Chapter 2

Chapter 2

For the first time in my life, I saw someone die.

The dying students’ final screams still seemed to echo in my ears.

For a while I could not move from the spot.

“…Ha.”

A sigh slipped out of my mouth.

Evidence kept appearing that this place really was inside the game, yet even so, deep down I wanted to deny it.

Why did it have to be here?

Had I done something so terrible that I deserved to fall into hell?

My thoughts were a mess.

“…This is insane.”

The more I thought, the more Joshua’s personality traits whipped me forward.

I turned my body.

I could not ignore the advice to survive, and I accepted that it was correct.

Leaving the students’ deaths behind me, I continued my search.

The first place I visited was the room next door.

The inside that I entered with careful steps had already been turned upside down by someone’s hand.

It must have been the work of the student who had lived in this room.

Thinking that, I checked to see if there was anything they had left behind.

I opened the drawers.

I bent down and looked into the narrow spaces.

I did not forget the trouble of knocking on the floor and checking the ceiling.

Even after all that effort, I had to leave the room empty handed.

“This is similar to when I played the game.”

I did not feel particularly empty.

I knew better than anyone how unfriendly this game was.

One by one, I checked the remaining rooms.

Even after I searched the last room and came back out, my hands were still completely empty.

“If I want water and food, I suppose I have to go down.”

To my left, from where I stood, I could see the stairs that led down.

I leaned my body on the handrail and stretched my neck to look below.

It was dark.

And I heard faint groans.

It was unclear how many there were, but it was certain that zombies were down there.

I fell into thought.

Water and food were not urgently needed right away.

Thanks to [Patience], I could hold out for about a week without any trouble.

But while I sit and endure, a different player would move.

You could not act in a panic, yet if you relax too much, you would lose everything.

That was the lesson I had learned in my first run.

For now, I went back to the room I had woken up in.

Inside, a single shaky lightbulb pushed back the darkness.

I sat down on the chair.

Fatigue washed over me.

Even though I had only done the simple task of checking one floor, it had taken a lot out of me.

“…Let’s plan how to go down.”

I muttered to myself, as if I was talking myself into it.

I did not know if that was because of the [Loner] trait.

Or if I was simply so frustrated that I could not endure it without talking.

“If I go over the current situation...”

I had not found a weapon.

I had not obtained any materials to make one.

Magic was the only area where things were a little better.

Because I had played the game, I had a decent amount of knowledge in that field.

I decided to try a simple spell.

I recalled the formula and the theory, drew up my mana, then snapped my fingers.

Pop!

A flash of light went off.

“Hm?”

I succeeded on the first try.

I had thought I would fail at least once.

I had memorized the formula and the theory, but I was not playing a game.

It was not the same as pressing a hotkey and having a skill come out.

“I was ready to fail a few hundred times.”

THE Survival.

In this game, magic had a reputation as a notoriously difficult discipline.

Among the students at the Academy, only about thirty percent actually managed to graduate as mages.

Most realized they had no talent, went back to their hometowns, or changed their major.

“The reason this worked must be…”

Only one possibility came to mind.

It was the talent that the character Joshua possessed.

I went back over his setting.

Even though he entered the Academy, he had neglected his studies.

He had never once tried to draw out the potential that lay dormant inside him.

“Does that mean I compensated for his flaws?”

The knowledge he had refused to learn was crammed into my head.

Knowledge I had accumulated through multiple playthroughs.

The result was that it combined with Joshua’s body.

[A latent ability has been discovered! Ancestral Heritage (Holy) / Master of Acquisition (Magic)]

[Ancestral Heritage (Holy)]

-The talent of an ancestor manifested across generations. Success rate for holy magic increases greatly, and its power rises by one rank.

[Master of Acquisition (Magic)]

-Proficiency gained from training magic increases. Each failure corrects a weakness, and in the end the success rate reaches one hundred percent.

Latent abilities.

They were one of the systems in THE Survival.

This game did not reveal all information about the character.

Some categories had to be discovered during play, and latent abilities were one of those.

“You had this great talent and just left it to rot huh.”

For a moment I felt a pang of regret.

Releasing a latent ability required sincerity.

Since Joshua had been insincere about his studies, he had never awakened these.

“If you had studied magic seriously, your fate might have been different.”

While I had been playing the game, I had never met Joshua.

I had gone through countless groups and managed to survive for several years.

Yet I had never heard any news of him anywhere.

The odds were high that he had died.

“Damn it, again.”

[Cool] advised me to shake off my emotions.

“I am worrying about my own body here, and you are complaining?”

I clicked my tongue.

Whatever the reason, this was good for me.

Whether it was fate or coincidence did not matter to someone who needed to survive.

More important was practicing magic.

I tried casting again.

Once more, light flashed as it had earlier.

“Am I doing something wrong?”

The formula that came to mind belonged to basic fire magic.

Normally, a small spark should have shot out.

“…Wait.”

I closed my eyes and checked my stats.

[Holy Power – 995]

As expected, my holy power had dropped slightly.

“So that is it huh.”

I repeated the same action several times.

Each time, the spell failed.

Or rather, it kept succeeding in a different form.

“Is it converting formulas of other elements into holy elements? It looks like it needs more research, but this might be very valuable.”

The holy element specialized in healing and defense.

Those had considerable advantages in THE Survival.

In this world, alchemy handled most methods of healing wounds.

Yet compared to how necessary it was, supply was severely lacking.

The herbs used to brew potion were precious.

Because of that, the usual options for the injured were either to leave the wound alone or wrap it in bandages.

“Being able to heal wounds is incredibly useful.”

If you left an injury untreated, problems followed.

The wound would rot, or secondary infection would set in and leave the person in critical condition.

At that point, even companions would start to look away.

It’s because they did not know any way to save the person.

“If there were antibiotics, maybe. But here you cannot even get medicine, and you don’t know anyone who can provide it.”

Holy magic was free from those limitations.

I smiled.

Depending on how I used it, this magic had limitless potential.

“I learned one thing about you.”

I spoke to the original owner of this body, who could no longer hear me.

No answer came back.

I had not opened my mouth expecting a response.

“So it is decided.”

What I had to do was decided.

My current Originality level was [LV1].

My task was to research the holy magic that was possible at this level.

I could not afford to waste too much time.

* * *

The next morning arrived.

I had spent the night with my eyes open.

It was not that I was unable to sleep.

The fatigue from exploring the fourth floor weighed heavily on my eyelids.

Even so, I could not fall asleep because I was on edge.

Trouble broke out at dawn.

The events that had happened yesterday at dusk repeated themselves.

For some reason, a group of students who had left the building were chased by zombies.

Some of them met the same end as the students I had seen the previous day.

A few survived and vanished out of my sight.

What was the reason?

It was possible they were trying to get water and food.

Or maybe they judged that the place they had been staying was no longer safe.

I thought that someday, a moment like that might come for me as well.

I watched the scene of the incident a little longer, then lay down on the bed.

My heart pounded.

In less than a single day, four or five lives had been lost.

More victims would appear in the future, and I might be among them.

I felt unsettled.

I was afraid, yet at the same time a part of me thought it would be all right.

It felt like Kang Minhyeok, my original personality, was clashing with the character Joshua.

I got up again and went back to the desk.

Then I read books related to gods until dawn broke.

To grow my holy power, understanding the god who lent me that power was essential.

[A latent ability has been discovered! Speed Reading]

[Speed Reading]

-Increases the speed at which you read books and raises your comprehension.

While I was reading, I discovered another latent ability.

A sigh escaped me in reflex.

“Have you really never read even a single book all the way through?”

If Joshua had been standing in front of me, I would have wanted to say something.

But that was impossible.

I was the owner of this body now.

I pushed away my wandering thoughts and focused on the book.

“I have never seen a religion like this.”

The god described in the book was different from any god I knew.

The name was the Lonely God.

[God does not save everyone]

[God grants grace only to those who are ready to receive help.]

[God respects altruism, but does not count selfishness as a sin.]

[The faithful have no duty to proselytize]

[The faithful must think of themselves before they think of God.]

[The faithful do not need to be strong, but they must never become weak.]

[Your understanding of God has increased. Your holy power usage increases.]

[Holy Power 1,000 -> 1,500]

[‘Shield’ is now available.]

[‘Purification’ is now available.]

Those were some of the lines that described the god.

He was uncommonly realistic for someone in the position of a god.

And he made that way of thinking very clear to his followers as well.

I smiled and closed the book.

I felt that I might get along quite well with this god.

So, what now?

This time I really needed to sleep.

[Patience] also suppressed fatigue, but even it had limits.

I rose from the chair and slowly headed for the bed.

“…Hm?”

Thud!

Something exploded with a loud noise.

It was not an auditory hallucination.

Damn it!

Whose doing was that?

Zombies were highly sensitive to sound.

That noise could excite the zombies inside the building, or it could draw zombies in from outside.

“This is troublesome.”

I could not just ignore it.

The matter was directly tied to my own life.

I narrowed down where the sound had come from.

It was close.

It felt like it was right next door or just behind me.

Had someone come up to the fourth floor while I was unaware?

No, that wasn’t it.

If that had happened, the third floor would not have stayed quiet.

And I had already confirmed that no one else was on the fourth floor besides me.

There was only one answer.

There was a survivor on the floor below.

I did not know if it was a student or a professor, a man or a woman, but someone was there.

For what reason?

Were they trying to escape on their own?

Were they trying to call for help?

Whatever the reason, this wasn’t a welcoming situation for me.

I walked over to the window.

Then I used the spell I had tested last night.

Tap!

Light flashed from my fingers.

The sky was dark, so the light was bright enough to stand out.

“Magic! Is someone up there?”

It was a person.

I heard a human voice.

A hand stuck out and waved from the window on the floor below.

I fell into thought.

Judging by the voice alone, it was a woman.

The sleeve of her arm was the black and white uniform of the Academy.

Which meant she was a student.

“That’s right.”

I could not stay silent.

If she caused an accident, there was a high chance I would be affected as well.

“…Ah!”

She let out a small sound, as if she was overwhelmed with emotions.

“Can you tell me your name? Since you stay in the third year dorm, you are a third year too, right? What is the situation like on the fourth floor?”

Her questions came at me like waves.

I held my breath.

I was not foolish enough to introduce myself so easily to a stranger.

“I will ask one thing first.”

“Huh? Ah, please go ahead.”

“The loud bang just now. Was that your doing?”

“Y-Yes. I could not think of any other way to let people know I am here.”

“Stop it then. If you don’t want to die.”

I purposely answered in a cold tone.

I wanted her to take my words as a warning.

“…I am sorry.”

She was not shameless.

When people are cornered, they get excited easily.

Video game characters were not much different, so many of them showed aggressive tendencies.

By contrast, she stayed calm.

“Excuse me, are you still there?”

She spoke again, maybe because she thought I had gone away.

“I am still here.”

“Since I answered your question, I want to ask one thing too. Are you alone?”

“Yes.”

“…I see.”

Disappointment tinged her voice.

She must have asked because she had hoped I had companions.

Thump, thump, thump!

While we were talking, another series of noises rang out.

“Gasp!”

She panicked.

Zombies had probably gathered outside her room.

The cause was the magic from moments ago.

“T-They are here.”

“Lower your voice. Do not scream. It is morning, so they will not cling as stubbornly as they do in the dark.”

“…How can you sound so sure? You talk as if you know them.”

I do know them.

Better than anyone else in this world.

If I had any powerful weapon, it was not holy power, it was my understanding of zombies.

Thump, thud!

The sound of pounding on the door gradually weakened.

I prayed inwardly that the wooden door they were pounding on would hold out.

“Wouldn’t it be better if I just jump from here?”

“Don’t try. You will destroy your legs.”

The third floor of the dorm was about ten meters up.

From that height, a fall would not kill you.

However, avoiding injury would be difficult though.

Unless you already had a plan in place for what to do after landing, it was a last resort for survival.

“…I think they left.”

A brief moment of turmoil had passed.

For her and for me, it had been terrifying.

“From now on you’ll have to stay quiet.”

“What am I supposed to do from now?”

“I don’t know. But you already know from experience that calling for help the way you just did is suicidal.”

“What do you plan to do?”

“I have not decided anything yet.”

I had no intention of explaining my plans to her.

She seemed to pick up on my wariness and could not find anything else to say.

“I am sorry, but I did not sleep last night, so I need to close my eyes for a bit.”

“Ah, of course. Thank you for helping me.”

I ended the conversation and lay down on the bed.

I closed my eyes.

I imagined that when I woke up, all of this would have been a dream.

…Damn it.

The [Cool] trait pulled me out of my daydream.

As if telling me to focus only on sleeping, and nothing else. I did not resist and obediently surrendered to sleep.