The S-Rank Warden Devours the Academy - Chapter 13

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

Episode 13

Screeeee—
A horde of monsters with massive bodies.
At least twenty of them, by the look of it.
The Golden Mole twitched its snout, sniffing as if searching for prey.
The students, not yet grasping the situation, wore blank expressions.
Yeom Sa-hyeon leaned his back against a massive boulder and spoke with casual indifference.
“Whoever downs the first monster gets bonus points.”
“!”
Tae Eun-o’s ears perked up.
“That one’s mine!”
He swiftly surveyed his target and took his stance.

[Wind Slash (AA+) skill activated!]

A bow drawn in empty air.
He drew his arm back as if drawing a bowstring, then released.
A razor-sharp gust of wind tore through the air.
Screeeech—!
The Golden Mole shrieked in agony.
Blood sprayed from its neck.
Before the creature could regain its senses, Eun-o vaulted over its back in an instant.
Slash—!
Back, wrists, waist—successive razor-edged strikes poured down.
And shortly after.
Boom—!
The first monster finally fell.
At the same moment, the system alert chimed.

[Monster Defeat Count]
Tae Eun-o – 1
Yeom Sa-hyeon – 0
…….

The score updated.
“First place!!”
Eun-o caught his breath and thrust both fists skyward in triumph.
Sa-hyeon recalled the student records Hae-seong had mentioned.
“So he trained before his Awakening, after all.”
The natural agility that came with a Wind Attribute.
Even with his ability stats lowered by half a rank like Sa-hyeon’s, he remained sharp. His focus and accuracy were both solid.
The only problem was excessive motion—he was wasting stamina on unnecessary flourishes.
Sa-hyeon offered a brief assessment and turned his gaze to the other two.
“Last place gets a makeup exam.”
“What?!”
“That can’t be…!”
Go Gyeol and Ha Jae-yun, who had been watching Eun-o’s combat, protested in alarm.
“If you don’t like it, you two teach the class instead.”
Sa-hyeon tilted his chin at an angle.
“Ugh…!”
Gyeol squeezed his eyes shut and scrubbed his head roughly.
Only Eun-o flashed a carefree grin.
“Let’s do our best, everyone~”
His tone was brimming with confidence, as if he alone had nothing to worry about.
“I absolutely can’t fail this test…!”
Jae-yun was especially anxious.
Just then.
Shriek—!
A Golden Mole seized on his voice with relentless precision.
The creature’s massive body wheeled toward Jae-yun, charging headlong.
Jae-yun swallowed hard, as if steeling himself for what came next.
He drove both feet deep into the sand.
Boom—!
He caught the monster’s full assault across his spread arms.
The impact thundered like a traffic collision.
The recoil from deflecting the Golden Mole launched Jae-yun skyward in a steep arc.
At the apex, silhouetted against the glaring desert sun, he had dwindled to a speck.
Then he plummeted, gathering speed as he fell.
Crash—!
When he struck, the sand erupted—a crater the size of a small building bloomed beneath him.
The Golden Mole, caught at the point of impact, was crushed flat.
Ping—
The system notification chimed.

[Monster Subjugation Count]
Tae Eun-o – 1
Ha Jae-yun – 1
…….

‘The other one shows promise if he trains harder.’
His method was to absorb the monster’s impact and amplify it with his own force—explosive and direct.
Sa-hyeon’s attention swung toward where the combat sounds were fiercest.
The moment Jae-yun claimed his kill.
Eun-o was already hunting his second target.
The creature was exhausted, barely standing.
Eun-o was raising his blade for the finishing stroke.
“That one’s mine.”
“?!”
Go Gyeol materialized from nowhere, dropping light as a feather onto the monster’s back.
Before Eun-o could react, Gyeol drove his dagger deep into the creature’s throat.
“Ugh. Blood. So sticky.”
Gyeol flicked the gore from his palm without a trace of concern.
Ping—

[Monster Subjugation Count]
Go Gyeol – 1
Ha Jae-yun – 1
Tae Eun-o – 1
…….

The kill went to Gyeol after all.
“What—? Stealing it at the last second like that?”
Eun-o exhaled sharply, clearly exasperated.
“Hey, sir! Is that even allowed?!”
As Eun-o lodged his protest, Sa-hyeon lifted one eyebrow with utter calm.
Using the Stealth Attribute well, aren’t you.
“That’s how real combat works.”
Gyeol let out a satisfied laugh.
“He’s got a point.”
“…Damn it!”
Eun-o hissed between gritted teeth, seething.
Then he pivoted his attention to a Golden Mole some distance away, choosing it as his next target.
Even as Gyeol crept closer, Eun-o growled a warning, staying alert to his presence.

[Monster Subjugation Count]
Go Gyeol – 1
Ha Jae-yun – 1
Tae Eun-o – 1
…….

And so the points were divided evenly among them.
Yeom Sa-hyeon crouched low, watching the three of them fight.
Though to call it mere watching would have been understating his role.

“You’re diving in at that moment?”
“Might as well be offering yourself up as a meal, the way you’re going about it.”
“I have to wonder what they taught you at the Academy.”

His criticism came without pause.
“You need to ambush when your opponent is at their weakest, don’t you?”
Go Gyeol finally lost his patience.
“Oh, come on! Like I don’t know that!”
Yeom Sa-hyeon tilted his chin up and spoke with practiced calm.
“Seemed like you didn’t.”
“Seriously―”
Go Gyeol’s head tilted back, venting his frustration.
Then his brow furrowed.
‘When is the Golden Mole weakest?’
He gripped his weapon again, half-convinced of something.
The Golden Mole burst through the sand.
Go Gyeol rushed forward and slashed its neck deep.
Unlike before, the creature couldn’t counter and collapsed.
“…Ah.”
So that was what he meant.
A breath of realization escaped Go Gyeol.
The Golden Mole dwelt in the dark underground.
They were accustomed to the cool temperature and darkness of the depths.
Which meant their weakest moment came when exposed to the hot, bright sunlight of the Desert.
‘How did I not think to apply that?’
They’d drilled this theory until it was burned into memory.
He gripped and released his weapon, caught between bewilderment and newfound clarity.
Another Golden Mole rushed at him, forcing his focus back to combat.

Yeom Sa-hyeon smiled faintly and surveyed the field broadly.
Each of them was managing their tiny, assigned role well enough.
And remarkably, one person stood out with genuine tactical skill.

“Two of them just burrowed into the sand—everyone stay sharp!”
“Eun-o! The Golden Mole’s sense of smell is acute, so adjusting the wind direction to disorient them might work well too!”

Quite competent coaching, actually.
Now that he thought about it, wasn’t that one stationed in the Education Department?
Teaching might be his calling; I could groom him to take my position instead.
‘…Not half bad.’
I was already thinking about making a move soon anyway.
Running a practical coaching exercise this time wouldn’t be a bad idea.
Yeom Sa-hyeon marveled at his own inspiration and spoke to Hae-seong.
“You can handle it without me.”
“? Yes? What do you mean?”
Hae-seong turned to him, bewildered.
Yeom Sa-hyeon patted his shoulder once, twice, and said what he came to say.
“Do your best.”
“Wait―”
Before Hae-seong could respond, Yeom Sa-hyeon waved and vanished, leaving only an afterimage.
“―Sa-hyeon! Where are you going!!”
Hae-seong’s cry scattered into the empty air.

* * *

A few hours earlier.
A high school somewhere in Suwon City.
Control barriers had been erected around the school perimeter.
The campus, emptied of all people, held a desolate quality.
In the center of the Sports Field stood an enormous Gate, the size of a gymnasium.
Whiiiine—
Then, at that moment.
The Gate began to vibrate violently.
It had been spilling an unstable, dark-blue light.
Now that glow suddenly dimmed, as if a switch had been flipped.
And shortly after.
Hummmmm—
A man emerged from the Gate.
His white hair caught the moonlight, shimmering with pale brilliance.
“…Quiet.”
The platinum-haired man exhaled a breath tinged with relief, then swept his blood-dripping blade through the air with a broad arc.
Crimson droplets scattered across the sky.
He shook the blood free, then sheathed the sword into an Equipment Belt fastened at his waist.
The blade vanished in an instant.
Hummmmm—
In the meantime, another figure burst from within the Gate.
“Eight hours, fifty-eight minutes, thirty-five seconds. A-rank Gate record.”
Her exotic features caught the eye.
A woman with short hair tinged a sky-blue hue spoke in an even, toneless voice while keeping her gaze fixed on her smartphone.
Hummmmm—
More faces emerged from the Gate in succession.
“—Come on, Guild Master. Could you slow down a little?”
A boy with a slight frame and youthful features grumbled as he hurried after them.
Once all three had exited, the Gate warped as if it were a black hole, then vanished in an instant.
The Sports Field lay empty now, as if nothing had ever been there at all.
The boy turned to look back at where the Gate had been, his eyes filled with regret. “It really pains me. The Mana Stones we left inside—do you know what they’re worth?”
“Senior, surely you’ve already collected enough to buy a building or two in Gangnam…”
The woman murmured quietly, her eyes still fixed on her smartphone screen.
The boy protested with an aggrieved expression.
“If you’d given me just a little more time, I could’ve bought five buildings, not one!”
“This is a disaster situation. If something were to happen while we were still inside, it would be troublesome. That’s why we need to exit as quickly as possible.”
The platinum-haired man replied, brushing blood droplets from his white shirt.
“Still, aren’t all the Gates in South Korea cleared by the Guild Master alone?”
At the boy’s sullen remark, the woman answered without shifting her gaze from her smartphone.
“Nearly so, yes. Without Iwon senior, there are scarcely any Hunters capable of clearing S-rank Gates. It’s fair to say so.”
“…That’s true.”
The platinum-haired man spoke with a bitter smile.
Baek Iwon—the current top-ranked Hunter in South Korea and Guild Master of the Goyo Guild.
He had pushed hard to clear this Gate quickly for precisely this reason.
The gap left by Lee Ha-je, who had held the second-ranked position, loomed large.
“As if I didn’t know that. If it were urgent, the Association would’ve contacted me already!”
The boy cast a dissatisfied look at the woman, then glanced at the smartphone screen she was focused on.
“River, why do you always check the Hunter community forums the moment we exit a Gate?”
“It allows me to grasp other guilds’ movements at a glance.”
The woman called River answered with a serious expression.
“…You’re really something else.”
The boy shook his head in resignation.
Beep-beep-beep—
Beep-beep-beep—
Beep-beep-beep—!
At that moment, all three of their smartphones chimed in unison, as if they’d been waiting.
River’s eyes remained fixed on her screen as she spoke in a dry tone.
“Gate alert.”
The alert text about the Gate, which hadn’t gone through while he was inside, had arrived belatedly.
“Our hammer uncle, when are you going to invent an item that lets us receive disaster alerts even inside a Gate~?”
“That would be ridiculously expensive….”
While the two of them chatted, Iwon furrowed his brow and checked the message.

[14:32 Seocho Intersection A-rank Creature Felcon Appearance: Nearby residents please evacuate immediately to designated shelters―]

Creature Felcon?
Iwon’s expression grew grave, his brow drawing tight. The boy’s mouth fell open in shock.
“Creature Felcon?! Insane. Isn’t Seocho District totally screwed?”
“Bi-su.”
Iwon cautioned the boy over his crude language. Bi-su’s lips twisted petulantly, but he closed his mouth obediently.
Beep—beep—beep—
Another alert sounded in quick succession.
River’s eyebrows rose as she parted her lips.
“It seems they suppressed it quickly.”

[14:59 Seocho Intersection Situation Resolved: Civilian access restrictions will remain in effect until 22:00 today. We apologize for the inconvenience―]

“Right? But….”
Bi-su tilted his head, puzzled.
“Who did it?”
“Everyone’s talking about that already.”
River shrugged and held her smartphone screen toward Iwon.

-Felcon 30-minute clear real talk?
└That’d be S-rank then?? New S-rank Awakened showing up??
└Does the ranking change?
└└Nah lmao hasn’t moved in 2 years
└└And there’s no Lee Ha-je anymore so isn’t it time for a generational shift??
…….

Everyone was speculating about who had defeated the Creature Felcon.

-But seriously there’s literally zero info lol If S-rank showed up the Association or media would’ve bragged all over the place already so why the silence?

Bi-su, who had poked his head to the side and was watching the screen next to Iwon, spoke in bewilderment.
“Exactly! Plus, if someone had that much skill, there’s no way we wouldn’t know about them, right?”
“…It is strange.”
Iwon narrowed his eyes and murmured quietly.
All the top-tier Hunters across the nation had been dispatched to Gates.
That was also why Iwon had rushed through his own Gate conquest.
Among the Hunters on standby outside, there was no one capable of dealing with a Creature Felcon. Yet it had been taken care of this quickly?
“Then I’ll be heading off to rest now, seniors. Thank you for your hard work.”
River took back her phone as though her job was finished.
She bowed her head and walked away with an unhurried gait.
Before long, her silhouette scattered and dissolved into the darkness.
Iwon, who had watched her in silence, finished his thoughts and turned to Bi-su.
“Bi-su, could you open a Portal for me?”
I need to check something.
“Again?”
Bi-su shifted his weight to one leg, dissatisfied.
“Dammit, Guild Master. Please don’t use my skill like a taxi service?”
“Moving one person isn’t that taxing, is it?”
Iwon flashed a gentle smile, and Bi-su laughed hollowly in disbelief before protesting.
“You could just use your own Space Skill!”
“I don’t think I should use my Space Skill today.”
“Why?”
Could he have gotten hit with a Skill Restriction Debuff from fighting the boss earlier?
Bi-su blinked.
Baek Iwon shrugged casually and replied.
“The fortune app says I should hold back. Apparently today’s energy flow is unbalanced, so it’s not favorable.”
“…Ah, the headache.”
That damned fortune app again.
Han Bi-su pressed the back of his neck and squeezed his eyes shut.
Ranked first in the nation, the guildmaster of South Korea’s top guild: Goyo Guild.
Did the public know that his morning routine consisted of checking the Hunter fortune app?
‘Is our Goyo Guild really okay like this?’
It was precisely when Bi-su had sunk into doubt.
“One more.”
At Baek Iwon’s single word, Bi-su’s eyes snapped open.
Baek Iwon added with a grin.
“How about it.”
Bi-su answered with a radiant smile.
“I’ll guard you safely.”
Of course it’s fine then.
A guildmaster with deep pockets truly is the best.

Episode 13: S-rank Instructor Devours the Academy

Author
Baek Ruga
Publisher
Daon Creative
Planning / Editing / Production
Yoon Tae-ri
Cover Illustration
Tompu

UCI
G720:N+A036-20260512043.0014

ⓒ2026, Baek Ruga

※ This e-book is a copyrighted work protected under the Copyright Law of the Republic of Korea.
No part or all of this work may be reproduced or modified in any form without permission from the author and publisher.

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