Chapter 170 – #37_Friendship?(3)
#168
One.
How are night and day so different?
Even though it is the same space as the first floor of a department store, the darkness that colored the son-in-law weighs heavily on his shoulders.
No, is it because of the monsters that roam around without attacking even after the siege is over?
Siu muttered.
The confrontation continued, wondering if this time was really necessary.
The longer the standoff, the more sweat ran down my back.
The red eyes surrounding them in all directions flickered like alarm lights, adding to the tension, but as if they were waiting for something, they didn’t move at all.
However, this bloody confrontation was also a time to exchange conversations with Sharon.
“Do you have any guesses?”
“Nothing. But something is strange… If there were this many, the homunculus would have found them while searching, even if they normally hide in the pocket dimension.”
About Sharon’s opinion, Siwoo agreed.
Not one or two
Perhaps dozens, considering the size of this building, it might even be hundreds.
You never found these?
“Is the homunculus on the high-intelligence side?”
“It depends on the number and shape of the eyes, but…You’ve seen them too. They are no different from animals.”
“But what is this? It looks like someone is in command.”
“Command….?”
Siu started to unravel what he thought Sharon knew.
“First of all, he has been hiding himself so as not to be caught in our search. The fact that he lured us out of sight while maintaining a distance of 150m.
Lastly, we kept our distance until we came to the middle of the department store, where we had nowhere to run, and then narrowed the encirclement all at once. Isn’t it strange?”
Too meticulous
Animals and incomparable things moved in perfect order, as if they were one body.
Homunculus, leadership…
For a moment, there was a witch passing through Sharon’s mind.
“Ah… I can’t believe it.”
“Do you have any tips?”
However, Sharon immediately denied his hypothesis.
It can’t be.
If the ‘feat’ had been here, there would have been a much bigger commotion than this.
A great catastrophe must have happened.
It was roughly 3 months ago when I met these black dogs, so if the culprit of the series of incidents was the ‘cowardly witch’, there would be no way that such a small-scale accident would have occurred.
Furthermore, wasn’t the last time the cowardly witch appeared during the Chernobyl incident?
She is the one who has disappeared even from her mortal life for decades.
“No, let’s focus on getting out of here first.”
“How many enemies can I deal with with the remaining magical power?”
“About 20. You?”
“…I guess I’ll have to find out.”
Fortunately, Siu is much calmer than expected.
Even for Sharon, who has accumulated quite a bit of hunting experience, this situation is quite dangerous.
I don’t know what it would be like in an action movie, but in real fights, the number of heads overturns the overwhelming difference in skill.
Even if she didn’t know it, she would feel the pressure of being surrounded and the fear of seeing monsters roaring all around her.
Siu had no such sign at all.
Wouldn’t Sharon have been flustered if Siwoo hadn’t been there?
His composure is contagious and it feels like her head is getting cold this way.
“Are you trustworthy?”
Seeing the words that came out of his mouth unconsciously, Siwoo looked at Sharon as if he was a little surprised, then smiled.
“These guys are getting more pages.”
“Are you saying we should move right now?”
“I mean, you better move as quickly as possible. But there’s a problem. The enclosure on the entrance side is strangely loose.”
Sharon listened to Siu and looked around her.
Certainly, there are places where the number of sparkling eyes is slightly reduced in all directions.
“I have something in mind, would you like to hear it? Ignore it if you don’t like it. Your experience will be richer.”
“What? I’ll listen.”
Siwoo told Sharon the conclusions he had drawn from his observations.
It was very fast, probably because I felt that there was not much time.
“Compared to the loose netting at the entrance, the netting on the escalator down to the basement, another escape route, is very dense. I guess these guys are deliberately pushing us towards the entrance. It will be a story when intelligence reaches that far.”
“You mean we shouldn’t run away through the entrance?”
“Under the circumstances, we are the prey that was lured all the way here. You don’t have to let go easily.”
Sharon nodded her head.
Siwoo’s opinion is very plausible.
If it was just to drive them out, there wouldn’t have been a need to build a siege.
“So my idea is to get out of the subway through the underground shopping center. How about you?”
Usually, when you are in a situation like this, you act according to what you see in front of you.
However, Siwoo was able to accurately diagnose the situation by combining the given information.
“Let us go first. I’ll break through the front, so you only cover me when I can’t react. While conserving magic power as much as possible. In the unlikely event that a major danger arises, then your strength will be needed more than mine.”
Moreover, without a hint of fear, they stand in the direction where the most eyes are shining.
Sharon was inwardly amazed.
“Okay, let’s do as you say.”
“Right now…”
Siwoo’s feet hit the ground.
Perhaps it was because of the sudden acceleration that even Sharon felt sorry for, she could see the group of black dogs crouching in front of her ornamental fire.
“Run!”
The particles of the fluffy shadow gathered in Siu’s right hand and formed the shape of a sword.
At the same time, a strand of ribbon sprouting from her backbone sharply strikes the surroundings.
– Kreung Kreung!
-Kieheek!
The inside of the department store, where the tense silence had fallen, quickly turned into chaos.
There were no exceptions to the destruction of clothes, cosmetics, and jewelry display cases.
The one who gets hit by a ribbon and flies away dozens of meters, the one who sticks out his teeth and rushes fiercely, the one who chases after Sharon and Siwoo as they run.
“Oh!”
Sharon let out her shriek and tried to wield her wand.
Because at the same time, she leaped and found three black dogs blocking Siu’s path.
Its speed is so fast that it is almost invisible to the naked eye.
If you think of a motorcycle running with all its might to hit a person, it would be roughly the same speed and power.
If it had been Siwoo until now, even if he blocked it, he would have been pushed back.
However, through the battles so far, Siu has analyzed his weaknesses.
The fact that the Law of Shadows, which is in charge of Siwoo’s melee combat, is physically very weak magic.
As the tiny magic circles that interfere with magic are united in the form of particles, it may be strong against magic, but its physical destructive power itself is not that great.
Moreover, it is the same in front of pure and dense magic.
What supplemented that lightness was the elemental magic she had learned from Sharon, especially the property of earth.
Using the characteristics of the elements of heavy and dull soil, weight was given to the shadows and density was increased.
If the weapon Siwoo had fought so far was a cotton bat, now he wields an iron bat filled to the brim.
– Empty!
At the same time, the sound of being hit by a truck rang out.
A homunculus falling in the air as a mass.
It was not an ordinary sight.
The normal human body does not have the ability to perform such exercises.
But the taste proves it.
Even with the same power, just by adding weight, the destructive power is greatly increased.
– Kyaooooo!
Before Siwoo can regain his posture, the monster that hit the ceiling is fired at Siwoo like an air-to-ground missile.
It’s too late to correct your posture.
It was not timely enough to raise the shield in the left hand to block it because it was hit with a big movement from right to left.
That fleeting gap.
Without hesitation, Siu corrected the shape of the sword he had just swung the homunculus away from.
Instead of a long sword, the shadow that turned into a straight spear was raised at an angle to the homunculus flying in the air.
The words of the monster who ran into the upright spear were miserable.
-Kieheek!
Disarm the spear as soon as the terrifying screams are put behind you to reduce the impact, then move forward again.
It was a natural movement, like flowing water.
It’s a strange thing.
Siu couldn’t learn how to handle his body except for magic combat.
Even the taekwondo academy that every Korean male has attended at least once was someone else’s business to Siwoo.
So, when he first hunted homunculus in the present world, didn’t he wield his sword in an awkward way?
No, to describe what he was like at that time, it would be more appropriate to say that he was swung by a sword.
But the body moves.
As if memories were imprinted on his body, he naturally creates weapons and kills enemies by taking advantage of the sharpest gaps before even thinking about how to defeat the enemy.
His body movements and movements were much more natural than during the fierce battle with Della.
-Keeeee
Sharon was watching Siwoo’s back as she ran through the siege in a half-daze.
At first, I was most worried.
No matter how much Shiu has battle experience with the homunculus, it’s not far behind Sharon’s.
Moreover, with such a large number of people fighting at once, it is possible for ordinary people to panic and get their hands and feet twisted…
– Boo-woo!
A ribbon swung like a sharp whip simultaneously knocked out the two homunculus attacking Sharon from behind.
At the same time, he knocked one down with a weight-bearing blow to his shield before detonating his head with his foot.
It is to defeat the homunculus that attacks Sharon without even looking at it, and at the same time deal with the monster that attacks in front.
Looking at him like that, Sharon thought of a word.
Yongtongmuae (融通無碍).
It is a four-character idiom meaning that there is no place to be blocked through thoughts or actions and is free.
There was no hesitation in his movements.
There is not even a moment of hesitation or a break in flow.
Like a worn-out hunter, he skillfully used his magic and slaughtered the homunculus while changing the shape of his weapon without rest.
Thanks to that, Sharon was able to avoid swinging the wand once while getting out of the trap.
In the blink of an eye, Sharon lost her mind and killed three more homunculus.
Although Sharon walks the path of sorcery, she feels a bit of awe at seeing Siu break through difficulties using techniques that can only be described as martial arts.
Because his skill was, after all, only something he could acquire after a long period of hard work and near-abuse training.
With that level of skill, wouldn’t it be possible to defeat Della despite the difference in magical abilities?
Could it be that Siu really beat Della?
Even the same absurd delusions have arisen.
Siwoo paved the way silently amidst the bodily fluids and screams of the homunculus.
He saw the entrance to the escalator, which seemed impossible to reach.
-Kurrrrrr…
“Whoa…”
However, the homunculus maintained the initial confrontation while maintaining a certain distance, rather than rushing to actively block Siu.
Siu, who was able to breathe thanks to that, looked around him while wiping the sweat from his chin.
And he was surprised
It was because the number of monsters that filled his intestines to the point of being crowded had decreased enough to count by eye.
All of those old, disgusting guys are walking backwards with their tails down.
How to say
There was no more inspiration than I thought.
When he first defeated the homunculus, Siu dragged his aching body and ran around as a side effect of the unreasonable magic.
Because it seemed that the achievements and efforts of the past were fully rewarded.
However, if it becomes this one-sided and overwhelming battle, rather than being happy with the sense of achievement, it is more like, ‘I really did this?’.
“If that’s the case, then I don’t have to run away, right?”
After all, it was Siu and Sharon who roamed every night to hunt the homunculus.
It was Siwoo’s opinion that he had to run away when he succeeded in hunting so many.
“But in case you don’t know. They might have more ambushes.”
Unexpectedly, Sharon did not reveal her cautious position.
There are many doubts, but the number of homunculi that Siu caught is approximately 80, including those added along the way.
If you organize the rest of them, you’ll have about 100 of them.
Even if only 1 million won per dog comes out, 100 million won.
You can earn 100 million, which you can never earn in a short period of time by doing ordinary work, by digging through a few corpses.
If you have 100 million, you don’t have to rely on Siwoo.
Sharon, of course, had no intention of claiming her ownership of all this harvest either.
Even though there was a treaty signed by Siu and Sharon: ‘Sharon owns the crystal obtained from hunting together, and Sharon replaces it with magic lessons’, but it wasn’t that shameless.
However, even if you catch only the remaining 20, you will receive at least 20 million won. You can meet the minimum payment for the next quarter without difficulty.
Such thoughts temporarily took away Sharon’s ability to judge reality.
“Then I’ll take care of the rest.”
Sharon raised the wand.
