The Sequel to the Romance Fantasy Was a Zombie Apocalypse – Chapter 70

“Come on! You need to maintain your pace, Young Lady! If you slow down any more, you won’t meet the standards!”

“Gah… Haah… Hek…”

The bright autumn sun shines down on the soldier training grounds located within the royal palace.

Esmela is running back and forth between two markers drawn on the ground, spaced about 20 meters apart.

Unlike her usual dress or the adventurer’s leather armor she wore before, Esmela is dressed in light athletic wear with her hair tied in a ponytail.

The way she runs, gasping for breath and stumbling as if about to collapse, looks quite precarious.

“I can’t… I can’t do it! It’s my limit!”

As soon as her foot touches one end, Esmela plops down onto the ground.

It seems she is really exhausted, as she gives up on her noble facade and sits cross-legged, head hanging low, panting without a trace of the dignity expected from the Ducal Family.

“Good work. Now, that makes 85 laps of running back and forth…”

I jot down her record in the notebook I brought.

It’s surprisingly high. Compared to a standard trained adult male back in Korea, it’s almost remarkable.

Of course, by this world’s standards, it only puts her a bit above rookie Hunters.

“Gah… Hah… Hey…”

Maybe she’s too out of breath to care about titles anymore, Esmela just calls me indiscriminately.

“Yes, Young Lady.”

“Is this… correct?”

“Of course. There’s nothing better than this for measuring your cardio endurance.”

“Haah… Hah…”

After a long while of harsh panting, Esmela finally manages to catch her breath and asks again.

“So, how did I do?”

“Hmm… You did better than I expected. But that’s just my opinion. It seems you still need more training.”

“Sigh… What is this even about… Anyway, this is the end of the measurements, right?”

“No? There are still five more to go.”

“What? You want me to do this five more times?!”

Esmela gasps in surprise and looks up at me.

“Of course. Cardio endurance isn’t the only aspect of your athletic abilities, is it? We need to assess your current status from multiple perspectives. The remaining ones are core strength, standing long jump, grip strength, sit-ups, and forward bend. That’s five events.”

“…”

Esmela stares at me with her mouth agape, looking as if she can’t believe what she’s hearing. Sweat is still pouring down her face.

“You’re trying to torture me under the guise of training, aren’t you?! You’re holding a grudge for how I treated you before, aren’t you? Plus, all these exercises are things I’ve never even heard of! Where on earth did you learn these?”

“Of course not. I can swear that this training has no ulterior motives. And you don’t need to worry about the source. I got it from a very reliable person.”

From a solid young man named Park Tae-han from South Korea.

And honestly, seeing Esmela struggle under my instructions stirred something within me, but I firmly deny having any ulterior motives. That’s just the way it is.

“You wouldn’t dare say you can’t do it, would you? Before we started, you swore to follow all my orders during training, right?”

“But…”

“…for the honor of the family.”

“Ugh.”

Of course, I anticipated her intense resistance, so before we started the measurements, I made sure to get her to promise that she would treat Lanit as a master rather than a butler during training. I didn’t forget to ask her to stake Herta’s name on that promise as well.

‘Why make such a big deal out of something trivial…’ Even while grumbling, Esmela accepted my request without a second thought.

And now, she’s probably regretting that slip-up.

“Chin up, Young Lady. This is the hardest of the six exercises; the others won’t be as tough. Come on! Get up. We need to move on to the next measurement.”

I offer my right hand to her, still sitting on the ground.

“…You’ll pay for this later.”

Esmela glares at my hand but reluctantly grabs it and stands up.

“Urrgghh-”

Sizzle, sizzle-

“Hold on! Just a little longer!”

A sharp pain shoots through my entire body.

My muscles spasm wildly, and mana infused with electricity courses through me like a raging current.

It’s agonizing, I’m about to go mad—

“Agrhk- Stop!!”

I shake off Esmela’s grip on both my arms.

“Haah… Hah… I really thought I was going to die…”

“Stop the dramatics.”

Esmela brushes off her hands nonchalantly and stands in front of me.

“Take a breather. Next up is the dynamic mana measurement.”

“What!? I can’t do that anymore! I’m going to die! You’re using this training as an excuse to torture me, right? Forcing mana into my circuits to expand them is ridiculous! I’ve never heard of such a method before!”

“Not at all. I can promise with my honor. And you don’t need to worry about where this comes from. This is a mana adaptation training passed down in the House of Herta for generations.”

Esmela wears a smug grin that only someone with ulterior motives would have as she says that.

“You promised, right? That you would follow my instructions unconditionally during magic lessons.”

“Ugh…”

Before we started the lessons, I echoed her claim that it was unfair for only her to swear an oath.

I expected things would turn rocky after observing how her demeanor shifted after our little promise, which had been soft and yielding beforehand…

“What exactly makes this ridiculous excuse a training regimen for increasing mana capacity…”

The method she proposed was straightforward. We sit facing each other, and Esmela holds my arm, using her skin to channel a specific elemental mana into me.

The principle behind her claimed training is that by forcibly channeling a significantly greater amount of mana than usual, my circuit will expand as a result.

Of course, the immense pain that comes with this process is just a minor side effect that Esmela conveniently left out.

“No matter how I think about it, this is just electric torture, isn’t it? Next, will it be waterboarding? Or ice torture, perhaps?”

“How dare you! You need to experience various attributes to adapt your mana circuits to them. Now, straighten your back and extend your arms. We’re starting again.”

After that, in a small study within one of the royal palace buildings, the sound of my anguished screams from enduring all sorts of torments under the guise of training echoed, mixed with the high-pitched laughter of an amused Esmela, for hours on end.

“Urrgh…”

Every move sends waves of agony through my body.

Dragging my feet, I finally reach my bedroom, gripping the doorknob with what little strength I have left, and after turning it with difficulty, I finally manage to step inside.

I muster the last bit of my energy to fling off my outer clothing onto the bed, sprawling out atop it.

“Urrrggh!”

And that was a mistake. My body is now in such a hyper-sensitive state that even this soft mattress feels like a bed of nails.

“Hah…”

A groan escapes my lips involuntarily, not easily subdued by the lingering pain.

In this state, I can’t even think about changing into my nightclothes.

Eventually, giving up on rising, I lie on the bed in nothing but my underwear, staring blankly at the ceiling.

…

According to Esmela’s explanation, the pain I’m experiencing now is an inevitable side effect of training my mana circuits.

Just like muscles require a recovery process after injury to grow, mana circuits inevitably sustain damage during forced expansion, and they’re said to expand during the restoration process.

“I don’t feel any changes, though…”

With a flicker of hope, I open my status screen to see if there are any changes to my stats.

Mana Amount C+, Mana Manipulation B. Nothing has changed at all.

Well, it wouldn’t be reasonable to expect results in just one day. If handling mana were that easy, I would’ve figured it out on my own by now.

…

As I continue to stare at the status screen, which I’ve already checked, I suddenly find myself switching tabs to the story screen, almost as if entranced.

[Romance in Arkesia]

[Love and Dead]

The familiar title screen I’ve seen many times before.

The sequel title and subtitle logo of [Romance in Arkesia], where I was forcibly made to become the protagonist of the game’s world without ever having played it.

However,

Error.

Normally, a list of chapter titles should be laid out below, but… the list has vanished without a trace, leaving just that word in the vast space.

Error. What could that mean?

Does it signify that I have strayed from the planned main storyline? Or does it mean this “System Eye” ability itself is malfunctioning?

I don’t know. Just like before, I have no idea about the anomaly appearing before me this time either.

But there’s a vague feeling that stirs within me.

The world I’m living in right now, the world of [RoinA], especially the world of the sequel that follows, feels like it’s gone wildly off course.

…

Staring at the error message for an extended period, I suddenly fall asleep, almost as if waiting for an answer to appear.