Chapter 15
Chapter 15
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 15
Chapter Title: Seizing the Chance
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“Looks like you hit your head after all.”
Otherwise, there was no way he’d be spouting such nonsense.
“No, I didn’t?”
Seo Woojin knew full well just how absurd his words sounded right now.
“But that thing isn’t moving at all. Don’t know why, but isn’t this our chance?”
Whether it was an ice worm or a dragon.
If it wasn’t moving, it was nothing more than a slightly oversized punching bag.
*Not slightly, though?*
He glanced at the ice worm.
Compared to the one fighting Ban Slaine and the Blue Shield Knights, it was much smaller, but still the size of a decent commercial building.
To take down a punching bag that big...
“Even so, just the two of us can’t do it.”
The ice worm could start moving again at any moment.
There was no way two people could kill it in that time.
Not unless Aileen was an upper-grade knight.
But Seo Woojin tilted his head at Aileen’s words.
“Who said anything about just the two of us?”
“What do you mean?”
As Aileen shot him a look asking what he meant, Seo Woojin raised his hand and pointed to one side.
“We’ve got all those guys over there who’ll fight alongside us.”
His finger pointed to the soldiers who had just finished hunting the mother Tranga and were raising cheers of victory.
* * *
“As expected, it wasn’t just one.”
Ban Slaine let out a hollow laugh as he scanned the surroundings.
His senses had picked up two ice worms.
*No, three?*
He couldn’t see it, but he faintly felt the energy of another ice worm from behind.
*...Over there with that kid.*
Ban Slaine hesitated for a moment.
Ice worms were dangerous monsters.
For the current Seo Woojin, it was a colossal, overwhelming foe he couldn’t even resist properly.
One wrong move, and they could lose their hero.
But in the end, Ban Slaine didn’t turn around.
It wasn’t just about revenge against the ice worm.
The massive ice worm before him had devoured countless of his knights and soldiers over the past several years.
If he let this chance slip, who knew when he’d encounter it again.
But revenge wasn’t everything.
*I’ll trust them.*
Ban Slaine trusted Aileen.
She was just a novice lower-grade knight with little experience...
But even so, she possessed exceptional situational judgment and cool-headedness.
He believed Aileen could protect Seo Woojin from the ice worm.
“My task today is to sever this tiresome grudge once and for all.”
He would trust his knights and swing his sword solely for that goal.
“My lord!”
Testron’s shout rang out.
A path had opened.
The swords and blood of the Blue Shield Knights had pierced through the countless tentacles, carving a straight line toward the ice worm.
Ban Slaine kicked off the icy ground.
Crack-!
The ground cracked under the force at his toes, and his figure shot forward like an explosion.
A speed no ordinary human eye could follow.
In the knight order, only Testron and Gerald could detect Ban Slaine’s movements.
To the rest, it was just a particularly fierce gust of wind.
In an instant, Ban Slaine reached the ice worm’s snout.
Shing-!
His sword was drawn.
His beloved blade, which had been with him for over half a century, tasted the frigid northern air for the first time in ages.
“Be cleaved.”
From left to right.
A clean straight line with not even 0.1mm of error.
A minuscule motion compared to the ice worm’s size, but the result defied imagination.
Splurt-!
A fountain of blood erupted.
Grrrrraaaah-!
It was a single stroke.
With that simple swing, the massive ice worm was bisected.
“Evade!”
But the monster’s tenacious life force hadn’t faded yet.
In the extreme agony of its body being severed, the ice worm began to thrash.
Hundreds of tentacles flailed wildly, posing an immediate threat to the knights.
“Block them!”
The attacks so far had been no joke.
But the death throes of a cornered beast were incomparably more ferocious and powerful.
“Gah!”
One knight who blocked a swinging tentacle head-on was sent flying into the sky.
His sturdy sword shattered to pieces, and the armor protecting his body crumpled, blood seeping out.
The first casualty.
“Train!”
The surrounding knights screamed.
They had steeled themselves for this, but maintaining composure in the face of a comrade’s death was impossible.
“Regain formation!”
Ban Slaine’s command pierced their ears.
“Urk!”
“Damn it!”
They grieved their fallen comrade, but there was no time for mourning now.
Following Ban Slaine’s orders, the knights steadied their hearts and began reforming their lines.
As the knight order’s power converged, the frenzied tentacles could no longer inflict damage.
But the tentacles weren’t the only threat.
“It’s coming!”
The other ice worm Ban Slaine had sensed.
The one lurking underground, waiting for an opening, sensed something amiss as its kin died and burst through the ground.
“...Insane!”
One of the knights cursed.
The one Ban Slaine had just cleaved in half was exceptionally huge among ice worms.
Over 1.5 times larger than average.
But the one emerging now was even bigger.
*So it was that one!*
Ban Slaine knew instinctively.
The ice worm that had claimed countless lives each year wasn’t the one he’d just killed—it was this one.
*Can I do it?*
The ice worm’s massive body was both a supreme weapon and armor in itself.
Ordinary attacks couldn’t deal significant damage.
There was a reason “brute force wins” was a saying.
That’s why past subjugations had failed.
Even Ban Slaine hadn’t been able to inflict meaningful wounds before.
But this year was different.
*I can do it.*
He was certain from that previous strike.
He could cleave its massive body.
If one strike wasn’t enough, then two.
He could cut it down before the ice worm had time to flee.
Ban Slaine raised his sword once more.
* * *
“The soldiers?”
Aileen asked.
The soldiers who had finished off the mother Tranga were a mess.
Dozens were dead, and several times that number wounded.
They were cheering in the joy of victory now, but that wouldn’t last long.
“The knights are busy right now.”
Seo Woojin turned to look where Ban Slaine was fighting.
“Huh?”
While they’d been distracted by the suddenly appearing ice worm, the battle situation had shifted dramatically.
“One’s dead.”
Aileen finally realized and bit her lip.
The guilt of not trusting Ban Slaine and his comrades, acting rashly, surged back.
“Another one showed up, though...”
A grotesquely enormous ice worm.
But Seo Woojin wasn’t too worried.
The knight order seemed intact, and above all, Ban Slaine was charging at it.
“Let’s focus on our side first.”
This monster was leagues beyond any snow owl.
If they succeeded in hunting it?
*Level up for sure.*
He’d leveled up from just five snow owls, so this could jump him several levels at once.
He couldn’t pass up this golden opportunity with an XP goldmine sitting still.
“The soldiers, huh...”
They’d be a huge help.
There were plenty among them stronger than Seo Woojin right now.
If hundreds charged in and hacked away, even an ice worm couldn’t withstand it.
“But if it starts moving again, the casualties will be massive.”
The very fact they could have this conversation was because it was still.
If its tentacles turned on the soldiers...
The damage would be unimaginable.
But Seo Woojin didn’t back down.
“There won’t be another chance like this. What if it heads for the knights instead?”
Fighting one ice worm was one thing; two at once was another level.
Ban Slaine would be fine, but the other knights?
Casualties could mount.
Seo Woojin pointed that out.
“That’s...”
Aileen bit her lip.
He had a point.
Observe or intervene.
Neither choice was easy.
“...Instead, if the ice worm shows even a hint of movement, we retreat immediately.”
“Of course.”
Even without her saying it, he was confident he’d bolt first.
The soldiers might call him a coward, but who cared?
The most important thing was his own life.
*Though for someone who values that, I sure keep doing reckless stuff.*
Scratching the back of his head, Seo Woojin looked at Aileen.
Her expression was icy, bordering on cold.
But Seo Woojin could sense it.
The deep concern for her comrades burning inside her.
He had to use that.
“Then we’ll take down this one.”
He had no intention of overdoing it.
He didn’t want to.
*Just enough, just enough.*
He planned to poke it a few times amid the soldiers and snag some XP.
*Gotta level up quick and check my skills.*
What he could do.
What abilities he had.
He needed to grasp that precisely to boost his survival odds.
*To do that, I’ll use everything I can.*
They were using each other anyway.
Him, to grow.
Them, to use his grown self in the war against the Demon King.
“Let’s go.”
Aileen started toward the soldiers.
Though just a lower-grade knight, she was one of the commanders.
With all other knights tied up fighting the ice worm, she held the greatest authority to command the soldiers right now.