I Became the Academy’s Heroine Stalker – Chapter 82

—————————————————————–
Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Chaos
—————————————————————–

◇◇◇◆◇◇◇

 
‘Ugh…’

My head was pounding.

Or rather, it felt like it had already shattered.

The moment I saw the statue Park Na-yeon showed me and the equipment it was wearing, a sudden, inexplicable headache overwhelmed me, and I blacked out.

I must have hit my head on the floor when I collapsed.

It was a marble floor… Was there blood everywhere?

Well, probably not.

I had an Awakened body, after all. It wouldn’t just crack open from a fall.

Anyway,

I still didn’t know why I’d had such a severe headache.

All I remembered was seeing the equipment, then the image of the equipment I’d stashed away in Drogh’s storage room flashed in my mind, and the headache hit.

It had been covered in dust, a medieval-looking bow-like weapon with no discernible enhancements or traits, so I’d left it alone.

I figured the previous Han Tae-jin had used it for practice or that it was a mana-cracked piece of junk.

But seeing the equipment Park Na-yeon showed me triggered the memory, and a massive, overwhelming surge of information flooded my mind, knocking me unconscious.

First, I tried to open my eyes.

But…

‘Ugh… What’s going on? I think I’m awake, but…’

My eyes wouldn’t open.

And my body wouldn’t move.

‘Shit, what the… Don’t tell me…’

I hadn’t turned into a vegetable from hitting my head, had I?

My body was unresponsive, as if I was experiencing sleep paralysis.

I couldn’t move a single finger, and I couldn’t even tell if I was breathing.

It felt like my consciousness was trapped somewhere.

‘Mmm…’

Then, I heard a sound coming from somewhere far away.

It was muffled, like I was wearing earplugs, and I couldn’t make out what it was.

‘…kay?!’

Was that Renia’s voice?

‘ake…! El… Ah!’

What was she saying?

The voice grew clearer, and the darkness behind my eyelids began to fade to a hazy gray.

It felt like light and sound were slowly approaching from a distance.

As I waited, I heard other strange noises besides the voices.

-Kuo! Kuo!

-Zing, Zing.

What was all that noise?

The clash of weapons, monstrous roars, the sound of wind, and what sounded like skills being activated.

Had I somehow landed in the middle of a battlefield?

The escalating commotion made me uneasy.

Wait, I wasn’t dead, and I was conscious, so why was I hearing all these strange sounds?

‘Am I dreaming?’

But it felt too real for a dream. The sounds were becoming clearer and the hazy gray scene brighter.

It was like experiencing the process of waking up from anesthesia in real time.

Boom-!

‘Roden…! Elroden!’

Another explosion, and a woman’s voice pierced through the noise.

It was much clearer now.

And with that sound, I started to feel sensations.

Someone was slapping my cheeks and shaking my shoulders.

The voice sounded like Park Na-yeon’s.

Had we been attacked by Illusion while I was unconscious?

I tried to move, but I still couldn’t feel anything.

And…

‘Elroden?’

The woman was definitely calling me that.

A name that sounded like it belonged in a medieval fantasy world or somewhere in Northern Europe.

My confusion deepened.

As the sounds and sensations became more distinct, a woman’s silhouette appeared in my gradually clearing vision.

Wavy black hair, a small, pale face, and fiery red eyes.

A face I felt I had seen before, looking down at me with concern.

‘Roden! Elroden! Are you alright?!’

Where was I?

And why did she keep calling me Elroden? I was Han Tae-jin.

I tried to sit up and assess the situation, but my body wouldn’t move.

Or rather, I couldn’t muster any strength.

It felt like it wasn’t even my body.

Wait, I can’t even blink, so how can I see?

‘Roden! Can you move?!’

‘Ugh… I’m alright. I didn’t expect a tail attack.’

Huh?

What was going on?

I was seeing the world through the eyes of someone called Elroden, but I couldn’t even move my eyelids.

And how was I even thinking these thoughts?

Wait, he’s sitting up now?

I was still lying down.

This was a series of baffling situations. I tried to scream, to struggle, but…

I was completely immobile, as if trapped in a terrible nightmare.

Meanwhile, the man called Elroden sat up with the woman’s help.

It felt like I was bound and imprisoned.

In the prison of this man’s mind.

‘Can you fight anymore?’

‘Of course. No problem.’

It was like playing a first-person simulation game. And then, I saw the armor the woman was wearing, and my confusion deepened.

Wait… isn’t that…?

The armor Park Na-yeon had shown me, asking if it looked familiar.

The rugged, sturdy-looking armor… the woman was wearing it.

Wait a minute, aside from the long hair, she looked exactly like Park Na-yeon…

Black hair, red eyes, petite build…

And now that I thought about it, her voice was exactly the same as Park Na-yeon’s.

‘Master?’

I called out involuntarily, but of course, no sound came out.

‘What the hell is going on?!’

Who was Elroden, and why was I trapped in his mind? And what was Park Na-yeon doing here?

‘Let’s go, Raphia.’

‘Okay, Roden.’

Elroden called her Raphia.

Then, he looked into the distance, and at the end of his gaze, a massive black dragon and two figures who appeared to be knights were locked in a fierce battle.

Elroden picked up a bow, and the woman called Raphia drew a sword.

‘Huh?’

Wait a minute.

Wasn’t that bow the one I’d found stashed away in the storage room?

So, had this Elroden somehow been reincarnated into the modern world?

I didn’t know.

My mind was overloaded with information, and I couldn’t form any coherent theories.

I was dizzy and disoriented.

Then, the two joined their apparent comrades and started fighting the black dragon.

-Kuo! Kuo!

‘Okay!’

I was forced to witness these events unfold, powerless to intervene.

It felt like they were trying to tell me something.

‘Or is this some kind of backstory for Han Tae-jin…?’

The woman called Raphia was wearing Park Na-yeon’s armor, and I had fainted the moment I saw it.

And now I was trapped in the mind of a man named Elroden, who was using the bow I’d found in Han Tae-jin’s storage room.

So, this must be some point in the past where Park Na-yeon and Han Tae-jin were connected, and there was a high probability that Raphia was Park Na-yeon and Elroden was Han Tae-jin.

Of course, I couldn’t be certain.

I couldn’t see Elroden’s face to confirm.

‘Haaa!’

-Kuo! Kuo! Grrr!

Wait a second…

Didn’t that black dragon look a lot like Drogh?

The curved, twin horns on its head, the spiked club at the end of its tail, the obsidian-like scales, and the three claws on its front and hind paws.

And the two whiskers on the sides of its snout, like an Eastern dragon’s.

Typical Western dragons didn’t have whiskers.

That’s why it immediately came to mind.

Drogh, who was still growing, had recently started to develop two whiskers on his snout as well.

‘What in the world is going on…?’

Of course, it was too early to jump to conclusions. I had to carefully observe Elroden’s surroundings and wait for the battle to end.

The other two comrades were unfamiliar.

The surrounding scenery was similar to Earth.

A lush forest, a massive cave, a sky covered in dark clouds, and billowing dust.

But upon closer inspection, there was a strange, unsettling feeling.

Like an imitation of Earth, or perhaps another Earth altogether.

One thing was certain: this wasn’t the Earth I knew.

Perhaps, just like Renia had been summoned from Drogfia to Earth…

‘Were Han Tae-jin and Park Na-yeon summoned to another planet?’

-Grrr…!

Boom-!

Then, the black dragon collapsed from Elroden’s attack. The earth trembled as the massive creature, the size of a six-story building, fell.

-Grrr…

The black dragon gasped for breath, then closed its eyes and went still.

At the same time,

‘Kyaa! We did it! We defeated Velokas, Elroden! We can finally go back to Earth!’

Raphia hugged Elroden and jumped for joy.

She said they could go back to Earth.

That meant my deduction was correct. I was trapped in the mind of Han Tae-jin, who was now Elroden.

And they had been summoned to this Earth-like planet to defeat the Black Dragon Velokas, and now, having finally accomplished their mission, they could return.

I didn’t know why it had to be Han Tae-jin and Park Na-yeon, but that was a question for later.

Right now, what mattered was what this flashback was trying to show me.

‘Elroden! Aren’t you happy? We can go back to Earth now!’

Raphia released him from the hug and asked with a puzzled expression.

‘….’

Elroden stared blankly at Raphia.

I was forced to stare at her too.

If this really was Master… she looked surprisingly good with long hair.

‘What’s wrong? You wanted to go back more than anyone.’

‘The food isn’t diverse, the beds are hard, and I can’t even take a proper shower. The bathrooms are filthy, and there’s a musty smell everywhere I go.’

Elroden suddenly launched into a rant about why they needed to return to Earth.

Raphia listened with a complex expression, a mix of bittersweet emotions.

‘I bet I will be happy to go back to Earth. All this discomfort and boredom will also be gone.’

‘But…’

Elroden suddenly changed the subject.

‘But the thought of you, who shared all this discomfort and boredom with me, being gone… It makes me sad.’

‘Elroden…’

Raphia’s eyes filled with emotion as she took a step closer to Elroden.

And she cupped his cheek with her hand.

Even though I couldn’t speak or move,

I could feel the warmth of Raphia’s touch on my cheek.

It was warm.

And soft.

‘Roden, do you think we’ll be separated forever?’

‘See? I’ll find you, and you’ll find me. As long as we know each other’s names, we’ll find each other in that small country. Elroden and Raphia. Those two names are all we need. We know we’re both Korean, anyway.’

Raphia said with a confident glint in her eyes.

‘But, considering we can only vaguely remember things other than our names… What if we forget our memories of this place when we return to Earth…?’

Elroden asked worriedly.

But Raphia’s gaze remained unwavering.

She was as resolute as ever.

‘No, we’ll remember. Even if we forget our names or our memories, we will definitely remember.’

‘Promise me. You too.’

Raphia held out her pinky finger.

After a moment of hesitation, Elroden linked his pinky with hers.

Raphia smiled at that.

To see a smile on Park Na-yeon’s usually stoic face… Just what kind of relationship did they have here?

It seemed pretty deep.

‘This place uses the same mana as Earth. Even if we forget everything else, our mana signatures will remain the same. So, we’ll be able to find each other.’

Reassured by her unwavering confidence, Elroden’s worries seemed to dissipate.

‘Okay. I’ll definitely find you, Raphia.’

Raphia’s smile deepened, and her face drew closer.

Raphia closed her eyes.

Naturally, Elroden also closed his eyes.

A moment later, a soft sensation brushed against my lips, piercing through the deep darkness.

Hmm…

Sharing a kiss right after defeating a black dragon…

They must have been pretty serious…

Anyway… so Han Tae-jin and Park Na-yeon had been lovers in the past but had forgotten each other upon returning to Earth… Was that what this flashback was trying to show me?

And the reason why Han Tae-jin, who was strong enough to defeat a black dragon, was significantly weaker than Park Na-yeon now was probably due to something that happened during their return.

Perhaps his creepy stalker tendencies, despite having protagonist-level potential, traits, and luck, were also a result of the return.

The current Elroden, or rather, Han Tae-jin, seemed like a perfectly normal guy.

It seemed the original author had set him up for a villainous downfall and world destruction.

To think they’d given such a deep backstory to a character destined to become a villain…

By the way, did that mean the Black Dragon Velokas wasn’t actually dead, but had somehow latched onto Elroden?

And that’s why he had suffered some kind of mental trauma during the return?

‘Drogh always growls at me like he wants to eat me alive… I think he holds a grudge.’

It seemed like a legitimate grudge, after all.

But if that were the case, should I kill Drogh now?

There was a high chance he would go on a rampage after reaching adulthood.

Well, I didn’t know if Drogh was Velokas or just a descendant.

But Drogh was a problem for another time.

I had enough on my mind already.

‘…What a complicated backstory.’

Anyway, the flashback seemed to be over.

I couldn’t hear any more noises or feel any sensations.

Then,

-Tae-ji…!

Renia’s voice reached me, and my consciousness faded, as if drifting off to sleep.

-Tae-jin…!

A moment later, my mind went blank, like a TV switching off.

So…

Does this make Na-yeon…my ex-girlfriend?

◇◇◇◆◇◇◇