EX rank supporting role’s replay in a prestigious school-Chapter 951: The Last School Refusal (9)

The angel I hadn't seen in a while was still a genius.

The way she opened her left eye, as if winking, was brilliant, and the sight of her little legs running toward me was angelic.

She repeatedly apologized for worrying me, and Olmu, wagging her tail energetically, tried to convey something to me.

However, I was too inadequate to understand the angel's high-level method of communication.

"I'm sorry... I made you worry all this time, and when you finally spoke to me, I couldn’t understand..."

Woof! Ugh...

Olmu tried hard to wag her tail and convey something, but soon gave up and nestled into my arms, gently wagging her tail.

Holding this understanding angel in my arms, I couldn’t have been happier.

The frustrated feelings I had accumulated while talking with the Dragon King in the Dragon Palace seemed to fade away.

"......"

"Baekho? You've been smiling a lot lately. Well, it is kind of funny seeing Joid-shin looking a bit dim-witted."

It seemed Baekho-gun was laughing while watching this scene.

Now that I think about it, Baekho-gun was there as well.

Since he was a beast of divine lineage with not many places to go, it made sense for him to be present.

If I read his thoughts and it made him uncomfortable, I hope he would return the True Name to the Dragon God and seek forgiveness.

Woof?

"Sorry for thinking about something else. It wasn’t that important."

When I stopped petting, perhaps wondering why, the angel in my arms looked up at me.

I resumed petting the angel carefully, and from a few steps away, I heard a low chuckle.

It was Baekho-gun laughing.

Hwang Ji-ho looked meaningfully at Baekho-gun, who was laughing.

"Hmm."

Hwang Ji-ho’s gaze also landed on me.

Was he thinking that I was the reason Baekho-gun had become strange?

It wasn’t entirely wrong, but if you looked at it closely, Baekho-gun hadn’t changed; he had always been like that, just hiding it well.

Hwang Ji-ho, as if probing Baekho-gun's feelings, spoke to him more than usual, and Baekho-gun responded with more words than normal.

In the meantime, I spent time with the angel, and occasionally, Baekho-gun’s laughter broke my concentration and brought me back.

"Wow, it's the first time I've seen Baekho laugh out loud."

"Me too! Did something happen while we were at the camp?"

"Nothing special."

Baekho-gun laughing seemed to be a rare sight, and Eunho’s three descendants were puzzled by it.

Eunseoho and Euniho asked Eunjaeho, who was guarding the house, various things, but they got no answers.

He either usually laughed a lot or remained completely silent, so seeing him laugh like that was strange.

When no answer came, the descendants left the tiger alone and started playing.

"Isn oppa, before you go back to the camp, let’s look at the camp's commemorative photos together!"

"Do you want to see the Sanryeong video too? We watched the talent show video, right?"

"No, not yet!"

Eunseoho’s suggestion prompted Sanryeong, who had hesitated to join, to come over quickly.

Sanryeong, now much more defined than when I first saw her, no longer appeared just as a blurry impression or a child hidden in a shadow of dark color.

Sanryeong was holding the block toy I had once given her, and its edges had worn out from how often she had played with it.

‘She helped with preparing for this talent show, right?’

Eunseoho and Euniho were happy to talk about how Sanryeong taught them something really good.

It seemed like the flute-playing was the thing.

Because of that performance, Gongcheonghwon even sang, so it must have been impressive.

But didn’t an explosion occur while practicing for the talent show at the tiger estate?

It seemed strange to me that practicing a musical instrument could lead to an explosion, but I could understand it.

‘If the special energy isn't controlled well while performing, the sound waves and special energy can clash and cause an explosion. It was dangerous when I practiced with the triangle before.’

I was more accustomed to controlling special energy than the descendants, and since I had learned to play the triangle during my school days, there wasn’t a major problem.

The most that happened was a few sparks from over-focusing on the triangle.

There wasn’t any real damage, like things burning or breaking in the tiger estate’s living room.

"We did great, didn’t we? Right?"

"Now there’s no explosion, and the sound is beautiful!"

The last part of the commemorative photo viewing for the youth camp ended with the talent show video.

The first-year Class 0 juniors played “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,” and Gongcheonghwon performed a song on stage.

Sanryeong, perhaps feeling emotional about the performance of the flute players she had taught, immediately asked after the video ended.

"Give me that video!"

"I can’t give you the device! But I’ll give you the video data."

Sanryeong seemed intent on taking the device from the descendants.

When I offered her a video player for the playback, she seemed very satisfied.

Watching Sanryeong interact with the descendants gave me a warm feeling.

It was very positive that the descendants had gained a talent other than playing dead.

Since Sanryeong had worked hard this time, I wanted to give her a gift.

‘The playback device is what the descendants are giving her. What should I give her? A new block toy? Or clothes?’

Sanryeong was wearing clothes that looked like they were made of shadows, but since she wanted new toys or a device, she might need clothes too.

My gaze stopped at Sanryeong’s bare feet.

Had she been running around barefoot and training like this?

This content is taken from freёnovelkiss.com.

Thinking back to when she was chased barefoot by Im Yeon-hwa and Ugi-hwan's group in the harsh winter on Cheonyeoksan, it made me feel sorry for her.

That day, Im Yeon-hwa was so concerned about Ugi-hwan’s weak muscles that she posted about it on social media due to how cold it was.

But the thought of buying her shoes or clothes didn’t last long.

‘...No, maybe I’m thinking this in human terms. Rather than clothes, a new toy is probably better.’

Sanryeong had expressed interest in new toys and food, but she had never asked for clothes.

The thought of buying her clothes might have come from my younger siblings.

I used to buy new clothes for my younger siblings who wore my old ones, but now that I didn’t have any younger siblings to give them to, maybe I was thinking of giving clothes to Sanryeong.

Sanryeong probably didn’t need clothes or shoes, but it felt awkward to just dump things on her.

"Hwangho, didn’t you say you needed to talk to Joid-shin about the report you received today?"

"Yes."

My thoughts were cut off by Baekho-gun and Hwang Ji-ho’s words.

After hearing Baekho-gun’s words, the descendants immediately stood up.

Since there were many operations to discuss at the estate, the descendants would always leave when they felt it was an important discussion.

"Then we’ll go ahead."

"Sanryeong, if you want to watch the video again, come over here."

"Do you want to see the unedited version?"

"Yes!"

Once the descendants and Sanryeong disappeared into the room, the living room became quiet in an instant.

Hwang Ji-ho, who had something to say, did not immediately speak.

Instead, he stared at Baekho-gun, lost in thought.

Baekho-gun, who had been speaking well up until now, remained silent once the surroundings grew quiet, only sipping the Chrysanthemum tea Hwang Ji-ho had given me.

It seemed like returning to the camp would be delayed, so I decided to speak up.

"What’s the matter? Is it urgent?"

"...It’s not urgent, but it’s something I’d like to talk about quickly. I wanted to discuss it before the exchange tournament begins."

It seemed that Hwang Ji-ho hadn’t found any clues from Baekho-gun, but he retreated for now.

Hwang Ji-ho then opened two holographic reports.

The first report was a summary of the contact received from the Japanese side participating in the youth exchange tournament.

Most of it was official documentation, but there were traces of personal contact attempts.

‘It feels like the player from the warrior clan was involved with an organization or company rather than the Japanese representative directly.’

The evidence showed that the player currently attending school had hardly been contacted by the institutions in question.

Most of the contact was routine administrative communication, which made it unlikely that the group representing Japan was the one behind it.

Instead, it seemed that those directly involved with the player were the ones making moves.

I decided to confirm the details with Hwang Ji-ho.

"Why did they contact you?"

"Since Moon Sae-ron is participating in the camp, they must have guessed. They’re trying to adjust the process to get the results they want. They offered a significant amount of money along with a monopoly contract that could generate several times that amount in the long run."

"Blatantly?"

"No, when I made it public, someone contacted me saying, 'A decision unrelated to the company was made by someone else, apologies.'"

I now understood why Hwang Ji-ho had brought this up before the tournament started.

From Hwang Ji-ho’s position, who wasn’t lacking in money, there was no way he would accept such an offer.

But it seemed like they were prepared to cut ties if negotiations didn’t go smoothly and were ready to intervene in other ways.

"They want each school to face off one by one instead of having three schools compete at the same time. They changed the format, making it seem fair, but they want a specific order."

"Of course, they want Korea and China to fight first, and then the tired winner will face Japan."

"Exactly, Joid-shin."

Since Moon Sae-ron had given an ‘if’ scenario, it was easy to guess their intentions.

Hwang Ji-ho seemed to be delaying, trying to buy time and prevent them from preparing any further schemes.

Considering the nature of the tiger clan, if it were any other time, Hwang Ji-ho would have cut through it immediately. But he seemed to be doing this for the students participating.

"It’s bold for them to try something like this in an exchange tournament hosted by my school."

Hwang Ji-ho narrowed his eyes and briefly commented.

From the way he said it, it seemed Hwang Ji-ho was paying more attention than usual, and it looked like there was no need to worry.

After closing all holograms, Hwang Ji-ho opened another one.

This one had a map attached, showing a region in China.

I recognized it from a few previous occasions.

‘It’s the map pointing to where Qingho’s training belt was found.’

The difference with previous maps was that this one displayed a list of facilities related to the youth player training academy and a list of players.

The list included those mentioned in the briefing by Cheondongha from the Chinese team.

Special energy musicians and shadow theater artisans.

‘From just looking at the map, I don’t see anything new. So...’

Some points on the map were connected by lines.

After confirming where the lines connected, I voiced my speculation.

"It seems there’s a connection between the players participating this time and Qingho’s training belt."

The black hand has Qingho’s physical body, and the crucial clue to finding it is the training belt.

That belt was a gift from Hwang Ji-ho to Qingho long ago and disappeared when Qingho vanished with the deity.

And the place where the training belt was found was very close to the youth player training academy in China, but no connection had been found between the two.

But since Hwang Ji-ho showed me this at this point, it seemed that he had found a clue.

Hwang Ji-ho nodded gravely at my words.

"That’s right."