Chapter 155

Gari Mountain spanned over two regions, Hongcheon-gun and Chuncheon-si, Gangwon-do. This mountain was the source of the Soyang River and the source of the Hongcheon River. Deep in this mountain, hidden in the shade of a tree, there was a hut that was hard to see.

Someone came to this remote place. Ham Geun Hyeong, the homeroom teacher of the Year 1 Class 0 Eungwang High. He went straight to the front of the hut and knocked on the door without getting lost in the complicated mountain road.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Old man, I’m fine.”

After a while, the door swung open. When the door opened, the smell of ink spread and an old man appeared. Until a few years ago, he received a student and was actively working in Seoul, but it was Hong Kyung-bok, the master of Korean painting, who went into hiding due to an incident.

“No, who is this? Isn’t that the kin? He said he didn’t have to come looking for me like this… Heh heh heh.”

“It’s been a long time since I last came here to say hello.”

“Is that the ski resort again? My brother-in-law is suffering a lot. But come all the way to this mountain valley.”

Despite the words, Hong Kyung-bok’s face was full of joy. He gave Ham Geun Hyeong the sunniest spot and suggested his tea made with mushrooms.

Hong Kyung-bok, who had asked for his regards until he finished drinking the tea, paused his words and asked carefully. “…How is Greene?”

“Yeah, I’ve been going to school every day lately.”

“okay? That’s good. That’s great!” At this, Hong Kyung-bok smiled brightly.

“Are you eating well? Are you making a lot of friends?”

“Yes. My classmates are taking good care of me.”

“Yeah, yeah….”

Ham Geun Hyeong presented to Hong Kyung-bok the photos that had been printed from the data sent to the device from class leader Kim Yuri. On Teacher’s Day, a group photo of Min Green holding a hand-drawn carnation picture was taken in the center.

There was also a photo of her eating snacks together with classmates in the classroom during the ordinance. She wore glasses that she never wore before. In all the photos, Min Green was smiling awkwardly.

“Our Green’s expression has improved a lot… You’ve made a lot of friends…”

Tears filled the wrinkled eyes of artist Hong Kyung-bok looking at the photo. Looking at him, Ham Geun Hyeong thought of his students and juniors.

‘Min Green has excelled both as a player and as an artist since she was a child like her Jae-in… Unlike Jae-in, she suffered badly.’

Unlike Kwon Jae-in, who came from a famous family, Min Green came from an ordinary family. Like Kwon Je-in, it wasn’t easy to access music, but Min Green, a genius who developed her talent after seeing her brush for the first time in her life.

The dramatic circumstances made her even more envious. It was also the reason that she looked easy because her background was too plain. As a result, she was persistently bullied for a long time.

‘…I wish I had known earlier.’

When people like Hong Kyung-bok and Song Man-seok, who cared for her Min Green, knew what had happened to her, she already had a disease in her heart. The two masters in the art world and in the player world were active and all the masterminds who tormented Min Green were severely punished, but it was impossible for her to cure her mental illness.

“I will take good care of Min Green. Please think about the health of the elderly first. If anything happens, she will have the hardest time for Green.”

Hearing this, Hong Kyung-bok burst out laughing. “Yeah! How many times has my hyung told me that I will live longer than you? Heh heh, even if I can’t, I’ll live to one hundred and fifty. It’s a promise I made with surgery, cancer.”

When talking about health or age, Hong Kyung-bok immediately came to his senses. He was an artist who regained vitality as Ham Geun Hyeong intended. He murmured as he looked at the group photo on the wall.

“The fact that Sung-hyung, who made a promise to me so firmly, goes so quickly as the ‘Age of Darkness’ is over. Oh yeah….”

In the photo, a young Kyung-bok Hong and a former head of the Korean branch of the Players’ Association were photographed.

* * *

After the dragon appeared in the peaceful Year 1 Class 0, the children’s reactions varied.

“Hello. Teacher Yong Je-geon is the temporary homeroom teacher!”

“Hello.”

Sawol Saeum and Han-yi participated in Stalemate’s beginner chess class. The two greeted brightly whether they were close with Yong Je-geon.

“Uh, the person I saw at the baseball field back then… No, it was said to be a dragon clan, after all, that’s the Jin clan I saw back then.”

“Ah, Master Yong was the biggest contributor to the Jamsil Baseball Stadium incident…!”

“Isn’t he the one who gave the opening show at the chess tournament? It’s the first time we’ve seen each other up close.” Maeng Hyo-don, Kim Yuri, and Kwon Lena evidently showed interest.

“It seems strange for Jinjok to be proud to be a teacher. Why is everyone taking it casually? …I want to go home.”

Min Green was openly wary of unfamiliar dragons. “Is this guy a temporary homeroom teacher? Well, it would be convenient if I had something to pamper myself with.”

On the other hand, Hwang Jiho, who received this abnormal situation positively, with bright eyes. Finally, he kept his mouth shut, not knowing how to react. “While Teacher Ham Geun Hyeong is away, please take care of me. Call me if anything happens.”

At this, Yong Je-geon finished the ordinance briefly by displaying the device code on the electronic blackboard. “Okay, the ordinance ends here. Change into your gym clothes and assemble at the 5th gym.”

After all, the class was the player’s combat practice 1.

Such was a practical class led by Yong Je-geon. There was a bad feeling that arose from this. The fifth gymnasium specializing in simulator operation for first-year students. It was a meaningful place where he played a team game with his classmates for the first time.

‘You have a bad feeling.’

Today’s theme was the basics of attacking the labyrinth. This training then assumed a labyrinth-type alien world with a high level of difficulty to attack. In the case of labyrinth-type and maze-type other worlds, there were times when they were divided according to the gimmick, and there were also times when the entrance was divided into several from the beginning.

At that time, the otherworld attack party set the top priority to identify the terrain within the other world and joined them as soon as possible. What our class would practice today was ‘Meeting within the labyrinth where the entrance is divided’.

“The outline of the labyrinth simulation has been sent to the device. We will start by dividing into groups of two, four. Gather in groups. I’ll give you 30 minutes to talk.”

With those words, Yong Je-geon opened two screens. One was a timer marked with a time limit. The other was a hologram showing the group formation. My head hurt when I saw the group formation on the hologram.

‘It’s a group formation where you can feel Yong Je-geon’s malice.’

[Group A. Jo Eushin, Jiho Hwang.]

“Hahahaha, that must be fun!” Hwang Jiho was already excited. It looked like they were looking forward to what Yong Je-geon will do.

“Hwang Jiho is smiling badly again.”

“Well, we are lucky that we are on the opposite course!”

Han-yi and Kwon Lena were assigned to Group B. Seeing Hwang Jiho smiling, he began to be wary.

“Hyo-don, we’re going to avoid the route that Group A goes!”

“…Uh? Uh, then…” Group C: Sawol Saeum, Maeng Hyo-don.

Maeng Hyo-don nodded as he saw Hwang Jiho relaxing and smiling.

“Green-ah, let’s move to the confluence point while avoiding the Uisin and Jihone routes.”

“I, I don’t know, so I’ll leave it to Kim Yuri.”

Last group D. Kim Yuri, Min Green. Min Green hid behind Kim Yuri, avoiding Yong Je-geon’s gaze, and nodded.

“Hmm, looking at the outline, our A side’s difficulty level is blatantly strange. If it’s not like this, I don’t feel like doing it.” Hwang Jiho, who was reading the outline of the labyrinth, said.

As Hwang Jiho said, Group A was much more difficult than the other groups. The rank of the deployed Enemy was also higher than two levels, there were many traps, and the road itself was long.

As he was discussing with Hwang Ji-ho while looking at the outline, 30 minutes passed in no time.

―3 seconds, 2 seconds, 1 second. 0.

When the countdown ended, Yong Je-geon clapped once. “It’s in the outline, but I’ll repeat it one more time. Consumable items are prohibited. Equipment items must be provided by the school. As long as you keep these two things, it doesn’t matter what you do.”

Yong Je-geon said this to us who had finished preparing. When he said, ‘It doesn’t matter what you do’, it’s probably not because of his mood that he looked at me and Hwang Jiho.

“Come on, let’s go!”

Woo-woong- As Yong Je-geon started the simulation, the black metal that covered the 5th Gymnasium began to glow in various colors. After a while, a hologram appeared in front of me.

[Starting a simulation of attacking another world. Are you ready? (Y/N)]

Pressing the Y button, he was determined to match the rhythm of Yong Je-geon and Hwang Jiho. In conclusion, the labyrinth simulation was quickly overpowered by the crazy Hwang Ji-ho.

“Ha ha ha ha ha!”

“Hey, is it okay if this goes on the school record?”

“I didn’t use that much power. If it becomes a problem, we tamper with the records, huh?”

Hwang Jiho then showed the dignity of destroying SR-class traps and crushing SR+++-class paralysis gas layers with the R-class ‘beginner’s iron rod’ provided by the school. Yong Je-geon’s malicious traps and energies were swept away.

‘Did you spread the gas layer with sticks? Is that possible…’

Only then would I be able to clear the R-class fire attribute basic magic weapon ‘Beginner Wizard’s Flame Rod’ without ever using it.

“You seem to be better at sticks than Kwon Tae-ho.”

“Kwon Tae-ho was learned roughly because ‘that guy’ provoked me, ‘You won’t be able to beat me with Taeho kwon for the rest of your life. First of all, I’m not very good at physical attacks. The stick art is okay, though.”

That guy?

‘Are you talking about Cheong-ho?’ There was Cheong-ho, the founder of Taeho-gwon.

It seemed that Hwang Jiho learned Taeho-kwon after being provoked by Cheong-ho. However, a guy who wasn’t good at physical attacks fought like this.

He was eager to tackle it, but he was more concerned about it. “So, did you win against ‘that guy’?”

“No.” Hwang Jiho, who answered that way, made a strange face. It looked like he was proud of himself, but it was a strange expression mixed with a longing for his old friend.

“…While waiting for the rematch with that guy, I’m training.” Group A reached the joining point in 5 minutes by Hwang Jiho, who ran wild after that. After waiting for a while, the children started to arrive.

“Well, we are second. Your route was very difficult, but what happened?”

“Awesome! I won’t lose next time!”

2nd place proved to be Group C, Maeng Hyo-don, and Sawol Saeum. “…Han-yi, I’m sorry I caught you by the ankle.”

“No. Without your support, I would still be in a labyrinth.” 3rd place was Group B, Han-yi, and Kwon Lena.

“Sorry…  At first, as soon as I saw the Enemy, I ran away without realizing it. You’ve been so lost because of me.”

“Haha, later on, Greene caught the energy better than me, so he collected more contribution points! I think I should work harder.”

The last ones to arrive were Group D, Min Green, and Kim Yuri. When the two arrived at the confluence point, a hologram soon came to mind. [Simulation clear! Clear time 16 minutes 52 seconds.]

“If you clear it, this screen appears…!”

“Oh, not bad.”

“Everyone worked hard!” Soon, the scenery in front of him changed, and Yong Je-geon appeared in a very good mood.

“Great job. Then, let’s start with the general review.”

Year 1 Class 0, which was not only the first-class grades but also achieved intermediate grades in Eungwang High. Group A, which included Hwang Jiho and I, got a very good score.

I didn’t want to count this because the character Hwang Jiho worked hard unnecessarily. In any case, the first class in charge of the Yu-Hee Balaur was completed.

*    *    *

After school, when I arrived at the dormitory room and checked the device message window, there was a message sent by Yong Je-geon at the top.

[Yong Je-geon] I wanted to see how much power you hide in front of people, so I played around a bit.

[Yong Je-geon] I wanted to know how much energy Chairman Hwangho would use when he did that. Did you do this to find out?

Hearing that, I had a question.

[Me] Did you know that Hwang Jiho revealed his identity to me?

[Yong Je-geon] As expected, Chairman Hwangho has revealed his identity to you.

I knew that Yong Je-geon was using this kind of conversational skill, but I felt strange after being attacked. It seemed like he had already guessed everything.

[Yong Je-geon] By the way, it seems that you did not disclose your Gwanglim to Chairman Hwang-ho. ^^

The ecstatic expression unique to Yong Je-geon was superimposed on that ‘^^’ emoticon and came to mind. I then turned the window off because I thought it wouldn’t do any good if we continued to send and receive messages.

The next message came from Siwan Sung.

[Sung Siwan] Now, Seong Guk-eon has entrusted me with two ghost story investigations. Can I take over the secret association case?

[Sung Siwan] There is a guy who likes ghost stories among the juniors of Jiikhoe, and he seems to have a lot of interest in ghost stories from the student council and the leadership team. Haha

Then, Sung Siwan’s message continued.

[Sung Siwan] These days, 2nd and 3rd grade 0 class seems to be doing something, but Cheoniksan sometimes doesn’t have radio waves…

There are some things that are difficult to stay in Cheoniksan for a long time.

[Sung Siwan] I’ll leave the ghost story to Cheoniksan!

What were the class 0 seniors trying to do again? No, he was not trying to do something, he was probably already doing something.

The Student Autonomous Organization had a lot to prepare for in case of an accident, so it had no choice but to do so.

[Me] Yes. I also wanted to investigate the Cheoniksan side. After sending the reply, I checked the item window.

‘There are also suitable items.’

‘Lens that can see the ears’.

It was one of the items stolen from the Hwanmong auction.

‘The moon is up now, but compared to when there is no moon, it would be better to check it as a control group as well.’

With this in mind, I headed to Cheoniksan. late night. There was no one on the trail to Cheoniksan. It would be normal if there were no people on the hiking trails in Cheoniksan, but this time around, someone was there.

‘The author… … .’

It was difficult to recognize because it looked different from what I had seen before, but I immediately felt it. It was because he was a very impressive person.

‘You’re the class leader of Year 3 Class 0!’

After Teacher’s Day, the class leader of Year 3 Class 0 who pretended to be a beggar and declared surrender in front of the clock tower at the main gate.

He was on the Cheoniksan hiking trail.