Villain Takes Over The Academy

[Translator - Helga ]

[Proofreader - Starfall ]

Chapter 44

Two days ago.

"Do you want to live?" I asked the Devil Villain I found in the cave.

Terrified, Nachal nodded.

"If you want to live, you have to follow my orders. Can you do that?"

"Anything...!"

The creature had a strong will to live. As expected, I thought he would accept my conditions.

'Anyway, he's a coward. That's what I know about him.'

After hearing Nachal's answer, I decided to keep him alive.

I cut off the head of Singing Scorpion's corpse that remained in the cave and handed it to Kim Taek-hee. Kim Taek-hee, who had never seen Nachal, was completely fooled into believing that the owner of the head was the devil villain who caused this incident.

Everyone else there was also fooled.

'Honestly, I didn't expect this ending...'

Originally, I planned to take out the heart of the devil villain to break the curse of the Imugi. Even if that villain was Nachal, I couldn't change my plan.

'But no matter how much I think about it, it's a waste.'

My old relationship with Nachal wasn't entirely without influence, but that wasn't all. This Nachal has a lot more to do.

'Especially in this playthrough, where Nachal ate Singing Scorpion and became the great villain. In the story, the great villain will become the villain who opens the gates of hell in Chapter 3.'

He will become the only devil villain and summon the devils of the abyss.

In this playthrough, Nachal will take on that role instead of Singing Scorpion.

'Since it's a turning point in the story, it would be better to keep him by my side.'

The problem was that I couldn't break the curse of the Imugi right now.

Even if Nachal summoned the devils later, it would happen in Chapter 3.

In the end, I had to come up with another solution.

Another way to get the devil's heart...

When I thought about it, the answer was surprisingly close.

'Sarah's experiment... It was definitely an experiment to summon a devil.'

I didn't know why she wanted to summon a devil, but it's clear that’s why she was collecting so many devil horns.

'Maybe I can use this...'

I needed to move Sarah, if only to thwart Kim Taek-hee's plan. And I thought this was an opportunity.

A win-win situation where I could both thwart Kim Taek-hee's plan and break the curse at the same time…

* * *

"...I thought so, but your reaction is too harsh."

I calmly looked at Sarah who was staring at me with a bewildered expression. She couldn't believe it.

"Even if you're crazy, keeping a devil villain who devastated a city alive? And even bringing him to the academy? You should know your limits!" Sarah shouted, her face a mixture of anger, surprise, and confusion.

She was so angry that Nachal behind me started shivering.

I can't talk to her like this.

"Didn't we agree not to question my methods?"

"Methods? A professor who teaches military tactics bringing a villain to the academy secretly?"

"It's not just a villain, it's a devil villain. He will put an end to the summoning experiment you've been working on for so long."

"...!"

Sarah's mouth stopped for a moment. She must know too. The reason why I brought Nachal here.

"If you collect thousands of devil horns, you might have a chance of successfully summoning a devil villain. But how long will it take? 10 years? 20 years?"

"......"

Sarah, frowning and glaring, couldn't easily answer. Of course. It was a number she couldn't bring herself to say out loud.

"But if you follow my method, you can finish it in a day. By using the devil villain here as a medium for the summoning."

No matter how many horns imbued with devilic power you gather, it can't be a better medium than a devil villain who has the blood of the same race flowing through them.

That's why I was able to make the decision not to kill Nachal in the cave.

If Sarah summons a devil using Nachal, all I have to do is take out its heart.

"...So, you kept the villain alive? To help my summoning experiment?"

"If you don't want to believe it, you don't have to. I don't expect to gain your trust at this point anyway."

"......"

Sarah calmed down and seemed to be deep in thought. Her eyes were still full of suspicion, but this reaction was much more positive than the first one.

"...I'll ask you one thing. What do you plan to do with that villain after the summoning is over?"

"I'm thinking of giving it an infiltration mission. To High Society."

"High Society?!" Sarah asked back in surprise. It was understandable that she's surprised.

A plan to infiltrate a villain into a villain organization and use it as a spy.

It was still an unfamiliar and unconventional operation to the humans here.

'It will become a common story as the chapters progress...'

In my previous playthroughs, as we got closer to the end, both the military and the villains sent countless spies into each other's territories.

Later on, you could even tell who was a spy just by looking at how they rolled their eyes.

So I was able to come up with the operation to infiltrate Nachal into High Society without much difficulty. If successful, it will be of great help to my future plans.

'Anyway, Do Jin-hak is a guy who gains fame through villain experiments.'

In order to seize power in the Masterclass as Do Jin-hak, it was best to achieve results in villain experiments.

Nachal's infiltration into High Society will bring me invaluable experimental subjects.

"...Okay. I understand."

Sarah finally made up her mind and nodded. Judging from her tightly closed eyes, it must have been a very painful decision.

"It's not like there aren't any operations that use villains. I'll trust your words this time. But if this is a lie..."

Sarah was telling me with her eyes that she would really kill me then.

That was unlikely to happen, but just in case, it was better not to run into this woman as much as possible after today.

'...Come to think of it, she was supposed to die.'

Now that I think about it, that's right. Sarah dies in the story. She gets caught up in a sudden explosion during an experiment.@@novelbin@@

I don't know exactly what kind of accident happened... but considering the circumstances, it's clear that the explosion occurred due to a failure in the devil summoning experiment.

'Then, if I summon a devil today, will this woman's future change?'

There was a high possibility of that. Sarah's accidental death will disappear from the story, and she will take on a new role that didn't exist in the previous rounds.

'She'll probably stay in the academy too...'

If so, I can't leave her with so much distrust towards Do Jin-hak as it is now.

'She might cooperate with someone like Kim Taek-hee again later.'

It’s necessary to try to improve my relationship with this human woman while I have the chance. Then, it's better to start by finding out why she's so obsessed with summoning devils.

In Military Chronicle, in order to gain someone's favor, it was most important to find out the character's purpose.

* * *

"Why do you summon devils?"

Sarah, who was modifying the large summoning circle drawn on the floor for the devil villain summoning, retorted, "That's unusual. I didn't know you were curious about other people's personal affairs."

Well, it was a question that Do Jin-hak would never ask. Fortunately, Sarah, who was preoccupied with the summoning preparations, didn't find it suspicious and answered.

"When I was six years old, my mom and dad were killed by villains, and I was left in a convent. But I didn't have any friends. Everyone made fun of me for having red hair, saying it was bad luck."

In the Military Chronicle, there were countless children who became orphans after their families were massacred by villains. Sarah was one of the victims of such an unfortunate setup.

"I used to play alone drawing pictures on the sandy floor. My mom used to draw pictures at home often. When I was drawing my mom's pictures like that, the kids would rush in and trample on the pictures..."

Sarah spoke with a gloomy face, recalling the memories of that time.

I felt the need to react to this situation. Aren't humans essentially animals who want to be empathized with?

"Kids of that age are surprisingly cruel. You must have cried a lot alone."

I tried my best to recall human emotions and empathize with her.

However, Sarah gave me a look as if I was talking nonsense.

"Not at all. Every time the kids did that, I beat them up as many times as the number of footprints. Later, they were scared and didn't even come near me."

"......"

I made a mistake. I learned that forming a consensus should be attempted with normal humans.

"Anyway, while I was drawing pictures alone like that, something strange happened one day."

"Something strange?"

"Yeah. Someone started talking to me. From the picture I was drawing,” Sarah said, as if she still found it amazing.

She said that someone in the picture said this to her: "You must be Sarah. It's nice to meet you."

The voice knew Sarah. Not only her name, but also her family, past, and background.

"The voice told me many things. That the picture I was drawing was a summoning circle, and that my mom was a summoner."

Sarah's parents were military personnel from the Summoning Department. Sarah then realized that the picture her mother always drew at home was a research project on summoning circles.

"The voice said that it had talked a lot with my mom through the summoning circle. That my mom was helping it, but she was killed by villains while doing so. It said it was very sorry."

"What was the identity of that voice?"

I was curious about its identity.

In the Military Chronicle, summoning spells act as portals that can connect to various worlds. As a result, they are often connected to mysterious beings whose identities cannot be known.

'That's why Do Jin-hak tried to complete the Blood Demon by summoning a soul from another dimension.'

Why that soul had to be me is still a mystery, but...

Anyway, there is one absolute rule in summoning spells.

That is, the more a being is beyond what this world can handle, the more difficult it is to summon it.

The voice that spoke from Sarah's summoning circle was likely to be a very dangerous being. The reason why it is interested in this world beyond the summoning circle but cannot easily cross over is because of this.

'It could be a ruler who dominates a region of the abyss, or a god from another dimension.'

But the identity of the voice Sarah was talking about was something I never expected.

"He said he was Hwadam Seo Gyeong-deok and asked me to call him ‘Teacher Hwadam’."

Hwadam Seo Gyeong-deok?!

"Seo Gyeong-deok is trapped in the abyss?"

I couldn't help but be surprised.

Seo Gyeong-deok was an indispensable figure in the history of the Military Chronicle.

Everyone thought he was dead because there was a setting that he had disappeared after the establishment of the Masterclass...

‘To think he was lying at the bottom of the abyss!’

"Teacher Hwadam visited the abyss several times to write books in the library. Then, due to someone's scheme, he was trapped there forever."

Sarah explained that Hwadam gradually lost his human body because he was trapped in the abyss for too long. She said that the abyss's poison is like radiation, something the body cannot withstand.

Hwadam, who lost his body in that way, eventually became a devil.

"But even after becoming a devil, he didn't fall because his soul remained human. My mother researched how to bring Teacher Hwadam out of the abyss."

Sarah said that she learned various spells from Hwadam through the summoning circle and was able to reach her current position.

If that was true, then Sarah is a direct disciple of the person who created the foundation of modern military science.

'I was wondering what kind of devil villain she was trying to summon...'

I finally learned Sarah's background story.

In the game, she only appeared as a professor obsessed with summoning experiments, and I didn't know that she had such a hidden setting.

'To think she was Hwadam's disciple.'

Seo Gyeong-deok disappeared almost 100 years ago in the game's timeline, so there were almost no related people left. At most, only the first-generation hero military personnel who co-founded the Masterclass remained, but...

'Most of them are dead or have retired a long time ago, so they are people I won't meet on the battlefield.'

In that respect, Sarah was a character with a very rare setting. It's absurd that no one had found out this fact until now.

'Well, she hardly ever leaves her lab, so that might be the reason.'

Even if the player enters the Summoning Department, there are almost no opportunities to interact with Sarah. As a result, she was a character who was notorious for being difficult to build a relationship with.

That's why it wasn't known what special skills Professor Sarah had...

Sarah's past, which was finally revealed, was more surprising than I expected.

"But... there's no guarantee that Hwadam will come out just because you summon a devil, right? You might get a completely different one?"

There were countless devils lurking in the abyss.

It is unknown which of them will respond to the summoning spell.

However, Sarah, who already seemed to be aware of this problem, took something out of her pocket.

It was a folding fan. It looked very old.

"This is an object called Taeheo that I found in the study that Teacher told me about. This fan, which Teacher Hwadam used for a long time, can be a medium to summon him from the abyss."

When Sarah unfolded the fan, the lacquered fan ribs on the bamboo core appeared with a rustling sound. On the fan ribs, the letters ‘Taeheo’ were written in early Hangul, as if it was made around the time when the Hangeul was first created.

'It's definitely not an ordinary object...'

A unique, unusual aura that can only be felt from high-grade items.

If it was really an item left by Hwadam, there would be no problem with the summoning. That fan will serve as the fixed coordinate necessary for the summoning spell.

'But... even so, Hwadam's item...'

To be honest, I'm quite tempted.

Seo Gyeong-deok was a self-made man who was known to be proficient in all spells...

An item that such a person used for a long time would be incredibly valuable.

While looking at the fan Taeheo, I began to secretly devise ways to get it.

[Translator - Helga ]

[Proofreader - Starfall ]