SWNOVELXO 1 - Graduation
“With this, I conclude my graduation speech.”
Applause spreads through the solemn auditorium.
The 26th graduation ceremony of Lucaria, the Empire’s finest high academy, is drawing to a close.
The one who prepared the speech as the representative of the graduates is Cain Calderon, the valedictorian.
The eldest son of the Calderon family, one of the Empire’s five great houses.
“Is that guy the rumored ‘Bloodless Sword’? He doesn’t look that skilled.”
“What Bloodless Sword? He’s the one who said ‘Would you die if you fought me?’ and managed to graduate with zero mock battles in three years.”
“If he gave the graduation speech, isn’t he the valedictorian? Is that possible without mock battles?”
“I don’t know, he must have some impressive achievement. That’s why he’s called the Bloodless Sword. What a ridiculous nickname.”
Among the crowd gathered outside the auditorium to observe the ceremony were spectators.
Some of their conversations reached Cain’s ears.
He smiled bitterly at most of the remarks that mocked him.
‘What’s with “Would you die?” I never said anything like that…’
Cain wanted to grab those people right away and correct their fabricated statements.
However, there is a right time even for telling the truth.
After brief contemplation, he pretended not to hear the conversations as usual.
As a member of the Empire’s five great houses, Cain Calderon had been approached by many people since his first year at the academy.
‘I’m still unable to control my power, so mock battles would be difficult.’
That was Cain Calderon’s answer to those who requested mock battles.
As the eldest son of one of the five houses, it was the most courteous response he could give.
Within less than a year, Cain Calderon had become known as an arrogant and negligent person.
He couldn’t even figure out where things had gone wrong.
‘I’ve already graduated, let’s not worry about it.’
Now is not the time to worry about such matters.
Cain quickly left the auditorium.
Outside, a sea of people waited for the graduates.
Spotting his butler Alfred among the crowd, Cain headed straight for him.
“Young master, did you finish well?”
“Somewhat. Where is father?”
“He’s in his office. Would you like to go there now?”
“Yes.”
Cain Calderon finished his brief conversation with butler Alfred and got into the parked car.
The magic automobile, which runs using magic stones as a medium, is considered the pinnacle of great magical engineering.
If the roads are well-maintained, magic automobiles can easily reach speeds of 30 km/h.
‘As someone from the modern world, the speed is lacking though.’
Cain Calderon, Korean name Kim Jin-woo, thinks.
How did it come to this?
‘This was a game after all…’
Kim Jin-woo was an ordinary 26-year-old college student facing graduation.
Like any graduate, he was preoccupied with job hunting concerns.
To clear his tired mind, he turned on the game he usually enjoyed.
Last World.
An unpopular common open-world package game, but Kim Jin-woo had been playing Last World for over 10 years.
It was due to his nature.
‘Complexity just gives me headaches.’
Learning new things was troublesome and difficult.
Last World was a game he bought after watching a gameplay video as if enchanted, but once he played it, it wasn’t too bad.
It had hidden elements that made it enjoyable to play.
Playing a little whenever he had time, and all day on days off, it steadily became his most comfortable game.
With over 10,000 hours of playtime, there wasn’t a single element in Last World that Kim Jin-woo didn’t know.
But that day was different.
‘Looking back, it was strange.’
As usual, he was creating a new character.
He was planning to play as the second son of the Calderon family.
As the second son of one of the five imperial houses, the character would have immense power, and being the second son wasn’t a big issue.
After all, he would naturally become the next family head after the eldest son was assassinated.
But then.
[Cain Calderon]
Create?
On the character creation screen was the name of the Calderon family’s eldest son, who was supposed to be assassinated, not the second son.
‘Was there an update?’
Kim Jin-woo dismissed the anomaly in the game without much concern.
More precisely, he felt a small spark of interest.
This was a game that hadn’t had a single bug fix in 10 years.
Such a change was actually welcome.
Kim Jin-woo clicked on the name Cain Calderon as if it were the natural thing to do.
The screen quickly moved, showing a brief story.
After the background story indirectly revealed that gods and dragons had existed but mutually annihilated each other, a familiar scene appeared.
Inside a massive mansion, the silhouette of a man in comfortable attire can be seen.
Behind him.
Swish-
Someone was hiding in the darkness.
The man, who had been holding his breath as if waiting for the right moment, soon pulled out a sharp dagger from his bosom.
It was an assassin who had infiltrated the Cain family.
The action was instantaneous.
The assassin’s blade pierced the target’s neck before he could even recognize what was happening.
The man, with six holes in his body in an instant, spurts blood and soon meets his death.
The one whose body was pierced was Cain Calderon, the eldest son of the Calderon family.
“Huh?”
Kim Jin-woo unknowingly uttered a dumbfounded sound.
Up to this point, there was nothing different from the usual story.
Isn’t that my character? Can he die like that? Just as such thoughts were occurring to him.
‘Oh?’
Kim Jin-woo had become Cain Calderon.
With all the stab wounds on his body healed.
There was no time to ponder questions like “What’s going on?”
Because the person who had killed Cain was standing right in front of him. With quite a shocked expression.
He must have witnessed the resurrection scene.
But he was a professional.
If the target wasn’t dead, he would simply stab again.
With such a look in his eyes, the assassin rushed toward Cain.
Kim Jin-woo felt his head growing cold despite the confusion of a game becoming reality.
It was because of the window that appeared before him as he possessed Cain Calderon’s body.
[Mind Sword (心劍)]
Manifests a sword bloomed from the mind. With one swing of this sword, one can cleave the world.
Cooldown: 30 days
Mind Sword.
A lethal skill that can only be used after reaching the pinnacle of swordsmanship in Last World.
“Die, you bastard.”
He instinctively used the Mind Sword.
The assassin’s body was split in half.
“…?”
Even as his body was being bisected, the assassin couldn’t comprehend his condition.
He didn’t understand why his vision was plummeting to the floor.
Without even uttering a brief death cry.
He died like that.
[Remaining Cooldown: 29 days 23 hours 59 minutes]
As the window showing the cooldown appeared, Kim Jin-woo finally grasped the reality of his situation.
He forcibly suppressed the urge to vomit.
One minute after being transmigrated into the game.
He had committed his first murder.
‘Well, not everything was bad.’
Although he had undergone a semi-forced shock therapy, it helped him grasp reality quickly.
When faced with imminent death, what needed to be done became clear.
Survival. All preparations for it.
That was all Kim Jin-woo had done in the three years since becoming Cain Calderon.
‘The academy was the most difficult.’
True to its reputation, Lucaria Academy is a place where most of the heirs from renowned families in the Empire pass through.
It’s also a place to build connections that might never be obtained again, and a place to effectively prove one’s worth.
As in the original story of Last World, a Lucaria diploma is essential to become the family head.
Additionally.
[Lucaria Academy Valedictorian Special Privilege]
Family Head: Obtain the special privilege after completing an interview with Gin Calderon.
[Special Privilege]
Eyes that Pierce the Heart: Acquire Mind’s Eye (心眼).
He needed to graduate as valedictorian for this special privilege as well.
In the game Last World, Lucaria Academy was essentially a place for the tutorial.
No matter which character you started with, the first part always began at the academy.
A place to learn basic controls and understand the overall atmosphere of the game.
Of course, being a tutorial didn’t mean it was easy.
Let alone becoming valedictorian, even securing the second rank provided special privileges that made subsequent gameplay much easier, so graduating from the academy with high grades was quite challenging.
‘If only I could have participated in mock battles, it would have been easier.’
Various scores are needed to graduate from Lucaria Academy.
They are largely divided into theoretical scores and practical scores, and theoretical scores weren’t a problem.
Cain knew everything.
However, there were many issues with obtaining practical scores.
Lucaria Academy gathers cadets who are considered talented within the Empire.
Fighting against mediocre monsters is less challenging than participating in mock battles.
Therefore, most cadets accumulate practical scores through mock battles, according to the setting.
‘I had no choice.’
Cain diligently trained in swordsmanship for three years but never properly executed a sword technique.
It was a natural progression given that he had lived as an ordinary person for 26 years.
However, he couldn’t participate in mock battles and use the Mind Sword either.
The moment he used it, he would be live-broadcasting the sight of a person’s body being separated into upper and lower halves.
Moreover, due to the Mind Sword’s 30-day cooldown, he couldn’t fight even if he wanted to.
Therefore, what Cain chose was hunting named monsters near the academy.
Thanks to hunting bosses or named monsters every time the Mind Sword’s cooldown reset over three years, he also secured the top practical score.
This was as much as he could do at the academy.
“Young master, would you like to get some rest? You look tired.”
“Is that okay? Sorry, Alfred.”
“Not at all. I’ll wake you when we arrive.”
Cain smiled slightly at Alfred’s words.
One thing Cain realized after becoming Cain Calderon was that Alfred was very thoughtful.
This was a fact he hadn’t known when experiencing the game.
Indeed, he hadn’t slept properly for the past few days while preparing the graduation speech.
Cain organized his thoughts and closed his eyes.