Chapter 170
Chapter 170
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 170
Chapter Title: 39. Sleeping with the Enemy (5)
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‘Take off the top? And run the tattoo ad at the same time?’
The area was already crawling with ash-gray fiends—no, it was a fiend-infested hellscape—so there was no time for second thoughts.
Whoosh!
「Golden Oath」 - Legendary Chestplate
【Enemy attack power reduced by 50%.】
As Yeongwoo immediately stripped off his chestplate, the new Dogo ad from Togo began playing on the ‘blank space’ tattooed on his right upper arm.
This ad was a kind of behind-the-scenes footage showing Dogo researchers, who resembled cephalopods, test-firing bows in some lab.
‘Dogo sells actual bows too, huh.’
That’s why the quest was named ‘Dogo, Supreme Bow’ for a reason.
Meanwhile, the fiends who suddenly faced a challenger stripping off his chestplate without warning.
-Wh… what the hell is this guy?
-What’s he trying to pull now?
-Aren’t they all like this……?
They stared at the problematic challenger with newfound fear.
They had completely forgotten to charge at him.
Until now, the only opponents they’d ever faced were test combat puppets copied from challengers who would one day arrive.
So they knew challengers possessed superhuman power on their level, but not exactly who would show up.
And today, they finally met their first outsider—a challenger—and it just had to be Joseon’s First Sword, Jeong Yeongwoo.
-What’s going on out there……?
-This guy’s Joseon’s First Sword?
The fiends had also waited eons that felt eternal for someone to enter the dungeon, so the bizarre spectacle unfolding before them was utterly shocking.
On top of that, Yeongwoo’s body—bought with millions of karma—was aesthetically quite beautiful.
Which only made the whole thing feel even more grotesque.
“You… you all feel it too, right?”
As silence briefly fell over the area, Yeongwoo flashed an awkward smile and showed off his shoulder to the audience.
Swoosh.
The fiends grimaced in disgust and shot back.
-What the hell are we supposed to feel, you lunatic.
-Who the fuck is this guy?
Yeongwoo slowly began building his fighting spirit as he replied.
“…Don’t you feel it? That in this universe, Dogo is the definitive answer in the arms industry?”
-……?
-What?
-What bullshit……
“Then feel it now! The power of 「Dogo」!”
Crack!
As Yeongwoo suddenly rolled his eyes wildly and powerfully drew back the bowstring, the fiends facing him realized something had gone terribly wrong.
-Th, this guy’s not human!
-He’s about to do something again!
-Kill him quick!
Sensing danger on instinct, thousands of fiends charged at the golden challenger all at once.
At the same time, Yeongwoo’s senses stat skyrocketed past ten thousand units in an instant.
“Uwaaaaaah……!”
Facing the gray tide filling his vision, Yeongwoo let out a roar utterly inhuman as he released the bowstring.
Twang!
Fwooooosh, boom!
A purple explosion from the psychic arrow erupted, mercilessly blasting the oncoming fiends into the abyss below.
“This battle is……! Brought to you by the pan-universal weapons brand, 「Dogo」!”
With a face like a fanatic introducing his sponsor, Yeongwoo realized something at that moment.
‘Huh……?’
He had already pronounced 「Dogo」 twice in transcendental language.
A form of communication used by higher beings, where merely hearing or seeing it instantly conveyed the embedded meaning and emotion.
At first, he thought it was a misperception or just another promotional gimmick from Dogo.
But no.
‘This… I pronounced it myself. I’m sure of it, somehow.’
Of course, the only transcendental language he could use was 「Dogo」, but that alone was a huge shock.
‘What the hell? What’s going on all of a sudden…….’
And in the meantime, from behind.
-Gotcha!
-His back’s open……!
-Kya啊啊啊!
Hundreds of fiends had closed in during the arrow shot and were attempting a sneak attack.
The auto-combat greatsword ‘Golden Trajectory’ tried to activate in response.
-Whirrr!
“Wait! There’s a specific quest condition.”
Yeongwoo stopped it immediately.
<Quest> Kill fiends with bow: 59/2,743.
According to the quest, he needed exactly 2,743 bow kills.
In other words, if Golden Trajectory interfered, there might not be enough fiends left, leading to quest failure.
“Don’t touch those guys. Just guard my back. You get it? Just stand there like a shield.”
As Yeongwoo issued the order and fired another arrow forward, Golden Trajectory positioned itself to block his rear.
Thud!
“Good thing it listens well.”
Leaving the golden greatsword propped up behind him like a folding screen, Yeongwoo deeply slashed his left leg with the orphan sword.
Splatter!
Blood gushed from his thigh, boosting his strength stat by 25%.
「Frightened Cat」 - Narrative Compass
【Points to threatening targets.】
【Strength +25% during bleeding.】
Yeongwoo self-harmed to boost strength purely because the quest demanded fighting with a ‘bow’.
-Grraaah!
Occasionally, fiends climbed over the Golden Trajectory blocking the rear. In those cases, rather than drawing the bowstring.
Slaaaash!
Swinging the bow like a sword was far more efficient.
That’s why he deliberately amped his strength for close-quarters combat power.
“Ah……! As expected, Dogo’s tech is number one in the universe……!”
After slashing a close enemy with the bow, Yeongwoo fired another arrow forward.
Boom!
「White Saturation」 - Narrative Bow
【Senses stat applied to arrow power.】
【Power increases with arrow range.】
◇ Dogo: Shadow Arrow
◇ Dogo: Psychic Damage
Thanks to ‘White Saturation’ applying senses to arrow power, Yeongwoo—surrounded by thousands of fiends—had absurd attack power.
If the dungeon boss were here right now, a few arrows would probably obliterate it.
“I am Jeong Yeongwoo07, Earth human, strongest in Gyeongbuk, Gangnam, and north of the Korean Peninsula! 「Dogo오오오!」”
As Yeongwoo shouted madly in transcendental language and charged forward, the fiends forcibly comprehending 「Dogo」 turned their ash-gray faces bone-white.
-This bastard too……?
-H, he’s not human either.
-Wh… what the hell.
Finally realizing some colossal entity loomed behind this madman, the dungeon fiends instinctively backpedaled.
Then.
-Sc, scary.
Starting with one fiend’s mutter, they all plastered themselves to the outer walls of the space and fled in all directions.
“Huh? Wait, hold on! Not yet……!”
Yeongwoo was the one panicking now.
<Quest> Kill fiends with bow: 1,321/2,743.
He still needed to kill over a thousand more, so he limped after them on his bleeding leg.
“Just a hundred! Just a hundred more……!”
Twang!
As Yeongwoo hastily drew the bowstring, the fiends now flinched at his gaze and dodged.
-Ee, eek!
-Run!
-Dodge that way!
Like a game of tag in a cramped room, the fiend horde scattered to evade his aim.
But with their numbers, hiding was impossible—and the opponent was Joseon’s First Sword, after all.
Moreover, these were mere ‘trash mob’ fiends placed here.
Dodging Yeongwoo’s arrows was next to impossible.
“Die with the power of 「Dogo」!”
Yeongwoo drew the bowstring wide again.
Creeeak!
Flames from the braziers stretched his massive shadow over the fiend legion.
-…Sp, spare me.
* * *
[Quest Complete - “Dogo, Supreme Bow”]
[Reward Issued]
|3 million karma
Massacre.
Having slain all 2,743 fiends, Yeongwoo received a card loaded with 3 million karma in front of the portal.
Flash!
Even in this otherworldly dungeon, Dogo—the pan-universal weapons brand—could deliver cards.
But Yeongwoo’s expression wasn’t great.
‘Turns out it’s a pretty shady company.’
He got the promised base 2 million plus 1 million bonus for stripping off his top, as agreed.
The problem was the quest’s completion condition: exactly 2,743 fiends.
It perfectly matched the total number that had poured in from the two braziers earlier.
In other words, if Yeongwoo had checked the quest even a bit late and swung his sword, or let Golden Trajectory rampage, he would’ve failed.
‘Sure, I basically blackmailed them into this quest, so I can’t complain… but is begging for ad money even right?’
(Option) [Grade 2 Exclusive Quest]
-Receive ad payments in installments only upon completing exclusive quests.
-Total ad budget increases approximately 40-fold.
#Base Ad Pay: Estimated 10 million karma per week.
Per the contract, Dogo owed him about 400 million karma weekly via quests.
To fulfill that, they’d need to churn out quests non-stop.
‘It’s business. Shouldn’t you guys handle this sort of thing yourselves?’
Yeongwoo glanced up at the dark void above where the card had shot down from, then slowly stepped into the portal ahead.
Clank, clank.
Soon, the blue portal enveloped his body and returned him to the arena.
Splash!
‘Still not used to this.’
The peculiar sensation of spatial transfer rippled through him for an instant. When Yeongwoo opened his eyes, the surroundings had changed to the vast arena.
Thud!
As Yeongwoo’s foot hit the arena floor fresh from the portal, the experts from the three East Asian countries—excluding Jeonggu—stepped back with fearful looks.
“What… what’s wrong?”
Sensing the weird vibe, Yeongwoo asked. Jeonggu scratched his chin and said,
“W-Well, we all saw it.”
“…Saw what?”
“Th-That thing…….”
“‘That thing’? How am I supposed to know? What did you see?”
“Dogo오오오……!”
“Oh.”
Yeongwoo, who had instantly looked embarrassed, scratched his chin like his father before tilting his head.
“Huh? But you heard it? No sound came through on the screen, right?”
Miyagi Sword Emperor Tomiko cautiously chimed in.
“We didn’t hear anything. But when you shouted Dogo, the sound came through.”
“Oh, so only Dogo……?”
Yeongwoo intuited it.
What they ‘heard’ wasn’t sound—it was the meaning sown by the transcendental language itself.
Transcendental language could pierce even relay screens that didn’t output audio.
But the narrow-minded experts from the three countries had come to a completely wrong conclusion from this.
“Yeongwoo-ssi, if I may ask…….”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
“…Are you an alien?”