Lightning Strikes and the Gallery Appears (2)
The chat window froze. For a brief moment, nothing moved. Then, like a dam had burst, a flood of messages began pouring in at insane speed.
“Ah, yeah. I figured.”
It was a little disappointing, but there was nothing I could do about it.
After all, why would they bother memorizing something like lottery numbers in the first place?
With that thought in mind, I looked down at the lightning crackling around both my hands.
Far from dying down, the electricity was slowly spreading further.
Crackle—
A spark that jumped from my fingertips struck the monitor on the desk.
With a loud pop, the screen shattered and smoke began rising.
“Aaaagh! My monitor!!”
At their frantic shouts, I hurriedly tried to retract my mana.
But the current refused to listen to me and began rampaging wildly.
The fluorescent lights flickered violently before exploding with a loud bang.
“Hey, hey! How do I stop this thing?!”
“How the hell am I supposed to know that?!”
…I had no idea what any of them were saying.
Me? Lightning?
Their explanations were far too abstract for me to understand.
“What kind of bullshit is that?!”
The moment I shouted, the range of the discharge began to expand rapidly.
The floor mats turned pitch black, and flames erupted from the wallpaper.
At this rate, my studio apartment was going to be reduced to ashes.
A conductor. Electricity instead of blood.
In the end, their conclusion was simple.
I had to recognize that what composed me was electricity.
I closed my eyes and steadied my mind. Then I repeated the words inside my head.
I am lightning. I am lightning. I am lightning. I am lightning. I am lightning.
I hypnotized myself like I was chanting a spell.
The moment I erased the idea that my body was made of organic matter and accepted that only electric current formed my true essence—
A strange floating sensation washed over me, as if my body had become weightless.
I slowly opened my eyes and looked down at my hands.
At some point, my entire body had turned into crackling electricity.
The skin, organs, arms, and legs that had once made up a human being—everything had transformed into lightning, as if it had lost all solid form.
“What? Weren't you just telling me not to control it?”
“…Ah.”
That was when it happened.
A sudden wave of pain hit me, and the current began rampaging once again.
In the end, unable to contain the berserk power, I threw myself straight through the window.
I thought it was just a normal jump.
But the sound of shattering glass rang out as my body shot into the air, transforming into a streak of lightning.
“U-uwaaaaaaaaah!!”
Even in that surreal burst of speed, a suitable target appeared in my mind.
The Tower collapse at the old Seoul Station that I'd seen on the news just moments ago.
If it was there…!
BOOOOM!!
With the sound of lightning striking, I changed direction toward Seoul Station.
My field of vision narrowed grotesquely, and every scenery I passed stretched into long bands of color.
The speed at which I tore through the air as lightning was impossible for human eyesight to follow.
Even so, an inexplicable thrill spread throughout my entire body.
Racing through the rain, I shot forward like a living bolt toward my destination.
It took only a few seconds to reach the target point.
In a flash, I slammed down right in the middle of the chaotic Seoul Station plaza.
CRASH!!
Asphalt fragments flew everywhere as dust billowed up.
As the rain washed the dust away, what entered my vision were dozens of monsters crawling out while emitting grotesque cries.
I looked around.
The scene was still without any Hunters on site.
All I could hear were the screams of ordinary citizens fleeing while bleeding.
I slowly straightened my bent knees and rose to my feet.
When I clenched both fists tightly, pleasant blue current flowed out once again.
And then the monsters began charging toward me.
Looking at the drooling creatures rushing in, I shouted.
“Wait, how the hell do I fight these things?”
I reflexively thrust both hands forward.
Recalling the sensation from the studio, I tried to release the lightning.
I expected to trigger a full discharge and electrocute the monsters in one go, but—
Crackle.
“Huh?”
A few blue sparks jumped from my fingertips before scattering weakly.
Panicking, I tried to release it again, but the current only rampaged inside my body.
I rolled across the ground by a hair's breadth. Tumbling through the mud, I yelled.
“Hey, you guys.”
A monster was swinging an axe right in front of me.
Yet instead of feeling fear, I calmly spat out the words.
“Teach me how to fight.”
I barely dodged the axe slicing through the air and rolled backward.
Another axe came flying as if it had been waiting for me.
“Hurry up!”
Letting mana and lightning operate separately? Coating them?
So basically, because I was generating lightning without using mana, I was losing control?
I took rough, heaving breaths and steadied my stance again.
I glared at the orc charging at me once more, swinging its axe.
Then I spun the mana circuit in my heart and drew up every ounce of mana I could muster.
I layered that mana over the lightning that formed my body.
“Ugh…!”
An indescribable pain assaulted my entire body.
Clenching my teeth, I forcibly drew up more mana to restrain the rampaging current.
Dodging axes and restraining the current with mana, over and over.
The sparks that had been flying out uncontrollably gradually began to subside.
“So… I wrap it like this…”
Little by little, I drew up more mana and coated the electricity that formed me.
“Like this…”
I kicked off the ground and leaped forward.
The orc, startled by my sudden counter-charge, hesitated for a split second. I drove my fist straight into its face with all my strength.
“Shove it!!”
The instant my hand made contact with the orc's face—
It began to disintegrate from the electric current.
Bzzzzzzzzzt—
The lightning exploded, and the orc's head simply evaporated.
The headless torso crumpled helplessly to the ground.
The shockwave from the blast sent the remaining orcs flying backward.
Of course, even I was staring blankly at the fallen orc corpse.
It had been a single strike.
I had taken down an orc in one hit.
When I looked down at my hands, I could still see faint blue sparks gently dancing across them.
The method of fusing my mana with lightning and using them together.
The moment I recalled that sensation, it felt like something that had been blocked was finally pierced through.
And with it came a surge of confidence.
“…This is actually pretty fun.”
A thick smile naturally spread across my lips.
Looking down at the orcs who still hadn't recovered from the shock, I clenched my fist tightly.
The sensation of the current flowing through my hand already felt familiar.
“Hey, you ghosts.”
I nudged the headless orc corpse with my foot and lifted my head.
Staring at the translucent chat window floating in the air, I smiled.
“How should I beat them next?”