World-Saving is a Skill

Chapter 70

Chapter 70

The first bout ended simply. Of course, people watching probably thought I won by a hair.

At this pace, I figured we’d reached the point where folks would start doubting my skill.

So in this match I planned to crush him, overwhelmingly. Sohwi and I stepped back onto the stage.

“Would you look at this punk?”

I muttered that and looked at Sohwi. As a rule, you didn’t use your unique magic pattern in a spar.

It was like using a wooden sword instead of a real blade. But that punk was using his magic pattern right now. I was sensitive to shifts in magic power, so I noticed at once.

I didn’t know exactly what it was, but it definitely wasn’t a flashy ability like mine or Han Sang-ah’s.

“Perhaps I shouldn’t have gone easy.”

He must have thought he barely lost. He probably decided that if he used his ability, he would win.

The spar started again.

“Die!”

Hey, this is a spar you bastard. Telling me to die is a bit much, isn’t it? With that shout, Sohwi came at me like a storm.

“?!”

Then I noticed something was off. His movement was clearly different from the first bout. Wherever I tried to move, one of his dual blades cut it off a beat early.

If I tried to block, he hit somewhere else, and if I tried to evade, he struck the spot I was about to move to.

Got it, more or less. Simple.

“So it’s something like a future sight. Nice ability.”

“…”

Sohwi didn’t answer. He was embarrassed. Even if it was a future sight, it wasn’t like he saw days ahead, or months ahead.

It looked like a power that saw a few seconds ahead, and it didn’t seem to cost much mana to use. For Hunters, knowing a few seconds ahead helped more than seeing far off futures.

I traded a bit more offense and defense with him, got the feel of it, then stated it flatly.

“Three seconds I see.”

After my words, Sohwi’s movement stopped for a split second.

“What are you so shocked about?”

Did you think I had never fought someone who saw the future? I had fought a guy who saw the future, then bent it to fit his taste.

Seeing a few seconds ahead wasn’t that great an ability when used by a fighter like Sohwi. At best it was like laying a few handicap stones ahead in Go.

I didn’t even need Paradoxical Flame. Sohwi wasn’t that high a level.

“In the last bout, only you were on the offensive, yes?”

It was time to flip the flow. We were all here because it was supposed to be fun. What was the point if only you had fun?

The moment I started to move my spear, he edged back. I swung anyway. I attacked assuming he would dodge.

Even if you saw the future, you couldn’t know what happened after that future.

That was why he would lose to me. Even if he saw the future, he couldn’t draw a result that mattered from it.

With the swing of my spear, the blue trails I created pinched him from both sides. One of those blue trails smashed into his chest as he kept frantically chaining evasion and guards while watching the future.

“Gugh?!”

Once you gave up the first clean hit, it was over. Seeing the future or not, your body had to move if you wanted to dodge or block right.

Future sight was an excellent power, but it didn’t actually wound the enemy or block their attack for you.

After the first blow landed, Sohwi started getting beaten like a dog. He looked just like Jung Oh-hoon when I pounded him in the training room.

But this wasn’t training, it was a beating. I was pulling my strength so he wouldn’t get a crippling injury while I laid into him. He wouldn’t gain anything from this beating.

The spar was halted. The organizers stepped in because they couldn’t bear to watch Sohwi keep getting pummeled one-sidedly.

“Good work.”

In that condition, Sohwi wouldn’t be able to continue. Even so, the organizers then brought me a message.

“He wants to keep going?”

“Yes, the request from Hunter Sohwi’s side was extremely insistent. Also…”

We had planned five bouts, and there were corporate ads slotted between them.

If we stopped here, the companies would be furious. The citizens watching in anticipation would be upset too.

“As Hunter Yoo Chan-seok overwhelmed Hunter Sohwi, public excitement multiplied several times. To be honest, it would be a real shame to call it off now.”

Even if that was what the organizers thought, if Sohwi didn’t want to continue, we couldn’t force it.

“Understood, for now.”

I sent the organizer back and fell into thought. Either way, Sohwi had already used every card he could pull.

He even used an ability that was implicitly banned in a spar. He still got brutally thrashed. And he wanted another round?

“He must be hiding something.”

It probably wasn’t just stubborn pride and anger. If it were, great. I would just beat him like I did a moment ago.

But if not… After my short rest, I stepped back onto the stage with that thought.

I looked over Sohwi and grimaced.

“What did you do?”

He didn’t answer. Inside his body, something that wasn’t his mana had taken root. It was creepy and sticky, disgusting and cold.

“Shut up and pick up your spear.”

Veins writhed under his forearms. I snapped my gaze to the staff and shouted.

“Evacuate the people! Now!”

Sohwi’s condition was bad.

“You crazy bastard, how can you live with yourself like that?”

The foreign mana in his body was slowly taking him over.

It felt like Kim Ji-hyun, the one I ran into in Dover. But the magic now lodged in Sohwi was far stronger, faster, more relentless.

“What are you doing, can’t you hear me, you idiots? Are your ears stuffed with shit?! Evacuate them!”

At my shout, the staff hurried to broadcast an evacuation to the gathered crowd. But people stared at me blankly, as if they couldn’t understand why I was suddenly losing it.

“Haa… haa…”

Jeez, things are turning into a mess now. A slithering black miasma seeped out of Sohwi’s body bit by bit.

It was already too late. Sohwi was already done. There was no saving him. People shuffled off as they evacuated, but they kept glancing between me and Sohwi over and over.

There was no danger right before their eyes. They didn’t even know why they were supposed to run, so their movement wasn’t sharp.

“The bastard’s doomed.”

I had to save as many as I could.

“Uaaaaaah!”

The rancid stink of a rotting corpse spread. Sohwi’s body was rotting in real time. Ragged rotten flesh plopped onto the floor.

A black ooze, once definitely red blood, dripped and smeared thickly.

Boils all over his body vomited yellow pus. He didn’t look human anymore.

“Help me.”

“I can’t.”

You are already finished. I had no choice but to pass a death sentence on Sohwi. With a soft pop, his ruined eyeball slid out and hit the floor.

His flesh healed without pause, and rotted without stopping. Only then did people realize something was terribly wrong and scream as they ran.

— You want victory, then so it shall be.

A voice unlike the one from moments ago spilled from Sohwi’s mouth. Just hearing it made my skin crawl.

“At least you have manners. You would still grant a wish, is that it.”

I raised my Paradoxical Flame, burning away the disgusting energy spilling out of his body. A normal person would start rotting all over just by touching it.

— The standard bearer of victory rides a horse. The horse’s name is Death. All who plant banners while shouting of triumph, remember the mountains of corpses that rot beneath them.

He stretched out a hand to the side, and a golden goblet appeared, full of a dark green liquid.

“You do love to talk huh.”

His magic power surged like it would pierce the sky. Every Hunter within a few kilometers would be able to feel it.

— I pronounce your death, mortal.

“This is pathetic.”

I let out a laugh of disbelief and pointed my spear tip at Sohwi’s body. Whatever had taken his body was on a different level entirely. I didn’t need to clash to know that much.

People were evacuating. Clearing just the immediate area wasn’t enough. Everyone within several kilometers had to get out.

Suddenly his belly split wide open, and rotten chunks of flesh hurtled at me. I dodged, and the meat slapped the floor with a wet squelch and burst, spraying maggots like shrapnel in every direction.

“That killed my appetite.”

I whipped my spear in every direction. Dozens of blue trails rose around me.

— Parlor tricks.

“I haven’t even started the parlor tricks. Ever dealt with this?”

The blue trails I had left suspended in the air began to tremble all at once. Their trembling resonated with the magic power in the air.

As the ambient magic started vibrating at a specific wavelength, that vibration spread into the body of that rotten corpse.

— …You bastard

Even that enormous magic power shuddered as the air vibrated, then slowly dispersed.

Aftertone.

It was the same principle as breaking a wineglass with sound. You sensed and analyzed the magic power your opponent carried. Then you make the ambient magic vibrate at that frequency.

Your opponent’s mana resonates with the ambient mana, then slowly collapses.

If I had to compare it to something, it was like a Qi-dissolving poison from a wuxia tale.

— So there is at least one among you with a deep understanding of mana.

I am a bit of an oddball indeed. Rotten chunks of flesh kept dropping off his body with soft thuds. The fallen meat turned into huge flies, maggots, and horseflies, swarming at me.

— Do not think I will let you leave.

“I wasn’t planning to let you leave either. You past-expiration freak.”

If you’re rotten, you should stay as waste. Why are you still crawling around alive? I raised my spear and slashed into the horde of vermin that poured toward me.

The ring on my finger flared with light. In an instant the air around me grew colder, pressing down on the monster before my eyes.

As expected, it wasn’t weak enough to be finished off by that alone. Still, its movements were clearly restricted.

Its immense mana was being worn down, little by little, by resonance. The blazing Paradoxical Flame burned away the corrosive energy spilling from its body.

At the same time, my spear and the streak of blue light struck together in rhythm, launching a coordinated assault.

“They call these scavenger bugs, right?”

Huge maggots, flies, and carrion beetles writhed as they surged toward me like waves. The spear and the blue arc swung without pause, and the horde of insects was shredded like hunks of meat thrown into a blender.

The Paradoxical Flame surged, burning away every foul energy it touched and releasing mana into the air.

My body absorbed that ambient mana without stopping. Meanwhile, swarms of tiny gnats clustered together in the air, clinging like a coat around the rotting monster’s body.

At the same time, large mushrooms sprouted across its flesh, scattering fog-like spores in every direction.

"Good grief, that’s filthy as hell. This really makes me not want to fight."

This fight looked like it would drag on again. And I had a bad feeling it would be one that kills my appetite.