Reader Mage 89-I’d Do Anything To Be Immortal

rlin was the first to arrive at the disciplinary committee’s office. Or so he had thought.

“rlin! Hi!” Kim Minji was dutifully stacking together Senior Sun-Hee’s comic books as she tried her best to keep the room tidy. rlin knew she had good intentions, but she really was gutsy, touching that cold woman’s books like that. Didn’t she consider the possibility of freezing to death? “How are you doing? Are you all better now? You should be resting?” She poured questions upon questions, overwhelming rlin as she crossed the room to bob up before him where he was standing. Too closely too, that rlin had to lean back to put so space between both of them.

“I’m fine,” he replied. “What about you? I don’t think we’ve actually talked since that day at the ward.”

She wrung up her nose, seemingly annoyed—at the question? rlin wasn’t sure. He blinked.

“I kept texting you and got no replies,” she said. “Even after Monday’s and Tuesday's classes, you just vanished. I thought you were avoiding .”

rlin blinked. “What? I wouldn’t. My phone got spoiled so I was unable to reply to my ssages, and I’ll be honest, I’m not really good at keeping track of things like that. It’s kinda overwhelming sotis.” He then stretched a tote bag at her. “Thank you for the humidifier. I know it took too long to return and I apologize. I promise I didn’t use it after that day at the ward, I just didn’t get a chance to bring it over to you. And I totally forgot on Monday and Tuesday.”

Kim Minji stared at him for a second and chuckled. She took the tote bag and said, “ssages scare you?”

rlin’s forehead creased. “Erm… Not exactly. It can just be overwhelming sotis.”

She pursed her lips in thought. “Ah. So you must prefer calls instead. Noted.”

He hadn’t said that, but he didn’t mind receiving calls from her. Sotis he always thought his phone was too dry to be a phone. Maybe that was why he never really considered checking his ssages. After all, it was not that ssages were overwhelming, it was just that he barely received any so he thought there was no point in checking them and just muted the app totally so that he didn’t feel depressed about the whole thing.

“Oh! The freshn are here!” President Sakamoto’s voice poured into the room as he sauntered in. rlin was about to turn around to give his greetings when an arm wrapped around his shoulder. “Are you feeling better now? It was nasty back then, and then again after.”

rlin’s lips twitched because he understood what the president was talking about with those vague words.

He sighed. “I’m better now. Thank you for stepping in when you did.

“No big deal!” President Sakamoto slapped rlin’s back, sending him sauntering forward. “Well, you guys aren’t on duty today, so why are you here?”

rlin was about to give his reasons when Senior Will and Senior Sun-Hee walked in as well. He bowed to them in greetings, but their eyes lingered on him far longer than was normal—at least to them.

That video had done a lot to change how others viewed him, hadn’t it?

“No reason in particular,” Kim Minji replied to the president’s question. I just ca to tidy up the place.

“Oh, tidy…” President Sakamoto nodded. Then his nods slowed. And then his face paled. “Tidy? Say, Minji-chan, you didn’t touch Sun-Hee’s books, did you?”

Oh, shit…

rlin’s breath froze. He shifted his eyes slightly towards Senior Sun-Hee, and even if no one could figure it out, he could. She was silently fuming. He had only guessed it earlier, but she really didn’t like anyone touching her books.

Kim Minji, however, was still oblivious to what exactly was going on.

“Ah, yeah,” she said with a smile. “They were all littered about and—”

President Sakamoto pounced on her and grabbed her by the shoulders. “No~ She keeps it that way because it’s easier for her to figure out which she was reading and at what ti before putting it down.” He glanced over his shoulder at Sun-Hee who was still silent but obviously fuming. rlin wondered how that functioned. If he got angry, the world would know in an instant. People were weird. “I’ll make sure she doesn’t do it again, Sun-Hee,” President Sakamoto pleaded. “Just let her be this once?”

Senior Sun-Hee stared at her books, then at President Sakamoto, and at Kim Minji who was still blinking obliviously. Then she shot a glare at rlin, startling him and prompting him to point a finger at himself.

What had he done?

She pounced out of the room a second later.

Well, rlin wasn’t letting her leave just like that. He bowed at his other two seniors, waved Kim Minji goodbye, and hurried after Sun-Hee.

“Senior Sun-Hee,” he called. “Hold up!” She didn’t stop. “Wait!” Then she did.

“What is it?” she asked as she turned around. “Don’t you have classes?”

“They start by eight,” rlin replied, bobbing up before her. She would have known the answer to that question of hers if only she dutifully attended classes like a student was supposed to. He wondered where she was even headed now; after all, soone who preferred to read comics than studying had limited places in the Academy to go to.

“So? What do you want?” she went on.

rlin straightened on his feet. He just noticed that he was a bit taller than her.

“You didn’t co to the practical like you said you would,” he started. She had not believed in his ability to use anti-magic, so he had brought up the option of her coming to watch him in action. Of course, he was well aware as to why she might not have done that, but he couldn’t just jump right to the real reason why he had stopped her, so he decided to beat around the bush first. Otherwise it would have been rude.

“I never said I would,” Sun-Hee replied, her tone the sa impassive one as always. “And, besides, I already saw what I needed to see.”

rlin nodded. Good. “Then… Have you thought about teaching ?” he asked, his real intentions for approaching her now brought to the surface. “Ti is flying by and I don’t want to lag behind my mates.”

As expected, Nora and Kim Yiseo had been unable to clear the syllabus like they had been intending, showing how superior Senior Sun-Hee was to them. They had tried their best though; Nora had gotten halfway, while Kim Yiseo got a quarter through it. They were not giving up, though. Now they were gunning for clearing the syllabus before the end of the term, so they could kick back and relax in the second term.

“It’s weird, though,” started Sun-Hee, prompting rlin to arch his brows. “In the video, you fought like soone well versed in the theory.”

rlin blinked. “I’m sorry?”

She eyed him from head to toe, folded her arms, and angled her body. “Fighting isn’t completely brute force, especially when battling against monsters, and smart ones like the Ice Wyverns. To be able to do what you did, regardless of anti-magic, one has to be well aware of the chanics surrounding monsters and how to use the terrain to their advantage, which are all theoretical aspects. One who lags behind in theory shouldn’t be able to apply sothing they don’t know about in the heat of battle.”

rlin’s eyes twitched. “Have you ever thought that maybe it was just pure luck?”

Senior Sun-Hee raised a brow. “Didn’t seem like that to .”

Well, she was right. It was not that he was abysmally bad in theory, his learning process just differed from other students. Big words hurt his brain, so they had to be dumbed down for him, which was why fictional terms and analogies helped in his understanding greatly. His application during the battle all ca from reading Singularity Mage, but even it didn’t focus on all the theoretical aspects of magic. So, if he only depended on it, he would be heading for a swift failure at the end of the term. And he knew the headmaster wasn’t joking when he had said his admission would be revoked if he didn’t et up.

“That’s why I’m begging you to help ,” said rlin. “I am actually bad at theory, but not very bad, so I’m mostly hovering around average. But average isn’t good enough for Prestige Academy. I need to beco better. Which is why I need your help.”

Senior Sun-Hee was silent for a few seconds. “You know, I still don’t understand why I’m the one you approached to teach you. Is it simply because Professor Jung recomnded ? Or because I finished the whole syllabus in a week? I’ve been putting you off, I’d have thought you would have approached a different senior by now.”

Oh, that was right. He had never ntioned why he was so hellbent on her help. He nodded.

“Because you’re the only one who can dumb things down for in a way I can understand,” he said, she blinked. “Fiction,” he added. “You’re the only one amongst my seniors who can teach using fictional terms.”

Senior Sun-Hee paused, then she imdiately turned around. “Fiction, huh?” she said. rlin frowned. Had he just heard a chuckle? “All right. Every Friday after your disciplinary committee activities. I’m not a good teacher, though, so it’ll be very hard.”

rlin shrugged. “I sit through Professor Jung’s classes, I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

Senior Sun-Hee snorted, then quickly cleared her throat as a ans to hide that she was still human and could be amused.

“Okay.” She nodded. “Fridays, it is.”

rlin perked up with a smile. “Thank you!”

“Monsters are shrewd,” Dr. Elias Namgoong explained as he flayed his eyes over the students before him. He was once again dressed in another overly exquisite attire, this ti like a vampire. His clothes consisted of a wine vest, a black fur coat, and a wine cravat. Of course, he had his cane in his hands too. He never went anywhere without the thing. One would almost be forced to think he couldn’t walk without the thing.

“Doesn’t he sweat?” Hakyun whispered into rlin’s ears as they listened to Dr. Elias’s explanation of what the practical course they were about to take on entailed. rlin hoped it wouldn’t be too stressful as he was still feeling quite exhausted from his exploits with his mana, but he really wasn’t certain. They were standing in the Open field after all.

“Vampires are immortal,” Chima chid in. “He probably doesn’t.”

Hakyun clicked his tongue. “I’d do anything to be immortal.”

“You must be a fool. Who wants to live in this world forever?” Chima snorted, and rlin sighed. They were at it again.

“Mr. Anozie Chima Ken, and Mr. Han Hakyun. Do you have sothing to say to the class?” Dr. Elias called from where he was leaning on his cane. It was either those two rascals had been shouting, or the man just had sharp ears. rlin hoped it was the latter, because the forr would an that he was getting so used to his roommates’ continual battles that he couldn’t even differentiate low voices from high pitched ones. In other words, his ears were gone.

Chima and Hakyun ramrod themselves straight and replied, “No, sir!”

Dr. Elias exhaled. “One more word from both of you and points will be deducted.”

“Understood, sir!”

Dr. Elias resud his explanations. “Like I said, monsters are shrewd. C-Rank monsters and above are smart beings. They do not just brute force their battles like, for example, Trolls do. They think and set traps. Which is why today’s practical course will be focused on how well you lot can locate, disarm, and set traps. There will be no monsters. You will be going against each other. Am I clear?”

“Yes, sir!!” the students answered in a chorus.

“Good.” Dr. Elias Namgoong nodded. “Since each Cohort is made up of twenty students, I will be dividing each into two sets, ten each. The cohort points will be allocated as a batch, not personally this ti; academic, however, will still be personally allocated. You will be set to different regions of the open field, and all have two hours to complete the test. If everyone understands that, then let’s get this underway quickly. I’ve not had lunch yet.”