Chapter 118: Duo. A Forgotten Grudge
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 118: Duo. A Forgotten Grudge
Boom!
"There it goes again. How many times has that been now?"
"The sixth."
At Seo-un’s answer, Nam Sa-gwang looked out the window with a fed-up expression.
It hadn't even been two hours since they entered the high-rise apartment complex to start farming, yet the sounds of battle echoed continuously from all directions.
When the prolonged roar finally ceased, Nam Sa-gwang checked the survivor list and shook his head.
"Still at 150. Not a single person gone."
"Looks like everyone’s busy testing the waters."
"Weaklings. If they’ve decided to fight, they should see it through to the end."
"They probably know all too well how dangerous it is to overextend on the first day," Seo-un countered.
"Then they shouldn't be fighting at all."
"They see an enemy and want to take a poke at them. If the target looks like easy prey, they’ll try to take a bite."
Nam Sa-gwang shook his head in disapproval. "They’re liable to get hunted by the hunter instead."
"Every player gathered here likely thinks they’re the hunter."
Seo-un understood why Nam Sa-gwang was so frustrated.
The man was so battle-hungry it was hard to believe he belonged to the Righteous Faction. Seo-un didn't know what kind of person he had been back in his own world, but in Cloyd, he was an overwhelming Lu Bu-style warrior who loved to steamroll squads single-handedly.
For someone like him to quietly avoid enemies and focus on farming, it was no wonder he was itching for action.
Seeing him desperate to go out and fight right this second, Seo-un smiled.
"Just hold it in until the TOP 100. Until then, we’re avoiding fights and playing as safely as possible."
"I know. I know survival comes first."
For someone who claimed to know, Nam Sa-gwang was having a hard time focusing on the loot.
"Tsk. All we’re finding is useless junk."
He opened a leather pouch, checked the contents, and tossed it onto the living room floor. Seeing the heavy pouch, Seo-un checked it; it was just an ordinary flying dagger.
"Everything is useful. If you hoard them, they’ll come in handy eventually."
"Hidden weapons aren't my style."
Coming from a man who could manifest massive amounts of Hand Aura, that made sense. However, in this place where anything could happen at any moment, the best policy was to stockpile as much as possible.
As they moved to the next unit to continue farming, a dark shadow suddenly flickered past, and the bright sunlight streaming into the room wavered.
Both of them quickly turned their gaze toward the veranda window.
"What was that?"
"A martial artist. And an assassin skilled enough to slip deep into my senses."
Seo-un’s brow furrowed at Nam Sa-gwang’s words. The realization that a martial artist had approached so closely without him sensing a thing made the hair on his neck stand on end.
Whoosh!
As they kept their eyes fixed on the window, a massive sphere of fire illuminated the outside as it hurtled toward them.
Crash!
In an instant, the window shattered. Shards of glass and flames surged ruthlessly into the apartment.
"Was that aimed at us?"
Seo-un shook his head. By the time the massive fireball had been confirmed, the two had already taken refuge in the apartment hallway.
Watching the front door get blown away by the backdraft, Seo-un spoke from their position of safety.
"Rather than us inside the house, it was likely aimed at that assassin crawling along the outer wall like a cockroach."
"If he’s that good, he must be a top-tier assassin. Be careful."
Instead of answering, Seo-un activated all his barriers.
Following Hamit’s warning, Seo-un shifted his gaze and saw a dark shadow flicker across the rooftop of the apartment building across from them.
"Did you see that?"
"An elf. Why are they suddenly swarming?"
"It's not so much a swarm as it is people farming nearby coming to investigate the commotion."
The two stood in the hallway of the old apartment for a while, scanning their surroundings. Once the disturbance settled, they resumed farming.
"That assassin was impressive, though. If his stealth is that good, his martial arts must be exceptional too, right?"
"Well, normally I’d say absolutely not. But since he’s someone who crawled his way up to Crown rank in this place, I can't be so certain."
"Are assassins usually not that strong in direct martial arts?"
Nam Sa-gwang nodded as Seo-un picked up a Mana Explosion Scroll and tucked it into his subspace.
"I can't say it's true for all of them, but it is for most. They’re a strange breed—different from normal humans in everything from their actions to their thought processes. Since they specialize in assassinating ordinary people, they spend their time figuring out how to kill more easily and quickly with a single strike rather than getting used to the combat of martial artists."
Seo-un roughly understood.
Basically, they're skill-based burst assassins. If they don't kill you in one combo by dumping all their skills, they're the ones who die.
"Still, to think there’s someone who can hide as well as a Cloak of Stealth in broad daylight."
"To be precise, that wasn't stealth. He just suppressed his very presence to the absolute floor."
"How do you even do that? A martial artist’s energy isn't something you can erase that easily."
Nam Sa-gwang answered with a scowl. "They’re people who spend their entire lives, generation after generation, thinking of nothing else. Naturally, their martial arts develop to match that."
Seo-un glanced at Nam Sa-gwang and nodded.
He really is a Righteous Faction member after all, seeing him react like that.
Seo-un wasn't quite used to this normal side of Nam Sa-gwang, who sometimes seemed more like a Great Demonic Fiend.
The conversation paused as they continued farming, but Nam Sa-gwang was the first to react.
Crash!
As Aura flew from his hand, Seo-un’s gaze also shifted outside the window.
The figure he had glimpsed earlier—clad in pitch-black night-traveling clothes that covered everything but his eyes—was clinging upside down to the outer wall.
The Aura flew toward him, smashing through the veranda window and the wall.
"I think he dodged it."
Nam Sa-gwang nodded at Seo-un’s remark.
Ting-ting-ting!
No sooner had he spoken than fine needles flew in through the hole created by the Aura. Nam Sa-gwang’s face contorted as he watched the thin needles bounce off his barrier.
"He’s being a nuisance. We should take him out before we move on."
Seo-un spoke as if scratching an itch for him.
The moment the words left Seo-un’s mouth, the two figures blurred, moving through the newly made hole and onto the apartment’s exterior wall.
The man, who had been clinging to the wall near the rooftop like Spider-Man, seemed startled when the two emerged and charged at him. He immediately began to flee.
"He probably didn't think we’d come out here and risk drawing attention."
"He came out here prepared to be targeted, so we have to make sure he dies."
A chase ensued, the three of them sprinting across the apartment’s exterior as if it were flat ground. Seo-un was inwardly impressed as he watched the enemy run along the wall.
How is he so fast!
Seo-un had been quite confident in his lightness skill since obtaining Gale Step. But seeing the enemy slowly pull away, he truly realized the meaning of the saying that there is always someone better.
"They’re experts at running away!"
Seeing that even Nam Sa-gwang couldn't easily close the distance, Seo-un understood what the man had been relying on while loitering around.
Zip!
In the midst of the chase, Seo-un threw the flying daggers he had picked up earlier at the man’s back.
Clang!
Even as he saw the daggers bounce off a barrier, he continued to throw them. It had been a while since he used the Black Star Finger Technique.
Nam Sa-gwang had nagged him about why he would learn such trivial martial arts, but the hidden weapon techniques that had saved his life multiple times in his first game finally shattered the enemy’s barrier.
The moment the barrier broke, the man kicked off the outer wall and glided through the air toward the building across from them.
"Sa-gwang!!"
Swish!
At the shout, Seo-un stopped his feet and fired a pyeonjeon. Nam Sa-gwang nodded simultaneously.
With his barrier down, the man turned mid-air to swat away the incoming pyeonjeon, but the arrow exploded, enveloping him in flames.
Through the flames covering the man, Nam Sa-gwang charged in with his Hand Aura drawn.
Kaboom!
Seo-un quickly stowed his bow and ran toward where the flames were dissipating, finding a hole punched into the middle of the high-rise building. He threw himself inside without hesitation.
Screech!
The man, wielding a sword slightly shorter than a standard one, was desperately blocking Nam Sa-gwang’s Hand Aura. He glanced at Seo-un, who had just entered.
Compared to the large, unwavering Hand Aura, the blue Aura flickering atop the black sword was shaking like a candle flame in the wind.
Seo-un also wasted no time, manifesting Aura at his fingertips and lunging at the man with Blood Bone Claw.
As they dashed between rows of office desks, the man suddenly kicked a desk upward.
The moment Seo-un tore through the desk blocking his vision, he saw Nam Sa-gwang sever one of the man’s arms.
Seo-un was inwardly shocked to see the man not even let out a groan despite losing an arm, and he lunged at him again.
Boom!
Just as the Blood Bone Claw was reaching for the man’s head, he slammed something onto the floor, and a white powder smoke filled the office.
As his vision was obscured, Seo-un felt his Blood Bone Claw slice through empty air instead of the man’s head.
"It might be poison gas, don't breathe!" Nam Sa-gwang’s voice rang out.
Crash!
The sound of a wall breaking echoed as well.
At that moment, Seo-un shouted. "Get out of here!"
KABOOM!
Just as he thought a spark of fire was brightening the powder smoke filling the dark office, flames swallowed the room, rendering his shout meaningless.
As if that wasn't enough, the exploding flames shattered every window and surged outward.
Grit!
Seo-un had quickly moved close to Nam Sa-gwang and deployed a barrier, but the two of them looked a mess, their clothes scorched black.
A terrifying, murderous light flickered in Nam Sa-gwang’s eyes as he gnashed his teeth. "I won't let him die easily!"
The two quickly exited through the hole the man had escaped from, but the bloodstains on the floor stopped after barely ten meters.
"If he’s determined to hide, can we even find him?"
Nam Sa-gwang, his face heavily distorted, didn't answer Seo-un’s question. "Damn it! To be caught by a child’s trick!"
"It was a pretty hot trick for a child. That wasn't ordinary powder. It was powder specialized for ignition."
Using powder to block vision and trigger a dust explosion seemed to be the man’s hidden trump card.
Nam Sa-gwang stared silently at the severed bloodstains in the dark, sunless building hallway and shook his head. "That archer and this guy..."
Screech!
Nam Sa-gwang was startled to see Seo-un suddenly thrust his Aura-infused fingertips upward, but he quickly grasped the situation and thrust his Hand Aura as well.
If not for Hamit’s warning, even Seo-un’s reaction might have been too late.
He never dreamed that the enemy, who had fled after realizing his disadvantage, would be hiding in the ceiling vents, waiting to strike by smashing through the ceiling.
Seo-un, who had barely blocked the man’s sword as it fell toward the crown of Nam Sa-gwang’s head, grimaced as he saw the man, his torso pierced by the Hand Aura, collapse to the floor and cough up blood.
Seeing him vomit blood with an expressionless face through his torn hood felt uncanny.
"These things always make even the person killing them feel uneasy."
Seo-un couldn't help but nod at Nam Sa-gwang’s words. 'Uneasy' was the perfect word to describe someone who showed not a shred of emotional turmoil even in the face of death.
Only then did he understand what Nam Sa-gwang meant by them being a strange breed, different from normal humans.
Just as Nam Sa-gwang was about to raise his Hand Aura to take the man’s head, he locked eyes with Seo-un.
Seo-un’s eyes also widened as he looked at Nam Sa-gwang.
At that same moment, without needing a word, the two of them smashed through the building’s window and threw themselves outside.
A massive surge of mana. An overwhelming wave of mana that was impossible not to feel shot up into the sky.
This was not the first time Seo-un and Nam Sa-gwang had felt this sensation.
"Damn it! Which lunatic is it!" Nam Sa-gwang shouted irritably.
"We have to move as far away as possible!"
As they glided down from the building, their figures moved rapidly, kicking off the rooftops of lower buildings.
They could see enemies running in all directions, but there was no time to worry about them now. Not just the two of them, but no one was wary of each other; everyone was focused on running.
Like all the birds in a forest taking flight at the sound of a hunter’s gunshot, players were scattering in every direction.
In the midst of it, someone appeared to block Nam Sa-gwang’s path.
The moment they saw the old man appearing with a thunderous roar filled with resentment, both of their expressions soured.
"No time to fight!" Seo-un shouted.
Nam Sa-gwang nodded. In an instant, Seo-un gripped his own hair.
The expression of the old man, who had just blocked their path and raised his staff above his head, contorted violently.
In a flash, Nam Sa-gwang had multiplied into five.
"Hmph!"
The old man snorted and swept his staff through the air, causing a rain of lightning to pour from the sky.
Lightning Storm. The strongest 8th Circle lightning magic.
Simultaneously with the pouring lightning, the five Nam Sa-gwangs multiplied into dozens.
Seo-un, sparing neither Immortal Qi nor internal power as he deployed Muryeong Phantom Step, desperately fled past the old man, his images scattering in all directions.
Though many of the illusions created by Muryeong Phantom Step were destroyed by the falling lightning and the old man’s irritable magic, Seo-un, who continued to step through Muryeong Phantom Step to increase his forms, finally managed to escape the old man’s grasp.
The old man’s voice, thick with blood-soaked resentment, echoed everywhere.
And before long, a terrifying Meteor finally revealed itself in the sky.
Seeing the falling meteor, the old man swung his staff and vanished from the spot.
RUMBLEEEEEEEEE!
The dust cloud created by the meteor’s impact spread rapidly with the aftershock, swallowing all the surrounding buildings.
Seo-un and Nam Sa-gwang dove underground at the sound of the roar.
Rumble!
The underground area they had jumped into shook, and before long, the space was filled with gray dust that made it hard to breathe.
"Wind Ball."
Seo-un cast the basic magic he had learned first. Several Wind Balls he summoned began to rotate through the thick gray dust, gathering it together and restoring visibility.
"Even though we made it to the terminal station, there’s still an aftereffect."
Ding! Kaieren-Jinderhwa (Kill by Magic.) Survivors remaining: 149/150
At the notification, Seo-un slumped onto the floor.
"They even give us individual announcements."
"That damn old geezer. He even steals other people’s kills."
Seo-un shook his head at Nam Sa-gwang’s words. "That grudge with him... it’s from back then, right?"
There was no way either of them could forget that time; the memory was still vivid. For Seo-un, it was the moment he first saw the true power of a mage, and for Nam Sa-gwang, it was the moment he had died at Seo-un’s hands because of it.
"Yeah."
"I can take a guess, but what did you do to him?"
"Exactly what you’re thinking."
"Sigh." Seo-un shook his head and spoke with regret. "If only we could’ve farmed that assassin’s items, they would’ve been so useful... We won't be able to find them if we go back now, right?"
"It’d be like finding a needle in a desert. By the way, why did your world build these kinds of tunnels?"
Only then did Nam Sa-gwang look around the interior of Incheon Terminal Station, peering into the pitch-black tunnels where the subway ran.
"It’s a place for a transportation method called the subway."
"You’re saying carriages carrying people travel through these tunnels?"
"Something like that. More importantly, we’ve gained a troublesome enemy. He’ll attack us every time he sees us."
"We’ll just kill him again, same as last time."
"You think that old man will fall for the same trick twice? Didn't you see him earlier? He just went straight for the Meteor. Seeing as he’s not dead, he must have used Teleportation right after summoning it."
Nam Sa-gwang looked troubled at Seo-un’s words. "If that’s the case, it won't even be a fight."
"Well, there’ll be a way. This is going to be a tougher game than I thought. The sun’s already setting, and only one person is out."
Seo-un shook his head and walked into the dark tunnel where the subway ran.