The Transmigrated Author

Chapter 33  Dungeon Hunt

[Pinnacle Academy 1-A]

[8:45 am]

Sunlight speared through the classroom window, bouncing off Camila's inquisitive brown eyes and into mine. A groan escaped me, muffled by my hand.

Sleep clung to me like a tenacious fog, weaving through my brain, making thoughts sluggish and sentences a distant dream.

"Is something wrong, Val?" Camila's voice cut through the haze, sharp as a morning bird's call.

"Uh, no," I croaked, forcing my eyelids open. They felt like sandpaper against each other, each blinking a herculean effort. "Just, uh, early morning energy dip." A believable lie, I hoped.

Kolek strode into the classroom, papers piled high, reminding me of the in-class quiz today.

Suddenly, a blur of dark brown hair flew past me. It was Lyra, radiating energy even at first glance. She plopped down beside me, eyes sparkling with curiosity and concern.

"Val, are you okay? You look like you haven't slept in years," she said, genuine worry lacing her voice.

My cheeks flushed. Busted. "Alright, alright," I grumbled, a tired smile pulling at my lips. "I tried gaming yesterday… and I got carried away playing Crownfall last night."

Lyra's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Crownfall? Isn't that that new game everyone's talking about? You're playing it too?"

"Mhm," I admitted. "But I didn't play for too long..."

Camila's gaze narrowed. "Hmm, for someone whose dorm kept emitting strange noises at 2 am, your energy is remarkably good today."

My cheeks flushed again. "Okay, fine," I grumbled. "Maybe I did play until, like, 2:30 am."

A hint of a smile played on Camila's lips. "Oh, I bet. That game must be so addicting you look like you could sleepwalk through class right now."

I slumped further in my chair, defeated. "Don't judge. Some of us need free time once in a while."

While I was being relentlessly teased a certain person had walked through the entry of the classroom doors.

His black hair passed by it wasn't like my mind was tugged on what happened yesterday but I definitely wouldn't forget it.

The words 'Can't we be friends?' echoed through my head, irritating me. I kept thinking about it, but I couldn't help feeling like there was something behind his words, even though the look on his face said otherwise. Perhaps I was overthinking things.

***

"Okay, class, today is another theory lesson on Mana Theorem and Defensive Mechanics," Kolek's voice droned on about the finer points of the presentation, each syllable bouncing off the classroom walls like a particularly dull ping-pong ball.

As he used his magic attribute of wind to pass out the sheets of paper presented I couldn't help but push it to the side. For me right now learning these things was all completely useless, I mean I did have a cheat sheet inside my head so I could pass all my exams without studying and still get 100%

However, for everyone around me, it looked so unfair on how I'm thriving off a system. I guess even under the humble presence of their author they have yet to find out. they won't.

Still, it was kind of a bummer after yesterday's incident with Valencia, Out of all people who could ever say thank you for saving their life I had never expected her to say such a thing to me But I guess asking her to be friends was already too much for cause it was clear she wasn't willing to allow any more friends than she has now. She does have a good point, I don't blame her having severe lapse of trust issues with people but I guess this is a good start. However, I wanted to try to poke her to see her current mental state of now so I could try and calculate if she could bear the responsibilities of what she was meant to do.

Blah, Blah, Blah

Kolek's voice yapped on about this being on an exam, but right now, I just wanted to relax. And as his voice became a sound that faded into nothingness, my new AirPod Max Pros that I bought with the tournament money were now sitting comfortably in my ears.

Tap!, tap!, tap!

[Playing - Boredom by Tyler the Creator ft. Rex Orange County, Anna of the north]

[Your classmates are pissed off at the thought of your carefree style. 12 PPP has been added.]

Yes, I can bathe in their tears and listen to true music. haah what a relief. As I carefully closed my eyes, many thoughts had begun circling through my head, as my body began to transcend.

Up until now, I've just been trying to get stronger so I can defend myself from danger and also protect characters from death itself.

Though I was a terrible author for trying to kill off a lot of characters, it seemed like a horrible way of saying that these characters no longer had any use.

The main events for these stories have yet to arrive, but at this point, the biggest thing to address was Valencia's father, Gerrard.

Arguably top 20 in the strongest characters in this novel itself, he was basically a mid to high-tier character.

But obviously, the difficulty of stopping him from trying to do the impossible was also impossible. I won't know if his mind is set on that one goal of trying to do such a thing, but I know that one thing for sure: the deciding factor of him living will depend on Valencia.

She had to kill her father. I couldn't see any other option, as he's written out to be a stubborn old bastard, but this Valencia 3rd year could stop many things. However, I don't think 'her,' now, would have the mental capacity to withstand such a fate to bear on her back.

So there's gotta be another way to do it instead of killing him. I just have to convince him not to join that side. But I also have to get close to Valencia in some way, then try to get on Gerrard's good side, and then show him the other good things about life. Then, boom, I saved an important character in the story.

But if he doesn't agree, I'll just figure out how to get him around it all without fighting him. Or the better option is to join the Mercenaries Corporation instead, and I'll build my connections off from there.

Still, I find it troubling enough that Valencia is now a first-year instead of a third-year. Which wasn't as bad but the worst thing about her was that she was severely nerfed, Most of the stats she has were reduced to about 90% of what she was capable of doing now so I assume that her skills and techniques were the same but her strength and attack power was just severely week.

FWANG!

[Item: Silent Abyss Key Rarity: [???] - Would you like to reveal the location?]

The system stopped my train of thought, and the notification had my attention.

I pondered a lot about what I could use this key for. This key could make me even stronger, and maybe I could protect those characters that I intentionally killed off. So, I should be greedy and grab all that I could from the dungeon.

So without hesitation, I replied with "Sure" and the location showed the coordinates appeared through a map and the specifics of the location. [Location: The coordinates to use this key are within Dobong Mountain in Seoul. The front entrance to the dungeon is hidden within trees that cover a secret cave entry. For further instructions, please arrive at that location.]

Dobong Mountain? I don't recall making a dungeon in that area. The only dungeons with keys should be the ones to get the material for Alice's staff. So why are there so many things being added to this novel world?

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