Chapter 47
Chapter 47
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 47
Chapter Title: This Is My First Live
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"Mom... I'm scared..."
"Jae-hyung, no! Pull yourself together!"
Jeong Jae-hyung, out on a rare family outing to see the autumn leaves with his parents, felt terror grip him as his fading consciousness struggled to push away the boulder that had crushed his lower body.
Numbness.
His body below the chest felt like it no longer belonged to him.
In his dimming vision, he saw his mother slapping his cheeks and sobbing. Her left arm hung limply at her side.
'Dislocated... Mom must be in so much pain... We need to get to the hospital...'
"Cough."
"Jae-hyung! No! Please, Jae-hyung!"
The clear blue sky was dotted with red.
Even so, his throat, which had felt completely blocked, eased a little.
He grasped his mother's hand as she frantically wiped his face.
"I'm okay... Mom, does your arm hurt? The ambulance will be here soon, cough!"
"Jae-hyung!"
Ah, his vision was blurring.
The colorful sky blended with the autumn leaves.
And then, an angel.
'...An... angel?'
His vision, reddened by the blood he had coughed up, turned blindingly white as light poured down.
The scene they arrived at by helicopter was horrific.
Piles of fallen rocks, people buried beneath them.
Their screams, mixed with trees and mud into a doughy mess, echoed through the mountains.
"The wind is too strong! It's too hard to stay stable!"
The helicopter rocked so violently that even rappelling down was difficult, let alone landing. The pilot shouted.
Seol A-yoon wrapped her arms around my waist and said,
"Lady Roha, hold on tight to me. We'll go down first!"
She flung open the helicopter door, and her telekinesis firmly caught us as we dropped.
We descended slowly, our faces growing grave as the screams sharpened into focus the closer we got.
The site was even more hellish than expected.
A few paramedics from the 119 ambulance service were rushing about, but there were far too many injured.
And further below, the terrain had collapsed into what looked like a cliff.
Not even a hand could reach those buried underneath.
First, the most urgent victims nearby.
"A-yoon, clear away the debris like rocks first!"
"Yes, Lady Roha!"
Rocks too heavy for human strength floated up slowly at Seol A-yoon's gesture and were moved aside.
The paramedics pulled people out accordingly, transporting them to flatter ground or providing immediate aid.
Among them, those with faint lights.
I staggered across the ruined earth, healing only the most critical wounds with Restoration and Overpainting before moving on.
"Aaaah! My leg!"
"S-Saintess! Help us here!"
"...Just a moment. Others are more urgent."
"Aaaah! This is urgent too! My leg, my leg!"
A middle-aged man whose leg was crushed by a rock screamed in rage. But it wasn't life-threatening.
As I turned to another injured person, curses rang out.
"What kind of saintess is she?!"
"I said come here!"
"Save me!"
A sudden dizzying headache hit me, and I shook my head fiercely.
Insults mixed with curses battered my ears as they ignored me, but I figured it was the screams of people out of their minds with pain and fear.
Above all, I wasn't some grand saintess.
I was just doing what I could.
"Urgh..."
"Just hold on a bit longer. You're okay now."
"Thank... you...!"
I finished emergency treatment on a man with damaged internal organs and dashed to the side.
I sealed a paramedic's long abdominal gash as he struggled to staunch the bleeding, then ran off again.
Sweat poured like rain, and just as my mana was about to bottom out from repeated treatments, a warm energy filled my body.
'Thanks, Dal-i.'
My mana replenished by Dal-i's buff.
Thanks to that, the most critical victims had passed the crisis.
Now, just to rescue those below.
Rumble—
The ground cried out.
Sky and earth shook together, spreading terror.
At the origin of the landslide.
The mountainside, half-collapsed, fell with a thud amid dust clouds, then surged forward like a tidal wave of earth.
"Kyaaaah!"
"W-We have to run!"
"Damn it! How from here?!"
"Anyone who can move, do so! Paramedics, help those who can't!"
The paramedics moved calmly on orders, but their trembling voices and fingertips drowned in despair.
Then, Seol A-yoon stepped forward.
"I'll hold it back!"
A hazy barrier formed between her spread hands.
Rolling stones caught on her telekinetic shield and stopped.
Earth piled up on the barrier, followed by waves of soil crashing down.
But Seol A-yoon's shield didn't waver, stopping the landslide like a transparent umbrella.
"Waaah! She stopped the landslide!"
"W-We survived..."
Cheers from those who had sensed death.
I caught a staggering paramedic whose legs had given out and shouted. It wasn't over yet.
"Hurry and evacuate people! I can't hold it forever!"
"Ah, yes! Move! Hurry up!"
No matter how S-Rank a hunter she was, she wasn't omnipotent.
Seol A-yoon seemed to have no spare energy just holding back the overwhelming mass of earth.
Barely maintaining the status quo.
We needed to evacuate those behind quickly to ease her burden.
...But what about those below?
Rushing to the cliff-like drop, even graver injuries caught my eye.
Among them, a man pinned under a house-sized boulder had an extremely faint life force.
'...Seol-ah. Lift me up.'
At my call, Seol-i fluttered up from my fingertip, then flew back to me.
I thought she'd lift me with wind?
As Seol-i touched me again.
A wind energy stirred at my back, and something pure white appeared.
...Wings?
Seol-i's enlarged wings sprouted from my back.
With a flap, my feet left the ground.
What in the world?
Regardless of my frozen shock, the wings moved with my will, carrying me down below.
I'd imagined floating lightly like Song Si-woo, so this was absurd, but the injured took priority. I focused.
"Ooh..."
"An angel... Am I dead?"
Nothing like that.
Seeing someone even praying, I hurried down and dismissed the wings.
The man under the boulder.
Seol A-yoon couldn't help; she was blocking the landslide above.
Without moving this rock, treatment was impossible.
I had to do something.
'Ground Breaker, as weakly as possible.'
Reduce power to the size of a small pearl.
'Rough, estimate destruction with GrBr applied.'
Check if it'd harm the man below.
'Seol-i, blow the small fragments far away.'
I entrusted the debris and reached out.
Crack, craaaack—
Dust flew, a huge crack split the boulder in half.
Fine fissures spiderwebbed from it, then it crumbled like Camembert cheese.
Seol-i's wingbeats beside it sent fragments flying far, finally revealing the man's body.
Restoration.
His body returned to normal amid white light.
Beside him, a woman's dislocated arm—tears streaming as she cried—was fixed with Overpainting, bones and muscles realigned.
"Thank you, thank you so much. God..."
"It's an angel! Real angels exist!"
Even as I treated others, people wept and prayed, leaving me flustered.
Anyway, the immediate crisis was averted.
Now what?
The collapsed terrain made escape difficult.
"Lady Roha!"
"She's down there!"
Murmurs from above.
Looking up at the cliff edge, Lee Jae-hoon and Song Si-woo were there, somehow.
"Heh—see her again?"
"Long time no see."
Song Si-woo rode the wind down, sending me and the others up one by one.
Then, Lee Jae-hoon gripped my hand firmly.
"Running off like that. You scared us."
"It was urgent... haha."
"Had to stop the Association Chairman from coming too. Let's head back first."
"Ah, but evacuation's not... A-yoon's still here."
"The site's stabilizing."
In the direction Lee Jae-hoon pointed, a woman with green hair appeared.
Vines like tree roots shot from the ground at her gestures, weaving a net around the earth mass Seol A-yoon held.
Plants anchoring like roots.
Large boulders half-smashed—probably Lee Jae-hoon's work—pushed aside; smaller ones formed a wall with roots, buttressing the landslide.
A plant-type hunter.
Fascinating how green energy bound the earth.
"Sorry, Lady Roha... But those wings...?"
Seol A-yoon approached, slightly fatigued after finally releasing her telekinetic barrier.
The wind spirit was busted right away.
"It just happened... Shall we head back for now?"
"Yes, understood."
"Hunter Song. If you would."
Song Si-woo, having lifted everyone from below, approached and leaped lightly into the sky.
The fierce winds calmed around him.
We boarded the approaching helicopter; paramedics loaded the injured via rappel onto others.
"Hunter Song Si-woo will stay to guide helicopter access. We'll head back."
"Will he be okay...?"
"Yes. With Hunter Bae Eun-seo using plant magic, no worries. The ground is her home turf."
Impressive indeed.
Vines from the earth... Perfect for binding foes.
"Hoo..."
Tension released, leaving me drained.
Body heavy like wet cotton.
Clothes soaked with sweat.
Returning to the Association, Cheon I-ryeong rushed from the rooftop and hugged me.
"Running off alone into danger like that!"
"Mmph, not alone."
"You almost got hurt! And those wings...? Were you really an angel?"
Huh, how'd she know?
Cheon I-ryeong, absent from the scene, spoke as if she'd watched.
And far off, a massive building screen broadcast the scene from moments ago.
Shot from the helicopter, so distant.
Then, replay: me suddenly spreading wings and descending the cliff.
Daily Hunters.
With the mark of the rapidly rising trusted news outlet.