Even if I Make It Roughly, Ex-rank Items Continue to Accumulate - Chapter 59

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Even Hastily Made Ones Keep Stacking Up as EX-Rank (59)

Escape Immediately

[Special Experiment Building No. 2]

 

This was the place Isaac had told him about a few days ago. One of the two locations that seemed related to the incident that had occurred in the past.

‘He said he saw people secretly coming and going at dawn.’

Even now, he could feel mana nearby, which seemed to signal that this was indeed the place Isaac had mentioned.

Step.

Lee Si-hyeok stepped forward with his guard raised high.

The interior was shaped like a cave. Rather than being precisely constructed, it had a crude structure with only sparse lanterns occasionally hanging here and there, creating a stark contrast to the refined Magical Engineering Academy.

‘It feels like a secret passage.’

Then who made it?

The people he could immediately think of were Pyo Jae-hwan and Yoon Seo-jin, survivors of the past incident.

However, how could students have penetrated Eterion’s strict security network and created such a passage?

As he crossed through the dark passage while continuing his thoughts, he suddenly felt the air change.

“…?”

It was mana that had been flowing steadily. But that mana suddenly began to twist bizarrely from a certain point.

‘What is this?’

It seemed like he had almost completely exited the passage.

Lee Si-hyeok walked out with his guard raised high, and soon arrived at a space that looked like a laboratory where he could find out the reason.

Whooom! Woom!

A crack.

From the crack positioned in the air of the laboratory, pitch-black mana was pouring out wildly. The mana was billowing like black smoke, visible to the naked eye.

Lee Si-hyeok immediately recalled the sentence he had seen in the incident records.

 

[· During club activities on campus, a large-scale mana crack occurred while the club ‘Ether Society’ was conducting independent research.]

 

‘…So this must be that mana crack.’

Then this laboratory must have been the place where the incident occurred.

They had hidden it well. Except for the passage he had emerged from, every gap including windows had been thoroughly sealed.

Still, seeing that there was a door, it seemed people did come and go as Isaac had said.

“….”

There were no signs of people nearby. Lee Si-hyeok turned his gaze again and observed the crack, eventually discovering something strange.

No, it would be more appropriate to describe it as a sense of unease.

Lee Si-hyeok tilted his head and carefully brought his hand close to the black smoke flowing from the crack.

Zap!

“…?!”

At that moment, he felt tremendous pain in his head. Pain that traveled through his frontal lobe to his entire brain.

 

[The new substance ‘Ether’ is attempting to penetrate your mind!]

[《Clear Mirror Still Water》 is protecting your mind.]

[Defense successful.]

 

That was brief, but fortunately messages appeared in succession and the pain gradually faded.

“Whew….”

He breathed roughly and glared at the messages.

Just in case, he had made contact while activating 『Mimicry』 by rolling a magic stone in his pocket, and as expected, his thoughts were correct.

‘It’s the black smoke I saw in Orbes.’

When he had crossed to the Imitation World with the Snow Flame Empress, her kingdom had been in a precarious situation due to the black smoke that kept appearing.

Smoke that eroded the mind and turned people into monsters. In fact, it was because of that smoke that Orbes had perished in the past.

Hissss….

However, the mana before Lee Si-hyeok’s eyes also had the exact same properties.

Hadn’t it tried to penetrate his mind and steal his consciousness as soon as he made contact?

That was the identity of his unease.

Why was it here? That was the first question that came to mind, but he couldn’t know. After all, this mana wasn’t something Lee Si-hyeok had summoned.

What he could immediately grasp was that it was somehow connected to the past incident, and he would need to find out the full story to gain anything.

‘Ether.’

Ignoring Blackie wriggling earnestly in his front pocket, Lee Si-hyeok approached the crack.

 

[『Eyes that Pierce the Essence』 activates.]

[Upon entering the crack, the mental defense of 《Clear Mirror Still Water》 may not function properly. Serious danger is anticipated.]

 

As he tried to enter, a message blocked his view.

However, Lee Si-hyeok casually dismissed all the windows.

『Eyes that Pierce the Essence』 was merely a skill that calculated only visible situations; it couldn’t calculate invisible domains.

In other words, it couldn’t grasp variables.

Since Lee Si-hyeok had one countermeasure in mind, he took another step forward.

Whoosh!

The mana that exploded outward instantly engulfed his body.

 

* * *

 

The feeling of his whole body turning inside out was brief, and his sense of balance returned as his vision recovered.

Lee Si-hyeok slowly stepped down and tried to look around, but soon was startled.

‘…Am I floating in the air?’

Because his body was floating in mid-air.

It was literally true. The surroundings were a complete void with no place to step, a space of absolute nothingness. Just like floating weightlessly in space, Lee Si-hyeok was in that state now.

‘This is unexpected.’

Since the crack would also be a type of dimensional gate, he had thought of another world like Orbes. It was a space beyond imagination.

It was the moment when Lee Si-hyeok, floating in a space similar to the universe with everything around him pitch black, was marveling.

“Kheup!”

Suddenly his breathing was constricted. His breathing became labored as if someone was strangling his neck, and his head rang sharply.

“Has it come…!”

As the skill had warned, the black energy, namely ‘Ether’, was attempting mental penetration once again.

As if everything that had been flowing out of the crack was just child’s play, this entire vast space was filled with Ether.

All that Ether rushed toward Lee Si-hyeok.

“Kuh, kueok.”

His vision became dizzy. He tried to somehow hold onto his consciousness, but proper thinking wouldn’t function.

Please, please. Repeating this, Lee Si-hyeok desperately raised his hand and tapped the front pocket of his research coat.

“Blackie, quickly…!”

“Maang?!”

With a small cry, Blackie popped out.

Then it looked around quickly and opened its mouth wide.

In his fading consciousness, the sight of the creature flicking its tongue was replayed slowly.

Waaang. Then such a sound was heard. The Ether that had been attacking Lee Si-hyeok began to be sucked toward Blackie’s mouth. Tremendous suction power as if a vacuum cleaner had been activated.

In an instant, all the mana in the surrounding area was sucked into Blackie’s mouth. It was instantaneous.

“Hah, hahhhhh….”

Lee Si-hyeok exhaled roughly. Meanwhile, when he checked his body, the mana that had been creeping through his mind had completely cleared.

He had almost really died.

He remembered how Blackie had suddenly reacted to mana earlier and rushed toward the secret passage, so he had tried this method. He wondered if the mana it had reacted to then was precisely this Ether.

A kind of gamble. Still, though he didn’t know why it had reacted to the ether, it seemed his guess was correct after all.

“Ma, maaaang….”

Seeing how it had collapsed with its belly sticking out like this confirmed it.

Blackie’s existence was the very variable that the 『Eyes that Pierce the Essence』 couldn’t calculate.

Having regained his composure, Lee Si-hyeok began analyzing the space again. He carefully floated through the chaotic space itself, reading the mana flow.

‘…But there’s less here than I thought.’

It was strangely empty of anything.

It was quiet and desolate, as if it were truly a space of nothingness. Except for the ether, he couldn’t find anything else. Naturally, questions followed.

‘Then there wouldn’t be any reason to manage it so thoroughly.’

Special Experiment Building No. 2 was a restricted access area. It was treated as a closed building, a place where people’s access was strictly controlled.

But if only ether really existed here, there would be no reason to go as far as closing down a perfectly good building to hide it.

Even if incidents had occurred in the past, since they had already covered it up once, there would have been no problem researching it with appropriate fabrication.

That’s when it happened.

 

[Escape immediately.]

 

Along with the message’s warning, a bizarre voice pierced through his mind and struck directly into his head.

“Sa, save me. Save me. Save….”

It was a voice that crackled and distorted as if filled with noise. When he narrowed his brow and concentrated, he could tell it was coming from nearby.

Lee Si-hyeok immediately headed toward that location and discovered a place where an enormous amount of ether was gathered, incomparable to anything he’d seen so far.

Even at that moment, voices continued to echo in his head.

“Save me, save me….”

“Please….”

There were four voices.

At first, he thought it was one voice with tremendous noise interference, but as he listened, he realized that cracked voices were being heard simultaneously.

When he realized this, the records of past incidents came to mind.

‘Could it be that the four fatalities who couldn’t return back then….’

Had they been trapped here ever since then?

“….”

He got goosebumps for a moment. To think they had been spending years in this ocean-like space, with their minds being eroded.

He had seen Elec’s case in Orbes once, but he could never get used to this kind of terror. Eons of time and endless suffering. Though he couldn’t know for certain, he could feel it from the heavily cracked voices.

Lee Si-hyeok gulped and slowly approached the source.

He slowly crossed the pitch-black space.

The message had told him to escape immediately, but to Lee Si-hyeok’s perception, this was the only approach. If he couldn’t find out something here, he would have to take a more complicated detour.

“I, I want to live….”

“Please… please, no more….”

Terrible cries of pain that pierced through.

He tried to attempt a few words of conversation as he approached, but seeing that no other words came back, it seemed they could only say those words.

Or perhaps they had already lost their sense of self long ago.

‘I can’t ask them directly.’

Still, one thing he could understand was that they were bound to this place by someone.

Someone had bound their bodies here with a magic tool.

So they could never escape from this place.

 

[Escape immediately.]

[Escape immediately.]

[Escape immediately.]

[Escape immediately.]

 

Lee Si-hyeok looked at the message blinking before his eyes.

This was the first time it had warned him so directly. However, he waited quietly for a moment, and then, as if reading his thoughts, the message changed to different text.

 

[If you proceed ahead, you will be able to investigate the new substance ‘Ether’.]

[Danger level: Extreme.]

[Upon failure, you may die or face even worse consequences.]

 

The ether density ahead was insanely high.

The area around where Lee Si-hyeok was located was safe thanks to Blackie’s efforts, but if the creature had fainted from being full, going further would be extremely dangerous.

But that’s precisely why it was more certain.

To draw a map, you had to step on the terrain directly, and to put out a fire, you had to enter the flames.

Magical Engineering was the same.

If he wanted to investigate ether, going directly to a place where its concentration was thick was the most reliable method.

The path toward his dream. Then?

‘I need to check it out.’

Lee Si-hyeok smiled and threw himself forward.

 

* * *

 

A few days later, when the session end date finally approached.

All participants had gathered together in the Grand Auditorium of the Central Engineering Hall.

It was to present the results of ‘Mimicry’. After this event ended, the results would be displayed in a specially prepared exhibition hall.

While other participants watched the presentations with eyes mixed with wariness and curiosity.

“…This is driving me crazy, really.”

Song Hyeon-gyu, who was sitting alongside his team members, muttered.

Soon, watching another team receive applause after successfully finishing their presentation, his frown deepened as if he was even more troubled.

‘When the hell is this guy going to come?’

Their team’s turn had already approached right before them.

But their team leader Choi Hyeok, that is, Lee Si-hyeok, still hadn’t arrived.

‘Where did things start going wrong?’

There had been no particular problems until the first day when the team was formed.

Instructions to start with information gathering when time was urgent?

He didn’t understand it well. Still, there wasn’t much wrong with the saying that when you’re in a hurry, you should take the long way around, so Song Hyeon-gyu had followed the team leader’s words well. There was also the charisma he had shown against Ray Wen earlier.

But….

‘The next day. Yeah, the problem started from the next morning.’

Suddenly, contact with Lee Si-hyeok was completely cut off.

Wondering if he might still be at the library, he even went to look for him there, but only books stacked like towers were left sitting there alone, and he couldn’t be found anywhere.

Time passed quickly. Morning, lunch, evening….

Then on the third day afternoon, when less than 12 hours remained until the presentation.

Several text messages suddenly arrived from him.

 

[(Photo)]

[Just make a basic framework with the materials I sent above.]

[I’ll finish the rest and bring it. Please do this for me.]

 

It was a photo with the necessary materials and simple manufacturing method written in handwriting that seemed very hastily scribbled.

What the hell had he been doing? It was really absurd. However, Song Hyeon-gyu, who had been secretly examining those materials carefully, felt dumbfounded once again.

‘No, why the hell are these things needed?’

The artifact his team had to mimic was ‘healing type’.

But the materials Lee Si-hyeok had sent were materials that had nothing to do with healing-type artifacts. Even the manufacturing method was bizarre, so he couldn’t even guess what he wanted to make.

That said, the explanation wasn’t completely unhelpful.

A few hastily scribbled lines of manufacturing method. Just by reading them simply, a blueprint was vividly drawn in his mind.

So he made it.

What else could he do? Time was tight, and the team members were passive. He had to do something.

With only a simple photograph as his lifeline, Song Hyeon-gyu devoted himself to manufacturing on the afternoon of the third day. Fortunately, Ryu Se-eun provided some help.

—Clap clap clap clap clap!

As another round of applause rang out, Song Hyeon-gyu rubbed his face with his hands again. His heart felt heavy. In the end, what he had made yesterday evening was merely a ‘basic framework.’

Even if the team leader arrived late and started working, it meant there was woefully insufficient time.

Moreover, the opposing team’s Ray Wen had completely ruined the blueprint.

At best, they’d bring a hastily assembled result that wasn’t even half complete.

Or maybe he’d be too embarrassed and just disappear entirely.

‘Either way, it’ll be a complete disgrace.’

It wouldn’t just be the team leader.

Song Hyeon-gyu, Ryu Se-eun, and Park Sang-min, who belonged to the team.

Furthermore, the status of ‘South Korea’ itself in the magical engineering field would surely plummet.

This wasn’t some children’s game, but an event where the world’s top-tier researchers had gathered. What would they think of Korea after seeing that? Especially since Korea was the host country.

“…”

Even in such a situation, it was even more ridiculous that Ryu Se-eun and Park Sang-min had expressions showing no concern at all. What were those guys really?

Eventually, Song Hyeon-gyu also let out a deep sigh and watched the other team’s presentation. Once this team finished, it would already be his team’s turn.

‘I wanted to be a bit different.’

Suddenly, the words his older sister used to repeat like a parrot came to mind.

‘She said you should enjoy the process rather than the results.’

It was probably something his older sister had heard directly from that famous EX-rank awakener during the awakening grade examination.

Until then, he had dismissed it as nonsense, but after meeting that person directly at the GateTech Expo, his desire for improvement had ignited like his older sister’s.

So from then on, he had made quite a lot of effort to be different from usual, but what use was all of that now?

‘Enjoy the process, my ass.’

Everything was ruined.

Song Hyeon-gyu looked at the host managing the proceedings with a bitter expression.

Before he knew it, the presenting team’s turn had ended and his turn was approaching.

“The next team is from Korea.”

The host finished a brief team member introduction. Then he checked his cue cards for a moment and made an ‘eh?’ sound.

“It shows that this team hasn’t submitted their artifact yet? Did you perhaps not finish?”

Other participants began murmuring.

“Still not done?”

“They gave them three whole days and they couldn’t do it?”

“…”

It would be surprising. It wasn’t that defects were discovered after completion, but that they couldn’t submit anything at all.

Though Song Hyeon-gyu was usually energetic, he couldn’t easily open his mouth in this situation.

As he hesitated to answer for a moment, the host smiled pleasantly and said.

“Hmm. It seems it’s not completed yet. If you’d like, we could move your presentation order to last.”

He was telling them to complete it late and then present.

At that moment, Song Hyeon-gyu and Ryu Se-eun’s gazes met. She sent him a look as if telling him to decide as he wished, and Song Hyeon-gyu opened his mouth with a dejected voice.

“…No, we won’t postpone it.”

There was no choice. The team leader showed no sign of coming even at this point, so if they postponed it unnecessarily, they’d end up having to postpone it again later.

In that case, it would be much better to just forfeit.

He squeezed his eyes shut and continued speaking.

“Our team will just be excluded from this session…”

—BANG!

That’s when it happened.

Suddenly, the door at the entrance opened roughly as if it might break.

‘What?’

Song Hyeon-gyu stopped what he was saying and whipped his head around.

Everyone in the auditorium focused their attention on the door. No one had left since the presentations began. Questions arose in people’s eyes.

The person who appeared amid such attention was a man dressed in a research coat.

A man with indifferent eyes who straightened his posture.

He felt people’s gazes and hesitated for a moment, then soon smiled and began walking toward the stage.

—Tap, tap, tap.

Only the sound of shoe heels echoed through the quiet auditorium.

After a while, he stepped onto the stage.

The host stepped aside and handed him the microphone, and the man stood in front of the platform, then raised his hand high to show something to the people.

A thin metal alloy band with red luminous filament.

It was an artifact.

“…?!”

Song Hyeon-gyu’s eyes widened.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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