Chapter 271

Chapter 271
## Chapter 271. Someone’s Malice (2)

—

“What in the world is happening here?”
Mo-ran-Seong’s expression grew exceptionally rigid. Since she had been given a ‘Mu’ (F) score, getting knocked out of the practical exam right now would put her in a highly precarious position.
“I could comprehend the actions of the Blue Army and the White Army, but why on earth is the Red Army behaving this way…?”
At the entryway of Hong-san, Academy students were stepping aside to clear a path as though it were the most natural thing to do. The absurd spectacle left everyone utterly speechless.
“Their goal is so blatantly obvious that I can’t even bring myself to laugh.”
Eun-ho-Lee sneered with frigid, mocking amusement.
“I suppose we should be grateful that they aren’t completely unified in this, shouldn’t we?”
Exactly as Eun-ho-Lee pointed out, about half of the participants were still positioned over on Cheong-san and Baek-san.
“It’s like a predator showing fake pity for its prey.”
Initiating skirmishes with opposing factions during the opening phase was a terrible tactic. Doing so yielded no banners, nor did it expand one’s own unit size. They had to know that behaving in a manner that blatantly disregarded the goals of the test—which was explicitly designed to measure tactical and strategic acumen—would harm their own scores. The fact that they still chose to move this way proved beyond a doubt that their malicious motives were deliberate.
‘It’s been an incredibly long time since I last encountered such a foul, relentless wave of ill will.’
Outside of a literal life-or-death battlefield, I had rarely experienced spite of this intensity. Nevertheless, falling prey to their malice was not an option. I turned back toward my companions and spoke up.
“If we just stand here waiting, they will encircle us. We need to strike first from our side.”
“In what way?”
“Their objective is transparent, isn’t it? In that case, we will thoroughly shatter their plans.”
I tightened my hold on the Black Dragon Sword. The moment I took a step forward, the younger disciples of the Tae-eul-mun moved into position with perfect coordination. Without needing explicit instructions, they naturally began organizing the White Tiger Sword Formation (Baek-ho-geom-jin). Mo-ran-Seong and Seon-hwa-Namgung, who had shared the entrance examination with me, anchored the left and right flanks of the formation respectively. Meanwhile, Jae-hwa-Moyong scaled a tree, nocking an arrow weighed down with a blunt training tip rather than a sharp point onto his bowstring.
The group under Jang U-jae’s command fell in directly behind our unit.
“Clear the path if you don’t intend to clash!” I bellowed.
Hearing my voice, a few squads faltered and stepped aside. However, those who attempted to strike our rear after we pushed past were immediately met by the blades of Seon-hwa-Namgung and Mo-ran-Seong, who spun around instantly to intercept them, sending them crashing to the dirt. Mo-ran-Seong, wielding her iron sword, forcefully slapped the flat of her blade against the enemies’ faces, causing teeth to fly out and scatter through the air.
“If you cannot engage with honor, stay out of our way! You won’t find any leniency here!”
At Mo-ran-Seong’s piercing shout, the oncoming attackers paused and retreated. Thanks to the impressive display of martial prowess by Mo-ran-Seong and Seon-hwa-Namgung, the pressure on our rear noticeably thinned out. Even so, a massive throng from the Red Army continued to block our advance.
*Crack!*
Utilizing the Black Dragon Sword like a heavy bludgeon, I smashed an opponent’s jaw. As the melee intensified, Eun-ho-Lee moved into the core of our formation and barked, “Advance!” We surged forward on the run, flawlessly maintaining the White Tiger Sword Formation while clashing directly with the White Army.
*Clang, clang, clang, clang!*
Weapons clashed repeatedly, but because everyone was deprived of internal energy, the strikes completely lacked lethal precision. As a result, the recoil from the colliding blades was far more pronounced than usual, leaving glaring openings in their stances. I aimed the Black Dragon Sword straight at the exposed face of an adversary whose guard had dropped. Aiming for the jaw carries the danger of accidentally slashing the throat if your hand slips, but when executed with precision, it is incredibly effective for incapacitating someone.
*Thud! Thud!*
“Arrgh!”
“Gah!”
Right away, two individuals rolled their eyes back and slumped to the ground. Infuriated and startled by their comrades’ sudden downfall, the surrounding students unleashed a flurry of rapid strikes toward me like a lightning storm. I had more than enough agility to evade them, but I chose to stand my ground.
*Clang, clang, clang, clang, boom!*
There was no need to dodge because a dependable shield wall intercepted all five blades on my behalf.
“Blast it! Bringing a shield into this is cheating!”
“Have you no sense of a martial artist’s honor?!”
The Academy students, whose techniques were severely blunted due to the effects of the Gentleman’s Powder, screamed out insults. Yet, Geum-pyo-Lee paid them no mind, bracing his shield even more firmly.
“Then why didn’t any of you think to bring one, too!”
With a roaring shout filled with pure spite, Geum-pyo-Lee violently deflected all the weapons caught against his Geum-gang-pae. Seizing that brief window of vulnerability, Dong-ryong-Lee lunged forward. The So-cheon Sword Art of the Tae-eul-mun focuses on rapid, direct strikes along the most optimal trajectory. While a sword style relying heavily on straight thrusts is usually a terrible match for this kind of dense melee environment, it posed absolutely no issue for Dong-ryong-Lee.
*Thud, thud, smash, crash!*
He accurately struck jaws, pummeled solar plexuses, and drove his sword’s pommel directly into their temples. Even stripped of his internal energy, the Heavenly Killing Star remained a force of nature. Dong-ryong-Lee methodically channeled his restrained bloodlust, subduing his adversaries in mere moments. The squads of the White Army were either knocked cold by precise strikes to their vitals before they could even react, or they were left retching on the ground as if their stomachs had been violently turned inside out.
“Red Ember!”
At Eun-ho-Lee’s command, the array shifted into a sharp wedge. While Dong-ryong-Lee tore through the opposing lines, Sa-ryeon-Hong leapt forward to suppress the remaining squad members.
*Swish—*
*Thump, thud!*
Two opponents dropped helplessly to the ground by Sa-ryeon-Hong’s hand. The fruits of her recent solitary, closed-door training were clearly showing; her breathing remained perfectly steady despite the frantic pace of the combat.
“Moving River!”
The formation transitioned seamlessly, and Seon-hwa-Namgung along with Mo-ran-Seong stepped to the forefront to lead the left and right flanks. Our unit enveloped the White Army squads as if drawing them into an embrace, crushing every single adversary simultaneously. As one White Army unit was rendered completely incapacitated in the blink of an eye, the nearby Red Army squads sensed the danger and began shifting their focus toward us.
Right at that moment.
“You absolute fools!”
Someone launched an assault from the rear of that very squad.
“Don’t you realize that a Red Army triumph is ultimately our victory as well? You brainless cowards!”
The one shouting loudly as if unleashing a Lion’s Roar, despite clearly suffering from the effects of the Gentleman’s Powder, was…
“Hey, it’s the Spy!”
“Quit calling me that damn Spy already…!”
It was none other than Nam Hwa-seong. Joining our ranks, he roared while glaring furiously at the other members of the Red Army.
“Smash the skulls of all these idiotic fools!”
“Yes, sir!!!”
Nam Hwa-seong, who had managed to assemble a force roughly the size of a company, began hammering the rear of the misguided Red Army factions. Demonstrating that even a common slug has a knack for crawling, Nam Hwa-seong, relying heavily on his hand-to-hand martial arts, tore through the combat zone like a runaway fire wagon.
*Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud, thud!*
After rapidly incapacitating six Academy students, he drew the heavy ire of the enemy, finding himself surrounded by several opposing Red Army squads. I shifted my trajectory toward Nam Hwa-seong’s position, systematically stripping away the banners of the Red Army units blocking my path.
“Gasp! Wh-when did you get here?!”
“You lot, I’ll be extracting the details of whatever scheme you’ve concocted later on.”
“A-a scheme…!”
“Tsk, quiet down and just defend your base. If you lose that position to either the White Army or the Blue Army…”
I stared directly into the eyes of the Red Army members whose flags I had just confiscated, drawing a finger across my throat in a clear, menacing gesture.
“Consider the remainder of your time at the Academy completely ruined.”
Leaving behind the pale-faced students, I pushed forward to assist the surrounded Nam Hwa-seong and finish off the remaining combatants.
“Pant, pant! So-un-Jin! Th-thank you…”
“Why are you wheezing so heavily? Do you skip physical training when you can’t use internal energy?”
For a split second, the guy looked genuinely touched, but my comment quickly made his expression sour.
“D-dammit! I stepped in to assist you, and this is the kind of gratitude I get?!”
“If you’re going to help, do it properly. Enough chatting, hand over those flags.”
“…Blast it.”
Nam Hwa-seong glared at me as if trying to comprehend what kind of atrocious jerk he was dealing with. But frankly, if he was upset, what could he really do about it?
“What? You want to go a round right here?”
“……”
“Besides, since you’ve gathered a whole company, you must have racked up plenty of points by now.”
“…F-fine, I get it.”
Nam Hwa-seong pulled ten red banners from his waistband and begrudgingly shoved them over to me. Taking the flags, I jerked my chin forward toward the front line.
“Do you know anything about this?”
“About what?”
“Do you have any idea why those fools are acting like this?”
The ongoing chaos was far from normal. There had to be some underhanded ploy orchestrating it…
“Isn’t it simply because the entire student body detests you?”
Huh? What kind of nonsense was he spouting now?
“Who? Why? Where on earth could you find a person as upstanding and benevolent as me?”
“…Are you completely out of your mind?”
Nam Hwa-seong stared at me with an utterly dumbfounded expression, looking like someone who had just been told the sun rises in the west. He sighed deeply, muttering under his breath.
“I absolutely loathe you.”
“Be that as it may, you chose to align with me, didn’t you?”
“That’s only because you gave your word…!”
“Right, right. I always deliver on my promises. So, you’re telling me you don’t know a thing?”
“Yeah.”
I looked at him and shook my head in disapproval.
“Truly a worthless Spy.”
“Dammit, I even surrendered my banners, and I still have to hear that ‘Spy’ label?!”
“Drop it! Direct your entire company to this side.”
“But then our base will be…”
“Is the base really your main concern right now? We are on the verge of collective elimination. First, we drive back the White Army.”
“Got it!”
Despite claiming to detest me, the fellow didn’t push back against a single word I uttered. A quiet chuckle escaped me as I watched his retreating back. Moments later, Nam Hwa-seong’s company deployed along both of our flanks, effectively shielding our unit.
“Charge!”
It seemed Nam Hwa-seong had selectively recruited people with the exact same hot-headed temperament as himself, because not a single person questioned his command. In fact, rather than resisting, a good number of them surged forward past Nam Hwa-seong himself. But amidst that rush.
“Huh?”
Yayul Geuk, who had been securely positioned within our sword formation just a moment ago, was suddenly mixed in with them. When had he slipped out again?
“You utter mongrels!”
Yayul Geuk was striking out ruthlessly, as if venting his rage on a sworn enemy.
*Snap— thud—*
“Aaargh!”
If one had to identify the most potent martial techniques in an environment devoid of internal energy, the principles of I-hwa-jeop-mok and Sa-ryang-bal-cheon-geun were absolutely paramount. Much like Nam Hwa-seong’s detachment that relied heavily on striking arts, Yayul Geuk was thoroughly dismantling the opposing frontline. Well, there was no denying the guy was an exceptionally capable asset in combat.
While our forces, spearheaded by Nam Hwa-seong and Yayul Geuk, systematically demolished the White Army.
“Who on earth could it be…?”
I kept a sharp eye on the broader battlefield between clashes. Even though the internal hierarchy within each faction hadn’t been settled yet, a full-scale war involving three distinct armies had erupted. A chaotic shift in such an absurd direction could never happen without a deliberate architect. After all, a misstep in this practical exam meant risking their own failure. Even if our squad fell early on, the only ones facing actual expulsion from the Academy would be Mo-ran-Seong and Geum-pyo-Lee. If the instigators themselves got eliminated due to a flawed strategy, they would be the ones facing expulsion depending on their final grades. Despite that massive risk, they were concentrating all their forces to strike our squad, completely ignoring the fundamental purpose of the test.
‘Ha, this is genuinely infuriating me.’
A fierce urge to completely smash the bastard who had orchestrated this twisted game began to surge within me. Just at that moment.
“Pant! Pant! Representative!”
Jang U-jae ran up, completely drenched in sweat and visibly drained from the relentless fighting.
“Pant, pant… things are incredibly chaotic, but I felt it was absolutely necessary to report this to you.”
“What is it?”
“Whew… right before the practical examination kicked off, a bizarre rumor was making the rounds.”
I shifted my attention fully to Jang U-jae.
“A rumor?”
“Yes. Word was spreading that the Representative deliberately sabotaged the creation of the Representative Team solely to serve his own hidden agenda.”
A rumor concerning the leadership and formation of the Representative Team… The memory of Cheol Sun-jik’s rigid, sour face as he stormed out of the office a few days ago flashed through my mind. Keeping a wary eye on the front lines, Jang U-jae continued his briefing.
“Since we are used to being targeted by malicious gossip, we initially dismissed it as just another regular annoyance…”
The moment I processed Jang U-jae’s words, the scattered pieces of the puzzle instantly snapped into place. It explained why he had approached the Representative Team with that preposterous proposal for a ‘Council’ in the first place. And it explained the absurd, coordinated madness currently playing out during this strategic evaluation. From the very beginning, Cheol Sun-jik had structured things so that no matter what path I chose, he would come out on top. Had I agreed to his terms, he would have seized control of the Representative Team via his Council. Because I turned him down, he weaponized that refusal as the perfect pretext to engineer this vicious ambush during the tactical assessment. He had cleverly hedged his bets, ensuring his own gain regardless of the outcome.
“Ha…!”
He was replicating the exact same underhanded maneuvers within the Academy walls that he had utilized during the Great War between the Orthodox and Demonic Factions back in my previous life.
“Wow, what a cunning, treacherous bastard.”
“Excuse me?”
“Ah, I am referring to Cheol Sun-jik.”
I explained flatly to the bewildered Jang U-jae.
“From the very start, we walked right into a trap he engineered.”
“So that man actually fabricated such a ridiculous rumor?”
Given how fundamentally illogical the premise was, it made total sense why Jang U-jae looked so baffled. However, the mastermind was Cheol Sun-jik. For a man like him, taking a few of my words, twisting them out of context, and utilizing his venomous tongue to manipulate and incite the masses was second nature. I slowly scanned the terrain of Baek-san. Sure enough.
Near the command post of the White Army, I spotted Cheol Sun-jik and his associates anchoring a large company. While orchestrating schemes and bleeding our squad dry by proxy, he was leisurely expanding his own forces, perfectly preparing for the endgame.
“Ha, hahaha!”
A dry, humorless laugh slipped past my lips. Even though I had seen through his ultimate goal, I had still walked right into his trap. It had been an incredibly long time since I found myself ensnared despite anticipating the opponent’s move. Yet, I didn’t feel the suffocating helplessness and despair that used to paralyze me in my past life. Instead, the simmering fury inside me instantly detonated.
“Eun-ho!”
Hearing my sharp call, Eun-ho-Lee, who was actively guiding our tactical lines, snapped his head around immediately.
“Yes!”
“We are pivoting toward Baek-san.”
“You mean right this second?”
I gave a firm nod, my anger cold and focused.
“Yes. The mastermind behind this entire circus is entrenched right over there.”
Following the direction of my gaze, Eun-ho-Lee stared toward the White Army’s stronghold, his expression hardening.
“Are you planning to show Cheol Sun-jik the consequences of his actions?”
A subtle, sharp smile touched my lips as I looked back at him.
“Yes.”
In my previous life, I was helplessly dragged around like a puppet because I lacked the power to resist, but now, I have absolutely no intention of letting anyone dictate my path. If anything, a fierce thrill began to surge deep within my chest.
“A fellow like him will never stop resorting to these underhanded tricks. Let’s use this chance to carve a permanent lesson into his mind.”
“Jon-myeong!”
This time, I am absolutely going to smash his skull in.