No Dark Secrets In This Book

Episode 169

Until just a month ago, it was hard to believe that Damyeon, who is now spouting preaching words, had crumbled to the point where it seemed impossible.

If it weren’t for the single letter sent by Cassice Demillang, he would have never been able to recover.

His condition was so critical that even the old folks who were secluding themselves in their old age, wondering when this skull-faced one would run out of mana and die, started popping out one by one.

Of course, even that brief meeting was only possible now that Demillang was temporarily holding their breath.

Most of Damyeon’s old friends were those who risked their lives fighting for independence, so whether their identity was revealed or not, there was too much risk in openly contacting Damyeon, who had become Demillang’s leashed skull face. Even if confidentiality was maintained, if the other party was Demillang, there was no way to predict where the information would leak from.

In other words, the fact that they thought they should meet Damyeon before they died, even at the risk of such danger, meant that Damyeon’s condition was serious a month ago.

* * *

To put it bluntly, Damyeon is someone who doesn’t have proper skin, blood vessels, or muscles.

To diagnose Damyeon’s condition, a high-level magician, not a doctor, needs to be mobilized. In other words, it wasn’t a job for the health professor, so when Damyeon first collapsed and laid down, Apple was dragged in unexpectedly.

‘Huh? Why me?’

Apple was dragged to this position because he was undergoing a strange character analysis where Damyeon was constantly telling him that he wasn’t a very trustworthy guy, but strangely, he wasn’t Demillang’s lackey either.

And on the day of the first examination, Apple was shocked to find that the internal energy flowing through Damyeon’s body was less than half of what it used to be when he pulled back the blanket.

Damyeon had been living by using mana to connect his joints, imitating human movements by controlling mana, and producing voice by vibrating air with mana, so if the internal energy Damyeon had accumulated were to scatter, it would be the end for him.

Apple immediately started thinking.

‘If you’ve become like this, Principal… Could it be that your mana core is broken?! I thought Principal, as a genius, could somehow survive half as a lich as long as the core isn’t broken! Damn it. I’m saying it’s bad luck for me to attend the funeral of a genius!’

‘…’

‘But you’ll die soon in this state! I’ll have to get a black suit tailored! Ah! My money, my purchase!’

If you ask if this is something to say in front of a dying person, of course not. But when Damyeon first took to his sickbed, he didn’t ask anyone for help. Then he was caught by the health professor who barged in to urge quick paperwork approval, and ended up calling Apple.

The health professor happened to be a person of few words. Damyeon, who normally should have roared like a tiger baring his teeth, had no energy and just lay there without even breathing. The light inside his eye sockets was also flickering out.

So Apple made this boast.

‘Don’t worry! Principal! We still have to try our best until the end! I’ll call Professor Dohyun right now!’

Damyeon tried to tell him not to. The reason Damyeon tried to say that even using mana he didn’t have was because he didn’t want to give room to be swayed by people who would be noisy anyway. Damyeon was a symbolic figure among those who knew him, although he had no power. He thought it was not advisable to reveal his crumbled state in this situation. But Apple understood the negative intention, but couldn’t guess why it was negative.

‘You know Professor Dohyun! There’s no way she… is a spy for Demillang! It would be good to call Professor Pungseoja too, but since fewer people would make you feel more at ease! Yes! Oh, by the way, for you to call me first, it seems I was unexpectedly the most trusted among the professors…’

The health professor was still taciturn, and Damyeon lost his strength when such nonsensical words popped out.

So he couldn’t even tell him to stop talking nonsense.

Regardless, Apple was in a frenzy.

‘Ah. I’m touched in my own way. I will purchase an expensive suit to wear to the funeral. Buying something expensive that I have to wear once and throw away because of bad luck means that I care about you, Principal. Keep that in mind. Now then!’

With that, Apple beat his own drum and brought Dohyun.

Dohyun was a person who knew how to think in a slightly more proper way.

‘Principal. Are you feeling anger rising in your heart right now?’

Damyeon looked at Apple without a word, and Dohyun and Professor Baekhan also stared intently at Apple.

‘Huh. I don’t understand the intention behind your gaze. Are you realizing now that I’m not only handsome but also a genius…?’

Everyone knew that Apple wasn’t just a crazy psycho bastard, but a person whose trauma gets triggered when he thinks of someone’s funeral.

Because in the closed strategist society, rumors often circulate within.

They also implicitly knew that he was the type to raise his tension as a defense mechanism.

But right now, it was really damn noisy.

“Ugh! Ugh!”

Dohyun grabbed Apple’s mouth with his hand and said,

‘…I’ve caught the bouncing nuisance in front of us. But besides that, I’m saying it seems like you’ve developed a mental illness.’

Professor Baekhan finally spoke.

‘If it’s a mental illness…’

Dohyun solemnly replied,

‘It’s delirium.’

* * *

Actually, from Damyeon’s perspective, the timing could be considered good.

Because a big battle had just taken place, people understood on their own that he ended up like this due to internal injuries sustained then.

‘Even though that’s not the truth.’

Old folks who were worried sick about him came and went, nagging that he looked like a corpse to his face. Damyeon, who would have normally gotten angry, saying they were no different, was silent as he lay ill. Everyone felt heartbroken seeing Damyeon like that. Damyeon had almost been erased from modern and contemporary history after being sold to Demillang’s experiments, but nevertheless, he was a person who had fought more fiercely than anyone else. Everyone who knew him hoped he would overcome his delirium.

That’s how the secret sickbed visits began.

But the reason Damyeon fell mentally ill was not because of the battle. It wasn’t like that…

It was because the truth he had desperately been running away from was piercingly painful.

‘…A human being doesn’t die from having their guts sliced or limbs severed.’

Cassice Demillang was vicious and strong. That was something everyone agreed on. Cassice Demillang was cruel and cunning. That was also something everyone knew.

But after Cassice Demillang entered the academy, as he got to know him little by little…

‘All those judgments, it’s not that they’re wrong.’

Nevertheless, he felt that all those judgments were wrong.

‘So what I want to say is…’

It wasn’t just Demillang’s vice that made Cassice Demillang throw himself off the cliff.

All the gazes that believed him to be vicious and strong drove Cassice Demillang down a cruel and cunning path. It was common sense that it was too much for someone his age to hunt monsters, but everyone thought that maybe Cassice Demillang could do it because it was him. All the eyes that turned a blind eye to the strange abuse, thinking it would be fine because it was Cassice Demillang, put him in the highest place,

And so, Cassice Demillang fell.

He threw himself off the cliff.

‘Just to gain an advantageous hand.’

He used his body like that…

‘In this era.’

The era Damyeon had gone through was a time when lives were easily severed like straw scarecrows. Back then, Damyeon could even lay down his life for a cause, and he almost did.

But now it’s the 21st century.

‘Where in the world has it become so livable?’

Of course, not all countries enjoy peace and prosperity just because it’s the 21st century. However…

‘Why did you always have to live as if you were on the edge?’

Whenever he had such thoughts, his breath would get stuck.

‘Cassice…’

I’m your teacher, but I’ve never called your name kindly even once.

Just thinking about that.

The urge to curse himself rose up.