#45 Dark Clouds (暗雲) (4)
#45 Dark Clouds (暗雲) (4)
Now, with the raft only moments from reaching Zone 2, Baek Gun-tae bellowed.
"We link up with the rear unit the instant we land! Form ranks! Selected advance unit personnel, prepare to move out immediately!"
The assault force included the chicks. A marching column can only move as fast as its slowest member, so speed was never an option. Pulling out an advance unit to move ahead first was the obvious move.
―The advance unit's captaincy fell, naturally, to the vanguard commander, Kang Tae-ho. Kang Tae-ho swept his gaze over the assembled hunters and called out the names of those who would join him.
"Gu Jin-ha. Ha-yeon. Yu Tae-jeong. And..."
Every name belonged to the assault force's core A-Class hunters. By the time they had finally disembarked from the raft, a terrible darkness was thickening in the distance. The gathering dark clouds swelled endlessly, bleeding black across the world.
"As fast as we can...?"
They would need to link up fast. Baek Gun-tae was about to say as much when a wave of magical pressure bore down on his entire body, making him scowl. The pressure was so immense that simply enduring it without raising one's own mana was a monumental effort. This was no ordinary mana—it was a force that crushed mind and body alike. When he looked back, the assault force was already struggling just to stay upright. Many had, in fact, already collapsed.
And among them.
'...A monster!'
Was Lee Eun-ha. Her own condition was somewhat better. In terms of mana alone, she matched or even exceeded most B-Class hunters. The real problem was the chicks, who looked as though they might stop breathing at any moment. No matter how much they channeled their mana, the overwhelming pressure left them suffocating and deathly pale.
'I have to do something...!'
Lee Eun-ha forced her mana outward. To her, mana was like a canvas. What picture to draw and how to draw it—she knew she could never withstand this horrific pressure head-on. Instead, she shaped a soft, streamlined dome—a buffer. Not a wall to absorb the impact, but a surface designed to let as much of it slide away as possible.
"......!"
As the hunters around her finally drew ragged breaths, Lee Eun-ha allowed herself a measure of relief. But exerting mana came at the cost of stamina. Her complexion was steadily whitening when Gu Jin-ha, now finding it far easier to steady himself, drew his rapier from within his coat.
'It's that Armored Monstrous Figure...!'
The Armored Monstrous Figure—the one who had killed Muno of the Seven Heroes and gravely wounded Changseon. He was advancing slowly, a greatsword wreathed in blue flame in his hand. Under a pressure so dense it threatened to choke him, Gu Jin-ha focused his mind. One Flash. The instant he cut through the seam of the mana, the pressure splintered and the suffocating weight vanished as though it had been washed away.
"———!"
The entire assault force gasped for air, faces pallid. Baek Gun-tae roared at the top of his lungs.
"All archers! Loose!"
At the order, the archers released their bowstrings without a heartbeat's hesitation. These were the finest marksmen among the hunters, all ranked B-Class or higher. The volley flew not in a parabolic arc but in a near-flat line. Though they were arrows, their velocity far outpaced that of a rifle. Speeds impossible for any human eye to track.
"......!"
But when the Armored Monstrous Figure brought his sword down in a sweeping strike, his mana manifested as a slash and swelled to monstrous proportions. The earth split. Vines and trees were sheared apart. The overwhelming wind pressure battered the incoming arrows—some dropping as though they'd struck a wall, others flung backward. The ranks of terrified hunters wavered, and in that instant Kang Tae-ho swung his Conqueror's Great Sword. The collision of their two sword-winds birthed a storm that clawed at the sky, and when the gale finally stilled, the terrain itself had been reshaped.
The lush jungle was gone. Over mounds of bare earth, shredded vegetation lay scattered like confetti. In the brief silence, Kang Tae-ho cocked his head to the side.
"So, looks like I won't be going anywhere."
His instincts told him with absolute certainty that no one else could stop the Armored Monstrous Figure. Kang Tae-ho jabbed a finger toward Ju-gyo.
"Granny and the old man, stick with me a minute. The rest of you, go on ahead."
Gu Jin-ha frowned at Kang Tae-ho's words. As the saying goes, when whales fight, shrimp get their backs broken—most hunters would only be a liability here. That included himself.
The only ones who could offer any real help were the Geoam Lord and Ju-gyo. Even the title of the Three Swordsmen felt insufficient to join this battle. Gu Jin-ha hesitated.
'...The commanders.'
Before they were elite hunters, they were the vanguard captain and the assault force leader. Their absence carried an entirely different weight. Next in the chain of command was himself. Which meant he had just inherited the entire assault force.
'But I still have to do it.'
—Their opponent was the Armored Monstrous Figure who had killed Muno and left Changseon gravely wounded. This was no time for weak complaints about the burden being heavy. And a part of him suspected that even the three of them might struggle to bring the figure down. He asked again.
"...Will you be all right?"
"Hey. Just get going and come back fast."
Kang Tae-ho hefted his beloved Conqueror's Great Sword and settled it against his shoulder.
"When you get back, it'll all be over anyway."
At that confident display, Gu Jin-ha nodded and shouted.
"Entire assault force, from this moment! We link up with the rear unit!"
As the assault force pulled away, Kang Tae-ho scratched the side of his head. —For some reason, the Armored Monstrous Figure's silhouette felt oddly familiar.
"Heh, I'm just imagining things, right...?"
***
The Wolf sprang. The surrounding area was already reduced to ash. Chimmuk-haneun Ip scowled with visceral displeasure.
'To be delayed like this.'
At first, he hadn't expected this fight to last more than a minute at most. He'd dismissed the first dodge as blind luck or animal instinct. Instinct, after all, was just a tower that eventually crumbles. He had never imagined the fight would drag on.
Yet the creature was still holding on. Realizing it wouldn't be easy to kill, Chimmuk-haneun Ip began to chant internally. Before long, he raised a hand.
[Șarpe Fulger Roșu]
A spell that should have required three verses. But only the final line left his lips. Not spell retention—chant dismantling. The magic completed itself with that alone. A flash erupted from his fingertips and shot forward like a bolt of lightning. Red lightning—the Wolf evaded it without much trouble, but it pursued like a creature with a will of its own. Its forked tip resembled the tongue of a serpent. One flickering tongue became another, and another, endlessly multiplying into scores, then hundreds, of red snakes.
Feeding on their own tails, the serpents divided and converged in an endless cycle. Whenever the Wolf's evasive path clipped the terrain, it ignited without fail, belching black smoke.
He had expected the Wolf to dodge. And when the beast finally evaded every last red serpent, Chimmuk-haneun Ip twisted the corner of his mouth into a smirk.
—He hadn't been burning the forest without reason. The black smoke rising from the jungle had been seeping into the clouds all along, feeding them mana. By now, that mana would have reached critical density. Once the mana was prepared, all that remained was manifestation. The creature had been a tenacious nuisance, but the grand magic was now complete. The dark clouds massing overhead solidified their shape, and Chimmuk-haneun Ip uttered the final chant.
[O fereastră de tunete și fulgere care acoperă cerul și pământul―!]
The window of thunder and lightning, born alongside the roar of thunder, would now engulf the world.
—Or it should have. But the dark clouds did not move. Chimmuk-haneun Ip stared upward, dumbfounded, then erupted with fury.
[What—what have you done?!]
That was when their eyes met. —And the Wolf's crimson glare detonated.
***
Originally, it was that bastard who was supposed to drink the Imitation Elixir. The calamity he unleashed after shedding every incomplete fracture of himself had been vicious and overwhelming. I remembered exactly how many hunters had been sacrificed just to stop him. —In that instant, a 'sight I could not possibly have witnessed' surfaced in my mind, and the Wolf clenched its teeth.
'......!'
The conviction that I had to kill him here, now, flared into certainty. The 'what if' I had been turning over throughout our clashes had already hardened into fact.
'His life vessel is close.'
He was a puppet—that was correct. But if his real body were far away, there was no way he could fight like this in an unrecovered state. His life vessel had to be somewhere nearby. I wouldn't let him slip away—I refused to let him return again and again. The killing intent rose slowly: I would end him here, no matter what.
'The first step succeeded.'
The grand magic had been devoured. At the very least, the rear unit was safe from immediate annihilation.
'Black Mist.'
As if answering the Wolf's will, the dark clouds scattered. No—not scattered. They had never been dark clouds to begin with.
What had seeped into those hanging clouds was not smoke.
[Black Mist (B) Lv.1 skill acquired.]
[Ghost Flame (C) Lv.7 integrated into Black Mist (B) Lv.1...]
[Black Mist (B) Lv.1 → Black Mist (B) Lv.3...]
[Remaining Skill Points 23 → 7]
—It had been black mist all along.
I swept the rising notification windows aside. As the furious Chimmuk-haneun Ip bellowed, the Wolf slowly steadied its breathing.
The mist that had infiltrated the clouds had finally swallowed them whole. The five-verse grand magic—the Bam that had cast the entire 2nd Sector into shadow—collapsed miserably, and the oppressive dark clouds lifted.
As light returned, the Wolf called the mist back. Wreathed in the black fog that had consumed the clouds, it dropped low into a stance ready to spring at any moment.
'—Now it begins.'
The Wolf did not let its guard down. It knew perfectly well that the real fight started now. Everything up to this point had simply been exploiting his complacency—and the fact that he'd been funneling his concentration and mana into a grand magic, unable to bring his full power to bear.
Right here, right now, he would finally reveal his true self.
Which meant I now had to fight someone who had once been a Square Master.
***
Dawn's Clan Leader, Kang Tae-jun, was at last shown into the room after a long wait. Beyond the veil, Changseon murmured in a hollow voice.
"So, in the end, you have come."
Kang Tae-jun took his seat without any pleasantries. A flicker of emotion crossed his face—a rare display—before his expression settled.
Because that single sentence was as good as an answer.
―And so, a long silence and stillness settled over the two figures seated facing one another: the Sword Saint and Changseon.