As the wind intensified and the snowstorm raged, visibility narrowed.
"Sharakan. I'm counting on you."
Yi-Han summoned the malachite colored leopard and checked the way.
He had to be more careful as the familiar landmarks that could serve as signs disappeared.
Fortunately, Yi-Han and his friends were already solidly armed with cold-weather gear.
"Thanks to Professor Garcia."
"We made them during Professor Verduus's lecture, right?"
At Dolgyu's question, Yi-Han turned his gaze as if he hadn't heard.
Just then, Sharakan returned. The leopard nodded its head as if to say it was okay to go ahead.
"Wait. We have to walk quite a bit further, but I don't think we can keep carrying them."
"Wardanaz. Even if it's annoying, we can't throw these guys off a cliff."
Jijel opened her mouth with the intention of teasing Wardanaz for once.
However, Yi-Han and Dolgyu showed a different reaction than Jijel expected.
"No..."
"That's a bit..."
"...It was a joke."
"R-right."
"It, it was a joke. I thought so too."
"Hey. Both of you just shut up."
Jijel vowed never to joke with these guys again.
"So, Yi-Han? Do you have a good method?"
"Rise, warriors made of bones."
Yi-Han chanted a spell while swinging his staff. Three skeleton warriors slowly carried the squires on their backs.
"This should do."
"Uh. But Yi-Han."
"Why?"
"What if these knights wake up?"
"...Can you give me a blindfold?"
Yi-Han not only tied up the squires but also put blindfolds on their eyes.
Only then did he show a relieved expression.
"Is it okay now?"
"..."
"..."
Jijel and Dolgyu made complicated expressions seeing that.
The sight of putting the knights to sleep, tying them up tightly, and having skeletons carry them was like...
'He really looks evil.'
'He's like a dark mage from old tales.'
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"I, I was admiring the way you utilized skeletons."
"What's there to admire about this?"
Yi-Han was slightly embarrassed by Dolgyu's praise.
***
"Ugh."
Labda woke up in pain.
He couldn't remember well what had happened.
He was clearly sitting in the carriage, and then there was a strong pain in his solar plexus...
"Gasp!"
Labda and the squires opened their eyes.
It was the inside of a cabin they were seeing for the first time.
Although the sound of fierce wind could be heard from outside, a crudely made fireplace was burning brightly, driving away the cold...
The cupboard was packed with canned mutton, a few eggs, peas, marmalade, sugar, salt, tea leaves, coffee powder, and more.
'Where is this??'
"You're awake!"
Yi-Han, who was checking the inside of the pot with a ladle, saw the squires waking up and ran over.
"I was worried. You guys collapsed!"
"Wh-what happened, Wardanaz? Where are we?"
Yi-Han hesitated. It seemed like he was exchanging glances with Jijel.
"You don't remember? The carriage was attacked! A monster attacked the carriage!"
"That... happened?"
"Yeah. We barely managed to escape with you guys."
Yi-Han and Jijel eagerly explained how a fierce and bizarre monster living in the mountain range attacked the carriage and tried to swallow the squires.
Dolgyu silently kept his mouth shut and sliced onions.
No matter how he looked at it, he didn't have the confidence to say such things.
"Th-thanks. I'm ashamed. I only received help. We should have blocked the front."
"It was an unexpected ambush, so it couldn't be helped. The mountain range is a dangerous place."
"Were there giants too? I heard there are giants here according to rumors."
Then the piled-up snow scattered and turned into sand.
'Got it!'
"Lightning spear!"
Yi-Han called lightning to his staff and fixed its shape. Thanks to Professor Bagrak's rigorous training, he was able to abbreviate without chanting long spells.
Crackle!
As the spear of lightning precisely pierced the slime, the slime could no longer maintain its form and melted away.
Basically, slimes had a very simple structure, so if a certain amount of damage was dealt, the core couldn't withstand it and collapsed like this.
In a normal situation, there was no need to be this startled or tense.
It wasn't a normal situation, so that's why!
"...You really are a professor at Einroguard!"
Yi-Han exclaimed.
Who would have obtained this shifting slime and from where?
It was clear that Professor Ingurdel had asked other professors to get it. Since it was quite a rare slime, it couldn't have been made without the help of professors.
'The days of fighting magic-enchanted bulls were rather better.'
Yi-Han seemed to know what Professor Ingurdel's evil scheme hidden in the final exam was.
Scatter the students in the mountain range, then release trained shifting slimes to attack the students.
Students who thought the cold winter was the test would let their guard down against slimes in the form of friends and be severely punished.
"It, it's unbelievable."
Dolgyu still had a dazed face.
"It clearly spoke like Bartreck? How did it imitate so precisely?"
"The professor probably had it learned secretly. He must have had it observed us when we couldn't see."
Yi-Han, who had learned about shifting slimes from Professor Bungaegor, had some information of his own.
Slimes were a kind of primitive colony that was incapable of advanced thinking.
Naturally, rather than thinking with intelligence, it was closer to seeing and imitating.
Dolgyu was shocked.
"To that extent?!"
"I was surprised too. But if it's a professor at Einroguard, it's quite possible."
Yi-Han cleaned up the remains of the slime.
Those remains were like the last piece of trust he had in Professor Ingurdel.
'Now I have to think of Professor Ingurdel as an Einroguard professor no matter what.'
While having a very rude thought, Labda sincerely admired.
"Everyone, you're really amazing. It's embarrassing to the point that we came to help."
"Haha. What's there to admire about this?"
Yi-Han was slightly grateful to the shifting slime seeing the heartwarming atmosphere.
If Labda had asked, 'Why does my head hurt like I drank a sleeping potion?' it would have been annoying, but thanks to the slime, it could be glossed over.
"Wardanaz. I was really impressed that you immediately noticed it was a slime."
"Right. It wasn't even clearly visible, but you noticed that difference."
"Being close usually, I naturally felt something off."
Dolgyu was deeply impressed by Yi-Han's words.
'To think that I couldn't notice it myself!'
Dolgyu vowed once again to pay more attention to his friends in the future.
'Was it a shifting slime?'
Yi-Han was also amazed inwardly.
He thought other White Tiger Tower students had come to interfere and tried to subdue them, but to think it was a monster.
Einroguard was truly a place where one couldn't let their guard down.
'I should attack more actively from now on.'
"East slope."
Jijel, who had been observing outside without listening to the conversation, spoke with a serious expression.
"Approaching from that direction. More than ten people."
"...!"
Yi-Han opened the door of the cabin and looked down.
Surprisingly, more than ten students and squires were coming toward them.
"Let's prevent them from approaching."
"Yeah."
The two agreed.
Regardless of what they were thinking by gathering like that, they couldn't fit everyone in the cabin, and it would be difficult to deal with the aftermath.
Not to mention if there was a shifting slime among them...
"..."
"..."
However, as the group approached closer and closer, Yi-Han and Jijel's faces stiffened.
In that group, there were also Yi-Han, Jijel, and Dolgyu.
The fake Yi-Han pointed at the real Yi-Han and shouted.
"Those are the fakes over there!"
"Oh, this crazy...!"
Yi-Han was shocked.
The intelligence of the slime should have been at the level of seeing and imitating Yi-Han, but how did it even instigate like that??
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