The Age of Adaptation
Debris surged upward in a violent burst.
In the midst of it, Hinawa glanced sideways at Hatsu-moto beside her. Fortunately, he’d barely finished healing in time to come with her.
That bastard...
She turned her head and looked down.
There, reflected in her bloodshot eyes, was the man calmly sheathing his greatsword.
She’d expected him to come.
After all, she had only barely kept Edgar alive and left him behind like bait.
He would have made contact, and by now it should have been more than enough time for him to kill Yoo Sung-hwan and move to the next point.
How is he already here?
She knew this place, the mission zone called the Corpse Nest of the Pit, inside and out.
The tunnels they’d dug, the distance from each point to here.
She’d calculated everything down to the last detail.
It was true that Yoo Sung-hwan’s unexpected combat power had delayed them, but there was no way a teammate could have arrived at this hour.
Thud!
Hinawa and Hatsu-moto dropped down.
The upper half of the debris, split neatly in two, crashed to the ground below.
Rattle! The sound rang out sharply.
Only then did she realize they’d been driven away from the hut.
She looked over at the Rotem who had already taken the hut for himself.
That wasn’t some thoughtless attack...
For an instant, it had seemed like a simple, brute-force strike.
But the bastard had done it with cold calculation.
As they rose, he had cleanly split only the upper section of the debris where Yoo Sung-hwan had fallen.
With that one sword stroke, he’d lost the hostage and created distance at the same time.
She’d already known he wasn’t ordinary—he had abilities of a commander, talents she’d never even heard of—but...
To that extent?
Had he analyzed all that in a split second?
Hinawa muttered to herself and checked her own gear.
The Blind Claw she’d used to neutralize Yoo Sung-hwan. Her firearm had been ruined long ago.
Hatsu-moto, who served as her helper, was in a similar state.
He drew out his collapsible spear, extending it long and straight.
“Hinawa. It’s just the two of us. Think of the achievement. You’re not planning to run, are you?”
At Hatsu-moto’s low voice, she nodded.
They had the numbers. If one of them drew the enemy’s attention, the other could go for the hostage.
Simple, but reliable.
Hinawa exchanged a look with him.
A long weapon was better against a greatsword than a short one.
“You take that bastard.”
“Got it.”
Hatsu-moto leveled his spear and moved first.
He had fooled them for a long time during the talent-introduction phase.
Rotem would certainly recognize that and respond accordingly.
He’ll think I’m the one with Perception Calm. Hatsu-moto will assume scent detection.
In truth, it was Grip Strength Enhancement for her, and Shuffle for Hatsu-moto.
That should be enough to punch through the bastard’s guard.
The exchange of glances was over.
Hinawa ran to the right, Hatsu-moto straight ahead.
He’s handing over the treatment spray.
Of course, the injury wasn’t something that spray could heal.
It had been inflicted precisely with that in mind.
Hinawa grinned as she closed the distance.
Just as expected, instead of using the spray, he set it down beside Yoo Sung-hwan.
Now they were close. She could hear his voice.
“...Let’s kill those assholes fast and get back.”
Could he really?
Hinawa checked the cover around him.
As she shortened the distance, she brought her firearm to bear.
Tat-tat-tat!
She ducked behind a rock. In the meantime, Hatsu-moto kept closing in.
A dull impact rang out.
At that sound, she kicked off the ground immediately.
While they dragged things out like this, they had to secure Yoo Sung-hwan.
They had to turn this into a perfect victory.
Level 1 of body enhancement. With her sharpened eyesight and thought speed, she could see the exchange of blows between Hatsu-moto and Rotem clearly.
There!
Hinawa let out an inward cheer at the sight before her.
Hatsu-moto’s spear had cleanly knocked up the underside of the gun.
Shuffle—changing the position of the hand gripping the spear, he had definitely connected with the firearm.
If they were both forced into close combat, victory was as good as theirs.
Once you had a hostage and occupied the rear, the enemy had no choice.
She watched the gun being struck upward. He was holding his ground.
So what if he held it?
The force going from bottom to top was stronger.
How is he supposed to endure that with the same Level 1 body enhancement?
She didn’t know the details, because for the union you didn’t need the full user data, but the entry requirement was a cumulative 200,000 points.
She hadn’t even considered the possibility that Rotem had reached Level 2 body enhancement.
Was there really a user who had spent 400,000 points just on body enhancement and still equipped himself with gear like that?
She herself had to keep hunting users like this to build up enough points.
Maybe that was why reality seemed to slip away from her when she saw him enduring without so much as a change in expression and then driving Hatsu-moto back with a kick.
What? What is this? What the hell is going on?
Hinawa could only stare blankly.
Hatsu-moto rolled along the ground.
He quickly regained his posture and thrust the spear forward.
Shuffle. A sharp snap of the wrist accelerated the motion, and once more he shifted the hand gripping the spear so that it met the gun muzzle.
The gun exploded as a bullet slipped wild from the barrel.
Rotem twisted away from the flying shards of metal.
Seeing an opening, Hatsu-moto kicked off the ground.
Shuffle again, and he swung the left hand holding the spear.
That was when they both heard it clearly.
“Hsssss—!”
The harsh sound of his breathing.
After that, they couldn’t even tell what had happened.
Which was why Hinawa couldn’t tell whether what she was seeing now was real.
Kwa-jak!
With a chilling sound, Hatsu-moto’s upper body spun through the air.
His lower half collapsed to the ground together with the spear, now split in two.
When had he grabbed it, and when had he swung it with such force?
Shit!
Hinawa stopped thinking.
Grinding her lips until they nearly split, she hurried her steps.
The hostage. Secure Yoo Sung-hwan.
That was the only thought driving her forward.
While running, she signaled the walkie-talkie. If she sent one more signal, they’d scan the Death Spoil Egg.
I survive. I survive, and with better weapons and better gear, I’ll keep surviving until the end, even when Dark Cover comes! I’ll live to the end!
He was right in front of her now. One grab was all it would take.
She reached out.
With Grip Strength Enhancement, she would seize Yoo Sung-hwan by the throat and subdue Rotem as a bonus.
Then it would be over. Over, except—
“Ah.”
Yoo Sung-hwan, whose face she could only see from behind, suddenly toppled to the right.
That was it. He had reached his limit and lost consciousness, and the situation had overlapped into a clumsy miss. A truly absurd, fucked-up turn of events.
Uttering a stupid sound, Hinawa lifted her head.
A massive shadow had already fallen over her. The greatsword came down.
When had he moved? When had he swung?
At last, Hinawa understood.
He had never been Level 1 body enhancement to begin with.
Level 2...
Her fighting spirit evaporated.
She hurriedly signaled the walkie-talkie.
But the one and only lifeline did not come down.
She didn’t even have room to use Grip Strength Enhancement to catch the sword stroke.
“You son of a biiii—!”
Kwa-jik!
That was Hinawa’s final scream.
Brain matter sprayed from her skull, split clean in half.
Tsk. Yoo Sung-jun clicked his tongue and kicked the corpse.
“You really thought I’d come here blindly?”
He spat a thick gob of saliva onto the road with contempt.
Then Yoo Sung-jun rushed to his younger brother.
The condition was critical. The side of his body had been ripped open and was hanging in tatters.
He had to be treated in the Enter Room as soon as possible.
“Hey, Sung-hwan. Get a hold of yourself, idiot. Hey!”
His heart thudded with panic.
He kept swallowing the dry saliva that rose in his throat over and over again.
He called out while patting his younger brother’s now-pale cheek.
He hurriedly sprayed healing foam and checked the injury.
Fortunately, his brother slowly opened his eyes.
“Ugh... the gun... I smashed them all... I did good, right?”
“Yeah, you did great. If you want more praise, keep your head together.”
“Hah... damn it. I was supposed to heal you and Jeyca noona. That’s why I studied so hard. So why does this look like this...?”
“You can do that next time. It couldn’t be helped. You held on well. That’s enough.”
The walkie-talkie crackled at just that moment.
It was the frequency he’d set with Jeyca.
—I killed them! I secured the Death Spoil Egg!
Good. Yoo Sung-jun answered without hesitation.
“Break it immediately. My brother is in critical condition.”
—Y-yes, understood!
He hadn’t gone alone for nothing.
His division of labor with Jeyca had been perfect.
She was a reliable teammate.
Mission cleared. Moving to the Enter Room.
He’d saved his little brother.
***
Had he blacked out for a moment?
It was the first time. So this was what fainting felt like.
I don’t have any strength left in my body.
When he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was the pure white space of the Enter Room.
The pain was gone.
Yoo Sung-hwan raised only his upper body and groped at his side.
He touched bare skin, no wound left behind.
“You’re awake.”
It was his brother’s voice.
When he turned his head, he saw him sitting there too.
But one person was missing.
“Where’s Jeyca noona?”
“She said she had something to do and went back first. Something about wanting me to buy her a piece of equipment? Said she was the one who saved you.”
He came over, chuckling.
There was a lot he wanted to know. How had he figured it out, and how had he known the egg was hidden, and cleared the mission?
“Curious?”
“Did it show on my face?”
“It’s your habit. Whenever you get curious about something, your forehead twitches.”
At his brother’s gesture toward his own brow, Yoo Sung-hwan laughed awkwardly.
“Honestly, I thought I was going to die there. How did you pull it off?”
“The mission?”
“Yeah. Unless they’re complete idiots, they would’ve hidden it tight.”
“No matter how carefully you erase your tracks and hide it, you can’t hide from Appraisal Eye. I just made a guess. They attacked us because of the achievement, right?”
“You knew?”
“I heard it from Edgar. They probably kept him alive on purpose and used him as bait. That was their mistake.”
“I see... then the Edgar party—”
“Wiped out.”
Ah. Yoo Sung-hwan opened his mouth and checked the notification window.
One achievement stood out.
[Last Standing Squad: 4,500 Points]
It seemed to be an achievement awarded when only one party survived in a union mission.
“You saw the achievement, right? That was one of the reasons they did it. So I thought about the cleanest way to crush them. I figured there might be a way out for them that I couldn’t afford to miss.”
He had factored their behavior into the disappearance of the Death Spoil Egg.
It was easy enough to infer that they’d made an escape route through the egg.
“That’s why I asked Jeyca to check with her Appraisal Eye. A dead city without a Death Spoil, and among all the other buildings, the one that was yellow.”
The sniper from Hinawa’s party, who had hidden the egg, was there.
Because it was impossible to conceal a “threat,” that had been Jeyca’s own style of tracking.
“So your Appraisal Eye is what saved you.”
“Wow... maybe I should buy her something really nice.”
“She said it like a joke and left, but are you actually going to buy her something?”
“Of course. If she helped us, even as a teammate, I should repay her properly.”
“Then what are you going to give me?”
His brother pointed at himself with a grin.
Yoo Sung-hwan shrugged and got to his feet.
“I’ll make you food, I guess. You go nuts over the stew I make.”
“That’d be enough.”
It was time to rest now.
After sending his younger brother off ahead of him, Yoo Sung-jun checked the settlement window.
Settlement complete
Infector subjugation: 18,700 points
Slayer: 2,000 points
Last Standing Squad: 4,500 points
Collector: 1,800 points
Mission Destroyer: 4,500 points
Clear Reward: 200,000 points
Total: 231,500 points
In an instant, he’d earned more than 200,000 points.
It made sense why Hinawa’s party had been so obsessed with hunting users.
There would be more and more people like that from here on out.
I need to change how union missions are handled.
Because he trusted only half of what he saw, and distrusted the other half, he’d been able to respond.
As time went on, he would have to do missions with other users more and more often.
This had been his first union mission, and he’d been a little rough around the edges.
He couldn’t respond the same way next time.
He needed to answer with certainty, or prepare ahead of time.
Either make them fear that any trickery would get them killed, or make sure he already knew which users were trustworthy.
Yoo Sung-jun decided to try the latter first.
I should meet Igrato once.
After Dark Cover, the reconstruction of South Korea.
The man was the administrator of Sunshine Cover, preparing to retake the bunker for the sake of that starting point.
He wanted to meet him in person, outside a mission, in reality.
After that, he could consider whether or not to accept the proposal he’d made earlier.
“Loki. Let me out.”
[Understood.]
He closed his eyes.
Once he focused, he could see the level of his innate talent.
[Breathing Lv. 2]
Because he survived, he grew stronger.
Let’s prepare for tomorrow.
With the points he’d earned, he could finally purchase gear modification—and at last, what he’d been waiting for.
The Omega Suit.
With anticipation in his chest, he headed home.
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