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Chapter 33: Older folks can be even more shameless.
"The treatment is simple. We'll isolate the problematic blood circuits — the ones that are converting excess magic into dark energy. It might hurt a little, but isn't that better than dying?"
The treatment proposed by Dr. Erneon, who had come from Paris, France, was this:
Take a potion that suppresses rejection reactions to the procedure and then sever the problematic circuits.
The Nine Yin Severed Veins.
Instead of purifying the blood cursed by ice, they would remove it entirely.
To be precise, it was practically the same as replacing all the blood vessels throughout her body with new ones.
An absolutely absurd surgery.
Setting aside the pain, she wondered if this was even remotely possible.
Seol Yeonhwa looked with trembling eyes at the Master of the Blue Tower who had brought the doctor.
Elneor Grants, the Master of the Blue Tower, patted her shoulder with a grandmotherly smile and said:
"Dr. Erneon is extremely skilled in magical surgery. Don't worry, Yeonhwa. Even though it sounds like your entire magical circulatory system is the issue, the real problem lies with just nine major bloodlines."
So, it would be alright, she said.
For now, they would just test how reactive the blood was and see what affinities it had.
Everything after that sounded like nonsense to Yeonhwa.
Treatment?
Surgery?
Experiments?
...She didn’t want to know.
Still, the fact remained that the only experts available were these two.
It seemed like she had no choice but to trust them.
"I'll make sure you survive."
Seol Yeonhwa listened to their words with a hazier mind than usual.
* * *
"She's such an unnecessarily cautious girl."
After Yeonhwa left the reception room, Elneor Grants muttered, pipe in her mouth.
With a crackling sound, smoke drifted into the air.
Unlike the relaxed mist curling through the room, Elneor’s expression, worn by long years as a mage, was both weary and slightly anxious.
"A woman should have a bold side. What is she even thinking about? She should know well enough by now that she doesn't have much time left."
"Elneor, calm down. We’ve waited a long time for this opportunity."
Dr. Erneon, the foreign physician from Paris, waved his hand nonchalantly.
"That circuit is practically 'alive.' Its performance heavily depends on the owner's will. Right now, even if it takes a bit longer, we need to be patient. It's a long-term game. We know that obtaining that circuit will solve everything, but we need to stay calm."
"...I know that, but still."
Elneor also didn’t have much time left.
After reigning as Tower Master for over a hundred years, she had only one or two years at most remaining.
Before her inevitable end, she had to elevate her status as a mage — to transcend.
Currently, Elneor's rank was Master.
Comparable to a Swordmaster among swordsmen.
But she had not yet transcended the human shell, so her lifespan was naturally limited.
Thus, she had no choice but to fully transcend humanity and its limits.
The Master of the Blue Tower knew that historically, there were mages who had achieved this.
Grandmaster.
The realm of the Gods of Magic.
It was something that remained only in ancient records — or so it was believed.
In truth, among high-ranking societies, it was a whispered rumor that such monsters still existed in hidden places.
Elneor knew about the ancient monsters of the Academy too, but...
they were too touchy about anything that deviated from the 'proper way.'
If they learned about this body-switching operation, they would surely interfere.
"I didn’t even want to send her to that superpower academy, but she was so stubborn. Tch, she usually hates studying magic and just holes up in her room — now she wants to go to school?"
"Probably because she knows she doesn't have long left and wants to enjoy something while she can."
"...Are you making fun of me?"
"Come on, would I tease my teammate? Let's take it easy. We've almost got her."
Dr. Erneon shook a bottle of pink perfume hidden in the corner of the reception room with a sly smile.
Illusion Fragrance — a scent that subtly manipulates emotions and weakens mental defenses.
It was usually used as a medicine, but in this case, it was being used as a poison to corrode mental barriers.
"A famous foreign doctor and a kind-hearted old mage. Don’t we make a great team? Plus, you get your breakthrough and circuit, and I get my experimental data. It’s a win-win situation."
Erneon, a notorious mad scientist and black mage, clapped his hands cheerfully.
"Unless some prince charming shows up to rescue her, the outcome is already decided."
Their complete victory.
Elneor's stiff expression relaxed at Erneon's confident declaration.
They exchanged a knowing look and soon kissed.
* * *
[The Goddess asks worriedly what would happen if the delivery of the medicine is delayed and she ends up dying.]
'Geez, old people can be so overly dramatic.'
[...?]
Ah, oops.
I forgot to disconnect my thought projection and accidentally sent that straight to her.
Clearing my throat, I quickly tried not to look at the sky and added:
"I mean, if her condition worsens, her complexion will get worse, and she’ll have trouble moving around. While she's still attending school, she's probably fine. If she dies early even after all this, then I guess that's just her fate."
[The Goddess smiles sweetly and says she’s more curious about the first thing you said.]
"You know, sometimes knowing too much can be dangerous, Goddess."
[She tells you to shut up and explain properly.]
After bickering back and forth for a while, we eventually agreed to marathon a romance drama together and moved past the issue.
"Anyway, the last of the potion ingredients should be gathered by this weekend. What's the worst that could happen before then?"
Just a few more days until the medicine is completed — surely nothing would go wrong…
"Seol Yeonhwa. Seol Yeonhwa? What's going on, why are so many students absent today?"
"Professor, there’s a festival happening today!"
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"What? Hmph, festivals are important, but so is learning about history!"
With our world history professor's excuses and the students' booing, the lecture soon began.
I flinched slightly because Seol Yeonhwa, who was in the same class, wasn’t there.
She usually attended diligently.
Why didn't she show up today?
'...Nah, it’s probably nothing.'
It was probably just a coincidence, but whenever this kind of bad feeling turned out to be right, it always put me in a foul mood.
Tapping on the desk to organize my thoughts, I let out a sigh and made a decision.
Since I had already decided to show some goodwill, it would be better to hurry a little before anything worse happened.
After the history lecture ended, I glanced at my phone and skimmed through the short list of contacts before calling one person.
"Yes, Emir. Do you have time after school?"
* * *
Cough, cough!
Suddenly, her body felt cold.
A chill burst out from deep inside her lungs, too unbearable to resist.
Even with her hand clamped tightly over her mouth, icy air escaped between her fingers.
Seol Yeonhwa frowned, pulling the thick blanket tighter around her body as her worsening condition from the past few days took its toll.
The cold, which she thought she had gotten used to, surged even stronger through her whole body.
It felt like she could really freeze to death like this.
In April, in the springtime, she was still wrapped in an electric blanket, barely breathing.
Normally, she would at least sit in the chair in front of her monitor, but her symptoms were too severe.
Maybe if she slept, she'd feel a little better — but when pain strikes so immediately, that kind of hope doesn’t really matter.
...It just hurt.
She couldn’t understand why she had to endure something like this.
She couldn’t see any benefit in being called a genius, and she certainly couldn't see what was so great about her current life.
She even had to be careful when shaking hands with others because of her cold skin...
'...Why do I even bother being ambitious?'
Seol Yeonhwa, eyes tightly shut, recalled the greedy gaze she had seen not long ago.
The blue Tower Master, Elneor, must have thought she hadn’t noticed, but she knew.
Since about last year, as she advanced rapidly, the look in the Tower Master's eyes had changed.
At first, she thought it was just her imagination.
But facing her repeatedly, she could no longer deny it.
The characteristic curiosity and greed of an old mage.
Not simply the gaze of a mentor proud of a rapidly growing pupil — it was as if she was looking at a precious elixir.
The stark contrast between her usual grandmotherly demeanor and that gaze made her begin to distance herself.
Still, she never imagined she would actually bring outsiders just to dissect her circuits.
Cough, cough,
Coughing again and again, Seol Yeonhwa groaned in pain and thought,
'Why is my life like this?'
She couldn’t trust anyone, and the only hope for saving her life lay with the Tower Master and some mysterious doctor — it was beyond absurd.
Her body was barely that of a normal person, practically a cripple, and although the surgery method Erneon had spoken of offered a chance of survival, she couldn’t fully trust either the Tower Master or the doctor.
But that was all she had to cling to.
"...What a shit life."
A bitter laugh escaped her lips.
Too drained to answer her buzzing phone, she ignored it all day.
Collapsed on her bed, coughing endlessly, she suddenly heard a sound.
Ding-dong—
The doorbell rang unexpectedly.
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