Chapter 46
When I received my first challenge letter, I sighed for a simple reason.
I knew that there was only one person in the Academy who could write a challenge in kanji like that.
Choi Yeon. It had to be her.
“To say the least, I didn’t expect her to be interested in me already.”
“What?”
Choi Yeon was someone who wanted to improve herself so as not to disappoint her family and her grandfather’s expectations.
As a family with a sword line as its mainstay, they emphasize dueling and actual combat, so as soon as the player becomes stronger, he or she comes to them.
The event where she would send these [challenge letters] to students she thought were equal to or better than her was a characteristic of Choi Yeon.
Because of this, the community has come to refer to her as the Academy Freshman Cutter
I knew that rumors about me had been spreading around the Academy recently through club events, but I hadn’t expected……her to reach out to me already.
“Does that mean she’s thinking of me as being on par with or above her now?
Judging by the start of the challenge event, I’m pretty sure she does.
I don’t think she’s wrong…….
“Can I read that?”
Se-ah asks, craning her neck as if she’s dying to know.
“It doesn’t say much. Just what time and where we’ll meet, that’s all.”
With that, I opened the challenge and saw exactly what I expected.
[Duel time next Monday, I’ll be waiting. -Yeon]
“……Again.”
“Oh, that pretty blue-haired girl who disappeared after giving you the challenge, was her name Choi Yeon?”
Se-ah reacts as if she’s hearing her name for the first time.
“Didn’t you see her during the exam? She’s the senior of this class, so you should have seen her at least once.”
“Alas, I was busy with many part-time jobs at the time, so……I quickly took the exam and went home to cook my younger siblings’ meals.”
……I feel a little sorry for her.
“Anyway, so Eugene and that senior called Choi Yeon will duel at that time…Senior and junior?”
I wonder if it’s because of the title of senior and junior but Se-ah looks at me with an expectant expression.
Dueling with Choi Yeon…….
Certainly, it would be great to make a connection with her through the duel, but……the problem was her personality.
“I’m thinking of refusing.”
“Eh? Why?”
Her strong competitive spirit is one of her strengths, but considering the Academy’s upcoming events, even if she were to accept the duel, it would only exhaust her.
It would do more harm than good.
So…….
“Just because.”
It would be better to make contact with her in a different way, preferably to my advantage.
“Hmm? What the hell, it’s over…….Boss, aren’t you going to eat?”
Jin-woo, who was sleeping on his stomach next to me, rubbed his eyes and stood up.
Okay, since he’s up too, we should get moving.
“Let’s eat.”
Our guests are coming, and I need to make sure we have a full stomach so we can serve them properly.
Hopefully, they’ll be satisfied.
* * *
“President, is it really necessary for us to be here?”
The members of the Ranger Club were gathered, each with their own personal armor as if they were going to a dungeon, preparing to go somewhere.
“They’ve been around for less than a week, and they’ve declared war on us, so what are we going to do?”
Kwon Soo-hyeop, the president of the Ranger Club, clenched his fists as he recalled what had happened not long ago.
They had managed to find a recipe for a food that would permanently increase their physical abilities just by eating it in the Recipe Development Club, but in the end, that recipe was unfinished.
In order to revive the Ranger Club, Kwon Soo-hyeop needed the recipe for better facilities and investment, so he sent his members to find the right recipe over and over again……..
“How dare a freshman disrespect a senior, especially a club with me, Soo-hyeop Kwon?”
‘Familia’, the club that had been hired to protect the Recipe Development Club was the problem.
Of course, Kwon Soo-hyeop didn’t ignore the strength of Familia.
Even if they were a new club, it didn’t change the fact that they were the ones who had defeated the gold club, the Fund Investment Club.
That’s why Kwon decided to put pressure on Familia in a different way.
“Don’t be too nervous. We’re just going to say hello.”
Even if they are rising stars, they are still just a fledgling bronze club.
Kwon Soo-hyeop, along with the other members of the club, planned to arm themselves properly and use the greeting to put pressure on them.
This was a bronze club’s battle club, a real club.
He had no intention of picking a fight since he didn’t want to feel the humiliation he had felt the last time when a club member was defeated by them.
Therefore, he was thinking of using his position and status to slowly pressure them and swallow them whole.
‘As long as I can absorb them properly, it’s not out of the question for us to become a Silver Club.’
In fact, Kwon was confident that the Ranger Club would be the next Silver Club.
“Are all the guys who came in as interns here?”
As he said that, he remembered the freshman who had joined the club last week.
Despite his young age, the newcomer, Kim Young-jae, had shown off his abilities by freely utilizing all four attributes.
His performance in the dungeon had been equally impressive, and Kwon was determined to catch him since a mage with such flexibility and potential was a rare commodity.
“Uh…… I don’t see that mage intern.”
“Young-jae?”
“Yep. According to the others, she didn’t even come to the club today.”
“…… Really?”
It was a little strange that the diligent kid would suddenly act like this, but Kwon Soo-hyeop didn’t think anything of it.
How many things had they given him in hopes that he would stay here?
In the dungeon, they took extra care of him when distributing food, and when distributing loot, they treated him as one of their own, not as an intern.
Not only that, but he also handed him a Ten-Year Hydrangea that he had been lucky enough to harvest in the past. That’s enough to convince a typical new recruit.
He had actually recruited a few of them that way, so he was confident.
‘I’m afraid he’s too busy to come today, so I’ll just wrap things up.’
Unless he’s the son of a tycoon, he’ll sign up with just a few more conditions.
It was no problem.
“So we’re pretty much all set, then?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’d like to show……the majesty of our organization.”
That would make it easier to finalize the recruitment…….But what could he do since the freshman didn’t come.
In the end, Kwon decided to head to Room Z on the first floor of the basement, where the Familia Club was located.
“Let’s go. Let’s show them who they messed with.”
Each member was dressed in what could be described as heavily armed.
If they went in looking like this, Familia Club was bound to feel the pressure.
Room Z, which housed the Familia Club, was located in the deepest part of the basement where the Bronze Clubs were housed.
It’s no secret that they were given a place that was only used as a warehouse not long ago.
Convinced that they were probably just talking to each other in the dust-filled space, Kwon stood in front of Room Z and immediately pushed both doors open.
“Did you come to congratulate me on the creation of a new club……?”
And what he saw inside was completely different from what he had predicted, something he had never imagined.
The size of the club was incomparable to other clubs. This was understandable since each club room varies in size depending on its location, and some of the basements are large because they were originally used for storage. But not the stuff inside.
The design was modern, with bright colors and quirky designs.
How come this is a bronze club room?
Kwon Soo-hyeop had grown up in a wealthy family, so he was familiar with the instruments produced by a company called Another String.
They were famous instrument makers used only by top-tier guilds.
Now, here they were, lined up side by side in the stacks of a Bronze Club, with prices beyond imagination, and no one who didn’t have the status or prestige to buy them could even attempt to do so.
“President, what’s wrong?”
The vice president who had followed Kwon into the room was also stunned when he saw what was inside.
The vice president also froze when he saw the interior of the club, which was far more luxurious than their own Ranger Club.
Showers, bedrooms, common rooms, game rooms, and training rooms. The sight of these facilities, which could not be compared to most guilds, was a great shock to a Bronze Club’s vice president.
“What? Seniors, you’re here?”
At that moment, a man sitting on an exercise machine doing lower body exercises put down the machine and approached them, smiling brightly.
“You……you……why are you here?”
Kim asks the new student he had spared no expense to bring in.
It was unexpected to see him, using the device as if he was very familiar with it.
“What? Why am I here…….Because I’m a member of ‘Familia’, right?”
As Young-jae shrugged his shoulders and smiled, everything began to make sense in Kwon’s mind.
The president of ‘Familia’ had sent Young-jae as a spy.
“Ha, you’ve been doing cute things…….You’re already spying on me.”
“What do you mean spying? I was purely curious about the activities of the Ranger Club? By the way, I ate the Hydrangea you gave me last time. It’s ten years old, so it was quite potent.”
Kim Young-jae smiles refreshingly but no matter how it looks to others, to Kwon Soo-hyeop, it looks like a sneer.
However, he held it in since he was not here to pick a fight today.
“Uh, yeah. Glad to see you enjoyed your meal. So, where’s your president?”
“He’s in a meeting.”
“……Meeting?”
As he asked the question, he could hear voices coming from behind him.
He turned around at the sudden commotion and saw the group slowly parting to the sides, revealing a man in the middle, talking to two women.
He recognized his face from last week’s duel, it was Eugene Han, the president of Familia.
“This is the payment for the construction work over the past weekend. There’s still a lot of money left over from the money the president of Familia gave me, but what should I do with it?”
“Huh? Well, keep it for now. I’m sure you’ll use it a lot in the future.”
“I will.”
Kwon’s pupils begin to twitch at the sight of the woman on the other side as he recognizes her at a glance.
She was the one that’s been hitting the high end of the market lately, the president of the International Trade Club, Haru.
She was the president of a top-tier distribution club that could get you almost anything you wanted, as long as you had the money to pay for it, as it was said that if you couldn’t get it at the Academy, you could go to the International Trade Club.
The club may only be a silver one, but its track record is more than enough to make it a force to be reckoned with.
Furthermore, rumors were already spreading throughout the Academy that the International Trade Club, which had recently absorbed all that was left of the Fund Investment Club, might soon become a Gold Club.
But why would the head of such a club be here?
“Huh? I don’t think I’ve seen you before, how did you get here?”
Eugene finally spotted Kwon and spoke to him.
He glanced at the other members of the Ranger Club, then looked at Kwon with a wry smile while the members stared back with dumbfounded expressions.
Eugene struggled to hold back the laughter that leaked out as his plan was already in motion.
