Eye Opening
"Eek!"
"Hah...!"
Aurell and Hwanggu looked thoroughly shaken by the explosion from moments ago. Both of them had plopped down on the floor and were staring blankly, mouths hanging open.
I narrowed my eyes and scanned the surroundings. Someone had set a trap at the entrance, and the stench of human blood was still hanging thick in the air. Their intention was obvious. They must have been waiting for a vampire or a werewolf to show up.
This was bad. The smell drifting through the area told me there were no humans nearby—only a cold, dead wind, carrying nothing but the vile aftertaste of gunpowder.
I hurriedly helped Hwanggu and Aurell to their feet.
"Charlotte-nim, this is..."
"Yeah. A human player's work."
I nodded in answer to Aurell's words.
If this wasn't human handiwork, then whose could it be? Vampires and werewolves didn't have skills for planting bombs, and even if they did, I doubted they’d bother using them.
Ssshh...
Then the direction of the wind shifted.
The moment the information carried on it changed, Aurell, Hwanggu, and I all stiffened, noses twitching as we sniffed the air.
There wasn't just one.
Two—no, at least three.
Humans were surrounding us.
How long had they been here? From the beginning? If not, then after the explosion?
One thing was certain: this situation was very, very bad for us.
And as if to prove my thought right, a quiet flash burst from far away.
Flash—
Pop!
A small burst of light came first, and only a beat later did the sound reach us. It wasn't a loud crack, just a muffled report swallowed by a suppressor.
The instant I saw the flash, I moved my shadows.
Swoosh—!
The shadow writhing beneath my feet spread toward the front of Aurell, and a sniper round from one of the human players came flying in over it.
Thwack—!
The flash scattered with a dull sound, and underneath it drifted a blurred bullet.
The sniping had begun.
And their first target was the weakest one—Aurell.
On the surface, all three of us probably looked like small girls, and yet they’d chosen her first anyway?
I wasn't sure yet, but maybe the enemy had some way of seeing our strength in numbers.
Fwoosh—!
Then another report rang out.
As the dull sound swallowed by the suppressor dispersed, a shot came from the exact opposite direction.
This time, I was the target.
The instant I sensed danger, my shadow rose of its own accord, moving as if to shield my body.
It was the moment the broad curtain of shadow caught the incoming attack intact.
Crash!
The shadow that had taken the flash exploded all at once. The light that had pierced through the barrier brushed past my arm.
Hssssss—!
A chilling sound followed.
I lowered my head and looked at my arm, and my wound was bubbling and boiling as if it had been exposed to sunlight.
"Silver bullet...?"
Clutching my arm, I muttered dazedly.
Ordinary bullets couldn't do much to a vampire. If my skin was actually boiling like this, then the humans had used special silver rounds.
Silver bullets.
Bullets manufactured by humans for dealing with monsters. They were especially effective against vampires and werewolves, and could even do some damage to the hybrid creatures formed by fusing the two.
If silver bullets were showing up, then there had to be a supply shop somewhere.
I bit my lip and pulled Aurell and Hwanggu toward a gap between the buildings, darting into cover.
"Ah! The bicycle! Charlotte-nim!"
This wasn't the time to worry about some bicycle.
I wrapped my arms around Hwanggu as she tried to bolt out and shook my head. After a moment of restless wriggling, she sniffed the air and finally settled down.
Maybe because we’d hidden ourselves in the collapsed gap between buildings, out of the snipers' line of fire?
I could feel the humans shifting positions. Aurell and Hwanggu were sniffing too, tracking the scent.
Hssss...
I looked down at my arm, where white smoke was rising.
It had only grazed me for a moment, and yet the wound wasn't healing.
That was how dangerous silver bullets were to vampires.
If this had been a game, I would've chugged a potion registered to a hotkey and ignored it...
Of course, I still had potions now.
I reached into the mouth of my shadow, pulled out a red potion, and poured it over the wound.
In an instant, my arm knit itself back together.
When the smooth, scarless skin was restored, Aurell, who had been watching anxiously beside me, brightened and touched my arm in relief.
"Thank goodness! There won't be any scar at all!"
Ignoring Aurell, I drew my katana from the shadows.
The pitch-black blade, coated in matte black, seemed to melt into the darkness as if it were swallowing moonlight whole.
There were four humans confirmed by scent.
And among them, two were snipers.
Now it was time for us to move too.
Just because the enemy outnumbered us didn't mean we had to take the beating without fighting back.
Besides, they had opened fire on us first when we hadn't even shown any hostile intent.
There was no way I could let that slide.
"Aurell."
"Four!"
"Hide somewhere sensible. If it gets dangerous, run with your transformation."
"Understood!"
"Hwanggu."
"Yesss!"
"You—"
I trailed off and looked at Hwanggu.
From the way she was squatting there with her eyes shining, she was clearly waiting for my order.
Honestly, I was worried.
What level was Hwanggu? How strong was she, really?
Was it really okay to trust her and give her orders?
Still, if I thought about the punch she’d thrown at me, her attack power had to be at least over level 15.
And yet I was still uneasy. Uncertainty was uncertainty.
"What should I do!"
"Protect Aurell."
In the end, I decided to keep the two of them together.
Hwanggu nodded with a confident look at my order.
It felt like I’d just entrusted something important to a dog I wasn't entirely sure I could rely on.
"Hm..."
After checking the two girls one last time, I dashed out through the half-collapsed wall.
A faint shadow wrapped around my body, helping me move. I slid forward through the darkness-drenched ruins like a blade gliding across water.
To protect Aurell and Hwanggu safely, I had to draw all their attention onto me.
I leaped onto the roof of a building.
It felt as if I were bursting up out of a sea made of shadow.
The darkness coiling around my body loosened and fell away in long strands.
I let out a slow breath.
The moment I exposed myself, I felt hostility rise from every direction.
I was going to have to take on four enemies alone.
With no real hope of relying on Aurell and Hwanggu's fighting strength, that was exactly how it was going to be.
And running wasn't an option either.
With snipers using silver rounds behind my back, there was no way I could get away while also dragging Aurell and Hwanggu with me.
This was a moment when I had no choice but to give it everything I had.
Pop—!
Another shot rang out.
This time, I didn't block it with shadow.
The instant I recognized the light and the sound, my body moved on its own.
As I swung the katana in a wide arc, a sword of shadow settled over it.
The blade lengthened, and a black crescent was drawn through the air toward the straight line of the incoming flash.
Swish—!
A precise shot aimed at my head.
The flash split into two along the path of the crescent.
In that instant, as if half the world had been sliced apart, my field of vision divided into two.
My left eye burned hot.
Not because I’d been struck, but because I had used a special skill.
Eye Opening.
Flare—
Blue particles burst up from my left eye and scattered like sparks.
All at once, the scent of blood drifted in on the wind.
Feeling the emotion carried within it, I curled the corner of my mouth.
Apparently, the trick I’d just shown had surprised them quite a bit.
But I was just as shocked on the inside.
Eye Opening wasn't supposed to work like this.
Eye Opening was a skill only vampires who had reached level 20 and cleared an epic quest were supposed to be able to use.
Normally, it was just a buff that raised a character's stats.
It wasn't supposed to change the world itself the way this did.
I covered my right eye with my hand and looked around.
Through the left eye that had been opened, the world was painted entirely in blue.
Recognizing objects wasn't a problem.
It was just that...
[Stone]
It was stone.
[Collapsed building]
The remains of a building.
[Weeds]
Nameless grass.
Not edible.
The amount of information pouring in through the eye was overwhelming.
This wasn't ordinary perception. It was as if the detailed information window for every single thing around me had been dumped directly into my head, the way it would if I checked an item in a game.
I lowered my gaze to the katana in my hand.
[Matte Katana]
Level requirement: 0
Attack +15
Durability 92%
A katana commonly sold in shops.
Matte finish.
It was no different.
As though a game interface had been carried over intact, the katana's information was being delivered straight into my mind.
Then a red line appeared across my body.
A marker predicting an incoming attack.
That was what I’d seen and responded to in that first shot, too.
Thump—!
Pop—!
Two dull gunshots rang out.
I moved lightly.
Since I already knew where the snipers were firing from, there was no hesitation in my steps. I skimmed across the roof, riding the shadows leaking beneath my feet.
Two white flashes swept past my body, just barely missing me.
I turned my head and looked toward the direction the shots had come from.
[SlayerChunsam]
Level: 15
Race: Human
HP: 100%
Mana: 72%
Emotional state: fear, excitement, anger, tension
It felt exactly like checking a character's status in a game.
I could even see the condition of the equipment he was wearing.
It was almost funny enough to make me laugh.
This time, I turned my head the other way.
I wanted to inspect the information of the other player who had aimed at me.
[TheLastStrikeOf82-Year-OldKingNoSik]
Level: 18
Race: Human
HP: 97%
Mana: 40%
Emotional state: fear, excitement, tension, panic
Once again, an information window floated up.
The nickname, cut off at fourteen characters, appeared exactly as it was.
Eye Opening marked the outline of the target I perceived, showing it exactly as it was.
Which meant hiding between buildings was useless.
I spread my wings wide behind me.
Flap—!
At that moment, a flock of black bats surged up from beneath my feet.
Flitter-flitter-flitter!
The instant the bats scattered into the air, I kicked off the ground and charged straight at the sniper, TheLastStrikeOf82-Year-OldKingNoSik.