The Academy’s Deceased Ate It All

"What in the world…."

Han Su-yeong couldn't believe the words coming out of her own mouth.

Who would?

That this massive dragon in front of her was, in fact, the Yu Ji-hyeok she knew.

"How is this even possible."

Magic and techniques that turned a body into a completely different being already existed, and Han Su-yeong knew that well.

But there were strict, undeniable limits to that kind of thing.

Changing only your outward shape was easy enough; changing your very essence was on an entirely different level.

To put it simply: Han Su-yeong herself could shift her appearance into a dragon's with just a bit of practice.

That was the difference between imitating something and actually being it.

It wasn't only her — no mage alive could do it.

A spell that turned someone perfectly into another kind of being was beyond what even she could touch, and beyond what her master Nam Hyun-hwa could touch either.

Even Evangelline Loengreen, called the Great Witch, would probably find it impossible.

Pulling it off required talent that you were literally born with.

And even then — the mage history considered the most gifted of all had only ever managed to turn into a troll.

But the dragon in front of her was Yu Ji-hyeok, transformed.

And not just any dragon — a real one, that breathed fire and roared like a dragon.

The Yu Ji-hyeok she knew didn't have a speck of talent for magic.

So how on earth had he ended up a dragon?

Question after question kept surfacing, one chasing the tail of the next, but none of that mattered right now.

Han Su-yeong carefully ran her hand along his scales.

Then she reached up and patted the bridge of his nose where his head was lowered.

"Oh, sweetheart…."

She murmured the words.

She didn't need the necklace to feel it.

She looked into his eyes and let out a small, pained sigh.

"Does it hurt a lot?"

[…….]

The dragon — Yu Ji-hyeok — blinked silently.

The eyes weren't the ones she knew. They were so huge she could see her whole self reflected in them, like an enormous full-length mirror.

Slit pupils running vertical, like a reptile's.

…And they were Yu Ji-hyeok's eyes.

She of all people wasn't going to be wrong about that.

"Where does it hurt? Hm? What do I do…."

Han Su-yeong whispered softly and tapped his head a couple of times.

It was the kind of motion you'd use to soothe a small child.

She didn't know what was causing it, but she could tell he was in real pain, and the gesture had come out of her on reflex.

[Krr… ngh….]

A low sound came from the dragon's throat.

Then he shifted his body as if uncomfortable, and in the middle of it, carefully unfurled a wing over Han Su-yeong's head like a canopy.

A soft huff came from his nostrils and slightly parted mouth.

Nothing like the breath he'd unleashed earlier — just enough wind to stir Han Su-yeong's hair.

And whether she'd caught a hint of a pained groan inside that breath or not, her expression hardened further.

"Ji-hyeok, open your eyes properly for me. Hm? Here — look at my face… that's it. Where does it hurt? Can you tell me? Even if it's just with your eyes, give me something. Hm?"

A human turning into a dragon was a first for her, so she couldn't afford to act rashly.

She didn't know the details, but turning into a dragon had to be delicate, complicated magic on a scale she couldn't even picture.

In a situation like that, she couldn't risk introducing some careless variable through her own actions.

She was just watching the dragon blink limply at her, eyes drooping like he was about to fall asleep, when a sigh of helpless concern slipped out of her —

"…You wish to aid him, do you not?"

"Ngh — who's there?!"

The sudden voice made Han Su-yeong jump and whip around.

She pulled her mana up in a rush and scanned the area, and for a moment she looked for all the world like she was standing guard over the dragon.

"In that case, I too shall lend my hand."

With those words, a woman rose up from the ground.

The first feeling that hit Han Su-yeong at the sight of her was — laughably — that she was beautiful.

Hair like black silk you'd only see in a painting; a pair of horns telling you, without ambiguity, that she wasn't human.

A beauty striking enough that Han Su-yeong, of all people, felt herself shrink back for an instant… and that mature, grown-woman air she herself didn't have.

It was only after she'd taken in the woman's all-black, unusual outfit and her bare feet against the dirt that Han Su-yeong realized who she was looking at.

"S-Seven Calamity…!"

"My, my — so amidst all that turmoil, you yet contrived to carve my face into your memory."

In stark contrast to Han Su-yeong's panicked mumble, Minerva couldn't have been calmer.

Han Su-yeong stepped in front of Yu Ji-hyeok as if to shield him from sight — never mind that there was no hiding him at all — and glared at Minerva.

"Hmm…."

Minerva looked at the openly hostile Han Su-yeong, evidently misreading something.

Well, fair enough.

Brushing it off, Minerva nodded and spoke to Han Su-yeong.

"Naught of what you fear shall come to pass — put away that hostility. Few things are so wearisome as another's keen-edged enmity drawn upon oneself."

"And how am I supposed—"

Han Su-yeong steadied her breath, then whispered:

"How am I supposed to know what you're going to do?"

"You wish to aid him¹, do you not? As do I, red-haired girl."

Han Su-yeong flinched at that.

It was partly the word "aid," and partly the name Minerva had used for Yu Ji-hyeok.

What she said...

The way a lover would….

Han Su-yeong shook the thought out of her head and shot back:

"And? How do I trust that? How am I supposed to know you really won't take revenge on him — on Ji-hyeok?"

At her wary tone, Minerva let out a small, mocking laugh.

"Oh? Even were I to harbor such an intent, could the likes of you dare stand in my way?"

"……"

Han Su-yeong clenched her teeth.

Her body shook, but she didn't step aside.

Minerva watched her for a long beat, then suddenly chuckled.

"That audacity, that spirit of yours — I shall hold them in high regard."

She gave a slight shake of her head as she said it.

"Henceforth, call me Minerva. Gladly do I grant my name unto you. Even should you speak it without ceremony, I shall receive it with pleasure."

"What…?"

"And I offer apology for mocking you — but pray, believe me. I, too, sought to restore him to his proper self, and had been at a loss for the means."

She bent one knee and drew herself back, dipping her head in something close to a bow.

Probably not expecting to get an apology of all things from her, Han Su-yeong stood there a little dumbstruck.

"Pray, tell me your name."

"H-huh? It's… Han Su-yeong."

The instant she registered what giving her name actually meant in this context, Han Su-yeong's face darkened — but what she was worried about didn't happen.

"So be it, Su-yeong. You and I have exchanged names and become friends. Thus shall the grudges each of us bore be cast far away, and what was high and low set rightly in its place."

Han Su-yeong didn't follow half of what Minerva was saying, but she could at least tell that the woman was extending her goodwill.

"Su-yeong — this Minerva, now your friend, makes her first request of you."

Minerva carefully reached out a hand toward Han Su-yeong.

"Pray, trust in me — and lend me your aid."

It is for his sake.

At her whisper, Han Su-yeong's eyes narrowed.

Unlike Han Su-yeong, who'd ended up on her own, Lee Ye-eun and Lee Yu-na, along with Choi Hyun-woo and Jin Ye-seul, were lucky enough to regroup quickly.

Along the way, Lee Ye-eun and Lee Yu-na had cleared up some misunderstandings between them and talked things through, and Choi Hyun-woo and Jin Ye-seul had taken some shots at each other and bickered — but right now, none of that mattered.

What mattered now was Han Su-yeong and Yu Ji-hyeok.

Find the two of them, who'd gotten separated from the group. Beyond that, locate 'Han Su-yeong's mana,' which had been their objective from the start, and if possible, take out Gracius.

That was, in essence, why they were here.

But none of that was going to happen.

Because Gracius — who'd found 'Han Su-yeong's mana' before they could — had walked right up to them on his own two feet.

With an overwhelming horde of undead at his back.

"Hahahahahaha!"

Holding a staff made of human bone in one hand, and a chain of mana that crudely bound the crystal in the other, Gracius let out a roar of laughter loud enough to tear his throat.

"Sweep them away, every last one! Sweep them all clean!"

Every time he gestured and gave a command, more undead crawled out without end.

It wasn't a question of strong or weak anymore.

They simply had no end.

That alone was enough.

"Ngh…!"

"Ye-seul!"

"Get back — I've got this one!"

"Don't need it…!"

"Yu-na, head down!"

Choi Hyun-woo and Jin Ye-seul, Lee Ye-eun and Lee Yu-na.

The four of them held a tight formation and stood against the endless tide of undead.

But against undead pressing in like seawater that never ran out, their stamina had limits, and as their bodies slowly wore down, scrapes and cuts started piling up on them one after another.

The golem Yu Ji-hyeok had summoned had reached the end of its life and crumbled away long ago, and the spirits Lee Ye-eun had called had burned through their strength and been sent back to their own realm.

"March on, press forward… we've no more need of their corpses. Just keep advancing! My host, my legion — drive them so hard, the mere sight of you breaks them into despair, into ending themselves!"

Apparently drunk on his own power, Gracius gazed at the crystal floating beside him with rapture.

He hadn't managed to claim it perfectly.

He'd only taken in the tiniest sliver of the power overflowing from it.

And yet even that sliver had been enough to turn him into a single death — a legion in himself.

"This is it…."

If he could fully claim this, there was nothing he couldn't do.

Confidence flooded him — that he could do anything — and gripped by the urge to compete, he swept his hand through the air once more.

"I don't want to see them anymore. Go, fast, and bring me their heads!"

At his gesture, dozens of Death Knights manifested and dropped to their knees, ready to obey.

In the past — no, even a few minutes ago — this would have been unthinkable.

"Aahh…!"

If he had this, he was certain to be summoned by his master at last.

And that meant the highest glory, the greatest honor for him; the thought that only he would have it all to himself made the light in his eyes burn redder still.

"Loath as I am to admit it…."

It was only after absorbing the crystal's power that he realized its original owner had been human.

And — much as it pained him to admit it — he could tell that this woman was a necromancer so far beyond him that he wasn't even close to her heel… no, "beyond him" didn't even cover it.

A trace left by someone in a class of her own, leagues apart from him.

And learning she'd been human, with maybe a handful of years of life to her name, did frankly bruise Gracius's pride — but a moment later, he gave a light nod, oddly at peace with it.

After all, the owner of this power was already dead, and now he was claiming it.

If she'd done this much for him, even being human earned her a measure of his recognition, and that wasn't hard to grant.

'If possible, I need to absorb more of this power.'

Thinking that, Gracius stroked the crystal with his skeletal fingers as if it were something he loved.

In any case, the humans in front of him would be swept under by the tide of undead and erased without a trace soon enough.

What he had to worry about now were the few strong-aura humans waiting on the surface.

And above all, Yu Ji-hyeok, who'd dropped down ahead of them.

"…So it really was true. He's carrying Minerva's power inside him."

He'd gone to the trouble of building that giant just to spit out Surtr's flames and take Yu Ji-hyeok down, and the thing had been vaporized without a trace in a blink.

It had probably taken a clean hit from that breath — the one that had punched through the shopping district and gone flying off.

And on top of that, Minerva's signature roar had scrambled his mana, and he'd ended up making a fool of himself in a way he never normally would.

But what did any of that matter now?

He had the best weapon in his hands, and with this, he was confident he could hunt Yu Ji-hyeok down.

"Hmm… Master wouldd probably prefer him taken alive."

Pulling out a dragon's heart — pure mana, undiluted — without a second thought wasn't something even he could predict the fallout of.

More than that, the boy was the owner of the pendant his master Milited had been searching for, and was tangled up with the Seven Calamities in any number of ways.

If he brought the boy in alive, they'd find some use for him.

No one could so much as graze the surface of his Master's deeper designs.

Having reached that loose conclusion, Gracius smacked his teeth together in satisfaction.

"Hm?"

But the fact that four humans were still alive — and that every single Death Knight he'd sent out had fallen — was getting under his skin in a way he couldn't ignore.

"Tch, these mortals are turning into a nuisance."

Gracius muttered the words with as much arrogance as he could muster.

"What shall I call up this time, hmm? Just summoning a banshee and killing them off in an instant won't satisfy me anymore. Yes — how about rotted leeches put inside their bodies, so they get to feel the agony of being eaten alive from the inside until they die? Before that, though, first—"

With the crystal in his grasp, there was nothing left to fear.

Who would dare stand against him now?

He was, quite literally, a legion in himself — death made manifest.

That was exactly it.

That was precisely why he failed to notice Nam Hyun-hwa dropping straight down on him from directly overhead….

"First — me."

And only realized it when her sword had driven cleanly through the center of his skull and out the other side.

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