Master.
"Master."
Paranet called out without warning.
Yujun answered, blunt as ever.
"What."
"Do you no longer intend to hide your identity?"
"Nope."
"And why not?"
"No reason to."
Yujun and Paranet kept walking through the heart of the residential district.
"Quite a few people recognize you, Master."
"Yeah. Figures."
The Species Tournament had made him more than a little famous, and he wasn't even covering his face. Of course they recognized him.
"Are you, perhaps, luring someone out?"
"Your eye's gotten sharper."
"Ahem. All thanks to you, Master. But where are we bound? You have summoned even me."
"I summoned you because I was bored. And yeah—like you said, I'm calling someone out."
"Ah. Those Coordination wretches?"
"Oh. You knew?"
"Will they truly come, merely for this?"
"They'll come. No question."
When he had faced Ji Gyutae, even if only through a screen, Yujun had known at a glance what kind of man he was. Not the sort to give up just because things had gone poorly.
"We can head somewhere with fewer people now."
"Is that not rather slapdash, Master?"
"There are already people on my tail."
"A-already?"
"Yeah."
"How did you know?"
"I can feel it."
His Agility had climbed so high that a gaze fixed on him from far off prickled against his skin.
"How many?"
"Five, probably. Three of them are especially strong."
"You can discern even that?"
"Apparently. First I've noticed it, too."
What he had gained in the Abyss was no small thing. His stats had grown by a wide margin.
"Time I got ready."
Yujun spread his 434 unallocated points evenly across every stat except Magic, then checked his pure stats alone.
Satisfying. This was his raw power, with no percentage bonuses attached, and he was confident he could take the Coordination bastards without much trouble now.
He left the residential district and headed for the forest. The place was vast and thick with obstacles—perfect for a fight that needed to stay quiet. Five presences were already closing in at speed.
"Master. What would you have me do?"
"Hang back and watch. If it looks like I'm in trouble, jump in."
"And if they strike me first?"
"Hit them back. Don't ask the obvious."
"Yes. Understood."
Yujun and Paranet stood still and waited. The five members of Coordination showed themselves soon enough.
"Been a while."
Yujun spoke first. A trace of tension crossed Ban Soyeon's face.
"Why didn't you run, like last time?"
"Because I don't have to."
"What?"
"Five of you. That's it?"
"Where's this confidence coming from? Last time you were wheezing against just three of us."
"That was a long time ago," Yujun said, face indifferent.
"Unbelievable. It's been two days. You grew strong enough to face all five of us in that time? Even pride has a limit."
Ban Soyeon spat the words out like gunfire.
"I'll let you feel just how long those two days were for me."
Yujun let the confidence show. Choe Gangmin stepped forward.
"Hey. You die here today. You know what playing tough costs you, right?"
Bravado, to hide the fear. Yujun could see all of it.
He drew up his mana. Since swapping his entire loadout, he had never properly tested his magic, and he wanted to see what it could do.
Keep the opener light.
He formed Fireball, the most basic of spells—except there were hundreds of them. The spheres of flame that seized the whole area were a spectacle on their own. The ground heated until it scorched, and the trees caught fire.
The System regrew them quickly enough. Even so, once a blaze took hold, putting it out took a considerable while.
"Fire magic in a forest. You're really committed."
Choe Gangmin moved first. However basic a Fireball might be, a volley on this scale had to have burned a serious amount of mana—or so he judged. The other four of Coordination, who had at least a rough sense of Yujun's strength, did not stand idle either.
Ban Soyeon spoke without taking her eyes off him.
"Make as many shields as you can. He doesn't just swing a sword—he's good with magic, too."
"Okay."
"Oh, and don't give him a second to breathe. He doesn't spare top-grade potions."
From a single clash two days ago, Ban Soyeon had learned a great deal about him.
Choe Gangmin thrust his spear.
Clang!
The spear struck the shield Yujun had raised. It bounced. It did not pierce. In the same breath, the fireballs flew at Coordination.
Fwoosh! Boom—boom—BOOM!
The blast was enormous. Fireball was the simplest spell there was, and its power was nothing one could dismiss for being simple.
"Wh-what?"
The shields raised by Coordination's two mages shattered like nothing, and what followed was obvious. Everyone except Ban Soyeon and Choe Gangmin took the baptism of fire head-on.
"Agh!"
"Hold on! Just endure it!"
Han Jiyun cast Great Heal, a wide-area restoration. Radiant light wrapped the burning members of Coordination, and the flames eating their bodies vanished without a trace. Their condition climbed back to near its peak.
"Sis Jiyun's heals really are something else."
"She's the undisputed best among healers. Everyone says so."
Meanwhile Choe Gangmin and Ban Soyeon hammered Yujun's shield without pause.
"Why won't this break? This isn't an ordinary shield, is it?"
Choe Gangmin muttered, dumbfounded.
That was when it happened.
"Fall back!"
Ban Soyeon shouted—and she had already moved before the words left her mouth. Choe Gangmin was late.
An arrow of light, formed by Yujun. In the space of a blink it was on him, and it punched clean through his throat.
Thuk!
"Guhk!"
That was the last thing he said before he died.
Choe Gangmin's life ended in an instant, and a brief silence hung in the air.
"What, you're not coming?"
When the members of Coordination only stood there, Yujun drew his mana up again. Only then did Song Taeyeong, Cheon Sihyeon, and Han Jiyun move.
The space around Yujun began to twist. Song Taeyeong's magic.
Space Domination?
Curiosity stirred in Yujun's eyes. Space Domination was a spell that could be used only by one who possessed Ancient Magic.
Has that man learned Ancient Magic too?
Judging by how much space he had seized, though, the rank of that Ancient Magic didn't seem high. The space around Yujun warped into a grotesque shape.
The solution, in a case like this, was simple: leave the space, or use the same Space Domination to force the crushed space back into shape. The latter was more finicky, and more of a nuisance. Yujun chose the latter.
Song Taeyeong, wearing a smile of certain victory, went wide-eyed.
"Wh-what?! You're unraveling my Space Domination?"
He was laboring under one large misunderstanding. He thought Yujun had used some ability to dispel magic, rather than Space Domination itself. It was an understandable mistake. Song Taeyeong had long considered B+ rank Ancient Magic his private domain, and he had never imagined Yujun might possess spatial magic of his own.
Song Taeyeong was shaken.
"He even has magic nullification. A mage of absurd talent. Hard to chalk this up to simply collecting a pile of lucky encounters."
"He's a spellblade too, same as Sis Soyeon. He's better with a sword."
At Cheon Sihyeon's words, Song Taeyeong and Han Jiyun laughed, hollow.
"He's a monster."
"Where did a guy like that crawl out from?"
"He seems even stronger than last time. His magic wasn't anywhere near this before."
"Let's hit him all at once. One at a time, we don't stand a chance."
"It stings the pride, but that's the better play."
The four of Coordination, minus Choe Gangmin, launched a proper joint assault.
Boom! Boom!
Explosions chained one after another. In a fight between fighters of this level, a pure brawl rarely broke out. Usually it became a contest of raw power, a few high-output skills traded back and forth. Attack mattered, but so did defense and evasion—and Yujun lacked for none of them. Far from lacking, he surpassed them by a wide margin.
Boom! Boom-boom-BOOM!
A single explosive spell from Yujun sent the members of Coordination staggering hard. Han Jiyun restored their wounds at once.
"I don't think he's a spellblade."
"Huh?"
"He keeps using nothing but magic."
Cheon Sihyeon frowned.
"I thought he was better with a sword, but his magic is even more absurd."
"So what are you going to do?"
At Song Taeyeong's question, Cheon Sihyeon tilted his head.
"About what?"
"This looks hopeless. Fighting on like this is cutting water with a blade... no. It's smashing an egg against a rock, isn't it?"
"......"
There was nothing to say to that. Reality was exactly as Song Taeyeong described it. Cheon Sihyeon, however, did not change.
"I'll do whatever Noona wants."
"Hah. You really are young."
Song Taeyeong let out a sigh. If nothing else, he decided, he had to prepare for himself alone.
Kraang!
Ban Soyeon came flying out, wounded. She tumbled across the ground several times before she stopped, and her condition was critical—one step from death. Cheon Sihyeon rushed to her.
"Sis Jiyun! Hurry!"
"Got it!"
Han Jiyun's SS-rank Heal skill washed over Ban Soyeon. The body that had been at death's door recovered at a ferocious pace.
"N-Noona! You okay?"
"Ugh... it hurts like hell. I almost died just now, didn't I? Nngh..."
Ban Soyeon clutched her forehead and pushed herself up. Cheon Sihyeon watched her with a worried face, then spoke.
"Noona, what are you going to do?"
"About what?"
"Taeyeong says we ought to pull back for now. Gangmin's already dead."
"Go back like this? Uncle Gyutae will be furious. None of us can handle that."
"Still better than dying. Whatever you say, I'll follow your choice, Noona."
"Hmm..."
The battle settled into a brief lull, because Yujun did not attack them at once. He had a better idea. Killing every member of Coordination here would not be a fundamental solution.
We've already crossed them. There's no taking that back. From the way they talk, Ji Gyutae is the core of this.
Unless he settled things with Ji Gyutae, this fight would never end.
I got dragged into it by my own useless nosiness, but in the end it did a lot for my growth.
Coordination had become the engine of that growth. Without them, the Abyss would have been a long way off.
"Master. What do you intend to do with them?"
Paranet, who had watched the fight without joining it, spoke up.
"What do you mean, do? They're enemies. Why ask the obvious?"
"It seemed to me you were granting them a chance to flee. Am I mistaken?"
"Oh. Sharp eyes."
Even so, the members of Coordination had not fled. They, too, had to produce a result somehow. They had come having made grand promises to Ji Gyutae, and now they held a suffocating standoff with Yujun.
"I am curious as to the reason."
"I need someone to deliver how this fight ends."
"To the boss of that Coordination, you mean?"
"Yeah. That was the idea."
A warning was better delivered properly.
"No need to leave all four of them alive, is there?"
The day might come when he faced every member of Coordination at once. Better to thin their numbers a little now.
Yujun moved his mana.
There was one who used Space Domination earlier.
He decided to return the favor in kind. Of the members of Coordination, he chose the one who looked the oldest, and cast Space Domination on Song Taeyeong.
Space Domination
Ancient Magic
The space Song Taeyeong occupies is seized, folded, and crushed.
Vmmm. Vmmm—!
The air shuddered, and warped with it. Though the distance was considerable, Space Domination reached Song Taeyeong in a single instant. It was on another level from the Space Domination he himself had cast—in scale, in destructive power, in the speed of its manifestation. In every respect, it might as well have belonged to a different dimension.
Space Domination. The moment Song Taeyeong recognized it, he was aghast.
"Th-that's imposs..."
His body bent in a grotesque direction.
Crack! Crrrrack!
Only the space he occupied twisted.
"Ah, ah...!"
Song Taeyeong could not finish the rest. His body had been compressed past any hope of recognizing its original shape.