Most schools begin their entrance ceremonies in early March.
Academies that teach sorcery were no exception.
The Korean Sorcery Academy likewise opened its main gates at the same time to welcome new sorcerers.
“That person….”
“The one who was disowned…?”
“I heard the Hwanseong Group is gunning for him…. How is he even alive?”
A vibrant start to the new semester.
Groups of freshmen gathering on campus with anticipation.
Unlike those splintering off into their respective factions, I stood at the center of the campus, waiting calmly.
My presence, an intrusive object wedged into the positive atmosphere, carried enough impact to earn the surrounding bewilderment.
The world of sorcerers is narrow.
Nationally speaking, bloodlines that inherit sorcery are a minority.
Mutants like me, naturally born with sorcerous aptitude, are even rarer.
That much is self-evident when you see that the number of this year’s freshmen scraped together from across Korea is barely over a hundred.
That is why rumors are always fast.
The fact that I was a powerless person with sealed sorcery until the very moment I was disowned.
Even the fact that Choi Tae-seong of the Hwanseong Group eliminated such a me and entered the Gongmyeong Clan as a son-in-law.
“…Isn’t his attire too neat? Everything he’s wearing is luxury brands, isn’t it?”
“Did he switch over to the Association…?”
“The Hwanseong Group making such a blunder? No, the rumors that he’s properly back to normal might actually be true….”
My showing up proudly at the Academy like this was also backed by my own calculations.
The Academy is an institution led by the state.
Its founding purpose lay in the survival of sorcerers.
Under the current system, the demand for anomalous groups is fixed, is it not?
Just like monsters in other worlds, there exist monstrosities in this one.
Not to mention sorcerers in villain positions lurking in the underworld.
Therefore, without exception, all sorcerers are obligated to graduate from the Academy.
So as not to throw away precious lives futilely.
For me as well, it was an unavoidable duty if I were to live in this world as a sorcerer.
But the truth is probably that they simply want to easily manage human weapons more vicious than missiles.
No matter how prestigious a sorcerous clan or a chaebol, there are no exceptions.
“You, you bastard…. With what face do you return so proudly…!”
“Then try killing me yourself. Think you can?”
Choi Tae-seong grinding his teeth before me was the very proof of that.
Enduring the grating whispers, there was worth in revealing my presence.
This bastard was the same age as me, so he must have had to attend this occasion today as well.
Having discovered me, Choi Tae-seong immediately came to me and twisted his expression ferociously.
But that was all. The guy didn’t have the guts to openly lay hands on me.
I didn’t know about other places, but the Sorcery Association had no choice but to maintain a pretense of integrity cleaner than anyone else’s.
They couldn’t intervene in every regrettable accident occurring in the underworld, but they could not tolerate conspiracies in public places like the Academy.
The delicate balance of power exquisitely maintained under the nation and the Sorcery Association.
Because it was obvious that the moment this precarious order shattered, a ruin akin to civil war would occur.
Any clan crossing the line, no matter how wealthy, would be thoroughly crushed.
“You had two months and couldn’t kill me? Can you kill me now? Act like a mad dog if you’re a mad dog.”
“…Ha. You think I’d fall for such provocation? …Wait. I will definitely kill you with the honor of Hwanseong on the line.”
“The one who coveted another’s position talks of honor. You’re the one who should look forward to it. Do you think I can’t assassinate?”
As if he had met a human opposing the Hwanseong Group for the first time in his life, Choi Tae-seong’s eyes shook violently.
To plant even more certainty in such a guy, the sorcery power gathering at my fingertips began slowly tracing a sorcery formula.
There was no way this bastard hadn’t been tracking me while I was in the other world.
He would know that the first-grade sorcerers of the Gongmyeong Clan had been slain too.
My confident attitude.
My clean outward appearance that didn’t look like I was hiding.
The thick lingering afterimage of sorcery power that made him unconsciously step back.
Every element he sensed presented him with a one-in-ten-thousand possibility.
A sprout of doubt would bud in his heart, something like, ‘Maybe just me….’
Rather, it was Choi Tae-seong, who mouthed such nonsense, who should be trembling in fear.
“Enough. Pay attention.”
The breathless standoff came to an end with the Academy President’s resolute single remark.
***
The elderly lady who introduced herself as the Academy President personally led the entrance ceremony from the podium.
An ordinary congratulatory address not much different from a typical university’s.
Uselessly prolonged formalities.
The entrance ceremony proceeded mechanically, the kind that wouldn’t remain even in a corner of one’s memories.
“Start preparing.”
“Sigh…. Is it finally time?”
However, the freshmen didn’t slacken in the slightest; rather, they sharpened their minds.
Any sorcerer who knew the Academy’s tradition would have sensed the moment had arrived.
“The Korean Sorcery Academy welcomes you all.”
Under the ideology that the answer to survival lies solely in struggle, those who entered the Academy had to prove their resolve.
“…They say this is a trendy saying among kids these days?”
Reaching the end of her address, the President raised one index finger.
“From now on, kill each other.”
Saying that even classmates who would spend the next four years together had to be cut away for survival, the President concluded her address in a cold tone.
“I shall select the sorcerer who survives until the end as the freshman representative.”
The Academy’s tradition, the Freshman Representative Selection.
Bang! Boooom! Pow!
The sorcery power fired from the President’s fingertips burst like celebratory fireworks signaling the start.
Fireworks decorating the sky from broad daylight.
Simultaneously, Choi Tae-seong and his followers, positioned at the very center, charged toward me.
“Let me emphasize again. If you call yourselves sorcerers, prepare yourselves with the resolve to kill your classmates.”
“Die! Gong Si-woo!!”
Words harsher than expected spilled from the mouth of a President who looked kinder than she was.
Hwareureuk—!
And as if spurred by the President’s emphasis, black flames saturated with killing intent blazed from the bastards’ fingertips.
The same flame sorcery that had burned my workshop.
Pillars of black flame rushing in from all directions simultaneously engulfed my body.
“Ha…! Guess you were only skilled at running? What a bland ending….”
Drunk on the sense of victory already, he uttered whatever he wanted, but unfortunately, their black flames did not reach me.
If your eyes are good, you might see the flames halted in the air an inch away from my skin.
“If you knew Void Spatial Arts, you wouldn’t let your guard down so easily.”
“Wh-what…! This bastard, his sorcery really is…!”
A spatial fault.
Void Spatial Arts is the culmination of abilities that manipulate space.
Isolating the surrounding space to block foreign objects was merely a basic application.
It was to the point where the Gongmyeong Clan seemed utterly pathetic for having remained a minor clan despite possessing such secret arts.
“More than that, why are you so obsessed with my life? Is it an inferiority complex toward my ex-fiancée?”
“Ha, haha…! A gutter orphan like you couldn’t possibly know the grand design of a prestigious clan.”
Choi Tae-seong seemed overwhelmed by my completely unblemished appearance, but he forced a loud laugh to hide his anxiety.
Ignoring the followers persistently spewing flames, when I took a step closer to him, he retreated in unsightly fashion.
I couldn’t believe the foundation I had been preparing was shattered to pieces by such a bastard.
“It wasn’t your arbitrary action, but a scheme orchestrated at the clan level.”
“Kuk…! If you’ve seen through it that far, then kneel quietly! Gongmyeong is already in my hands! Your fiancée is already carrying my child! A wretch of low birth has nowhere to return!!”
“…Return? That’s not it.”
Whether what the Hwanseong Group wants is the Void Spatial Arts or the Gongmyeong bloodline.
My first meeting with Gong Jin-cheol came to mind.
His figure covered head to toe in bandages as if he had fought a fierce battle. Dragging such a body, he had personally made his way to the orphanage to see his adopted son.
“I don’t care about such clans at all.”
Thinking about it, it was a situation that likely had a backstory, but it had nothing to do with me.
I had no duty to care until the end from the position of one who had been disowned.
“Rather, if I don’t die, you guys are the ones in trouble, aren’t you?”
“Heup…!”
Considering plans henceforth, it could prove even more fatal to the Hwanseong Group.
Ttak.
I lightly flicked my finger.
Void Spatial Arts was the sorcery I had trained in my body the longest since beginning sorcery.
Omitting the preparation process for the sorcery formula was no difficult task.
Yet the result was an unbelievable spectacle compared to the simple motion.
—Kugugugugu!
Void Spatial Arts, Spatial Severance.
Black lines dashed across the entire campus, spreading like a spiderweb.
From the day my restraints were released, from that point on, I had burned three Grade 1 sorcerers.
An authority that freshmen-level sorcerers who couldn’t even compare to them could never resist.
Along with the gradually thickening lines, classmates began being diced apart helplessly.
“Aaaargh…!”
“Kuaaaack…!”
Amidst the terrible screams, only I remained standing.
Looking at such a scene, it was hard to think that fantasy was all overflowing with romance.
I could even see the faces of professors and upperclassmen watching from afar turning pale.
Before my classmates drew their last breaths, there was a brief moment to spare.
I picked up Choi Tae-seong’s head rolling at my feet.
Without the neck below, a head dangling limply by the hair.
Looking straight at the guy desperately trying to avoid eye contact, I conveyed my thoughts.
“Run to your father and beg. Ask him to kill me right now.”
“….”
“Now is the most likely chance, isn’t it?”
With those words, when I threw the head, unable to speak without its body, far away—
The President, who had been quietly watching the results, took the microphone again.
“This year’s representative is more outstanding than I thought. This is the first time the selection has ended so quickly.”
A voice so calm even though the campus was dyed bright red with the blood of classmates.
The President lightly tapped the floor with the cane in her hand.
“Those who unfortunately died—I expect to see you in a more grown form next time.”
A sorcery whose details I couldn’t fully grasp even with my eyes; the classmates’ bodies began to restore as if time were rewinding.
Whether it was the President’s ability or the effect of something hidden in this campus.
The rule that within campus, you generally don’t die.
That was the reason they forced a bloodbath from the first day of entrance, no matter how traditional it was.
***
The last procedure of the entrance ceremony was the freshman representative’s oath.
“- Next, we will have the freshman representative’s address. Sorcerer Gong Si-woo, please come forward.”
The long-awaited moment had arrived.
I stood on the auditorium podium as the professors guided me.
From first year to fourth year. The attention of the entire student body was focused on me.
The reason I stood here was not to fill a petty desire for recognition.
What I wanted was this very moment when all Academy personnel were gathered and eyes were focused on me.
Isn’t there a tradition where the class president throws hamburgers in the classroom?
Having become the freshman representative, I too intended to scatter something.
Ttak.
Before I even opened my mouth, I flicked my finger first.
Simultaneously, a rift appeared in an empty space where no chairs were present.
Swaaaaaaash—!
Like a waterfall, books poured out endlessly from within the rift.
The surroundings were in an atmosphere of confusion at my sudden action.
“As those in the know are already aware. Gong Si-woo, disowned from the Gongmyeong Clan.”
I got to the main point without paying heed.
“You must be curious what exactly those books I’m scattering are.”
Void Spatial Arts.
The moment that word left my mouth, eyes that had held doubt were dyed with greed.