What The Typhoon Washes Away

Gu So-ye said they shouldn’t do this on the stage and should have the interview instead, then brought everyone down below.
Unlike Jiri’s side, who looked little different before and after the spar, the relatively rumpled and dust-covered students on the Bukhan side needed to reorganize themselves.
After entering the waiting room, Kim Jun-tae screamed and threw his one-handed sword and shield onto the floor.

“This makes no sense!!”

Clang!

The expensive equipment rolled across the floor.
Kim Jun-tae, revealing his true nature now that they had entered the temporary tent, flew into a rage at the unbelievable result.
Unable to accept defeat, Kim Jun-tae turned his blame toward Hwang Yu-na.

“Damn it! Hwang Yu-na! This is all your fault! You couldn’t even subdue one defective product, and you made me suffer humiliation?!”
“Wait. Are you saying our loss is all my fault right now? If you really think about it, it’s because the analysts you brought couldn’t analyze them properly! Weren’t you the one who said everything would work if we followed your plan? And now you’re trying to blame me? If you had told us to bring trap-disarming items in the first place, this mess wouldn’t have happened! If we’re talking about the cause, it’s because the analysts you brought couldn’t analyze them properly!”
“Both of you, stop. It’s because both of you failed to follow the operation and got held back.”
“An Mi-ru. Why couldn’t you subdue Lee Ro-un? Don’t tell me you’re going to say your bullets missed because of the wind and rain.”
“You done talking?”

The atmosphere overheated, and the energy of the three grew sharp, as if a knife fight might break out at any moment.
Tae Seong-ho, who did not feel much of a sense of defeat because he had met the Ro-un he admired, stepped forward to stop his friends.

“Guys. Calm down.”
“Tae Seong-ho, you were no help at all, so shut your mouth!”
“No, what do you expect from a supporter? Who was it that couldn’t fight properly even after I gave all the necessary doping items?”
“If we had held it in a state-of-the-art training hall instead of on this crumbling temporary stage in the first place, the result would have come out exactly as the analysts analyzed!”

They were splitting apart among themselves without even realizing other people were there.

“Hey. Lee Ro-un. Shouldn’t we stop them?”
“Why should I?”
“We don’t care whether they fight or not, but that person is waiting outside.”

Ro-un thought of Gu So-ye waiting outside with a microphone and shut his mouth.
He didn’t feel like it, but he had to do the interview with them.

‘I can’t help going out with them, but they’re noisy.’

Look at them whining just because they lost, when they were the ones who picked the fight in the first place.
This was not even their turf, so why were the losers acting like that?

“Hyung.”
[Woof!]
“Bite.”
[Grrrr.]

Chomp!

“Argh! You little!”

Thunk!

“Kghk!”

Was this a comedy?
Ro-un looked pathetically at Kim Jun-tae, who had gotten angry and stupidly drove his fist into his Hyung’s protective barrier.
Kim Jun-tae, who had received his own attack right back, curled up and sank to the floor from the shock that felt as if his solar plexus had been blocked.
Kim Jun-tae’s burning gaze fixed on Lee Ro-un.

“Lee, Ro-un!”
[Grrr.]

Seeing Kim Jun-tae sending an absurdly resentful gaze toward Ro-un even after being hit by the reflected force in his solar plexus, Ray bared his teeth.
The spirit in the form of a small puppy growled and showed his millet-sized teeth, then bit Kim Jun-tae’s nose.

Chomp!

“Argh!”
“Hyung. You got something dirty on you. I’ll wipe it off.”
[Woof!]
“Lee Ro-un…!”

Ro-un picked Hyung up into his arms.
Seeing him unable to accept why he had lost, Ro-un spoke as if he found it contemptible.

“How ugly.”

At Ro-un’s bone-piercing words, the Bukhan students, who had been growling at each other, looked at Ro-un.

“What did you just say?”

At the sight of them shifting responsibility onto one another, Ro-un spoke cynically.

“How ugly.”
“Lee Ro-un. It would be best if you didn’t provoke us too much.”
“That again. Why? You lost this time because your information was lacking, because your preparations were lacking, because the weather was bad. What else did you say?”
“They said the result would have been different if it had been held somewhere with better facilities instead of here.”
“Ah. Right. There was that too.”

Cheon Su-ho faithfully conveyed their words beside Ro-un.
Ro-un looked coldly at the Bukhan Academy students with a cold face.
At his terrifying presence, the young masters and ladies who had been screeching and blaming one another shut their mouths.

“Wow. He shut them up with a look. Those guys don’t have ordinary tempers either.”

Slide.

“I didn’t say anything.”

Joo Hee-jun, whose eyes met Ro-un’s as they moved to the side, flinched in surprise and scurried behind Cheon Su-ho.
Ro-un looked at Joo Hee-jun pathetically for a moment, then turned back to the four.
A cold light, as if thin ice had settled over it like before, once again lingered on his face.

“What you’re saying is so ridiculous I can’t even laugh.”
“Lee Ro-un…. We lost this time because we were unlucky, but,”
“Luck? Do you really think it was luck?”

At those meaningful words, Kim Jun-tae’s eyebrows shot up.

“So you really think all of this happened because we were lucky enough to win. Have you people truly ever cleared a passage?”
“Acting so high and mighty just because you happened to win once by chance! We have cleared real passages too!”
“Really? By yourselves? With that level of skill? Ah. Was it thanks to your equipment? Or did your bodyguards kill everything for you?”
“What did you say!”

Hwang Yu-na flared up.
Ro-un said one thing coldly.

“How laughable.”
“Lee Ro-un.”
“That’s too harsh. Even if you won this time, if we show our true strength, the result is unknown.”
“Saaaint. We disappointed you this time, but next time,”
“I mean that even that complacent attitude of yours is all laughable.”

Tae Seong-ho, who was Ro-un’s fan, looked like he was about to cry.
The other three, excluding him, repeatedly turned red and then blue.

“This time? Stop making excuses. Do you think there’s such a thing as a perfect clear? There’s no such thing in the world. Awakeners can prepare for everything and still die because an abnormal situation occurs. So what are you people? Just how complacently have you lived that you can say your luck was bad? Frankly, if this had been real combat, you would be dead.”
“Lee Ro-un…!”

At Lee Ro-un’s cold words, Kim Jun-tae called Ro-un’s name with a deathly pale face.

“Why? You didn’t know things would turn out like this when you used force to intimidate other students and call me out? Hasn’t the time to show off with power passed already? I faced you with power, just as you wanted, but to think you would show such a pathetic sight just because you don’t like the result.”
“You! Watch your mouth. If we fight again, we absolutely won’t lose like this!”
“That again. The most pathetic one is you, Hwang Yu-na.”
“If the information on that guy had only been accurate, I would never have gotten my feet tied up!”
“Can you say that to the people who died in the early days of the <Otherworld Upheaval> too? That you didn’t know the otherworld would invade?”

At Ro-un’s point, Hwang Yu-na’s mouth snapped shut.

“All sorts of variables pop up in passages. Are you going to die thinking crap like, I should have prepared a little better, I should have bought better equipment, I should have come when the weather was good, right before you die?”
“B-but!”

Hwang Yu-na’s face reddened as if she felt wronged.
There was no way a student attending Bukhan Academy, which was considered prestigious in its own way, did not know about the danger of passages.

“It’s not just Hwang Yu-na. The same goes for all of you. You don’t know when, where, or what might happen, so how long are you going to keep living with that complacent mindset? The proper time, the proper place, and the proper items?”
“…Stop there, Lee Ro-un. I’ll admit that we were complacent this time.”
“Admit? I didn’t do this to give you some realization. I did it because there was something I wanted to gain by using you. Thanks. I gained a lot because of you.”

Ro-un sneered.
He no longer wanted to exchange words with them.
Someone was struggling however he could to stop even a little of the Calamity, while they, they were soaked in peace and playing rank games.

‘Right. I don’t need help from humans like that against the Calamity anyway.’

As if a spell had been cast, Ro-un’s mind cooled in an instant.
If there were no expectations in the first place, there would be no disappointment either.
Had he not decided to leave being disappointed in humans behind before his regression?
Ro-un looked at Kim Jun-tae, his face empty of emotion, and spoke.

“…The reason I played along with this ridiculous farce in the first place was to make you give up. From now on, don’t bother me anymore with ridiculous things like groups or whatever.”

The Bukhan students lowered their heads in frustration.
Seeing the Bukhan students experiencing failure and frustration for the first time in their lives, Ro-un clicked his tongue.

‘I was right not to consider transferring to another academy after all.’

He had no leisure to spend a relaxed school life mingling with people like them.
He had to leave the academy as soon as possible and enter the world of professional Awakeners.
There, he had to quickly build influence….

Clap!

At the sudden sound of clapping, everyone’s eyes turned toward the entrance of the waiting room.
Proprietress Gu So-ye, wearing a red suit and a red bow tie, was smiling brightly with her palms together.

“Shall we go have the interview now? Everyone is waiting.”

Proprietress Gu.
Surely you weren’t secretly listening outside until our conversation ended, right?
For some reason, he felt as if he had seen a fox tail swaying lightly behind Proprietress Gu.

The students who had gone down below the stage came back up.
The audience enthusiastically welcomed the students, who had brushed off the dust and looked cleaner than before.

“Please give a round of applause to the eight participants who worked hard today.”

Waaaaah!
You’re awesome!
Lee Ro-un!
President!

Thunderous applause and people’s cheers burst out.
The sound was so loud that it covered even the sound of wind and rain brought by the typhoon, if only for a moment.

“First, we will hear a word from the representative of the Jiri student team, who won this friendly exchange sparring match with a splendid strategy. Student Lee Ro-un.”

Gu So-ye held the microphone out to Ro-un.
All sorts of procedures really did attach themselves to one short sparring match.
Just as Ro-un was about to open his mouth while feeling a familiar fatigue, someone in the audience seats in front of him sprang to their feet.

“Saaaaint!”

In-woo’s voice rang out as if tearing through the air.
At the same time, Ro-un felt something passing beneath his feet.

‘This is!’

Ro-un reflexively looked down, sank to the ground, and placed his hand on it.

“What is it?”
“I don’t know either.”
“That girl called the president, and suddenly the president’s complexion turned bad.”
“Is it a skill?”

While the people who had come to watch the sparring match murmured, the first to grasp the situation were the three Divine Beasts whose names were recorded in myth.

“Baek Ho-yeon. This.”
“I felt it too.”
“Yong Chang-jin.”
“I did as well.”

The Divine Beasts’ reactions were unusual.
Awakeners, humans, the Tiger Clan, and the Fox Clan were all gathered here, but the only people who sensed something were the Divine Beasts Baek Ho-yeon, Gu So-ye, Yong Chang-jin, Baek In-woo, who would one day become the Great Shamaness, and Lee Ro-un.
Ro-un, who spread Holy Power like the sea, felt something spreading beneath the ground.
To think he had not noticed at all while this massive energy had been gathered.

‘Just now, something. Something passed by. No. Did something that was wrapping around that something break?! Why is something like this here?’

If it hadn’t broken, he wouldn’t have noticed.
Even when Ro-un and the Divine Beasts felt it, they had been able to sense it only because the quantity was enormous, but now that it had broken and spread, it was becoming harder and harder to capture.
He had to quickly contain this ominous energy again. Why on earth was something like this here? More importantly, why only now?

Swaaaaaa!

Cold raindrops struck Ro-un’s head while he was lost in thought.
It was because Gu So-ye had released the barrier surrounding the stage in order to track the energy.
Ro-un raised his head at the raindrops hitting it and faced the disaster occupying the sky and earth.

“Ah.”

This is it.
The typhoon.
The typhoon came and broke the veil that had been hiding the energy passing under my feet!

‘A timed trigger? Did someone secretly plant energy and wait for a massive force like a typhoon to break the concealment veil?’

What this energy was targeting was… Ro-un’s head shot up.
In the place he looked, a massive mountain range like a barrier was visible.

‘Jirisan! Don’t tell me it’s targeting Jirisan’s spiritual vein!’

Jiri Mountain was one of the pillars of the barrier protecting the Korean Peninsula.
If so, whoever had planted this energy might be targeting the Korean Peninsula’s barrier.
To know the exact target, he needed more information.
But what mattered now was the unknown energy dispersing in an instant.

“I have to stop it.”

If he could not stop it, the Calamity three years later!
The Korean Peninsula!
The charnel house where his family’s photos hung surfaced in Ro-un’s mind.
At the same time, Ro-un recalled the tidal wave that had risen so high it seemed to reach the sky, and his face turned deathly pale.

Grab!

At the warmth wrapping around his shoulder, Ro-un flinched and looked to the side.

“Lee Ro-un, what’s wrong?”
“Hey. What’s wrong with you? What is it? What is it that’s making you look so scared?”

Cheon Su-ho and Joo Hee-jun were looking at Ro-un with worried faces.

“Ah.”
[Whine.]
“Hyung.”
[Woof! Lick, lick.]

As if saying Hyung was by his side, he pressed himself close to Ro-un’s nape and licked his cheek.
The warmth of the two holding his shoulders and Hyung’s soft energy seemed to travel through his shoulders and thaw his entire body.
Cheon Su-ho shouted with a vitality that seemed to melt one’s whole body just by looking at him.

“I don’t know what is going on, but I will help Lee Ro-un!”
“Let’s hear what it is first.”
“Joo Hee-jun, you help too!”
“I was obviously going to help too, you know?”
“Hahahahahaha. Good choice!”
“So what do you need?”

The two looked at Ro-un as if telling him to just say the word.
Ro-un hesitated before opening his mouth.

“First, evacuate the residents. The two of you won’t be enough, so use every academy bastard here.”
“Understood.”
“Isn’t that too many?”
“I mean evacuate every resident in this area too.”
“This area? …How far?”
“To be safe, everyone within a 10-kilometer radius?”
“Understood, Lee Ro-un!”
“Run already!”

Joo Hee-jun, remembering that part of the academy city was included within ten kilometers, ran with a pale face.
He had to make the academy bastards listen to those two, but the [Amplification] skill,
A red megaphone suddenly appeared in front of Ro-un.

“Saint. Do you need this?”
“Thank you, Proprietress. You know exactly what I need.”
“Not at all.”

Gu So-ye smiled with her eyes curving roundly.
It was judgment worthy of a being who understood how urgent the current situation was.
Ro-un spoke into the megaphone.

[Ah, ah. This is Student Council President Lee Ro-un. An abnormal phenomenon has now been confirmed. Jiri Academy students, follow the instructions of Cheon Su-ho and Joo Hee-jun and evacuate the residents to a safe place. Hurry!]

The students, who had been sitting without knowing what was going on, moved in perfect order at Ro-un’s words.
Kim Jun-tae, representing the four-member group as they watched Lee Ro-un move countless students with a single sentence, asked.

“Lee Ro-un. What are you doing right now?”
“Just now, the ominous energy beneath the ground moved. I don’t know what it is, but seeing as it repels Holy Power, there’s a high chance it’s otherworldly energy, or energy with an evil or demonic attribute. Whatever it is, we have to stop it.”

At Ro-un’s explanation, the expressions of the four changed.
They put their heads together for a moment, then, as if they had decided something, spoke to Ro-un.

“We’ll help with the evacuation too.”
“There are kids from our academy here too.”
“Will lend hands.”
“If it’s helping the Saint, hghmph!”
“Shh. Quiet for now.”

Why were they trying to help?
Their public image?
Were they trying to use the crisis as an opportunity to make their names known?
Such questions suddenly came to mind, but right now, he had no time to consider their circumstances.

“Cheon Su-ho! Joo Hee-jun! Take these guys too!”

The two, who heard Ro-un’s voice from afar, raised their hands high.
After confirming the signal, Ro-un and the four exchanged looks, and the four immediately split into two groups and headed toward Cheon Su-ho and Joo Hee-jun.
Ro-un looked at them for a moment, then crouched on the ground again and spread his Holy Power widely.

Finding the whereabouts of the energy came first.