Chapter 16 - Episode 2. Witch of Massacre (6)
Chapter 16: Episode 2. Witch of Massacre (6)
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A Stab, neither fast nor slow.
Not graceful, but flowing in a precise rhythm like music, the sword point touched the enemies' bodies and drew away. Lightning-like flashes burst and stained the darkness.
Five or six charging Red Fox Clan members scattered into dust with screams.
"You bastard! Kill him!"
The flustered Red Fox Clan members paired up and broadened the angles of their assault. Blasts from the Fire King Fourteen Forms came at Jaehwan from east, west, south, and north. The ultimate move of the Fire King Fourteen Forms, Cruciform Immolation, had been unleashed all at once.
A prison of fire shaped like a cross.
It was a strike that would have left anyone helpless, not just Jaehwan.
The smug faces of the Red Fox Clan members came into view.
Then, a moment later, Jaehwan's figure wavered into sight from within the flames.
"......How?"
Jaehwan stood there, having taken almost no damage from the blazing heat.
And that was not all.
「Understanding」
The flames of the Fire King Fourteen Forms, their force fading, were swirling around the tip of Jaehwan's sword.
As if those flames had originated from Jaehwan's blade from the very beginning.
Something tremendous was about to happen.
The clan master of Red Fox Clan, Black Fox Klant, felt a chilling premonition and shouted urgently.
"Everyone, get away!"
From the sword's point, a Stab unfolded.
No, could something like that even be called a Stab?
The oxygen in the air condensed, and for an instant, silence fell.
Within that brief silence, every Adapter, including Black Fox Klant, found breathing difficult, their lungs seeming to shrink.
As a Third Adapter, Klant had experienced moments like this a few times in his life.
They were the moments when he stood before the Ten Great Hall Masters, counted among the strongest in Chaos.
The condensed oxygen exploded, opening a path of fire, and forest and people alike were swept up together in the storm. Splintered wood and broken equipment flew through the air. The screams were swallowed by the roar.
All that remained where the flames passed was charred ruin. One tree, still holding a few embers, toppled to the ground with a heavy thud.
And Mino watched the entire scene from beginning to end.
Only then did she realize.
The reason that man named Jaehwan had handed over the Two-Horned Beast's corpse so easily was not because he was a fool.
The reason he had taken out his spirit weapon in front of everyone, fed it, and left it lying there was not because he was careless.
The reason he had not run even while surrounded by countless Adapters was not because he was dull to danger.
It was because he was far too strong.
Black Fox Klant, who had barely managed to take refuge up in a tree, muttered with a dazed expression,
"......Where the hell did a guy like that come from?"
They had received a suspicious report that some brat carrying a spirit weapon had shown up at the "witch hunt" they had planned.
But when they actually came, there was a monster waiting for them.
Stopping the Fire King Fourteen Forms had not been enough, he had dismantled the skill and turned its force back on them. That single blow had crippled most of their fighters.
A seasoned Third Adapter could nullify a mid-level skill with spiritual power.
But even Klant had never heard of anyone dismantling a skill and then applying it like that.
He could not even begin to guess what level of Adapter Jaehwan was.
"Th-This can't be happening!"
Kanghun stammered under Klant's gaze.
"Everyone, withdraw."
Kanghun ground his teeth.
"I have a spirit weapon. If it's this weapon, the one that killed the Two-Horned Beast in a single blow, I can beat that bastard!"
Klant glanced at the black sword Kanghun claimed was a spirit weapon, then shook his head.
"It's impossible. The gap in skill is too wide."
"That's not true!"
Eyes sharp with refusal, Kanghun turned his back on Klant and started charging toward Jaehwan.
He could see Jaehwan approaching through the flames.
Kanghun immediately used his sure-kill skill.
This was the blade that had killed a Two-Horned Beast with nothing but a mere Stab.
With this, surely...
But the all-out strike missed with absurd ease.
His sword swung in desperation.
Again and again, it sliced uselessly through empty air.
The difference in combat power was overwhelming. Strength gradually drained from his grip.
Kanghun's blade, overlaid with skill, was caught limply in Jaehwan's hand.
Why?
Past memories flashed through Kanghun's mind like a lantern reel.
Graduating from the Tower, wandering the 《Great Realm》 while narrowly surviving death after death, and finally arriving here in 《Chaos》.
Training skills to death, piling up stats to death.
Joining Red Fox Clan and hunting Adapters.
Being pointed at by other Adapters, cursed as despicable, and still somehow dragging himself all the way here through all of it.
They had been hard years to endure.
That was why he understood it even less.
Kanghun remembered clearly the spiritual power value he had seen for Jaehwan on the measuring device.
[Target Spiritual Power: 154]
Considering that the average first-stage Adapter had 1,000, it was an utterly pathetic spiritual power value.
The enemy before his eyes was, beyond doubt, a Non-Adapter.
"How can someone with a value like that......"
At the hollow mutter, Jaehwan's eyes grew deeper, as if he could see straight through Kanghun's thoughts.
Values.
It had been a long time since Jaehwan had heard that word.
There had once been a time when he, too, had struggled to raise even a single value, to gain even a single level.
Those hellish days in the Tower.
The days when he fought desperately just to get an item even a little stronger than other people's, just to have stats even a little higher.
Jaehwan understood Kanghun.
Because he understood him, he could say it.
"That's why you're weak."
"......What?"
One step, then two.
Each time Jaehwan came closer, Kanghun retreated without realizing it. He could not understand the depth contained in Jaehwan's eyes.
It was something Kanghun did not know.
Something that could not be laid out in numbers or descriptions.
By the time he came to his senses, Kanghun was already on his knees. Jaehwan reached out and took the sword from Kanghun's hand. Then, pulling the hilt toward his own body, he leveled the sword's point at the fleeing Red Fox Clan members.
Stab.
Unlike before, his posture was serious and solemn.
As if he were showing them that this was how Stab was meant to be done.
Kanghun trembled like someone who knew exactly what was about to happen next.
"......W-What are you, exactly?"
At the same moment Kanghun's eyes filled with despair, a ray of light shot out.
An intense and terrifying force, as though it were aiming at the entire world.
Klant, who had fled far away, looked back in alarm.
But it was already too late.
"That's impossible......"
Klant collapsed to the ground with his chest pierced through.
Similar sounds rang out one after another from all through the brush.
That was the last thing Kanghun saw.
* * *
A dark night. A forest dotted sparsely with starlight.
A burning campfire, sparks leaping from it now and then.
Looking up at the black sky, Mino recalled a memory from long ago for the first time in a while.
"Mino, you're far too unlike an assassin."
Those were the words the Black Forest Hall Master had said to her on the day Mino first failed an assignment.
More precisely, they were also the words Mino heard from the Black Forest Hall Master every time she failed an assignment.
The Hall Master always said the same thing.
That human softness of hers would kill her someday.
Mino had wanted to deny it.
So, even though she knew perfectly well it was against the rules, she had been taking personal commissions left and right and carrying them out.
And only the difficult ones, commissions to bring down vicious criminals. Perhaps because she had hoped that maybe she could learn something from their cruelty.
For half a year, while wiping out party after party of criminals, she gained the empty fame of being called the Witch of Massacre.
But today, Mino wanted to say this.
"Hall Master. Did you know? I survived today by acting nothing like an assassin."
Mino looked over at Jaehwan, who was leaning against a nearby tree trunk. The man silently feeding equipment to his sword only seemed stranger the longer she watched him.
Who in the world was this man?
The dazzling battle Jaehwan had shown would not leave her mind. She had never seen martial prowess like that before. It was such astonishing martial prowess that she felt embarrassed by the fact she had told him to run and handed him a Return Stone.
"Hey."
In the end, after hesitating for a long while, Mino spoke first.
"Who are you, really? You're not actually an Abyss powerhouse, are you?"
Jaehwan looked at her for a moment, then turned his gaze back to his sword.
"Why are you suddenly using formal speech?"
"That's not what's important right now."
Mino persisted and opened her mouth again.
"......I'm really curious, so won't you tell me?"
Looking at Mino, Jaehwan let out a faint snort of laughter, as if some thought had crossed his mind. Then he said,
"You already know who I am."
"......What?"
"You've forgotten already?"
He looked disappointed. Mino fell into confusion.
He had already told her? When had he told her?
But no matter how hard she tried to remember, nothing came to mind.
After she spent a long time mulling it over, Jaehwan slowly shook his head and said,
"Looks like you've got amnesia. Are you an Abyss powerhouse too?"
"What?"
Remembering what had happened earlier that day, Mino replied with a dumbfounded look.
"......That's petty."
Jaehwan pretended not to hear.
"......Give back the Return Stone I gave you earlier."
"I don't have it."
"What? Why not?"
"I lost it."
"Do you know how expensive that is? How do you lose something like that?"
Watching Mino fire back at him one answer after another from the side, Jaehwan silently began feeding equipment to his sword. The crunch, crunch of it mixed oddly well with Mino's voice, forming a strange ensemble. Listening to that sound, he gradually started to feel, oddly enough, at peace.
How was he supposed to describe it?
Strangely enough, in that moment Jaehwan felt as though he had returned to some time he had lost long ago.
He set the Ice Dragon Sword beside him for a moment and looked up at the sky. Through the rough square framed by the sparse broadleaf trees, the pitch-black night sky spread overhead.
It was a mysterious thing.
That he could see the night sky here, too.
That he could see stars.
Perhaps what he had spent decades searching for inside the Tower was something like that night sky. Something that could prove he was human in this unreal world.
"Are you that curious about who I am?"
At Jaehwan's words, Mino, who had been chattering away, shut her mouth as if by magic.
"Then I'll tell you just once, so listen carefully."
Suddenly like a well-behaved child, Mino nodded over and over.
"I'm human."
"......Are you kidding me right now?"
She was about to get angry, but this time Jaehwan asked,
"Was that not the answer you wanted?"
"Of course not! Anyone can tell that just by looking."
"Then I don't know what more there is to say beyond that."
"What?"
Mino was about to ask what he meant by that, but the moment she saw Jaehwan's profile, the words vanished from her lips.
Had she ever seen an expression that lonely on anyone before?
Between the starlight, the sound of soft breathing and the low hum of the sword spread out in steady rhythm.
Under the stars, Jaehwan quietly slipped a hand into his pocket. A small stone caught at his fingertips.
Small, but precisely crafted.
Cold, but solidly real.
A stone that, no matter how many times someone returned, only led back to reality. As if telling him that reality was always the only place anyone could return to.
In the firm feel of that stone, Jaehwan dreamed for the first time in a long while of bygone days. A time before the Tower of Nightmares had appeared, and so a time when no one had regressed. A time that had sometimes been hard and sometimes despairing, but had been good because no one had run away into the past.
One month after escaping the Tower,
That was how Jaehwan finally met another human besides himself.
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