Gap (3)

Lee Dojin opened his eyes.

He had fully returned to reality.

In front of him were about 550 academy students.

If his group members had been nearby, they might have exchanged words about how hard they worked, but since they returned in random order, no one from Group 12 was visible.

Everyone slowly moved to the main auditorium.

The atmosphere was different from when they had been pointing weapons at each other just moments ago, now feeling rather light.

Instructor Park Cheol-ung went up on the platform.

When he clapped his hands, a hologram window appeared.

The members of combat classes 1 to 10 all stared blankly at the hologram window in front of them.

1st place: Group 12 – 208 beads

2nd place: Group 5 – 125 beads

3rd place: Group 37 – 98 beads

4th place: Group 41 – 83 beads

:

:

They were in first place.

Since they had known they were in first place since the mock dungeon, there wasn’t any particularly new feeling about it.

“With this, we conclude the mock dungeon exam. Good work, everyone.”

As Instructor Park Cheol-ung finished speaking, the students began to disperse here and there.

“Dojin! Dojin!”

He stared at the pink-haired woman running towards him. It was Baek Hwayeon.

“I heard Group 12 was your group! Group 5 is our group! Wow, but what’s with this score difference.”

So Group 5 was Baek Hwayeon’s group.

Seeing that they hadn’t encountered each other once inside the mock dungeon, it seems the cave was quite vast.

“You must have worked hard.”

“No, everyone followed along better than expected. It was manageable.”

While talking with Baek Hwayeon, a few more people approached.

It was Choi Bit-na and Ryu Jia.

Choi Bit-na approached Lee Dojin and put her hand on his shoulder.

“Teacher! Good work!”

She didn’t care, or rather didn’t even think to care, about who was nearby.

Baek Hwayeon looked at Choi Bit-na with a strange expression.

Baek Hwayeon stared intently at Choi Bit-na, whom she was meeting for the first time.

“Why is this friend calling you teacher?”

Choi Bit-na kept patting his shoulder while grinning broadly.

“Because he’s my teacher! He made me completely reborn!”

Baek Hwayeon made an even more incomprehensible expression.

“Reborn…?”

“Yes! Completely!”

Choi Bit-na’s eyes were shining.

Baek Hwayeon felt her own vivaciousness, which she had thought was quite lively, fading in comparison.

While Choi Bit-na was making a fuss, shaking her short hair, one more person approached.

A long-haired swordswoman with her eyes closed.

It was Ryu Jia. Ryu Jia walked lightly over and said, looking at Lee Dojin.

“You worked hard today, Dojin.”

“Oh, you too.”

Ryu Jia smiled with her eyes.

“Then, tomorrow morning.”

“Yeah, see you tomorrow morning.”

After briefly exchanging greetings with the other group members, Ryu Jia slowly walked away.

Ryu Jia quickly left after saying those words.

Baek Hwayeon’s gaze followed Ryu Jia’s back.

Baek Hwayeon then quickly turned her head towards Lee Dojin.

“Why are you seeing Ryu Jia tomorrow morning?”

“We spar every morning.”

“…You meet every morning? At what time?”

“Around 6:30 AM?”

Baek Hwayeon opened her mouth blankly.

“Then… you’ve been doing morning training together for an hour every day for a month?”

“I guess so.”

Baek Hwayeon shuddered for some reason. She asked herself: Getting up at 6:30 AM every day?

‘Impossible.’

Even getting up at 8 AM was torturous.

Morning exercise every dawn. Just the two of them.

‘I’ll try it tomorrow.’

She concluded that she should at least see with her own eyes once how they train together.

“There are a lot of girls…”

Baek Hwayeon muttered, glancing at Choi Bit-na.

She was still shaking her short hair with her gaze fixed on Lee Dojin, shooting sparkling eyes.

Ryu Jia who had just disappeared was the same.

She didn’t know Lee Dojin, who only thought about swords, would have so many girls around him.

Kim Ji-hoon stood beside them.

“Hey, we’re in first place, how about a drink?”

Choi Bit-na glared at Kim Ji-hoon.

“It’s Tuesday tomorrow, what drink? Jia left too.”

“Right, Jia’s not here.”

Kim Ji-hoon complied surprisingly quickly to Choi Bit-na’s words. He scratched his head and then grinned.

“Okay, let’s drink next time. Soon.”

“Yeah! We’re having a celebratory drink for first place on Friday night?”

“Oh, alright.”

Only after hearing Lee Dojin’s firm answer did Choi Bit-na take her hand off his shoulder and disappear together with Kim Ji-hoon, who was in the same class.

The people who had crowded around Lee Dojin disappeared, and only Baek Hwayeon remained. Baek Hwayeon opened her mouth again.

“The teacher said that what she talked about when she first met you, Dojin, would finally be ready soon and asked me to tell you. What is that?”

Lee Dojin seemed to know what Sword Empress Yoo Seol-ah meant by that thing.

And he didn’t feel the need to hide it from Baek Hwayeon in front of him.

“If it’s difficult, you don’t have to tell me…”

“No, it’s okay for you to know. It’s probably an elixir for increasing inner energy.”

“I see!”

Lee Dojin didn’t know why Baek Hwayeon’s expression suddenly brightened.

“See you tomorrow.”

Even Baek Hwayeon disappeared.

Lee Dojin immediately headed to the dormitory. He was in a considerably fatigued state since he had clearly been fighting for 6 hours.

He went to the dormitory and lay down on the bed.

[Please prepare.]

As always, Lee Dojin entered Mistilteinn’s world.

Mistilteinn, her snow-white hair fluttering, stared at Lee Dojin.

“You’ve come, Master.”

“Yeah, I’m back.”

Slurp-

Lee Dojin heard a sound that hadn’t been heard here before.

“…What are you eating again?”

Hwangbo Seryeong was eating none other than thin noodles.

Hwangbo Seryeong, who was obsessed with gastronomy, had asked Lee Dojin to try extracting and visualizing food memories if possible, but unfortunately, Mistilteinn’s ability didn’t react to Lee Dojin.

Hwangbo Seryeong wasn’t too disappointed and enjoyed this situation with just the food she visualized in her mind.

Hwangbo Seryeong glanced at Lee Dojin.

“Did you win? That, what was it. Didn’t you say you were taking an exam?”

“Yes, I won.”

“Well, you should win at everything.”

Lee Dojin picked up a book on the table.

It was a martial arts manual.

Lee Dojin read the martial arts manual carefully.

Lee Dojin’s eyes lit up as he read the martial arts techniques written down.

“Is this for me?”

“Of course, I clearly know that the reason I’m maintaining my existence here is for your martial arts improvement. Wait a little longer. I’m making some adjustments to fit your current movements.”

After saying that, she drank bamboo leaf liquor straight from the bottle.

Her face didn’t redden at all.

“Would you like a drink too?”

And she held out the liquor bottle to Mistilteinn.

Mistilteinn puffed her cheeks.

“You don’t bother me like this when it’s just the two of us. You’re doing this because you have nothing to say when the Master is here.”

Unlike with Sword Emperor Dan Cheonwoo, Hwangbo Seryeong spent much more time with Mistilteinn.

While Lee Dojin was at school, the two were constantly together.

Mistilteinn, who refused the alcohol, sat across from Hwangbo Seryeong and ate thin noodles.

Her appearance eating with pursed lips was quite cute.

Hwangbo Seryeong, still maintaining her lion’s mane-like disheveled hair, stared at that sight with the corners of her mouth raised.

After staring at that sight for a moment, she looked at Lee Dojin again.

“You should have a celebratory drink.”

Lee Dojin also stared at Hwangbo Seryeong.

It was too innocent to call her an old-fashioned person, the expression of Hwangbo Seryeong holding out the liquor bottle.

“I’ll drink it poured in a cup.”

“…That’s not manly.”

Glug glug glug….

Despite saying that, Hwangbo Seryeong obediently poured the liquor into a cup.

Lee Dojin stared at the clear bamboo leaf liquor in the cup.

“Let’s make a toast.”

He then said, holding up his cup.

Hwangbo Seryeong slightly furrowed her brow.

“What’s a toast?”

“It’s when you clink cups.”

“Clink cups?”

Lee Dojin raised his cup and clinked it against one cup on the table.

“Like this.”

“Oh ho.”

Hwangbo Seryeong, who let out a small exclamation, was about to drink alone. Lee Dojin hurriedly snatched the liquor bottle.

Hwangbo Seryeong grinned again as she watched Lee Dojin pouring the liquor.

“A toast, huh. Where I lived, if someone clinked their cup against another’s, their hand would have been cut off.”

“The place I live isn’t that bleak.”

Hwangbo Seryeong chuckled.

“Monsters called beasts appear, and strange people with powers go around killing people, and you say it’s not bleak? You joke well. If the world is as you said before, your world isn’t much different from the martial world.”

Clink-

Lee Dojin and Hwangbo Seryeong’s cups clinked, making a cheerful sound.

Lee Dojin turned his head as he drank from his cup.

“Why are you turning your head?”

“It’s etiquette towards elders.”

“…Are you calling me an old woman?”

“No, I’m just saying it’s courtesy.”

The two drank quietly and comfortably. Hwangbo Seryeong, who had been driving away the intoxication, this time quietly accepted it.

Because Lee Dojin, who was drinking together in front of her, drank without driving away the intoxication.

Although his inner energy, which had reached just before 3-star, could easily drive away the intoxication, he didn’t feel the need to do so.

After all, it wouldn’t affect reality.

“You drink well.”

Hwangbo Seryeong said quite affectionately.

Mistilteinn smiled brightly as she watched the two drinking.

The night of the long day with the mock dungeon exam passed.

---

Ring ring ring ring-!

“Ahhhhh!”

The pink-haired woman hurriedly got up from bed.

“Ah, how many alarms did I sleep through!”

Baek Hwayeon looked at her smartphone in panic.

It was 8 o’clock.

Her plan to crash Ryu Jia and Lee Dojin’s morning training had fallen through.