Surviving as a Mage in a Magic Academy - Chapter 372

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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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Chapter 372

Lee Han’s expression became slightly serious.

“Please call me comfortably.”

“I, I am calling you comfortably though?”

“…”

“That was just a slip of the tongue.”

The upperclassmen belatedly tried to regain their dignity.

Of course, it was surprising that Lee Han’s mana was at an unheard-of level, but weren’t they the seniors who entered Einroguard first?

They couldn’t abandon their dignity as upperclassmen.

“But just how much do you have?”

“Even if there aren’t strong ones among the undead in Zone 1, does it make sense for them to run away just from sensing mana? Didn’t the professor exaggerate?”

* * *

It made sense.

The upperclassmen who witnessed the ghoul hound that appeared in the opposite passage whimpering and running away looked at Lee Han with eyes that had seen something unbelievable.

“How many times is that?”

“Si, six times.”

“Isn’t it much more effective than undead repelling potions? We won’t need them, will we?”

Originally, exploring the Undead Realm was a lonely and suffocating task.

Mages had to cast dark vision magic and then carefully step forward while being cautious even of their breathing.

Loud noises, heavy breathing, sweat, or body odor attracted undead, and fighting undead would cause more undead to swarm upon hearing the commotion.

At this point, gathering and exploration became meaningless and they had to focus only on combat.

To avoid such situations, they had to thoroughly avoid enemies from the beginning.

Using undead repelling potions to prevent approach was a good method, but it had the disadvantage of heavy potion consumption.

However, today they discovered a new method.

A living human undead repeller!

“This way. Junior.”

“Detected undead. Junior. Walk quickly over there! Yes! That’s right! The undead are running away!”

“Stand here for a moment! So they can’t come!”

Seeing Lee Han standing there, Diret apologized with an apologetic voice.

“Sorry. Junior. Are we working you too hard?”

“Huh? No. Honestly, this is pretty easy.”

“…I, I see.”

“Ah. There’s a shadow bug here!”

“I’m coming with the collection net now!”

Seeing the underclassmen taking out equipment and running over at Lee Han’s shout, Diret thought to himself.

‘…Won’t the positions of upperclassmen and underclassmen be switched in about half a year…’

* * *

About two days after Lee Han’s group entered, Bakdeggul in the village began to feel something was strange.

“…This is odd.”

Originally, it wasn’t common for there to be a two-day error from the scheduled overlap date.

Other parties in the village seemed to feel it too, as he could see them gathering in the clearing and murmuring in conversation.

“What do the knights say?”

“They say it hasn’t opened yet, that they’ll let us know first as soon as it opens, over and over…”

“…Don’t tell me those bastards?”

Bakdeggul felt an ominous feeling creeping up.

People with some brains in the Empire didn’t trust knights.

Knights had their own solid internal logic and would often break promises as they pleased.

“Check the surroundings first. See if there are any missing parties!”

“Un, understood!”

“And keep probing the knights! If they react strangely, push them hard. If the knights have something to hide, they won’t be able to come on strong!”

When they sent people to poke around here and there, clues quickly emerged.

A group of mages who came a few days ago hadn’t been seen for a while, and one or two of the knights had been avoiding eye contact.

Once the answer became clear, Bakdeggul’s face turned red with rage.

“How dare these knight bastards?!”

“So… sorry!”

“Call all the guys who are resting. We’ll depart right now!”

Bakdeggul gritted his teeth, vowing to repay this debt someday.

He was letting it slide because his purpose was more important, but these knights were truly detestable.

“Sir Knight! Is it true that the dimension has opened?”

“What is this! Why are you hiding it from us!”

Other adventure parties that had been gathered in the clearing came rushing over to confront them first.

Those who heard the rumors late were very indignant and shouted.

“Answer us!”

“I think there’s a misunderstanding.”

“What!?”

“The dimension opened an hour ago.”

“…”

“…What do you mean…! We heard! Two days ago, something black was writhing and spreading in the forest! Wasn’t that the entrance opening!”

“That was a false rumor.”

“When such strange phenomena occur, false rumors usually spread along with them.”

‘Really damn shameless bastards!’

The adventurers were amazed by the knights’ iron wall of never admitting their wrongdoing even in this situation.

It wasn’t for nothing that not just anyone could be a knight.

“Then why are you telling us now about something that opened an hour ago?”

“If we had announced it immediately for people to enter as soon as it opened, how much damage would there have been from fighting each other? Look at the current situation.”

“At times like this, an orderly entrance is necessary.”

“…”

The adventurers realized that arguing further would only be a loss for them.

‘Son of a bitch.’

‘Be cursed.’

They moved their steps toward the dimensional entrance while fuming quietly. Bakdeggul also followed behind with his party.

He wanted to start a sword fight right away, but he couldn’t cause a disturbance.

“So… sorry.”

“…”

“We will definitely find and secure the mushroom.”

“If you don’t want to die, you’d better. Scout the other parties properly. If there are any who found the mushroom’s location…”

At his superior’s words that seemed to reek of blood even when spoken quietly, the subordinate trembled and nodded.

* * *

“Found it! Found it!”

“Dig it out quickly!”

“Should I help too?”

“No. You can just stand still.”

“Don’t waste your energy unnecessarily. You’ll consume mana.”

Gainando and Raphadael grumbled as they picked mushrooms from the ground and put them in their baskets.

‘I’m good at just standing still too!’

Unlike Lee Han, the other first-year students received no special treatment. They had to work as much as they came.

“Coming earlier than others really made a big difference. It looks like we swept up everything in Zone 1.”

“Right? I think we’ve gotten everything we can get now.”

The upperclassmen put their heads together and compared the maps each had drawn.

Though it was a winding, complex cave, thanks to the mages wandering around for two days, it was fairly well completed.

“We’ve checked everything here.”

“This side is all done too. We’ve mined all the shadow stones that were attached to the walls.”

“We might need to start heading toward Zone 2 soon.”

When Gainando sent a pitiful look, the upperclassmen spoke as if they understood.

“We’ll send you guys out before going in, so don’t worry.”

“Unlike other times, we’ve gained a lot of time so we have plenty. It’s enough.”

* * *

“You kept it open for two whole days?”

“Hehe. It wasn’t very difficult.”

The students who came outside were surprised when they heard the explanation from the knight, thinking they must have gained a lot of time and completed their maps.

To think they gained two whole days.

“I was wondering why I didn’t see other people…”

Lee Han, who was listening, suddenly remembered something and asked.

“Wait. Then the people who entered late won’t have anything to collect in Zone 1, right?”

“That’s right. But what can we do about it.”

“They should have come early if they felt wronged.”

“Or they can enter Zone 2.”

At the shameless reaction of the dark mages, Lee Han thought he understood just a little bit why dark mages were cursed at in the Empire.

“There’s nothing to feel sorry about at all. Junior. We did what we had to do. Let’s rest and organize our materials a bit before going in.”

“It’s great that we can rest a bit before entering Zone 2.”

The upperclassmen spoke joyfully.

Of course, since they had to save on expenses, resting just meant eating some rough food from the inn and lying down, but it was much more comfortable than wandering around nervously inside the gloomy undead dimension.

“Um, how about we ask the merchants to get us more food? I think you’ll lack energy if you only eat what comes from the inn… The merchants are probably troubled by the shortage of mountain ring mushrooms right now, so they’d welcome it even if we exchange just a little.”

“…Junior, can’t you just skip a grade and come to our year??”

At the sight of their junior making such an appealing suggestion that made their ears perk up just hearing it, the students were moved to tears.

* * *

“I was going to kill you anyway, so this works out well. Kill them!”

“How, how dare you?!”

When Pakdgul’s subordinates started swinging their swords, the other party was shocked.

They had picked a fight thinking these were just bookworms who came to watch after hearing rumors, but such a sudden ambush.

“Kill them!”

“These bastards took what we were going to get first! Destroy them and take it!”

The parties that entered the empty Zone 1 late were suddenly caught up in internal strife.

At first, the parties wandered around thinking it was just bad luck and that something useful would appear soon, but their nerves became sharp and they started suspecting other parties.

-Didn’t those bastards collect everything first and come out?

-The way they moved first was suspicious, could it be…

The air was taut with tension.

The first to break this situation was none other than Pakdgul.

He had no intention of bringing along such unnecessary competitors when he needed to gather materials anyway.

Since he was going to kill them anyway, when they even picked a fight, Pakdgul’s subordinates thought it worked out well and swung their swords to attack the other adventure parties.

“Block them!! It’s an attack!!”

“Duck your heads! Raise your shields! Arrows are coming!”

“Don’t let those bastards use potions!”

“Scrolls! Where are the scrolls?!”

Shouts flew in all directions, and other parties who heard them from afar were also shaken and started swinging weapons.

“If you approach, we’ll kill you! Don’t come closer!”

“You’re the ones who were fighting earlier, aren’t you? Don’t come near! If you don’t want to be suspected!”

A hair-trigger atmosphere where they would mercilessly swing weapons if they got close to each other.

Pakdgul didn’t care.

“Since it’s come to this, let’s clean them all out.”

“Are, are you sure that’s okay?”

“Looking at the current situation, it’s better to deal with them all rather than leave them be. Even if it’s a bit tiring, we’ll endure it and handle them. Zone 2 comes after that.”

* * *

The students who finished recharging entered again.

This time the number of people was reduced by about half. It was because their target was Zone 2.

“You’ll feel the difference the moment you enter too.”

“Cough. The undead in Zone 2 will charge at you even if they’re scared of mana. They’re that vicious.”

“Of course, if you avoid them well, you won’t have to meet them, so you don’t need to worry about that.”

“More than that, junior. Should I carry your luggage?”

The upperclassmen worried that Lee Han might get tired carrying luggage.

If Lee Han got tired, his mana would decrease too, and then the undead repeller for Zone 1 would weaken as well…

“Wait.”

Professor Mortum frowned and spoke.

“A fight has broken out.”

“Inside here?”

“How long has it been since it opened?”

It wasn’t a rare occurrence, but it wasn’t that frequent either.

The students were puzzled by the sight of other people already fighting.

“Cough. Normally I wouldn’t interfere, but this case is a bit…”

The fight Professor Mortum saw with his scrying magic was one side unilaterally attacking the other.

“Should we prepare to fight?”

“No. Cough. Their skills are quite decent, so there’d be nothing good about fighting them.”

“Can’t we send undead to drive them away instead? They’re people too, so wouldn’t they get tired if undead keep swarming them?”

At Lee Han’s question, Professor Mortum was about to say what kind of nonsense that was, but stopped.

“…That seems like it might work. It’s not dangerous either.”

“We have an undead repeller here, so it’s definitely possible!”

“Hey. Idiot. Junior is listening.”

“…”

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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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