Chapter 60
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 60
Chapter Title: Tangled and Intertwined (4)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Ugh..."
A massive explosion. I staggered backward.
The gnoll, which looked like one of their elites, was engulfed in the blast and died instantly.
I had seen it clearly. That bluish energy it used as a shield.
While the others were armed with crude melee weapons, some of them stood out.
I didn't know what world or what kind of items they were from, but they were clearly special ones who had received gifts from a Player.
"...I'll gladly take these for now."
I collected the ores that appeared with the vibration of the phone hidden in my clothes.
The Legion was watching me. And it was helping me.
I had to fight, even like this, to show them my intent.
The limit for Legion Ore I could receive at one time was three.
And I knew how much bio-energy it took to create just one of these.
Each and every one was a blow that packed a serious punch.
"?!"
I hurled one of them with all my might at a kobold that was pulling some crap on top of the garrison's barrier.
I'd been watching it for a while; that kobold was casting something like a buff spell on the gnolls.
Naturally, all sorts of attacks, from machine guns to grenades to rifles, flew at it, but the creature protected itself with a barrier.
The fact that they could somehow withstand artillery fire while charging head-on was likely thanks to spells like that.
"Aaargh!"
"Another explosion...!"
My allies faltered at the successive blasts.
In the end, it was a one-trick pony that exploded by detonating all its energy at once, but I had succeeded in killing the bothersome kobold and destroying its barrier.
However, this was war. A great war where armies of tens of thousands clashed.
I hesitated for a moment, seeing the endless swarm of enemies crawling toward us. They quickly scaled the crude, hastily made fence.
"The front line is breached... right n—"
"What? Breached?"
To make matters worse, the voice coming from the radio of the comms soldier next to me plunged us into deeper despair.
'I have to be ready.'
I steeled myself. If things went wrong, we could be completely defeated here.
The enemy was currently a coalition of two forces.
Low-class monsters on par with goblins, which we called gnolls and kobolds.
But just as the goblins I'd met before had shown, they were Units, and because of that, they benefited from racial traits and a Player's help.
I still didn't know the limits of that power.
One thing was certain: they had some kind of powerful command structure, as they were relentlessly pushing forward, stepping over the corpses of their own kind while braving a hail of machine-gun fire and explosions.
It was an incredibly simple yet effective strategy.
We severely lacked the Hunter power needed to stop their special forces, who were armed with gifts and spells.
They used these special units to lead the charge, twisting through the storm of fire to infiltrate our lines and slaughter our soldiers.
"You bastard..."
I kicked away a gnoll that was about to attack a machine gunner and entered a contest of strength.
This one had also done something to its body. Despite being short enough to only reach my chest, its strength was on par with mine, even with my own physical enhancements.
Barely shaking its arm off, I used my longer legs to kick it away.
Then, with the sword I'd been holding—one I'd taken from them—I struck it again and again. Until it was dead.
I had dealt with one, but honestly, the situation looked hopeless.
"Everyone, we need to fall back! There are too many of them!"
"B-but..."
I urged the soldiers to retreat. I had no idea what the field commander was doing; the order to withdraw still hadn't come.
"But Hunter-nim. We have to protect our positions, our guns. We have to keep firing."
Someone stepped forward in response to my words.
The fire direction controller, wearing sergeant stripes. His combat uniform was already soaked in blood, though whose it was, no one could tell.
"That is our duty. We are soldiers."
His voice trembled, but his eyes did not.
I knew it instinctively. It was time to choose.
Should I fight alongside them until every last one of those monsters was dead, or should I run away?
Sure, I was a reservist, but here, I was a civilian, not a soldier. In fact, I wasn't even a mercenary. Just a month ago, I was nothing more than a college student studying for exams.
"...Please, shoot the ones I point out first."
After a moment of silence, my face twisted.
[The moment a mere college student becomes a true warrior.]
"Don't talk nonsense! This is..."
[Have you not considered that this might be your true nature?]
As I ran, my breath caught in my throat.
Me, a warrior? That was ridiculous.
If only I hadn't been forced to become a Player and get dragged into this game.
[Haven't you been dreaming of it ever since that day? That if you had power, you'd want to fight.]
"Hah. What do you know?"
I cleaved the head of a gnoll that had charged at me with a sword.
My face flushed, and I felt sick, as if a long-hidden secret had been exposed.
It wasn't that the voice was wrong. Still, I had thought I'd come to terms with reality long ago.
"Look at that. How am I supposed to beat them? Isn't this just a pointless death?"
A bitter laugh escaped me. Even though I was the one who had charged in first.
I could see the enemies swarming before me.
"Everyone, get out of the way!"
That was when they appeared.
People who deserved the title of hero far more than someone like me.
A hot, massive wave of fire swept through.
The curtain of flames instantly engulfed the enemy.
The power of fire incinerated their flimsy buff spells in a single strike.
Ji Chang-hyun, an S-rank Hunter from Korea. A man I had only ever seen on TV, had just brushed past me.
*
"Why did they suddenly retreat? Even with an S-ranker here, the reinforcing Hunters were only a dozen strong."
"I just heard the reason."
In the middle of the garrison, where they were busy tending to the wounded.
Robert returned from somewhere, his face haggard.
"Our superiors. You know them, right? Chris Baker and Cha Ji-yeon. Right after the reinforcements arrived, those two led their teams and hit the enemy's main base."
"J-just the two of them... no, with just a single squad?!"
Everyone was aghast. They clicked their tongues at the recklessness but praised the courage.
But I understood Cha Ji-yeon's—no, the Player controlling her's—intent.
'They don't have anyone strong enough to match an S-rank Hunter yet.'
This insane game had completely broken balance. No Player or Unit ever got a chance to change their initial partner.
Gnolls and kobolds were, at their core, the lowest-class monsters.
No matter how much equipment you gave them or what spells you taught them, while they might be a threat in a group, an individual's strength was not that great.
'The reason they waited for Ji Chang-hyun's group to arrive was obviously because of the Execution Tickets.'
At this point, they probably had two, maybe three, Execution Tickets. Or perhaps none at all.
That's why they deliberately waited for Ji Chang-hyun, to confuse the targeting.
If they succeeded, it would be an easy score, looting an undefended base. If they failed and got ganged up on by Execution Tickets, from that Player's perspective, they would have only lost two pawns.
I had no idea what kind of alien they were, but they were impressive.
"Where are you going?!"
"...To get some rest."
"R-right, you should rest well for today."
Robert didn't stop me, perhaps because I looked particularly unwell.
But I wasn't headed for the barracks.
"..."
I went to the place where the bodies of the dead had been collected. There seemed to be at least a few hundred of them, covered in white sheets.
Among the many, I found one person.
The sword she used in life lay beside her as a memento, broken in half.
[Was she not merely a passing acquaintance?]
"I see now that you're not human."
I wasn't sad. Yoon Soo-ah was, as the voice said, just a passing acquaintance.
But that didn't mean I felt nothing. I was just angry. She had saved my life once, but I couldn't save hers.
"What does the Legion say? You must know how I'm feeling right now."
[It is similarly enraged. The reason is simple. Because you are angry.]
"...Is that so?"
A bitter taste filled my mouth. Fighting them myself made me realize it even more.
The Legion was strong. Not just the Legion, but even the Ruin Fungi it had fought against could probably swallow those gnolls and kobolds whole if they were dropped into this Demon World.
"Did you know Soo-ah?"
Just then, someone spoke from behind me.
The voice wasn't unfamiliar. I had definitely heard it before, on TV and elsewhere.
"Mr. Ji Chang-hyun?"
"I've heard... about you, Mr. Kang Shin-woo."
I was face-to-face with an S-rank Hunter, something I could have never dreamed of.
"Heard about me?"
"About what you did. Of course, all the Hunters fought desperately. But they're soldiers. They did their duty. You, however, are a civilian with no reason to fight, as I understand it."
His expression was strange, making it hard to guess his intentions for approaching me.
"I..."
"Soo-ah was my cousin."
"Ah."
"And Mr. Kang Shin-woo, don't you want to become stronger? In times like these, we need righteous and determined people like you to step up."
"Pardon?"
Caught off guard by the sudden barrage of questions, I asked dumbly.
I stealthily put my hand in my pocket and touched an ore.
This wasn't a bomb, but an ore that detected Players and Units.
"I will tell you everything—the secrets of Evolution, and the secrets of this world. I trust my judgment. As does my master."
Ji Chang-hyun's eyes sparkled. The detector in my hand grew hot.
Ji Chang-hyun, Korea's S-rank Hunter, was definitely involved in this game.