Chapter 80: What I Lost, What You Lost (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 80: What I Lost, What You Lost (3)
I put the other two villains out of my mind.
If those villains were what I expected, the kids wouldn’t be defeated by them. Besides, I wasn’t in any position to be worrying about anyone else right now.
Even if she was weaker than usual, I wasn’t nearly impressive enough to be careless against the woman before me.
I had poured so much Innate True Qi into my physical reinforcement that it would have killed a normal person, yet my physical abilities still lagged behind hers. She was a completed superhuman, while I was just a half-baked guy who had only recently begun to recover and enter the ranks of superhumans.
If that black aura of hers also boosted her physical stats, I stood no chance of winning through raw specs alone.
Therefore, the area I had to exploit was what she had lost.
Her techniques, which had always been honed to the sharpness of a masterwork blade, were gone. What stood before me now was merely a disaster exerting violence without any finesse.
In that case, I had a slim chance of victory.
The disaster, weeping black tears, lunged at me and swung her arm.
* * *
Cathy did not want to fight.
However, her will had long since ceased to matter. The control over her body, which she had always possessed as a matter of course, had long ago been surrendered to another entity.
A black thing, flickering like a small beast, wavered before her eyes.
This small, beast-like thing seemed so furious about something as it charged at her in a rage.
You can’t win. You must be afraid.
The difference in power was so obvious that anyone could see it; even a slight bit of pressure would ensure it didn’t survive.
— It’s annoying, isn’t it?
The thing that had seized control of her body muttered, but Cathy did not want to harm that small, weak child.
Yet, her body raised its fist regardless of her will.
— It’ll be easier if you just crush it.
She forcibly twisted the arm that was trying to crush the flickering black thing.
Her posture wavered, and the perfect straight punch became a gesture that could hardly be called a punch at all, but it still possessed enough power to crush the black thing.
She tried to scream for him to dodge, but her mouth wouldn’t move. The small, black child before her did not dodge.
Cathy closed her eyes.
She didn’t want to see him perish under her fist.
At the same moment she felt her fist strike something, her body tilted.
Huh?
Before she could even process the confusion, her body went down.
The follow-up kick was still unrefined, but it was a movement she definitely remembered.
There was no way she could forget it.
It was a move she had taught him. It was a movement she had drilled into him, repeatedly telling him that he didn’t need to be fast, but that maintaining an accurate posture was what mattered.
It had been a mess at first, but the kick—which had eventually become quite decent—struck her square in the jaw as she lost her balance and fell.
A heavy impact shook her brain.
It hurt.
Seeing that decent kick seemed to bring back some of the things she had forgotten.
Cathy looked at the person before her again.
At first, he had seemed like a mere black smudge, then like a small child or a beast, but now he was taking on a human shape.
He wasn’t fully mature, but he wasn’t just a child either, and he certainly wasn’t a smudge anymore.
Something red glowed within the flickering black form.
Something.
Something she had lost was there.
It felt as if she would regain her memories if she could just reach it.
So, for the first time, Cathy took a proper stance.
She regulated her breathing and checked her physical condition. Her head spun from the heavy blow to her jaw, but it wasn’t enough to stop her from moving.
She had no intention of crushing him.
She just wanted to reach that red thing, to grab it with her hands and pull it into an embrace.
She leaped with a spring in her step and threw a kick from a familiar posture.
* * *
“Ugh…!?”
Parrying Professor Cathy’s charge and landing a kick on her jaw had been good.
It was good up to that point, but then her movements suddenly transformed.
Her movements, which had seemed like mindless swinging without a shred of technique, regained a hint of sharpness. A clear purpose emerged in her previously thoughtless actions.
A kick.
She perfectly replicated the movement she often showed me—the very one I had clumsily mimicked just moments ago.
Blocking wasn’t an option.
I threw my body aside to dodge a ferocious strike that would have cost me at least one limb if I failed to evade it.
Bit by bit, the keen edge returned to her movements.
Once her actions gained a clear purpose, her movements were no longer something I could keep up with.
Conversely, her openings were disappearing.
The gaps that had existed until a moment ago—the ones I had been diving into—gradually vanished, and the flow from one movement to the next became increasingly natural.
Her eyes, still stained black, were fixed solely on me.
“Fine, so that’s how it’s going to be?”
I had poured in enough Innate True Qi to kill a normal person, but it wasn’t enough.
Then I’d use a little more.
Don’t underestimate me.
Thanks to the fortuitous encounters I’d devoured so far, I was confident in my total capacity of Innate True Qi.
Something surged from deep within my body and poured out.
As if matching her as she took her stance, my movements also grew sharper.
I dove forward, dodging the straight punch she threw.
* * *
Hey, don’t run away.
— What are you doing?
An annoying voice interfered in her head, but she didn’t care.
For some reason, her body was moving according to her will again.
If that was the case, she thought reaching him wouldn’t be very difficult.
In fact, she had cornered him several times. He was busy just dodging, looking so exhausted that he couldn’t even think of counterattacking anymore.
And yet, she couldn’t quite catch him.
Like the moon reflected on the water’s surface, he seemed within reach, only to slip away at the decisive moment.
I’m not trying to hurt you.
I’m just curious about what I’ve forgotten.
I just want to hold you.
The black thing, which had seemed only nostalgic and lovely, felt a little heartless for the first time.
Feeling a bit petulant, she swung her fist with more force.
In that moment, as he dodged the fist, the black thing changed once more.
What had transformed from a mere black smudge into a human shadow now possessed a fairly respectable human form.
Now that the shape was complete, she finally realized what the red thing she had been looking for was.
Ah, those red things are eyes.
It was a gaze, red as if burning, looking at her as thick as blood.
Her heart felt at ease at the familiar look in his eyes.
Cathy tried to remember.
The name of the black thing that had been forcibly shattered, even though she had finally found it again.
“What was your name again?”
But she couldn’t quite remember.
She had remembered it earlier, and she felt sorry that it wouldn’t come to mind.
So she asked, but the black thing did not answer.
As if he couldn’t hear her voice, he simply flickered and approached her.
“Ugh…!?”
His momentum was sharper and more fierce than before.
He was quite difficult to deal with because he approached using a mix of the combat arts she had taught him and dagger techniques.
He lunged into the openings created by the fact that she had become stronger but slightly slower than usual.
He prevented her from making large movements and stuck close to her the moment she tried to pull away, refusing to give her any distance.
She should have been annoyed, but for some reason, she felt strangely proud.
— He’s in the way.
‘No, he’s not.’
— Get rid of him.
‘I don’t want to.’
Crack.
“Ah!”
In a moment of distraction, the knife in his hand grazed her arm.
— See? He’s someone who puts you in danger.
‘No, I wouldn’t have been hit if you hadn’t interfered.’
Cathy realized the reason she couldn’t reach him.
The black aura surrounding her was the problem. Having this made her stronger, but everything else was a mess.
So, she decided to cast aside the energy that was hindering her.
— What are you doing?
The black energy resisted, but she was able to suppress it surprisingly easily.
As the creeping black energy vanished, her body finally felt a bit lighter.
Her balance returned, and her speed returned.
When she took a step as she usually did, it finally made a light, rhythmic sound.
She took her stance.
With this speed, she would surely be able to catch that heartless black thing.
Because she had suppressed the energy trying to dominate her body to the limit, her strength only ended up being slightly stronger than usual, but she didn’t need it anyway since it wasn’t hers to begin with.
Ah.
She felt like she could replicate that strike from that day now.
Her fist felt light.
The strike that was faithful to the basics, the one that had annihilated the goblins in a single blow inside the cave where she had been trapped with someone.
The strike that had understood a glimpse of the essence of martial arts and surpassed its limits.
As if sensing danger, the fiercely flickering black thing narrowed the distance in an instant and lunged.
I’m not trying to hurt you.
I just want to reach you and hold you.
“Hehe, caught you.”
She thrust her fist forward.
The black thing was swallowed by the cleanest punch she had thrown for the second time in her life.
And then, with a thud, it lost its balance.
It ceased to move.
The black thing, finally within her reach, no longer tried to run away and leaned quietly into her embrace.
And for some reason, the noise that had been constantly buzzing in her head grew a little quieter.
She was holding it in her arms, but for some reason, it began to grow cold.
The fading warmth felt lonely somehow, so Cathy pulled it even closer.
As if to catch the vanishing warmth.
* * *
“…Huh?”
Whose voice was that?
Was it Lilac, or Cheon Yu-hak, or perhaps someone else?
Ah, seriously.
Drip.
There was no way I could win just because I charged in out of anger. Right.
Softly.
She embraced me.
It was a familiar sensation I had experienced before.
Drip.
For a moment, I wondered if she had regained her senses, but it didn’t seem to be the case.
Her eyes were still stained black, and there was something alien in her movements.
The black energy surrounding her had mostly vanished, but that only meant she had regained her original strength, so in a way, this outcome was inevitable.
The pain wasn’t as bad as I expected.
Rather than painful, it felt hot.
Things that shouldn’t be leaving were pouring out of the large hole in my stomach.
Ah, this is bad.
I can’t maintain my balance.
I thought I heard a scream, but I didn’t know whose it was.
As my body slid down, Professor Cathy’s embrace felt much closer.
I could smell a scent.
The scent of Professor Cathy and the floral fragrance flowing from my own body mixed together, creating a scent I had never smelled before.
It was a strangely reassuring scent.
A soft touch brushed against my cheek.
Haha, damn, I missed this.
How long has it been?
It would have been better if it wasn’t in a situation like this.
Her black-stained eyes seemed to be looking at me with worry for some reason.
— Wake up…!
— The Saint’s…!
“Professor.”
I called out, but there was no answer.
Of course there wouldn’t be.
“It’s time to wake up. The kids are worried.”
The hot stuff.
The red stuff that had been circulating through my body.
Almost all of it had already spilled out of me.
My strength fades, and my consciousness darkens.
Just before I was completely swallowed by the darkness.
— One-Coin?
The last insurance I had set up moved.
…How the hell are the artifact contract conditions like this?
You piece of crap coin.
* * *
I hate this.
This isn’t what I wanted.
I only held it in my arms, but it’s getting colder and colder.
It was hard for her dizzy head to recall what that meant, but it was certain that it was not a good sign.
The noise could no longer be heard.
“…fessor.”
The black thing seemed to be saying something.
“It’s time…”
She didn’t understand, but she focused on its form as much as possible.
“It’s time to wake up. The kids are worried.”
Wake up?
Is that what he just said?
An instinctive sense of rejection arose; she felt that if she resisted now, there would be no turning back.
Nevertheless, Cathy resisted in order to grant the request of the cooling black thing.
Her darkened vision returned to normal, if only slightly.
Clarity returned to a world that had lacked it, and she began to slowly remember what she was holding in her arms and what she had forgotten.
“…The artifact?”
Those words came from the mouth of the villain who was confronting Lilac.
“…Uh.”
It’s red.
The thing she thought was black was stained infinitely red.
She wondered why there was such a strong scent of flowers, only to realize it was the fragrance emanating from him.
Unlike a typical metallic scent of blood, the intense floral fragrance meant it took a moment for her to recognize that the substance staining him and herself red was his blood.
It was far too sweet to be called the scent of blood; it wasn’t unpleasant at all, but rather delicate.
But the substance still flowing from the hole in his abdomen was undoubtedly his blood.
Her scent and his mixed together, becoming a fragrance she had never smelled before.
It was an ominous and sorrowful scent.
Why?
What happened?
Her memories were muddled.
Her consciousness was not clear.
But she could tell who the culprit of this tragedy was.
Because her own fists were stained infinitely red.
Only after seeing the life gradually fading from his eyes did she realize.
“No.”
She began to realize what she had done.
Cathy recalled the name of the boy cooling in her arms.
“So-hyun…!”