Even I, who prided myself as a veteran of Become a Hero, had died many times in that event.
With most events being rushed forward and turned into higher difficulty, the probability that Park Siwoo would safely get through the crisis was very low.
Even Lia, without any special precursor, had experienced a random encounter event and proceeded through a story I’d never seen before.
I had to minimize variables as much as possible.
That was why I planned to let him gain experience with Demons in advance, to raise his clear rate for the event that would happen later.
I lifted the dummy in my hand and held it out in front of Park Siwoo.
The dummy sagged and dangled like a corpse.
“Is this trash your friend?”
“What did you do to Seongwoo!”
“I’m cleaning up. I’m dealing with prey I hadn’t finished disposing of. Now that you’ve seen this, you won’t have long to live.”
His brow furrowed as if he had realized something.
At the same time, magical power rose around his body.
“Could it be… you’re the Demon that harmed Senior Da-hee?”
“I don’t know the name well, but someone did get killed a few days ago. Are you talking about that woman who fought to protect this trash?”
The provocation hit home easily.
Angry, Park Siwoo shouted and lunged at me.
His fist wrapped in faint starlight poured toward me.
I lightly deflected Park Siwoo’s punch, slipped into his guard, and struck his solar plexus.
With a choking sound, Park Siwoo rolled on the floor in a pathetic mess.
A sigh escaped me at the sight.
If he went to the field trip like that, Park Siwoo would be one hundred percent dead.
I felt even more certain that choosing this was the right call.
Park Siwoo was a good student.
Kind, good grades, and he handled practical work excellently.
He even had exceptional talent.
That one strike just now—
It was clumsy, but traces of the Asura Divine Art lingered in his footwork and the way he used his fists.
He must have followed it unconsciously, knowing that academy training in hand-to-hand wouldn’t suffice.
But it was only at a cadet level.
To overcome the crisis ahead, he had to go beyond a student level.
So I had thought to give him a little help to break out of that student tier.
What separated a student from a pro was experience, after all.
Heart hot, head cold.
Rage could be a good source to briefly raise strength.
But one must not be swept away by it.
“Looking at your pathetic skill makes my eyes feel dirty. Shall I freshen myself up a bit? Even if I kill you, I might as well give you a lesson as a parting gift on the road to the afterlife.”
“Cough, cough. Are you mocking me!”
“Did you finally get it? It’s a small hobby of mine. Teaching the lacking ones like you. For a so-called hero to be taught by a villain — there’s no greater humiliation. Keep that shame close and come at me. Who knows? As your teacher I might grow fond of you and spare you.”
Crawling like an insect, Park Siwoo struggled to get to his feet.
His eyes were bloodshot and he looked like a fiend.
“Shut up!”
He screamed in fury and charged at me.
Perhaps my provocation had paid off, because I no longer sensed the scent of fear from him.
“Are you completely incapable of learning? Your crude hand-to-hand couldn’t even scratch my armor.”
“I know that!”
Saying that, he emitted a flash from his hand.
The starlight’s magic detonated and obscured my vision.
White washed over my sight.
I smiled inside my helm.
He really did learn fast.
He was probably trying to buy time by clouding vision.
Not a bad choice.
But would he be able to find the right answer from here?
As sight returned after the blinding burst, I scanned the surroundings and saw Park Siwoo clinging to the Hero statue.
He drew the statue’s sword and hurled it at me.
With a harsh cracking sound the blade flew.
That was more like it.
Instead of recklessly rushing in, he started to use the terrain and objects around him to harass.
Now he was beginning to use strategy bit by bit.
While I dodged his attack, Park Siwoo pulled the spear that had been attached to the other hand of the Hero statue and charged at me.
With a flash of light he reached me in an instant.
The spear strike was on a completely different level compared to the clumsy punches from before.
The spear, imbued with the power of the stars, turned into a streak of light.
Clang!
Starlight burst apart.
And soon, a curse escaped from his mouth.
“Son of a—damn it…”
That was because the spear, gleaming with a sharp bluish light, had stopped right in front of my eyes.
The power behind it was impressive, but it was far too straightforward.
I held the spear still with one hand.
“For a rookie, not bad. But that’s all you are.”
To have grown this much in such a short time—
He really was talented.
But he was still lacking when it came to fighting a Demon.
He needed to be able to strike where the Demons least expected…
At that moment, the starlight on the tip of Park Siwoo’s spear began to intensify.
Bang!
With a rough explosion, the spearhead detonated.
The magic of starlight erupted violently, throwing my body back.
Ha, I didn’t see that one coming.
Thanks to the armor made from a 【Dark Relic】, I wasn’t damaged, but his application was impressive.
Sure, this kind of improvisation could appear in the game too, but only later in the scenario.
Was he learning faster than I’d thought?
As expected of Park Siwoo, the Playable Character with the highest growth potential.
Soot formed faintly on my helm.
Still, it wasn’t enough.
Even now, the explosion hadn’t been to deal damage but rather a makeshift move to retreat.
Such unorthodox tactics might work against low or mid-ranked Demons, but against higher-ranked ones—or someone like me—they were mere tricks.
So, was there no method?
If there weren’t, I wouldn’t have appeared before Park Siwoo in the form of the Devil Knight in the first place.
I released my restraints and drew out my full power.
A violent demonic energy burst forth, engulfing the surroundings.
“I’ve grown tired of this. Brat, playtime’s over.”
It wasn’t like before—no longer the intangible energy that gnawed at the mind.
A dark aura, as if blackness had been sprinkled with golden dust, erupted outward.
Park Siwoo’s face turned pale at the sight.
He had endured the intangible magi, but the pressure of its materialized form seemed too much; he sank to the ground.
The materialized magi instantly swallowed the area, staining everything black.
Then, from somewhere, a brilliant light erupted.
Before that radiance, incomparable even to Park Siwoo’s starlight, the magi that had filled the air shrank back.
The light—instinctively repelled by the magi, as if a predator had appeared—made every hair on my body stand.
An unpleasant shock crawled up my spine and spread through me.
I turned my gaze toward the source of the light.
The one emitting it was none other than the Hero statue atop the fountain.
To be precise, the Hidden Piece sleeping within the statue.
The hero enshrined in that statue was the Academy’s founder—
Baek Hyun-joong, who had once surpassed the Sword Emperor and was called the strongest Hero.
And he was the core reason I had called Park Siwoo here.
The statue that radiated light turned its head with a heavy, grinding sound.
『I sense it… an evil presence…』
The statue’s gaze met mine.
A numbing pressure swept through the area as a massive aura surged from the statue.
That statue was a Guardian—one imbued with Baek Hyun-joong’s power to defend against a possible Demon invasion.
As it extended its hand, the spear and sword that originally belonged to it returned to their master.
And then, weapons that shone with a light similar to the statue’s began to change shape.
The spear that had exploded from Park Siwoo’s attack was restored,
and the sword that had bent from being thrown straightened, glowing brightly.
Before long, both weapons regained their original forms.
From the figure pointing those restored weapons at me came a voice.
『Wicked being tainted by evil, I shall erase you from this place.』
Even though it was nothing more than a lingering will, the aura radiating from it was overwhelming.
It raised its sword and drove it into the ground.
『This place is my holy ground. I am the judge who punishes the wicked. Evil and corrupted ones, fear the light.』
As its incantation ended, a magic circle spread across the ground.
Soon, the entire world turned white.
“Huh, I didn’t see this coming.”
Well, things had gone well, in a sense.
I provoked Park Siwoo, stimulating his soul.
Then, through my magi, I awakened the Hidden Piece.
Hidden Piece meets Awakened Park Siwoo—happy ending.
Everything had gone perfectly… except for one thing I hadn’t anticipated.
The Guardian was much stronger than I’d expected.
Not only were the Demons getting stronger—our side was being buffed too?!
This white subspace, cut off from the world, made my body feel heavy, as if weighed down.
Even the power of the Demon’s Authority was strangely subdued.
It truly felt like meeting a natural enemy.
Right now… this might be the most dangerous situation I’d faced since entering the Academy.