Bloodhound’s Regression Instinct

Chapter 30

Yan shook off the blood on his hand and returned to the training camp.

To put it bluntly, he failed to extract information from Jacques.

“I expected it, but things got annoying.”

Jacques was about to open his mouth before even cutting off one of his fingers.

In the meantime.

“Why is that symbol on such an old-fashioned pendant! That is… Ugh!”

Suddenly, his body swelled up like a balloon.

And then, boom.

“They put a gold seal on it like this, huh?”

The organization called the Revolutionary Army was made up of thorough cell groups.

But even if they were cell groups, they couldn’t hide from the Special Task Force, one of the imperial intelligence agencies, if they were determined to dig.

‘These guys took quite some time because of the gold seal.’

There was no way to deal with it even if he knew it would explode.

The head instructor was watching from behind, and there was no need to show him the scene of breaking the gold seal of the Revolutionary Army.

Anyway, he confirmed the most important thing.

The head instructor’s tattoo and the symbol on this pendant.

And the ‘Revolutionary Army’.

He knew that the three were connected by something.

Yan vowed to advance his relationship with the head instructor further and entered the side door.

As soon as he entered, Yan stopped his body upright.

“Hmm~.”

The head instructor was standing still in front of the side door.

He stroked his chin with his index finger and chuckled.

“Did you do well?”

At that, Yan’s eyes twitched.

‘You’re acting smart when you’ve already seen everything.’

He remembered when he came out of the royal prison a while ago.

He pressed down on Jacques’ words, who said it was unfair to the other trainees, as if he was contemptuous.

Maybe he was looking forward to this event since then?

No, he definitely was.

“So you planned to make it like this from the beginning.”

“Two birds with one stone? I wanted to give Jacques a shock because he was too arrogant lately, but I didn’t know you would kill him.”

“Then you should have stopped me. Didn’t you come out to watch?”

“Me? What are you talking about? I didn’t see anything. If I did, I would have stopped you.”

The head instructor said with a pity.

‘What bullshit.’

Yan spat out a curse as he saw his hateful expression.

The gaze he felt when he started interrogating Jacques was definitely the head instructor’s.

Gloomy and secretive.

Who else in this training camp could send such a gaze?

Yan hid his inner thoughts and said something like ‘I see.’

The head instructor turned his body.

“Anyway, we’ll start the second test tomorrow, so go and sleep. Yawn~.”

He checked that Yan’s condition was fine and walked to his office with a yawn.

Yan looked at his back and headed to the dormitory.

‘Does he have no intention of telling me about the Revolutionary Army yet?’

He thought he would ask about that, but it ended more blandly than he thought.

* * *

The next morning.

The instructors were standing at the edge of the central hall, holding signs with the words east, west, south, and north.

The trainees felt the tension rise as they realized that the second test was about to begin.

“From today, you will leave for the battlefield and carry out your assigned missions.”

Some of the trainees tilted their heads at the head instructor’s words.

Battlefield? Fighting place?

Can we leave this place?

The head instructor smiled as if he noticed their questions and continued.

“Yes, from today, you will go outside. You must have been suffocated to death by staying in the training camp all this time, right?”

Some of the trainees brightened their eyes at that.

Roman was one of them.

The head instructor chuckled as he saw him.

“You can try to escape if you think you can. By the way, this time, not only the instructors, but also the elites from the Special Task Force will be watching you.”

Roman’s expression twisted.

He didn’t know how great the elites of the Special Task Force were.

But judging by how confidently he spoke, he must have been well prepared for escape.

“The battlefields you will head to are four. East, west, south, and north.”

The head instructor explained about them.

The eastern death, adjacent to the land of the undead and the dead.

The western weirdness, where strange monsters and mysterious phenomena occur.

The southern blaze, where all kinds of pirates appear and the hot sun rises.

The northern cold, where the land is frozen all year round and adjacent to the barbarian tribes.

None of them were easy places.

A trainee raised his hand.

“Can we choose the battlefield we want to go to?”

The head instructor smirked.

“Yeah. You can go wherever you want.”

The trainee’s face brightened at that.

It meant that he could volunteer to go where the trainee he followed was going.

This time, Lorena raised her hand.

“Are the missions different for each battlefield?”

“Yeah. They are different for each battlefield. But don’t worry, there won’t be any difference in difficulty.”

Kasa, who heard that, spoke to the trainee next to him.

“Tell the kids to come to the east.”

He seemed to call his forces to the east.

He looked confident in his eyes, as if he had some way.

Roman, too, as if he couldn’t lose, called Jake, who had escaped with him, and said.

“We’re going to the west.”

“West… West? Wouldn’t it be better to go to the south or the north?”

“I don’t like hot or cold.”

Jake made a ridiculous expression at that.

He was going to the west, where he didn’t know what would happen, just because of that?

He tried to change Roman’s mind, but his determination was firm.

In the end, Jake made a sad face and went to tell the trainees who followed Roman.

And the upper ranks who had allied with each other, the lower ranks who had not yet made a decision, all decided to go to the south.

They thought it would be easier to deal with pirates, who were also human, than to fight undead or monsters.

“Decide well in 10 minutes and go to the place you want to volunteer and line up.”

As the head instructor’s words ended, the trainees gathered in groups and headed to the instructors holding the signs.

The east was Kasa and his followers, about eighty.

The west was Roman and his subordinates, about fifty.

The south were the trainees who did not belong to either of those two forces, about sixty.

And the north had very few trainees who volunteered, unlike the other regions.

The region was characterized by the cold that endangered their lives all year round.

The trainees were reluctant to go to the north, as they could lose their lives from the cold alone.

Also, the fact that Cruel, who had a vicious temperament, volunteered was one of the reasons why the others shunned him.

“What are you doing here?”

“What, fuck. I said I’m going.”

“……You’re still vulgar.”

“What?”

“I said you’re vulgar, do you want me to say it again?”

“Lo, Lorena, please ignore him.”

“What? You pig-like thing!”

“Eek!”

“Sigh.”

Yan sighed deeply as he watched the trainee hiding behind Lorena.

It felt like a hard time from the start.

The number of people heading to the north was four, including himself.

Cruel, Lorena, and the trainee named ‘Charl’ who was stuck next to her.

* * *

A train station near the training camp.

The trainees arrived quickly thanks to the gate they took.

They looked around and muttered.

“Is this place unused by anyone else?”

“Yeah… It’s kind of eerie.”

It was quiet for a place that operated one of the empire’s finest products, the ‘train’.

There were only rails and chairs to sit on, and no ticket booths or other amenities.

And most of all, there were no other passengers besides them.

Whooosh-!

The trains that stopped at the station honked their horns.

It meant they were about to depart.

Most of the trainees looked at the trains with curious faces.

Most of them were seeing the train for the first time in their lives.

One of the instructors who led them shouted.

“From now on, you will split into east, west, south, and north!”

The east was platform 1.

The west was 2, the south was 3, and the north was 4.

Unlike platforms 1, 2, and 3, which were crowded, platform 4 was deserted.

The instructor who led them from the front took out four train tickets from his pocket and handed them to each of them.

“You just have to get off at the station written on this ticket. When you arrive at the station, a special agent will be waiting for you. Just follow him.”

Yan checked the ticket he received.

There was the departure and destination, and a counterfeit-proof character and the seal of the transportation bureau that seemed to be made by magic.

Gillimling Station → Beowulfing Station
“Beowulfing?”

Cruel’s face twisted.

He had a hunch when he heard the north, but he didn’t expect to go to Lorena’s family’s side.

‘Damn it!’

He had poured out all kinds of insults to Lorena.

If the Beowulf family found out about this, this test would be quite painful.

Cruel turned his head to Yan.

“What, got something to say?”

He bit his teeth at Yan’s calm question.
‘It’s because of that bastard that I volunteered for the north.’

He volunteered for the north as soon as Yan did, hoping to kill him when they were alone.

But he would be lucky if he didn’t die by the Beowulf knights before he could do anything to Yan.

Lorena had been called the ‘Forbidden Flower of the North Wall’ since long ago.

And that fact was well-known even by the Dwight family, who had a central position.

Whooosh-!

A train entered platform 4.

The large and black-painted train was so majestic that anyone who saw it for the first time would be intimidated.

“……Wow.”

Charl opened her mouth and looked at the train.

Clang. Clang.

The train started to slow down with a screeching sound.

Click.

A small door opened between the trains and the conductor asked them.

“Are you the customers boarding?”

Cruel stepped forward and handed over his ticket.

Click.

“Yes, confirmed. Have a nice trip.”

The conductor took the ticket and confirmed it, then punched a hole and returned it to Cruel.

Seeing that, Charl, Lorena, and Yan boarded the train in order.

The conductor checked their tickets and shouted to the front.

“All aboard! Departure!”

At the same time, the train honked its horn and left the station.

* * *

They were assigned to the third class.

It was a place where they had laid shabby chairs in the cargo compartment, so it looked miserable.

Cruel sat down in his seat and grumbled.

“I can’t believe I have to sit in this garbage-like place.”

He glanced at the other trainees.

Lorena and Charl sat together by the window and stared quietly at the outside, and Yan sat them to them and closed his eyes.

‘Hehe, peace and quiet.’

Cruel took out a small knife from his pocket.

He didn’t want to risk breaking it by taking out the sword on his waist.

Then he pulled up his mana and wrapped it around the knife.

It was a sword aura that had a definite shape, not the wavering one from two years ago.

Cruel checked Yan’s breathing again, just in case.

It was steady, and he breathed thinly and long, as if he was asleep.

‘Now’s my chance!’

Cruel stabbed the knife he was holding toward Yan, who was sleeping without knowing anything.

His target was the carotid artery in his neck.

Evil!

As he almost reached the end of the artery, Cruel’s eyes filled with ecstasy.

It was then.

Clack.

The knife that was reaching out stopped abruptly.

It was because Yan, who had opened his eyes, grabbed his hand.

“What are you doing?”

Cruel’s face hardened.

‘Damn it.’

He had been trying to pull his hand back by pulling up his mana, but it was as stiff as a rock.

Yan smiled at him.

“How many punches do you want?”

* * *

An hour later.

Yan leaned his chin and looked at the scenery outside the window.

And next to him was Cruel.

“Ugh. Ugh.”

He groaned in pain with something like a cloth in his mouth.

His face was like dough, swollen all over, and there were many places with bruises.

He had been beaten by Yan for an hour with his mouth shut.

‘Someday, I will surely…!’

Cruel thought he would get his revenge someday, but then.

“This bastard, still not sober.”

Whack.

He lost consciousness by Yan’s fist.