But He'll Go After Hong Yeji...
He had been sure Sim Sanghoon would go for Hong Yeji. Instead, the man came straight at Yujun.
Yujun threw up a shield with Ancient Magic, and a crimson force burst from Sim Sanghoon's hand and slammed into it. The roar was enormous. The whole tunnel shook. The shield did not break.
Sim Sanghoon's eyes went wide.
"You blocked my attack?"
The shock looked genuine. He knew exactly how hard he hit.
Yujun had no intention of sitting on defense. This time he called a brutal lightning spell, and in an instant the tunnel was drowned in it.
"Wh—what?"
The sheer mass of lightning left Sim Sanghoon no time to answer. Caught in the open, he staggered, a choked sound tearing out of him.
"Ghk..."
With his gear swapped out from top to bottom, Yujun's magical firepower was dozens of times what it had been.
Not dead.
He drew his mana up again. The same lightning.
That was when Sim Sanghoon shot in like an arrow, a massive aura coiled in his hand. Too late to fall back. Yujun drew his sword and swung, and the crimson force split cleanly in half against the mana-charged blade. In the same breath Sim Sanghoon snatched a sword from his inventory and charged once more.
That. Don't tell me—
Astonishingly, the man's blade was Mythic as well: a Dragon Knight's Sword with a level-400 requirement. The level cap was low, but the fact that Sim Sanghoon owned a Mythic sword at all was a surprise.
Nine years in here. It could happen.
Yujun did not dodge. He met the swing head-on, and Sim Sanghoon's sword sheared away in a clean cut.
"Wh—what?"
While the man was still reeling, Yujun's blade thrust forward. Sim Sanghoon flung up a shield in a panic and was blasted far back.
Ancient Magic. He had been interrupted the last time he tried it, but now there was an opening. Yujun generated a massive surge of lightning, gathering it into a single point—onto Sim Sanghoon. The bolts crashed down in a chain of detonations.
"Gyaaaaaah!"
The scream was raw agony. Yujun had no mercy to give. This time he meant to kill, and he reached for fire. Acrid smoke swallowed the tunnel. He raised a shield over his companions, then hurled hundreds of fireballs at Sim Sanghoon. Blast after blast rolled through the passage until the smoke blotted out everything in front of them.
"Did I get him?"
Ju Donghyeon stared at him, startled.
"What?"
"You really shouldn't say things like that."
"He isn't dead anyway. I was just saying it."
Sim Sanghoon had spent nine years inside the Tower of Infinity. If all that time had not been a complete waste, he ought to endure at least this much. Yujun was exactly right. Sim Sanghoon came charging back without a scratch on him.
Recovered that fast...
An elixir, at the very least a top-grade potion. No question.
So unless I kill him outright, this turns into a war of attrition.
The fight itself was, surprisingly, nothing much. Sim Sanghoon attacked on stamina that never seemed to flag, and Yujun answered only what came at him. With every exchange, Sim Sanghoon's face crumpled further. The reason was simple: the battle refused to go the way he wanted. Above all, Yujun's Swordsmanship, honed to its peak, was doing the work. No matter the angle, no matter the method, Yujun read the attack with uncanny precision and shut it down, as if he had Future Sight.
The panic on Sim Sanghoon's face was plain.
"How is this happening?"
Was this what a prey animal looked like, driven to the edge of a cliff? The arrogance from the start of the fight had flipped completely. His face was tight with fear.
This is the man who wiped out an entire village?
For someone the Abyss King had treated as a serious headache, he was remarkably unimpressive. A clash with Yujun sent him tumbling across the floor.
"Want to keep going?"
Sim Sanghoon said nothing. Maybe his pride was too wounded. His eyes darted as he hunted for a way out, and nothing suitable came. There was no method by which he could beat Yujun. He knew that better than anyone. The tall, striking man in front of him was toying with him—or more precisely, matching him just enough, waiting for him to surrender.
Damn it...
Humiliations like this had been rare. A few, early on, not long after he was dragged into the Tower of Infinity. Once he passed a certain threshold of strength, he had never tasted defeat.
Who the hell is this guy?
His own level was 610. Dozens higher than even those Coordination bastards.
Leave out that monster Ji Gyutae, and I figured nobody in Coordination could beat me.
He had never even heard of the man in front of him.
Don't tell me he's a prospect?
Sim Sanghoon shook his head. Losing to some up-and-comer was absurd. He was absolutely not a prospect.
A top-ranker who's been hiding his strength... that's the most likely answer.
Honestly, short of running, he saw no way out. Fighting to the bitter end was little better than suicide.
"Wait. I've got something to say."
Yujun narrowed his eyes at him.
"Something to say? What?"
"Let's make a deal. I've got rare items. Plenty of them. You said you were a bounty hunter, right? Fine. I'll admit it. You're stronger than me. You've earned the bounty on my head. But."
A sly smile crept onto Sim Sanghoon's face.
"I'll give you something better than that bounty. Then you won't need to bother catching me, will you?"
"Bounty? Oh. Right. I did say that."
The bounty hardly mattered either way. He already had more points than he knew what to do with, so the offer did not land at all. When Yujun's expression stayed lukewarm, Sim Sanghoon grew frantic.
"I—if you saw the items I've got, you'd be shocked!"
"Worth nine years of your life?"
"Of course! Obviously!"
"Your weapon was pretty disappointing, though."
Yujun's sword had cut through Sim Sanghoon's like tofu.
"..."
Yujun gathered his mana, done listening.
"W-wait a second!"
"Don't listen to him. That guy will stab you in the back the second he gets a chance."
Hong Yeji said it loudly enough for Sim Sanghoon to hear, and his face flushed red.
"Oh, and I've already amplified his weak points. Hit a vital spot now—the head, the neck—and the damage will land several times harder."
Hong Yeji's Weakness Amplification. It was an absurdly broken ability, the kind that made even Yujun jealous. Land one high-powered skill or spell now, and Sim Sanghoon was as good as dead. She smiled, bright and easy, saying the sort of thing one usually saved for a boss monster and saying it with a grin.
Yujun scratched his head.
"If he just up and dies, that's a problem."
"He's survived this long, hasn't he? If you're really worried, hit him once at lower power. You don't even have to aim for a weak point."
He had thought the ability would be a huge help against a single powerful enemy. He just had not expected the first target to be a fellow Korean.
Yujun gave a wry smile and shaped another lightning spell. Sim Sanghoon cast a shield of his own—strangely, a red one. It made no difference. Yujun's lightning shattered it without mercy, and sparks burst in every direction.
"Gyaaah!"
Struck dead-on, Sim Sanghoon convulsed.
"Aaaah! This is pissing me off!"
He downed a potion and hurled a small bead at the floor. It cracked, and a sickly blue-green poison smoke erupted. In the enclosed tunnel it spread in an instant. Yujun already had a shield ready. The poison looked potent, but it was nowhere near enough to pierce his barrier.
In that gap, Sim Sanghoon tried to run. He looked straight up and cast, and luck was with him: a new tunnel branched off directly overhead.
"Paranet."
"Yes, Master!"
"Space Movement. Get behind him."
"At once!"
"Yeji, Donghyeon—wait here a moment."
"All right."
The shield was already up. Even if an Abyss beast showed up while he was gone, it would not be a problem. Yujun took Paranet's Space Movement and came out at Sim Sanghoon's back. He did not draw his sword. He swung a fist, hard. Sim Sanghoon went down face-first, and the blow was heavy enough that blood ran from his head.
No quarter. Yujun did not let up, fist after fist. A sword with that kind of attack power, against a man already under Weakness Amplification, might kill him on the spot, so he left the weapon sheathed. Not that going unarmed made the hits weak. In the end, Sim Sanghoon lost consciousness. A body beyond even the superhuman still had its limits.
Yujun hauled him up in his left arm and returned to the others. Hong Yeji's eyes went wide.
"You're just going to carry him like that?"
"Why?"
"Isn't that dangerous? If he suddenly comes to..."
"It's fine. I've already got insurance."
He used a consumable binding item. Legendary-grade, so the effect was certain—more reliable even than binding the man with Ancient Magic.
"Still, no point getting comfortable. Let's move."
Rather than walk, he chose teleportation. First he messaged the Abyss King and asked him to nullify the barrier. Then Paranet cast Space Movement. A vast tide of mana shifted, and in the moment Yujun blinked, the Abyss King was suddenly before him. More precisely, Yujun's party had arrived where the Abyss King stood.
"So you've brought Sim Sanghoon."
"Yeah."
"Th-that was fast."
How long had it even been since the request? He had dragged in the man who had thrown the Abyss into disorder for months. Had Yujun only talked about it, Calitheus would have called it bluster. But Yujun had subdued Sim Sanghoon himself and brought him back. The Abyss King, Calitheus, laughed, hollow with disbelief.
"This isn't a fake, I trust?"
"Do I look like I'd pull something like that?"
"I would not put it past you. But I know your skill. Pressing you on it would be strange."
"Good. So. The reward?"
Yujun had no interest in what became of Sim Sanghoon. The reward the Abyss King had promised—that was all he cared about.
"You truly are a peculiar man."
The remark came out of nowhere.
"Peculiar? Why?"
"You are already strong enough. Strong enough to stand beside me, who rules the Abyss. No—given how quickly you brought Sim Sanghoon in, you may be stronger still."
"..."
"And yet I see in you a hunger to grow stronger. You want. You crave. Without end."
"And your point is?"
"I believe that is why you are strong. The desire to become stronger."
Calitheus said it with complete conviction. It sounded like so much empty philosophizing, so Yujun had kept listening—and then he shook his head.
"None of that matters."
"What...?"
"The will to grow. Effort. Anyone can do that. Good items, though—not just anyone can get those. Legendary-grade and above, especially. The point is, items are what actually matter. Skills and traits are nice, sure. They don't compare to items."
It was a long speech, for Yujun. The Abyss King nodded, looking awkwardly stranded.
"If you say so, then it must be so."
"You put an awful lot of trust in someone you met today."
"Are you not my benefactor? Trust comes naturally."
"So. The reward?"
"You seem to be waiting on nothing else, so I shall grant it at once."
Sim Sanghoon still had not woken. While the Abyss King rummaged through his inventory, Yujun set about a task of his own: pulling the Stone of Omnipotence out of the level-400 Mythic weapon he had been wearing. He had two Stones of Omnipotence. One was already mounted on his strongest weapon, the one that required level 500. The other he had no intention of hoarding. He meant to put it to use.