The blessing of tranquility was the only blessing that the gray-haired Kim Ra-Hee could conjure. Kim Ra-Hee couldn’t even conjure a blessing of strength that a three-year-old baby could do. So, she honed the blessing of tranquility to perfection. After grueling efforts, she could finally use the greater blessing of tranquility.

Other than Sung Ha-Yeon, who possessed the ‘blood of purification,’ no one could bear to stand conscious under the influence of Kim Ra-Hee’s blessing. Everyone would immediately fall asleep, and there were no exceptions.

At least until now.

“Huff, huff…!” Kim Ra-Hee stared at the panting Do Sun-Woo. He kept his drowsiness at bay by taking deep breaths and did not fall asleep. Do Sun-Woo was the first case to be conscious after directly taking a hit by the greater blessing of tranquility.

‘Did he hold on with just his mental strength? Is he crazy?’ When one was under the influence of the greater blessing of tranquility, they would be washed over by a wave of unbeatable drowsiness. The level of sleepiness would quite literally be unbeatable. To withstand the effects of the blessing, one had to have extremely high mental power or suffer from a severe mental disorder that prevented them from falling asleep. Either way, this meant that the person who survived the blessing was not someone to be taken lightly. Suddenly, Kim Ra-Hee felt an immense amount of fear toward the boy standing in front of her.

***

The greater blessing of tranquility was cast by a gray-haired girl named Kim Ra-Hee, judging by the nametag on the right side of her chest.

The blessing that Kim Ra-Hee used had a devastating effect. The drowsiness brought on by the greater blessing of tranquility was so intense and sweet. I almost lost consciousness. It was not something that someone could withstand just through sheer willpower. However, at a certain point, my eyes suddenly opened. My fuzzy consciousness cleared up, and I was able to breathe properly. I couldn’t understand what and why this was happening.

[The blessing that the girl used is more of a curse than a blessing. So, I absorbed it.] Legba explained what was happening.

[As you know, you are housing multiple Loa in your body, and some of us hone the power of curses. Absorbing curses and blessings is a piece of cake, although it’s not perfect at the moment because we don’t have our Altar.]

I wanted to thank Legba immediately, but I couldn’t. Kim Ra-Hee and Sung Ha-Yeon were right in front of me. It was not the time to carefreely thank him. These people were attackers, and their goal was to destroy our wagon and eliminate us. I had to defend the wagon from them.

Luckily, I had a few tricks up my sleeve. I could conjure the array of the lesser blessing of strength or use the power of Bossou to immobilize them through physical force. I probably could only use Bossou’s power for a short period of time, but it would be enough to fend them off. If all else failed, I could always run away.

But first, I drew the array of the lesser blessing of strength in the air. Light spilled forth from the blessing array and wrapped around my body. I felt stronger than before. With big strides, I approached Kim Ra-Hee and Sung Ha-Yeon. As I walked toward them, Kim Ra-Hee hastily backed off.

“Wa-wait! Don’t come near me. I said don’t come near me!”

Splat. 

Fear struck Kim Ra-Hee, and she fell backward over a tree root. With a devastated look on her face, she begged, “Can you just let us go…Please?”

She looked up at me with twinkling eyes. She was obviously acting, trying to win me over by drawing out sympathy. As a master of lies and acting, I saw right through her.

“Why? Are you going to call your friend?” I said, stepping closer to Kim Ra-Hee.

Unfortunately for her, I had no intention of letting her go. Nothing was worse if she was let go and brought her friends for revenge. We were lucky this time, but there was no guarantee that our luck would hold during our next encounter.

That’s why I chose to immobilize them. Something along the lines of tying them up with a vine. Normally this would have been impossible, but for some reason Kim Ra-Hee was afraid of me. It would have been hard if she had fought back, but immobilizing a foe who had lost their will to fight was not difficult.

“Uh, uh, uh a truce! How about we call for a truce and work together?” Right then, the cornered Kim Ra-Hee proposed an interesting suggestion.

“Truce?”

“Yeah, a truce. Aren’t you guys a one-man team run by Kim Jin-Seo? That Ko Jun-Min or Oh Jum-Min guy over there [1] can’t even get up. At this point, you guys will never get first place. First place in a training session at F.A. Now that’s an amazing achievement. Don’t you want that for yourself? Hm?”

Thinking about it, Kim Ra-Hee had a point. Furthermore, I needed to become a prelate. If I got first place during this training session, I would be one step closer to my goal.

“And what makes you think we can get first place if we work together?”

“Of course, we can get first place! At worst, I'm sure you’ll be able to secure third place. I have a really good plan.”

Judging by her expression, it seemed like she was telling the truth and did have a plan. I was highly interested in her proposal if what she said about getting at least third place was true.

“How do I trust you?”

However, I needed to set something straight before we held a truce. We needed to establish trust. I could not join forces with them before knowing that they wouldn’t be able to betray us.

“We’ll give you our core. Will you believe us then?”

Just then, I heard a familiar voice from behind. It was Sung Ha-Yeon. She still had the same lofty and prideful tone from middle school. I guess some things never change.

“You’ll give us your core? To us?”

“If it’s for a truce, then we are prepared to give it to you.”

The core was one of the victory conditions in this practice session. There was no reason to suspect them if they were willing to give up their core to our group. I smiled at them. I tried to look as naive and stupid as possible.

“Tell me the details of the plan. We’ll talk about making a truce afterward.”

“Phew, okay, okay.” Kim Ra-Hee got back up, dusting off the dirt and foliage that had dirtied her school uniform. She started to explain her plan, and I stood there, listening silently.

“—What do you think? Not a bad plan at all, right?”

I nodded. “Alright, we’ll work together with you.”

“Okay, then from this moment forward, group 100 and 32 are in a truce. We can’t betray or doubt each other. We are all in the same boat,” Kim Ra-Hee said with a straight face. I nodded, and Kim Ra-Hee reached into her pocket and handed me their core. I took the core and placed it into our wagon.

“Give us five minutes. We’ll bring our group’s wagon here.” With that, Kim Ra-Hee and Sung Ha-Yeon left. Watching them fade into the distance, I thought about Kim Ra-Hee’s proposal.

Kim Ra-Hee’s plan seemed perfect on paper. Getting first place in the training sessions seemed achievable if everything worked out as planned. Accounting for some variables, I was sure we would be able to get a good mark.

However, there was a significant flaw in the plan. I couldn’t tell if it was intentional or not.

Only time would tell.

***

Five hundred meters before the finish line, Sung Ha-Yeon and Do Sun-Woo were dragging the wagon along. The two didn’t talk to each other and were focused on doing their tasks.

Kim Ra-Hee’s plan was simple. First, Do Sun-Woo and Sung Ha-Yeon would move the wagon toward the finish line. Then the other three truce members excluding Kim Jin-Seo would scatter to collect cores via any method possible. The more cores found, the better.

Then, the three people would come back with their cores and place them into the wagon. The wagon would be brought past the finish line. The goal was to have group 100 and 32 end in first place together.

The main point of this plan was to utilize the power of numbers. Properly defending the wagon and acquiring more cores would be easier with more people. Not only that, but having a lot of people on the team meant that it was possible to divide the labor and plan out a very efficient route. This made it possible for them to reach the finish line faster than any other group.

They had hidden our wagon in front of the finish line, between the bushes. That was the point where we would wait for our other team members.

“Now, we just need to wait here,” Sung Ha-Yeon said in a crooked and blunt fashion. Although it wasn’t intentional, she seemed to gravitate to that way of talking.

“So we just need to sit here and wait?”

“Yes. You can rest, nap, or do whatever you want,” Sung Ha-Yeon replied dryly.

Do Sun-Woo just nodded his head with a perfectly blank face. It seemed like he didn’t have any doubts and wasn’t suspicious of anything happening.

And so time passed by. One minute turned into five, then to ten. Sung Ha-Yeon looked at her watch, waiting. Finally, after thirteen minutes and thirty seconds, a black mist carried by the winds swept over Do Sun-Woo and Sung Ha-Yeon. The mist smelled of acrid ashes and iron. It was a mist imbued with demonic energy.

There was one thing that So Do-Jin had forgotten to explain before the training session began. Specific locations were periodically infiltrated by mist imbued with demonic energy.

Of course, this wasn’t the real demonic energy, but it was artificially manufactured demonic energy made by F.A. However, it was still demonic energy, artificial or not. Upon inhaling the mist, one would start to feel weak and collapse after losing consciousness.

However, Sung Ha-Yeon was immune to the demonic energy since she had the blood of purification. In other words, only Do Sun-Woo would inhale the mist and fall unconscious.

“Wait, what is this? The mist, huh?” Beyond the thick mist came the panic-ridden voice of Do Sun-Woo. Sung Ha-Yeon covered her face with her hands and smiled slightly.

The truce between group 100 and 32 was a fake one all along. The real plan was to draw group 100 in with the sweet temptations of a truce and disqualify them by dragging Do Sun-Woo into the designated misty area.

Although they had laid out words such as truce and were in the same boat, it was already decided from the start that group 32 would betray group 100.

“My apologies. I need to do well in this training session,” Sung Ha-Yeon muttered amidst the mist. She had not spoken to Do Sun-Woo, because he would have been rendered unconscious due to breathing in the mist. She had spoken to alleviate some of the guilt that she felt.

With that, Sung Ha-Yeon was finished with her task. Now she just had to wait for Kim Ra-Hee to return.

When the mist started to clear up soon after, Sung Ha-Yeon felt a gaze upon her. In the middle of the dispersing mist, someone was squatting down and staring at her.

“I was wondering why you brought me here. Figures.” The mist soon lost its density and dispersed more. With more and more mist disappearing, it became easier to make out the boy’s figure. His eyes seemed to lack depth, and he had a dark expression. Creepy was not a word strong enough to describe this boy.

Sung Ha-Yeon felt goosebumps all over her body, and her eyesight went black.

“So you were thinking about betraying us from the start.”

“Ah, gasp…”  Surprise, fear, and many negative emotions stirred within Sung Ha-Yeon, making it hard to breathe. Her irregular breaths and heartbeat caused her consciousness to fade away. Finally, Sung Ha-Yeon’s eyes slowly closed. Through her closing eyelids, she saw Do Sun-Woo with a cold smile on his face.

Thud.

And just like that, she lost consciousness.