CH 2

The beast was probably following this train. So, the sound didn’t go away. But no matter how fast the beast run, it would be slower than a moving train.

…no. The man shook his head to shake off his thoughts. The important thing now was that there were no beasts other than him. The important thing now was, ‘Why am I in this state?’. He didn’t have any clues to answer the question. The man was in a single room attached to the train. He probably couldn’t explain why he was left here. There were, in fact, few things a man could do in this moving train.

The first thing he can do was go through the luggage in this room. The man hesitated and unpacked the suitcase that was supposed to belong to the boy. He looked through all the pockets of his coat and the pockets he was wearing, just in case. The man was a little disappointed. The content didn’t matter.

A piece of paper that looked like a train ticket, a pocket with money presumed to be a wallet, an envelope with a letter, a ring with a picture, an old notebook, clothes and household items, etc. It was modest. Next, a newspaper on the table caught his eyes. Wanting it to be of some help, the man quickly read the newspaper down.

The man’s face frowned as if he had seen something strange. The content in the newspaper was beyond his comprehension. What adorned the front page of the newspaper was a picture of a train and a train station quite familiar to the man. But the letters on it were different from what he knew.

“The new station for the magic train ‘Kennis’ (케니스) has finally been completed. Everyone’s expectations were high as we had been waiting for a long time. Starting this year, students at Aurora Academy will no longer have to travel long distances by horse-drawn carriage! Because Aurora Station was newly completed this time. This is really good news for incoming and current students……”

“……”

Suddenly, the newspaper in his hand fell to the floor. The man didn’t know the name of the train named Kennis, but he knew the Aurora Academy. It was a school that did not exist in a reality where the man lived. Well, that was the name of the school in the fantasy novel he was reading a while ago!

‘Does this make sense?!’

The man was enveloped in a dizzy feeling. It was when the man was grabbing his head in shock.

<Chick, Chick—ah ah test, the destination station after a while is Aurora Academy, Aurora Academy. Passengers disembarking, please check that there are no items left behind before disembarking. We will inform you again. After a while, the arrival station is Aurora……>

Announcements sounded throughout the train. The man seemed to have been confirmed killed once again. His face turned pale. Amidst the chaos, the train stopped at some point, and the outside door became noisy. People were getting off the train and the noise suddenly filled in. But the man sat in the train for a long time until all the murmuring was gone.

He rather wished it was a dream. It was a trip he has been looking forward to and it was a novel he enjoyed so much that it was coming out in his dreams. But even though he wanted to turn away from the fact that all of this was real, he couldn’t. Everything came to the man vividly. The feeling of rustling sheets, cold sweat run down the back. His shaky hands were trembling. His heart was beating wildly. His hands and feet were cold.  

Rattle. Bang!

Then the room door opened with a loud noise. A man who appeared to be a flight attendant knocked on the door that had already been opened.

“Hey, student. Why don’t you get off?”

The first language he heard was English or French at first, but when he listened closely, it was a completely different, completely new language. But strangely, as soon as he heard those words, he immediately understood. The man got up from his seat. He shuddered at the look of the flight attendant’s dissatisfied frown and swept into his bag the items that had been lying on the bed.

“No, now, I’m leaving!”

The words he stuttered were the same as those uttered by the flight attendant. He didn’t notice it before, but now that he thought about it, it wasn’t Korean either. The bag did not close properly as the messy clothes only increased the volume. The flight attendant standing behind let out an annoyed sigh. He was so nervous that his hand was hovering in the air.

“Great. Do it fast. Judging from that uniform, you look like an Aurora Academy student, am I right. Even if you are late for this, you shouldn’t blame us!”

“Yes, yes!”

Eventually, the bag was forcibly closed and locked. It was quite unsettling to see the seams being pulled tight. It seemed as if the bag would open at will at any time. The hem of his clothes was sticking out through the slightly opened bag, but there was no time to rearrange the bag. The man hurriedly grabbed his bag. As soon as the flight attendant stepped out of the door and gave it to him, the man ran out of the cabin.

Tap. Bang.

The man was bewildered to himself as the sound of his shoes resounded in the aisle, but he couldn’t stop. Being chased by something, the man thought he had to get out of here quickly. There was no one in the aisle narrow enough for only two people to walk side by side. There it was quiet outside the window. The spacious train station was already empty, so the appearance of the station was bleak.

As the man got off the train, a loud horn sounded. Soon after, all the doors of the train closed, and the train quickly left the station. The man stood idly until the train left, staring at the train as it moved away.

“……now what?”

The words he uttered unconsciously flowed out in vain as if to represent his feelings. The man staggered and sat down on an empty bench. His loose hair fluttered freely in the wind. The dull red hair fluttering in the wind still felt unfamiliar. And it was annoying. His long hair was something he had never seen before in his life, so it was annoying and cumbersome. The man pondered for a moment whether this might be good, and he remembered the black ribbon he had in his pocket. He pulled out a ribbon, bit it gently with his lips, and gathered his messy hair together with his empty hands. Still, he did not stop thinking.

A little while ago the flight attendant saw the man and said he looked like an Aurora Academy student. Perhaps his words were reliable information. Didn’t he say that this was a school uniform? And he thought it was reasonable enough given the outward appearance of this body.

‘Let’s say the owner of this body is a student at that school. So what now? That Aurora? Does he have to go to the academy?’

Maybe it was. The man tied his hair up. He just rolled it up with a ribbon and made a rough knot. Then it became more comfortable. The man looked at his luggage bag. It was a bit too much for travel luggage. Was the owner of this body really heading to the academy?

In the current situation, the man knew nothing. He was just guessing where this place was. It was also a nonsensical hypothesis, so he thought it would be better to go to the academy for now. If he went there, would anyone know about this boy?

First, he had to know about this boy. The man clasped his skinny hands and opened them. His pale hands were long and slender, with bones clearly visible. Let’s get out of the station. It was clear what he had to do to get his mind right. The man grabbed the bag next to him. To his surprise, it was so heavy that his body staggered. He thought he was good at holding it and running. Again, I thought that this body was weaker than I thought.

“Ah.”

Getting out was fine, but there was one problem. That was a big problem too. Naturally, the man did not know where the academy was. To make matters worse, he didn’t see students around here (개미 새끼 하나, I don’t understand ‘a single ant cub’ here). The bag he was carrying was so heavy that his fingers could not turn red and turned white. Even if he knew the location, he wouldn’t be able to walk for a long time like this.

The man quickly put down his heavy bag and looked around. How could there no one here? Should he go back into the station and looking for someone? He saw earlier that there were still sparse people in the station…

It was time to think so. A carriage rushing towards the station caught the man’s attention. A small carriage stopped near the station after a while. Seeing the man presumed to be the coachman getting off the carriage, the man rushed to miss him.

“There…!”

“Huh? Student? What are you doing here? All the other kids have already gone to school!”

Seeing the man approaching him, the driver was rather surprised.

“Because I overslept…”

The man hurriedly told the lie. But those words seemed to fit the coachman’s question very well. Perhaps after looking at the languid boy showed, he earned the coachman’s sympathy. The coachman sighed and got back on the carriage.

T/N:

I’ll update this translation on weekend around 2-3 chapters or release 1 chapter every 2 days? I don’t have a fixed schedule for now. Also, this is still unedited or so I thought. I’m sorry if some sentences or some paragraphs didn’t make sense ahahaha!

Oh right, I’m waiting for the info I added on Novelupdate to be approved. u_u