Chapter 26: The Textbook Backstab
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 26: The Textbook Backstab
Shooting a bow while lying prone was harder than he had imagined.
Because he had to hold the bow horizontally, rapid fire was out of the question. This forced him to attempt something he had never tried before.
Sss—ha.
Sss—ha.
Regulating his breathing, Seo-un attempted to imbue his internal power into the arrow.
He had never studied the art of infusing weapons with energy. Since the Boundless Fist didn't include any weapon techniques to begin with, this was a first for him. Yet, for some reason, he felt it wouldn't be that difficult.
Was it perhaps his intuition as a lifelong fan of fantasy and martial arts novels?
After a long moment of concentration, he finally loosed the arrow at the mage, who was busy summoning a dozen or so ice arrows.
The arrow flew with a sharp, whistling thrum.
"Tch!"
Seo-un clicked his tongue the moment he fired. He quickly rolled and dropped below the roofline to hide.
It’s a failure.
For some reason, he had thought that imbuing the arrow with internal power would grant it terrifying destructive force, but it had only succeeded in making a loud noise. Come to think of it, speed and stealth were far more important than raw power when it came to archery.
Leaning against a wall, he stole a glance. As expected, the martial artist had immediately sensed the energy of the arrow packed with internal qi. He had leaped into the air and swatted it away with ease.
In that brief interval, the monsters they had been fighting filled the gap and lunged at them.
If it’s come to this...
If a single-strike surprise attack wouldn't work, then he would try a second, a third, a tenth, a hundredth. He would keep going until the enemy was dead.
Running quickly between the houses, Seo-un fired three-arrow volleys whenever the enemies came into view. As he moved his legs swiftly, weaving through the neighborhood and firing arrows without pause, the two men were thrown into a state of confusion.
In front of them, a still-formidable number of monsters charged with murderous intent, while from behind, arrows rained down from various directions. Their sense of crisis intensified.
The martial artist was in slightly better shape, but the mage—whose shield had shattered after taking two arrows—was a different story.
A mage's shield was a form of insurance. In standard combat, knights or warriors protected the front while archers guarded the perimeter. Protecting the mage was common sense. However, targeting such a mage was also common sense. Consequently, many warriors trained specifically to hunt assassins or mages, and the shield was the insurance meant to evade their blades.
The shield of a high-ranking mage was often so powerful that even a sword imbued with Force couldn't break it in one go, but this mage's shield was not like that. It had shattered after blocking a mere two arrows.
The moment that insurance vanished, the obsession with impending death took hold. The mage's spells—which had been binding the monsters' legs—faltered significantly. The power and number of the ice arrows he had been firing by the dozen, and the ice spears he used to freeze targets in pairs, decreased noticeably.
He felt as if an arrow might pierce his back at any moment; there was no way he could concentrate on his magic. Driven by the desperate need to redeploy his shield, his mind raced.
"Askro Squad's Holding! Damn it! Askro Squad's Holding!"
Only after shouting the incantation several times did a transparent film manifest. The mage gasped for breath. As a 4th Circle mage who took pride in his skills, failing at something as simple as a shield was supposed to be impossible. Yet, with his life on the line, he repeated such trivial mistakes.
Another arrow slammed into the newly formed shield, covering it in cracks.
"We have to retreat! I can't hold on any longer!"
"Just a little more and we can finish these things off! Hold your ground!"
The mage's patience, as he swallowed the curses rising in his throat, was truly impressive.
Easy for him to say since he's holding up fine!
Even when several arrows flew his way, the martial artist managed to dodge or block them. Though his hands were becoming a bit busy, he didn't seem to be in any great danger. On the other hand, the mage was so preoccupied with the fear of another arrow that he couldn't focus on his offensive magic.
As the mage's support dwindled, the martial artist grew increasingly anxious. He wanted to finish off these monsters quickly, grab the items, and either flee or find the enemy, but the mage was hesitating in the safe rear, making his irritation flare.
"Askro Squad's Castle Wall!"
After glancing back repeatedly, the mage finally finished his casting. A wall, fifteen meters long and two meters high, erupted from the ground.
At that moment, the expressions of the martial artist and Seo-un shifted in opposite directions.
Nice!
That idiot!
The martial artist gritted his teeth, his brow furrowed in a deep scowl, while Seo-un's lips curled upward as he moved his legs quickly.
Instead of hiding and circling around, Seo-un approached the wall openly and fired his bow toward the sky. Since the wall blocked their line of sight, he no longer needed to sneak around.
A bow is a projectile weapon with a curved trajectory. Because it isn't a direct-fire weapon, simply erecting a wall cannot block everything. Of course, because of the wall, the frequency of missed arrows would increase drastically and their power would decrease, but that only applied to ordinary arrows.
Having arrows packed with internal power rain down from the sky was not a situation to be taken lightly. As stray arrows fell one by one, their power was anything but ordinary. The mage, whose concentration was already shaken, still couldn't exert his full strength, and the martial artist, left alone to fend off the monsters, couldn't afford to spare any effort.
When the rain of arrows finally subsided, the two men became even more uneasy.
Having closed the distance to the wall significantly, Seo-un pulled a scroll from his subspace.
[Mana Explosion Scroll]
Explodes 10 seconds after use. It is recommended to use this from outside a 20-meter radius.
[Would you like to use it?]
After tightly wrapping the scroll around an arrow, Seo-un pressed the 'O' button and fired the arrow into the sky.
8, 7, 6, 5...
Counting down the remaining time, he crouched down and covered his ears just in case.
—BOOM!
—Rumble!
Along with a deafening explosion, the wall the mage had erected collapsed. Debris and the aftershock swirled around Seo-un.
Whoa...
Though the shockwave whipped his hair violently, he couldn't take his eyes off the spot where the Mana Explosion Scroll had landed.
Monsters were scattered everywhere, writhing and unable to steady themselves. The mage was slumped against the broken wall, motionless—it was unclear if he was unconscious or dead.
And then, there was the man. Drenched in blood, the martial artist had plunged a short-bladed saber into the ground and was kneeling on one knee.
A twisted smile spread across Seo-un's face at the satisfying result.
"Ha... ha... You coward!" the martial artist spat as Seo-un revealed himself.
Seo-un, aiming his bow from twenty meters away, didn't feel like responding. Instead of an answer, he loosed an arrow. The martial artist, who looked like he was at death's door just a moment ago, lunged forward and accurately split the flying arrow in half.
The Rapid Fire skill allowed Seo-un to fire a second arrow at the charging man, but the martial artist swatted that away easily as well. The distance between them was now only seven or eight meters.
As he notched a third arrow, Seo-un did something different: he poured a massive amount of internal power into the bow itself rather than the arrow. The tension in the bow limbs became immense, and the bowstring shrieked as if it were about to snap.
My approach was wrong from the start. A powerful bow is what fires a powerful arrow.
The moment the arrow left Seo-un's hand, it streaked toward the martial artist like a bolt of light. The arrow flew as if drawing a line through the air. The moment it grazed the flank of the martial artist—who had barely managed to react—a scream erupted from his mouth.
"Aaaargh!"
As if electrocuted, the man who had been charging so fast began to tremble violently. He lost his balance and collapsed to the ground.
"Phew. I really can't underestimate them. To think he dodged an arrow of that speed at this distance."
The arrow's speed had been much faster than expected. Seo-un felt he wouldn't have even been able to react to it himself, so he couldn't help but be impressed by the martial artist who had managed to avoid a fatal wound.
But that was as far as it went.
For some reason, the Cotton Tree Bow, reinforced with internal power, had imbued the arrow with a tremendous aura of lightning.
The martial artist, barely pushing himself up to look at Seo-un, closed his eyes. He no longer had the strength to resist the opponent who had closed the distance in an instant to drive a fist downward.
—CRACK!
Along with the heavy sound of something shattering, an overwhelming surge of Vitality was felt.
This is it!
A look of ecstasy appeared on Seo-un's face as he opened his Qi Absorption Gate to take in the martial artist's Vitality. Next, he absorbed the mage's Vitality just before it could dissipate, and then spoke.
"My Info."
[Name: Jin Seo-un]
Race: Human
Trait: Demonic Human (Mage)
Strength: 45
Vitality: 20
Agility: 20
Stamina: 30
Magic Resistance: 10
Special Stat: Internal Energy: 160
Special Stat: Mana: 30
Normally, one had to circulate energy for ten to twenty days to increase internal energy by 1. Absorbing the Vitality of one of those otherworlder bastards usually only increased internal energy by about 3 to 5. The last time he had checked his internal energy after obtaining the Power Glove, it was 113.
But a single martial artist... Taking down one martial artist is better than hunting ten other otherworlders. They're literally walking elixirs.
Of course, the risk was proportionally higher, but it didn't matter. There was no risk at all in this particular game.
Just as he was about to check the two men's boxes, he got an unpleasant feeling. Looking around, he saw the monsters that had been writhing on the ground were picking themselves up.
Incredible recovery speed.
They had been on the verge of death, yet they were already standing.
—Swish! Thwack!
Using his reinforced bow, he methodically finished them off with two or three arrows each. Before long, he had cleared them from his sight. Leather pouches dropped where they fell, but the important things were the boxes that appeared before him.
First, he opened the martial artist's box. The first thing that caught his eye was a black saber with a short but thick blade. When he gripped the handle and lifted it, he felt a decent weight.
[Ding! You have obtained the Artisan's Black Iron Blade.]
—Whoosh! Shick!
He gave it a few light, quick swings. It definitely felt like the work of a master craftsman.
—Clang!
Despite that, he tossed the fine saber behind his back. He had no interest in carrying around something he couldn't use.
[Ding! You have obtained an Unsim Pill.]
Seo-un's mouth stretched into a wide grin as he looked at the thumb-sized brown pill inside a small, worn wooden box.
"An elixir!"
[Unsim Pill: A medicine used for treating internal injuries. Its effects are quite good.]
"Ah..."
A disappointed sigh escaped him involuntarily. However, thinking it might still be useful in its own way, he quickly tucked it into his subspace.
[Ding! You have obtained the Seven Star Blade Technique.]
[Ding! You have obtained the Seven Star Spiritual Art.]
[Ding! You have obtained the Seven Star Steps.]
A look of regret washed over Seo-un's eyes as he looked at the secret manuals that appeared in succession.
They're obviously a set of martial arts.
Since he had already learned the Baekmu Juyeongong as his mental method, there was a high probability he couldn't learn these without first learning the Seven Star Spiritual Art.
Well, it doesn't cost money to try.
[Ding! You cannot learn this without first learning the Seven Star Spiritual Art and Seven Star Steps.]
This time, he picked up the Seven Star Spiritual Art.
[Ding! This conflicts with your existing mental method. Would you like to learn it anyway?]
"Are you crazy?"
With lingering regret, he tossed the manuals into his subspace. There were other miscellaneous items like healing salves, but he discarded them all and approached the mage's box a short distance away.
Let's see...
As was always the case, the mage's box contained many miscellaneous things. Among them, the first thing to greet Seo-un was a glittering necklace.
[Ding! You have obtained Askro's Necklace.]
"There it is!"
His lips twisted into a grin. He had been disappointed after killing several mages and not finding this item, but here it was. It was an item worth a whopping 6 million won.
If he had come all this way and failed to get even this, he would have been more than just disappointed—his heart would have broken. Since he had already decided to throw away his studies and job hunting, the only things that would support his livelihood were gold pieces that could be converted into money back on Earth.