I Became a Swordsmanship Genius at the Academy

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Entering the main workshop of the mountain range forge.

In front of the room, which was already bursting with heat despite only having been preheated, Hwang Deok-soo, the mayor of Jangsan Cave, fidgeted and asked.

“Narin… are you really okay? You know how dangerous this is…!”

“I’m fine.”

To create the magical tool designed by Hanarin, it was necessary to concentrate the essence of the mountain range at a single point.

It was a task requiring an enormous force to be focused at a very small point, even more than stabilizing the Hyeonwolgyeom.

The danger of the process was as extreme as the expected performance of the completed magical tool.

It was natural that even the slightest error in manipulating the figures was unacceptable.

The heat radiating outwards would be far hotter than that of a blacksmith’s forge.

One would have to endure melting heat while constantly manipulating extremely minute figures.

However, if this was all there was to it, Hwang Deok-soo wouldn’t be so anxious to stop me.

“No matter what, don’t you think mana exhaustion is too much? No, this can’t happen. If you mess up, you could die!”

The greatest danger of the task was that it had to be carried out in a state of complete mana exhaustion, with all body mana drained from start to finish.

Since no interference could be allowed in such precise work, this was a necessary procedure.

If something went wrong, the risk of becoming crippled or even dying was extraordinarily high.

“Think it over again. How about looking for another way?”

“You know there is no other way.”

“…Do you really have to make this?”

“Yes. I need it to survive.”

The extreme anxiety and loneliness I felt last time, when I thought it might be better to die.

Hanarin intended to alleviate those feelings by completing this magical tool.

Kim Il-shin wouldn’t just stop on his own, and such a situation would happen again someday.

‘Perhaps… the anxiety could become a reality.’

Thus, despite Hwang Deok-soo’s insistence, Hanarin opened the door to the main workshop.

Having made up her mind, it was now time to stake her life on this.

*

“What did you think would happen when you came this far? You’re really unbelievably stupid!”

Berter exclaimed confidently.

He seemed to have made no preparations for any intruder.

“Fine! I’ll kill you here and absolve my sins!”

His display suggested a great deal of confidence.

In the battle that would soon unfold, he was certain he wouldn’t die.

Berter was a very cautious person.

Other than making puppets, he had no combat ability and suffered from severe health anxiety; he feared everything in the world.

Yet, contrary to that mental state, Berter always roamed the battlefield with his puppets.

The reason was simple. Being beside the puppets was the safest place for him as long as he had his abilities.

Berter’s unique ability, [Separation], had been his since before he plunged into the Aeternum Church.

It was a skill used to separate or relocate the souls left within corpses.

However, after being empowered by the church’s leader, his [Separation] could now even divide space as far as it pertained to his own body.

‘What a broken ability.’

While using [Separation], he could not use mana, and the cooldown was tremendously long.

But until he exhausted all his mana, he was absolutely safe from enemy attacks.

Thus, the original strategy was to seal the surroundings and wait for his mana to deplete.

If successful in sealing, while his mana lasted, one would only have to deal with relatively weak puppets, so it wasn’t a particularly challenging boss fight.

‘Not anymore.’

However, if a sword ghost appeared, the story would change.

It would be an incredibly unreasonable boss fight where one had to survive for hours against the endlessly respawning sword ghost.

‘No other tricks are possible either.’

Assassinating Berter beforehand or killing him upon encounter would not work.

All countermeasures against them had already been prepared.

‘Magic and curses don’t work either.’

There were hardly any long-lasting spells or curses effective against sword ghosts, and even those were easily dispelled by Berter’s other puppets.

‘This is why people say to delete it.’

The “Resurrected Sword Ghost” route was a combination of unexploitable weaknesses and grotesquely difficult patterns.

Thus, players who experienced this route were doomed to face extreme frustration.

The widespread notoriety of this made others instantly delete their save files upon realizing they had entered the “Resurrected Sword Ghost” route.

‘You can’t break through with sheer power.’

No matter how strong one was, surviving the relentless attacks of the sword ghost was a tough task.

‘So you have to break through from the front.’

So ironically, breaking through from the front became the sole method available.

During the previous battle with Bernica, Kim Il-shin had founded the Il-shin Sword Technique and, in the process, had another experience.

He pierced the very fabric of the world he existed in and gazed beyond into the next dimension.

‘Even now, it’s possible.’

Kim Il-shin had not let go of that sensation.

It was a crucial element for the first proof of existence of the Il-shin Sword Technique.

If he used it, he could find Berter hidden within the separated space and slice him down in one go.

‘I can’t do it alone.’

The problem was the split second it took to manifest the sword technique.

It wasn’t just a matter of simply drawing the sword on a visible target; it involved the process of locating the hidden enemy between spaces.

A three-second period requiring extreme concentration. During that time, Kim Il-shin would be completely defenseless.

And three seconds was an extremely long time when facing a powerhouse like the sword ghost.

So he needed Hazuki’s help.

It was her role to block the sword ghost’s strike during those three seconds.

‘So… I have to pull this off.’

Gripping her sword tightly, Hazuki looked at her enemy.

Her father, Endou Norio, whose soul had disappeared, leaving only the body as a puppet of Berter.

Meeting his empty gaze caused the tension that had subsided to rise once again.

It wasn’t out of fear.

Though the time had been short, she had trained with Kim Il-shin to the point of death.

And throughout that time, there hadn’t been a single enemy who could withstand the sword technique mimicking the sword ghost.

‘So what is this?’

Hazuki fell into deep thought.

It felt wrong to let this emotion slide by for the sake of the moment ahead.

“…Ah.”

With that, she realized.

A part of herself that the sword saint hadn’t told her.

The years she had lived with only the goal of killing her father with her own hands.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that the human known as Hazuki had been forged from that cruel goal.

Her obsession with the sword was to catch up to her father who had become a sword ghost.

Her kind and bright personality was to fill the void left by her father’s massacre.

And to prevent her inner darkness from surfacing.

The reason Hazuki was tense now stemmed from that too.

Hazuki instinctively felt that after achieving her goal, she would be left empty.

She did not know how to live, nor did she know any way to do so without a goal.

‘It was such a simple reason.’

As she grasped all of that, she found herself smiling.

She felt embarrassed that she had shown such awkwardness to Kim Il-shin for something like this.

Without a goal, she could not live.

This was still unchanged in her nature.

But now, there should be no situation where her goal disappears.

Kim Il-shin. His very existence had become Hazuki’s goal.

“Phew.”

As all tension vanished simultaneously, the absolute faith Kim Il-shin had given her echoed in her mind.

There was no way she would betray that.

With her mind made up, Hazuki once again gazed into the sword ghost’s eyes.

The emptiness in those eyes evoked no emotion within her.

And in that moment, Berter shouted.

“Khahhahaha! Go ahead and struggle!”

As soon as those words ended, Berter’s body vanished.

He had used [Separation]. There was no trace of him to be found in the surrounding area.

Kuwung!

Finally, the sword ghost charged in, shattering the ground as it came. Watching it, Kim Il-shin closed his eyes.

“Please.”

“Trust me.”

Lowering her stance, Hazuki pulled in her sword.

The sword’s aura shimmering in the water quickly condensed, harboring immense power.

Grggrggrgrg……

The compressed sword aura swayed precariously as Hazuki waited for the moment.

Tukwaak!

Finally, at the moment the sword ghost unleashed its technique, Hazuki also thrust her sword forward.

The sword strike tore through the air, rushing in with even more ferocity than what she had seen before.

‘I can’t perform like Il-shin.’

Reading all the trajectories of those strikes and countering them with optimal movements was impossible without Kim Il-shin.

So, Hazuki found another method.

‘If I can’t read it, I’ll just have to react.’

Chwaak-!

A sharp burst of mana, like a cactus’s thorns, spread all around from Hazuki’s thrust.

The speed of those needles flew beyond the realm of perception.

Kagagagak—!!

Its accuracy was perfect.

Without reading the sword ghost’s strike trajectories, she imprinted only that brief moment into her mind like taking a photo.

And then, with the protruding needles, she intercepted all the strikes.

This was the countermeasure Hazuki had devised, and she succeeded.

Tukak!

As the attack was blocked, the sword ghost leapt again.

Even seeing his form, Hazuki put her sword away.

The three seconds had already passed, and she had unwavering faith in Kim Il-shin’s success.

Swoosh!

He had never once failed to meet her expectations.