Surviving the Assassin Academy as a Genius Professor - Chapter 16

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 16
EP7 – Bone and Marrow (3)

It began six months ago, during the first semester’s entrance examination at Jamryong Academy—a conflict that had been festering ever since.

Or perhaps it traced even further back, to when the White Path and Black Path first divided and turned their blades against each other.

‘Damn bitch.’

Marina ground her teeth together.
Half a year ago, Marina from Wolryeong Academy had been pushed aside by Elise and scraped into Jamryong Academy by the skin of her teeth—eighth place. Despite her unrequited feelings for Kendrick, that’s what had happened.
From that moment on, she’d despised Elise.

She’d swallowed her irritation, biting her tongue again and again.
But then she’d heard the news, and she couldn’t hold back anymore.

“So you flunked half the written exam for Jamryong’s entrance test?”

Elise blinked and answered.

“Yeah.”
“You’re not even denying it? That’s the problem with you White Path trash. You lot have the power to get into Jamryong no matter what, so you just waltz in on your family’s name without even feeling ashamed, do you?”
“…?”

Elise, confused, shook her head and raised both hands.

“No, I didn’t get in because of my family’s power…”
“What?”
“I did well on the practical examination.”
“Like hell you did. Did you think you were the only one holding a sword? You insane girl?”
“…”
“Hey. Tell me. Was only you holding a sword? You with the blade, and me assassinating with a spoon?”

Marina’s friends chimed in from the side. “This is ridiculous.” “Why are you talking back?” Elise’s lips trembled.

“I… I don’t understand why you hate me so much.”
“You don’t get it?”
“I don’t hate you. We’ve known each other for a long time.”

Marina let out a hollow laugh and stepped closer, shoving Elise’s forehead with her finger.

“Still acting like a good girl. Must be nice. Your head’s full of flowers.”

Elise stumbled backward.

“Honestly, I’m jealous. The White Path can get their kids into Jamryong even if their family’s on the way down. Right? My dad threw money at the academy and it still wasn’t enough for me.”
“…Maybe it just wasn’t enough money?”
“Exactly. You don’t need money. But I do. So it doesn’t matter if I throw money at them—if there’s not enough, I’m out. No title, nothing. Just some nobody daughter from the Black Path Assassination Squad?”

Marina’s breathing grew more ragged. She shoved Elise’s forehead hard.
Thump!
Elise’s body lurched.

“…Stop.”
“You stop. Stop acting good. Stop acting innocent. Stop pretending the whole world is just so wonderful and kind.”
“…”
“Every time you get mad you act good, don’t you? Why? Do you want to kill me right now?”
“…I don’t kill unless it’s a mission.”

Marina burst out laughing.
Then her expression hardened into something fierce.

“How long are you going to keep up this act? Huh? Come on. Come on.”

Marina rushed forward and shoved Elise’s face with her head.

“…Stop. Please. Yeah?”
“Go ahead. Keep going. Keep playing pretend.”

As Elise stumbled backward under the repeated shoves, she stepped into something.
A trap sprung open.

Snap!!

Below her skirt, the jaws bit into her calf and shin. Blood gushed out, streaming across the floor. Elise staggered and fell hard on her backside, and as she did, Marina and her gang doubled over with laughter, cackling “Haha! Pathetic!” Elise made no sound, just the faintest of gasps. She wrenched the trap open and tore it free.
She forced the trap open and pulled it away.

After that, a few more exchanges passed between them.
Every so often, Elise glanced at the professors standing nearby.
But they were neutral faculty, and they simply stood with their hands folded, watching.
Just as they always had.

“…Would you just let me go? If you keep doing this, I’m going to start hating you too.”
“Then what? Are you going to assassinate us or something? Go ahead. Don’t just bark—actually do it!”
“……”
“What? Scared because people are watching? You want me to clear the floor for you?”

Crackle—
Lightning-like Mana Traces burst from Marina’s body. The sign of an Ability awakening. At the same time, tombstones erupted from the ground beneath her feet.
It was Marina’s signature power—the Totem System.

『 Arsenal of Destruction 』

The Totem System was a category of Ability that seized control of a domain, wielding dominant force within that space.
A sixth-level supreme-tier Totem unfolded. The air tore open to reveal over a dozen gun barrels.
Every single muzzle was trained on Elise.

“Die!”

The barrels blazed to life.

Rat-a-tat-tat!!

In a heartbeat, a storm of bullets rained down on Elise. She stumbled but instantly widened her stance, dodging every round.

“See? How is your practical skill any different from mine?”

Rat-a-tat-tat-tat!!

Elise deployed her Movement Technique, evading all the bullets and spreading her stance wider, but in the process a chunk of stone the size of an adult’s head tore free and whipped across her already-injured leg.
Thud!
The same leg the trap had mangled. Blood sprayed. Pain seized her upper body, making her flinch.
And yet Elise simply swayed there with a melancholy look, making no move to strike back. But then—

“Your Concealment is fake too, isn’t it?”
“…What?”
“Your Concealment—it’s just smoke and mirrors, isn’t it? So maybe your father ran afoul of someone and met the same end?”

Marina had finally found the tender wound beneath the surface.
Something inside Elise snapped clean in two.

……

Elise’s world fell silent.

Pink eyes, their gaze unfocused on the ground.
Slowly lifted, meeting Marina’s blue stare.

“Look—the filthy thing’s finally dropping her mask!”

Now the true battle would begin.
Marina expanded her Ability.

Crack-crack-crack—

Two more Totems materialized in rapid succession.
Three pairs of cannon muzzles emerged from the void, alongside a staff thrumming with mana, spears and swords taking shape.
As one of the three Totems released its mana, the surrounding space bloomed into a spherical darkness of Illusion Magic.

「 Dark Barrier 」

If no one could tell who had killed whom, the sentence might be reduced.
Simultaneously, massive Mana Traces erupted from Marina’s companions’ bodies.

Snap—!

They too unleashed the Totem System Ability, bringing the total to five Totems summoned.

……

Trembling, her upper body swaying.
Elise wiped all expression from her face and reached for her waist.

Whisk—

Something scraped free from empty air with a soft friction.
A weapon invisible to the eye, the will to murder given form—a Legend Grade instrument.

「 Formless Sword 」

Her reason for avoiding combat had always been simple: she did not know how to fight without killing.
Murdering outside sanctioned assassination carried expulsion as the maximum penalty. But now such concerns had bleached away to nothing.
Elise closed her eyes.

……

Time froze around her.
This was the secret Ability passed down through her family line.

「 Thorny Forest Walk 」

Marina’s group seized the moment as their opportunity, drawing mana to unleash their assault.
Snap—!

“Kill her—!!”

A vicious roar tore through the air. Now they had no choice but to kill each other.
In that hairbreadth moment—

‘What?’

……Something changed. An anomaly bloomed.
Something began to interfere with the entire domain of the Totem.

─── .

The weapons slipped from their control and began to bend.
The blade tips, the staff ends, the gun barrels—all of them.

‘What is this.’

Every weapon aimed at Elise slowly curved away, redirecting toward their wielders.

‘What? What? Damn. What the—?’

When even the thick cannon barrel began to creak and bend—creak, creak—Marina and the cadets recoiled in horror.

‘What—what—what??’

It was incomprehensible.
This space existed within the domain of their Totem.
The Totem was an Ability designed to assassinate every existence within a space.
The Mana difference between inside and outside this domain exceeded three times.
In other words, within this space, they were like gods.
And yet.

‘How is my Ability……?’

The gun in her hand felt as though it were lodged in her own mouth—a dizzying disconnect. Control over her body stripped away entirely, a moment of pure helplessness. In that instant.

Elise’s eyes opened. The first thing they saw was Marina’s back.
Squelch—
A blade pierced through Marina’s abdomen and erupted from the other side.
Spray—!
Blood fountained as the other cadets still failed to comprehend what had happened.
It had been too fast, and in the moment Marina’s belly was pierced, there was simply nothing to see.
Half a beat too late, Marina felt something foreign in her abdomen. Seeing the protruding blade, she gasped.

‘—When?’

But Elise did not stop. Another cadet’s arm came into view. Elise’s forearm blurred beneath it.
Crack—
With a sharp, clean sound, the cadet’s arm tore free at the shoulder, completely severed.
But Elise did not stop. Next came a different cadet’s thigh in her line of sight.
Crack—
A dull sound, and a limb was cleaved away. Her body began to collapse diagonally.
But Elise did not stop. Finally, Marina’s head entered her field of vision. Those blue eyes—suddenly so close.
All of this unfolded in less than two seconds, a mere instant.
Yet Elise’s motion ceased not because the final attack was aimed at a human head.
It was because the ‘human’ she’d grown rather fond of recently now blocked her path.
Those pink eyes looking down at her made her heart lurch. Like a dog caught in some grave misdeed.

“Professor.”

He came to an abrupt halt.
Time, suspended, began to flow again. A sharp, high-pitched scream cut through the air. Marina clutched her abdomen and sank to her knees.
Elise remained motionless. Yet the excitement welling up inside her was impossible to hide—her hands trembled violently.

“Please step aside. Just for a moment.”

Dante narrowed his eyes. “Enough,” he said. But Elise shook her head.

“No, I can’t. I can’t stop myself. Professor, you have to move.”

Her hands trembled. Her pupils trembled worse. Her breathing came ragged. Her legs quivered as though ready to spring.

Drip.

Blood began to flow from Elise’s nose.

She was not calm. This situation was no different from tying down a maddened dog with a single thread.
Elise knew this truth: when she reached this state, she could not stop. In all her life, only her father had ever halted her. After that, no one had ever stopped her again.

“Professor. Please step aside. I’m begging you….”

And so she begged him to move. Before the single thread of reason she barely held snapped. Before she lost her mind and attacked even him, the one she favored….

But what returned was only a single word.
A command so cold and absolute.

“Sit.”

In that instant, Elise’s emotion came to a dead stop.
Like a runaway train smashing into a mine wall.

“….”

The tremor in her eyes subsided. The tension drained from her fingertips. An invisible blade clattered to the floor. Clang. Slowly, her body—stained with another’s blood—sank lower.

Elise dropped to her knees on the ground.
Like a good dog before its master.

By then, Marina had wiped the blood spilling from her mouth. In the dizzy rush of so much happening at once, her gaze fixed on one man.

‘That person….’

A face she had seen before. Kendrick, whom she harbored an unrequited affection for and believed stronger than any professor, had repeatedly shown inferiority to this new instructor.
Their eyes met.

Hiccup.

A hiccup sounded beside her. Marina stemmed the bleeding with mana and clenched her teeth.

‘What is this. What the hell is this!!’

This could not end here. Elise was of Jamryong Academy, of the White Path. Touching this meant Marina already had much at stake.
And so, as she braced herself further, the professor who had calmed Elise approached her and issued a command.

“Release your Totem.”

A voice that sent chills down her spine. Within the Dark Barrier, her world—yet a voice that crushed her completely.

“…Why? This isn’t my fault.”
“….”
“She started it! She did! At Jamryong Academy, in the White Path! Using her noble privilege! That bastard disrespected me first…!!”

Marina launched into a desperate rebuttal.
The professor looked down at her, speaking in a measured tone.

“Release.”

She could not meet those pink eyes.
Marina lowered her head.

…….

The Dark Barrier that had encircled them finally dissolved—like a soap bubble collapsing in slow motion.
The totems she had so eagerly summoned lost their power, crumbling to dust.
Dante then turned toward the assembled neutral faculty and shouted.

“You there. Clean this up.”

While the neutral professors stood rigidly frozen.
A handful of the more capable junior faculty sprang into action—calling the Medical Corps and the Discipline Bureau, notifying the Black Path and White Path, isolating the cadets.
Mercifully, no one had died. The wounded were all in stable condition.

The midday clash of wills ended there.

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