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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Mod7
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“The dungeon practice teams will be posted on the bulletin board right now. Make sure to check them before heading out.”
“That’s all for today’s announcements. I hope everyone continues to work hard.”
With those words, Gainard left the classroom, and the students rushed to the bulletin board beside the blackboard.
The students, who had grown close in their short time together, either celebrated being in the same team or showed disappointment at being separated.
“…We’re not in the same team.”
Among those disappointed faces, Meiri was the most obvious.
She kept looking back and forth between me and the team roster, making her feelings crystal clear.
‘Of course we wouldn’t be.’
It was impossible for second and sixth place to be on the same team.
The professors wouldn’t put top-ranking students together when they needed to balance the teams.
Moreover, top-ranked students naturally had to take leadership roles in their teams, so overlapping was even more out of the question.
‘It goes up to Benras.’
Five people per team, seven teams total.
That left three people, who were neatly distributed one each to teams one, two, and three.
“We’re not in the same team, Seok-hyun.”
Meiri repeated herself, apparently unhappy that I seemed lost in thought despite clearly hearing her.
“Of course not. They wouldn’t put team leaders together.”
“…”
I couldn’t understand the sharp glares coming my way despite speaking the obvious truth.
In just a week, Meiri had firmly established herself as Class S’s mascot, receiving unintended overprotection.
Just look—Mijuran was hugging her, calling her cute. Meiri’s position was really like…
‘The class rabbit from elementary school?’
That’s exactly what it felt like when you thought about it.
“Commoner, now we can finally have a proper match. Let’s see who clears their dungeon faster!”
“Me too! I want to compete too!”
“Seok-hyun, I want to have some friendly competition too.”
Bellos led the charge, followed by Mijuran and Woo Do-hyun, but that last comment bothered me.
Friendly competition? I’d always competed fairly—that word choice felt unfair.
Though in Do-hyun’s case, I did land the finishing blow in the survival battle…
‘Surely he’s not still hung up on that.’
The male lead of the story shouldn’t be dwelling on something so trivial.
Then again, without my appearance, he would’ve lived without knowing defeat, so I understood.
Even with his humble personality and typical righteous protagonist traits, constantly being called a genius would make anyone become strict with themselves.
Plus, at such a young age, emotions naturally play a bigger role, so this level of competitiveness was understandable.
However…
“Is dungeon practice something to treat like a game, betting on who clears it faster?”
What was wrong was wrong.
This applied not just to Do-hyun, but to everyone in class getting carried away.
When Gainard mentioned dungeon practice, they’d been silent with fear, imagining death—and now this atmosphere?
Being cheerful before a big task was fine, but not to the point of turning it into a competition.
‘People could really die.’
Thinking lightly like ‘Mirinae Academy wouldn’t give us anything too difficult’ or ‘We’ll manage somehow’ could lead to disaster.
“I’m really sorry to kill the mood, but right now isn’t the time for competition.”
Even if the role was forced on me, as class president I had to fulfill my responsibilities.
‘I sound like that guy at drinking parties who can’t have fun and starts serious life discussions.’
Self-awareness brought creeping embarrassment, but I decided to finish what I had to say.
Better to be the mood-killer who couldn’t read the room than to see injured classmates after dungeon practice.
“We need to discuss who’s in our teams, what everyone can do, and what positions we’ll take. It’ll be too late later—are you going to scramble to share information after finding out which dungeon we’re going to? That’s too late. By then, we should be researching what monsters might appear and how to deal with them. Being happy is fine, but don’t forget your position.”
“…”
The cheerful atmosphere broke, replaced by silence.
I couldn’t start feeling awkward now or apologize for belatedly reading the room.
It was important to maintain a confident expression that said this was obvious and they were the ones being strange.
“Share information and either memorize it or write it down. But since information leaks would expose our strategies, keep it within your team. Don’t show anyone else. Team leaders should coordinate these aspects overall.”
Got it?
With that, I quickly left the classroom.
We only have one life.
In this moment where death meant everything disappearing meaninglessly, I wanted to take things seriously.
‘Well, they might badmouth me behind my back.’
I was prepared for some criticism after destroying the mood like that.
But after leaving the classroom, I realized I’d forgotten something.
‘I haven’t even greeted my team members yet.’
Focusing on my class president duties, I’d forgotten my role as team leader.
Though I already knew their names, stats, and skills from the information I had, so it wasn’t a huge problem.
But that was just the logical side—emotionally, we should properly meet and greet each other.
‘I’ll do it tomorrow.’
Going back now would just make things awkward again.
“Seok-hyun, let’s go together.”
“Ah… yeah.”
Just as I was about to head to class, Meiri followed me.
She’d arranged most of her schedule to match mine after hearing it, so we usually went together like this.
Thump thump thump.
We usually chatted while walking, but after what just happened, words didn’t come easily.
As if reading my mind, Meiri spoke first.
“Everyone came to their senses after hearing what you said. Nobody badmouthed you, so don’t worry too much.”
“That’s good then.”
Thinking this wasn’t enough, Meiri continued.
“They’re all having team meetings now.”
I nodded slightly at her final words.
‘Yeah, that’s enough.’
If it meant even one less person getting hurt, I could do this kind of thing as much as needed.
“Though I wondered if you really needed to say it when everyone was just trying to lighten the mood a bit, but at least the result is good.”
“…”
I gave an awkward smile at her concluding words.
‘As long as the result is good.’
Good enough was good enough.
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“I hear you’re having dungeon practice?”
“Yes.”
After finishing the morning schedule.
As usual, we had a light conversation before beginning proper training at Acasa’s training ground.
“Has the dungeon been announced yet?”
“Not yet, since this was just the first announcement.”
“Well, since your class is the most talented in recent years, it’ll naturally take time to select an appropriate dungeon.”
If the level was low, they could just send you to the field to hunt goblins and slimes.
If the level was moderate, they could have you tackle a dungeon dominated by orc tribes.
But what if the level was high? That’s where the problem arose.
“It’s quite ambiguous. You’re first-years who haven’t learned much yet, but you’re Class S with excellent grades. So what would be appropriate for your level?”
While appropriate-level dungeons posed no lethal danger, the stronger you were, the harder it became to find matching dungeons, inevitably raising the difficulty.
This could lead to risk of injury, or in the worst case, death—making dungeon selection a headache.
Finding a dungeon that required cooperation to clear while not being dangerous enough to cause serious injury…
It was like finding a needle in a desert.
“Aren’t you helping choose, Master?”
“I have to teach you.”
That alone keeps me busy.
Acasa looked at me like I’d asked something foolish.
Her confident expression suggesting I shouldn’t ask stupid questions actually made me more flustered.
“By the way, seeing how comfortably you’re talking, you must be getting used to the weight?”
“Yes, starting to.”
They say humans are creatures of adaptation.
After five days of high-intensity training pushing my body to its limits, bearing 200kg had become manageable.
“Then we should increase the weight.”
Click!
With a bright smile, Acasa snapped her fingers to adjust the weight.
“It’s 5kg each, so exactly 20kg more.”
Twenty kilograms might not sound like much, but the total was 220kg, which was no joke.
“We’ll keep increasing like this whenever you get used to it.”
Now let’s begin training.
With those words, the training ground slowly began to move.
‘Here we go again.’
As if seeing right through my thoughts, Acasa’s words reached me.
“This is necessary until you obtain Infinite Track.”
That’s not encouraging at all.
Whiiiiiiir.
The sound of wind being cut.
This signaled the beginning of hell.
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