The Academy Regressor is Obsessed

Grace’s return to the Academy was a few days later than others.

She had already completed the request long ago. Her team members had already returned to the Academy, and only Grace delayed her return briefly because she had something to take care of.

It wasn’t a big deal. She just visited the mansion briefly to bring some items from her family.

In the process, she took a bit longer than expected by wiping out a criminal organization that had nested in the territory to replenish her wallet, and going around to find some fateful encounters in her memories, but she still didn’t exceed the Academy’s return period.

‘I wonder if Asel handled it well.’

Grace thought as she walked through the bustling Academy grounds. The streets were less crowded than usual.

She hadn’t exactly grasped how capable Asel’s magic abilities were. But she knew that level was by no means low.

She now knew whose doing it was when lightning fell from the clear sky during the entrance exam. Thanks to that, she couldn’t help but be quite surprised at the time.

Including memories from the previous iteration, the only lightning magician Grace knew was Ena alone. That figure who sprayed all sorts of lightning alone while facing monsters and demons left quite a deep impression on Grace.

Although she died before the final battle, it was true that they gained some reprieve thanks to her.

So Grace felt quite relieved when she heard Asel was the disciple of Gaebyeok. Because she was someone sufficiently trustworthy.

It was a bit concerning that she was a woman, but Ena was someone who didn’t care a rat’s ass about men, so there was no need to worry much in that regard.

She was a good person in many ways. Both in skill and character. Having learned under someone like her, it seemed there was no need to worry about Asel’s abilities either.

He would probably complete the assignment with high grades. Maybe he could even finish the midterms well and enter the upper class. Since that was Grace’s goal too, she vowed they would meet there.

While thinking, she had already arrived at the Academy grounds. Grace tapped the sword at her fingertips and first visited the dormitory. She went into her room to change clothes, finished a simple wash, then threw a ring she had brought from her family onto the desk.

A magical tool that momentarily extends perception time to split 1 second into an instant. Though it’s considered a high-grade relic even in the Baidel family, Grace felt no particular excitement looking at that relic. To her, the ring was nothing more than a tool to prepare for the upcoming midterms.

She had brought it out with her family’s permission, and proving her own capabilities to them was nothing to Grace. She had simply done what needed to be done.

Since she wasn’t tired enough to need rest from the journey, Grace put on a light shirt and leather pants and immediately left the room.

Before that, she stood in front of the mirror to check her appearance.

A face without anything applied. An appearance like a virgin who doesn’t know how to put on makeup. Nevertheless, her face didn’t fade at all. She put on a smile, then left her room and stood in front of Asel’s door.

“Ahem.”

Then she cleared her throat once and knocked on his door.

“Asel, it’s me. Do you have a moment?”

The series of events from a few weeks ago remained a huge dark history for her too. For several days after that, she had kicked holes in about ten blankets. It was an unbearably embarrassing and shameful memory.

But separate from that, there were also some positive effects.

By confessing about her regression, the burden on her mind had somewhat subsided, and she resolved to no longer cling desperately to the human relationships from the previous iteration.

It wasn’t an easy thing, but Grace achieved this. So she decided to rebuild her relationship with Asel from the beginning. She envisioned a rosy life starting as friends like before the regression, becoming conscious of each other, and ultimately even having children.

Today was the first step towards that.

“Asel?”

But there was no answer. Grace tilted her head and called his name again, but not even the sound of footsteps was heard. Only then did Grace realize that no presence could be felt from inside the room, and she pouted her lips.

‘Has he not come back yet? Or is he out briefly?’

Either way, it was disappointing. She left the dormitory with a face dripping with lingering attachment and headed to the Academy’s main building. Then she realized that the atmosphere in the Academy was quite depressed.

It was an unusual case for the Academy that was always full of vitality. Grace tilted her head and eavesdropped on the murmurs of 2nd year students moving in groups. Her senses, which had reached the realm of a master swordsman, accurately caught even small sounds.

“I heard this year’s freshmen were all amazing. But if they died and went missing in the first assignment, doesn’t that mean they’re essentially nothing special? Or did they arrogantly pick difficult requests trying to show off?”

“No matter how difficult, it’s still Academy level. It’s not like they can’t solve it. It’s just lack of ability. Still, it’s a sad thing. An Academy student dying during the curriculum, isn’t this the first time in history?”

“That’s why there’s even talk of temporary leave. Ah, this sucks. Because of these bastards, we might be forced to take a break too.”

‘…Someone died during the assignment? A freshman?’

Grace’s face crumpled as she overheard their conversation.

This didn’t happen in the previous iteration. There was a terrorist attack at the entrance ceremony, but even then there were no casualties. Just a few injured. No fatalities occurred.

Of course, much had changed from the previous iteration Grace experienced. There was no terrorist attack, and other minor incidents hadn’t occurred so far either.

But in Grace’s experience, if something that happened in the previous iteration didn’t happen now, it would surely come back as something else.

Perhaps all of that burst out in succession during the first assignment.

“…”

Grace’s face crumpled. She stood in place for a moment, desperately racking her brains.

At that moment, a male student who had been on the same team as her approached from the opposite direction. He waved at Grace with a smile that anyone would find likable.

“Ah, Grace! You’re back. When did you arrive? You should have let me know.”
“…Why should I tell you that?”

Grace answered in a cold voice. The man flinched at that tone which even contained a faint killing intent.

“I-I was just saying. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“Is that so? Then now…”

Grace was about to continue by telling him to get lost, but trailed off as a thought suddenly occurred to her.

Though she still disliked the man who had acted overly familiar from their first meeting, he was a suitable person to resolve her curiosity.

“I heard someone died and went missing during this assignment. Is this true?”
“Oh, that? It’s true, they say. The name was Gorcel or something, all his teammates died except Gorcel, and a magician who was on the same team as Saya went missing too. His name was…”

Gorcel was a name even Grace had never heard before. Probably a person who, like Asel, hadn’t entered the Academy in the previous iteration.

Grace engraved that name that somehow felt ominous into her mind and turned her head towards the man.

“What’s the name.”
“So it’s… Ah, I remember. Asel. It was definitely a name like that.”

The moment she heard those words, Grace’s brain momentarily ceased functioning. She stared at the man’s face with her eyes wide open.

“…What?”
“From what I heard, they went to hunt doppelgangers but met a spirit magician and fled in a hurry, but only Asel couldn’t escape so he’s listed as missing. Well, they say missing but he’s essentially dead-”
“Shut up!”

Grace shouted before the man could finish speaking. The man’s mouth closed at that shout filled with aura. But Grace didn’t even pay attention to him and covered her face with trembling hands.

‘Asel is missing? Dead? Why?’

Grace had already experienced Asel’s death once. The face that forcibly smiled while coughing up blood was still vivid in her eyes.

This life would be different. In this newly gained opportunity, she would absolutely not let him die.

She had vowed that as soon as she became aware of her regression, and made bone-grinding efforts to put it into practice. Thanks to that, she even obtained the title of youngest Expert in the empire, but that wasn’t enough.

The calamity to come was not something that could be blocked with just the realm of Expert. She had to aim for Master and even beyond that. So she diligently went out to find fateful encounters and continued training to become stronger.

This was the result of that. Her carelessness in thinking he wouldn’t be in danger since they were in the same Academy put Asel’s life at risk, regardless of Grace’s realm.

Perhaps it wasn’t her fault. No, objectively thinking, that was surely the case. If anything, the Academy’s mistake was more the cause of the problem than her.

But Grace thought the cause of Asel’s disappearance or death lay with herself. Her chest tightened at the fact that she hadn’t actively tried to stop him despite having knowledge.

Whether that was true or false didn’t matter. She gritted her teeth and said to the man:

“Saya, where is that bitch?”

A life gained through another’s sacrifice wasn’t very pleasant. No matter what she ate, it didn’t feel like she had eaten, and even while sleeping she would startle awake from voices blaming her. It had been a long time since she’d gotten a good night’s sleep, and her body felt devoid of strength.

If she had harbored evil intentions and forced sacrifice on the other person, would she not need to feel this guilt?

“…”

There’s a saying that to catch a monster, one must become a monster oneself. In that sense, Saya knew that to achieve her goal, she couldn’t just live purely like a good person.

Sometimes cruelly, sometimes calculatingly. She knew that she had to obsess over money with the mindset of a merchant without blood or tears in order to save her dying family back home. But… knowing didn’t mean she could just become that way.

There’s such a thing as innate nature. Saya wasn’t born to be an evil person who could eat off others’ backs, take sacrifice for granted, and only care about satiating her own hunger. That’s why she couldn’t feel proud of herself for surviving through Asel’s sacrifice.

Quill shouted that they should be grateful to him for saving them. He yelled that instead of mourning, they should survive tenaciously for revenge.

It was truly a mercenary-like statement. That’s why Saya couldn’t do that.

Warren sent infinite commemoration towards the fallen star of the magic world who died saving them. It was a statement where sadness and gratitude coexisted, but it was commemoration directed more at the talent Asel possessed than Asel as a person.

It was truly a magician-like statement. That’s why Saya couldn’t do that.

Then, what should she have done?

In what way should she send him off?

How should she, who flaunted her own judgment to choose the wrong request and drove him to his death, send him off?

She didn’t know. So she writhed even more in guilt.

She spends all day lying in bed staring at the ceiling. She roughly deals with meals, eating without really eating, and handed over the backed up work of the merchant group to the vice leader. Quill and Warren lying on the opposite bed occasionally say something to her, but after it passes she can’t even remember what conversation they had.

But she could properly recall Asel’s face.

It was the same now. Saya pulled the blanket over her head as she recalled Asel.

If she had known it would be like this, she shouldn’t have approached him calculatingly. If she had known, she should have tried to have more personal conversations.

If she had known…

“…Sniff.”

The more she thought about it, the greater her sense of guilt towards herself grew. In the end, tears began to leak again from tear ducts she thought had dried up over the past few days.

It was then that Grace entered the hospital room.

With a bang, the door to the hospital room opened. Everyone’s gazes turned towards the door at the sudden noise. Grace ground her molars as she met Quill and Warren’s gazes. But Grace didn’t pay them any attention. Instead, she approached Saya who was covered by a blanket and opened her mouth.

“Yoho.”
“…I’m not a cursed fox. If you’re going to babble as you please, get out.”
“You say you’re not cursed when one of your teammates went missing?”
“…”
“Forget it. I didn’t come to argue about this.”

Grace forcibly lifted the blanket Saya was covered with and looked down at her face.

“The place where the doppelganger hunt took place. Tell me where it is.”
“…And if I tell you? What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to go bring Asel back. Or at least find some traces.”
“Wake up from your dream. Do you think you can face that spirit magician? We could barely hold out. Even that was only possible because the spirit magician was being careless. You absolutely can’t save Asel alone.”
“That’s for me to figure out.”
“Don’t talk nonsense. Are you crazy, wanting to die?”
“If it’s a world without Asel, there’s not much point in living anyway.”
“…You.”

Saya furrowed her brows. Then she raised her upper body and glared at Grace.

“Anyway, I have no intention of telling you so get out. I don’t want another person to die because of me.”
“You’re going to irresponsibly let it go? One of your teammates disappeared because of the request you decided on, but you’re not going to do anything until you recover?”
“…What difference would it make if I did? Isn’t telling you just passing all my responsibility onto you? What if you die? Who will take responsibility for the emotions I’ll experience then? If you die and Asel dies too! Are you saying I should suffer from guilt all day until I die?”
“That’s for you to figure out.”

Perhaps due to her unstable mental state, a sharp voice burst out of Saya’s mouth. Grace’s face crumpled as she responded to those words.

“…Hm?”

Warren quietly watched that scene, then turned his head at the sound of something tapping on the window.

There was a bird with a metal body tilting its head as if asking to open the window. Warren realized the bird’s identity was a messenger bird only allowed to Weiheim magicians and opened his eyes wide.

“Could it be…!”

He immediately opened the window and let the messenger bird into the room. The messenger bird bowed its head towards Warren, then tried to fly towards Saya but realized the atmosphere between her and Grace wasn’t good and stopped in place.

Warren said to the messenger bird:

“It seems you have a letter to deliver? Show it to me first for now.”
[Gurgle?]
“If it’s for Saya anyway, it shouldn’t matter if I receive it. I went through the same thing as her.”
[…Gurgle gurgle.]

The messenger bird tilted its head to one side as if pondering, then straightened up and opened the storage device attached to its abdomen. A neatly folded piece of paper fell out.

Warren immediately unfolded the paper and read through it.

“…!”

As soon as he confirmed it, he jumped up from his seat and approached Saya and Grace. The two people who had been glaring fiercely at each other turned their heads towards Warren as they saw him walking over holding the paper.

Warren spoke before they could open their mouths:

“It’s news from Asel.”
“…What did you say?”
“What?”

The two people reacted simultaneously. Warren immediately unfolded the paper between the two of them to show the contents written on it.

[Saya, I’m alive. I received all the treatment at a cathedral, and I’m staying here now doing rehabilitation. Don’t worry too much. My master has confined me, but I think she’ll let me go soon. Anyway, I escaped well too, so don’t dwell on it and focus on recovering. Send my regards to the other two people as well.]

Saya let out an “Ah” sound after confirming the letter, then covered her mouth with both hands.

Grace also let out a deep sigh of relief and clasped her trembling hands. The feeling of anger and sadness that had been boiling up until just now subsided in an instant. Tears welled up for a moment, and her heart thumped once. All sorts of emotions swirled then slowly faded away.

Yes, it’s enough that he’s alive.

Grace thought that as she raised her head. At that moment, her eyes met Saya’s, who had raised her head with similar thoughts.

“…”
“…”

The two people looked at each other with awkward gazes, then turned their heads away.