Chapter 104: Exploring Original Magic

[Translator – Aren]

After the briefing in the conference room ended, we were given some free time.

Of course, there were objections to having free time when the Seongnam blockade line was on the verge of being breached, with some arguing that maybe we should be a little more anxious about it. Among the Supreme Archmages, the one saying that was our turban-wearing canary for measuring danger, the coward Hamza.

He came over to me while I was leaning against the stairway railing in Suwon City Hall, staring mindlessly down at the floor below, and started pestering me with questions.

"Jemin-ssi. Is it really okay to let everyone scatter like this?”

"Why wouldn’t it be?”

"I mean…people are dying.”

Apparently Hamza was the type who, despite being a coward, still felt a sense of responsibility when people were dying around him.

Our Pakistani former medical student and migrant worker wasn’t the sort of person who would throw his own life away like a blade of grass to rescue someone, but I was reminded that he was still an ordinary, decent person who cared about human lives.

I tapped the stair railing with my index finger and let out a hollow laugh.

"What do you think soldiers are for? They drag them here to be bullet sponges. That’s why they scrape together kids in the prime of their youth and tell them to pick up a gun first, whether it ruins their lives or not.”

"That is an absolutely horrible thing to say.”

"We’re civilians, Hamza. We’ve got no reason to worry about soldiers.”

Heroism was admirable, but I had no desire to possess it myself.

Sure, I felt bad that the lives of the soldiers dragged onto the blockade line had been completely derailed, but there was no reason for me to shoulder additional unnecessary danger just to save even one of them.

If feeling sorry for people who were dying were enough to make me go save them, I would’ve opened a UNICEF donation account for starving children in Africa long ago.

I didn’t even have the cowardly excuse of saying the money would never properly reach the children anyway, or that it was all just a business, while never actually taking a single bill out of my wallet.

I was a selfish and petty human being.

I might pity others, but I would never act solely for their sake. I would only extend a helping hand when doing so aligned with my own interests and goals.

The only reason I had accepted fighting monsters and conducting reconnaissance inside Seoul was because it made acquiring magic easier. Rescuing people was merely a secondary objective shoved all the way down into third place.

While I was reassuring Hamza like that, Pastor Park Yohan came striding over.

"Jemin, what kind of bullshit are you spouting now?”

"I was explaining to Hamza that we’re civilians, so we don’t need to worry about the military.”

"If you’ve got time to spout nonsense, you remember the place we used to gather back when we were in Suwon, right? The place we used as a makeshift chapel. Come there. Islam can come too if he’s interested.”

I threw out the one question you absolutely have to ask someone higher than you in the pecking order.

"Why?”

"Why? What on earth do you mean, why?”

"Jemin-ssi…”

Hamza clicked his tongue in disbelief, while the pastor’s face immediately twisted into a frown.

Then, as though Pastor Park Yohan had surrendered first, he shook his head and kindly explained why he wanted me to come.

"Mister Anderson wanted to see our faces."

"They’re letting him into the country? With all this going on?”

Seongnam was on the verge of being breached. No matter how rich someone was, there had to be limits.

If something went wrong and Anderson ended up marked as a target by Gangnam Thousand-Miles Eyes and cursed to death, it would be a catastrophe.

If the Korean-US Combined Command had any sense at all, they wouldn’t allow Anderson-ssi into the country in the middle of this mess.

The pastor immediately understood what I was implying and shrugged.

"Baek Jemin. What era do you think we’re living in? Why would we have to meet face-to-face?”

"If it’s nothing major, I’m not going.”

"It’s about magic, you idiot.”

The soundproof room that Pastor Park Yohan and Shin Nain had once used as a makeshift chapel.

It was where the Supreme Archmages, having finished the briefing and relieved their stress in their own ways, had gathered together again. Of course, the Supreme Archmages weren’t the only ones there. After several American soldiers in uniform and a few civilian technicians carried various things in and out, they placed a thick, expensive-looking laptop down on the table.

The moment we saw the person displayed on the monitor, the Supreme Archmages’ reactions split sharply between delight and dismay.

[Good to see you, Best of the Best. Word of your exploits has been making quite a stir all the way across the ocean in the mainland of the US.]

Anderson Makenford.

The courteous American tycoon with an enormous interest in mysticism and real magic—the Alteration-type magic system—greeted us in fluent Korean, speaking through a camera mounted atop the laptop monitor.

Every Supreme Archmage let out a sound of surprise at how much more fluent his Korean pronunciation had become since we first met him.

"Ah..."

"Tsk."

Shin Nain and Lee Sejun, who had absolutely zero interest in mysticism, were the first to turn their heads away.

Pastor Park Yohan immediately grew flustered, scolded Shin Nain and Lee Sejun, then turned toward the monitor with an affable smile.

"Now, now. Mister Anderston has taken precious time out of his busy schedule for us. Mister Anderson, forgive us. Our kids have been spending too much time in rough places, so they’re a little on edge.”

[If anything, I should be thanking you for making time for me. Has my sponsorship been proving useful?]

"Of course! Hahaha!”

Hamza merely blinked, clearly planning to keep his head down and quietly blend into the background, while I looked over at Go Ryeoha, who still had her face buried away.

Pastor Park Yohan had apparently managed to drag her here somehow, but she showed absolutely no sign that she intended to join the conversation. It was good that taking the red pill hadn’t made her explode, but she felt like she was giving off an ominous beep, beep, beep, beep warning signal, so I quietly looked away.

It wasn’t like I was the only emotional dumping ground around here, and it was time to focus on what mattered.

"Anderson-ssi. I heard you wanted to claim rights to the magic symbol from the Human-skin Tapeworm I hunted before.”

The corpse of the Human-skin Tapeworm that had been lying in the military hospital in Anyang had now been transferred to the Korean-US Combined Command in Pyeongtaek.

The detailed records had been destroyed long ago, but apparently the military had once attempted to separate people who had been fused into Amalgams, and the result had led to a biological catastrophe. Research experiments had been abandoned for quite some time because of that, but encountering the unprecedented monster known as the Human-skin Tapeworm had caused policy to shift once again.

This time, they intended to strictly control bodily infection while trying to learn even the slightest bit about the ecological origins and characteristics of these monsters.

Naturally, the biggest factor was that they had officially obtained a monster containing a magic symbol for the first time.

It was only a matter of time before wealthy people learned that magic could be acquired through the magic symbols left behind by slain monsters. Anderson Makenford-ssi alone already knew.

We could hardly blame our sponsor, Anderson-ssi, if he wanted a share of the fruits. 

But he knew far more than we had expected, and at the same time, he showed a side of himself unlike an ordinary sponsor.

[Don’t worry, Mister Baek. The reason I asserted rights over the monster’s corpse was to prevent others from carelessly leaking it.]

"Mister Anderson. Didn’t you want to learn magic yourself?”

The pastor sounded genuinely surprised as he asked.

At that, Anderson-ssi clasped his hands together, offered a short prayer, then spoke with a faint smile.

[I won’t deny that my personal interest lies with Heart-branch magic. Nor will I pretend that Eyes-branch magic isn’t tempting. But there is a maxime that every mystic, Eastern or Western, should engrave deeply into their heart. Never use power you cannot control.]

Anderson-ssi unclasped his hands and settled into a composed posture.

[Considering how much I already enjoy in life, why would I lose my composure before a mystery that has only just now revealed itself and risk losing everything? Besides, lately we’ve discovered that some of the knowledge held by our circle is actually valid, so I’ve been happily spending my time sorting out which parts are genuine. Spiritual protection using pentagrams has become especially popular recently. And now that word has gradually spread that it has something to do with all of you, everyone’s rather envious.]

"Then…for what reason…?"

The pastor asked in a dubious voice, but it was a question shared by all of us Supreme Archmages.

There was no way he had called us just for idle chit-chat.

Sure enough, that wasn’t it.

Only after Anderson Makenford spent a little while making trivial small talk with us in that roundabout way peculiar to the upper class did he finally get to the point.

[After obtaining the knowledge on magic that the Command has compiled, one particularly unique branch caught my attention. The Tongue. It focused on degrading the original form of magic into a level humans can actually use. It’s also believed to be connected to Qliphothic inversion. This strongly suggests some kind of relationship with Kabbalah, although there are certain aspects that don’t fit neatly within conventional mysticism.]

I could see Lee Sejun and Shin Nain dying of boredom, but Pastor Park Yohan and I, being relatively interested in mysticism, decided to listen even more closely.

Because we already knew that although Anderson-ssi had plenty of intellectual vanity, he wasn’t the sort of person who talked out of his ass.

Of course, this was also evidence that information from the Command was leaking freely into the hands of the Western upper class, but if the beneficiary was our financial backer who made things convenient for us, I could afford to be generous. Corruption was heartwarming mutual assistance when it benefited our side.

Sure enough.

Anderson-ssi began pointing out things that we Supreme Archmages, busy actually using magic, hadn’t known the slightest about.

[There’s something that becomes apparent when you compare how Tongue-branch magic manifests through the Sephiroth and the Qliphoth. The act of eating. The fact that this branch directly deals with human emotions and desires. And, when you testified to Command, you described Tongue-branch magic as the signature manifestation of the Qliphoth.]

"Erm, Anderson-ssi. We don’t call them Sephiroth and Qliphoth. We call them Upright and Inverted.”

[Aah! Hmm. My mistake. I’ll stick to the field terminology then. Yes, so…according to the records, you testified that Inverted Tongue-branch magic could be considered the signature, or symbolic, expression of the Inverted form.]

Apparently, the records of the conversations we had held with the American generals had been delivered to Anderson-ssi word for word.

If I were some righteous and fair-minded person, I might have gotten angry, but as a beneficiary of corruption myself, I could hardly complain about the privileges granted to the elite.

After all, Anderson-ssi was taking information obtained through corruption, processing it properly, and spoon-feeding the useful parts back to us.

And this time, the information was definitely crucial.

[Although it’s a single branch of magic, it becomes the most alien when inverted. Given that pronounced duality, and the fact that it appears to serve as a signature dividing Upright from Inverted, Tongue-branch magic can be interpreted as embodying both one who brings enlightenment and spiritual wisdom, and one enslaved by material desire and sensual pleasure. And in mysticism, there’s one celestial body above all others that is considered especially important while possessing precisely this kind of striking duality.]

Anderson-ssi’s eyes gleamed as he launched into a passionate explanation.

[I suspect Tongue-branch magic corresponds to Venus. The pentagram itself was originally derived from the celestial path traced by Venus, and there were even goddesses who took Venus as their symbol, so it would make sense for magic corresponding to Venus to possess this degree of significance. That said, there are places where this magical system doesn’t align cleanly with traditional astrology, so the interpretation requires greater caution.]

"Venus..."

I couldn’t simply dismiss what he was saying.

I had already reached Hand-branch, Stage 2, by performing a ritual on the date Anderson-ssi predicted with Monk Cheonhwi’s help, so I had no choice but to acknowledge that the various branches of Alteration-type magic corresponded to celestial bodies.

But at the same time, I had my doubts.

The ritual had been far too accurate for him to have simply guessed it right. Was Anderson Mankenford somehow connected to the 66-Society, or had the circle he belonged to inherited knowledge that originated from the Society?

Naturally, I wasn’t stupid enough to openly reveal those suspicions.

No matter how much of a dumbass I was, if all I ever did was charge straight at things, I’d just be a damn animal.

As a human being, I asked about the part that actually mattered.

If the knowledge came from the Society, that basically meant it had an official seal of authenticity stamped all over it. If anything, it was a good thing.

"So can Tongue-branch magic also be advanced through a ritual?”

[It should be possible, but…the time of Venus has already passed. If our hypothesis is correct, it would have been April 21st, when Taurus returned.]

No.

There was no fucking way.

I missed it?

Just because I didn’t know, I missed my chance to reach Tongue-branch, Stage 3???

The instant I heard that, I felt every last bit of strength drain out of my body.

After that, the pastor was the only one carrying the conversation.

Lee Sejun, who had never bothered hiding how much of an idiot he was to begin with, folded his arms, lowered his head, and fell fast asleep. Shin Nain let everything go in one ear and out the other because it was heretical knowledge. Hamza was too busy glancing around and reading the room. Go Ryeoha had her face buried away and wanted nothing to do with anything. And then there was me, Baek Jemin, resenting the entire world because I had missed the date for the ritual.

With a lineup like that, even the pastor eventually reached the limits of what one man could accomplish.

In the end, the video conference between the Supreme Archmages and Anderson-ssi wrapped up in a thoroughly wrecked atmosphere.

By the time it was ending, even the pastor looked like death as he turned toward us.

"Kids. Even if you’re the MZ generation, aren’t you being way too rude? What kind of attitude is that toward someone who’s helping us?!”

[Not at all, Rev. Park. Those monsters are truly horrifying. Horrifying enough that I have no desire whatsoever to face them myself. It’s because people like you and Mister Baek are there, because all of you are there, that I’m able to remain somewhere safe. Best of the Best. Once again, I promise you my full support and assistance to all of you who continue to live up to that name. May our friendship endure.]

"Ugh…All I can do is thank you for your generosity, Mister Anderson. Loyalty! Goodbye!”

[Haha…Goodbye! Good luck.]

When the pastor even raised a hand in a spirited salute, Anderson-ssi mimed returning it before ending the call.

But my sense of loss wasn’t something I could recover from immediately.

Tongue-branch, Stage 3… April 21st…

Those words kept circling endlessly through my head until Pastor Park Yohan sighed, walked over through the ruined atmosphere, and patted me on the shoulder.

"Baek Jemin. It's not like that was your only chance. Magic stages or whatever are nothing, you know? They’re especially nothing compared to the Word of the Lord.”

"Shut up."

Pulling that fanatic move at a time like this?

If I were a complete son of a bitch, I would’ve already punched him right in the mouth.

That was when the last person I expected finally spoke up.

"Jemin-ssi. The problem is that trying to gain power by relying on such wicked, heretical knowledge is in itself wrong.”

Shin Nain.

The guy who had been doing nothing but humming along with the music coming out of his headset suddenly took it off and said something completely out of left field.

"Please~. Stop spewing bullshit at me from both sides. Just let me be sad by myself.”

"Baek Jemin, you brat. How are people who go to church supposed to just leave someone alone when they’re suffering?!”

"Amen."

I realized that being Satan or a devil must be an absolutely miserable profession.

If you had Shin Nain on one side and the pastor on the other, listening to the two of them happily spout nonsense in surround sound, even a demon would lose its mind.

If Shin Nain hadn’t added something else, the Superme Archmages might have disbanded that very day.

"Instead, I think it’s time we reviewed the Holy Alteration Battle Arts we already possess.”

"Hmm?"

"I heard that when you first obtained Tongue-branch Holy Alteration Battle Arts, you used it on Eyes-branch Holy Alteration Battle Arts. And in practice, as a practitioner of the Holy Alteration Battle Arts, Jemin-ssi, you’ve demonstrated far more varied applications than the rest of us by using the Tongue-branch!”

Little by little.

Little by little, my mind began to clear.

Shin Nain looked down at me and showed a smile mixed with pity, contempt, and acknowledgment.

"Wouldn’t exploring the power each branch of Holy Alteration Battle Arts originally possessed be something we can do without relying on outsiders?”

*t*t*

We Supreme Archmages immediately headed to a storage area that wasn’t currently in use.

The people gathered in the bleak, cramped lot where abandoned boxes had been neatly stacked were me, Shin Nain, Lee Sejun, and Hamza. The reason we had gathered there was extremely simple and straightforward.

To confirm magic at 100% of its performance.

"Do we not need Go Ryeoha-ssi? You usually keep dragging her around everywhere.”

"The pastor’s being her emotional trashcan right now. He’ll calm her down properly.”

"Facing one’s sins is a burden only the individual can bear.”

I felt sorry for what Go Ryeoha had gone through, but if it didn’t help my life, my attitude was basically that it wasn’t my problem. Shin Nain, on the other hand, seemed to be ignoring her with that uniquely condescending mindset of his. Deal with it yourself and overcome it.

In the face of the ironclad convictions of our Vaccine Duo, even Lee Sejun’s ugly inferiority complex finally lost some of its steam.

"Must be nice being so equally heartless.”

Hamza, who had taken charge of medical support, opened the first-aid kit he had already hauled over in a huge bundle and gave us a stern warning.

"Sejun-ssi should probably be fine since he’s a Heart-branch wizard, but Jemin-ssi, be careful. Don’t try to uncover absolutely everything the magic can do. Stop at a reasonable point.”

"I’m a Heart-branch wizard too, you know?”

"That’s exactly why I’m worried. You’ll get cocky about being a Heart-branch wizard, push yourself even farther, and end up wrecking yourself.”

As someone who had once dreamed of becoming a doctor, Hamza demonstrated remarkably clear insight.

And thus began the Supreme Archmages’ exploration of Original Magic.

No matter how thoroughly Anderson Makenford and the rich swept up information and artifacts with a rake, there was no way they could obtain every scrap of knowledge we had personally acquired in the field. In particular, figuring out what magic’s original performance actually was, and where its limits lay, wouldn’t be easy.

Because we were going to make a huge show of cooperating while barely cooperating at all!

"Medical supplies are ready.”

"Jemin-ssi, Sejun-ssi. I’ll listen, so there’s no need to force yourself to explain anything out loud. Focus on remembering the sensation. Let’s begin.”

With Hamza and Shin Nain observing, the experiment finally began.

Excluding Eyes-branch, Stage 1 [Cognitive Distortion], whose Original Magic performance we already knew.

This was where Tongue-branch wizards like me and Lee Sejun were finally going to shine.

Especially considering that I possessed multiple branches at multiple Stages, you could say my role here was particularly important.

Soldiers were dying in northern Seongnam, but to us, magic was more precious.

-Sssup, haaah...

First, I decided to test Tongue-branch, Stage 2, [Desire Amplification].

The target was Lee Sejun.

I spent a while wondering how I could use Tongue-branch, Stage 1, [Degradation] to strengthen Stage 2, [Desire Amplification], then decided to just try it first.

I stuck out my tongue.

Pure, 100% Original Tongue-branch, Stage 2, without even thinking about using the camera-aperture-like narrowing unique to Tongue-branch, Stage 1 to reduce the range.

The moment I imagined how terrifying its power might be, the pain came.

-Thump.

Without meaning to.

Without meaning to, the image of a factory surfaced in my mind.

Workers operating presses with dead expressions and objects riding along a conveyor belt, helpless to do anything. If I were one of the objects being carried along that belt, how would the press slamming down again and again look to me?

What if the object being carried toward that press was none other than my tongue?

-Thump. Thump. Thump.

A chill crawled up my spine.

And then…

A crushing pain incomparably worse than anything a meat tenderizer could inflict slammed down on my tongue.

An imaginary sound effect that no one else could hear thundered only inside my head.

-Craaaaaaash!!!!

.........

...min-ssi, Jemin-ssi!!

It sounded faint.

Was that just my imagination?

"Jemin-ssi!!!”

"Agh, aghrrrrrgh…”

I gasped for breath.

Dry foam coated my lips. The metallic stench of blood filled my nose as well.

As an aftereffect of using Tongue-branch, Stage 1, [Degradation], my tongue had split open and blood was pouring from it. The one fortunate thing was that my tongue hadn’t actually been severed or crushed flat. Apparently the crushing sensation had ended as phantom pain.

The problem was that phantom pain didn’t mean it hurt any less.

Apparently I was the kind of person whose mind became clearer the more pain I was in, but having a clear head didn’t mean my body was doing fine.

"Ahhhhgk... Ahhhhhgk..."

Baek Jemin, man among men.

I just fucking cried.

I didn’t even know who was calling my name in front of me. I flailed around and bawled my eyes out. It felt even more miserable than the time I pocketed 600 thousand won meant for cram school tuition, blew every bit of it at a PC room, and got beaten black and blue by Mom and Dad with a rice paddle and a switch. I just sobbed and sobbed like my heart was breaking.

It hurt so badly that I didn’t even notice until much later that I had pissed my pants.

Normally that would’ve been humiliating, but it hurt so damn much that I didn’t have enough room in my head left to feel embarrassed.

"Uwaaaah…waah….fugg…”

After bawling my heart out for a long while, my senses finally started coming back properly.

Only then did I notice the strange feeling like some of the bones around my chest had been broken. That was also when I realized the person who had been comforting me was Hamza.

"Jemin-ssi, I broke some of your bones while performing CPR.”

They really went and broke my bones.

But once the misery subsided, an important question occurred to me.

"Ee Sejuu…wha ha haen–?”

"Everyone’s horrified after personally experiencing the Original performance of Tongue-branch, Stage 2 [Desire Amplification]. He survived because he’s a Heart-branch wizard.”

If it weren’t for Shin Nain’s Ears-branch magic understanding me perfectly, I wouldn’t even have been able to communicate.

With my blood-drenched tongue hanging out and dripping steadily, I panted and sent him another question.

Shin Nain’s face held both horror and a depth of pity I had never once seen him show Lee Sejun before.

"Jemin-ssi."

"Uhhhh…”

"How do you think it would feel to be drooling from hunger, overwhelmed by sleepiness, and still have your dick standing at attention?”

"Dihh…”

"He managed to keep himself from pissing and shitting by replacing the urge to excrete.”

If Lee Sejun hadn’t quickly used Heart-branch, Stage 3, [Desire Replacement] to substitute away his urge to relieve himself, the sight confronting us would have been even more horrific.

I swore I would never use the Original performance of Tongue-branch, Stage 2, [Desire Amplification] again even if it killed me.

Then it was time to test something else.

"Ehh…”

"Jemin-ssi, you’re going to use magic? Again?”

Hamza looked appalled, but I merely raised my index finger and wagged it.

Wasn’t there exactly one spell perfect for a situation like this?

Eyes-branch, Stage 3, [Cognitive Dissonance].

I’d barely had any chance to use it because I rarely got injured, but now that my ribs happened to be smashed and I was about to get pumped full of drugs, this was the perfect opportunity to test the performance of [Cognitive Dissonance].

Fearing and anticipating the horrific pain that was about to strike my blood-drenched tongue, I used the magic.

Eyes-branch, Stage 3, [Cognitive Dissonance], 100%.

Alright, what had changed?

I looked around with my heart pounding in anticipation.

But everything was exactly the same.

People moving boxes in the distance, Shin Nain staring blankly at me, Hamza rummaging through the first-aid kit just in case, Lee Sejun nowhere to be seen after apparently being carried away on a stretcher, and the same barren little lot.

Nothing had changed from when I’d been standing there a moment ago with my tongue hanging out, bawling my eyes out.

More importantly, no pain came rushing into my tongue either.

What?

Could magic actually fail to activate?

"Hey, Hamza. Help me out here.”

"Jemin-ssi?”

"No, the magic isn’t activating. What’s going on? I used [Cognitive Dissonance].”

So little had changed that even I was starting to get confused.

Wait…

Up until now, Eyes-branch magic had always shown ridiculously impressive effects. Stage 1 could show me the past, present, future, and all sorts of other things, while Stage 2 had even let me stop time, so for Stage 3 to be this disappointing… Was this one of those builds that dumped all its potential into the early stages?

Just as I was continuing that perfectly reasonable line of thought, Shin Nain looked down at me with a strange expression.

"Jemin-ssi.”

"Oh. Did you figure something out?”

"Your pronunciation is normal right now, and you’re breathing properly. You’re not complaining about pain either.”

"Well, obviously…”

That was when I realized it.

Cognitive Dissonance.

The blood-drenched tongue, the pain from my shattered ribs. It was all gone.

I had completely healed.

Until just a moment ago, I had felt like even breathing was crushingly difficult, but all of that had disappeared.

Exactly as I expected.

It seemed like the injuries and all the pain caused by them had completely vanished.

And yet, I didn’t seem to have paid any particular price for it.

What? This was different from the magic I had known until now. Why was magic that always demanded a price suddenly just handing things out for free?

If it really was giving this away for free…

Wasn’t this a god-tier spell?

That was when Shin Nain and Hamza started to frantically wave their hands in front of my face.

"Jemin-ssi. I don’t think you should use Original [Cognitive Dissonance] again."

"What? Why? This spell is amazing. There’s basically no cost, and it doesn’t even hurt.”

Hamza pointed toward my side with a troubled expression.

Only then did I realize that Shin Nain had been kicking me in the ribs.

"Jemin-ssi…we’ve been touching and poking you for a while now, and you haven’t been perceiving any of it.”

The price for 100% [Cognitive Dissonance].

The moment I realized what it probably was, I couldn’t help sucking in a sharp breath.

Something directly connected to perception.

Sensory deprivation was Original [Cognitive Dissonance]’s penalty.

"No!”

I hurriedly tried to get to my feed, but I couldn’t stop my vision from swaying.

-Touch.

None of the sensations that should have reached me when something pressed against my skin were getting through at all.

Shin Nain and Hamza caught me as I started to fall.

"It didn’t leave you permanently blind last time either, so let’s wait and see for now.”

"Jemin-ssi, at least you’re better off than Sejun-ssi.”

“You call that a fucking comfort…”

No.

I suppose compared to Lee Sejun passing out because he was starving, sleepy, and horny all at once, maybe I really was better off.

As damn awful as it was, I found myself genuinely comforted.

But it wasn’t all awful.

Supported by Shin Nain and Hamza as they helped me toward the medical room, I was secretly exhilarated even while suffering through the aftereffects.

Magic at 100%.

Exploring the performance of Original Magic.

While soldiers died investigating the Gangnam group’s Seoul wizards, we endured pain to investigate the magic we ourselves had acquired.