NOVEL WEB Chapter 330: Winter Break (4)
When a person awakens, it doesn't happen instantly, like flipping a switch to light up a room. Instead, it creeps in slowly… an ebbing tide of submerged consciousness gradually bleeding into reality, little by little seizing control of the senses.
The first sense to stir was hearing.
‘Let me help…’
‘... The transfer process is complicated…’
‘... We can manage as well…’
Faint murmurs brushed against his ears, stirring the edges of his mind and sharpening the fog of his dulled senses.
And then… reality crashed down all at once.
Baek Yu-Seol instinctively tried to open his eyes wide and sit up, but—
It felt as though the weight of an entire building bore down upon his eyelids. Yet it wasn’t just that.
As if he were shackled by chains of iron, not even a single finger would obey him. His body felt hollow, stripped bare of all sensation.‘What’s happening to me…?’
A surge of fear gripped him. He couldn’t understand what was happening to his body.
Then, a sudden and violent surge erupted from his chest, wrenching a silent scream from within him.
‘Aaaahhh…’
But no sound was heard. His paralyzed body betrayed him, refusing to release even the faintest cry.
It was as though a time bomb had been embedded in his heart, ticking away. Cold sweat trickled down his temple.
‘It’s going to explode…’
His heart throbbed, swelling like a balloon stretched to its limit.
The searing energy brimming within it was far too much for a fragile human heart to contain.
For a fleeting moment, the thought of death brushed against him. Panic clawed at his chest as he instinctively tried to grab hold of something - anything - but his limbs refused to respond.
As he desperately clung to his slipping consciousness, he became aware of a presence. Someone was watching him.
‘... What is that?’
His mind snapped into sharp clarity in an instant.
His hearing had somewhat returned, and he realized there were people nearby. Familiar voices echoed faintly in his ears.
‘Ma Yu-Seong and Jeliel…? And Alterisha…’
The voices blurred in and out, calling to him before vanishing into the distance.
‘Baek Yu-Seol is acting strange…!’
‘Doctor! Get a doctor...!’
He suddenly started convulsing…’
His awareness began to unravel, the voices growing ever more distant.
Yet beyond their cries - separate from their mortal gazes - something else loomed.
‘Who is it? Who are you!’
He shouted toward the massive, otherworldly gaze fixed on him, but no voice came out.
Ugh! That piercing gaze gnawed at him, but there was no time to dwell on it. His heart continued to expand, swelling to a perilous size.
‘Hup!’
Grinding his teeth - or at least attempting to, only to fail miserably - Baek Yu-Seol poured every ounce of willpower into suppressing the wild energy surging from his heart.
‘I can do it. I just did it earlier’
The Baek Yu-Seol of the distant future.
Or perhaps, Baek Yu-Seol from another world.
He had once glimpsed what it felt like to wield a fully developed body - a vessel honed to perfection - and through that, he had gained a faint understanding of how that version of himself had ascended to the pinnacle of Nature’s Heavenly Energy Body.
Of course, compared to the future Baek Yu-Seol’s level of mastery, the fraction he had managed to grasp was less than 0.01%.
‘Even if it’s just 0.01%, that’s enough…’
The difference between absolute zero and 0.01% was immeasurable.
Like the gap between ‘it doesn’t exist’ and ‘it exists.’
That tiny sliver was what Baek Yu-Seol needed—a narrow passageway through which he could control, release, and circulate the immense energy trapped inside him.
‘Grrrgh…’
His head seared, as though molten lava had been poured into his skull, and his heart felt as if it might explode at any moment.
‘… I can feel it.’
He willed the raw life force in his heart to move… not to rampage recklessly, but to flow, guided along the paths of his meridians.
Throb!
The directionless, chaotic flow of life force began to stabilize, following the path Baek Yu-Seol’s intended.
This was it.
This was exactly what he had been searching for.
The future Baek Yu-Seol possessed highways of meridians carved through his body, enabling energy to flow at unimaginable speeds. But the current Baek Yu-Seol didn’t even have dirt trails… merely raw, unpaved ground, making movement unbearably slow.
And yet, if he could carve those paths himself… etching them through his meridians with life force...
‘Huh?’
Suddenly, his vision went dark.
‘W-What am I supposed to do now?’
It felt like trying to drill a hole through a solid wall to create a path, but without any tools.
If only he had something - anything - a jackhammer or at least a shovel! But all he had was a clump of life force.
‘Ugh!’
Like a restless child, the life force refused to stay still. The moment Baek Yu-Seol faltered, it began rampaging again, as if it were trying to break free.
It was impossible to find a solution.
Though he had glimpsed the future Baek Yu-Seol, that version already possessed perfectly cleared meridians and blood vessels. He had never learned how to carve them open from the beginning.
Had he followed the proper path of growth, he might have discovered the method naturally. But as things stood now, no clear answers presented themselves.
— Amazing. You’re controlling life force. It’s still incomplete, but… It’s a rare talent for a human.
A voice echoed suddenly.
‘What...?’
The raging life force, which had been thrashing as if it might shatter his heart, abruptly calmed.
A woman’s voice resonated with the power to shake the entire world and reached him.
Baek Yu-Seol’s eyes flew open. In the pitch-black emptiness, a towering figure emerged… an emerald-green woman who loomed over him with a gentle smile.
She resembled a mountain, her vast figure towering as she addressed him.
— I knew you were special, but I wanted to see it for myself. And now... I’m certain. You are worthy of sharing in my life force.
‘Worthy? Who are you?!’
— I’m Soft Green Spring Moon.
‘… What?!’
The Twelve Divine Moons!
The very entity he had never encountered properly in the game now stood before him in all her majesty.
Extending her colossal hand, she addressed him once more.
— You are the closest existence to nature in this world, but you are still too young and inexperienced to truly grasp the birth of life. Nevertheless, your efforts to accept and understand life force have moved me deeply.
‘R-Really?’
To be honest, he didn’t understand a word she was saying.
Wasn’t this entire mess caused by his failure to comprehend life force in the first place?
— I cannot freely meddle with your body. However, I can grant you a small measure of assistance.
‘Help? What kind of—‘
Tap!
As soon as Soft Green Spring Moon finished speaking, a small hole opened in his heart.
— Do not be alarmed. I haven’t harmed your heart. I merely opened a passage for the energy to flow.
‘You… opened a passage?’
Finally regaining his composure, Baek Yu-Seol closed his eyes once more and focused on the life force. Just as she said, there was indeed a small hole in one corner of his heart where the life force could now flow.
It was minuscule and blocked further down the line, so it couldn’t travel far. However...
Even a tiny hole was enough. Clearing the rest of the path afterward would be easy.
‘I can do this... Because I’m Baek Yu-Seol… And I’m the coolest, most badass guy alive…’
— Modern spells are peculiar. Is this some kind of self-suggestion spell?
Crack! Crack!
His meridians slowly opened, creating space for the life force to flow freely.
The road ahead was still long and arduous. All he had managed to accomplish was opening a single path near his heart. The Baek Yu-Seol of the future, however, had opened pathways throughout his entire body.
He knew better than to expect such mastery overnight. For now, forming even one meridian to connect his body was enough...
‘I can become like the future Baek Yu-Seol.’
***
Beep! Beep! Beep!
The shrill alarm of the monitoring device echoed through the room, signaling a critical condition. Lying in the life-support device designed by Alterisha herself, his forehead was drenched in cold sweat, his face twisted in visible pain.
"I-Is he going to be okay...?"
The nurse asked hesitantly, her voice filled with worry.
"He’ll be fine."
Alterisha nodded firmly, her confidence unwavering.
Even though she wasn’t a doctor, she had poured the last month into obsessively studying medicine to create the device that would aid in the circulation of life force.
‘That life force needs to be controlled.’
The life force within Baek Yu-Seol’s body was akin to a ticking time bomb. If it were released recklessly, it might explode and kill him.
It had to be controlled, circulated, and allowed to flow naturally out of his body.
And Alterisha knew very well:
‘This transfer is meaningless.’
Baek Yu-Seol’s condition was far too severe. Desperation had driven them to seek out the physicians of the Life Research Association, but modern science lacked the tools to harness such an enigmatic force.
Life force couldn’t even be detected by machines. If humans could uncover even ‘0.01%’ of its secrets, they might one day be able to control the very birth of life itself.
‘It’s that mysterious a field.’
Inspired by Eisel’s comment—‘His body smells like a forest’—Alterisha had designed a life-support device that mimicked nature as closely as possible.
But what if—
What if, in his unconscious state, Baek Yu-Seol was trying to tame the boundless force within him?
What if he was already fighting to survive?
What would she need to do then?
‘I need to modify it further.’
She could help. Alterisha wasn’t certain her skills could become the decisive turning point to save him, but if they could provide even the smallest shred of assistance, she was willing to do anything.
“Could everyone leave for a moment? Only the doctors, please remain.”
“Yes, understood...”
Since it wasn’t the doctors or clergy but Alterisha herself who had stabilized Baek Yu-Seol’s precarious condition, they respectfully obeyed her request.
Click!
As the nurses exited the room, beads of cold sweat on their foreheads, they collapsed into nearby chairs. Stella’s knights, who had been patrolling nearby, quietly approached them.
“Nurse, are you okay? How’s Baek Yu-Seol’s condition?”
“...I’ll be honest since your first question is probably just politeness—I’m not okay. As for Baek Yu-Seol, he’s stable for now.”
“Hooh... When we heard he suddenly had a seizure, we were scared out of our minds. Hasn’t he been quiet for the past month?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
The nurse pursed her lips, glaring at the knights, who awkwardly cleared their throats.
“We’re really sorry for barging in like this, but what can we do? Back there, the Princess of Adolevit and the daughter of the Starcloud Trading Company are practically breathing fire, demanding updates...”
The nurse’s eyes flicked toward the far corner of the hall, where the two girls stood. Her shoulders tensed as she caught their sharp gazes.
Ever since Baek Yu-Seol’s condition had worsened, those two had stormed in, making a commotion. Alterisha had personally thrown them out for being disruptive, but now, barred from the room and starved of information, they looked dangerously restless.
“... This is exhausting.”
As if caring for a patient in such a precarious state wasn’t stressful enough, they also had to deal with pressure from nobles wielding terrifying influence.
For the first time, the nurse genuinely began to question whether being in this profession was worth it.
“Couldn’t agree more...”
The knights sighed in unison.
What was supposed to be a simple transport mission had spiraled into madness the moment they learned the special students would be accompanying them.
“This transport operation... It’ll end safely, right?”
No one could answer that question, even now.
————-
Goal: 20 Bonus Chapters to Celebrate 300 Chapters of Flashing Genius!
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