Chapter 17
Chapter 17
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 17
Chapter Title: Owner of the Ghost Sword (3)
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“Chwiik-!”
Rough breaths mixed with guttural growls echoed through the empty lot behind the factory.
Its gait staggered from the incomplete anesthesia, but the killing intent pouring from its bloodshot red eyes was unmistakable.
The ground trembled faintly with every movement of that massive musclebound bulk.
“Mi-madness! It’s a High Orc!”
“It was definitely dead! Why the hell is it alive?!”
The three hunters recoiled in horror, stumbling backward.
They were nothing more than low-tier E-rank hunters who scraped by against goblins and kobolds.
To them, a B-rank specimen like the High Orc was nothing short of a catastrophe.
The terror of that overwhelming size difference rooted their legs in place.
“Chwiik!”
The High Orc bellowed and swung its fist.
The factory’s sandwich panel wall crumpled like tissue paper and went flying.
Witnessing rebar bending like pulled taffy under that sheer brutality, the bald hunter’s panicked gaze snapped toward Ye-eun.
“Hey, take this and get lost!”
Without hesitation, he shoved her back.
“Ack!”
Ye-eun stumbled forward, tumbling right to the High Orc’s feet.
She looked up on instinct.
Thick drool spilling from between its jaundiced fangs splattered across her cheek.
A nauseating stench stabbed into her nostrils.
“Run! While it’s eating that bitch!”
The hunters bolted into the darkness without a backward glance.
The High Orc’s eyes locked onto Ye-eun sprawled at its feet.
The gaze of a predator that had spotted its meal.
‘I’m dead.’
Even trained hunters were fleeing—there was no way she, a mere civilian, stood a chance.
Her legs shook uncontrollably.
“Uwaaaah!”
Ye-eun rolled across the ground, hurling herself aside.
Boom-!
The High Orc’s fist cratered the spot where she’d been.
Concrete splintered in a spiderweb of cracks, shards flying everywhere.
Ye-eun clenched her teeth and hauled herself up.
Debris had scraped her face raw as she rolled, but the primal instinct that stopping meant death drove her on.
She ducked behind a heap of scrap materials.
“Chwik?”
The High Orc glanced around.
It seemed to relish the hunt.
Thudding slowly toward her hiding spot.
Each footfall rang like a death knell countdown.
“Huk... huk...”
Ye-eun tightened her grip on the orthopedic knife clutched in her hand.
A rusty 15cm blade, its edge long gone. Could this even pierce the monster’s hide?
No—she had to pierce it to survive.
Crunch!
The scrap pile exploded under one kick from the High Orc.
From the billowing dust, its hand lashed out.
“Ugh!”
She dodged—but not far enough.
The High Orc’s iron grip snagged her left arm.
Vise-like strength crushed her forearm.
Crack.
A sickening snap echoed.
“Aaaah!”
A raw scream tore from Ye-eun’s throat.
The agony of her bones pulverizing slammed into her brain.
Nerve-searing torment whited out her vision in strobing flashes.
But she didn’t pass out.
Teeth grinding, she endured—right up to the moment it hoisted her high and gaped its maw.
‘Now.’
Ye-eun’s right hand struck like a viper.
The instincts of the once-titled Fencing Empress ignited in that split second.
The orthopedic knife in her grasp plunged dead-center into its left eyeball.
Stab!
“Kuaaaaa-!”
The High Orc thrashed in agony, flailing its arm.
The backlash flung Ye-eun’s body through the air to smash into the ground.
“Cough!”
Blood clots erupted from her mouth.
Her left arm dangled limp; her body throbbed with bruises.
But she didn’t pause.
Staggering to her feet, she fled back into the shadows.
The one-eyed High Orc rampaged in berserk fury, smashing everything around it.
The factory’s rear turned to pandemonium in seconds.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Screech.
High on the hillside overlooking the factory outskirts, Siwoo’s black sedan pulled to a halt.
Engine still humming, he peered through the window at the carnage below.
What met his eyes was a brutal game of survival.
A woman fleeing, left arm mangled and dangling, drenched in blood.
And the raving monster in pursuit.
Her desperate flailing for life bordered on heartbreaking pathos.
Vrrrrm-!
The Ghost Sword Star Blade on the passenger seat thrummed violently.
The car rocked from the vibration.
⚙ SYSTEM NOTIFICATION ⚙ [The sword has detected its master's crisis.] [Strongly opposes intervention.] [The sword rejects the living.] [The sword desires its master's awakening.] Arms crossed, Siwoo observed Ye-eun with detached eyes.
‘Not yet.’
Her gaze burned with life and budding killing intent.
But it wasn’t enough.
Fear still overshadowed rage within her.
The urge to flee drowned out the thirst to kill.
‘If I step in now, she won’t be able to handle it.’
That blade was an S-rank item.
A demonic sword that gnawed at the wielder’s mind.
Without ironclad will and crushing bloodlust, gripping it would let its spectral energy devour your soul—driving you insane.
You’d become nothing but a marionette swung by the blade for slaughter.
‘And awakening would fail.’
To claim true ownership, she had to shatter her limits.
The tipping point where death’s terror drowned in fury.
She needed to be cornered until she chose to become the monster.
Siwoo rested a hand on the wheel, staring down.
Sleek combed hair, impeccable suit.
Against the blood-soaked chaos, he looked like a patrician at the theater.
“Struggle harder.”
She might die—but that was fate.
If the vessel proved unworthy and shattered, so be it.
Siwoo was gambling on her potential.
“More desperately. To your absolute limit. Burn every last scrap of life force.”
As his murmur faded, the scene below spiraled into frenzy.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ “Uwaaak!”
A death-rattle shriek ripped from Ye-eun’s throat.
Her fleeing foot had snagged a stray steel pipe littering the ground.
Off-balance, she crashed down—just as the High Orc’s colossal hand descended.
Dazed, she rolled sideways in the nick of time.
She craned her neck, hunting for any escape.
But...
“No way...”
She was boxed in—a dead-end enclosure with concrete walls on three sides.
“Haa... haa...”
Ye-eun slumped against the chill wall, gasping raggedly.
No more running room.
At the mouth of the trap, the cyclopean High Orc lumbered in, vengeful savagery radiating.
Its oozing socket was grotesque.
Left arm numb. Legs quaking. Lungs aflame.
A savage grin split its lips.
“Chwiik...”
Death looming, Ye-eun’s mind oddly chilled to clarity.
Boiling terror evaporated; icy killing intent flooded the void.
Nothing left to lose. Nowhere left to flee.
‘If I’m going down anyway...’
Ye-eun slowly lifted her gaze to the orc.
The tremor in her eyes stilled.
Beneath sweat-streaked blood and tangled hair, her stare was no longer that of prey.
Left arm dangling useless, she reversed her grip on the orthopedic knife in her right—fingers vise-crushing the slippery, blood-slick hilt.
“In the end, you’re just a hunk of meat.”
Her eyes transformed.
‘Like butchering a carcass.’
The High Orc’s hulking frame registered as prime cuts awaiting the knife.
No mana, thick hide—irrelevant.
Every monster had joints.
Tendons. Nerve hubs. Vulnerabilities thinly skinned, muscle-shielded.
‘Armpit. Popliteal hollow. Femoral artery in the groin.’
Red lines traced her vision.
Stab here. Slash there. Sever this.
“Here I come, you fucker.”
Ye-eun snarled beast-low and lunged into its reach.
Its hand arced down—too late. She slid low across the ground.
‘Lower. Lower!’
Shlick.
Her blade hamstrung its ankle tendon.
“Kugh!”
Its balance crumbled; the behemoth teetered.
Seizing the gap, Ye-eun burrowed between its thighs.
The tenderest, deadliest mark.
Her knife plunged without mercy.
Blood geysered, soaking her face.
Fetid copper flooded her lungs, but she pressed on.
“Die! Die! Die!”
It flailed in guttural shrieks, but Ye-eun clung to its thigh like a fiend, knife sawing relentlessly.
Not struggling to live—to kill.
Bathed in gore, she seemed less human than a demon crawled from the abyss.
Siwoo’s eyes narrowed as he watched.
A ghost of a smile tugged his lips.
‘......?’
His blue irises sharpened toward the adjacent rooftop.
Three men stood there.
No shock, no flinch at the bloodbath.
Camcorder in hand, filming the atrocity—whispering, chuckling.
Zooming in, snickering lewdly.
“Heh, check that bitch. Still kicking?”
“Tenacious slut. Just die already—why drag it out?”
“Damn, that snapped arm. Chills. Shoulda brought popcorn.”
Siwoo’s face iced over.
Contempt and revulsion cracked his stoic gaze for the first time.
They guffawed, the desperate duel mere amuse-bouche.
One staked her life to transcend; the others lapped up the gore with giggles.
‘Pathetic. Obvious.’
Siwoo lifted his hand from the wheel.
Door open, he straightened his suit and melted into the shadows.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ “Hey? Check it!”
“Ooh, finally croaking?”
“Yesss, our Empress! Nailed it! Deeper!”
The rooftop hunters jabbed fingers below, buzzing with glee.
The camcorder lens dogged blood-masked Ye-eun savaging the orc’s groin.
To them, pure snuff-flick stimulation.
Help? Nah—visions of cash danced in their heads.
Right as they yammered loudest.
“Having fun?”
A low, frigid voice drifted from behind.
Arctic chill spidered down their spines.
“Hiiik?!”
“Wh-who...!”
The hunters whipped around, jolted.
A suited man loomed inches behind—when had he scaled up?
No presence at all.
Siwoo stared down stone-faced, hands pocketed.
Night breeze toyed with his tie.
Polished veneer, but his eyes burned fiercer than the High Orc below.
Churning blue glint throttled their hearts.
“Asked you a question. Fun?”
Siwoo’s tone was flat void.
Yet the killing intent coiled within sliced like a honed edge across their throats.