Chapter 283: Fragmented Black Night
Chapter 283: Fragmented Black Night
I tore a piece of the night to drape over my shoulders and sprinted through the Martial Alliance as darkness settled.
In typical martial arts movies, the night is depicted as pitch black, but the night in the Martial Alliance was different. If anything, the city became more vibrant after the sun went down.
Under the light, the city had been filled with the sound of hammers striking iron and voices calling out to one another. But as the light faded and darkness descended, the city of iron and battle transformed.
It became a city of alcohol, laughter, and shadows.
Just like the dojo I was looking at right now.
I had no idea what kind of dojo it was during the morning, but now, it was dimly lit by electric lamps that looked like traditional lanterns. They had knocked down the walls to set up tables, operating as a tavern.
Aside from large-scale commercial activities like that, I could see stalls selling simple noodles and theaters putting on performances.
During the day, theaters, restaurants, and shops were visible, but they felt like public facilities placed on the outskirts for the sake of daily life—just to give the city a sense of form.
But as night fell, the atmosphere of the downtown area completely flipped, looking like a typical bustling food alley.
Of course, there were still blacksmith shops operating and sending sparks flying in every direction. I could also see dojos where people were training hard even at this hour, but unlike the morning, they were now the minority.
Sensing the shift in atmosphere, I leaped across the rooftops, hidden within the shadows of the night.
"Eeeeee! Damn this world! Let go of me, you bastards!"
A strangely familiar voice drifted from somewhere, drawing my gaze.
There, I saw a man whose face was flushed bright red, clearly wasted.
"Sect Leader! You can stop now! Even that person said he’d only do something about the sign when he left..."
Around the Martial Artist, others dressed in martial uniforms with peeling gold leaf were desperately holding back the drunken man.
"Do you think I can just sit still after hearing that?! He said we weren't even worth his attention! This is the only way to wash away the humiliation as a Martial Artist!"
Shouting those words, he brandished a pair of hair clippers.
I didn't know where he’d found it, but he was wearing a martial uniform of an incredibly tacky design—not a speck of gold to be found—as he threw his tantrum.
He seemed to have more followers than I expected, as practitioners from the Jijeo-hoe and martial artists who looked like his friends were trying to stop him.
Perhaps it was due to the strength of a B-Rank Hero. Eventually, in his drunken thrashing, those holding his hands were thrown off.
Whirrrr.
The mechanical hum cut through the rowdy night air.
Golden hair fluttered into the void.
...I feel a bit bad for some reason.
If I weren't in Black Marauder mode, I would have told him I left him alone because I acknowledged him as a Martial Artist in his own right...
I should stop by later and at least tell him his footwork was excellent.
Though I can't do anything about the hair that's already gone.
Even if his methods were a bit twisted, I realized he possessed a sense of honor as a Martial Artist in his own way.
When I only saw his footwork, I thought he was at the bare minimum level for a Martial Artist. But seeing him now, he seemed like an average Martial Artist who just lacked sense and had a bit of a craving for fame and money.
To have the resolve to shave his own head, even if it was the alcohol talking.
Let's see. His name was Kim... Geum... Geum-hwan, was it?
It feels slightly off, but whatever. I just need to remember that we'll meet again later.
More important than that were the people lurking in the dark alleys.
As the main streets grew brighter, the alleys became even darker to compensate.
There, those who had strayed from the righteous path existed.
Even if it was a small city, it was a place where martial artists from all over the world gathered, resulting in a high population density.
Perfectly managing such a place was a difficult task, even for the Management Bureau.
I mean, look at the Mutant Society. Aside from the bad luck of having their location pinpointed and getting bombed, they even put up buildings in the U.S. and were living quite well.
And while the vast majority of those who Awaken are statistically inclined toward a good alignment, the reality is that Villains do emerge in small percentages.
For such people, a place of complete extraterritoriality like Nanjido is a great home, and a city like this, where civilians and Heroes mix, is a great source of income.
However, they knew that if they were caught, the Management Bureau would use every means possible to crush their organization. Thus, they couldn't be tracked by conventional means. But as long as they were doing business against innocent people who knew nothing, they were bound to leave a trail.
The scammers selling fake martial arts manuals to civilians in the morning.
The dojos teaching martial arts that didn't even function as a proper form.
I used the traditional method of finding where they headed after they closed their doors at night.
They were aware of this as well and used numerous means to prevent being followed.
But they couldn't escape me—someone extremely specialized in that field.
Of course, even if one is good at tailing, there are many ways to evade a gaze.
But who was I?
I had served in an Assassination Team for the Management Bureau.
I had helped establish the world's largest villain organization, the Mutant Society.
And when necessary, I had worked in the field as a Young Girl spy...
...Let's set that last one aside.
Anyway, I was that kind of Hero.
In that sense, the petty tricks these people used were as clear to me as the lines on my palm.
Usually, even if their base was discovered, it would only end with them closing shop for a while if no clear evidence was found.
But right now, I was...
The Black Marauder.
An extra-legal measure, equivalent to secretly dispatching an Assassination Team because a problem had become too large.
Therefore.
From the rooftop of a building near the shop of the trash I had targeted.
Draped in the night.
I concentrated all my mana into my mind.
My sensory perception spiked rapidly.
My brain began to burn with information it couldn't handle, and every sensory nerve in my body was being destroyed by overwhelming electrical signals—but all of it was restored in an instant.
The sensations flowing in from the massive detection range I gained became a great roar, isolating my existence.
A massive detection ability obtained by being prepared to kill myself.
Using this was something that only happened under extremely limited conditions—like when I had to hear everyone's voices during the Gray Eater incident, or when I needed to grasp everything during the Quilp incident.
But now, it was different.
Through the newly acquired regeneration ability and the filtering ability developed while sifting through the countless sensations that gnawed at me in the Otherworld.
Though not perfect, through those two abilities.
I detected a massive range that couldn't even be compared to the past.
'Aigo, today's just not the day. Tsk. Too many Martial Artist bastards crowded around today because of some Dojo Breaking nonsense.'
Beyond the pain gained by continuously killing myself.
I found the target.
Deep inside an alleyway over there.
The location of a big shot who was using cognitive degradation techniques, stealth-type footwork, and even phase-shift magic.
Having found the target and withdrawing my amplified cognitive abilities.
The moment I kicked off to leap toward the identified target location.
"What? It's a physical body?"
'I' was already there.
Already at the target location.
However, it wasn't that I had already arrived at that place.
I was still leaping across buildings toward the location.
It was just that a split perception—that there was another me at the target point—had dominated my brain.
The wind brushed past me.
Dim lights formed lines and vanished behind me.
"What are you?! Where did you come from?"
The cliché words of a villain reached my ears.
Thud.
Perhaps because I was flustered, I broke something as I leaped.
I raised my hand.
I saw a body made of sparse Black Particles.
Just like Zess.
Not a whole body, but one that seemed to have been formed by Black Particles dotted together to create a shape.
Tang.
Having experienced failure once, a clear sound of controlled force echoed.
The target location came into view.
As I perceived my situation, I knew what I had to do.
I had to complete my lacking strength by devouring my surroundings.
With a final kick, I ran through the air.
Now, all that remained was to plummet toward the target location, following the influence of gravity.
I reached out my hand. The targets were the noisy Villains.
The ones threatening me with weapons.
Boom.
Perhaps because it was their base.
Unlike its appearance, I smashed through a sturdy wall reinforced with steel plates using my Pry Bar and a kick, stepping inside.
Ignoring the weapons passing through my sparse body.
I grabbed the neck of the nearest enemy and squeezed the target as my instincts dictated.
Power surged in.
The Otherworldly Power possessed by The Enemy flowed through my hand.
I could feel The Enemy whose neck I held trembling.
I could feel my incomplete body taking on a physical form.
"It's a monster! A Mutant has invaded!"
Because of the distance and location, two similar but different voices overlapped in my ears.
It was a bizarre sensation, but my brain processed it with familiarity.
Crash.
The noise and debris of The Wall I had broken.
Through the rare experience of having my underground self be showered by it.
I and I faced each other.
I threw the villain, who had turned pale after having all his strength drained, into a corner.
And I, whose black dress had turned gray from dirt after rushing through everything, looked at the me made of Black Particles.
The thing wearing a black dress with a slightly different design than mine.
It seemed it hadn't been able to complete its physical body even after draining all the power of a C-Rank Villain, as it was still sparse and empty in places.
A version of me whose entire form was black, composed only of light and shadow.
The only thing solid about such a being was a single dark-red Pry Bar.
Toward such an entity, I threw a question.
"Who are you?"
Both of us knew it was a strange question.
Because we knew, even if we couldn't understand it, that we were each other at our core.
The actions of the black-particle me were what I had thought to do.
The power that thing had absorbed was also transmitted to me.
However, one strange thing made me ask that question.
The action it took as soon as it appeared.
Its first words.
'What, it's a physical body.'
That was an action I didn't know, and it wasn't an action I had performed.
Even though it was an undeniable fact that the being in the form of that halfway-human was myself.
Something I didn't know was mixed inside it.
That was why I asked the question.
To the being inside my own body.
Then, it laughed.
I had no intention of laughing, so the being inside must have exerted its influence.
"You know. You heard it from The Queen."
A sentence that explained everything, yet left only questions.
"Anyway, you're certainly fast. Though the method is a mess, maybe this time..."
As she spoke, the appearance that looked exactly like me began to distort little by little.
The color remained black.
But the clothes, which had a similar design to mine, gradually changed into a different design.
From the embarrassing gothic dress I was currently wearing.
To a form wearing a tattered, ragged coat with a turtleneck shirt and pants underneath.
However, it didn't mean it had stopped being me.
I could still move my hand to lift the changed coat.
And it was possible to wave my hand to check for control.
Only the expression and the mouth were beyond my control.
A bizarrely twisted, smiling expression.
And the words that followed.
"The method is quite strange, but the manifestation is a success. I suppose the disappointing part is that you don't know how you did it."
The other me.
Even though he had fallen into reality like this, he didn't tell me anything clearly, just like when we met in the past.
To that, I threw a question.
"Isn't it about time you told me clearly?"
"No, I can't. Oh, and I'm vanishing. Farewell."
An incredibly firm answer.
And the unexpected words that followed.
As soon as they ended.
The black-particle me collapsed.
As if I had existed as particles from the beginning, my form crumbled.
Those particles were swallowed by my Black Marauder outfit.
The bizarre sensation of my body being two disappeared without leaving a single trace in my mind.
"..."
The questions increased.
How I had become two.
How they, who only appeared within me or in spaces filled with mana, had come down to reality.
Everything was a mystery.
But I stopped thinking.
Because I knew it was meaningless.
This was just information dropping one by one on the path I had to take.
Someday, when I need to know everything at the end, I will be able to.
So, let's move forward.
It's a waste of time even to worry.
"So, first."
Shall I sweep away the vermin before me?
The ones who need to be judged, who have scattered and fled like cockroaches.
And so, smiling, I ran through the darkened basement.