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Chapter 120

When I lifted my head, I saw Jin-Seo.

As I was lying on the floor, she was crouching down next to my body and looking down at me with a dark expression on her face. Her gaze, which was usually fierce, was slightly softer than usual.

"What happened... What about the class?"

At my question, Jin-Seo lowered her head silently. Instead, Do-Jin answered my question.

"Class ended a while ago. You just woke up after being unconscious for about... an hour and a half."

I was unconscious for an hour and a half? I remembered sparring with Jin-Seo right before losing consciousness, but I couldn\'t properly remember why I had passed out. For some strange reason, my solar plexus was throbbing with pain.

"...How did I faint?"

"Jin-Seo\'s stabbing attack precisely hit your solar plexus. Luckily, it was a training sword, so you didn\'t die. If it was a real sword, you would have died for sure."

"Ah."

It was then that I finally remembered. Jin-Seo had taken an offensive stance, and I was just about to use Bossou\'s power with the intention to counterattack after blocking her attack. However, before I could even call out Bossou\'s name, her attack had already struck my solar plexus. As a result, I lost consciousness...

My face started to burn. I couldn\'t tell if it was because of the medicine Ji-Ah gave me in the morning or if it was because I was simply embarrassed. It seemed like the latter. I wanted to just turn into dust and disappear.

"You were in the wrong."

"...What did I do?"

"You were being vague with your answer. And..."

Jin-Seo had been looking at me with a peculiar gaze when she lowered her head. Then, she brushed a strand of hair to the top of her forehead and said in a small murmur, "I\'m sorry..."

As she apologized with a mumble, her gaze wandered the floor. Based on her reaction, it seemed like she was so sorry that she didn’t know what to do. I didn’t really think that there was any need for an apology. I had intentionally given Jin-Seo vague answers to provoke her, and the reason why all this trouble happened in the first place was because my skill level was vastly inferior compared to hers.

As if he was reading and repeating my inner thoughts, Do-Jin said, "There\'s no need to apologize. You intentionally swung your sword with exaggerated movements in order to induce the opponent to take a defensive posture, and anticipating that an opening would be revealed, you entered into a stabbing motion in advance. In order to do this, you would have had to adjust the trajectory of your attack, and if you had messed up the controlling of your strength, your stance would have completely collapsed."

Jin-Seo shifted her eyes around in different directions as if she were bewildered by Do-Jin\'s explanation.

"To succeed in the attack, there was no choice but to stab while exerting a lot of force. It wasn\'t a situation where you could consider whether the opponent would be knocked unconscious or not, am I right?"

"...Yes," Jin-Seo said while nodding in agreement. For some reason, she had a somewhat bitter expression on her face. It seemed like she hadn’t intentionally done everything that Do-Jin had said.

Do-Jin shifted his gaze away from Jin-Seo and turned to me.

"Sun-Woo, you did well too. Just by blocking the first attack, you did great. If it were another student, they would have already been knocked out by the first attack. Avoiding the second attack was almost impossible, so let\'s consider it an exception."

"...But in the end, I lost."

"The opponent was just too strong."

I silently agreed with his words. Even if Jin-Seo fought with her bare hands and I fought with a sword, she probably would have been able to subdue me without too much difficulty. That was how much she one-sidedly defeated me in this spar. Although I didn’t have an opportunity to use the power of Loa, that was just an excuse. Jin-Seo\'s ability to overpower me without even allowing me a moment to use the power of Loa was remarkable.

I managed to shake off the pain that was radiating out of my abdomen as I stood up. Meanwhile, Jin-Seo kept bowing her head as if she was ashamed of herself.

"By the way, Jin-Seo. I noticed you didn\'t use any blessings during the duel. Is there a reason for this?" Do-Jin asked while looking at her with bemused eyes.

Come to think of it, Jin-Seo hadn’t used any blessings in our duel. She had overwhelmed me purely with her physical abilities...

Thinking about it like that made me even more depressed. Jin-Seo finally raised her head and then stared at Do-Jin with her usual sharp gaze. "I prepared for a situation where I wouldn’t be able to use blessings."

"Is it because of the duel with Min-Seo?"

"..."

As if he had hit the nail on the head, Jin-Seo bit her lower lip instead of answering. In previous duels with Min-Seo, she wasn’t able to use blessings, and as a result, Jin-Seo constantly suffered defeat after defeat. In preparation for another duel with her, Jin-Seo practiced dueling without using blessings by only using her physical abilities.

Do-Jin\'s face stiffened as if that slightly displeased him.

"It\'s good to consider various situations, but in a duel, you should do your best. It\'s not polite to go easy on each other."

"....Yes," Jin-Seo replied uncertainly while glancing at me through her disheveled hair.

I ignored her weird gaze and looked around. I saw some students lying on the ground, unconscious. Fortunately, I wasn\'t the only one who had fainted during a duel. While feeling somewhat relieved by this fact, I also felt embarrassed about myself for finding solace in such a thing.

It was only natural to be frustrated after losing a spar, and it was natural to feel embarrassed after fainting during a spar. It wasn’t right to become complacent just because I wasn\'t the only one who fainted.

"How will you evaluate the class?" I asked Do-Jin while gently rubbing my still-sore abdomen.

He was just about to check the condition of the other students who had lost consciousness, but he stopped walking.

"The first day of sparring is excluded from the evaluations. I\'ll let you know which days will be considered for evaluation before the start of class. I\'ll also explain the evaluation criteria later."

"Ah, alright."

"Do you want to go to the nurse\'s office? I saw what happened earlier, and it looked a little painful," Do-Jin said while pointing to my abdomen with his chin.

I silently shook my head. Honestly, it was ridiculously painful, but it didn\'t seem necessary to go to the nurse\'s office for it. This was nothing compared to the pain caused by the drawbacks of forcefully using Granbwa\'s power. When I used Granbwa’s power, it felt like a ball of fire had entered my body and was melting my organs.

"Sure, if it\'s okay, then you don\'t really have to—"

“Ahhhhh!”

At that moment, a sudden scream interrupted Do-Jin\'s words. The scream was mixed with a hollow, metallic sound, and it echoed desperately and agonizingly. It seemed like the sound was coming from the bathroom attached to the sacred training ground, but it was impossible to determine exactly where it was coming from.

"..."

Upon hearing the scream, my body froze. My hair stood on end, and my breath was caught in my throat. My heart started pounding. It wasn\'t just because the scream was eerily desperate.

It was because the prophecy I heard from Baron Samedi last night suddenly came to mind.

[Beware of screams and cries.]

He had said to beware of screams and howls. And he called the screams ‘echoes of false pain.’

What did he mean by echoes of false pain? If the ‘echoes of false pain’ referred to the scream, then did it mean that the scream itself was fake?

"Help, please help! Teacher, arghhhhh—!"

"...Everyone, since class is over, go back to your classrooms for now! Don\'t worry about it. Just hurry!"

The restroom was still filled with frantic screams. Do-Jin\'s voice echoed across the sacred training ground. His voice, which was always tired and lethargic, was stiffer and stronger than usual. The students who froze in fear after getting startled by the scream began to move out of the sacred training ground with horrified faces.

After confirming that the students were leaving, Do-Jin turned his gaze toward Jin-Seo and me. We were both standing around without knowing what to do.

"Please help move the kids lying on the floor to the nurse\'s office," Do-Jin blurted before placing his hand on the hilt of his sword and slowly walking toward the direction where the scream had come from.

Looking at his back, I could sense his determination. It seemed like he was familiar with these kinds of situations, and it looked like he had anticipated that something like this would happen.

"After that, you two should also go back to the classroom. We don\'t know what might happen—"

"Ah, aaah─! Kyaaah...!"

The scream cut off Do-Jin\'s words. It no longer sounded like a scream, and it sounded more like the screeching of metal. However, the screams of a female student continued to echo.

"Don\'t just stand there. Hurry up!" Do-Jin shouted.

Jin-Seo woke up from her daze from Do-Jin’s shout and approached the fallen children. One girl and one boy were still lying on the sacred training ground, unable to regain consciousness.

The screams persisted.

“Please save me... Teacher, please save me...”

Their desperate cries filled the silence of the sacred training ground. Do-Jin briskly walked toward the direction of the bathroom, where the screams and pleas for help could be heard.

The echoes of false pain.

Baron Samedi\'s eerie voice echoed in his mind.

Beware of the screams.

What did that mean? Why did I have to beware of the screams? I didn’t understand.

"...You must not go."

I stopped him in his tracks.

***

"Aaah! Please, please. Save me, please just save me..."

Despite the heart-wrenching screams ringing in his ears, Do-Jin stopped in his tracks. It was because Sun-Woo had stopped him with a very serious tone and expression on his face.

“What’s the reason?”

If it were any other student, he would have casually ignored them and continued on his way. But if it came from Sun-Woo, then the situation was different. Although he often said nonsensical things, he occasionally made accurate deductions based on his sharp intuition. There was enough value in at least hearing his reasons.

"...The screams are too long."

"What?" Do-Jin frowned.

It was a riddle-like statement that he couldn’t make heads or tails of.

Sun-Woo furrowed his eyebrows as if organizing his thoughts and spoke while covering his mouth with his hand. "If a demonic beast appeared, then the owner of the scream would have died, and the screams would have stopped long ago. After all, demonic beasts have no reason and only possess the instinct to attack humans."

“..."

"If they were demons, there would be no reason for them to let them scream like that. They have intelligence, so they would either cover their mouths to prevent them from screaming or cut their vocal cords. Thus..."

Sun-Woo bit his lip as if he could not come up with the next words. Do-Jin slowly nodded as he pondered over the meaning of his words.

"So you’re saying that it’s a trap?"

"...Yes, that\'s correct. It\'s highly likely to be a trap." Sun-Woo nodded in agreement.

Do-Jin had also considered this possibility.

There was a time when he and Bok-Dong were patrolling and heard screams coming from the public restroom. Inside the restroom, they had found a severed ear, and the screams had belonged to a startled female student who had been surprised after seeing the ear. After retrieving the severed ear and exiting the bathroom, the female student disappeared.

After that, Sung-Hyun appeared at Florence Academy. It was a fake Sung-Hyun that had been created by the Satanist using a taxidermied creature. Do-Jin had attacked Sun-Woo that day and received disciplinary action.

That night, the results of the forensic analysis came out. The ear found in the bathroom belonged to Sung-Hyun. The reasons behind why the Satanist did such things remained unknown. He couldn’t understand the reason why he had sent the fake Sung-Hyun to Florence Academy and why he had placed Sung-Hyun\'s ear in the bathroom to show to the teachers. He couldn\'t understand anything.

However, one thing was certain. The Satanist was trying to lure the teachers with screams.

"Ah, ah, aaaa.... Teacher...."

Just like Sun-Woo had said, the screams were excessively long. It was possible that the Satanist created the screams to lure him in.

"What if it\'s not a trap but a genuine scream from a student?" Do-Jin asked.

What if a demon or a demonic beast had really appeared in the bathroom, and a student who happened to be inside there screamed because they were attacked? It was possible that it was false screams created by the Satanist to lure him, but on the other hand, it was possible that they were genuine screams from a student seeking help.

"If that’s the case, that would mean that the student left the class without saying a word and hence..." Sun-Woo said while dropping his gaze to the floor. "They would be reaping what they sowed..."

"..."

At that moment, silence filled Do-Jin\'s ears. The plea-filled scream had abruptly stopped at some point in time.

"The scream stopped. I have to go."

"No, you can\'t. It\'s a trap."

"No, as long as there is the slightest possibility that it\'s not a trap, I must go."

Do-Jin drew his sword. Then he moved the light of blessing to his legs. Taking a leaping posture, Do-Jin looked toward the direction of the bathroom where the scream had come from and said, "You\'re right about the possibility of it being a trap. I have a plan for that. Don\'t worry."

Do-Jin touched the Branch of the Burning Bush that he had crumpled and put in his pants pocket. If it was a trap, he could contact other teachers for help.

If it was just a shoddy trap, he could handle it himself.

Bang!

Do-Jin roughly launched himself from the ground and leaped toward the bathroom.