Chapter 194
Chapter 194
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 194
Chapter Title: Refined Lady, Old Ties, the American, Long-Held Grudge (6)
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Yeomyeong clenched and unclenched his fist, checking his breathing.
He could feel his twisted organs pulsing back to life, his dislocated bones slotting into place.
No more wasting time listening to nonsense about four thousand years old or whatever.
He gripped his sword in his right hand and his staff in his left, glaring at the Titan.
[I cannot comprehend it. Even if you are a star, once fallen to earth, you must follow the years of a human—]
Yeomyeong aimed his staff at the creature still spouting drivel.
Instead of the mana within his body, he drew in the twisted mana overflowing from the air and wove a repulsive incantation.
Corpse Explosion.
An invisible spell shot toward the Titan's head.
The backlash from using twisted mana churned his insides, but the staff shared the burden, keeping the damage minimal.
[Threatening a volcano with a matchstick, are you?]
Proving it was fundamentally different from the other Titans, the creature dispersed the spell with a mere gesture.
Yeomyeong wasn't disappointed. The Corpse Explosion had only been a feint to draw its attention.
In that brief moment as it blocked the spell, Yeomyeong scattered ice spikes through the air and leaped toward the sky.
Under the leaden sky, his figure dashing through the void resembled a moth flying toward flame.
At least on the surface.
The Titan, having fully grasped Yeomyeong's danger, immediately entered combat.
[Is that the extent of your tricks? Then allow me to show you mine.]
As the loathsome voice filled the air, the Titan's forehead split open vertically.
From the fissure emerged a third eye, blood-red like something out of a nightmare.
Without warning, the third eye fixed on Yeomyeong.
Twisted mana gathered along its gaze, flowing and filling the space around him.
Sizzle!
In the next instant, a chilling sound accompanied yellowish-green smoke rising to block his path.
Yeomyeong's reaction was immediate. He dissolved the ice spike he'd been using as a foothold and plummeted outside the smoke's reach.
He didn't need to ask what the smoke was. The edge of his sleeve that had barely brushed it had melted black.
'Acidic smoke...?'
Its power was fearsome enough to furrow his brow.
Yeomyeong landed on another ice spike foothold, halting in midair, and summoned his sword aura.
He moved to cleave through the smoke, but the creature's eye flashed again.
More acidic smoke? No, this was something entirely different yet familiar.
Something he'd experienced once from the Pig Head Shepherds...
...Curse of the Senses.
But the power was worlds apart.
Unlike the mild dizziness from the Shepherds' curse, this one twisted all of Yeomyeong's senses.
His ears rang first, going deaf.
The sensation in his sword hand dulled, and the stench of rotting corpses turned to the piercing sweetness of flowers.
The worst, though, was the distortion of his vision.
His left eye swapped left and right, his right eye flipped top and bottom.
Yeomyeong nearly slipped off the ice spike, gritting his teeth.
'Only filthy spells.'
How to counter it? The deliberation was brief, the action swift.
In the next moment, he simply closed his eyes. He ignored smell and sound as well.
All that remained was one sense: feeling mana.
A makeshift solution that could only detect a few hundred meters at best, but Yeomyeong didn't care.
No matter the method, driving his blade into the creature's skull would end it.
As if reading his mind, the creature let out a hollow laugh.
[Fallen flesh reaching that far? What would the Immortal King say if he saw this! You are far too fine a meal to devour.]
A tone somewhere between admiration and mockery.
Yeomyeong narrowed the distance without reply, and the Titan countered with yet another spell.
[The King's Joa(??) commands it—rise!]
This spell's target wasn't Yeomyeong, but the remains of the fallen Titans.
More precisely, the bones within the corpses.
!!!
With a shockwave tearing the air, bones swelled from the Titans' remains. Massive and thick, like buildings or towers.
The bloated bones floated into the air as one, pointing their sharp tips at Yeomyeong.
Impressively huge, but unmistakably spear-like for throwing.
Acidic yellowish-green smoke, Curse of the Senses, and now bone spears flying through the sky?
Dodging the incoming spears, Yeomyeong grimaced. He now understood how this fight would unfold.
Dodge a spear, and smoke followed. Dodge smoke, and spears slipped through the gap...
Impossible to close the distance while evading both amid distorted senses.
It would naturally drag into a long, tedious war of attrition.
If the creature completed another spell in the meantime? The outcome was predetermined.
And Yeomyeong wasn't foolish enough to force himself into a fight with a set end.
He halted his charge, retrieved his staff, and gripped his sword with both hands.
A short deep breath. Mana flowing through his veins.
What he prepared was the Juga Shibili Style, sword aura, and telekinesis.
[Further resistance is futile. Become my sustenance willingly... Wait, what are you doing now?]
Ignoring the possessed Titan's ravings, Yeomyeong finished his preparations and seized himself with telekinesis so intense the space rippled.
Disregarding the cracks forming in his ankles and ribs, he yanked the telekinesis backward with all his might.
Like drawing a bow to its limit—and the result was no different.
Except here, Yeomyeong himself was the arrow.
A reckless act that would horrify even the Titan, let alone Seti and the Saintess watching from the distant train.
In the next instant, Yeomyeong hurled his own body forward with the telekinesis.
A crude method, but undeniably effective.
Before the creature could react, Yeomyeong pierced through the acidic smoke and bone spears, closing the gap in a flash.
Dizzying sensation, the Titan's face drawing nearer by the second.
Yeomyeong thrust his sword without hesitation.
Over the blade forged by dwarves with blood and tears layered Comet Sword, Wave Yang Art, and the sword aura stolen from the Player.
The exact technique that had cleaved Kahal Magdu's heart. But one difference this time.
The sword aura was entirely blood-red.
The result of cramming killing intent into the essence of all martial arts—a cheat, and a declaration of his intent to kill.
The smoke and spears chased belatedly, but they couldn't outpace the advancing blade.
"With this—"
As red light burst from the sword aura-wrapped blade, staining the leaden horizon crimson.
Yeomyeong and his companions awoke from the mindscape.
***
"...."
Awakening in the familiar cabin, Yeomyeong couldn't speak.
Of all the moments, why then?
The noon sun peeked through the window but fled, unable to bear the heavy mood.
Weighty silence.
As the suffocating quiet stretched, the Saintess lying opposite cautiously spoke.
"...Wow, you woke up at the most exquisitely awkward moment."
"...."
"It... wasn't me, okay? You know that, right?"
"...."
"I was just in the train watching Neti and you. For real. Wanna go ask her?"
Yeomyeong stared at the Saintess with a sullen face.
Watching her ramble in the face of a familiar gukbap auntie brought a slight easing to the recent shock.
Unaware of his inner thoughts, the Saintess chattered on to lighten the mood or prove her innocence.
How such coincidences happen, who the culprit could be...
At some point amid her words.
Screeech!!
The train abruptly halted, the whole car lurching as if someone had yanked the brakes.
Not again?
Yeomyeong and the Saintess shared the thought and rose.
They reflexively grabbed their weapons and exchanged glances, about to speak.
When someone flung open the door and entered the cabin.
The Saintess flinched, aiming her revolver, then sighed in relief upon recognizing the face.
"Seti?"
Seti was dressed much like in the mindscape. The difference: she carried a long rifle.
"That rifle...? What's going on outside? Why'd the train stop?"
"Oh, don't worry. I stopped the train."
"...What? Why?"
"Later for that... Can you come with this for a sec?"
Seti handed the rifle to the bewildered Saintess and dragged her straight to the window.
She threw open the cabin window and pointed to a hill some distance away, fairly high up.
"That skull and woman on the hill. Can you hit them?"
"Uh, yeah...? I think so..."
Squinting, the Saintess gauged the distance to the woman collapsed and panting atop the hill, and the skull floating beside her.
If the train were moving, maybe not—but stopped like this, it was well within range.
As the Saintess nodded, Seti glanced at Yeomyeong.
He watched them with arms crossed, still oblivious that she'd pulled them from the mindscape.
...Would he get mad if he knew?
Seti swallowed a wry smile and told the Saintess,
"Shoot now. Don't kill the woman."
"...Why? Who the hell are they?"
To the Saintess's cautious question, Seti replied with a small laugh.
"The ones who just dragged us into that nightmare."
The Saintess fired without hesitation.
Had she known she'd have to share a cabin with that woman, it would have been a shot she'd never have made.
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