The Protagonist Already Knows

Chapter 61: Return [1]

Two students...a closed Dreg Portal.

It was obvious what had happened.

Carissa and Ash had entered the Dreg Dimension.

That was what the Grove Investigators had concluded, based on their lack of mana signature and the closed Dreg Portal.

But...Professor Sooyung couldn’t quite believe it.

Carissa, sure she could be heroic and everything...but him?

Ash really had entered that portal? Had he been forced in by Carissa?

Picturing Carissa forcing Ash to enter the portal with her, Professor Sooyung nodded her head and took a few deep breaths.

As of now, a team of top heroes was already being gathered to infiltrate the Dreg Realm and potentially rescue the two lost students.

Of course, as the now 175th-ranked hero, Professor Sooyung was the leader of this team.

Glancing at the files before her listing various heroes, she sighed.

Were...they still alive? Was this all for...naught?

Clasping her hands together, Professor Sooyung slammed shut the files.

How could she think like that!? Of course, they were alive!

He had to be...how could her last words to her first student be that?

"You’ll fall again."

The words she muttered echoed through her head like a fire alarm, over and over again.

As the image of a young child swinging the sword at her, a beaming smile on his face even after ten straight losses, formed in her mind, Professor Sooyung pushed back her hair.

The image of that boy overlapped with the angry black-haired boy standing before her two days ago.

"Then, I’ll get back up."

That child...despite everything, the family drama and all the hardships, was he still in there?

Professor Sooyung recalled visiting Ash upon his graduation from the middle school academy.

His head was hung low, his sword slashes lacking any motivation or ambition, and his blood-red eyes dead and empty.

That year, he had received the news of his mother’s death.

The sword prodigy of the Fell family who had poured everything into his slashes and jabs had turned into a shell of himself.

Approaching his silent figure amidst the crowd of cheering students, celebrating their graduation under the extravagant streamers and chandeliers, Sooyung finally said.

"Put down the sword."

She knew that using it would only hurt him further, driving him deeper into a hole.

She didn’t want Ash to form his Weapon Art with such...emotions holding him back. This wasn’t him.

If he continued with the sword now...his future progress would be severely stunted.

Of course, he had refused, and they had gotten into a fight.

"What?"

The teenage Ash stared at Sooyung in disbelief.

His broadsword was the only thing he had left.

"I’m taking this."

She yanked the broadsword out of his trembling hands.

Martial Arts never centered around the weapon one used.

Looking at the young Ash’s sullen figure, Sooyung wanted to comfort him...not as a tutor but as a friend.

But she knew...she couldn’t.

If she helped him sort through his emotions now, the emotions he held in the future wouldn’t belong fully to him...always influenced by the person who had helped in his darkest time.

As a sword tutor, she couldn’t.

She couldn’t...but her mouth opened as she stared at him.

"...I have to go."

She had to...if she stayed any longer, she knew the words would inadvertently leave her mouth.

It was for the best...wasn’t it?

That question had always lingered throughout her mind...until two years later, she had seen him standing right before her, a Dao lying blankly in his hands as he left the weapon selection room.

All her lingering doubts and anxious thoughts left her head.

He had picked up the sword again...of his own accord.

A tinge of excitement raced through her body as she recalled him slashing at AI dummies with the Dao in his hand.

How far could he go now?

Someone who had gone through so much hardship and drama by themselves...what was his potential?

That cheerful boy...he was still in there.

...

...

...

Glancing through the filled hallways of the academy, as students joyfully spoke with each other and typed away on their smartwatches, Sooyung fell back into her chair.

The news had yet to be spread to the public...only the Grove, Carissa’s family, and administrators of the Sunken Pearl knew.

Admitting to the entire world that there had somehow been a Dreg Gate right above a classroom in the most secure and top Hero Academy would be detrimental.

Of course...if their rescue team failed, they would have to release the story, though.

He had to be alive...the world would be too cruel to kill him right after he had navigated through those moments.

Right...right?

*BZZT*

At that moment...Sooyung’s smartwatch suddenly lit up with a notification.

[B-Rank Gate Detected] / [Heroes Needed ASAP!] / [Vael City]

"..."

The rescue team was supposed to leave for the Dreg Realm tomorrow. But...with every second that passed, the chances of their deaths increased.

However, just like Dregs, humans couldn’t simply enter Gate Crashes in the human dimension and head to the Dreg Realm.

They needed to create them through spatial magic.

However, Sooyung was special. If she could...target the dream of a Dreg Demon through the Gate Crash.

Without a second’s hesitation, Sooyung slammed the [Accept] button on her smartwatch and sprinted out of her classroom.

In the next moment, her figure vanished from the human realm... as she appeared in the mind of a student stepping onto a train departing from the academy’s train station.

Finding herself in a world filled with rainbows, beaches, and tropical trees, Sooyung smiled before leaping into the next person’s subconscious.

Dreamwalking...the ability to enter others’ dreams at will.

She could jump from one person’s dream to another dream from someone in that initial person’s line of sight without ever re-entering reality.

...

...

...

Within two minutes after traveling through dream after dream, Professor Sooyung finally leaped back into reality, finding herself in front of a massive silver gate.

Dozens of heroes were fending off serpents in front of her, the gate slowly shrinking with each Demonic Beast that died.

"..."