Chapter 207
Simon was racking his brain to understand the situation he was currently in.
First, there had been a strange explosion, the Underworld Whale had roared in pain, and the ship inside had trembled. Then he had lost consciousness, and upon opening his eyes, he found himself on a beach shrouded in thick sea fog.
He needed more information. Simon took off his soaked uniform jacket and shoes, then walked through the water with splashing steps.
After passing through the shallow water and stepping onto the white sandy beach, the sensation of soft sand underfoot felt pleasant. As he walked a bit further, he saw terrain with trees and grass growing.
Having grown up in a rugged mountain range, Simon’s eyes naturally went to the plants first. His gaze moved past the trees to the flowers and grasses in bloom.
‘This is……’
Vegetation from Roke Island.
More specifically, the environment commonly found on the western side of Roke Island. He had become very familiar with the terrain during Hongpeng’s classes, which involved traveling all over the island.
‘So I somehow ended up on Roke Island?’
When he turned around, a vast ocean stretched out toward the horizon.
He could hear the crashing of waves. At the very least, it was certain he was on an island.
Now, time to think things through again.
While traveling inside the Underworld Whale, they were ‘attacked’ by someone. The Underworld Whale crashed, and Simon lost consciousness. But somehow, he had been swept along by the waves and reached the edge of Roke Island.
This was the most natural progression of events he could infer for now.
‘……Of course, there are too many strange parts to simply believe it outright.’
Simon placed his shoes on a nearby rock, twisted his uniform like a pretzel to wring out the water, then gave it a firm shake before putting it back on.
It was still damp, but there was no helping it. That’s when Simon realized the ‘defensive magic’ that should have been on his Keyzen uniform was gone.
He drained the water from his shoes, stuffed some moisture-absorbing leaves from nearby plants inside, and dealt with the dampness as best he could before putting them back on.
There was no time to leisurely dry his clothes here.
‘I need to find the squad members.’
Just as Simon resolved himself and began to move—
Scrraaaaape!
A sound like metal being scraped rang out. He stopped immediately and looked toward the direction of the sound.
From the dense thickets. Something was approaching through the darkness of the forest.
‘A monster? Or a wild animal?’
Simon tensed, readying himself for battle.
And the moment he saw what emerged from the darkness, a gasp escaped his lips before he could even stop it.
‘No way.’
It was a monster, completely white, with hollow holes where its eyes, nose, and mouth should be. He knew exactly what it was.
It felt like being struck in the head with a hammer. How could he forget what had happened only two months ago?
‘A creature from the Prima Materia……!’
It felt like the terrible nightmare of the Saint incident, which he had tried to forget, was being dragged back up from the depths of his memory.
As he witnessed the thing standing on all fours before him, Simon thought to himself that he’d rather this be a dream.
Scrraaaaape!
The white creature charged at him on all fours.
His confusion was swept aside, and combat logic instantly settled into place.
‘I’ll end this with Overlord in one shot.’
Simon remained perfectly still, then summoned two blade-like tentacles.
One was placed like a wall in front to block the monster’s attack, and the other was timed to rise from below the moment its movement stiffened upon being blocked.
Shrrrrrrrk!
The blade pierced through the creature’s belly and rose upward. Simon summoned a skeleton short sword from subspace, gripped it in his hand, leapt up the blade, and decapitated the monster.
With its white head falling from its body, the creature’s form disintegrated like ashes and vanished into the air.
Thud.
Landing on the sandy beach, Simon tossed the short sword over his head. A subspace portal opened and swallowed the blade with a snap.
“This confirms it.”
From that brief combat, he had gathered critical information.
First, the creature he just fought was definitely created from Prima Materia.
Second, Prima Materia is an artifact that endlessly creates heterogeneous monsters from the user’s essence. If asked what essence was used this time, it was exactly the same as during the Plema incident. Without a doubt.
‘It’s holiness. Someone is using holiness to create these monsters again.’
The more information he gathered, the less clear the mystery became, only growing more confusing. Just how had a Priest made it into Roke Island?
Plop.
At the sound of something dropping to the ground, Simon turned his head.
And just like that, as if to prove his hypothesis, he saw a shocking sight.
The air rippled, and as though the space itself had vomited, a white lump dropped down. With no clear cause or process, a brand new white creature was born.
This one stood upright on two legs like a human. The moment it was born, it bared its teeth and entered a combat stance toward Simon.
“…Ah, seriously.”
Simon let out a hollow laugh and prepared himself for battle.
“If my guess is right, you bastards are the worst.”
The creature kicked off the beach and charged at him.
* * *
Chhhh.
Chk.
Countless screens spread out over dim lighting.
Over a thousand mana screens.
And surprisingly, each screen was showing a different first-year Keyzen student, stranded somewhere across Roke Island.
—If my guess is right, you bastards are the worst.
Listening to the voice of the student who had engaged in battle first, the man sitting in the chair smiled as though thoroughly amused.
“Yes, we are the worst.”
He swirled the wine glass in his hand.
Dressed in a black uniform, with all sorts of medals hanging from his chest. Epaulettes on his shoulders, and a staff in his other hand.
“You knew all this when you enrolled, didn’t you? Right?”
His name was Evangelos Alphonia.
An executive of Keyzen Headquarters, and a necromancer known by the alias Needle.
“Sir Evangelos.”
Two HQ staff members approached him and bowed their heads.
“All 948 first-year Keyzen students. The exam has begun.”
“Mhm, good.”
With a casual wave, Evangelos dismissed them, and they returned to their duties. The flying magical devices called Observers were following the students and transmitting the footage to the mana screens. Naturally, the Observers were cloaked in invisibility magic and couldn’t be seen by the students.
“Some students, like that one, are quick on the uptake.”
Evangelos turned his gaze from Simon to the adjacent screens.
“But many of them are in complete panic.”
—Ugh! Uwaaaaaah!
—Why is that thing on Roke Island?!
—I thought it was all over!
—No! No! No! No!
Evangelos burst into loud laughter.
Students collapsing.
Students screaming.
Students on the verge of tears.
Students in denial.
For this year’s first-years, the end of the first semester must have been a terrible memory they didn’t even want to recall.
The unprecedented incident where the Saint herself invaded Keyzen, trapped all the first-year students inside a barrier, and tried to massacre them all. They were the only generation who had gone through such a thing.
Although no one died, many students were injured, and even now, a large number continued to suffer from trauma and nightmares stemming from that event.
However, rather than consoling their wounds and trauma, Keyzen chose instead to cruelly dig into them, demanding that the students face their past head-on and overcome it.
“Hey, hey! How long are you going to keep bawling in that prestigious uniform? Get your mind straight. If you don’t want to die, get it together and fight!”
Evangelos shouted, waving his staff.
“I mean, no one even died back then, right? And now you’re whining about trauma over something so trivial? Must really be an era of peace, huh? Out in the field, you experience far worse. And if you can’t handle even this—”
Evangelos’s eyes glinted.
“You don’t deserve to call yourself a Keyzen.”
The staff members, who had been stealing glances at Evangelos while working, felt a chill down their spines.
Then Evangelos turned his head and spoke.
“Keep a close eye on the students’ mental states and actions. Anyone who shows significantly poor crisis response, dismiss the situation immediately.”
“Yes, sir!”
* * *
“Huff!”
Simon let out a harsh breath as he lowered his leg. The monster, struck cleanly in the head by a Darkness-infused rotating kick, sagged and then dissolved into the air.
The number of monsters Simon had taken down had just passed ten.
‘If I keep fighting them one by one, there’ll be no end to it.’
He realized he needed a clearer operational plan.
Simon considered two scenarios in his mind.
First, Efnelle had really attacked Keyzen, stolen the Prima Materia, and was creating endless monsters.
Second, this was all a fabricated situation orchestrated by Keyzen to test the students.
Simon was leaning more toward the latter. It didn’t take a complicated analysis, the timing and the entire setup were too artificial.
There was also the implausibility that mighty Keyzen had allowed Prima Materia to be stolen by priests again, and the fact that Efnelle's offensive, which had shown no signs, had just so happened to begin right on the day of the opening ceremony.
Unless the Pontifex had completely shifted her stance, Simon still believed that the moderate Saint, Israfil, would have done whatever she could to stop an outright war.
‘But to create these white monsters, wouldn’t a priest be necessary? How could they create holy monsters inside Keyzen?’
The thought suddenly occurred to him, but Simon shook his head and decided to shelve that question for now. If he kept chasing every doubt like this, he’d never get anywhere.
What was certain was this—regardless of which scenario was true, he needed to head toward the Keyzen campus.
If it was a test, then reaching the campus would mark the end of it.
And if it was truly an attack by priests, then he needed to get to the command center on campus and prevent the use of Prima Materia.
‘Alright, time to go.’
Resolving his thoughts, Simon stepped forward.
Truthfully, more than strategy, he was going crazy with worry about three people, but he didn’t know where they were, or even if they were on this island at all.
For now, as a fellow Keyzen student, he had no choice but to believe in their skills.
Scrraaaaape.
Clank.
But he hadn’t walked far before he encountered more Prima Materia monsters.
A group of seven—small, medium, and large types—were charging at Simon.
‘No time to deal with them all.’
Exploding Darkness from his legs, Simon dove straight into the group of monsters.
He dodged the attacks of the small types and leapt onto the body of a medium one. The medium and large types swung their fists, but Simon jumped again, climbing up the arm of a large monster and quickly reaching its body.
Perhaps because of their low intelligence, the monsters got tangled up with each other, and Simon used that moment to leap off the shoulder of the large monster.
‘Bone Armor!’
A subspace portal opened, and two skeletons latched onto Simon’s body.
‘Forward!’
Then, activating the skeletons' propulsion via Absolute Order, he created a glider-like effect.
Simon's body quickly slid through the air. Behind him, the monsters were in chaos, all tangled together.
‘Whether it’s a test or real, I’m going to end this madness as fast as possible!’
Skip the small fry, head straight for Keyzen along the shortest route.
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