The Support Ate it All

Pillars of fire kept roaring up without pause, and explosions went off one after another.

Hong Yeonhwa swung the staff again.

The flames spread wide across the area changed into several huge fireballs, like clumps of rice pressed together.

And they flew at me.

The place where I’d been standing just moments ago turned into a sea of fire.

Hong Yeonhwa swept the staff a third time.

The sea of fire instantly converged into a single point and turned into a blazing egg.

And from there, a phoenix the size of a chick awakened.

By the time the spar had progressed that far, every last flame vanished as cleanly as if it had been washed away.

Naturally, because Hong Yeonhwa had pulled it all back in.

But for someone who had cut things off midway, their complexion looked strikingly bright.

“It’s done……!”

“The quest?”

“Yeah!”

Then they even shared the notification message with me.

[Sub Quest: Stage 25 Austerity] (Complete)

[‘Pyro-Fusion(F)’ will be acquired.]

Pyro-Fusion.

It let them gather and fuse the lingering embers created by flame magic, then use them in the next flame spell.

‘A kind of recycling magic.’

Though “recycling” was underselling it by a lot.

Its area control was excellent, and it made chaining spells feel as natural as flowing water.

As a bonus, it also accelerated casting speed.

I nodded and said,

“So you really cleared it before school started back up.”

“Yeah, thanks for helping me.”

“All I really did was run around like crazy.”

In practical terms, I’d just played the role of a moving scarecrow.

I hadn’t gotten involved in concretizing their insight or researching the magic itself.

But Hong Yeonhwa shook their head.

“You gave me Invitation and [Austerity]. And you kept doing it with me…….”

“That’s not wrong. Anyway, good work. Rest now.”

“Yeah……!”

After that, we spent our time leisurely wandering around various parts of the tower.

That evening, the whole family gathered for dinner again.

And when night came, Hong Yeonhwa showed up in my room as usual.

Ever since declaring it proudly to their sister, they weren’t even sneaking around anymore—they came completely out in the open.

After wriggling their way under the blanket, they claimed the spot beside me.

“……”

Hong Yeonhwa’s face looked as comfortable as always, but today it also seemed a little subdued.

So I asked,

“Something wrong?”

“It feels like……. time went by too fast.”

“You don’t want to go back to school?”

“It’s not that…….”

Hong Yeonhwa trailed off.

It seemed they were too embarrassed to say the rest out loud.

So I said it for them on purpose.

“You want it to be just the two of us a little longer?”

“……”

Hong Yeonhwa pulled the blanket up to cover their face.

Then, from under it, they gave a timid nod.

So I grinned mischievously and asked again,

“Then should we just skip school and run away somewhere far off?”

“Far away……?”

“We could hide out somewhere deep in the mountains and live there.”

“……!”

For a moment, Hong Yeonhwa’s eyes widened as if the idea had genuinely tempted them.

But then they gave a faint smile.

“I do want to……. but I don’t think I can.”

“Why not?”

“Because everyone’s fighting. Mom, Dad, my sister, the people at the Mage Tower……. I can’t be the only one who runs away.”

“So you’re saying you’ll do your duty.”

“Yeah. I want to get stronger…… so I can protect them.”

The people precious to them—and beyond that, even world peace.

A satisfied smile tugged at my mouth.

“That’s more like it. If you’d accepted right away, I’d have been disappointed.”

“But still…….”

Hong Yeonhwa glanced at me and continued,

“After it’s all over…… then what?”

“Then let’s go have all the fun we want. We could even travel around the whole world. How about that?”

“I’d like that……!”

We smiled at each other.

Holding that small promise quietly in our hearts.

*****

The next day.

As we left the Ruby Mage Tower, Hong Yeonhwa’s family came out to see us off.

Hong Yeombaek shouted in his booming voice,

“Daughter—! Come give me one hug before you go!”

“Ah, lower your voice! And a hug? What am I, a kid?”

“You’re a kid in front of your father! We won’t see each other until summer break, will we? I’ve got to hug you now—!”

“I said no!”

Hong Yeonhwa ran around in disgust, but in the end, as if they couldn’t really help it, they let Hong Yeombaek hug them.

Hong Yeonhwa’s mother watched the sight with a pleased look, then turned her head toward me.

“There’s no need to say much. If it’s you, you’ll keep doing well from here on, just as you have until now.”

“Thank you for trusting me.”

“I’ll be expecting good news.”

After that came the usual stock phrases.

I’ll visit often from now on. I’ll call through the crystal orb, too. That sort of thing.

In the meantime, Hong Yeonhwa had escaped from their father’s embrace.

Then, finally, they stood facing their sister.

“……”

“……”

For a while, no words passed between the two sisters.

They fought every chance they got, but now that the moment of parting had come, it seemed they were feeling that mixed sort of relief and regret, tangled up into something complicated.

Soon Hong Yehwa opened her mouth out of habit, probably about to nag again, but then seemed to change her mind and closed it.

Then, after letting out a small sigh, she said,

“Take care once you get there.”

“Yeah. You too, Sis.”

“Call once in a while.”

“I will.”

Hong Yehwa slowly waved her hand.

That meant there was nothing more to say, so we should get going.

I gave Hong Yeonhwa’s family one last respectful bow, then started walking, and Hong Yeonhwa followed beside me, repeatedly waving back over their shoulder.

Once we left the Ruby Mage Tower and traveled a while, we arrived at the platform.

I boarded the train and walked down the corridor, soon spotting an empty compartment and stepping inside.

“……”

Hong Yeonhwa waited, watching my mood.

When I took one of the seats, they ignored the seat across from me and deliberately sat right beside me.

‘That damned Kim Ho pillow.’

Even at the very end, they were planning to make the most of lying on it and sleeping.

And back on the train at the end of summer break, ★Blink★ Dang Gyu-young had stolen that spot first, so there was probably a bit of compensation psychology at work too.

I understood that perfectly well, but I still felt an urge to mess with them for no reason.

So I stiffened my face completely and stared at Hong Yeonhwa.

“……”

“……?”

“……”

“……???”

Hong Yeonhwa rolled their eyes around.

Then, shrinking up, they pointed at the seat across from me.

“Um……. Should I sit there?”

“No, I was kidding.”

“Stop teasing me…….”

“I keep doing it because your reactions are fun.”

Hong Yeonhwa looked just slightly sulky, but still leaned their body toward me and rested their head on my shoulder.

And in that state, we looked out the train window together.

Before we knew it, winter was coming to an end.

*****

Even after throwing his fist strike, Kim Gapdu held the same posture for quite a while.

Then he pulled back his fist and looked around the area.

It was a place like a martial arts training hall.

Everywhere, the place was littered with rock fragments and rubble.

Among some of it, you could glimpse the faces of Buddhas, because they had originally been stone statues.

The moment Kim Gapdu had stepped inside, they’d moved as though alive and launched a joint attack on him.

Not only did they use martial arts at a fairly high level, but for stone Buddhas, they even knew how to use internal energy.

Because of that, a brutal struggle had broken out, but in the end, he’d succeeded in smashing every last one of them.

Soon a mechanism activated, and a staircase appeared.

If he followed it, he should be able to enter the floor above.

But Kim Gapdu did not step forward right away. Instead, he stood still for a moment, sunk in thought.

How had he ended up here?

Right before graduation, Kim Ho had handed him a single note.

The locations of hidden pieces for fighters only, and how to obtain them.

Kim Gapdu followed the directions and claimed them one by one.

Elixirs, martial arts manuals, trait scrolls, equipment materials……

And the final place he reached like that was a cave deep in an isolated wilderness.

It was hidden so well that even while looking at the walkthrough, he’d wandered around for quite a while.

Finding it wasn’t even the real beginning.

The cave went endlessly deep, and inside it was packed with strange formations and mechanical devices.

But Kim Gapdu had steadily dealt with everything and kept moving forward, and the moment he activated the final mechanism—

The entire area shook as if an earthquake had hit, and then a massive tower rose up.

Who on earth had built something like this in the middle of a cave, by what means, and for what purpose—and then hidden it there?

And how had Kim Ho known this and guided him here?

There were more questions than answers, but right now, only one thing mattered.

‘I have to climb the tower.’

Because this had to be the final hidden piece left for him.

And so Kim Gapdu’s ascent had begun,

‘What I just cleared was the second floor.’

In practice, that meant it was still basically the very beginning.

From what he had judged before entering, it seemed the tower had well over ten floors with ease.

‘Considering that, the difficulty is pretty serious.’

Even breaking through the first and second floors had not been easy.

‘And it seems a fair amount of time has passed too.’

When he lifted a hand and touched his face, his hair and beard had already grown wild and shaggy.

If his classmates had seen him now, they’d probably have mocked him by saying, “The toad evolved into a bearded toad!”

‘Even so, it’s more than worth the investment.’

His skill had surely risen just as steeply as the hardship he’d gone through.

Kim Gapdu could feel it.

By the time he broke through the third and fourth floors, he would probably be able to stand shoulder to shoulder even with strong fighters like Oh Sehun and Song Cheongi.

‘And if I go further and reach the top.’

He couldn’t even begin to guess how much stronger he might become.

Of course, that would not be an easy thing to do.

Judging by how sharply the difficulty was ramping up, it was obvious he would suffer over and over again on each floor.

There wasn’t even any guarantee the difficulty would increase at a steady rate.

In other words, it was impossible to know whether conquering it would take months or years.

When his thoughts reached that point, Kim Gapdu’s gaze turned elsewhere.

What was there was—

‘The stairs going down.’

It wasn’t the kind of structure where the lower floor closed once the upper floor opened.

Even when he’d entered the first floor, the exit had remained wide open.

‘Which means I can come and go as I please.’

If it got too hard, he could always step outside for a while, take a break, get himself back in order, and then return.

He had graduated from Dragonslayer Academy with a respectable academic record and as the head of a club, so plenty of groups had already been sending him offers.

It might not be a bad idea to join one of them and take on various requests.

But Kim Gapdu shook his head.

‘That’s weak thinking.’

Once you chose the easy road once, doing it a second or third time would become effortless.

There was no telling when he would come back here, and even if he did return, once he climbed a few floors and suffered through them again, he’d probably want to leave all over again.

If he kept hesitating like that, how ★ 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ many years would it take him to reach the top?

‘If I’m going to do this, it has to be now.’

He steeled his resolve once more.

He would not leave the tower until after he had conquered every floor.

Then Kim Gapdu clenched both fists.

And with strong, forceful steps, he began climbing the stairs.