Chapter 116.2

“What are you?!”

“……”

“What are you affirming, and what kind of delusions are you harboring? Do you even know what you’ve trampled on?”

Crackle!

Woo-jin gripped the Iron Dragon Staff tightly, and a teal electric current surged up its shaft.

“I… can’t understand you at all.”

Woo-jin had made his decision.

He would end both the Head Principal and Se-Ah here.

“Yes, I see. I see….”

Se-Ah hung her head, her smile bittersweet.

“You can’t understand, so you choose to reject me. I guess it can’t be helped. This is truly disappointing….”

Se-Ah raised her head again, her blood-red eyes fixed on Woo-jin.

“Thank you for everything, senior.”

Se-Ah smiled brightly, and a mysterious red aura began to emanate from her.

The aura manifested into countless forms of young children’s upper bodies, reaching out with their arms.

Woo-jin’s eyes widened. The aura was unnerving, unlike anything he’d ever felt before.

‘Why does it feel like I’m sensing not one person’s power but the life force of many children…?’

Why did Se-Ah’s power seem to hold the vitality of so many young children?

He suddenly recalled the discarded children who had been unable to withstand the Head Principal’s atrocities during Golden Time and had been left to rot.

Children who never became the Head Principal’s pawns.

Pitiful children who were born only to suffer and were eventually discarded.

He remembered that their bodies were piled like mountains, still intact, in a deep underground space.

“That power… it’s not yours, is it?”

“You’re quick on the uptake, senior.”

Woo-jin’s eyes were filled with killing intent.

“The children discarded in the underground… What exactly did the Head Principal do to them?”

“I’m not entirely sure. All I know is that it’s related to her Unique Ability.”

“How can you use something so revolting without batting an eye?”

“You think it doesn’t bother me, senior? This power was forced on me when I was young. I’ve accepted it now, but it wasn’t easy.”

“That’s not your power.”

“Who knows? Maybe it is.”

The discarded children had been prodigies classified with innate A+ magic power.

What would the power created by gathering all of them be like?

And how was such power even produced?

Recalling Se-Ah’s astonishing Unique Ability, which revived the children who died in the first semester, it was undoubtedly an extraordinary power.

Crack.

A small fissure opened inside Woo-jin’s ear.

─ Kid.

It was Geumyang’s voice.

Woo-jin kept his eyes on Se-Ah, listening to Geumyang.

─ This might sound strange, but that power should not exist.

“?”

─ That’s a force that should never have materialized in this world. If my true form were here, I would have judged it the same way.

Geumyang’s true form was the 9th Tier Golden Ram, a being that had reached the realm of gods.

Geumyang’s voice quivered slightly.

─ Run away. That power defies the laws of the world and cannot be measured by any standard of superiority. To humans, it belongs in the realm of impossibility…!

“I don’t know what’s going on, but that’s not happening. I can feel it.”

─ Feel it? What are you talking about?

Despite Geumyang’s warning, Woo-jin advanced toward Se-Ah.

Because he was certain that running away wasn’t an option here.

‘Maybe the reason I was reincarnated into this world has something to do with that power…. I just have that feeling.’

It was an instinctive cry.

Like a sensation etched into his soul.

Something only a reincarnated soul in this world could feel.

As Woo-jin began to approach, Se-Ah looked genuinely regretful. Then she composed herself, showing Woo-jin her usual polite smile.

“When I said I liked you, senior, I meant it.”

“I did too. I really did like you.”

“Yes. It’s a shame.”

Both of them felt that further conversation was unnecessary.

Woo-jin channeled his magic, prepared to dodge any attack with spatial leaps, and gripped the Iron Dragon Staff, ready to strike.

He lunged.

Fwoosh!

For a moment, a chilling glint flashed in Se-Ah’s crimson eyes.

“……!”

Suddenly, Woo-jin’s vision was engulfed in red.

Moments later, he felt his consciousness drifting away from his body.

Thud.

He collapsed to the floor.

Before he could even process what had happened.

“Farewell.”

With Se-Ah’s whisper, Woo-jin’s breath stopped.