30 Years Have Passed Since the Prologue Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Go The Retired Soldier Wants to Rest

Ivan, who had been waiting for the ending with an easy heart, thinking only of escaping this dreary other world and having some dried pollack with a cold can of beer—

—at this point, finally realizes that all of his experiences had been nothing more than “background setting.”

And that this game’s genre was—

—not a strategy simulation where you must hold back a fierce war against the Demon King’s Army.

Nor an orthodox RPG about a Hero who assembles a party and topples the Demon King’s tyranny.

—but, of all things, an “academy story.”

Up to here was year 30 of Ivan’s possession.

***

St. Vasilisa Orphanage is one of the wealthiest orphanages in the entire kingdom.

For an orphanage to be wealthy, several conditions are generally required.

Either its location is good enough to fall within the capital’s administrative sphere of influence.

Or, when a kingdom ravaged by war begins its reconstruction, it holds the political symbolism of being “the first orphanage for war orphans.”

Or the orphanage director has cultivated connections among society’s power brokers and high nobility—and if it satisfies a few other such miscellaneous conditions, then astonishingly, one can create that self-contradictory institution known as a “wealthy” orphanage.

For reference, St. Vasilisa Orphanage was able to satisfy every one of those conditions.

“Hm.”

Ivan stroked the goosebumps prickling up along his forearm and frowned.

If there was one thing he’d learned through long military service, it was that a premonition of something bad about to happen must never be ignored.

“Kids, go scatter some salt.”

“Yes, sir—!”

Watching the children run off cackling, he let out a deep sigh.

Four years had already passed since the Demon King died, and the game still wasn’t over. Isn’t there a problem when the epilogue drags on this long?

Are there more conditions? The ending condition isn’t something like “the Hero dies of old age,” is it? He’d rather go back sooner than that.

Around this time, Ivan was diligently rummaging through his ever-fading memories, painstakingly writing out a list of “things to eat once I get back to Earth.”

With the desperation of a sergeant who has his discharge date fixed and is counting down.

Canned beer, dried pollack, Honey Butter Chips, nachos dipped in cheese sauce, tuna mayo, kimchi stew.

Ah, damn it, kimchi stew needed about three more underlines. It had been thirty years since he last ate kimchi. Braised kimchi and stir-fried kimchi couldn’t be left off either.

And every kind of alcohol except vodka and wine. If possible, he wanted to drink something from Northeast Asia.

When you live among monsters who scarf down pickled cucumbers and pickled mushrooms as bar snacks, you start to miss even puffed rice crackers.

“Hoo…….”

Ivan was walking along listlessly when he suddenly stopped.

There were signs of someone in his office, where no one should be. An adult—and a well-trained soldier, at that.

The eyes that had been slack a moment ago opened sharply. Then he carefully took a step forward. This time without muffling the sound, as naturally as possible.

Thud, thud.

Emphasizing that he was defenseless, as though he’d noticed nothing at all, walking in a straight line to the wooden door bearing the Director’s Office nameplate.

One man.

His senses were already in the realm of an animal. Anyone who spent years grinding through the Annihilation Corps could pull off this sort of acrobatics.

The presence beyond the wooden door flinched and went still. Gauging the man’s position, he slowly slid a hand toward his waist and bent slightly at the hip.

So that even if the other party fired a crossbow the instant the door opened, it would miss where his head was. An old habit.

“Long time no see, senior!”

The instant he turned the doorknob, the unfamiliar guest called out brightly. It meant he had no intent to attack. Ivan identified the man the moment he heard the voice, and let the tension drain from his shoulders.

When he opened the door the rest of the way, a soldier in a neatly pressed uniform was waving at him.

“You’ve been well, I hope? Ah, honestly, I should have visited more often!”

“You should have come through the front gate.”

“Come on, since when did we ever work that way?”

The soldier laughed briefly—ahaha—and stepped back. His gaze grazed briefly over Ivan’s waist and sleeves.

“Your business.”

“So impatient! First we drink some tea and unpack all the old stories, that sort of time has to come first!”

Even as he said this, he drew a small letter from his coat.

With white-gloved hands, slowly and very carefully, he set the letter down on the table.

High-quality paper and fine wax sealing.

And pressed firmly upon it, a chrysanthemum-shaped seal.

The instant he confirmed it, Ivan reflexively recoiled a step from the table.

“Whoa, whoa, that’s lèse-majesté, you know?”

“Why would Colonel Kirillovna want anything to do with me……?”

“She’s the Minister of the Royal Household now. She was already a brigadier general around the time you retired, wasn’t she?”

“So why is she looking for me? If my memory is right, when I retired she clearly said—”

“Yes. She told you to keep out of sight and live quietly. It’s really something, how you took that at face value and just left. Her Highness the Princess couldn’t eat for three days, you know.”

He snickered and pushed the letter, which had been shoved to the far edge of the table, back toward Ivan.

“Just read it. A personal letter from Her Highness the Princess would fetch whatever price you name at a collector’s auction.”

“…….”

He reached out as carefully as if he were disarming a magic tool on the verge of detonation, taking care lest the wax seal be crushed, and gently peeled it open.

With a crisp little tok, the envelope opened smoothly. When letter paper threaded with gold appeared, his hand came to an abrupt stop.

“What’s wrong? Her Highness might just be asking after your health, you know?”

……Sure she is.”

Elizaveta Kirillovna Krasilov. By the slightly more familiar nickname from when the front was in full swing, “Iron-Blooded” Liza. There was no way this woman would send an envoy just to ask after someone’s health, of all things.

She was the sort who would sooner smear poison on the letter paper.

Surely there wasn’t poison smeared on this—

“Just read it, would you.”

It took Ivan one more round of hesitation after that before he could summon the courage to open the letter.

A letter written in a graceful hand, as neat as if it had been struck out on a typewriter, appeared.

[Vanka, have you been well.]

He already didn’t want to read it. Ivan swallowed dryly.

[I’ve heard news of you now and then. It seems you’ve been doing well. For the first few months I thought that was a relief, but from then until now, I haven’t. Regrettably, I am not doing well at the moment.]

Whoever it was, they were surely paying the price for making this woman “not do well.”

[Do you remember when we tended the garden together, with such difficulty. I had hoped we might all take tea together, but you left without so much as a backward glance. The days when we burned down the demonfolk residential districts, established the military government office, and exploited the now-“peaceful” demonfolk? Of course I remember them. Afterward, I thought this for a while. Well, fine. Vanka, even without you, there’s no way a garden we tended this diligently could fall to ruin. Winter has passed, so once the snow melts the flowering season will come. And then perhaps someday you too might come to see the garden you made.]

Ivan muttered without meaning to.

“Me? To the royal court? Why……?”

[But the seasons have turned and winter is coming again, Vanka. The servants have grown fat and idle and no longer tend the garden. And amid a garden overrun with weeds and wild beasts, the wildflowers no longer grow. A winter colder and more silent than the last is coming. The other day I noticed mistletoe covering a dying shrub.]

Only now did he grasp the purpose of this letter.

Before reading the final paragraph, Ivan reflexively let out a long sigh.

[Vanka, my most trusted woodcutter. If there is something you desire, I will repay it threefold without fail. If the compensation falls short, I will make up the difference with our friendship. And if even that fails to settle the account, I will pay with our memories. The kingdom still needs your devotion. As it always has, and as it will. With affection. Kirillovna.]

Only after reading the not-especially-long letter several more times, carefully, did he press his stiffened eyes and turn his head away.

Tap, tap, tap.

He drummed his fingertips on the table, lost in thought for a moment.

“So, your answer?”

“The situation first.”

“It’s pretty rough. The military government side whines every single day begging to be allowed to withdraw, and His Highness Crown Prince Alexandr is itching to carve the country into five pieces and sell it off. And our ‘Great King’ still just sits there saying nothing.”

The man went on with a sneer.

“But then—ta-da! You remember St. Yansk University, right? The international university they founded during the war.” “What about it?”

“I got an advance look at this year’s list of incoming students and faculty. Care to take a look?”

The man took out a notebook and handed it to Ivan.

“The Saintess has taken a teaching post. Full professor in the theology department. And skip past all this…… the students. Now then, a whole string of familiar names comes rolling out, doesn’t it?”

The daughter of the Hero Maximilien. Isabelle.

The son of the Knight Gilbert. Oscar.

The daughter of the Mage Beolgrin. Elphera.

The daughter of the Berserker Einar. Esidis.

The disciple of the Thief Enrique. Lucia.

And on top of that, the Saintess Patricia as a newly appointed professor this year.

A “Hero’s Party roster” that might as well have been drawn from a picture.

“And of all things, our great late king went and abolished St. Yansk University’s age restriction on admission, would you believe it? He said as long as you pass the entrance exam, they’ll take you regardless of whether you’re young or old—and this is the result!”

St. Yansk University is one of a handful of the most prestigious institutions in all the United Kingdoms.

And this damned other-world “prestigious university” doesn’t look at an applicant’s age.

Whether very young, or very old.

Regardless of age, fairly and equally, if you pass conditions like the viciously difficult entrance exam, the interview, and a recommending guarantor, it opens its doors to anyone.

And here is where the problem arises.

After killing the Demon King, the Hero’s Party departed for their respective homelands.

Some became nobles, some went into seclusion. If there was one thing they had in common, it was this.

Every single member of that party passes for a legendary hero in their own homeland.

Which means every single one of their actions could touch off an international conflict. Especially in the case of a child sent abroad to study.

“So our Prince is trying to sell off the country, and—oh my goodness—as it happens, something like this is going on right in the middle of the capital? Then what do you suppose happens?”

If even one of them were to die or be injured, this country is finished.

“What do I need to do?”

“I’ve had a position set aside on the faculty roster. Not a post like professor or teaching assistant. Gardener. Well, universities have roadside trees too, don’t they?”

“…….”

The man traced the roster in his notebook with a finger and continued.

“Until these kids go home to their own countries without a single hair harmed. Protect them for just 3 years. If they drop out it could be shorter than that.”

At this point Ivan had finished his calculations.

Colonel Kirillovna…… that is, Her Highness the Princess, was in urgent need of an operative who was no longer on the military register.

Using an active-duty operative would inevitably leave traces, risking detection by the Prince’s faction; and picking just anyone from among the retired operatives left no way of knowing who had already laid a hand on the Prince’s side.

But then—ta-da—there happened to be exactly the right person tucked away near the capital.

A man whose loyalty needed no questioning, whose ability was already proven, who despite going quietly into seclusion with no involvement in politics after retirement was so clearly located that he could be contacted immediately.

That miraculous individual was Ivan.

Ivan, who had been quietly waiting for the ending and had finished preparing to cross over to Earth and chew, tear, taste, and enjoy the beautiful foodstuffs of modern civilization, realized an astonishing fact in this moment.

The Demon King is dead, but the Hero’s Party doesn’t get a and they lived happily ever after~ ending.

Instead, against a backdrop of an international situation gone to hell and a menacing domestic political scene, an “international university” pops up out of nowhere and the world’s dignitaries all vie to enroll their children in it……

After a full 30 years, a genre that any citizen of the Republic of Korea would recognize came to mind……

“Fuck.”

“……Pardon?”

Kim Seon-woo, dormant for long years, abruptly awoke.

“Fuck. This was an academy story?”

“Senior……?”

The man broke into a cold sweat as he looked at Ivan.

It was a sight rarely seen even in his active-duty days. That look of violently spewing rage.

And of course, as a man who had known him in his active-duty days, he found his body stiffening with a flinch at the thick killing intent seeping out.

Just as he was sweating coldly and wondering what on earth that word meant—

Ivan shut his eyes tight and, forcibly suppressing and mastering Kim Seon-woo’s seething fury, said:

“Ivan Petrovich…… accepts Her Highness’s command.”

Let’s just go home already.

3 years.

He’d waited 30 years—what was 3 more?

Wait just 3 more years and he’d surely see the ending.

This was the process by which the academy came to have a gardener.