Sweeping the Academy with a Wooden Sword

“Can I ask why?”

Choi Bit-na sighed.

“It’s trauma. A kind of. In high school, I sparred with a friend. We both had high self-esteem, so we sparred with staffs without wearing protective gear.”

Choi Bit-na took a sip of her latte before continuing.

“I almost killed her. I could have controlled it… but as if possessed, I aimed for her solar plexus. If a friend nearby hadn’t reported it quickly, she would have died.”

‘Is it talent?’

What Lee Dojin felt as he used his body in combat was that half of the movements were in the realm of instinct.

And the Choi Bit-na before him had a high probability of having combat instincts that surpassed others.

To the point of being unconscious.
“Have you ever faced monsters?”

Choi Bit-na nodded.

“In my third year of high school, I killed a goblin that appeared from a gate. Without using mana.”

“Did your body move instinctively then too?”

“Yes.”

She has no hesitation in killing monsters.
That was at least good news. But the experience of killing a goblin without even using mana seemed to make Choi Bit-na overestimate her instinctive power too much, coupled with her previous experience.

‘Is it fear of her own power, with some basis?’

“In the entrance exam, you couldn’t kill anyone, right?”

At Lee Dojin’s words, Choi Bit-na smiled self-deprecatingly.

“Yeah. I couldn’t take down even one person.”

The reason why Choi Bit-na, who could have been in Class 1 based on her skills, was assigned to Class 10 was revealed.

Just as Lee Dojin, having organized his thoughts, was about to open his mouth again,
a woman approached from afar.

“Wow, it’s been so long. Bit-na.”

It was a woman with short hair.
Choi Bit-na also seemed to recognize the woman and gave an awkward smile.

“Oh, it has been a while. Kim Ye-rim.”

The short-haired woman, Kim Ye-rim, put her hand on the table where the coffee was placed.

“I came because I saw the freshman representative, and here’s a very welcome face. Hello, Student Lee Dojin.”

Kim Ye-rim smiled brightly at Lee Dojin.
And she bowed deeply towards Lee Dojin.
As if to emphasize her body’s curves.

“I’m Kim Ye-rim, daughter of the Taehwa Guild Master. Here.”

And she held out a business card to Lee Dojin.

“As soon as summer vacation starts, Student Lee Dojin will receive countless scout requests, right? Especially from mid-sized guilds like ours. But still, I hope you’ll visit our guild at least once.”

Lee Dojin fiddled with the business card.
It was the business card of the Taehwa Guild Master.

“Why is it the Guild Master’s business card, not your own?”

Kim Ye-rim gave a natural eye-smile.

“Because my name still has no authority or value. Compared to Student Lee Dojin. So I gave you my father’s business card, which has sufficient authority. Don’t worry, I got permission to use my father’s authority.”

Kim Ye-rim continued.

“So please drop by our headquarters when you have time. You’ll be an honored guest anytime.”

Lee Dojin slowly nodded.
Though he didn’t answer, Kim Ye-rim seemed satisfied with just that action and smiled brightly again.

And this time she turned her head to stare at Choi Bit-na beside her. She leaned in close and whispered.

“You, I heard you ended up in Class 10? You still haven’t overcome that phobia? This… aren’t you being a burden to your group members?”

Choi Bit-na’s eyes trembled.
Lee Dojin quietly watched this scene.

Kim Ye-rim stared at Lee Dojin again.

“You’re in the same group as Bit-na for the mock dungeon exam, right? Oh no… you might not be able to get first place this time. Student Lee Dojin.”

Kim Ye-rim, smiling brightly until the end with an eye-smile, said she’d see them next time and moved away from the two.
After a brief commotion, several voices were heard.

“Wow, so that’s this year’s freshman representative.”

“Oh, that’s right, that’s right.”

They were voices of seniors and classmates.

“Is it because he’s the freshman representative that the Taehwa Guild’s daughter is approaching him like that?”

“She was a bit too aggressive though.”

It seemed no one had heard what Kim Ye-rim whispered to Choi Bit-na.

The Taehwa Guild wasn’t a top-class guild, but it was a mid-sized guild that all academy students knew about.

Because the daughter of such a guild had made direct contact, people’s attention was inevitably drawn for a moment.

It was a very brief moment, but for Choi Bit-na, who was clenching her fists tightly, it felt like quite a long time.
Only after everyone’s gazes disappeared did Choi Bit-na stretch out her body that had been shrinking.

“…I’m sorry. Because of me.”

Choi Bit-na’s voice was trembling.

“What are you sorry for?”

Lee Dojin didn’t like Choi Bit-na’s attitude. This situation where she became dejected after being swayed by a single word.

“Like Kim Ye-rim said, I’ll probably be a burden to the group… I’m sorry for making you worry.”

Lee Dojin chuckled and then crumpled up the business card he had just received.

“Why should I care about someone who hands over her father and guild master’s business card because her own name has no value? Someone who has nothing else but that.”

And he casually tossed it into the trash can beside the table.

What Lee Dojin just said wasn’t comfort for Choi Bit-na. It was just a very honest impression of the recent situation.

“Rather, if you’re going to maintain this attitude after hearing such words, I’d be disappointed in you because of that.”

Choi Bit-na’s eyes widened at Lee Dojin’s words.
She felt like she vaguely understood what kind of person Lee Dojin was.

Lee Dojin drained the remaining iced Americano and stood up from his seat.

“Tomorrow, are you free?”

Choi Bit-na nodded.

“We’ll move a bit early. Around 7. Let’s meet at the station.”

“But, just the two of us?”

Doubt bloomed on Choi Bit-na’s face.

“Yeah.”
Lee Dojin grinned.
Choi Bit-na felt a chill down her spine for some reason.

“I intend to get first place this time too. Of course, together with my group members.”

Lee Dojin intended to break through a wall.
This time, the wall he needed to break wasn’t his own, but the one blocking Choi Bit-na’s path.

**

He told Ryu Jia and Kim Ji-hoon to train individually, and said he would train with them on Sunday.

When he said he intended to try solving the problem Choi Bit-na had, they both agreed.

Early morning.

Choi Bit-na exhaled roughly.

“Wow… you really were an amazing guy.”

Paju Gamaksan Mountain.
Lee Dojin was climbing the place where he had first encountered Baek Hwayeon two years ago.

The reason Lee Dojin brought Choi Bit-na to Gamaksan was simple.
It was a place he had been to before, and

He thought it was a place where they could train without having to worry about anyone else.

The two climbed to the middle of the mountain in silence.

“This is nice.”

Choi Bit-na, who had gulped down water from a plastic bottle, said as she looked at the mountains now dyed green.

“It feels like my cluttered mind is being organized.”

“Rest comfortably. We’ll start in 10 minutes.”

“Huh? In 10 minutes? What do you mean?”

Lee Dojin sat down, leaning against a tree.

“I told you. That I’ll get first place this time too.”

“Oh, right.”

“Then we need to solve that problem of yours where you can’t do person-to-person combat, right?”

Choi Bit-na’s brow furrowed.

“…That’s right. But how can you solve it? I now understand that you dislike weak people, but there’s only one day left. The mock dungeon exam.”

Lee Dojin’s expressionless face didn’t change.

“One day is enough. Because I’m going to use an extreme measure.”

Choi Bit-na tilted her head.

“…Extreme measure?”

“Yeah, extreme measure.”

No matter how he thought about it, there was only one way to solve Choi Bit-na’s person-to-person combat phobia in a day.

And that would be quite a bitter prescription from Choi Bit-na’s perspective.

10 minutes passed quickly.

“…What are you trying to do?”

Choi Bit-na looked at Lee Dojin approaching her.
Lee Dojin was holding a wooden sword in his hand.

Colorless sword energy was flowing on the wooden sword.

“Stand up.”

Lee Dojin swung down the wooden sword.
A gale tore the ground in a straight line.

Slash!

Tree leaves fluttered. Sand scattered in all directions.

“Take out your spear, Choi Bit-na.”

“No, what are you trying to do, I said! Hey!”

Choi Bit-na stared at Lee Dojin with a face that said she was seeing a real crazy person.

“Pick up your spear if you want to live.”

Choi Bit-na pulled out her spear from her spatial pocket.
Gripping it so hard it might crush.

That’s how ominous Lee Dojin’s appearance was.

“I’m telling you, if I really swing it properly, I don’t know what’ll happen!”

Lee Dojin raised his wooden sword high.
It was literally just laughable, so he was confident that she couldn’t do anything to him with just her meager instinctive combat talent.

“Stop talking. Swing it properly.”

Fear and anger coexisted in Choi Bit-na’s eyes.

Choi Bit-na gripped her spear with both hands and ground her teeth.

“Every time I think I’m going to do it properly, my body moves on its own. That feeling is so disgusting.”
Choi Bit-na slowly stood up.

“Hah….”

Her lips trembled.
The spearhead aimed at Lee Dojin.

That spear was still shaking.
Lee Dojin swung his wooden sword. He intended not to stop his arm until it reached right before Choi Bit-na’s neck.

Just before the wooden sword, scattering colorless sword energy, reached her neck.
A gleam flashed in Choi Bit-na’s eyes.

Screech!

The wooden sword scraped against the spear shaft.

Lee Dojin grinned.

Something had clearly changed in her spirit. A strange heat haze was flowing from Choi Bit-na’s body.

“How much I… hate this damn feeling. You don’t know. You’ll never know.”

Choi Bit-na aimed her spear at Lee Dojin again.
This time it didn’t shake at all.

Thud!

Choi Bit-na stomped the ground hard.
A purple energy flow emerged from Choi Bit-na’s entire body.

The spear wrapped in magic power shot out.

The air distorted. The wooden sword met the spear. The shockwave spread widely as if howling.

Before the scattered leaves in the sky could fall, their bodies moved again.

All of Choi Bit-na’s spear thrusts aimed for Lee Dojin’s solar plexus.
Killing blow.

And all those killing blows were rendered futile. By Lee Dojin’s wooden sword.

‘It’s certainly sharp.’

It seemed to surpass the standard of instinctive combat sense.
Seeing the endless barrage of spear thrusts, Lee Dojin recalled something Sword Emperor Dan Cheonwoo had once said.

He would tell stories of the martial world whenever he was bored.

-You were born with quite excellent combat senses, but in the world I lived in, there were those born with even more excellent bodies than you.

-There were also those who, as if their personality changed when they picked up a weapon, would only aim for killing blows like ghosts. They said that was close to instinct.

-However, that’s a level of talent you can surpass. Talent is ultimately relative, and if you can’t handle it properly, it’s just a curse.

“That combat sense you have is definitely a talent. But you can’t even control it properly.”

Choi Bit-na gritted her teeth.

“…Who are you to act like you know everything about me!”

“I know enough. You’re just a coward who can’t properly handle a talent that’s not even that great.”

The spear extended sharply. So fast that afterimages of its trajectory were visible.

But that trajectory was deflected as it met the wooden sword.

“Don’t be swayed by instinct.”

Lee Dojin continued his lecture.

“Be aware. Don’t let your instinct overcome your self.”

He genuinely disliked seeing someone born with talent just standing still, consumed by that talent.

“Isn’t that why you came to the academy without giving up, to achieve that?”

Choi Bit-na abruptly stopped her arms swinging the spear.
It felt like she had been hit hard on the head.

Choi Bit-na was angry.
At this situation where a single word from a classmate struck her to the bone.

Choi Bit-na admitted.

‘Lee Dojin won’t die from my instinctive spear technique.’

Nearly 100 exchanges of offense and defense.
Let alone killing him, she couldn’t even make a small scratch.

Lee Dojin’s defense was that perfect.

‘Awareness, consciousness….’

She had never once thought that this beast-like ‘instinct’ could be tamed.

“Let’s continue.”

Choi Bit-na aimed her spear again.
Because as Lee Dojin said, she came to the academy to break her pathetic self,

“Keep going.”

Lee Dojin grinned as he saw Choi Bit-na who had become desperate for growth.

The look in Choi Bit-na’s eyes as she stared at him.

Because that gaze resembled his own eyes when he died a thousand times before Sword Emperor Dan Cheonwoo with a single desire for martial arts.

The spear split the air again.
The wooden sword suppressed that ferocious killing blow.

Once, twice.
…Fifty exchanges.
Each time the exchange continued, Choi Bit-na felt goosebumps all over her body.

She began to rationally recognize her instinctive combat sense.
The wall that had long confined Choi Bit-na was crumbling.