WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Surviving the Assassin Academy as a Professor

Translator: Touch

Editor: Grass

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Chapter 51: DLC [Professor in a Heroic Fantasy] – Hotfix Ver2.3.1a (2)

“…What happened to the real me?” I asked the boy.

Dino didn’t speak. He simply shook his head nervously.

Did that mean he couldn’t answer?

“If I die in the game, do I die for real?”

This time, Dino nodded. 

One thing was now clear.

I absolutely must not die.

“Why was I brought to this game world?”

Another silent shake of the head. 

“Is that the only way you’re able to answer my questions?”

Again, he shook his head. 

“Then why do you only respond with head gestures? Do you have a death wish?”

Yet another shake. 

“Speak,” I demanded.

“Y-Yes,” he stammered. 

I repeated my earlier questions again—about the real me, about dying in the game, about why I was here in the first place, and so on. 

“…I-I don’t know,” he said, avoiding my eyes. 

“You do know, don’t you?”

“…I dooon’t!” Dino whined, clearly troubled.

“You think that’s a good enough answer?”

“Huh?”

“If you don’t know, then go find out.”

“I-I know…!”

“Oh, so you do know. Then answer the questions.”

“Don’t bully me…! I can’t tell you…” Dino said, flinching. 

“You’re my helper, aren’t you? Your job is to help me. But if you stay silent when I ask for help, how are you any different from someone who knows nothing? Useless maggot of a brat.”

“Stop…! I-I’m not going to talk even if you keep bullying me…!”

Unfortunately, berating him didn’t work.

There was probably some kind of systemic restriction holding him back.

“Then… am I the only player in this world?”

“Yeah, b-because it’s a single-player game… In your world, you’re the only player, mister,” he said. 

In my world, I was the only player.

Was it just my overthinking, or did that sentence carry some deeper meaning?

“Then…”

I paused, following the logic in my head. 

“It sounds like… there are other people who each have their own world.”

“Y-You’re right. And everyone’s worlds are a little different.”

So, this was essentially a sandbox game.

That was an interesting and curious theory—one I hadn’t thought of before.

“Oh, right!” Dino clapped his tiny dinosaur arms together. “Come to think of it, there are people waiting for you…!”

“People waiting for me?” I asked.

“Yeah! A whole bunch! Thiiiiiiis many people~~!” He stretched his stubby arms as far as they’d go.

If I went by arm length, that meant maybe one or two people.

But judging from his enthusiasm, there were surely far more than that.

“Who are they?”

“Players like you! And you’re super famous among them, mister…!”

“Why am I famous?”

“Because you’re in Hell Mode…!”

I didn’t see how that would make me famous—until Dino added something that hit me like a brick to the head.

“…And the only one still alive!”

Ah, I see.

At last, something clicked in my mind.

This really was just like a single-player game in real life.

But single-player gamers could still connect and interact through communities.

The people Dino said were waiting for me must be members of this game’s community.

“Then… are all the other Hell Mode players dead?”

“Yeah.”

Of course they were. Considering how many assassination attempts I’d survived on just my first day of work, it was a miracle I was even still here.

I’d been involved in so many life-threatening situations, I’d lost count.

But I had survived.

Was it because I was a veteran of the game? Because I was skilled and talented?

That was only half of it.

The other half was pure luck.

Sure, the bugs, the tips, my acting, and game knowledge all helped…

But without luck, I would’ve died far sooner.

I could never deny that truth.

“…But if everyone has their own world, what does it matter that I’m in Hell Mode?”

“Well, later on, there’ll be a DLC with multiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii— i-i-i-iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii—”

Whoa.

Just as Dino’s speech began to lag like a glitchy server, a blue system window appeared, sealing his mouth.

「 ⧉ 」

The boy’s eyes immediately lost their shine and focus.

As expected, it was a systemic restriction.

The 「Systematic Star⧉」’s stigma had locked him down.

What was he about to say?

A ‘DLC with multi,’ hmmm…

A DLC with multiplayer features, maybe?

Come to think of it, I hadn’t even considered that there might be more DLCs in the future.

Perhaps a multiplayer server would be added later, where players could gather together.

I get the picture now.

It all makes sense now why I’d be famous among the player community.

The scale of the game on Hard Mode was far larger compared to Normal Mode. It even offered much greater rewards.

And to defeat the incredibly stronger enemies in Hard Mode, you had to become overwhelmingly stronger yourself.

It wasn’t just about higher stats or better damage numbers. The game’s very structure would change depending on the difficulty level. Even dungeons that used to have three floors would expand to five in Hard Mode. 

Therefore, it was likely the same for Hell Mode.

The fact that a Legend Ⅱ-grade weapon had been made accessible despite being midway through Main Story 1 said it all. And most importantly, I had managed to obtain that powerful weapon.

Sure, it was partly thanks to the Bugged Space and some conveniently timed circumstances, but still, it was a ridiculous growth rate considering we were still in the early game.

And this would likely continue moving forward.

As long as I stayed alive, I would become far stronger than players on any other difficulty. 

That seemed to be why so many people had high expectations of me.

Just then, Dino’s previously unfocused eyes regained their clarity.

“Huh? Where did I leave off again…?” he mumbled, blinking a few times.

He pondered for a moment, confused, then clapped his hands. “Anyway, wanna go see the other players? They’re all waiting for you in [End Ocean]!”

I didn’t mind meeting them. There wasn’t any reason not to.

But first, I needed to think a little more about the situation.

First, this game—Hiaka Academy: The Assassin Department—had actually been released as a part of a trilogy, alongside The Warrior Department and The Mage Department.

They’d been released in the order of Warrior, then Mage, and finally Assassin.

I’d played all three, but found Assassin the most fun, so I ended up digging deeper into it. 

The developers of the game were from overseas. Was it Poland? Or maybe Finland…?

Anyway, some European country that ended in “-land.”

The game’s system and gameplay were extremely complex, so the barrier of entry was pretty high. It developed a cult following among hardcore fans overseas, but didn’t get much attention in Korea.

So when I wanted to interact with the player base, I had to join a foreign online community.

“Dino, how many people died in Hell Mode?” I asked.

“Um, a ton.”

“Roughly how many? Hundreds?”

“Waaaay more than that. Gasp!” Dino suddenly clapped his hands over his mouth and glanced around nervously. But this time, no restriction stopped him.

“More than hundreds, huh…”

I couldn’t know for sure what had happened to them.

But one thing was certain: they were dead.

“Did many players from other difficulty modes survive?” I asked.

“Uh-huh.”

“You mentioned something called [End Ocean] earlier—what is that?”

“It’s a sea that players who’ve seen the game’s ending can go to,” he explained.

So, players who completed the single-player game could join a special community after finishing it…

“But I haven’t seen the ending yet.”

“Right! That’s why you won’t be able to go too deep. It’s really rare for someone who hasn’t cleared the game to show up in [Offline] like this.”

I see.

Things were still pretty vague, but I was starting to get a better grasp of the situation.

As we kept talking, I began to picture a map of this world in my head.

The world was divided into multiple layers of dimensions.

First was the in-game world: [Overworld].

Second was the world outside the game: [Offline].

Finally, there was the community of players who had cleared the game: [End Ocean].

The [Overworld] was the world I had just come from.

That <Seed: 3340 1414 5592 **** ****> that showed up in a status window earlier was probably the address of my personal single-player world.

[Offline] was this white void I was currently standing in—a space you entered either after clearing the game or when temporarily booted out by a hotfix.

And now Dino was telling me to go to the final location, [End Ocean], where players from other difficulty modes who had cleared the game were supposedly waiting for me.

< Time Remaining Until Ver.2.3.1a Patch Complete… [21 minutes] >

I glanced at the time and made up my mind.

“Alright. Then let’s go to this [End Ocean] place.”

“Okay! Hop on!”

Huh?

Dino approached me and bent over, showing me the back of his grey dinosaur costume.

Was this kid seriously telling me to hop on his back?

“You have to maneuver properly, okay?” he warned.

There was a spacebar-length button sticking out of the back of his dinosaur head.

[ JUMP ]

A grey dinosaur. A white world. A jump button.

This all felt… oddly familiar.

Whatever…

As soon as I got on top of Dino’s back, my body shrank down significantly. The two of us became stuck together like we were one body.

“Let’s go! We need to get 10,000 points!”

“Got it.”

Dino started running.

Waddle waddle.

It was a surprisingly stable ride.

< Current Score: 1 >

< Current Score: 2 >

⋮

The score above his head steadily increased as we moved forward.

So this was what he meant when he said we needed 10,000 points.

Then, as I rode on Dino’s back, the world began to shift rapidly for the first time.

The sky changed, and cacti appeared along our path.

Dino wasn’t running through [Offline] anymore.

He was slipping into a different space.

< Current Score: 15 >

< Current Score: 17 >

Once again, it all felt strangely familiar.

< Current Score: 35 >

Dino’s speed gradually increased as a cactus approached.

I hit the jump button.

Boink!

“Ack!” Dino exclaimed

“What?” I asked.

“Be gentle when you press that…!”

Seriously?

Why would he put the button on the back of his head if he didn’t want to get bonked?

Nevertheless, I chose to ease up on the button since he was in pain.

Boink. Boink.

“Ack! Ow! That hurts…!”

But he kept complaining even when I pressed it lightly.

Fine. I’ll try pressing even lighter.

“I said it hurts! Be more gentle, will you?!”

Fuck this. I give up.

BOINK! BOINK!

“Aagh!”

< Current Score: 65 >

< Current Score: 79 >

< Current Score: 139 >

As we kept jumping through the space, a flying creature that resembled a pterosaur came swooping in.

But since I didn’t press the jump button, it passed harmlessly above us.

This, too, was all too familiar.

< Current Score: 512 >

But then, another pterosaur swooped in at an unclear height. I wasn’t sure whether it would miss or hit us.

“What should I do?” I asked Dino.

“It’s fine. I think it’ll miss.”

“You sure?”

“I’ll trust you.”

Thwack!

The pterosaur smacked me right in the forehead.

Ah fuck! What the hell?

< GAME OVER >

When I opened my eyes again, the cacti and pterosaurs were gone, and we were back in the familiar, empty white world of [Offline].

Dino was staring at me with a dead-serious, yet disappointed, expression.

“What was that, mister? That was a super easy zone!”

“You’re the one who said it’d miss!”

“When did I say that?”

I stared at him.

The boy tilted his head like he genuinely didn’t know what I was talking about.

This brat…

His sass levels were rising now that we were starting to get along.

But I didn’t want to start arguing with a little kid, so I kept my mouth shut.

“Let’s try again. Do it right this time.”

But I’d already gotten the hang of the game after that first attempt.

< Current Score: 611 >

< Current Score: 1,552 >

< Current Score: 2,914 >

I was bored to death.

Dino kept getting faster as night fell on the path we were running down.

Cacti and pterosaurs kept showing up with their sneaky tricks.

BOINK!! BOINK!!

“Ow! Ouch!”

I slammed the button like hell and cleared it all in a flash.

I think I heard a voice say something like “gentle please,” but the breeze was too loud to be sure. 

It must’ve been the wind.

BOINKBOINKBOINKBOINK!!

“Waaaah!!”

< Current Score: 6,335 >

< Current Score: 8,595 >

< Current Score: 10,000 >

Eventually, we arrived at our destination.

Dino rubbed the back of his head and grinned from ear to ear.

“Wow, you’re really good, mister! You’re the first to make it here on just the second try!”

Didn’t you say I was the first person you ever met?

I questioned his statement silently but didn’t bother voicing my thoughts.

Instead, I turned my gaze to the distance.

On the edge of this white world lay a sea that extended to the horizon.

So this was [End Ocean]—where people were waiting for me.

* * *

Jingle…

Jingl— Clink! Thud…

Something fell to the ground.

Light returned to Eve’s blank blue eyes. She reached out and picked up the fallen round object.

The thing that was jingling in the bell had fallen off. And for some reason, it no longer reattached to the main body.

It just wouldn’t stick, regardless of what she tried. 

So, the bell never rang again, no matter how hard she shook it.

It only made dull, empty sounds when she tapped on it.

“…”

Eve turned her head and looked into the distance, staring blankly for a very long time.

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