Chapter 763: ★Blink★ Launcher

If it was the principal, then it made sense for him to contact us this late at night.

Because we cleared a dungeon this late at night.

By now, <Demon God Liberation> should have completely collapsed, and the faculty stationed in the dungeon wing would have realized it too.

Since it had been in the deep layers, a report must have gone up to the principal as well.

And we’re basically the only suspects.

Students almost never run A- or B-rank dungeons without authorization.

Even when a whole group went in fully prepared, success was never guaranteed, so how high would the success rate be if only a few people snuck in?

On the other hand, I had every dungeon’s clear route and hidden pieces lined up in my head.

My companions were also outstandingly skilled, so as long as the numbers looked possible, we challenged anything without hesitation.

This year, we had been going in and out of the deep layers almost every raid week.

The principal knew all of that and had been looking the other way, but—

Looks like he’s going to say something today.

So Dang Gyu-ri and I headed to the principal’s office.

The moment we arrived and stepped inside, a sigh-laced complaint flew at us.

“You brats. Are the deep layers your living room? Why do you go there so often?”

First, we bowed politely to the principal and vice principal.

Then I answered with a fresh smile on my lips.

“How could a sparrow simply pass by a mill?”

“That means you’re going to keep going, doesn’t it?”

“If our skill is enough and the opportunity is right in front of us, of course we have to go.”

At that, the principal made a face like he was dead tired.

“Think about my position a little. It keeps coming up in faculty meetings these days. They’re asking why the deep layers /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ keep getting breached.”

Since they had not even caught the culprit, it was only natural that the faculty stationed there might be held responsible.

But they had their own defense.

Compared to how vast the underground floors were, both the staff on duty and the security were hopelessly inadequate.

So every time the arrows pointed at them, they were apparently pleading for more budget allocation.

And since the principal knew all of that, he had to be in an extremely awkward position.

Even so, I spoke shamelessly.

“It’s not as if we’re going there to satisfy selfish desires. We’re going there to get stronger.”

“Hey, even so, don’t you think this is going too far?”

“And we got results after getting that strong, didn’t we? In Hyeseong.”

“Grrr……”

By this point, the principal seemed to have run out of things to say.

He maintained a fairly good relationship with the Seo family’s Chairman, so he must have heard about what happened in Hyeseong this time.

If the Meteor Dragon and the dragons had fought a battle against the Blood Cult elites and entered their sleep phase, Hyeseong would have suffered an enormous power vacuum and chaos.

The only reason that disaster did not happen was because I got rid of the Cult Leader with back-to-back uses of [Invitation].

When I was contributing to world peace so steadily, he could not simply block me by saying I had violated school rules or that it had come up in faculty meetings.

I smiled brightly and said,

“As I keep saying, I’ll be in your care.”

“……Ugh, why am I suffering like this? Of all times, why did I have to become principal now?”

The principal regretted that he had not run off somewhere or gone into hiding the moment he retired.

But regret was always too late, no matter how early it came.

After letting out several deep sighs, he continued in a resigned tone.

“Anyway, fine. Actually, I called you here for something else.”

“Please go ahead.”

The principal’s expression soon turned quite serious.

“You know. We’ve mentioned it a few times, haven’t we? That something strange happened.”

“We did.”

During the entrance ceremony, something strange had flashed through Seo Ye-in’s vision while she was looking around.

When she tried to check again, it did not work as well as she had expected.

If she had not seen things, that meant the other party’s camouflage skill was exceptional enough to fool [Dragon Eye].

Another time, on the underground floors, Song Cheonhye and Shin Byeongcheol heard a splash while they were bickering.

If that had not been an auditory hallucination, that meant someone other than us was also running unauthorized clears.

It also meant their stealth ability was good enough to deceive those two’s senses.

Since it might be something serious, we had tipped off the academy.

“We looked into it in our own way…… and it seems there really is something.”

As he said that, the principal handed me a note.

Three words were written on it.

[Flower Garden]

[Rabbit]

[Exile]

“That’s vague. Did you ask the Wall of Wisdom?”

“No, how did you know about that!?”

The principal jumped in surprise.

Even the vice principal, who had been watching silently, flinched.

That was because it was confidential information known by only a tiny number of people in all of Dragonslayer Academy.

But I spoke as if it were nothing.

“I have entire walkthroughs memorized. There’s no way I wouldn’t know about that.”

“……That oddly makes sense.”

“I just haven’t bothered to show that I knew until now, but I figured the conversation would be faster if I said I did.”

At this point, we were basically in the same boat anyway.

The principal looked as if he had raised both hands and feet in surrender.

Still, perhaps just in case, he added,

“You must not talk about that anywhere else. It would cause a real disaster.”

“You don’t have to worry. I’m tight-lipped.”

“Fine. Back to the original topic. Yes, I asked the Wall of Wisdom.”

“Did it say something was there?”

“It said [Positive] and [Crisis].”

Seo Ye-in and Shin Byeongcheol’s “suspicious signs” had turned out to be real.

If the word [Crisis] was attached to it, then as expected, it seemed a fairly skilled individual had infiltrated Dragonslayer Academy.

The principal added with a groan.

“I tried to ask what their identity was and how we could stop them too. But this thing…”

“You were short on items.”

The information provided by the Wall of Wisdom was truly transcendent, almost omniscient in scale.

However, to hear it, one had to pay a corresponding price.

Most of the time, that meant high-rank items.

And the more important or specific the information was, the better the items it demanded.

The principal complained with an expression of disbelief.

“No, why is it asking for two S-ranks? I don’t even have enough to feed myself.”

“So you settled for hints?”

“Yeah. For reference, even this cost two A-ranks.”

I looked at the note with fresh eyes.

So this was that expensive.

[Flower Garden] [Rabbit] [Exile]

I did not know whether the three words were connected, but there was one more hint.

Namely, that Shin Byeongcheol had heard a “splash” in the dungeon wing.

“All three are dungeons.”

“We think that’s highly likely too.”

The principal readily nodded.

“Flower Garden” was Dungeon No.31, <Sky Garden>.

“Rabbit” was Dungeon No.68, <Rabbit War>.

“Exile” was Dungeon No.70, <Exiles’ Fortress>.

The first two were A-rank, and the third was B+-rank. All of them were quite difficult to clear.

By this point, I could also tell why he had called us—more precisely, me.

“You need walkthroughs?”

“You said you know everything except what you don’t know. I had to at least ask.”

The academy side also had data accumulated over many long years, but compared to my walkthroughs, there were many lacking parts.

I nodded as if it were no big deal.

“Of course I have all three. I can write them for you too.”

“……And of course it won’t be free.”

“As expected of the principal and a former Hero. Investing generously for Dragonslayer Academy’s safety.”

“When did I say I would invest generously?”

“You already invested heavily in the Wall of Wisdom, didn’t you?”

Wouldn’t the sunk cost make it a waste to close his wallet now……?

At that, the principal rubbed the back of his neck as if he had a headache.

“Ugh, damn it. Let’s hear it first. What do I need to do for you?”

“I’m not that shameless. You’ve already taken a lot of damage.”

“It’s not coming out of my pocket, you know?”

“Yes. Instead……”

I held up the note and pointed at one word among them.

[Rabbit]

“Please let us go in too. It would be even better if you shared the rewards with us.”

“You brats, this isn’t a normal clear. We don’t know what might be inside.”

The fact that the Wall of Wisdom had pointed to those dungeons meant some kind of anomaly would occur in them.

There was a very high possibility that variables would interfere during the clear.

Accordingly, it was only right to adjust the difficulty upward.

Of course, I did not even blink.

“I’m asking with that point included. It’s not as if we’ll be the only ones going in anyway.”

“……I’ll probably ask Instructor Lee and Instructor Seo too.”

As expected, it seemed Lee Sudok and Seo Cheongyong would step forward.

I continued persuading him.

“We came out alive from a similar place too. <Transference Labyrinth>.”

It had not only been an A-rank dungeon, but because the Witch of Decay had occupied it, it was crawling with dark ubleks.

Yet not only had I come out without a single hair harmed, I had even contributed greatly to the expedition group’s victory with [Crow Branch].

The principal looked sour.

“I can’t stop you, can I? What’s in there?”

“When I hear that a crisis is coming to Dragonslayer Academy, my sense of justice burns so fiercely that I can’t control myself.”

“There’s a hidden piece, isn’t there?”

“I plan to pick it up while I’m at it.”

Just as the final dungeon of the Feathered Serpent series had been <Descent of the Feathered Serpent>.

<Rabbit War> was the final dungeon in the Rabbit series, connected to places like <Rabbit Room>, <Rabbit Tower>, and <Rabbit Center>.

It means I’ll be seeing Earth Eater for the last time.

Also, as befitting an A-rank dungeon, it had rewards that could not be obtained before.

Clock-related parts.

If I obtained them and brought them to the seamstress, I should be able to upgrade [Golden Pocket Watch] another step.

It was one of “Kim Ho’s Bucket List” items.

Until now, I had put it off because our forces were still insufficient to clear an A-rank dungeon by ourselves, but if Lee Sudok and Seo Cheongyong joined in, it was worth trying.

The principal seemed to see through all these dark intentions, but he also knew it was far too late to stop me.

“Who are you taking?”

“If it’s me and Senior Dang Gyu-young, we’ll do our part.”

“That’s true. Anyone else?”

“Yes. Maybe they’ll even be the key to this incident.”

“Who?”

I paused for a moment, then answered.

“Seo Ye-in.”

*****

The start of all this had been Seo Ye-in’s eyes in the first place.

She had spotted something suspicious at the entrance ceremony, and that was how things had flowed this far.

If I brought her along again, she might be able to properly identify whatever that suspicious thing was.

So I headed to the training center to recruit Seo Ye-in.

She’s probably asleep.

Since it was late at night, there was a high chance she was sprawled out in the special cultivation room.

But around the time I had almost reached the training center, I saw familiar gray silhouettes sitting there.

The sloth and Fast-Luckless.

“……”

They seemed to have spotted me as well and stared this way, so I approached while waving a hand.

“You weren’t sleeping?”

“I woke up.”

“How come?”

“Felt like you’d come.”

In other words, she had come out to meet me based on a feeling.

Then Seo Ye-in patted the seat beside her.

When I obediently sat there, she climbed onto my lap.

The mirror-image Fast-Luckless watching from beside us seemed to find it fun too, so she climbed on top of that.

The so-called Kim Ho-sloth double-decker rice bowl.

In that state, Seo Ye-in asked,

“Where did you go.”

“Didn’t I tell you? I went to a dungeon.”

“Why didn’t you bring me.”

“Because two people were enough.”

If our numbers increased, the risk of going in and out of the deep layers would have gone up instead, and riding the Feathered Serpent to move around would have become troublesome too.

Even so, the sloth and Fast-Luckless spoke in turns.

“Disappointed.”

“We went around together all the way until midterms. There has to be Gyu-Gyu time too.”

“……Acceptable.”

I continued with a fresh smile.

“And I brought good news too.”

“What.”

“I learned a skill from the crow.”

“Skill?”

“It’ll be faster to show you. Stand over there.”

“……?”

Seo Ye-in tilted her head, but still went and stood off to one side.

When I focused my mind on her, mana surged and gathered.

Then, with a whoosh, it moved her a short distance away.

“……?”

Seo Ye-in looked around.

Soon, as if she realized what had happened, her gray pupils widened.

“……★Blink★.”