Training Camp # 5
Training Camp # 5
We kept our presence concealed and slowly made our way into the ruined area. It was only training, but keeping our mouths shut, staying focused, and moving with our bodies low still made me tense.
—Shhk.
Si-hoo, at the head of the group, raised a clenched fist. After pointing at a building ahead, Si-hoo made a gesture indicating going up to the roof.
"Going up to get a view from the rooftop?"
"Lee Si-hoo is more than capable of seeing enough from there."
When Leona gave the signal, Si-hoo immediately planted a foot against the building wall.
And then.
—Leap.
Effortlessly.
Si-hoo sprinted straight up the vertical wall. It looked like the building wall had become the ground. Si-hoo literally used the wall as a stepping stone to leap upward.
—Fwoop!
Grabbing the rooftop railing with both hands, Si-hoo scrambled over it like a snake slithering up a wall and entered the rooftop.
"Whoa."
That right there is a real Special Operations Division operative. Not only scaling the building wall, but then immediately switching to a low crawl to enter the rooftop?
"Incredible. Not only scaling the wall, but switching to a crawl. That'd definitely make reconnaissance solid, right?"
"That's right. An Awakened of Lee Si-hoo's caliber will definitely provide solid recon."
I answered while quickly scanning left, right, and behind me, and Leona replied.
"Entering by crawling was a good move, too. In a place like this, it's a very important thing."
"But Leona, back when that gate appeared on the weekend, we didn't fight like this then, did we? We moved a bit more openly."
"Mm, that was just an ordinary, everyday incident. This training seems to assume a full-scale war. That's why there's a difference."
"Ah, I see."
We had already experienced gate incidents several times before.
Gate incidents, when it comes down to it, are just gates appearing in the city and monsters emerging. Since the infrastructure is all in place, even if they show up like that, they get subjugated in no time.
But this place was a zone controlled by monsterkin. We were in a situation of infiltrating that zone, and we had to take the head of the monsterkin controlling the monsters.
In other words, we had to secretly enter enemy-occupied territory, carry out an assassination, and get out.
"Feels more like assassins than heroes."
"I've heard there are actually a lot of missions like this. You know about the Old Territory Recapture Operation, right?"
Old Territory Recapture Operation?
"What? What's that?"
"Huh? You don't know it? You're Korean, Kim Geun-cheol, and you don't know that?"
"No, what is it? Explain it to me."
"Such a complete lack of common knowledge...! I don't know what in the world they taught you at the orphanage! I suspect mismanagement!"
Leona was more furious suspecting the orphanage of mismanagement than angry I was missing common knowledge!
Feels like she's going to blame the orphanage for everything I mess up from now on!
"No, I could not know. What mismanagement. If you're not interested, you naturally don't know."
"Even so, there are limits! Anyway. Korea used to be a divided nation in the past, right?"
Right.
"But during the Dimension War, North Korea itself was annihilated. Now, the entire North Korea-China-Russia border region has become monster territory. Even Gangwon-do is riddled with war zones."
War zones are literally areas where they're actively fighting monsters. Parts of Gangwon-do underwent otherworldization and became monster territory. Combat is constant there.
"So, heroes are advancing into the North and carrying out an operation to recapture the old territories... and you don't know about it."
I listened while keeping an eye on our surroundings.
"Later, Kim Geun-cheol, you might go there too once you become a proper hero, so look it up in advance."
"Yeah, I'd better. I'll look it up when I get back to the dorms."
Leona nodded satisfactorily at my answer.
"Anyway, that place is already a paradise for monsterkin and monsters. So I've heard that hero units are sometimes deployed specifically to assassinate monsterkin with command abilities. That's how they advance, securing territory that way."
I got the gist. They're busting their asses to reclaim the Northern Region.
"Knowledge gained."
"Seriously. I feel like I've practically become your private tutor, Kim Geun-cheol. Now that I look, you have plenty of will to learn, but there's so much you really don't know?"
Because I'm not from this world.
"That's sort of... shall we say, I was indifferent to the world before I Awakened. So, yeah."
"Ah, Ahh...!"
There she goes with the sad face again!
"Stop crying! I said I'll study hard from now on!"
"I'm not crying!"
Anyway.
We kept our voices as low as possible while shooting the breeze like this, and I thoroughly scanned our surroundings.
Woo Yu-ri, ahead of us, was also on guard, hiding her body in a suitable spot.
That's when.
—Fwip.
Si-hoo, who had gone up the building, came back down. And then approached us. Yu-ri, who had also seen Si-hoo, came over.
"Looking from up there, starting from the front of this building, there are some monsters ahead. A little under twenty of them. Want to ignore them and go around, or just wipe them out here?"
Twenty F-rank monsters, huh.
That should be manageable.
"Anything of note?"
"Lots of windows. We should be careful of ranged attacks. Didn't see what looked like a monsterkin. But there's always a chance it's hiding inside a building."
"Hmm... In a real fight, we'd have to suspect that too, but this is training. They wouldn't have placed a monsterkin out front like this."
At Leona's words, Yu-ri nodded.
"Yeah, probably. Let's go with total annihilation then."
"Sounds good."
"Alright. Let's ambush them, moving in along both sides of this building."
Si-hoo summed it up cleanly.
"Kim Geun-cheol, follow me. Lee Si-hoo and Woo Yu-ri, enter from the right."
Then, Leona gave the order as squad leader. Standing in front of the building, we immediately split into two pairs and moved left and right.
"I'll break through, so you follow behind and watch our surroundings, Kim Geun-cheol. Be especially careful of the windows."
"Leave it to me."
Watching our surroundings is extremely important, too.
—Step. Step.
I circled the building with Leona like that.
—Clank.
—Clank.
"Grrrrrr."
I could see holograms of F-rank monsters I'd seen in class lecture footage. I could tell at a glance there were more than ten of them roaming around.
—Swish.
The machine underneath did all the actual moving, but the hologram monster realistically moved its legs, opened its mouth to lick the floor, and showed other lifelike movements.
It feels incredibly real.
"Kim Geun-cheol! Breaking through!"
"Yeah!"
All I have to do is follow orders!
—Fwoop!
Leona, not even making footsteps, kicked off the ground and charged. The monsters didn't react at all.
—Bwoong.
As her training sword, wreathed in a green-light aura, cut through the hologram monster, the hologram vanished with a brisk Pang! sound.
—Shrrk!
—Bwooong!
Leona charged straight forward like that, clearing away every monster in her path. And from the opposite side, Si-hoo and Yu-ri were approaching.
I can't just stand still!
"Hup!"
—Fwoop!
I immediately followed behind Leona, targeting the monsters on the fringe that hadn't been killed by Leona and had only drawn aggro, executing backstabs.
"Die!"
As I drove my training sword into the monster's back, —Pang!— the hologram vanished with a brisk sound. Nice. One kill scored. That counts as pulling my weight. I quickly checked that things were safe, then turned my head to look behind us.
—Sweee!
I scanned the ruined landscape like I was playing a hidden object game. My eyes caught an anomaly.
"Leona! Rear! Something in the window of the building to your left!"
I reported it to Leona immediately.
"Roger!"
—Kwoong!
Leona slammed on the brakes, spun her body around, and then broke into a sprint!
"Whoa!"
Leona ran straight up the wall of the building on the left and charged diagonally toward the window! That was the definition of stylish!
—Fwip!
The hologram monster that had stuck its head out launched some kind of light projectile, but it went in a completely different direction from Leona's running arc. Leona reached the window and, with incredible ease— —Bwoong— swung her sword, beheading the monster before landing.
"She fights like a damn beast!"
Perfect!
A seriously powerful, free-moving melee DPS!
Terrain means absolutely nothing to her!
"Hey! We wiped them out!"
Around then, Yu-ri, who had finished her side, came over laughing. Si-hoo followed right behind Yu-ri.
"Kyah. We sync up better than I thought? Lee Si-hoo too, and you too, Leona."
"Hoo, you're right. I thought it would be hard with three melee DPS. But since we each have a good eye for different things, we processed them quickly. Your skills are solid too, Woo Yu-ri, aren't they?"
"I've been learning since I was a kid."
We really did sync up well.
The problem is I didn't do much.
"But I think taking out that one in the window with a ranged attack would've been better. With a normal party composition, there wouldn't have been any need for Leona to go over and kill it herself, right?"
At Si-hoo's words, Leona and Yu-ri nodded.
"True, that. Honestly, the best option would've been you taking it out, Kim Geun-cheol, but you can't scale buildings yet."
"Kh, sorry about that. But I did spot it and report it, so cut me some slack."
"It's fine. It can't be helped. Anyway, if this were a real fight, we'd have guns too, so we could've handled it that way as well. It's really no problem."
"Leona...! When you say it like that, I could almost cry!"
"Just train hard."
Leona said it with a teacher-like expression, folding her arms.
"Hey. Work hard on training your mobility, not just your swordsmanship. We've been learning this since we were kids, so of course we're good at it. For a newbie like you, Kim Geun-cheol, it can't be helped."
"Wow, Woo Yu-ri, even you know how to give encouragement?"
"You think I can't?"
"I always knew you were a kind-hearted one."
"Wha—you crazy bastard."
Anyway.
Having shot the breeze briefly, we started a discussion analyzing the battle we'd just had and talking about areas of improvement.
It's definitely helpful.
Whether it's just watching or listening to them talk like this, watching and analyzing how players stronger than me operate makes me feel like my own skill is rising alongside theirs.
—Ding.
[Prowess has increased by 1]
Wait, my stats actually went up for real?
This seems to mean my comprehension is pretty damn good. A stat-up just from watching and listening. This makes me think that if I just had the strength, I could probably do something similar.
Motivation rising!
"Geun-cheol. Listen carefully and always think about it. At your current level, just watching and listening like this will be a huge help."
"I'm hard at work taking mental notes right now, so don't worry."
"Heheh, good. You're working hard. Try hard so you can carry your own weight soon. Fighting together with you, Geun-cheol, seems like it'd be fun."
I plan to.
"Even so, watching you, Kim Geun-cheol, it seems like you'll pull your own weight in no time. Even now, you followed the orders I gave well. You seem to be good at watching the surroundings, too."
"Hehehe, ah. Leona. Compliments like that make me all puffed up."
Getting recognition from the masters makes my shoulders want to dance!
"This bastard's attitude for learning is really there, but if you just listen to him talk, doesn't he seem like a bastard who doesn't do a single thing?"
"Hoo, well. Kim Geun-cheol does have a bit of that, I suppose. He's a little... frivolous, shall we say."
"Right? Keukeu."
Enough trash-talking me right in front of me!
"Geun-cheol. It's all advice that'll become flesh and blood. Anyway. Shall we get moving again? Judging by the monster levels, it shouldn't be a big problem as long as we find the monsterkin."
"Alright. Let's go."
After regrouping, we started moving again.