I Realized It Was An Academy Game After 10 Years – Chapter 35

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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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“A man who treats a lady roughly will live alone forever!”

“Tsk.”

There was a spot to put the head, so I tried putting Millia’s head in, but her head was smaller than I thought.

I thought I could eat at least one raw.

As if this damn world would give me such a lucky chance.

It might make me eat shit, but it wouldn’t let me eat the dungeon raw.

I must have gotten quite lax after 10 years of suffering.

I sighed and detached Millia’s head from the head part of the coffin.

“I’m not a key!”

“Oh, this one doesn’t get censored.”

“Do I look like a mere key to you?! I am !*()@&(!$#*&!”

“Shut up.”

I shoved jerky into Millia’s mouth and hung her on my waist.

The sight of her crying and eating the jerky while wriggling her mouth was extraordinarily grotesque.

Just what had made Millia like this?

Taking my eyes off Millia, I examined the coffin again.

A coffin with compartments for the head and limbs.

There was no torso part.

Looking closely, the size and length of the limbs were subtly different.

Was it telling us to bring them from multiple people’s corpses, not a single person’s?

A gloomy puzzle in a gloomy place.

I don’t know who made this dungeon, but I can tell they have a nasty taste.

Judging by their behavior, it’s probably a necromancer or a lich.

In the first place, when you think of undead, those two are the representative ones.

Among them, the probability of it being a lich seemed even higher.

Or it could be a death knight, a fantasy staple.

…I hope it’s not a dragon.

“Johann, look at this! I found something!”

At Renny’s words, I immediately walked over to where she was and took the paper she was holding.

An old paper that looked like it would crumble with just a little force.

Five lines of sentences were written on the paper.

“The hint is quite intuitive.”

“This? I have no idea what it’s talking about…”

Renny looked at me with an expression that seemed to ask what the hell this meant. I organized my thoughts for a moment.

At first glance, it might seem like nonsense, but when you think about it, it’s quite a simple problem.

Family.

Family means sharing the same surname.

So it means to collect the bones of people with the same surname written on the tombstones and stick them in the coffin…

The problem is that without any other hints, we have to guess the family relationships just by looking at the names.

Surely they wouldn’t pull a stunt like writing Elizabeth and making it a man, or writing a name like William and making it a daughter, right?

Or having multiple people with the same surname.

“So what does it mean? Explain it to me.”

“What’s the common point of a family?”

“Uh…they are connected by blood?”

“I know! They have the same surname!”

What are you talking about when you’re from here?

Why are you saying that as if you just realized it?

I glanced at the clueless Millia for a moment and continued.

“Yeah. As Millia said, a family would have the same surname.”

I pointed to the tombstone on the path where I had created the wall.

Henry Sigmund.

“…Ah!”

“We just need to find people with the same surname on the tombstones. We’ll probably have to detach one part each from the corpse under that tombstone…no, there’s one more possibility.”

As I was speaking, I frowned at the possibility that came to mind.

The difficulty rose too sharply.

To be precise, it was at an annoying level.

The reason why the 2nd floor was a cemetery.

And the reason why zombies kept popping out.

Connecting everything led to one conclusion.

“Among the zombies coming out from here, there might be the family mentioned in this paper.”

“Then do we have to catch and check every single one of those zombies?”

Don’t make such a disgusted face.

We might have to do that from now on.

I scratched my chin and looked at the distant tombstones.

There were five parts we need to find.

A puzzle where we have to roam around the circular cemetery surrounding the hill with the entrance to find the parts.

It was a puzzle you’d see in a 2D dot horror game that broadcasters used to enjoy long ago.

Considering that this world was a game, it’s not that strange, but…

“Ugh…my head hurts. So you’re saying we have to go around the cemetery and cut off limbs and heads to put them in? But what’s a shameful head?”

“…I don’t know. There’s probably another hint on the tombstones.”

For now, we had to check all the tombstones.

This feels like old game sensibility too.

To think there’s such a tedious puzzle in this day and age.

This is why it was called a failed game.

Although I’m not in a position to say that when I played that failed game for over a thousand hours.

“So what’s the next plan? Are we going to wander around looking for tombstones right away? Or return for now?”

“We return first. We need to tell Karina too.”

Renny nodded at my words and turned around.

We leisurely returned to the shelter with the sound of knocking on the wall as the background.

When we opened the door to the shelter, Karina was in the middle of praying with her hands neatly clasped together.

As we entered through the door, Karina smiled brightly with a face full of joy and opened her mouth.

“Welcome back. Did you find anything?”

“I think we found the door leading to the 3rd floor.”

“That’s a relief! So can we open the door right away?”

“No. We have to solve a puzzle.”

I showed the paper to Karina.

After reading the sentences written on the paper, Karina clapped her hands and her eyes sparkled.

“So we just need to find tombstones with the same surname?”

“Probably.”

“Is there anything I can help with?”

Is there anything she can help with?

I stared at Karina for a moment, then turned my gaze to Millia.

Millia, who had been rolling around on the table, seemed to be still grumbling, unsatisfied.

“Treating a lady like this…”

“Ah, right…Lady Millia. A smart one like you must know something, right?”

I showed Millia the contents of the paper.

Perhaps because I praised her, Millia’s mouth twitched, looking a bit brighter.

“A shameful head? It means the head of a bastard child! Or you have to offer a red-haired head!”

Strangely, Millia’s voice came out clean and clear, without even a hint of censorship.

Is this not being censored?

Perhaps it’s not very important information.

Or maybe they don’t block the minimum hints necessary for clearing.

Anyway, it seemed to be somewhat helpful this time.

“A bastard child…and red hair. What does that mean?”

At my question, Millia explained with a triumphant face.

“Back when I was a beautiful lady with a renowned name, red hair was a symbol of misfortune! So when a red-haired child was born, they would kill them right away! Sometimes there were kids who survived even after that, but…”

Millia’s words trailed off as she made a gloomy expression.

We naturally couldn’t help but look at Millia.

We had no choice.

Because Millia, who only had a head left in front of us, had red hair.

“…Anyway, that’s what a shameful head means!”

“Got it.”

I feel a bit sorry for Millia.

I put jerky in Millia’s mouth and alternately looked at Karina and Renny.

The two of them had slightly downcast faces due to the gloomy story.

To lighten the mood, I clapped my hands and opened my mouth.

“Then let’s rest for a bit and collect bones while roaming the cemetery.”

Everyone quietly nodded at my words.

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“…Aren’t you going to sleep?”

“I just woke up.”

The pink-haired saint sat next to me as I was looking down at the cemetery from atop the shelter.

With the fragrant scent wafting from beside me, I naturally turned my head to the side and looked at her.

A distance that seemed reachable if I stretched out my arm.

Karina, who sat with that subtle distance between us, asked me while gazing at the cemetery that filled her field of vision.

“Where will you go after escaping this island, Johann?”

“Well.”

To be honest, even if we manage to reach the bottom of this dungeon and succeed in the so-called clearing, I don’t know if it’s possible to escape the deserted island.

But, if we really succeed in escaping…

Then…

What should I do?

To put it bluntly, I can’t attend the Academy.

I’m probably around my 30s, so wearing a school uniform would be a crime.

Even if I enter the Academy in another way, I have no intention of getting involved in the storyline of the game.

From what I can recall, the story of Survival Academy wasn’t a bright one.

If I carelessly get involved, I don’t want to end up bleeding.

By the time you see the ending, it’s confirmed that about one-third of the students will be slaughtered.

And that’s still the good ending.

I don’t even want to think about the bad endings.

As for the recently added true ending, I don’t know how it will turn out.

If it were a game, I wouldn’t mind, but in reality, I don’t want to struggle to see the true ending.

In the first place, I don’t even know the conditions, so even if I wanted to, I couldn’t do it.

“If, if you have nowhere to go, I can help you.”

What was her intention in saying that?

I made eye contact with Karina.

Her eyes were pure and filled with innocence.

At least it wouldn’t be insincere words.

She’s not the type to do that.

I lowered my gaze to her small, fidgeting hands and turned my eyes back to the cemetery.

“Thank you.”

With my short gratitude, we silently gazed at the cemetery.

Until everyone woke up.

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