The Protagonists Are Murdered by Me

When Yoo Seodam and his party returned to Earth, everything seemed to be already over.

“Oh, my phone is going to explode.” Taylor said as she held her smartphone high in the sky. Yoo Seodam didn’t know why she did it. Nowadays, as satellites developed more and more, the internet was practically everywhere, except in a few special spaces such as dungeons and places where anomalies occurred. Thus, even in the Kalahari Desert, smartphones could normally function, but it seems to be a habit of hers.

“Yeah.” Yoo Seodam also picked up his smartphone to check on his messengers and some news portal.

The headlines of all news portals were ‘Magician Assembly held by Another League, and a huge demon which appeared there’, And…

[Special Report! The guild master of the Morian Guild was the one who summoned the demon!]

[Another League President, Yekaterina successfully defeats the demon!!]

It wasn’t difficult for Yoo Seodam to find the video which showed the event as there were a lot of videos going around. The video he clicked on showed a red-bone giant which appeared and threatened people, but then fell when Yekaterina resisted.

“What a good timing, it must have happened around the time Baek So-hwi beheaded him.” Yoo Seodam said. Their original purpose for going to Murim was to close the ‘dimension gate’ and severing the connection between Earth and Murim since they had initially thought the demon would not be able to exert its power on Earth once it happened.

However, they became aware that it was pointless and eventually stopped pursuing the matter altogether because there could be another ‘gateway’ opened somewhere on Earth. Instead, they enlisted Baek So-hwi to cut the demon’s neck, which sowed chaos on the Earth.

“If there’s another door, it could be said that one day it would be found.”

“That’s so. Though, not just anyone could get through it… Perhaps, it would be better to say that it is almost impossible to pass through it.”

Seol Jungyeon’s expression became sullen at Yoo Seodam’s words. He knew the reason. The place which used to be like home for her was now in a very chaotic situation due to the appearance of the demons. However, they couldn’t do anything to help out. Because, the story of ‘Fighting Against Demons’ in the end was something that should be done by the protagonist of the story.

Yoo Seodam had experienced it when he was in the destroyed world. If someone like him, who was not the protagonist, fights against something only the protagonist could fight, there’s a high possibility that it will literally disappear without anyone knowing. Therefore, it was better to let it finish naturally. It’s something the protagonist needs to figure out anyway.

Yoo Seodam proceeded to explain to Seol Jungyeon that Murim would gradually become better in the future, including the existence of ‘probability’. And asked her not to worry.

“If you say so, it’s fine then. I have no more regrets there anyway. And from now on…” Seol Jungyeon looked at Yoo Seodam. “I can focus on Earth a little bit more.”

* * *

After the demon died, the world seemed to return to its original state as the ‘emotion contagion’ which plunged the world into confusion had completely disappeared. In the process, there were countries and organizations which particularly became hot topics.

The Korean government, which succeeded in responding to national disasters in a timely manner, strengthened their status in the world, while China, which had become more chaotic in the midst of chaos, was criticized worldwide. And then, the leader of Japan withdrew from his position as he was aware of his incompetence this time, while the United States was criticized a little bit because of their selfish control.

However, because of the ‘Great War’ which occurred decades ago, most countries on Earth had learned how to actively respond to unknown emergencies. Therefore, there’s no particular country which was completely destroyed.

[The fall of the Morian Guild… Will the first magician guild on earth disappear into history just like this?]

Avon, the strongest witch of the Morian Guild and the first human to ever reveal the existence of magic to the world, was currently imprisoned in the superhuman prison. And in order to prevent her from using her magical powers, she was detained with a very special restraint crafted by Another League.

On the flipside, the stock price of Another League skyrocketed thanks to Yekaterina, who was known by the public as the one who uncovered the identity of the demon and even took it down. That’s why Yekaterina always hummed gleefully every time she watched the news.

“By the way, Seodam-nim.” Yekaterina looked at the desk next to her. Even though the room was originally Yoo Seodam’s office, he was often away from Earth while the Another League was managed by Yekaterina. Therefore, Yekaterina placed another desk in the room for his use for times when he’s on Earth.

“Yeah? What’s the matter?” Yoo Seodam asked.

“How did you kill the demon?”

“Oh, that? I’m not the one who killed it. I asked a contract killer to do it for me.”

“Yes?”

“Demon is a creature which cannot be killed by the power of ordinary humans.”

“Is that so?”

Yekaterina pondered for a moment at his words before carefully asking another question. “Then… if demons appear again in the future… Are you saying that the same chaos will happen again?”

“Probably so.” Yoo Seodam said.

Although the demon which dealt with fear and anger was now dead while the demons of Murim should be dwindling thanks to Baek So-hwi, there’s a chance that demons from another world would come since the previous demon had already left its scent on Earth. And for Yoo Seodam, who became aware that dimensional travel was more common than he originally thought, it was quite worrying.

People all over the world believed Yekaterina had defeated the demon with her magic that was different from science, but in the end, it was not the truth since it was impossible to deal with the demon even with magic.

“Still, I think the whole world has realized the need for magic thanks to this event.”

Just like the saying you must know your enemy and know yourself, there’s a need to know about something in order to fight the unknown. In this case, the public became aware that there’s a need for them to learn magic as a subject rather than a tool for war.

“That’s why support for the establishment of the ‘magic academy’ is coming in. Well… the original plan was to make one at the level of a small middle school, but…”

Yoo Seodam looked at the popping file on his monitor which he believed was sent by Yekaterina from her monitor. He opened it and read all the content for a few moments before rolling his eyes.

“Now it is around the size of a university in Seoul?”

“Yes, and I think there will be about seven of them all over the world.”

The name of the academy would be ‘Another League Magic Academy’.

Starting with the Seoul campus, it would also be built in major cities around the world. The sheer scale of the project left Yoo Seodam completely gobsmacked.

“And because of this project, we will need to recruit more staff members. But I think it will take at least 5 to 10 years before a professor who can teach magic professionally appears… Until then, Seodam-nim and I have to teach.”

“Me?”

“Yes. It couldn’t be helped since there’s not enough people.”

“Hey, when will the school be established?”

“Ummm. Currently, we’re still in the stage of drawing the blueprint. We’re planning to have all the structures on our campuses to be the same as the other campuses. I will even match all the letters on the wall.”

Yoo Seodam broke out in a cold sweat. He indeed possessed a vast amount of magical knowledge in his head, but it was not entirely his own knowledge as it was kept in the form of a ‘library’. However, Yekaterina had misunderstood and took that as a sign that Yoo Seodam had learnt most of the magic available there.

‘I’m going crazy…’ Though he was glad he still had some time before it happened for real.

After that, Yekaterina turned quiet as she seemed to be focused on her work while Yoo Seodam looked at the monitor in front of him and thought about the guild.

Originally, he founded the guild without any intention to make it as big as it is now and he also didn’t want to become attached to it. He just wants to use it as a means to recruit party members to enter the Hell Gate with him.

With those thoughts passing on his mind, the scene outside the window entered his eyes. He could see the used-to-be swordmasters of Earth who had become full-fledged warriors of Murim, flying by using their mugong.

In the far away laboratory, magic researchers were busy analyzing the unknown science of magic in a modern way, and the spirits in the garden were doing a kind of ‘breeding’ of plants in order to fully restore the energy of this world.

Another League was getting bigger and bigger.

If so, how close was him from his ultimate goal in life, ‘Hell Gate’?

In the future, will he be able to put all his members into a literal hell called Hell Gate?

‘I don’t know.’

In fact, from the beginning Yoo Seodam was aware it was only wishful thinking. He only dreamed the moment of reaching the final stage after digging into an unknown place called Hell Gate with colleagues who agree with him every day. He didn’t think much of the process.

Though, who in their sane mind would accompany him into a place where even SS rank hunters were struggling for survival?

Right now, Yoo Seodam himself was only at the level of S Rank. To be safe in the Hell Gate, he would need strength comparable to Seol Jungyeon or Taylor Nine… but he never wanted to take them to such a dangerous place.

So, since the establishment of Another League.

‘I would rather go alone.’

That’s what he had been thinking.

The Hell Gate was always dim, and the space itself was always twisted to the point it was useless to map the interior of Hell Gate. But the scariest thing there was not the monster but rather their own emotions which were constantly being torn and worn out in a space without dreams and hopes.

He then recalled things which happened while he was stuck inside the Hell Gate.

He had encountered a human-faced figure which suddenly popped out of the wall and let out the most terrifying scream he had ever heard in his life. He also encountered a mysterious phenomenon where the whole sky was distorted and turned into a form of bizarre eyes which stared at him and his party all day long as if wondering how long they could stay sane.

In fact, more than half of the expedition members at that time chose to end their own life while the other half died because of murder. Only less than 20% of the fatalities were due to monsters. And the survivors who survived the ordeal simply survived because of luck.

Even beyond such a mental problem, the monster inside would eventually become a huge barrier to the entry of Hell Gate since it was monsters which never had appeared on Earth. They were really common-sense defying creatures, as if they were creatures from another world.

‘Wait a moment.’

Come to think of it, didn’t he have a creature which had bloomed from Hell Gate? Although it seems to be completely clueless about what Hell Gate is, the Flowerpot was born there.

By the way, there’s another strange thing. It’s the part he hadn’t paid much attention to so far…

‘Why was the information about the Flowerpot written in the Library of the White Witch?’

The name ‘Silver Spirit Flower’ was recorded in the Library of the White Witch. In other words, it means that the creature recorded by the ‘witch of another world’ could be found in the Hell Gate of Earth.

If so, then why?

‘Something…’

Something was weird. In the first place, was the word ‘Earth’s Hell Gate’ correct? The moment when such a question is about to enter his mind.

“That’s right!” Yekaterina smiled softly and lifted her head.

“You surprised me. What happened?”

“Even though we can’t build the academy right away, we still need to show the public how we teach, so a lot of students will enroll, don’t you think?”

“Uh, maybe?”

“That’s why I decided to rent a hotel temporarily for a month or two. So, Seodam-nim and I can actually invite some students in their teens to 20s to our lecture.”

“Huh?” Yoo Seodam was baffled as he tried to give Yekaterina his opinion on the matter. But before he could do that, Yekaterina put some files on her hands and said.

“Seodam-nim is more adept at magic than me, so could you please make a temporary textbook for me? Oh, I have a meeting now, so I need to go.”

“…”

He’s screwed.

As Yoo Seodam thought like that, he let out a very long sigh.