How to Survive as an Extra

Chapter 39

The next day, I arrived at Incheon Airport.

I was a little nervous about riding an airplane from a different world, but it did not feel much different from before.

It was just that it was much more expensive because it flew by melting mana stones, and it was excessively fast.

Gwon Chihun, in the seat next to me, was on his smartphone the entire flight, using an SNS called ‘Incrystal.’

He did so intermittently until we landed and entered Seoul.

Naturally, since I had created this setting, I watched with a glance of interest, and he, feeling my gaze…

“Hmph, you’re from the outskirts so you probably don’t know, but originally, only the popular kids in the 4th Scholastic District use ‘Incry.’ Even if you sign up, you probably won’t have any followers. Though, since you’re a Hero Prep cadet, there might be some kids who follow you without knowing any better.”

“…Ah, yeah, right.”

He put on airs.

A quick glance showed his follower count was in the thousands.

Considering that the Incry app could only be used by students from the 4th Scholastic District, it was a considerable number.

Was it thanks to the prestige of Hero Prep, or because he had his own standing in the Awakener world?

Whatever the case, it meant that Gwon Chihun, who sometimes seemed pathetic, was an elite young master living in a world of a different class than me.

“Then you go to the 4th Scholastic District first. I have to stop by the 3rd Branch.”

“Oh, good luck.”

“What?”

What do you mean, what?

It was obvious he was going to get scolded by Gwon Seongjun, the head of Dispel’s 3rd Branch.

“Nothing, it’s nothing.”

“You spineless bastard.”

As soon as we entered Seoul, Gwon Chihun headed for District 2, and I headed for the 4th Scholastic District.

I did not go straight to Hero Prep.

Since I was out, I thought I would explore the geography of the 4th Scholastic District that I had described in the novel.

At the same time, I planned to observe the academy students within the 4th Scholastic District.

After all, the characters in the novel were not just Hero Prep cadets.

“The students’ races and uniforms are really all over the place.”

Academies were as numerous as the various professions, such as hunter, alchemy, production, and healing.

And the students were of various races, as they gathered from all over the world.

Frankly, half of the Hero Prep cadets were of mixed blood, and since most of them used Korean, they even wrote their names in Hangul.

“If I get the chance, I’d like to check out other schools too.”

Among the various academies, there were three major ones besides Hero Prep.

Saint Sienna Magic School, which emphasizes light attribute magic.

Bloody Espers Academy, which specializes in producing hunters.

And Golden Meister Academy, which boasts a higher reputation than Hero Prep, limited to production.

Besides these, there were many other places that made a name for themselves with their own specialties.

“Whatever the case, there’s no place that gets as much attention as Hero Prep.”

Guys like Gwon Chihun would probably wander around the 4th Scholastic District in their cadet uniforms.

Scattering their pride as Hero Prep cadets to draw the envy of students from other academies.

It was an unsightly sight, but in this world, boasting about the ‘ability’ one had achieved on their own was not heavily criticized.

In the world of Awakeners, ‘ability’ was synonymous with the power to confront monsters.

Well, it was still a world where the virtue of humility was valued.

Anyway, I wandered around the 4th Scholastic District for a long time in drab casual clothes, not my cadet uniform.

To be honest, I was doing this because I thought I would be pushed around by An Hwigom from broad daylight if I went in early.

“That old man might have already noticed that I’ve set foot in the 4th Scholastic District.”

No matter what anyone said, he was a member of Manyeong.

I passed through the crowded downtown area and reached a rather quiet place.

Soon, I set foot in an alley with a certain charm, and in front of a small, shabby arcade there, I found a familiar figure.

“…Somehow, I thought you’d be here.”

A woman of my age, squatting alone and vigorously shaking a joystick.

She was wearing glasses, a bucket hat pulled down low, and a thick zip-up hoodie pulled up to her chin, but…

“Oh? Not bad… you little punk.”

With a lollipop in her mouth and occasionally spitting out curses, it was undoubtedly Cha Yeri.

I had come just in case, and I was lucky.

I might be able to probe Lee Eunho’s condition a little.

I sat down on the empty game machine next to her and casually spoke.

“That’s an interesting hobby.”

It was a light question, but it was enough to stop Cha Yeri’s dazzling hand movements.

“…?”

Cha Yeri flinched her shoulders like a petty thief.

She looked up at me with wide eyes, then slowly turned her head back and continued her game.

Without a reply.

Without acknowledgment.

Outright ignoring me.

“I have something to ask you.”

CLICK! CLICK-CLACK!

Even when I asked again, all I could hear was the sound of the game machine.

If this was a talent, it was a talent.

A wretched talent.

I opened my mouth again.

But the lollipop crunched and broke, and Cha Yeri’s words came out first.

“Could you please not disturb someone who’s relieving stress? I don’t know if you know this, but people call that having tact.”

She really speaks her mind.

A way with words that harshly criticizes the other person while rejecting them.

This was not the skill of someone who had argued once or twice in in-game voice chat.

“And don’t think about spreading rumors on campus. Your reputation is so dreadful that no cadet would believe you, and it would probably backfire.”

That day, Cha Yeri and I had agreed to speak informally as a condition for trading the MA6.

We had exchanged words a few times on campus since then, but Cha Yeri never fully dropped the formalities and twisted her words in an ambiguous way.

That person, this person, you, hey, him, excuse me, etc.

When using personal pronouns, she clearly used words that created distance, but to adhere to my condition, the end of her sentences were always informal.

It was a bit funny, but it was the so-called ‘Cha Yeri’s way of speaking informally,’ which clearly revealed her personality.

Still, since it was a positive aspect of our improving relationship, I was also actively using her way of speaking.

“I have no intention of spreading rumors.”

“So it’s no use… Huh? What? Why?”

“I’m too busy trying to survive. As you said, my reputation is quite dreadful. And… what’s wrong with playing games? What hobby is more efficient and economical than games?”

For a moment, Cha Yeri turned her gaze to me again.

At the same time, the words ‘YOU LOSE’ popped up on the game screen.

I thought Cha Yeri, whose competitive spirit was second to none, might argue that she lost the game because of me, but she just stared up at me blankly.

“What’s wrong?”

“…Ah, it’s nothing.”

Cha Yeri belatedly threw the lollipop stick she was holding into a nearby trash can.

Without even looking.

Then, she thrust both hands into the front pocket of her zip-up and spoke with a completely different look in her eyes than before.

“So, what is it that you want to ask?”

“The reason why Lee Eunho is trying to leave the club, I thought you might have heard.”

As someone in the same Combat Division, the same club, a top-ranking competitor, and Lee Eunho’s future heroine, there was a high possibility that Cha Yeri had received some word about the current situation.

…or so I thought, but Cha Yeri’s answer completely missed my expectations.

“How would I know that? I’m not close with that person Lee Eunho, nor do we talk much.”

“You’re not close?”

Cha Yeri nodded.

“He’s so popular that he’s treated like public property for everyone. Whether it’s the opposite sex or the same sex, if you try to get close to him personally, you get subtly ostracized. …The problem is, he knows it himself but has no will to improve it.”

Lee Eunho’s personality before regression.

Embracing everyone.

“But there’s one person who’s an exception in that nauseating human relationship.”

“That would be me.”

“Oh my, you know well, don’t you?”

It had been more than a day or two that I had been receiving resentful glares from Lee Eunho’s close associates.

“Rather, I want to ask you why that person is trying to leave the club. …But seeing as you don’t seem to know either, it would be meaningless to ask. I can only assume that you did something wrong to that person.”

“…”

Fortunately, it seemed that no major changes had occurred with the addition of my narrative.

The proof was that Cha Yeri remembered the relationship between me and Lee Eunho without distortion.

If so, it meant she would not openly antagonize me…

Well, it was a meaningless guess without meeting him in person.

“I have no intention of meddling in your relationship. But don’t let it affect a third party.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t know what confidence you have to talk back to the instructors, but I’m attending this school with my company’s name on the line. I’m in a position where I can’t afford to be disliked even by instructors who have no influence.”

So even a fourth-generation chaebol has her own circumstances…

Indeed, while other cadets were striving for a respectable career as an Awakener, Cha Yeri would be striving for the top position in the business world.

Cha Yeri saw a black car entering the alley and got up from her seat.

A luxury sedan with the Hyeonseong symbol on it.

A woman who appeared to be an aide got out of the car and waited for Cha Yeri with her hands politely clasped.

“Tch, I wanted to clear the last stage.”

“Sorry about that.”

“It’s fine. I’ve cleared it hundreds of times anyway. More importantly…”

Cha Yeri, who was about to head toward the car, turned only her head and gave me a sharp glare.

“If you spread any unnecessary rumors, I’ll turn you into a beehive, so you’d better know that.”

“…”

***

It was evening by the time I entered Hero Prep.

I took a wide detour around the 3rd Training Ground where An Hwigom would be, relieved the fatigue of my short trip in the dormitory, and then came back out.

“Phew, I’m tired.”

The number of things I had to do piled up like a mountain with each passing day.

I had only just obtained a sword, but I also had to get a scabbard for it, start swordsmanship in earnest, and even practice swinging the Mist-Clearing Sword secretly to get used to it.

The only positive part was that the Simulated Training had been unlocked.

“Doesn’t a scabbard to store a Platium blade need to be made of an equally special material?”

Furthermore, where would I find a blacksmith to make it?

“There’s also the risk of having to show the sword…”

Should I measure the specifications myself and order a model sword first?

If the weight is the same, would it help with swordsmanship practice?

“No, I’ll be using it from my inventory anyway, so why do I need a scabbard?”

I walked through the campus, truly captivated by such useless thoughts.

At the same time, I diligently scanned my surroundings to avoid running into Do Minyeong and An Hwigom, and after taking a long detour, I arrived at the campus restaurant, the Grand Pistachio.

The reason? I was hungry.

They say even a ghost who died after eating looks good, so I planned to resolve the grudge of not being able to eat much in Jeju Island, a place full of delicacies.

—1 point will be deducted.

I tagged my smartwatch on the terminal and picked up a warm plate.

It was late evening, so the cadets in the restaurant were sparse.

Since it was Sunday, many cadets had gone off-campus anyway.

I leisurely went around the buffet, filling my plate with food.

But in the middle of it, I saw Lee Eunho holding a plate on the opposite side.

To be precise, he was surrounded by five or six people.

The moment I saw him, he saw me too, and Lee Eunho naturally turned his steps toward me.

“…”

What was he up to?

The moment I first faced a change in the setting.

A disagreeable tension began to flow.

To him, I was the scion of the enemy who had caused his parents’ death.

After evacuating to Seoul, we spent our formative years far apart, but in Gangwon-do, we were childhood friends who had spent our early years together.

How was Lee Eunho accepting that gap…?

I put down the tongs I was holding onto the tray and turned my body toward the approaching figure.

The distance was only a few steps.

Soon, Lee Eunho showed a nice smile as if he had just found me.

I thought he would just pass by me after that greeting, but…

“…!”

I brushed shoulders with him very lightly, and at that moment, I alone lost my balance and fell backward ungracefully.

The food from my plate spilling all over my clothes was a bonus.

It happened without me even having a chance to use the sense of balance corrected by my agility.

It was a contact that could have been considered a mere brush of clothes.

For me to lose my balance from that much friction meant he had intentionally tried to knock me over.

While showing that benevolent smile.

“Are you alright? Sorry, I should have been more careful.”

“…”

As Lee Eunho extended his hand in a manner befitting his character, the surrounding group threw in a word each.

“Gosh, look at the food that splattered on Eunho. Where were you looking?”

“What do you expect from someone from the outskirts? You should just think of it as stepping in crap.”

“Isn’t it your fault for standing right where people are passing by?”

“And what’s with falling over from just a brush of shoulders? Ugh, so low-class.”

Well, well, well.

“Don’t be too harsh. It’s not like I’m entirely without fault.”

“Eunho is so big-hearted, as always.”

“But Eunho, aren’t you always being too considerate? Even if he’s a social care beneficiary…”

“That’s right, if you don’t moderately admonish them, they’ll think of consideration as a privilege.”

It was so disgusting it made me want to vomit.

I had been contemplating and struggling with various conflicts until this situation arose, but this made it clear.

Lee Eunho’s stance toward me and his methods.

The non-regressed Lee Eunho was a protagonist who always took the lead and set an example.

However, he had the flaw of not wanting to get involved in dirty work and being afraid of losing something.

In the end, he was set up to be killed by a surrounding character because of that complacent personality.

He would probably continue to try his best to kick me out of Hero Prep without getting his own hands dirty.

This was my conviction as the original author.

From this moment on, in the world of the protagonist Lee Eunho, the character Ji Seokhyeon was the only flaw.

Therefore, it would be impossible to hope for Lee Eunho’s cooperation as before.

But…

The difficulty of the episode had certainly skyrocketed, but one corner of my mouth had already curled up into a grin.

It was because of a confidence I could not explain.

A welcoming feeling, as if I had met the real Lee Eunho from the original work.

Not the passive Lee Eunho who only moved according to my intentions, but the appearance of a character who moved solely to keep me in check.

…A very interesting character had come up on stage.

One who might bring about a variable that even the devoted reader could not calculate.

I grabbed Lee Eunho’s hand with my food-covered hand and spoke slyly.

“You’re right, you should have watched where you were going.”