138) Chapter 20. Because I Hate Villains! (7)
Even if a fire appears extinguished on the surface, sometimes it still retains enough heat to ignite again.
A fire like that remains quietly dormant, holding only heat without fully cooling down, and then the moment an object with a lower ignition point than that heat falls nearby, it bursts back into flames.
Visible fire can rise to temperatures of several hundred degrees, and those several hundred degrees become more than enough to burn other objects.
And just like that, it becomes a massive fire once again.
“Fire!”
Along with someone shouting, people could be seen running in that direction.
Some held fire extinguishers, while others ran carrying the end of a fire hose they had brought from somewhere. Most of them looked like professionals used to handling situations like this.
“Wait.”
I unconsciously started following after them, only to be stopped by Instructor Justina, who came running out of the building.
“Where are you going?”
“Ah, um.”
Naturally, it was difficult to answer.
“The place you all need to go is that direction. Where the children are headed. This isn’t your responsibility.”
She was right.
We weren’t experts at putting out fires. We’d never learned rescue operations either.
And for nonprofessionals to run into a disaster scene was dangerous in itself.
“Let’s go.”
Soi grabbed my wrist and pulled.
So in the end, without being able to do anything, I had no choice but to follow behind Soi toward where the other children were heading.
I barely managed to turn my head and look back, and Instructor Justina winked one eye at me before running toward where the others were headed.
*
Since I had already told Instructor Justina about it, I was supposed to feel reassured.
I’d already warned her about the villains who would appear here.
But…….
What if, just what if—
There were far more villains than I knew about?
What if, like last time, they’d planned things even more thoroughly than in the novel? What if the witch showed up again?
“You don’t have to worry so much.”
Soi said.
“I’m sure they prepared for it.”
“Yeah.”
We were gathered in an open lot quite far away from the fire scene.
A parking lot where the flames hopefully wouldn’t spread.
Of course, if the fire truly turned into a massive wildfire, then standing in an open lot would become meaningless and we’d have to run as far away as possible.
But there still wasn’t really an atmosphere of evacuation yet.
The people injured in the fire were all in the hospital, so unless the flames reached the hospital, there wouldn’t be any need to evacuate yet.
“Your face is pale.”
Chae-yi said worriedly.
“It probably isn’t villains. They said they already caught them.”
“Yeah…….”
That was probably true. At the very least, the arsonist had been caught.
“It’s probably just lingering embers flaring up.”
“C-could there really still be embers after all this time?”
I asked at Hyeonji’s words.
They’d said the fire was extinguished two days ago. Since there hadn’t been any issues until now, that was why we were allowed to come here. They wouldn’t bring students to do volunteer work somewhere that still had active embers or a risk of reignition.
Maybe if we were second- or third-years, but we were first-years doing our very first volunteer activity.
But that was exactly why it bothered me. If they’d extinguished it that thoroughly, could the fire really flare up again?
“…….”
Not a trace remained of the playful atmosphere from barely ten minutes ago. This wasn’t the kind of mood where people joked about who was cute or cool or pretty.
“……There’s nothing to worry about.”
Hyeonji suddenly spoke up.
She raised her hand, lightly forming ice in her palm.
“No matter how hot the fire is, I can cool it down with my ability.”
“O-oh. Th-thank you…….”
Had Hyeonji been so frightened that she felt the need to say something like that? I suddenly felt embarrassed and twisted my body awkwardly.
“I can make a backfire too, you know?”
Soi cut in with a huff.
“And if villains really are behind this, I’ll take them down right away!”
Chae-yi declared with a grin.
“I-I.”
Jinwoo opened her mouth.
When everyone’s eyes—including mine—turned toward her, Jinwoo fidgeted for a moment before blushing and saying,
“I-I can hold your hand.”
“…….”
The others all opened their mouths.
……Well, I mean.
Jinwoo did need to hold my hand to use her ability.
But if she was going to use her ability anyway, wouldn’t it make more sense to hold Hyeonji’s hand instead of mine?
“I will too! Obviously I’d hold your hand too! I’d even hug your arm! I can make it so Rua isn’t scared at all!”
“Same here!? I can hold hands too! We even sleep holding hands!”
“N-no, um, guys.”
We weren’t the only ones here.
There were the other kids from our class, and even students from the other first-year classes all gathered nearby too.
At least our classmates just looked over like, There they go again, but the students from the other classes were craning their necks toward us like they were wondering what the hell we were talking about.
No, more importantly, Jinwoo.
You’re crossdressing as a guy right now.
If you say things like that, people are going to misunderstand, you know? Do you want the others thinking we’re dating?
……Though obviously not. A misunderstanding about dating might stop being a misunderstanding and somehow become reality before we even noticed.
Even though we’re both girls.
“…….”
Meanwhile, for the record, Hyeonji was just silently watching all of us.
How should I put it.
It looked like she wanted to join the conversation somehow, but didn’t know what she was supposed to say.
More specifically, like she wanted to say something equally ridiculous too, but couldn’t bring herself to.
Though somehow, if Hyeonji actually did that, I felt like it would be shocking in its own way—
“H-hey, everyone!”
But Soi and Chae-yi’s bickering was quickly interrupted by someone shouting.
It was the teacher.
The teachers, who had gathered us all and were discussing things intensely, shouted toward us.
“I think we’re going to have to move the patients! Alright, everyone line up!”
……Looks like the fire had gotten much worse.
*
In the original story, a large group of superhumans attacks the place where the students are gathered.
Their abilities were mostly simple. Breathing fire, freezing ice, moving dirt, blowing out powerful gusts of wind. But there weren’t any villains on Soi or Hyeonji’s level, and there wasn’t anyone with as much large-scale destructive power as that mole from before either.
Still, there were simply a lot of them. Around a dozen.
They directly started fires and charged toward where the students had gathered.
In the mole incident, it had been about holding a grudge against the students and seeking revenge.
But this time was completely different.
This was a kind of pleasure crime.
One member of their group had committed the original arson and been arrested, so they caused this incident claiming they were trying to rescue him.
The villains appearing in this work were often people like this—individuals who seemed to have no real connection to each other from incident to incident.
If they had one thing in common, it was probably that despite possessing superpowers, they all lived somewhat detached from society.
In other words, this was venting frustration.
The villains’ names were rarely described, but among them, there was one line that stood out particularly strongly.
[What makes me worse than everyone else!?]
That’s right. They had abilities that sounded like something straight out of novels, comics, or movies, but in reality were largely useless.
In modern society, where a gas stove was enough for fire and a refrigerator was enough for freezing things, simple, middling superpowers didn’t really provide any advantages.
The only thing those abilities let them do better than others was “taking out their anger.”
But this time, those villains never appeared.
Did the teachers subdue them first? Or did the principal manage to suppress things beforehand somehow?
The reason the arson itself hadn’t been prevented was because I didn’t know the exact location. ……No, even if I had known the location, honestly, I wasn’t even sure whether I would’ve said anything.
Still, I felt relieved that the villains hadn’t rushed in at this point. It made me think that maybe what I’d said had actually had some effect.
The students rushed into the hospital one after another, supporting patients as they moved them.
Some especially strong students simply lifted immobile patients outright.
There were quite a lot of first-year Academy students. If everyone moved in an orderly way without overlapping routes too much, they could relocate the critically ill patients very quickly.
And I had five hands.
With three hands, I supported three other patients, and with my remaining two—
“P-please, over here, please help her.”
At a young woman’s pleading request, I supported her.
“A-are you okay?”
“I don’t think I am.”
Hmm.
Yeah, sometimes people answered like that.
I understood. If someone was injured enough to be wrapped in bandages from head to toe, they might naturally respond that way.
But even so, it made answering difficult. If I said, “I see,” it sounded sarcastic, but if I said, “Ah, yes,” it sounded dismissive.
In the end, I missed the timing to reply and simply supported the woman.
“B-be careful.”
The other three hands could feel pain but were sturdy.
But my actual two hands weren’t like that. I’d trained as much as possible, but I wasn’t strong enough to be called physically powerful.
So while supporting the woman and helping her walk a few steps—
Suddenly, I felt something chilling against my ribs.
“Ah.”
“Shh.”
As I murmured, the woman whispered into my ear.
“If you scream, I’ll stab you right here.”
When I looked down, one of the woman’s fingertips was pressed against my side.
The shape of that finger had transformed into something like a scalpel.
“…….”
And I already knew this ability.
Because I’d seen it before.
A very long time ago.
Back when I was being held in Uncle Dohyun’s arms.