Ex Rank Supporting Role’s Replay in a Prestigious School

Baek Ho silently stared at Eun Ho.
The silence lingered, but Eun Ho smiled warmly and waited for a response.
When Baek Ho showed no signs of speaking, Jeok Ho, feeling frustrated, broke the silence.

"Is it such a difficult question that you’ve been stalling like this? Hwang Ho would always prioritize his friends, then and now. But I don’t understand how that question relates to the situation in the simulator."
"Why do you think it’s unrelated?"
"Think about the question Jo Yi-shin asked when he was pretending to be the suspicious prophet."

The situation in the simulator was as follows:
Just before Hwang Ho arrived, Yeom Jun-yeol and Jo Yi-shin had heard a certain song.
Based on the time and distance, Jo Yi-shin assumed that Hwang Ho must have heard the song too, which led him to ask this question.

"Who’s the one singing that song?"
Jeok Ho didn’t think Jo Yi-shin’s question was rude or dangerous.
It wasn’t really something that needed to be hidden either.

Jeok Ho continued.
"Now, imagine if Baek Ho or I were the ones singing that song. Would Hwang Ho just keep silent? It’s clear he would answer directly."
Hwang Ho, following Jeok Ho’s reasoning, considered what would happen if Baek Ho or Jeok Ho were the ones singing that song.

If someone showed interest in that song and asked who the singer was, they’d reveal their identity.
Seeing that no one stopped the song from reaching the ears of outsiders, it didn’t seem like there was anything particularly secretive about it.
Since the system allowed it, the song itself probably wasn’t playing any tricks.

Therefore, Hwang Ho had a clear response.
"I don’t know what kind of song you’re singing, but if someone’s curious, I wouldn’t hide it. If it’s a good song, I’d proudly brag about my friends, and even if it’s bad, I’d try to make it sound nice."
"Don’t be ridiculous, you’d definitely mock them. Hwang Ho, you’d laugh and make fun of it."
"Haha! Of course, I would tease them. But I wouldn’t let a stranger mock my friend."

Then, could it be that the song was so bad that they were trying to hide its origin?
That didn’t seem likely.
Based on the flow of the conversation, the song must have been performed by the Hojo’s best performer.

There was no way the Newcomer would allow someone else to perform if they didn’t have sufficient skill.
Hearing Jeok Ho and Hwang Ho’s words, Eun Ho realized he had asked an unexpected question.
"Baek Ho and Jeok Ho, you two are both Hwang Ho’s friends and strong, aren’t you? Moreover, everyone who knows the Hojo knows your names. If someone asks about the song, it’s no big deal to tell them who sang it, right?"

"That’s true."
"Even if I were the one singing that song, Hwang Ho would happily introduce me to Yi-shin. After all, the leader of the Hojo heard the performance, and he’d consider it an honor."
Hwang Ho agreed with Eun Ho.

He thought of his friends, and there was no reason to hide the identity of the singer if any of them had performed that song.
Even if a stranger tried to make trouble by knowing the names of Baek Ho or Jeok Ho, they wouldn’t be able to do much.
Eun Ho seemed to know this well, but Hwang Ho couldn’t understand why Eun Ho was bringing it up.

"But what if that friend was secretly carrying out a dangerous mission under the enemy’s radar?"
"...A dangerous mission?"
The eyes of the Hojo members turned toward Eun Ho.

Eun Ho met their gaze steadily and answered.
"I was making a timeline, tracing old memories, examining the flow and causality of many events. At first, it seemed like I couldn’t find any contradictions, but when I used my experience from being Tian Sheng-hun, I found parts I couldn’t understand."
"What parts couldn’t you understand?"

"The difference between the events we stopped and those we couldn’t."
Eun Ho’s words, though brief, were enough to make the Hojo recall incidents long buried in the past.
During the war, Eun Ho had shown exceptional leadership as the Hojo’s leader.

Although the enemies were overwhelmingly numerous, the Hojo were few, and resources were limited.
In an obviously disadvantaged situation, Eun Ho used his wisdom to defeat the enemies and led the Hojo until the skies cleared.
However, even as an exceptional leader and strategist, Eun Ho hadn’t always won.

There had been times when they nearly lost the Newcomer and when Cheong Ho came close to death but barely survived.
Even so, we never doubted Eun Ho’s ability. How could anyone question his capabilities just because there were events we couldn’t stop?
No one among the Hojo who survived the war had ever doubted Eun Ho’s methods.

Thus, if there were contradictions in Eun Ho’s choices back then, no one from that time would have noticed them.
"In some events, we didn’t make a major move, yet we achieved great victories. In others, we did nothing right and were completely defeated."
"I always thought you made the best moves. What incidents are you referring to?"

It was Hwang Ho who asked, but Eun Ho’s gaze lingered on Jeok Ho for a brief moment.
Eun Ho hesitated for a second before speaking.
"...There’s more than one incident I’m considering. But if I were to pick one, it would be the incident when Cheong Ho lost several of his disciples and was severely injured before the dark times fell."

From the Hojo’s perspective, it was one of the painful moments of defeat, so it wasn’t strange that Eun Ho considered it a significant event.
But Hwang Ho was troubled by Eun Ho’s brief glance at Jeok Ho.
He had realized what Eun Ho was about to say but held back.

Could it be that Woo-nyeo betrayed Jeok Ho?
Had he known earlier, there would have been no tragic accidents, except for one gunshot. But he couldn’t easily speak of that event in front of Jeok Ho, who had been tied to the red mold for thousands of years.
Most likely, Eun Ho wouldn’t speak freely about it unless a solid hypothesis was formed.

"I knew the enemy was preparing a large-scale ritual, and I also knew they would target the Newcomer before the ritual. Still, my response was lacking."
"But at that time, didn’t you personally join the battle to help Cheong Ho? If you hadn’t, Cheong Ho would have died in that battle."
"Yes. I succeeded in cleaning up afterward, but the issue was that I wasn’t properly prepared."

The Hojo members couldn’t understand Eun Ho’s words.
They couldn’t grasp why he was saying he hadn’t made the proper moves as the leader.
Eun Ho quietly observed his friends’ reactions before giving an example.

"There was an incident where a Chinese team member hid among the enemy forces to gather information. It was dangerous, but because of that, the Chinese team ended up having the most information of the three teams. The timing of the enemy’s attack, their movement route, the preparation process for the ritual... even the number of times they heard the ringing."
As Eun Ho said, the Chinese team had the most information.
The Japanese team had been fortunate enough to catch a clue when the leader of the Woong clan was nearly assassinated, but the Chinese team had taken a much riskier approach.

As a result, they lost two raid members, and the remaining one had to join the Korean team with no real success.
Eun Ho continued.
"If it were me, I would have selected someone from the Hojo to infiltrate the enemy’s ranks and keep track of their movements, reporting regularly. But I didn’t do that."

"Surely, there was no infiltrator, but wasn’t there a reconnaissance team? I clearly remember getting a report from them and setting out immediately."
"Infiltrating the enemy ranks is dangerous. Two of the Chinese team were caught, after all. As a leader, it’s not an easy decision to make. Choosing reconnaissance over infiltration wasn’t a bad call either."
Jeok Ho and Hwang Ho countered Eun Ho’s words with memories from the past.

But Eun Ho shook his head.
"If you were the leader back then, Hwang Ho, I’m sure you would have done the same. But for me, if it was to protect the Newcomer and this land, I would have sacrificed a few. You don’t forget that most of those who followed my orders to impersonate the Newcomer perished, do you?"
Eun Ho’s expression remained gentle.

Everyone in the Hojo remembered clearly the moment when Eun Ho personally selected the best cloth and handed it to the Newcomer’s impersonator.
Though Eun Ho was often busy and gave many commands through others, when it came to issuing orders for impersonation, he always did it himself.
After confirming that neither Jeok Ho nor Hwang Ho could refute him anymore, Eun Ho spoke.

"If it were me, I would have ordered both infiltration and reconnaissance. If the Hojo hadn’t sent reconnaissance teams, the enemy would have suspected infiltration and conducted thorough internal checks. But I didn’t do that. Perhaps I acted that way, but forgot about it."
As Eun Ho’s words grew longer, Hwang Ho and Jeok Ho began to accept them more.
It was incredibly difficult to accept that something had been missing for thousands of years, but it was hard to deny what Eun Ho was saying.

Eun Ho gave more examples, convincing the Hojo members.
"In my memory, it’s hard to find contradictions, but when I look back from the perspective of an outsider from another world, I can’t understand it."
"Are you suspecting memory loss?"

"Should I call it memory? Everyone forgot together, and it wasn’t recorded. So rather than calling it memory loss, I’d say it’s the loss of existence."
The phrase "loss of existence" came with a heavy weight.
Eun Ho no longer focused on past memories and events but spoke of someone who had disappeared.

"If someone has disappeared, they must have been close to us. Also, they must have been trusted and capable enough to carry out a dangerous and important mission. If such a person existed, we would have treated them as a close friend."
A lost friend.
The Hojo members couldn’t be sure if anyone had disappeared, but just hearing it made their hearts sink.

Now, Eun Ho turned to Hwang Ho and asked.
"What if that friend returned after completing a dangerous mission and played a song? If a suspicious outsider or prophet showed interest in that performance, would you tell them the name of your friend?"
Hwang Ho imagined the scenario.

What if his close friend had infiltrated the enemy ranks and gathered information on a dangerous mission?
If the suspicious prophet asked about this friend in exchange for removing their mask, Hwang Ho, despite being curious about the outsider and the masked face, would never reveal the name.
He would divert the conversation so that the outsider wouldn’t even care about his friend and would watch over them to ensure no harm came to them.

"No, I wouldn’t tell them. As Eun Ho said, I prioritize my friends."
"Then..."
Jeok Ho fell silent.

Hwang Ho spoke with a heavy voice, concluding the matter.
"The simulator, which claimed to have reproduced the memory of the land, must have acted just like me."