Chapter 119
Chapter 119
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 119
Chapter Title: Friend (2)
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It felt like about ten minutes had passed.
Clang— Clang— Clang—
She was still striking with all her might, but her speed had slowed considerably.
Her breathing seemed a little ragged, too.
“Wha… what in the world did you do?”
“How about you forfeit?”
“Don’t be ridiculous!”
Furious, she swung her whip again, but it seemed to take her a bit longer this time.
After about five more minutes of this, the referee moved toward me.
“Halt!”
What now?
“Summoner Oh Hyeon-ung, if you do not actively engage in combat from this point forward, you will be disqualified.”
Tch, so just defending isn’t allowed.
Then again, there were a lot of people waiting for their turn.
“Understood.”
I figured I’d shown enough, and Kang Ji-seon didn’t seem like she would give up easily.
“I will begin the count again. Step back.”
Kang Ji-seon created some distance, and the referee shot a flare of fire from his hand.
She charged toward me again at high speed, but she stopped before even reaching the halfway point.
*Slice— Thud—*
This time, I had used my Will-force from the very start.
Her left leg was severed, and though she collapsed, she didn’t scream.
She simply clutched her leg, frozen in place.
I walked slowly toward her.
“Let’s end it here.”
“…I’ve lost.”
I was glad she didn’t cling to pointless pride.
I felt sorry for her, too.
“Stop! Stop!”
The referee rushed over, declared the match over, and dispelled the barrier.
“Healers, get up here and take her away.”
At the same time, the referee gestured for me to come closer, likely to declare my victory.
“Ah, just a moment.”
I drew my sword from its sheath and swung it lightly toward Kang Ji-seon.
The severed leg reattached itself to her stump just as it was.
“Wh… what is this…”
“Could you try standing up and walking?”
Kang Ji-seon slowly got to her feet and, sure enough, she walked perfectly fine.
If not for the pool of blood on the ground, no one would have believed her leg had been cut off.
“H… how did you do that?”
Not just Kang Ji-seon, but the referee beside her also wore a look of utter shock.
“It’s a simple trick.”
“…Thank you. I said something I shouldn’t have…”
“There are many people waiting. Let’s talk later.”
“Ah, yes.”
I watched Kang Ji-seon walk off the stage unaided before turning back to the referee.
“I’m ready.”
“Uh… Right. Yes. The winner of the seventh match of the Round of 64 is Summoner Oh Hyeon-ung from Kramis!”
Following the referee’s declaration, shouts and cheers erupted from all around.
It wasn’t as loud as I’d expected, but well, I was satisfied.
I bowed toward the emperor’s seating and descended from the dueling stage.
I returned the way I came, back to the waiting room.
The moment I opened the door and stepped inside, all eyes were on me.
They could watch the duels from the waiting room, too.
No one said anything, but I could feel a strong sense of wariness.
“Hyeon-ung, you copied me.”
*Ack…*
I knew she’d say this.
“The referee said I’d be disqualified if I didn’t attack.”
“Still, copying is copying.”
Did she get a patent on using Will-force or something?
“Fine. I’ll admit I copied you.”
“But what was that at the end?”
Huh?
“Reattaching her leg. That wasn’t magic, was it? If you cut a leg off like that, even with healing magic, she shouldn’t be able to walk for three days. But your opponent walked right off the stage.”
That was news to me. As they say, he who has tasted meat knows how to eat it; it seemed she knew so much because she’d cut off so many limbs.
“I see.”
In any case, it appeared Misha didn’t know about the Life Sword either.
“What do you mean, ‘I see’? What was that?”
“It was an application of Will-force.”
“You did that with Will-force?”
She looked completely dumbfounded.
Though Misha was also a Will-force user, it seemed she’d never considered using it for something like the Life Sword.
To be fair, I hadn’t understood it either until Bio showed and taught me himself.
“Instead of killing intent or aggressive emotions, you just have to imbue it with a benevolent will.”
“But how can you do something like that with Will-force…”
“You just try it. Didn’t you see it yourself?”
I could have explained it more kindly, but she was still my competitor.
Of course, I wasn't trying to hold her back.
Besides, no matter how much I explained it with words, she wouldn’t be able to grasp it without putting in the effort to practice it herself.
I wanted to return to my comrades right away, but I couldn’t go to the VIP box where the lord was on my own.
He had said he’d send a butler after Misha’s match was over, so I had no choice but to wait.
I sat down again in front of the white cloth that displayed the dueling stage.
After a couple of matches, a familiar face appeared.
Jeon Shin-wook.
The seeded contestant from the Aurellia Forest, he wielded a greatsword nearly as large as himself.
His opponent was also a burly man with a massive battle-ax.
Not long after the match began, most of the contestants watching became wide-eyed with surprise.
“Wh-what was that?”
“What did he do?”
“That guy’s no joke.”
“Are all summoners monsters…?”
It sounded like a compliment, but calling us monsters was a bit much…
“Ahem.”
After I cleared my throat once, the summoner who had spoken quickly left his seat.
I had expected a heavy clash of massive weapons, but it ended all too tamely.
“He’s incredibly fast, isn’t he? His weapon doesn’t look light, either. The Pioneers really are on another level.”
Misha also looked slightly surprised.
The moment the referee gave the signal, Jeon Shin-wook vanished, and his massive greatsword was suddenly under his opponent’s chin.
The opponent hadn’t even had a chance to swing his ax.
Of course, the match took a little longer than mine or Misha’s, but his speed was unbelievable.
Did he receive an agility-related trait?
He was faster than any contestant who had appeared so far.
So fast that even I couldn’t follow his movements with my eyes.
Though, I suspect it would have been different if I were watching in person rather than on this screen…
I think I had underestimated the Pioneers from the other regions.
“At that level, he probably knows how to use Will-force, don’t you think?”
“Seems like it.”
He hadn’t explicitly used Will-force, but achieving that kind of speed would be impossible with high stats alone.
Amidst the slightly restless atmosphere, the duels continued, and finally, a staff member called Misha’s name.
“I’ll be back.”
“I’ll go with you. Excuse me, can I go with her?”
“Oh my, Hyeon-ung, are you coming to cheer me on?”
Cheer her on? Hardly.
It would be better for us to leave together once her duel was over.
And frankly, watching on the screen here was getting a little old.
“It’s fine. Follow me quickly.”
I walked with Misha through the corridor and arrived at the entrance.
A moment later, the contestant who was waiting ahead of us went out. Huh?
The one waiting on our side was a stranger, but a familiar face entered from the opposite side.
“Isn’t that person your friend, Hyeon-ung?”
“You’re right.”
It was Sang-yoon.
Come to think of it, if Sang-yoon won here and Misha won her match, the two of them would face each other next.
I hadn’t intended it when I followed Misha, but this worked out well.
Sang-yoon was holding a golden staff.
His opponent was a woman.
Was her weapon a rapier?
The blade was already thin, but it looked even more so compared to Sang-yoon’s thick staff.
It looked almost like a toothpick.
…?
The duel began with the referee’s signal, but like me, Sang-yoon didn’t move a single step.
I watched closely, wondering if he was trying to copy me, but it was completely different.
The golden staff he held extended, shooting out toward the swordswoman.
It moved at a considerable speed, but the swordswoman was no slouch either; she dodged it and charged at Sang-yoon.
Or rather, she tried to, but she was struck squarely by the staff as Sang-yoon swung it horizontally.
*Thwack—*
With a heavy thud, his opponent was sent flying into the barrier.
“I guess there’s no out-of-bounds rule.”
As if intending to finish her off, he brought the staff down vertically on the fallen woman.
*CRASH—*
A deafening roar erupted as if a bomb had gone off.
“His opponent is no pushover, either.”
She hadn’t lost consciousness and managed to raise her rapier to block the blow at the last second.
I was a little impressed.
The difference in the weapons’ mass was, even at a glance, absurdly large.
It was amazing that she could block that thick staff with such a thin sword without it breaking…
The moment I had that thought, the rapier shattered into pieces.
“The match is decided.”
Just as Misha said.
Sang-yoon continued to swing his staff, pressing his opponent.
*CRASH— CRASH— CRASH—*
I knew he was strong, but this was on a whole other level.
Every time Sang-yoon’s golden staff fell, a massive crater formed in the stage.
His opponent was doing a decent job of dodging, but…
*WHAM—*
With an even louder impact than before, she was struck by the swinging staff and slammed into the barrier, collapsing.
It was the expected result.
She had lost her weapon, and she could never win by just running away.
It seemed she had lost consciousness… no, she was moving slightly, but it was already over.
…?
Sang-yoon looked like he was about to finish her off with a vertical strike, but the referee intervened.
“Stop! Stop!”
The staff, which had been about to come crashing down, shrank back to its original size.
I was sure, one hundred percent sure, that if it had landed, his opponent would have lost her life.
“Your friend shows no mercy, Hyeon-ung. I don’t think he needed to attack at the very end.”
“It’s your turn now, so get ready.”
I thought the same and was surprised, but I didn’t show it.
Sang-yoon’s style… it hadn’t just changed a little. It had changed a lot.
The guy I remembered was incredibly pure and soft-hearted.
In school, the upperclassmen a year or two older can be more intimidating than adults, especially on sports teams.
The pure-hearted Sang-yoon would endure any bullying or hazing from his seniors and deal with it himself, never once passing it down to the underclassmen.
After high school, when a few of us went on a trip to a pension, he stopped me when we all tried to step on a spider, carefully moving it outside with a piece of paper.
He was so pure that he’d lecture us, saying we shouldn’t kill any living creature except for mosquitoes and flies.
Of course, it wasn’t that I didn’t understand.
I didn’t know the exact difficulty of Krishna’s Tower, but it couldn’t be much different from the Labyrinth.
No, forget the difficulty; if he had retained that same purity from his modern life here in Elsia, he wouldn’t have been able to stand in this place today.
Perhaps if his personality had remained the same, he wouldn’t have even survived…
I, too, had changed a lot since coming to Elsia.
I had killed countless monsters.
And people…
Sang-yoon silently bowed and walked down the opposite side of the stage.
Honestly, my life had taken a turn for the better after coming to Elsia.
From a perpetually unknown streamer to a famous Pioneer who everyone in Kramis knew.
Meeting my comrades was one thing, but meeting the Chairman and Ha-young and being able to help them were all good things.
But seeing my changed friend made me wonder if Elsia, which had transformed us like this, was truly a good thing.
“I’ll finish this quick and be right back!”
“Alright.”
Misha probably wasn’t originally like this either.
For some reason, I felt a little sad.
****
After the Round of 64 concluded, I returned to the waiting room to find Butler Keten waiting for us.
We followed the butler who had come to meet us, not to the VIP box, but to the carriage.
“Hyeon-ung, you’re here.”
“We missed you.”
“You were so cool!”
“Poyo!”
Elaine and Timi rushed to my sides, and Nix immediately landed on my shoulder, rubbing against me.
We’d only been apart for a few hours, but anyone would think we were a family reunited after a long separation.
“As expected, you were the best. You should have seen the look on that Epheli fellow’s face. It was completely sour.”
“Haha… I see.”
I wondered if Ms. Ji-seon would be alright.
“Hyeon-ung, that woman over there is no joke either.”
Timi whispered, pointing at Misha. Misha had also achieved an overwhelming victory in the Round of 64, just as she had in the Round of 128.
The only difference from the Round of 128 was that this time it was legs instead of arms.
When she came back down, she’d made the terrifying comment that legs were a cleaner cut.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Ah, of course, I wasn’t saying you would lose, Hyeon-ung.”
“Haha, Lord, are we heading home now?”
It felt a little harsh for Misha to hear this right next to me, so I changed the subject.
“No. We’ve been invited to dinner.”
“Invited?”
“Rachel invited us.”
“Isn’t she the lord of the Syuten region, where Krishna’s Tower is located?”
Why would a woman so full of herself invite us?
“Yes. She said her summoner requested it. And that you probably wouldn’t refuse. But if you’re tired, we can go back.”
It seemed Sang-yoon had made the request.
“Not at all. Let’s go.”