The Wish of El-Lena
"Fire!" El-Lena shouted.
At the same time, hundreds of strands of hair floating in the air lunged toward my heart. Each one was a lethal blow. They weren't just simple threads; reinforced by her Word of Command, they possessed a density rivaling titanium. Their speed was 170 kilometers per hour—surpassing the fastball of a top-tier pitcher. A single hit meant death. Even the hide of a dragon would be pierced like a soft pastry by that many strikes. Well, then, I suppose I’ll just have to charge toward death myself.
"Blue of Death."
[C■SUS■AER■LA]
My vision inverted. My eyeballs shrieked at the sudden influx of information. A massive scythe appeared in both my hands. The pale blue blade flickered, hungry to harvest a soul. Let’s go.
El-Lena could not understand what had happened in that moment. To be precise, she couldn't even perceive it. She hadn't let her guard down. Her opponent was Georgius—a man who had resisted her Word of Command time and time again. She had intended to launch her next move if he managed to dodge this attack.
The hundreds of floating hairs were a trap she had laid while enduring his close-quarters combat. As soon as he entered her range, she fired them all at once. There were no gaps. It was a simultaneous Word of Command. Her vocal cords had been trained tens, hundreds of thousands of times. It was beyond high-speed vocalization; it was akin to ventriloquism, speaking while speaking. And yet, despite using that technique to weaponize so many strands of hair...
Whoosh—
What El-Lena saw was Georgius moving as if he had teleported. And the massive scythe held in his arms. Her hair was scattering into a handful of white ash. It was as if a page of a book had been turned right before her eyes; the scene had changed unnaturally. It was like... teleportation.
'—No.'
El-Lena had seen it. She had witnessed it clearly with her enhanced ocular muscles. In that sliver of time, less than 0.1 seconds, Georgius had moved and used that scythe to "stab each one" of the hundreds of hairs.
'High-speed, rapid-speed, sub-speed... no. What should I even call that realm—'
If it were merely a matter of high movement speed, El-Lena could have dealt with it easily. Even when she had suppressed his powerful arm, she had only thought of it as high speed. But this went beyond that category. El-Lena’s Word of Command only exerted influence over physical force. That was a power outside the laws of physics.
Furthermore, her hair. El-Lena quickly realized what the phenomenon of it turning to ash was.
'—It weathered.'
No damage had been dealt to the hair. It hadn't been cut, nor was it wounded. It had simply faced the ravages of time; the cells had aged, weathered, and eroded until they became dust. It had met a natural death.
'That scythe—'
That was dangerous. El-Lena intuited it. Georgius turned to look at her. In those golden eyes, for the first time since she was born, she felt it. Fear.
"'Stop.'"
High-speed Word of Command. The moment her compulsion was executed—
Slash!
Georgius’s scythe cut through the air. El-Lena understood instantly what that action was. He had just killed her Word of Command. A single drop of cold sweat trickled down her cheek. Georgius entered her range again. El-Lena increased the speed of her lips as well.
"'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop.'" "'Stop!'" "'Stop!'" "'Stop!!'"
Georgius swung his scythe vigorously, killing every one of El-Lena’s commands. Every Word of Command to stop was nullified. 0.027 seconds had passed. The next moment, Georgius was standing behind El-Lena, the blade of that pale blue scythe pressed against her neck.
"My victory, El-Lena."
Kaaaaa-boom!!
Simultaneous with Georgius’s declaration, the shockwave from his movement cracked the floor and stirred up a storm.
"I am... not yet—"
"We agreed to acknowledge defeat if you were in a situation where you would die. You must have grasped the ability of this scythe by now."
El-Lena swallowed hard. "Why did you hide that until now?"
"Because it’s an ability I don’t want to use. The 'Blue of Death' isn't just an ability that accelerates my body and accelerates the target toward death. It requires a price. Literally, I have to charge toward death."
Georgius spoke the fact calmly. "It shaves off my lifespan as much as I accelerate."
"What—"
El-Lena understood immediately that he was insane. There is one thing that all powerful people who have obtained everything desire in the end. Time. Time is fair to everyone. Youth does not return. Death comes eventually. Even an emperor who has conquered the world or a tycoon with all the wealth cannot avoid this. Georgius had been shaving off his lifespan—the minutes he spent killing her commands, the time he spent moving to dodge and stab her hair—to charge at El-Lena. It might have been a day, two days, a month, or a year. He was saying, as if it were obvious, that he had paid with his time to defeat El-Lena.
'You want me that much?' El-Lena was dumbfounded, but she quickly retracted the thought. 'No, I’m the same.' Isn't strengthening my Word of Command ultimately just shortening my own time? But even so.
"I cannot acknowledge defeat." El-Lena denied it. "Accelerating the target toward death. It’s time acceleration. You might have just set a trick to make this scythe’s ability look that way. Didn't you lay the foreshadowing from the start with the intention of deciding the victory that way, Geo? If you could reach death just by stabbing, there wouldn't be a single capable person in the world who could oppose you. It’s hard to believe."
"You coward!" Dark Matter, who had been watching the fight, jumped at El-Lena. El-Lena hadn't anticipated this intrusion, so she took the punch head-on.
"Geo used his trump card while shaving off his life, so what’s your problem? You said with your own mouth that you would acknowledge defeat!"
"Dare you call me a coward? You rootless hunting dog! 'Stop!'"
Dark Matter froze in place as if petrified. Her fist trembled with rage. "Geo, how is it? Do you intend to curse me as a coward too?"
Georgius did not answer.
"Aren't we villains? It’s natural to value betrayal over faith and contracts over loyalty, isn't it? Vengeance is a risk factor for the Holy Water. One cannot abandon an important match because of a verbal promise."
El-Lena said that, but Georgius judged that it wasn't just that. By the time it had come to this one-on-one match, her personal desires were heavily involved. She must have truly wanted to confirm it. Georgius’s power.
"This match was won by Geo! Hurry up and release the Word of Command you placed on Geo! You’re going to get Geo hurt again!" Dark Matter shouted, desperately putting strength into her body.
"Getting hurt? Hmm." A strange smile appeared on El-Lena’s face. Judging by Dark Matter’s words, it was clear that Georgius was also affected by his attack commands. He had just been inducing her misunderstanding until now. El-Lena parted her lips to unleash an attack. But Georgius was faster.
"You’ll regret it."
"Why?"
"Because once the Sky Lens fails, the only way to strengthen your Word of Command is through my skill."
"Certainly, Dark Matter is an amazing child. She’s already moved two centimeters even now. But she’s just a rookie I’ve raised to this level."
El-Lena’s hair fluttered. "I’ve seen your power well, Geo. I acknowledge it; you are strong. But to make me feel the threat of death, shouldn't you have at least plucked out my heart?"
"I didn't want to hurt you."
"You are soft. No matter how strong an ability is, if the user is soft, the ability just becomes futile along with them. With that kind of mindset, you want to strengthen my Word of Command?"
"It took one year."
"...What are you talking about?"
Georgius continued calmly. "Blue Saber didn't even know she had an ability. She was a biker in a punk group active in the back alleys."
"...What?"
"Yellow Clocker was a college student in his sophomore year of business administration. He hadn't even thrown a punch in his life, let alone fought."
El-Lena’s eyebrows trembled. What is this man saying right now?
"Green Nature was a dropout from the Hero Academy. Because his grades were low, he was bullied by his peers and ignored by his teachers."
"Silver Mirrored had the basics. He had been raised as an assassin in a school his whole life. He had the skill to match his late arrival. But at best, he was just a high-performing B-class hero."
"They certainly had talent."
"But do you think they could become S-class heroes and acquire the title of S-Squad in one year with just talent?"
"Red Dragon’s ability was known as a single arrow of light. In fact, there are four active skills. You just saw one of them, El-Lena."
"But the most important ability is the passive skill, 'Soul of a Comrade'."
"It is an ability that accelerates the growth of comrades."
Saying that, Georgius deactivated his transformation. The solid blood-colored hide disappeared, and soft human skin took its place. There was no way El-Lena wouldn't know the face of the man standing there. And she, too, understood everything in that moment.
"Now, let me ask you, El-Lena."
Georgius, Red Dragon, Jung Ui-seok was looking straight into El-Lena’s eyes. As she was shot through by that gaze, she felt her heart accelerating as if it would burst. She gripped her skirt with her fingertips without realizing it.
"...What are you curious about?"
"Who do you want to bring back to life?"
El-Lena gritted her teeth. Because of that, they cracked and blood leaked out.
"There are things even you don't know, Geo."
"It’s not like I know everything."
"Yes, that was the case."
El-Lena cast her eyes down as if bewitched. Red Dragon. If it were this man, the strongest hero, he could have taken her life at any time. But he hadn't; he had clashed with her with all his might. He had faced her in earnest. He had poured everything into winning while keeping the conditions of not wounding or killing her.
'You have something you desire, too.'
And a very strong wish at that. El-Lena finally opened her mouth.
"Yoo Chae-mi."
With a fluttering voice, she answered.
"I want to bring Yoo Chae-mi back to life."