Fated to Die in an Academy Novel – Chapter 114

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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: JayM
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When I regained consciousness, I was standing in a very familiar place.

It was a scene I couldn’t easily forget, even though I tried to bury it in a deep corner of my mind because I hated remembering it.

And standing before me was someone I once longed for, someone I hated, and someone I resented so much yet couldn’t sever ties with.

“Ha-neul, what do you want to eat?”

Ha-neul.

My real name, which felt strangely unfamiliar even though it hadn’t been that long since I last heard it.

My parents said that they named me so hoping I would become someone broad and accepting, like the sky.

The sight of her made me so disgusted that I felt like throwing up.

But instead of gagging, my mouth smiled and spoke to her.

“I like everything Mom makes.”

It was hard to believe that a four-year-old would say that, but that was me.

It was also something I said because I knew I didn’t really have a choice.

Fried kimchi with pork fat scraps bought cheaply from the butcher, and boiled bean sprouts from the market seasoned with soy sauce.

That was the most expensive and the best meal our family could afford.

Yet, I had no complaints.

Complaints stemmed from comparison. I didn’t know the outside world, and my small single room and my Mom were my everything. I was happy just with that.

What was this?

Who was showing me this unpleasant memory I had buried away?

I didn’t know what my father did for a living, but he often came home drunk.

My mother was clumsy at many things. Come to think of it, she was probably very young to be a mother.

“I love you, Ha-neul.”

“Me too.”

Be like the sky. That was the meaning of the name I was given, but even back then, I vaguely knew it was impossible.

My father often brought home old books as gifts.

He probably picked them up from somewhere as they had been discarded.

Thanks to that, I gained some knowledge, limited as it was.

And when I learned to read, I roughly understood.

Ah, we weren’t a normal family.

A place where I was sometimes beaten up by my drunk father with keys, padlocks, or broken remote controls, where my exhausted mother would smile while crying and say I gave her strength, then burst into tears again. This place, so normal to me, wasn’t normal at all.

Yet, it didn’t matter.

I liked my mother, even though she sometimes hit me while crying.

I also liked my father, who, while completely drunk, would shout that reading would make me a great person.

The violence was punishment for my mistakes, something that could be resolved with more effort.

I just had to become a great person like they said. That was probably what I thought as a child.

Even seeing that scene again now, I felt indifferent.

It was too old a scene to grieve over, a memory too faded from being recalled too many times.

There were various forms of human suffering.

But the suffering a child experienced often ended similarly.

Perhaps due to some misplaced guilt, perhaps because he truly meant it at first, or perhaps as a safety measure in case I regretted it later…

The day I turned five, I experienced the outside world for the first time.

I even ate ice cream.

Mom wiped my cheeks with a smile, but her hands were trembling, so I remember telling her to hold them still.

Her expression crumpled.

My father didn’t come, but I thought it would be nice if he did.

As time passed and the weather turned cold…

I felt uneasy.

That day, I felt a strange sense of unease beyond the excitement of being outside for the first time.

Adults might not notice, but children easily sensed small changes, and I knew, faster than anyone, that my mother’s behavior had changed.

She was my god, my only value.

“Ha-neul, do you want more ice cream?”

“…No.”

That refusal might have been the only small act of rebellion I could muster as I sensed what was about to happen.

“Hmm, what should I do? Mommy has to go somewhere for a bit.”

…At this hour? And you expect me to believe that?

But I believed her. There was no reason for my god to lie to me.

“Wait here for a little while, okay?”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m just going to buy something. Wait here with this and buy some ice cream. Don’t go anywhere. Promise me.”

Why did she do that? Did she think that I might follow her and cling to her?

Was she worried that her resolve might waver if she saw me like that?

“Okay. You’ll be back soon, right?”

“A little, yeah. It might take a while. But you have to wait here, okay?”

Why did she look so sad, like she was about to cry, instead of brushing me off with an annoyed expression?

I didn’t use the money to buy ice cream even after she disappeared from sight.

I was afraid that would be the end. I just watched her retreating figure while feeling uneasy.

We were poor.

We couldn’t afford to eat this often.

So, I would wait until she came back so we could eat it together, so it wouldn’t melt, so we could go buy it together hand in hand.

Wouldn’t Father like it too?

He might even praise me for not wasting money.

No, wait.

I realized then…

Perhaps because it was so similar to the scenes I had read countless times in books where bad parents abandoned their children.

I had been abandoned. The price of her conscience, the price of abandoning me, was just this single bill.

This was our last connection.

That was what I thought.

I should have run away, found a way to survive, but I foolishly stayed there.

Maybe she would come back.

She said she loved me, so wouldn’t she regret it?

Wouldn’t she be heartbroken if I wasn’t here when she came back?

“I hope she comes back soon.”

When the sun completely set and the moon rose, it wasn’t a temperature a child could endure in thin clothes.

People gathered around me.

“Are you okay?”

Who was it? I didn’t remember, but an adult asked me that.

“Yes, I’m just waiting for my mom.”

Their expressions turned serious.

It seemed like they had been watching me for a long time. It was unnecessary kindness.

He called the police, and I denied everything.

But there was nothing a child could do, and I was taken to the hospital for treatment.

And I secretly escaped from the hospital at night and went back to that place.

Or rather, I tried to.

But the way was too complicated for a child to remember.

I ended up sitting in front of the hospital. Tears welled up in my eyes. I cried my heart out for the first time in my life.

It felt like the end of the world.

The police, believing my words that my mother might be looking for me, took me back to that place, and I quickly ran away.

Because they would take me back when they realized there was no hope.

Well, it wasn’t much of a rebellion, and I was quickly caught again. Soon after, I became an orphan.

Orphanages were surprisingly territorial.

The children growing up in isolation wanted to test any newcomers, and if they didn’t comply, they would be punished.

Back then, I didn’t accept that I was an orphan, and they tried to beat me up.

And when I fought back, they tried to take the money my mother gave me, so I fought even harder.

Life in the orphanage was hell, a curse.

What saved me was…

“You like reading, don’t you?”

A girl approached me, who was always reading alone.

“I like writing stories! Read this!”

But at first, I strangely disliked that cheerful girl, even though she was also an orphan.

“No. You’re pathetic.”

Tsk.

“Damn it, that’s enough.”

Squirm.

The void in my heart reacted to my emotions, and the world created from my memories cracked.

My heart ached as if it would explode, the price of using a power that wasn’t mine, but it was better than continuing to watch this pathetic scene.

As sensation slowly returned to my body along with the pain, I became certain.

I didn’t know what method the bastard who showed me this memory used, but if it was based on the laws of this world, it couldn’t resist this void.

“Sorry, but I’ve overcome this shitty memory a long time ago.”

My mother wasn’t my only god.

I lost my family, but I made precious connections.

I learned that there were gains in loss, and that after gaining something, I had to experience separation again.

This wasn’t a nightmare for me anymore.

The moment I moved, the world froze like a photograph and cracked.

Now that I had regained my freedom, it was time to find out what caused this.

Right, I was at the ball?

Judging by the frozen world, I must have been caught up in some serious incident.

It seemed like I could use my artifacts.

-Devil’s Touch is concerned about your well-being.

-Saint’s Will says it was more worried and asks about your well-being.

“That’s a relief.”

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And there were those who noticed his change.

The culprits of this incident, a race highly sensitive to dreams, could sense a single person, a boy, somehow regained partial consciousness even within the vast dream world.

“…Huh? One of them escaped.”

“What? What do you mean, escaped?”

“They’re all supposed to be trapped in the dream, unconscious. How did he wake up?”

“I don’t know! We have to send someone to deal with him! The Queen will be furious!”

This operation was a matter of life and death for their entire race, and it was essential for their further development. They couldn’t afford to miss even a small irregularity.

“We’ll be in big trouble if we can’t catch him…!”

Of course, it wouldn’t just end with a scolding, but that was all a low-ranking nightmare could say with her limited intelligence, especially with her vital energy depleted.

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“…So, this is a space created by mixing vast demonic energy and human desires, and I was able to maintain consciousness thanks to you two resisting it?”

-Saint’s Will begrudgingly agrees.

-Devil’s Touch claims it would have been difficult to resist it alone.

I see. Saint’s Will maintained my consciousness with its mental strength and resistance buffs, and Devil’s Touch blocked the demonic energy meant to hypnotize me.

The fact that it took these two working together to do it meant it was something powerful, something I couldn’t dispel with my incomplete Fiery Eyes and Golden Pupils.

“…Then is this like a mental realm?”

-Probably something similar.

“Oh, hey, you’re here?”

-Ah, yes. I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I was also hit by the nightmare and revisited some of my dark past.

…A nightmare.

It wasn’t a coincidence that both Sun Wukong and I were trapped in dreams.

The culprits of the recent kidnapping incident were succubi.

I could roughly guess what had happened.

A powerful succubus must have created a vast dream world using some unknown method.

They probably targeted the moment when a large number of people focused their consciousness simultaneously.

Using the perfect timing of the ball’s first dance, they trapped everyone in a dream.

Their goal was probably to extract vital energy from this dream and do something with it, and it probably wasn’t something beneficial to humanity.

“This is troublesome.”

Honestly, I didn’t know what to do since this didn’t happen in the original story.

Was there anyone else awake besides me…?

Should I try to enter other people’s dreams?

But how?

The dream I broke earlier was just due to the void acting on its own because I was angry.

Should I ask it for help?

“Hey, can you let me enter other people’s dreams?”

Well, it would be too convenient if it worked. I shouldn’t try to take shortcuts like this.

Static.

Huh?

Surprisingly, the already cracked world broke further, and a door-like space opened.

And the void squirmed proudly(?).

…Oh, it worked? Yeah, I knew I could count on you.

-…What is that thing in your heart? It didn’t even budge when I tried to interfere with magical power the last time.

“Well, it’s something amazing. I don’t fully understand it myself, but if I had to describe it with the least restrictive term…”

It resisted and rebelled whenever I tried to name it, but it seemed to allow one word, stopping its resistance.

“It’s probably called… an Authority.”

A part of the Creator’s power, the one who created this world.

The power that interfered with the world, the power that attacked Professor Cathy that day. A part of the Creator’s Authority was the true nature of the void residing in my heart.

-Your pronunciation is muffled, I can’t hear you.

Ah, it didn’t work after all. I tried, just in case, since this was a dream.

I could speak, but he couldn’t hear me.

“Anyway, it’s something like that. I’ll explain later, so let’s wake up the others first.”

Should I try to wake up the others?

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T/N – Jeez man, I did not expect to be hit by such a sad backstory for this chapter.

Also, I find Saint’s Will quite cute with how it tries to compete with Devil’s Touch. It’s like a petulant child begging for attention.

If you find any mistakes, feel free to point them out in the comments.