Episode 174

The reason Lee Han didn’t reveal to Professor Voladi that they were entering the underground dungeon was simple.

…It was impossible to predict what kind of reaction would come.

Professor Voladi was the most difficult professor to predict among the professors.

He had no choice but to be extra cautious.

“A picnic? We’re here to conquer the underground dungeon, aren’t we?”

But a clueless White Tiger Tower student asked as if he didn’t understand.

Lee Han clenched his teeth and muttered.

“Be quiet…”

“What? I can’t hear you, Wardanaz. What’s this about a picnic and why do we have to go back?”

Lee Han regretted not just quickly knocking the other out.

But by then, Professor Voladi had already come up the stairs and was standing in front of the students.

The White Tiger Tower student who had just spoken also noticed Professor Voladi’s arrival and straightened up.

“Hello, Professor.”

“What’s going on?”

Lee Han quickly snatched the answer.

“We’re all going on a picnic underground…”

“Wardanaz gathered the students to conquer the underground dungeon.”

‘Should I kill him?’

Professor Voladi listened to the White Tiger Tower student and looked around the corridor with an expressionless face.

Students who had finished all preparations and were about to go down to the underground dungeon caught the vampire professor’s eye.

Lee Han could see a very faint smile on Professor Voladi’s lips.

The anger toward the White Tiger Tower student disappeared completely, replaced by an icy fear.

“Well done.”

“…It’s really nothing special, though.”

Lee Han spoke carefully, paying close attention to try to read what Professor Voladi was thinking.

“Continuous training is essential for improving skills, but few wizards actually practice it. Keep striving.”

“We’re going because we need materials for the midterm, Professor.”

“There must have been other dungeons.”

“…I thought there wouldn’t be enough time to find them…”

“I suppose so.”

Professor Voladi nodded.

An outstanding wizard, even when doing one thing, achieves several goals at once.

When there were needed materials in an underground dungeon, weak and lazy wizards would enter an easy place, but promising battle wizards would deliberately enter a difficult place to train themselves.

Wardanaz was exactly that kind of wizard.

“I just managed the dungeon a moment ago.”

“……”

If it was a naturally occurring dungeon in a remote place, no one cared if monsters popped out or strange things happened inside, but dungeons located within the magic school were different.

If the monsters inside the dungeon came out and rampaged, it would be the professors’ workshops that got destroyed.

Even people like Professor Voladi regularly checked the dungeons and inspected their conditions.

Checking the flow of magic inside the dungeon, the number of monsters, whether there were signs of them going berserk and bursting out, and so on.

But to Lee Han, Professor Voladi’s words seemed to carry a slightly different meaning.

‘Wasn’t it thanks to his special preparations for me last time that all that chaos happened?’

A chill of anxiety ran down his spine.

Unaware of Lee Han’s feelings, his friends expressed their thanks.

“Thank you, Professor.”

“We’ll be back safely!”

“He’s actually really kind, unlike the rumors?”

“Told you, you can’t trust rumors.”

“……”

• * *

“Burn.”

A flame the size of two finger joints appeared in the air.

The advantage of the fire element was that even simple, low-circle magic had enough destructive power.

The ghoul hit by the fire summoned by the Phoenix Tower priest slowed down instantly.

“Burn!”

“Catch fire!”

Even the simplest 1st-circle spell became more powerful when several students cast it together.

The ghoul quickly burned and collapsed.

“Excellent.”

At Lee Han’s praise, the priests nodded lightly.

The White Tiger Tower students following behind snorted.

“You all used magic together just to take down one, and you call that excellent?”

“That’s such a waste, isn’t it? Combat is all about the sword.”

The White Tiger Tower students confidently prepared to cast enhancement magic on their wooden swords.

Still holding a grudge from the earlier incident in front of Professor Voladi, Lee Han spoke coldly.

“Draw your swords. Let’s see if you can block my magic.”

“…Wa, Wardanaz. Why so serious…”

“W-We were a bit rude to the priests, weren’t we?”

The White Tiger Tower students were startled by Lee Han’s expression.

They hadn’t expected Wardanaz to get so serious just because they boasted a few words.

‘Oops. What have I done?’

Lee Han immediately came to his senses.

He needed to work together with the students, but from the start…

“Sorry. I spoke too harshly.”

“N-No, we were too harsh to the priests too.”

Ahsan wiped under his nose with a proud expression.

A person who stood up for another’s honor was truly honorable.

He was proud that such a person was his friend.

“I’m proud of you, Wardanaz.”

“??”

Lee Han looked at Ahsan as if he were a strange person.

“Wait. Not that way, we’re going around this way.”

“There’s a ghoul. White Tiger Tower, take care of it.”

“Be careful of that wall. Ghouls hide well in that section.”

“Watch your step. The mud is deep.”

Refocused, Lee Han gave a series of instructions.

At first, the students followed without much thought, but gradually they began to feel something was off.

‘…Huh?’

‘How does he know so well?’

Of course, since Wardanaz was the one who found this dungeon, it wasn’t strange for him to know the entrance area well.

But even after going quite deep, Wardanaz knew the dungeon inside out.

As if he had gone back and forth several times.

“That Wardanaz guy knows this dungeon weirdly well.”

“Wasn’t the professor earlier the professor? I heard that class is weird. Did he teach here?”

“Stop with the nonsense. What kind of crazy class would be held in a dungeon like this?”

Hearing the White Tiger Tower students chatting, Nillia closed her eyes.

Wardanaz was not someone who usually drew sympathy, but this time, she genuinely felt sorry for him.

To have taken such a class…

After the narrow passage ended, the students walking in single file came out into a wide plaza where everyone could gather.

Lee Han spoke seriously.

“From here on, be really careful.”

“Wardanaz, you can stop worrying now.”

The White Tiger Tower students, who had handled the ghouls on the way down well, were quite confident.

In fact, not only the White Tiger Tower students but also the other tower students looked somewhat relaxed.

Compared to how tense they were at first, it was natural since they had come down smoothly.

“From here, Demon Ghouls appear.”

“……”

“……”

“…Don’t lie.”

“I’m not lying. From here, Demon Ghouls appear, so we’ll move avoiding their territory.”

The structure of Professor Voladi’s underground dungeon, which Lee Han had been forced to learn, was as follows.

First, there were narrow passages leading down from the entrance.

Here, ghouls would jump out from hiding and surprise the wizards.

Going down further, there were wide plaza-shaped areas.

In these wide places, there were actually almost no ghouls. Unless some madman deliberately gathered monsters.

And going further down from here was the area where Demon Ghouls appeared.

Because Demon Ghouls were large, the terrain became much wider, but also more complex.

A vast rocky mountain valley with naturally formed caves everywhere.

If this weren’t an underground dungeon, Lee Han would have thought so.

“There are caves all along the way down. Some of these caves have Demon Ghouls. Demon Ghouls are monsters with big appetites, so unless they sense prey, they just sleep inside the cave. So we avoid caves with Demon Ghouls. Then we won’t have to deal with them.”

“How can we tell?”

“I’ll give the signal.”

“How can we trust your signal, Wardanaz? How do you know?”

“If you don’t want to trust me, go in yourself.”

“Ah… No, I was just asking.”

The student backed down when Lee Han got serious after being questioned.

A Black Turtle Tower student tilted his head and muttered.

“Wardanaz seems especially sharp.”

“It’s because it’s dangerous. He’s a responsible guy.”

The students couldn’t imagine that Lee Han had risked his life and rolled around in this underground dungeon valley first.

• * *

How much further had they gone down?

Avoiding the caves as much as possible, the students brightened when they saw a cluster of plants.

Priest Siana’s eyes sparkled as she whispered in a small voice.

“It’s definitely boneflesh flowers!”

“We found them.”

Two or three students from each tower carefully began to dig up the flowers.

The rest of the students stood guard in various places. They had avoided the caves with Demon Ghouls, but you never knew.

“Wait. Isn’t that a light?”

A White Tiger Tower student on guard pointed to behind a rock down the slope.

It was a bit far away, but a bluish light was faintly shining out.

“It’s a light, right? Isn’t it an artifact?”

Deorgyu said cautiously.

“I don’t think we should move carelessly.”

“Wardanaz said there were no Demon Ghouls in that cave. It’s fine.”

“That’s true, but what if…”

Before Deorgyu could finish, the White Tiger Tower student carefully went down the steep slope with a torch.

He checked behind the rock. There really was a helmet emitting a bluish light.

“It’s an artifact! It’s an artifact! Deorgyu, look at this!”

“Alright, just come back quickly!”

“Okay, I’m coming now!”

The White Tiger Tower student tried to climb back up the slope.

-■■■…

Before the Demon Ghoul appeared from behind the rock and growled at the student.

“…!”

At the sudden appearance of the monster, the student’s muscles stiffened. His hand slipped, and as his weight shifted, the rock on the slope broke off.

Suddenly, the path disappeared, and he was trapped below with the Demon Ghoul.

Deorgyu panicked and called Lee Han.

“Lee Han!”

“!”

Lee Han responded immediately. He could feel the urgency in Deorgyu’s voice.

“What…”

He didn’t even need to ask to understand the situation.

A White Tiger Tower student and a Demon Ghoul were down the steep slope.

‘Wait. There definitely wasn’t one in that cave?’

Lee Han didn’t understand.

Of course, the White Tiger Tower student had gone down carelessly, but how could there be a Demon Ghoul when there wasn’t one nearby?

For a moment, Professor Voladi’s face flashed through Lee Han’s mind.

-I just managed the dungeon a moment ago.

“……”

Was it possible that Professor Voladi had placed a wandering Demon Ghoul to give Lee Han a proper stimulus the next time he came in?

“Hang in there! I’ll come help you!”

Realizing his mistake, Lee Han spoke firmly to cover it up.

If he left it alone, people might start saying, ‘Huh? Lee Han said there wouldn’t be a Demon Ghoul, so why did one appear?’ and blame him.

The White Tiger Tower student who had fallen below was even more surprised.

He thought Wardanaz would just abandon him, saying it was his own fault.

Deorgyu shouted as if he knew it would be this way.

“Hold on somehow! Lee Han will help you!”

“What’s going on?”

“A White Tiger Tower guy fell down below!”

“Why?”

“I don’t know! I think he was trying to pick something up!”

“What an idiot!”

Lee Han stopped his friends from criticizing.

“Anyone can make a mistake. That’s enough.”

“Wardanaz…!”