During the two months of school holidays, Yeorum didn’t fight against other cadets. It was because Yu Jitae didn’t allow her to.
How much stronger have I become; how much can I fight?
Those were the thoughts that had constantly hit her throughout the training.
And by moving her body just once, Yeorum realised that everything had become a lot better than before. The weight of the ground when she kicked off it; every strand of body hair fluttering against the breeze, and the shock received by her fist when she struck her opponent – everything made her heart beat faster.
‘I, became stronger.’
The pain she went through during the training vividly flashed past her eyes – the suffering that tempted her to give up, the time she spent crying before sleep at night and the stream of blood that travelled down the sword handle. She could remember her own shameful voice that asked the guardian to stay together, thinking that she might die.
It felt like she was being rewarded for all that suffering.
After the battle ended, right before being summoned back to the real world, Yeorum showed a bright smile at the camera artifact and shot her fist up.
She then screamed while jumping up and down.
“I won!”
It was her expression of joy towards Yu Jitae but Yeorum did not know. She didn’t know the fact that the footage continued even after the fight ended until she was summoned back.
[( ́•ω•̀) x 23]
“Uwah…”
Carley from the PR team absent-mindedly watched the display screen.
“What’s wrong, Carley?”
“Sorry? Ah, it’s just… I was thinking to myself that Cadet Yu Yeorum also made faces like that.”
“What face?”
Even the senior who revisited the footage was surprised and laughed. The video had more potential than just a simple surprise factor. The Public Relations team responsible for the promotion of Lair was also in charge of creating Lair’s image, and Lair’s image was made by cadets themselves.
Yu Yeorum, who always had a pouty look and easily got upset was not suited for being Lair’s mascot character. There was also the atmosphere around her that dissuaded others from approaching her.
However, Yu Yeorum inside the footage was full of liveliness and energy. It was more striking than normal because she was acting differently.
Her ridiculous beauty was another positive element.
“Hmm… not too bad.”
“Right?”
“Keep as many videos of her as possible.”
“Ah, yes. Can I ask why though?”
“Looks decent right. There was a lot of talk about creating a mascot character out of her in the first place so…”
“Huh? I thought we weren’t doing that for the Yu household cadets?”
The PD shook his head.
“Mate. No. That’s just for Yu Kaeul. Anyways, take the videos and send it to me on email. I’ll try showing it to the team leader when we go through the script.”
*
Whatever the form, one could only participate in the ranking competition once a day but it was fine considering that the event lasted four long months.
Anyone could freely continue the spars but points wouldn’t be given after the first one, and so Yeorum wanted to go back. It seemed to be because of the advice given by Sophia.
Therefore, the two of them left the Colosseo and were in an alley on the way back to the residential area. After looking around, Yeorum crouched down next to a large bin on the side of the alleyway.
“What are you doing? Come here.”
“…”
Yu Jitae also went near her and crouched down. She took out a cigarette and placed it between her lips.
“You know. Tell me honestly. Honest.”
“…”
“Okay?”
“Alright.”
“Super honest. Well, I know you’re pretty bad at lying in the first place, but as honestly as you can.”
“…Got it.”
“In your opinion, how much have I grown? Is it to a satisfactory degree?”
Immediately after finishing her sentence, Yeorum shook her head.
“No, wait. Don’t say anything. Fuck.”
“Why.”
“You were about to go quiet and hesitate. I know.”
How did she know.
“Ehew. So it’s still not enough after all that… isn’t your standard too high?”
“…”
“Not that I hate it though.”
She grumbled. Thinking to himself that she might need a compliment, Yu Jitae opened his mouth while shaking his head.
“You’re doing good. A lot better than what I expected.”
“What?”
“It’s true. There aren’t any dragons living as earnestly as you.”
“Hmph…”
Kum, hmph. After giving several meaningless coughs, Yeorum lit the cigarette on fire. In the back alleyway away from others, she slowly breathed out smoke and lowered her head.
The joy she tried to suppress bursted out as she faintly chuckled.
“That’s good.”
Meanwhile, the Regressor felt another strange feeling.
The small lines of smoke diverging into the air could be seen vividly and the smell of cigarette nearing his nose contained a heavy texture.
What about the scattered bob hair and the smile on the child’s face? The hazy world which appeared to have been behind a blurry cover became clear, from the alleyway all the way up to the sky above.
This was not his first time feeling this.
It was similar to what he felt when Bom was being mischievous with him in the past; the sensation that hit him when he could visibly sense the distancing of the Apocalypse.
Without even blinking his eyes, he absorbed the clean feeling in its entirety.
It didn’t feel too bad.
“…Anyway, let’s talk about what to do next.”
“Yeah.”
“Your goal is to be ranked 1st in the school competition, right?”
“Right. If I can’t even do that, how would I take down Javier, and how would I go home. I’ll be fucked.”
Though she didn’t specify, that ‘oldest unni’ who had broken out of the egg before others probably had an outstanding talent even compared to other dragons. It might even be enough to make her the lord of their race.
Besides, if she was over a hundred years old, she would still be considered a hatchling to dragons who lived over thousands of years but might be as strong as the 40-year old Javier and could even be stronger depending on her level of talent.
“…Right. So, I looked into it.”
Yu Jitae turned his watch on and displayed a hologram of the screen. A list of profiles appeared.
“What’s this?”
“Cadets receive the most points from individual spars, completing assignments and the tournament. These three.”
They each took about 30% and added up to 90%.
“Nn.”
“And from those three, the spars and the tournament are especially more driven towards individual power. Since that’s the case, the ones that will be competing against you are pretty much already decided.”
He shared the information about cadets that he had discovered with Yeorum.
1. Renowned Swordsmanship Family, the Yong household.
27 cadets were admitted into Lair from the Yong household this year and the ones that were considered the cream of the crop are Yong Taeha and Yong Danbi, the son and daughter of the family head, Yong Jungkook. Of course, they were both adopted and Yong Danbi wasn’t even an Asian and she was black.
“It’s them, huh. I’ve seen them somewhere.”
2. China’s Erfan Guild.
510 cadets had been sent from the Erfan Guild, and there were about four that required more attention – Zhou Luxun, Ling Ling, Zhang Xueyan and O Wong. In this era where human rights were being reconsidered, these had received hellish training ever since they were babies.
Zhou Luxun also belonged to Professor Ha Yoon’s Moonlight study group.
“These guys look fucking sinister.”
3. Noblesse School.
85 cadets had been sent from there. Although their average level of skill was already very high, the one that required the most amount of caution was Tyr Brzenk, the son of the current Rank 1 worldwide, Oscar Brzenk.
Almost everyone sent from Noblesse school belonged to a study group or a society, but Tyr Brzenk wasn’t. He appeared to have learned it from his father.
There were lots of exceptional cadets apart from them. First grade students living in the academy city amounted to around 10,000, and 1% of those were prodigies who had been praised for being geniuses in their home countries.
They would all be commuting to Colosseo Lair, pondering on how to raise their ranks.
“Then what should I do now?”
“For now, let’s continue with the spars and slowly raise the points. There aren’t any assignments with a high number of points available yet, and the tournament is only going to open next month.”
“Alright.”
Yeorum nodded with a serious expression.
“So this guy’s father is that Rank 1 Oscar?”
“Yeah. He’s also the vice president of the International Hunter Association.”
“Hnn, is he stronger than you?”
“No.”
After casually flicking the cigarette bud away, Yeorum grinned.
“He’s trash then.”
***
After that, Yeorum spent the next two weeks diligently participating in the duels without resting a single day. Most of them ended with one strike and were boring.
The semester had just begun and the cadets all had relatively low points on average. Strong and weak cadets were all intertwined within the similar range of scores and Yeorum’s opponents were comparatively too weak.
Of course, it was also true that Yeorum was just overwhelmingly strong.
The allocation of points decreased when there was a bigger gap between the scores of the participants. For example, If Yeorum with 100 points defeated a cadet with 50 points, she wouldn’t get the full 10 points and would instead get 5.
Due to that, the points she had gathered from the past 14 days was 111. The ranks weren’t given yet because it only got refreshed monthly, but she would at least be in the top twenty.
On Lair’s forum page, there was an anonymous cadet with 113 points. That cadet probably won all 14 days but was just luckier and received more points than Yeorum did.
Once everyone accumulated a decent amount of points, cadets with high scores will fight others with similar points.
That will be the true starting point of the competition.
“Uwaaah! Our unni is crazy. Crazy crazy!”
Kaeul clapped and created a fuss. Clap clap clapp–! Without knowing anything, Gyeoul copied her unni and gave a clap.
“Unni unni unni! Can I go have a look?”
“Huh?”
“I want to watch unni fight!”
“Why?”
“Do you know everyone’s talking about you these days? I’m not interested in fighting so I didn’t know, but the kids were calling Yeorum-unni insane!”
“Really?”
“Nn! They said you look like a charging boar!”
When Yeorum made a straight face after hearing that, Kaeul went, oops.
“Umm, anyways! Can I go watch?”
“Why bother. Just use your watch at home. Why would you go all the way there?”
“Whyy? It’s going to be more exciting in person right!”
“Just don’t come. There’s nothing to watch anyway. It ends straight after the start when I smack their heads so why bother?”
Kaeul appeared regretful and Gyeoul also showed a regretful look a second after her.
“Do you even know what we’re talking about?”
“…Nn,” nodded Gyeoul.
“Know my ass. What do you know.”
“…I, know. Okay?”
“Whatever. Come watch when I’m actually fighting someone a bit stronger, when there’s actually something to watch.”
“…Will you call me?”
“Yeah.”
Hearing that, satisfaction arose in the water-coloured eyes.
Although Bom didn’t say much, she tied Yeorum’s hair into a bun before she left for Colosseo and said, “Don’t get hurt.” But her hair was too short and it was hard to create a good bun without all the hair sticking out.
“I’ll be right back.”
*
The gazes of the surroundings had changed. Cadets wearing short sleeves stole glances at Yeorum whenever she was walking down the road.
This was the same as usual. However, it was to glance at her face before while now they looked as if they were staring at a celebrity. Some of them whispered, “Is that her?” among each other.
“What you looking at?”
Sometimes, Yeorum frowned and spoke to the whispering ones who would then turn their heads away in fright. There were occasionally cadets who walked up calling themselves a fan but Yeorum remained apathetic.
“A fan? So what?”
That wasn’t the end. When they were at the waiting room of Colosseo, people glanced at Yu Jitae with eyes that seemed to be asking, ‘Is he that girl’s guardian?’. For him, this was a new experience because everyone had been uncomfortable and afraid of his existence from the fifth iteration onward.
Since they were completely uninterested in fame, Yu Jitae and Yeorum both ignored them.
However…
Something added fuel to the fire.
Two weeks after the start of the school competition when Yeorum was struggling from the boredom of fighting against boring cadets, a special cadet was finally chosen as the opponent.
The stage for the battle in the alternate dimension was a back alleyway of a town. A gloomy townscape was visible behind the pathway.
Yeorum was waiting for a person to join after entering first when the opponent was found and a simplified profile appeared in mid-air.
⚫[Ling Ling]
(Erfan Guild, Heavenly Horse study group)
– Strength 9 Agility 9 Stamina 9 Mana 9
– Acquired Points: 109
She was a cadet from CPC’s Erfan Guild, who also belonged to the Heavenly Horse study group, which rivalled the previous Azure Dragon study group of Wei Yan.
The statistics weren’t very meaningful beyond the limit and Yeorum also had 9 for all her stats. However, considering the fact that average cadets had 4~5, it was a pretty high stat.
Her acquired points were 109 and were 2 less than Yeorum who had 111 points. It also meant that she hadn’t lost during the past 14 days.
As light gathered in one place and soon scattered, a female cadet holding two swords appeared from within.
It was Ling Ling.
She was short and small and was a head shorter than Yeorum who was about 167cm tall. Although her body was small, she resembled a wild beast.
Her eyes were blurry and her unkempt hair was left messy. Her face, neck and arms were all full of scars and wounds, and her fangs were also protruding out like a beast.
The only things clean were her two wooden swords that had been provided by Lair.
“…”
The aura she was giving off was different from others.
She was strong – after estimating the power level of the opponent, Yeorum’s gaze became a level sharper. News about their fight seemed to have spread in that short span of time and the number of audience which usually stayed somewhere around 50 to 100, quickly soared up like crazy.
[( ́•ω•̀) x 373]
Soon, the countdown began.
[3]
Ling Ling raised her two swords and readied herself for battle.
[2]
Yeorum closed her eyes and felt her pulsation.
[1]
And finally, the bell rang.