Chapter 42
Chapter 42
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 42
Chapter Title: Dark Angel
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An airship’s ability to fly was thanks to two forces.
One was magic.
The other was engineering.
While the initial levitation relied heavily on the power of magic, changing direction or adjusting speed required wings, engines, and the power of the wind.
Medium-sized airships and larger generally relied more on magic, allowing for a great deal of freedom in their design. However, the same was not true for small airships.
Their smaller size meant they could only carry small levitation stones and magical engines. Their naturally weaker output made proper flight impossible without the aid of engineering.
Large wings spread out from both sides of the small airship's fuselage, much like an airplane.
As it rode the wind and gained altitude, the party once again gasped in admiration.
Choi Yu-ra was as excited as someone on a plane for the first time, even letting out a short cheer.
But the joy was fleeting. Seong Yu-jin asked Hunt, her voice tinged with worry.
“So, what do we do now?”
It was all well and good that they had tracked the medium-sized airship with their small one, but that was as far as they’d gotten. They had to do more than just follow it.
Hunt couldn’t answer easily either. Choi Yu-ra looked at the medium-sized airship through the cockpit window and said.
“Should we shoot it down? It looks like it has propellers and wings. We could shoot a fire arrow or something.”
“No, putting aside whether we can even do it, that’s a bit…”
Kang-seok voiced his opposition. Not only was it questionable if it was even possible, but the thought of how many casualties there would be if that massive airship crashed into the city was horrifying.
Hunt spoke.
“I hate to say this, but it seems we’ll have to rely on your strength once again. I’ll try to land on the airship somehow…”
[The medium airship has spotted you.]
[Prepare for an attack!]
Unlike usual, red text flashed before their eyes. Hunt yanked the control stick.
“Uwoooah!”
With a guttural cry, the small airship spun in mid-air.
Dozens of large arrows, presumably fired from the medium airship, cut through the sky. A few of them punched holes in the small airship’s wings.
With no seatbelts to speak of, the party was sent tumbling and rolling inside the spinning vessel. As soon as the vibrations stopped, Choi Yu-ra shot to her feet and yelled.
“Dammit! Fire! Let’s fire back!”
It wasn’t just talk; she looked ready to pull out her anti-materiel sniper rifle at any moment. Kang-seok glanced between the punctured wing and the medium airship, then clenched his fists.
“Hunt! Get us above them!”
“Kang-seok?”
The moment Kang-seok finished speaking, Seong Yu-jin cried out in alarm. She had instantly realized what he was about to do.
Hunt increased their speed, flying as if to ram into the medium airship.
Seong Yu-jin quickly grabbed Kang-seok’s arm. He gave her a wry smile, shook her off, and opened the door of the small airship.
“I’m going first!”
“Hey!”
Choi Yu-ra, realizing his intentions too late, shouted in panic. But Kang-seok had already thrown himself out of the airship.
He was about a hundred meters in the air.
A fierce wind slapped against his cheeks. The sight of the ground below sent a dizzying sensation through him. But this was no time to be dazed.
The height difference between the small and medium airships was about twenty meters.
The medium airship.
Men in black suits standing by ballistas.
The wind howled. Kang-seok spun his body and used Air Dash to propel himself forward. He pushed against the wind that tried to shove him away from the medium airship.
*CRASH!*
A loud boom echoed the moment he landed. Having barely managed to touch down on the edge of the airship, Kang-seok swallowed the pain from the impact and forced himself up. He charged toward the men in black suits he had spotted while landing.
“He’s fast!”
One of the men in black suits shouted. As if to reward his astonishment, Kang-seok took down two of them in quick succession. Again, it was with nothing but his fists and feet.
After felling a man a head taller than himself with a roundhouse kick to the jaw, Kang-seok used the momentum to spin his body. He lowered his center of gravity and once again surveyed the men in black suits.
Three of them remained.
Two fixed ballistas.
Kang-seok made his choice.
“Fire! Fire!”
Someone shouted. That someone then took a fist to the gut and went rolling across the deck. Both ballistas turned toward Kang-seok. A chilling sensation ran down his spine; they were monstrous machines that fired bolts easily four times larger than normal arrows, but he didn’t stop. Instead, he picked up speed, closing the distance to the ballistas in an instant.
It was like a flash of lightning.
Nothing less. The man at the ballista couldn’t aim at the rapidly approaching Kang-seok and, just like the two before him, could only allow the blow to land. He collapsed to the floor, gasping for breath.
Now, only one ballista remained.
Kang-seok turned his head and found himself facing the large ballista aimed directly at him.
“Die… Gaaah!”
The man holding the ballista let out a piercing scream and collapsed. Blood gushed from his hand, which had been pierced by a crossbow bolt.
That wasn’t all. Something red and black landed right next to the large ballista. It struck down the last man in a black suit, who was still stunned by his colleague’s impaled hand.
A red officer’s coat fluttered in the wind.
A red officer’s cap pressed down on her head.
Beneath the coat, jet-black armor hugged the captivating curves of her feminine form.
Seong Yu-jin, fully clad in the Demonic Armor Arnak, let out a furious roar.
She stomped over to Kang-seok, grabbed him by both shoulders, and yelled.
“Are you crazy?! What if you had missed the landing!”
Seong Yu-jin was genuinely furious. Her eyes were even red, a testament to how worried she had been.
For a moment, Kang-seok felt an urge to pull her into a tight hug, but there was no time. He snatched her by the waist and leaped away.
“Sorry! Let’s clean up first!”
Several crossbow bolts struck the spot where Kang-seok had just been standing. Men in black suits had emerged from the cabin door.
“I’m going to give you a piece of my mind later!”
As soon as they landed, Seong Yu-jin raised her shield, protecting both herself and Kang-seok. He smiled wryly, his eyes scanning the area, and realized there was no need for them to counterattack.
“Aargh!”
The men in black suits collapsed with agonizing screams, bolts piercing their shoulders, thighs, and hands.
It was the work of Choi Yu-ra, who had jumped from the small airship, now close enough to be practically landing on the medium one.
Landing on the deck of the medium airship with the flair of an action movie hero, Choi Yu-ra frowned. She looked at the closely huddled Kang-seok and Seong Yu-jin and grumbled.
“You two are so lovey-dovey. It’s enough to make a girl feel lonely.”
Unlike usual, she held a crossbow in each hand. Her most reliable weapon, the anti-materiel sniper rifle, which was also the biggest hindrance to her movement, was nowhere to be seen.
It was an additional effect she gained upon her promotion from Sergeant to Staff Sergeant.
The ability to summon her main weapon.
Whenever she wished, she could now conjure her anti-materiel sniper rifle from thin air. It was a natural feature, considering the FPS games where players carried arsenals of heavy weapons.
As if hearing Choi Yu-ra’s grumbling, Seong Yu-jin quickly pulled away from Kang-seok.
And it was at that very moment.
“Grrr! Who are you! Who dares to attack the Connell Family!”
A rough man's voice came from a long metal rod attached to the wall next to the cabin entrance.
On closer inspection, it looked like a periscope with a horn-shaped tube attached. It seemed to be a device for observing the deck from inside the cabin.
[This is Connell, the boss of the Connell Family and a key figure in this quest.]
The helpful text appeared, and Choi Yu-ra’s shoulders slumped.
“That line is such a cliché. And you, are you really Iris?”
There was no reply to Choi Yu-ra’s accusation. Connell’s voice came from the periscope again.
“I don’t know where you bastards came from, but I’ll make you regret attacking the Connell Family to your very bones!”
“Yeah, yeah, we’re coming in to kick your ass, so just you wait.”
After her sarcastic retort, Choi Yu-ra looked at Kang-seok and gestured with her chin. He nodded in return.
The party’s objective was the Green God’s Tear, which Connell supposedly possessed.
Although it wasn’t a life-or-death battle against monsters like in previous quests, it was by no means a light task.
They had taken down nine men in black suits so far.
The medium airship was quite large, but it was unlikely to be filled to the brim with gang members, so it was safe to assume they had defeated about half of them.
“Don’t let your guard down, you two,” Seong Yu-jin said lowly, her eyes stern as she looked at Kang-seok and Choi Yu-ra.
While both Kang-seok and Choi Yu-ra possessed overwhelming power compared to the men in black, the same couldn't be said for their defense.
Unlike Seong Yu-jin, who was protected by the Demonic Armor Arnak, a single crossbow bolt could inflict a fatal wound on either of them, depending on where it hit.
Choi Yu-ra replied.
“Got it. This is a tighter space than the casino, so you take the lead, Yu-jin. Let’s move in formation. What about you, Hunt?”
Hunt, who had jumped down from the small airship a moment ago, was gathering the crossbows and bolts from the fallen men.
“Doing as you say would be best. They won’t try anything reckless at this altitude. If we proceed calmly, it should be an easy victory.”
After picking up a butterfly knife and a longsword in addition to the crossbow, Hunt quickly moved to the rear. Seong Yu-jin exchanged a glance with Kang-seok and then stepped forward.
And just as the four of them were about to breach the cabin.
“Get back!”
Seong Yu-jin shouted, raising her shield again. She drew upon the power of the Demonic Armor Arnak and activated a tanking skill, creating an invisible barrier that covered their entire front.
*CLANG!*
A sharp sound rang out. Pushed back by the impact, Seong Yu-jin quickly scanned the area, her eyes tracking the trajectory of the ‘object’ that had struck her shield.
“A boomerang?!”
But it was far too large. It had to be at least a meter long.
The classic V-shaped boomerang, with wicked blades attached to both ends, spun a few more times in the air before falling. Judging by the sound it made as it embedded itself in the deck, it was incredibly heavy.
Choi Yu-ra immediately raised the crossbows in her hands and aimed at the cabin entrance from which the boomerang had emerged. Kang-seok, unlike before, drew Durandal and stood beside Seong Yu-jin.
A voice came from the cabin entrance.
“That’s far enough. I was told not to let you inside. And that Connell fellow isn’t the only one on this ship.”
The voice was cheerful, yet somehow flippant. Choi Yu-ra placed her finger on the trigger of her crossbow.
The voice continued.
“Anyway, about that—you wanna go a round?!”
The last words were nearly slurred together. A figure shot out from the cabin entrance with a speed that rivaled the boomerang’s.
Unlike the boomerang, it was a vertical leap.
Kang-seok and Seong Yu-jin simultaneously kicked off the ground and jumped back. Choi Yu-ra did the same, quickly moving her hands to maintain her aim as she retreated.
A man landed on the ground.
Crouched low with his hands on the deck like a tiger or a leopard, the man radiated a feral energy.
He wore animal skins, but he was practically naked. The arms, legs, and chest visible through the gaps in the leather were packed with hard muscle.
Short blond hair slicked back, blue eyes. A handsome young face with a playful smile.
And colorful red and white tattoos adorned his body.
His striking appearance didn’t fit with the Connell Family at all. Kang-seok’s eyes widened for a moment. Seong Yu-jin resisted the urge to look at Choi Yu-ra and glared at the man.
Choi Yu-ra shouted urgently.
“Nickname, Dark Angel! He’s a Player!”
Before she could finish her sentence.
The Player shot up like a bolt of lightning. He charged toward Choi Yu-ra.