Chapter 28:
The Plan (2)
“Hey there, everyone! Long time no see!”
Dr. Kang Hyorin, the genius in dungeon and monster research, stood before the class. It was the first time we had seen her again since she had to postpone the class and leave due to some urgent matter.
“I had some family issues… But I’m back now.”
She seemed a bit worn out, with some dark circles under her eyes.
“Let’s try to move forward with the curriculum! Since the previous test hasn’t been graded yet, today we’ll be playing strategic chess.”
“Ugh…”
Sighs echoed through the classroom. Strategic chess was one of those practical exercises that the students dreaded.
“Yay, strategic chess! Finally!” Lucy suddenly exclaimed.
“Huh?”
Lucy, Lumi, and I had grown closer as members of the same club. We didn’t sit right next to each other, but they occupied the seats in front of me, side by side.
Although I couldn’t see their faces, I could smell a subtle scent from the twins hung in the air during class, distracting me from focusing.
I was confused by Lucy’s enthusiasm because she wasn’t exactly a top performer academically.
Not all mages excelled in studying. While there were aspects like magic circles that required memorization, most of it came down to one’s natural talent as a mage.
Lucy always struggled during theory classes, often holding her head and groaning. So why was she so confident, even with the supposedly challenging strategic chess?
A holographic monitor mounted on each individual desk appeared, forming a chessboard-like field.
Wow, it’s been a while. Really.
Strategic chess was one of those practical exercises at Victoria Academy. It was like a game where I played as the leader, controlling a raid party to conquer a dungeon.
It worked just like chess, taking turns to move your party members, and the goal was to defeat all of the opponent’s monsters. Even in the original game, strategic chess was notoriously difficult.
Strategic chess had three main elements:
– A dungeon as the background.
– Monsters as the opponents.
– The raid party under your command.
All three had over 50 different variations and were randomized. The difficulty could range from easy to extreme.
Maybe, since it’s the first time, Dr. Kang Hyorin would give us an easy challenge. But considering this professor seemed to enjoy watching us suffer with the extremely difficult test before, I wasn’t too sure.
“Okay, let’s get started.” As Kang Hyorin spoke, the hologram in front of me started to change.
The dungeon was set in the lush [Jungle], the monsters we faced were [Banana Red Blood Monkeys x2], and my raid party consisted of [Melee Warriors x10, Curse Mages x5, Support Mages x5].
It wasn’t the most optimal combination, but honestly, the difficulty didn’t seem too high.
The Banana Red Blood Monkeys were boss-type monsters, strong but not the brightest. I could use the melee warriors as the frontline and stack curses with the curse mages to take them down with minimal damage.
“Is that it? It’s a piece of cake!”
“Um, maybe the professor toned it down since it’s our first try?”
“Lumi, let me show you how it’s done. Watch closely, okay?”
“Sure! Good luck, Lucy.”
“Hmm…”
Considering Dr. Kang Hyorin’s expression during the previous test, I highly doubted it would be that easy.
Then, another student raised their hand and said, “Professor, my raid party isn’t following my commands!”
Kang Hyorin smiled like she had been waiting for this, “No worries. The party members are a little scared on purpose. Unless it’s a completely safe and risk-free move, they won’t listen to orders.”
“What? What counts as a safe move?”
“That’s for you to figure out.”
“…!”
“I want to see your creativity and leadership, so just relax. The end goal isn’t the only important thing, it’s the journey itself. Try anything, get creative~”
No matter how she sugarcoated it, it was still a daunting task for us students.
“I doubt you can solve it, but I’ll give extra points as a little motivation to those who manage to clear it.”
Did that sound like something a person would say to motivate us? It’s the extreme difficulty for sure.
In the original game, the trick was to keep the main force intact and minimize damage. It earned you a higher score and saved you from expulsion. Plus, if I wanted to pursue Alice’s route, I had to beat her in exam grades, adding another layer of challenge.
“Huh? Why aren’t you guys listening…?”
Lucy, who was once confident, gave orders to her party members who stood frozen in place.
“Ah! No, why aren’t you attacking when you can totally take them out from there!”
Other students were in the same boat. I watched them scream and restart from the beginning. I was feeling a bit intimidated by professor Kang Hyorin, who sat there sipping her coffee, seemingly enjoying the spectacle.
She seemed a bit scary, no matter how I looked at her, with a somewhat sadistic personality. Was she an S?
I took my time analyzing my own puzzle. In this shitty adult game called Sex Academy, if I wanted to progress with the scenario, I had to clear this strategic chess at least five times.
Each time, all the elements changed, making it impossible to memorize. But I had conquered all the routes and completed this strategic chess countless times.
Naturally, I knew the quirks of the Banana Red Blood Monkeys too. They always appeared in pairs, and they were really cautious because of their precious bananas. They even had little babies in their nest.
You couldn’t mess with their babies recklessly. If you killed them, the Banana Red Blood Monkeys would go into a frenzy, making it even harder to defeat them.
“Hmm… This looks manageable.”
With a careful analysis of my party and the monsters, I began to make my moves.
Since my party members wouldn’t follow unsafe commands, I had five melee warriors attack the banana trees from a distance.
At first, they ignored my orders, so I instructed one of them to chop down five trees and then retreat immediately. Finally, they obeyed and went to cut the trees.
With the remaining five melee warriors, five support mages, and five curse mages, I made my way towards the monkeys’ nest.
Thanks to the support mages being able to shield three others, it was a relatively safe situation.
As I quietly observed the nest, I noticed that the monkeys had rushed out to deal with the external threats attacking the banana trees.
The melee warriors were probably long gone by now, running away after their tree-chopping mission.
Taking advantage of the Banana Red Blood Monkeys leaving the nest, I led the rest of my party members inside and placed curses on the young monkeys, who were too young to pose a threat.
Instead of curses that would harm them, I used highly contagious curses that paralyzed their bodies. After that, I quickly retreated from the nest.
“Now, if I speed up time by three, it’ll all be over.”
The curse on the young monkeys would gradually spread to the Banana Red Blood Monkeys.
The overly maternal monkeys would take care of the young ones until their bodies were completely immobilized by the curse. Then, I would send in my troops to finish them off and complete the conquest.
The key to this strategy was patience. After speeding up time by three, all I had to do was wait.
For over 30 minutes, I moved to adjacent cells without taking any further action, allowing the monkeys to stay inside the nest and gradually become affected by the curse.
It took quite a while, and my score might have been slightly reduced, but this was the foolproof method to finish without any losses.
“Ah!”
Startled by a scream from the front, I looked ahead and saw Lucy gripping her head with both hands, groaning in frustration.
“I’ve been practicing strategic chess all week! How can this happen?!”
“…”
“Sniff… I’m doomed…”
“Don’t worry, Lucy. Everything will be fine.”
While Lucy had her melodramatic moment up front, my troops successfully severed the paralyzed monkeys’ necks, affected by the curse.
The message “Victory!” appeared on my hologram, indicating the completion of the strategic chess.
“Huh? Someone already cleared it?”
Dr. Kang Hyorin expressed surprise in her voice. The other students also looked at me with astonished eyes.
“Well, a promise is a promise. I’ll give you an additional point,” she said, sounding slightly disappointed.
I felt a bit embarrassed. Then, Lucy suddenly turned around, pretending to cry. Her eyes widened as she saw the “Victory!” message floating in front of me.
“H-How did you do it?!”
“I got lucky. It was an easy problem once you knew the characteristics of the Banana Red Blood Monkeys.”
Of course, it wasn’t that simple to know that the monkeys would continue to care for their injured babies even when they couldn’t move due to the curse.
“Can you give me some tips too… Oh, no, not now. I’ll work harder!”
Lucy, who had asked me for tips, glanced at Dr. Kang Hyorin and quickly regained her enthusiasm, refocusing on the front.
30 minutes later.
“This is impossible! It doesn’t work! Who came up with this?”
Sob… Sob…
As I looked at Lucy, once again throwing herself on the table and crying, I couldn’t help but think, ‘Luckily, her “not good at studying” character trait didn’t change.’
***
After school, Lucy made her way to the Friendship Club room. She had asked Hoyeon to come because she was recruiting a new member.
“Sorry, I have something really important to take care of today. I’ll finish it up and join you later.”
Hoyeon said those words and hurriedly headed towards the dormitory. Meanwhile, Lumi mentioned that she would buy some cookies since they had run out.
“Ugh, I’m so bored.”
Lucy had always enjoyed being active and moving around. That’s why she had started a club, but with no one joining, she was pleasantly surprised when a new member finally joined during one of her moments of boredom.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Yeah? Who is it?”
“It’s me, Felix.”
“Oh! I’ll open it right away!”
Lucy swung open the door to find a platinum-haired boy with innocent eyes standing there.
“You’re here before everyone else. Go ahead and have a seat while we wait.”
“Okay, thanks.”
Felix, feeling a bit awkward, glanced around and took a gentle seat on the sofa. Lucy, with her friendly nature, struck up a conversation with the timid Felix.
“Yeah, our club consists of me, a guy named Hoyeon, and my sister Lumi. The three of us.”
“Um, Hoyeon? Is he… the person from the student council’s PR department?”
“Yes, that’s right. Our club has a student council member.”
Lucy’s shoulders perked up with pride, even though it wasn’t anything extraordinary. After all, she was the president of a club.
“Uh, I see… So maybe that’s why no one comes to this club… Sigh.”
“What did you say?”
“Oh, it’s nothing.”
“No, I heard you clearly. Tell me again why no one comes to our club.”
Lucy gave him an unusually serious look. Felix lowered his head as if admitting his mistake and let out a sigh.
“This is something you have to keep a secret.”
“Yeah, don’t worry. What’s the matter?”
“Well… There are many negative rumors about Hoyeon.”
“Negative rumors?”
“Yes, for instance, there are rumors about his relationships with women. From the student council president to Professor Im Sol, and even with Alice, a fellow member of the PR department.”
“….”
“And there’s also a rumor that he went to a motel with a classmate.”
Lucy was the type of person who believed only what she saw. And from what she had seen, Hoyeon was a kind and hardworking student, even if their relationship had started with a misunderstanding.
‘But that initial misunderstanding… What if it wasn’t an accident when he touched my chest?’
“Well… Now that I think about it, Hoyeon is mostly surrounded by girls.”
Although Lucy had male friends as well, she had never seen Hoyeon interacting with any boys other than Kim Yeonghan.
“Right? That’s why I think girls might hesitate to join our club because of that.”
“Maybe…”
After forming the club, many boys approached Lucy and Lumi, but no female students had expressed their desire to join.
“Well, it’s not confirmed, so let’s just forget about it. I hope those are just baseless rumors since Hoyeon is in the same club as you, Lucy.”
“Yeah, I hope so.”
Felix, who believed that even if Lucy and Hoyeon weren’t dating, they were at least involved in a flirtatious relationship, spread the rumors himself in an attempt to separate them and conveyed those rumors to Lucy.
However, contrary to his expectations, Lucy’s behavior didn’t change significantly because they were just friends.
Felix pursed his lips and took a sip of the drink that was on the table.
‘I still have plenty of time. I should take it slow.’
Lucy was the girl whom Felix, a demon, had fallen head over heels for. The girl who had led him to engage in the risky act of infiltrating the academy. Even being here now carried a considerable burden of risk.
‘As long as I can have her beauty and eat that voluptuous chest, I’m willing to do anything!’
Thump, thump, thump.
At that moment, footsteps could be heard from outside.
Felix reverted to his innocent face, placed the drink back on the table, and sat on the sofa with a tense expression.
“Oh, the place looks clean.”
Hoyeon commented with a smile as he observed the tidy club room.
“If you knew how much effort Lumi and I put into cleaning it, you’d be amazed. Hehe…”
“You did a great job. You should have reached out to me for help.”
“But Lumi was adamant about not asking you… What can I do, right? We wouldn’t even have this club without you…”
“Well, now that it’s starting to feel burdensome, we can stop discussing it.”
As soon as he entered, they naturally engaged in a friendly conversation.
Despite having spread false rumors, there was no significant difference. Felix felt like his world had been turned upside down, but he held back and turned his attention to that side.
“Oh, right! I’m planning to recruit a new member this time, and I called you to ask for your opinion. What do you think? Doesn’t he seem nice?”
Lucy introduced Felix to Hoyeon. They became aware of each other for the first time. They exchanged glances, and Hoyeon smiled.
Lucy expected a positive response from him, but the words that came out of Hoyeon’s mouth were completely unexpected.
“I don’t like him.”
***
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