The Last-Seat Hero Has Returned

4. A Reason to Live (3)

The training hall was shrouded in silence.

Professor Lucas, who had proposed this duel, and the cadets who had flocked to watch this rare spectacle, all stared in shock at Felix, who was retching on the floor of the training hall.

Felix Ordman.

A noble from a viscount family of the Empire, a cadet who had awakened the stigmata of the ‘Sea God’ passed down through his family.

His personality was insufferably arrogant, and his manners were atrocious, so he wasn’t well-liked at the academy.

But there was one thing he was recognized for.

“Felix lost in swordsmanship?”

“And, so overwhelmingly?”

His pure swordsmanship skills, without the use of magic.

In ‘non-magic duels’ like this one, where the use of magic was restricted, Felix was a top-tier swordsman, ranking within the top 50… no, even the top 30.

And yet, Felix had lost.

By an overwhelming margin, without even managing to swing his sword properly.

‘What was that swordsmanship just now…’

Professor Lucas recalled the swordsmanship Dale had displayed, his expression confused.

He was known for his keen eye, earning him the nickname ‘Hound.’

The swordsmanship Dale had just displayed was undoubtedly…

‘The Solar Sword?’

The Solar Sword.

The Empire’s strongest… no, the continent’s strongest swordsmanship, created by the legendary hero Reynald Helios, who sealed the Demon God 500 years ago.

How could Dale, who wasn’t even from the Helios family, or the Empire, use it?

‘No, it’s different.’

As he continued to think calmly, Professor Lucas shook his head.

‘The basic form looks similar, but it’s different from the Solar Sword I know.’

He was certain because he had recently seen Yuren Helios, the eldest son of the Helios family and the rightful heir to the Solar Sword, using it.

The swordsmanship Dale had displayed looked similar to the Solar Sword at first glance, but it was definitely different.

It was as if he had broken down the Solar Sword into pieces and modified it to suit himself.

If anyone else had seen it, they might not have even noticed the similarities to the Solar Sword.

‘Even if it’s a coincidence that it resembles the Solar Sword… it doesn’t make sense that Dale can use swordsmanship of that level.’

Would he be in the last seat for no reason?

The reason Dale monopolized the last place in the comprehensive evaluation rankings for three years since his admission was not only because he was absolutely lacking in magic compared to other candidates, but also because he was so clumsy that the word “hopeless” suited him.

But how on earth.

How could he have acquired such astonishing swordsmanship skills as if he had become a different person overnight?

“What are you doing? Didn’t you say you’d come first? Aren’t you coming?”

Before Lucas’s doubts could continue, a low voice broke the silence.

Tap, tap.

Dale took a step forward, tapping the floor with the end of his wooden sword.

“Then I’ll go.”

“Ugh…”

Felix, who was lying on the floor of the training ground, staggered to his feet, vomiting.

“You… b*stard!”

Felix, his face flushed and twisted, stomped his foot fiercely and charged.

And then, a clash.

-Thud!

“Ugh!”

Once again, Felix’s sword couldn’t even touch Dale’s collar.

Felix, who was knocked back in an unsightly manner, trembled his eyes in disbelief.

At first, he thought he was careless, but this time it wasn’t like that.

“How on earth…”

Only then did the rumors he had heard yesterday flash through his mind.

The rumor that Dale had knocked out Professor Lucas. And the rumor that he had subdued Camilla Vedice with one hand.

All of them were so absurd that he hadn’t even paid attention to them.

‘Were all those rumors true?’

Felix frowned and shook his head.

‘Nonsense.’

Even though Felix had just been knocked down without even swinging his sword properly, the deep-seated prejudice he had built up against Dale over the past few years made him ignore the reality in front of him.

“…Dale Han.”

Grit.

Felix gritted his teeth fiercely and gripped the wooden sword as if to break it.

“Let’s see how long you can keep up that arrogance.”

The holy mark engraved on Felix’s left chest emitted light, and a soft blue aura enveloped his body.

Magic.

The breath of the gods, which only those who have awakened the holy mark can wield, spread throughout his body.

“Haaap!”

Whoosh!

Felix’s sword swung with explosive speed, incomparable to just a moment ago.

“Felix Oddman!”

Professor Lucas, who had been watching the sparring, hurriedly stood up, but he couldn’t stop the already swung sword.

“Come on, try to block this too!”

Hearing the fierce shout that pierced his ears, Dale looked at the wooden sword wrapped in a blue aura.

He smirked.

A faint chuckle escaped his lips.

‘Come to think of it, that guy Yuren once said.’

If you reach the pinnacle of the Sun Sword, you can cut the sky with just the sword without using magic.

‘Well, I’m not at the level of cutting the sky yet.’

But he should be able to cut through a wooden sparring sword made of oak.

“Hiss.”

He took a deep breath and pulled the sword towards his shoulder.

He slightly bent his waist and focused the weight of his entire body on the soles of his feet.

Like a spring compressed to its limit, the force concentrated on the soles of his feet exploded upwards, heading towards the blade.

And then.

He cut.

Clang-!

With a clear metallic sound that shouldn’t have come from a wooden sword, the wooden sword in Felix’s hand split in half and rolled on the ground.

“…What?”

Felix stared at the split wooden sword with a dumbfounded expression.

“What is… this.”

The power of magic is numerous and hard to count on one hand.

Among them, there was one fundamental effect.

The pure enhancement of ‘physical strength.’

The miraculous power of magic could make even a thin twig that seemed about to break drive a nail into iron.

‘You split my sword in half without using magic?’

With an ordinary training wooden sword?

‘That’s impossible.’

It was like cutting a solid iron club with a twig.

No, wait.

Even if I conceded a hundred times that a twig could dent an iron club.

How on earth could an ordinary wooden sword ‘cut’ a magic-infused wooden sword?

This was impossible, regardless of the presence of magic.

Though called a sword, a training wooden sword was merely a wooden club carved from oak.

“What kind of trickery did you… Ugh!”

Thud.

Before Felix could finish his sentence.

A fist swung like a lightning bolt struck Felix’s jaw.

Felix’s body collapsed to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

“……”

“……”

There were no cheers for the victor, nor jeers for the loser.

In the silence that fell like a curtain.

I leisurely turned my body towards Professor Lucas and spoke.

“As promised, the suspension period is reduced to four days, right?”

“…Ah, um. Yes.”

Professor Lucas nodded with a bewildered expression.

Even seeing it with his own eyes, he couldn’t understand the situation, but he didn’t bother to explain.

After all, even if he did, it would be the same as not understanding.

“Then. I’ll see you next week, Professor.”

I bowed politely and headed out of the training ground.

Maybe because it was almost lunchtime.

The sight of cadets busily moving around the campus could be seen.

“Four days.”

Since today was Tuesday, there would be roughly six days of leisure, including the weekend.

‘I have a lot to do.’

Having decided to live a new life, there were mountains of preparations to be made.

‘I won’t lose anything anymore.’

Hadn’t it been a life of nothing but loss until now?

Friends, siblings, seniors, lovers—those who were most precious.

Not a single one could be protected.

Hadn’t they all been lost?

‘Even if I can’t decide how it ends, I can at least decide how to live.’

This time, without losing anyone.

I will protect them with my own hands.

“Let’s go.”

Engraving this resolve deep in my heart, I headed towards the dormitory.

* * *

“I knocked on the door but there was no answer, so I wondered where you were, and here you are?”

The hallway leading back to the dormitory.

A voice so familiar echoed in my ears.

“…Iris?”

Had it not been enough to pour out my emotions like that yesterday?

As soon as I saw Iris, my eyes reddened again with a sense of suffocation.

“Mr. Dale Han… right?”

“Ah, yes.”

Barely managing to control my emotions, I nodded.

Iris approached me with graceful steps that even felt elegant.

Her eyes, shining with a blue light as if they held the sky, drew closer.

“…Ah.”

The only unfamiliar eyes in a face so familiar.

Seeing her before she lost her sight to the demon’s ‘curse,’ my heart pounded as if it were broken.

Indeed.

It couldn’t be helped.

Even with her eyes covered by a black blindfold, she was more beautiful than anyone else in the world. How would she look now?

She was so beautiful that the baseless rumor that one of the seven gods had reincarnated as a human felt real.

“Hmm.”

Iris, who had approached closely, looked me up and down as if inspecting me, then turned her head to look around.

During lunchtime, when the cadets flocked to the cafeteria, the dormitory hallway was deserted.

‘Iris.’

Looking at her standing before me, I recalled her image in my memory.

She was always gentle and kind, to the point where the title of saint didn’t feel out of place.

She had such a delicate nature that she hesitated to even step on a small bug.

Every day, she would hold my hand with a worried expression, asking if I was okay, if I was hurt, even though I would revive in the blink of an eye after dying.

The more I recalled my memories with her, the more my eyes stung with tears.

And then.

-Smack!

With a sharp pain, my head snapped to the side.

“Huh?”

As I rubbed my cheek and let out a dazed sound, Iris grabbed my collar roughly and spoke.

“Hey, why are you speaking informally to me? Do you know me?”

Huh.

Excuse me?

Miss Iris?

“Well, we’re in the same grade, so I guess informal speech is fine. But what was that yesterday? Huh? Why did you hit my friend without permission, you jerk?”

“……”

In the midst of my confusion, it wasn’t hard to understand why she was so furious.

In fact, thinking from her perspective, it was only natural.

A fellow cadet, whom she had never even spoken to, suddenly approached, threw her guard and best friend to the ground, and then started crying in front of her.

For an ordinary person… no, even for an extraordinary person, it was enough to make them angry.

“Sorry. Yesterday, I… I lost my mind for a moment. I’ll properly apologize to Camilla later.”

“Hmm.”

She was about to retort more fiercely, but when an apology came out of my mouth, she loosened her grip on my collar.

“Hehe. I don’t know exactly what your situation is, but since you apologized, it’s fine.”

Iris shrugged her shoulders and stepped away from me.

“Oh, by the way, you must forget everything that happened today. Otherwise…”

A smile spread across her lips.

The same one that was vividly etched in my memory.

In the kindest voice possible.

“You’re dead.”

She whispered.