I Got a Fake Job at the Academy

Chapter 723: The Wings of Freedom (1)

"Ah, finally."

Surna looked at the brightening sky with white rays of light and smiled faintly.

A soft and warm touch was felt on his forehead.

It was a familiar sensation.

"Do you remember?"

At the clear voice that brushed against her ear, Arkenis nodded slightly.

"Every time you charged at me in the past, I would knock you down and always let you rest your head on my lap like this."

"Why are you talking about something from a thousand years ago?"

Surna burst into hearty laughter while looking at the sky.

"It's all over."

"Yeah."

"The cage is broken, and the oppressor who suppressed this world has disappeared too. Now this world will flow in a direction no one can predict."

"Yeah."

"I don't know if that's good or bad. Given the humans I've seen so far, it could change for the worse. But then again, given the humans I've seen so far, it could also change for the better. It will depend on what the people left behind do."

"Yeah."

"That Lumensis bastard. How satisfying. To think he'd have his heart pierced by the caged canaries he looked down upon so much. Blinded by greed, he didn't know that the holy grail he arranged would become the poison that would stab him."

"Yeah."

"Hey, Arkenis."

"Yeah. Tell me, Surna."

"I was really struggling. While doing this crazy thing, I wondered hundreds and thousands of times whether I should give up. Is this really right? Will the moment I'm waiting for come? Maybe it will never come at all."

"Yeah."

"I did so many bad things on the way here. Things I would have scoffed at in the past, but now I know. I learned their pain and suffering, their sadness. Even knowing that, I kept walking. Everyone called me crazy, but the truth is different. I knew it all. No, maybe that's why I went crazy?"

"Surna..."

"Arkenis. I..."

Surna asked with a faint voice.

"Did I... do well?"

That question encompassed so many things.

The footsteps of a thousand years that he had lived and walked were all melted into it.

There was no way he had done well.

Even though it was for this purpose, what Surna had done would never be forgiven by anyone.

But

"Yeah. You did well."

Only one person.

Only Arkenis, who could understand Surna.

Gently stroking Surna's forehead, she affirmed his life.

"You worked hard."

"Ha, haha."

Surna laughed.

In fact, he knew better than anyone that he would not be forgiven.

But at this moment, Arkenis affirmed his life to bear part of his sins.

Knowing it wasn't the right thing to do, he willingly chose to endure it.

"I thought I would meet an end befitting the deeds I've committed."

Surna's remaining eye slowly closed.

"This too... isn't so bad."

Surna's stirring body went limp.

Life completely left his body, and his body scattered like powder from his feet.

Arkenis captured Surna's final moment in her eyes until his form completely disappeared.

Rudger just stared endlessly at the light of the dawning morning.

The cage was broken. He could feel it.

People wouldn't notice, but Rudger, who was sensitive to divine power, was different.

In his eyes, he could see Lumensis beginning to slowly crumble.

Beyond the cage, in the imaginary space invisible to others' eyes.

There, Lumensis had his heart pierced, and from the hole in his heart, white powder scattered as he suffered in agony.

But he cannot break the cage. He can only writhe in pain until just before death in that space.

'Finally.'

Rudger lowered his head and turned around.

He felt all the people around him looking at him.

Their expressions hadn't escaped the afterglow of the shocking scene they had witnessed moments ago, rather than relief that this war was over.

They wanted to ask Rudger.

But

"It seems I don't have the luxury to give answers."

As Rudger muttered this, a bluish pillar of light shot up from inside the spire.

While everyone was confused by the sudden event, the blue pillar scattered like a fountain and gathered around Rudger.

Rudger deployed the bluish magical power gathered around him with spells, recombining them to draw complex diagrams.

What was completed at the end was a single gate.

"If not now when the cage is broken, there won't be another chance."

Looking at the gate swirling in blue, Rudger stepped toward it without hesitation.

"Wait!"

"Wh-where are you going?"

When everyone couldn't come to their senses due to Rudger's sudden action, there was only one person who moved.

Before anyone could catch him, the one who threw herself into the gate where Rudger had disappeared was a girl with ash-gray hair.

It was Rene.

As she threw herself into the gate, the door contracted like a dot and disappeared.

The people left behind could only watch the scene in a daze.

Rudger walked the path.

No, should this really be called a path?

Walking on what seemed like white glass, or perhaps ice plates, or finely crafted crystal, Rudger fell into thought.

At the end of this path was the goal he had so desired.

Such thoughts were washed away by the sound coming from behind.

"Wait!"

Rudger stopped walking and slowly turned around.

There he saw Rene, hands on both knees, gasping for breath.

"Huff. Huff. Why, why are you so fast?"

"Rene. How did you get here...?"

Rudger was about to ask her that, then recalled the nature of her magical power.

"I see. Your magical power protects you even in here. It must be thanks to that that you were able to chase and find me even in this imaginary space."

"Imaginary space?"

Rene, who had finally caught her breath, found Rudger's words completely incomprehensible.

"This place is the gap between dimensions. Nothing is filled here, but at the same time, everything exists. We call it imaginary space."

"H-here?"

Rene looked around.

Unlike the empty-sounding name "imaginary space," this place where she was walking looked like a beautiful tunnel decorated with crystals.

Looking at the walls, countless mirrors reflected her image.

Rene looked at those images closely and couldn't help but be surprised.

All the images of herself in the mirrors were different.

"Wh-what is this...?"

"Those are your past forms. Based on the memories you've lived so far, the walls of this corridor show them."

"Teacher. No, Brother Heathcliff. What exactly are you trying to do?"

Rene couldn't understand why Rudger had come to such a space.

"There's a lot to talk about, so let's share it slowly while walking."

Rudger moved his steps, and Rene hurriedly followed behind him.

"As you know, I am the illegitimate son of Emperor Bretus and the holy grail that Lumensis arranged as a vessel to contain himself."

As Rudger passed by the walls of the crystal corridor, his image was reflected like mirrors.

Rudger's image carved on the walls reflecting from various angles was different each time.

The appearance of the emperor's illegitimate son, Heathcliff.

The appearance of Theon's teacher, Rudger Chelici.

The appearance of Machiavelli holding a rifle.

The appearance of Moriarty wearing a monocle.

The appearance of Van Helsing armed with various weapons.

Various other appearances that Rudger had experienced throughout his life passed by one by one.

Rene watched the scene with somewhat enchanted eyes.

'Those are the different sides of brother that I didn't know.'

After passing by like that, Rudger briefly stopped walking.

What was reflected on the wall where he stopped was the appearance of young Rudger, who looked about 7 years old.

"The emperor didn't welcome me. Because I was so outstanding, he was jealous of my talent. All the blood relatives were like that. They tried to kill me because I was an eyesore."

"How terrible..."

"The methods were various. But I, blessed by the gods, didn't die easily. Then one day, under the pretext of going on an outing, they took me all the way to the back of the castle."

Rene saw the past scene reflected on the crystal wall.

It was the image of Rudger being pushed and falling down into an abandoned well.

"For several days and nights, no one came looking for me."

Rudger, who had fallen to the bottom of the well, was miraculously uninjured anywhere.

But the approaching hunger was unbearable even for him, blessed as he was.

Yes. If this is how it's going to be, let's just die.

Let's die and be freed from this pain.

As Rudger was making such a resolution, what he discovered was a very small fragment.

At the bottom of the well, a fragment is buried in black soil with only a small part exposed.

A fragment that glittered under the moonlight.

Discovering it, Rudger picked it up with his hand as if possessed by something.

A fragment that seemed to have fallen from some disc.

By itself, it had no meaning, such a fragment but Rudger was strangely drawn to it.

He didn't know why. Maybe it was the whim of someone on the verge of death.

And soon, at the moment when moonlight bloomed fully at the bottom of the well.

The relic fragment that Rudger held created a hole in the air along with light.

Young Rudger opened his eyes wide in surprise.

That bluish hole was only about the size of a hand mirror.

It couldn't be entered, just something for viewing, that kind of mirror.

However, young Rudger saw a certain world through that hole.

At that moment, one goal was born in Rudger's heart.

It was a kind of instinct engraved deep in his bones, in his soul.

Let's survive.

And let's make sure to return.

As Rudger made such a resolution, as if someone was bestowing a blessing on him, a girl with blonde hair appeared above the well.

That was the end of the scene that this memory composed.

"Rene. Everything I've done so far was only for this moment."

Rudger moved his steps.

The corridor that seemed to stretch endlessly finally reached its destination.

At the end of the crystal corridor was a blue door like the gate Rudger had first created.

"Changing identities and wandering the continent, collecting relics and breaking the cage, piercing Lumensis' heart. All of that was nothing more than additional processes for this."

When the cardinal used the holy relic on Rudger, the reason Rudger was fine even after being hit directly by that holy relic was precisely because of this.

From the beginning, his purpose wasn't something as grand as overthrowing the continent.

From before until now, his goal was always one.

"And finally, I have arrived."

Rene, who crossed the final door following Rudger, had to frown and cover her eyes with her hands due to the blinding light.

Eventually, when Rene lowered her arm, what she saw was an utterly amazing sight.

-Beep beep beep!

The sound of car horns ringing in her ears. Many people coming and going everywhere. Buildings reaching toward the sky and electronic billboards with rapidly changing screens.

"Where... exactly is this place?"

Rene felt dizzy from the scene she was seeing for the first time in her life.

"The place where I was born. And the place I absolutely had to return to."

"..."

"Let's go."

Rudger began walking.

His torn clothes and wounds were quickly restored through magical power.

Rene, extremely tense, froze stiff and stuck close to Rudger's side.

"Wow, look over there."

"Is that a foreign model?"

"Pretty hair color."

Passersby glanced at Rudger and Rene.

At the unfamiliar language and people's gazes, Rene hunched her shoulders, but Rudger just walked quietly as if uninterested.

After walking, they eventually saw a residential complex where people lived.

Among them, Rudger stopped in front of a house located in an alley with few people.

"Wh-where is this?"

"A fortune-telling shop. You wait here."

Rudger left Rene behind and went inside.

The fortune-telling shop was filled with brass incense burners and various Buddha statues, and many paintings hung on the walls.

Rudger felt indescribable emotions at this scene.

A place he had disliked yet was simultaneously familiar with, and had missed terribly.

Rudger stood in front of the sliding paper door installed inside the fortune-telling shop, then took a deep breath for a moment.

After organizing his thoughts, he opened his mouth with a calm voice.

"It's me."

"Come in."

Permission was granted. Rudger opened the paper door and entered.

There sat a woman who appeared to be in her mid-30s, wearing hanbok, staring intensely at him.

The moment Rudger saw her face, he unconsciously clenched his fists.

The woman, who looked slightly older than the face Rudger remembered, opened her mouth.

"Sit down."

Rudger sat down and faced her.

How many minutes passed as they exchanged gazes without words?

The first to speak was Rudger.

"It's been a long time."

"The fortune today said a very welcome guest would visit, and it was true."

The woman, Rudger's previous life's mother, before he was Heathcliff, spoke with an expressionless face.

"What brings the son who left home here?"