## Chapter 143 – 143. Hunting (2)
#143. Hunting (2)
Bang! The clash of magical power stirred up a fierce wind around me and the guy.
The curved swords in his hands rushed towards my neck from both sides.
Quickly pulling back, I took out a dagger from my pocket and threw it.
Clang. Unfortunately, he lightly deflected the dagger with a swing of his sword.
‘…Well, I didn’t learn any assassination techniques, so there’s no way I could land a hit.’
I brought it to look like an assassin, but it seems like I won’t be using it again.
“You… you’re not an assassin.”
A chilling voice flowed out, filled with viscous murderous intent.
“…Is it that obvious?”
“Anyone who throws a hidden weapon worse than I can with my feet can’t be an assassin.”
Seriously, this bastard?
“Then why are you carrying curved swords with that build? You should be carrying a greatsword.”
He looked at least 2 meters tall, and his forearms seemed twice as thick as mine.
“With those blurry features, I bet your thing is small too. Hey, be honest. Is the reason you’ve been dumped by women because you’re a shorty?”
“…”
“…Really?”
Without a word, he raised his curved swords. Red sword energy bloomed above them.
“I’ll cut you to pieces.”
“Wait, wait a minute.”
Even if we’re fighting, there was something I wanted to ask.
“But is that true?”
“…What are you talking about?”
“That if it’s too small, you can’t get a circumcision.”
Thump! He kicked off the dirt floor and rushed towards me. It was a speed that didn’t match his size. The sword energy covering the curved swords had grown even larger.
I also raised my energy and created sword energy. I deflected the curved swords, swung with a speed that seemed to tear the air, with the Mad Demon Sword.
As expected of his size, the power in the sword was considerable.
“Pissed off?”
“…”
He looked like he’d be taciturn, but he was wasting magical power over a little taunt, just like a rookie.
‘Still, I can’t let my guard down.’
He’s wielding dual curved swords, but he might be an upper-tier B-class fighter.
And I have to fight him with the handicap of only using support magic.
Logically, it was a dangerous situation, but strangely, I wasn’t nervous.
Is it because he seems weaker than the Minotaur, or even the leader of the guys who attacked Chun Yeo-hwa?
I unconsciously laughed, and seeing that, he rushed towards me first.
I lightly swung my sword to respond.
Clang!! Sparks flew from the colliding sword energies. The aftermath stirred up dust.
Dozens of exchanges took place in a short time of less than 10 seconds.
It was my first real fight in a while, and I felt my senses coming back to life.
I couldn’t find even a hint of hesitation in aiming for the opponent’s vitals, like the neck, heart, and solar plexus.
But he was fighting better than I thought.
He must have reached a considerable level in curved sword techniques, as he blocked my sword every time he swung. As if he didn’t want a prolonged battle, he suddenly switched from defense to offense and sent a heavy blow towards me.
To counter the clearly shining sword energy, I also raised my internal energy.
Clang!! The shockwave from the collision of our sword energies forced me to step back for a moment.
In the tense silence, he was glaring at me.
‘It’s my first time fighting curved swords, and they’re trickier than I thought.’
It can’t be easy to handle dual curved swords, but his swordsmanship was precise for his size.
“…Why did you kill Go Nam-seok?”
He was the one who broke the silence first.
“I didn’t like the way he looked.”
“…”
“You look unpleasant too, Kko-sam.”
“…Kko-sam? What does that mean?”
“It means your dick is 3cm.”
His face twisted instantly.
His already ugly and fierce face became even more grotesque. Looking at it made me feel uncomfortable. If I had known this would happen, I would have brought Noel to cleanse my eyes.
The guy, who looked like he could cast a curse just with his face, suddenly changed his stance.
He held the curved swords in reverse grip and lowered his body extremely. It reminded me of a runner’s crouching start.
But since he wasn’t touching the ground with his hands, it looked like he was about to fall over.
Nevertheless, the energy I felt from him was different from before.
I started to feel a little nervous. Since his stance was so extreme, I had the initiative.
But I was curious about what he was going to do, so I decided to yield the initiative to him.
콰아앙!
With a loud explosion, he disappeared from my sight.
He didn’t turn invisible.
Even if hunters awaken and gain abilities, most of them are simple abilities like physical enhancement.
I can feel his presence in magic detection and ki-sense.
‘He’s using the ground and trees as footholds to move in three dimensions at high speed.’
Momentarily accelerating his body, that must be his awakened ability.
It’s really an ability that doesn’t suit his appearance.
Hoo, I took a deep breath and raised my senses to the highest level.
From the left to the upper right, and then stepping on the ground again, leaping, and kicking off the tree behind me to run.
[Thought Acceleration]
Everything around me except for me becomes extremely slow.
Even the falling leaves in the wind and the appearance of a small bug flying in front of me are clearly visible.
Of course, so is the guy rushing towards me from the 5 o’clock direction.
I wrapped ki around my fist and swung my arm.
Pow!!
“Keuk?!!”
The guy, who was hit head-on by my fist while accelerated, screamed pathetically and crashed to the ground.
His nose was bleeding as if his nose bone was broken, and that area was turning bright red.
The impact must have been considerable, as he couldn’t get up easily.
“Is this the end?”
To be honest, I was a little disappointed.
‘At this rate, he’s not even upper B-class, but a little below average, isn’t he?’
He’s far below my expectations.
At this point, I started to suspect that he was exaggerating his skills to show off.
“I’ll, kill you…!! I’ll definitely kill you!!”
Kaddeuk, as if he was provoked by my casual words, a fairly strong magical power swirled around him.
Certainly, his magical power seemed worthy of being called upper-tier even in B-class, but everything else was below average.
The simple and ignorant method he was about to use was proof of that.
Overburst.
A technique that temporarily increases output by exploding the magical power in the body, but consumes a huge amount of magical power and stamina.
It has strong side effects that leave permanent sequelae in the magic circuit, so it is designated as one of the 3rd-class forbidden techniques in the Magic Tower.
The energy I felt from him became ominous.
The guy, who had regained his stance, rushed towards me.
This time, I couldn’t even hear the sound of him kicking off the ground.
Before I could even blink, his curved swords were aiming for my side from a strange angle.
I lightly pulled my body back to avoid the attack.
I couldn’t block that attack. Even if I blocked one, there wasn’t just one curved sword.
Once again, the guy disappeared.
The speed was so fast that I could only see faint afterimages with the naked eye. In this state, magic detection and ki-sense weren’t very useful.
It seems that his awakened ability is also enhanced in the Overburst state.
At this point, I had to admit it.
‘It’s going to be hard to win without using martial arts.’
I put the Mad Demon Sword into my inventory and took out Millennium.
The Vajra energy, hidden deep within my dantian by the magic of the Mad Demon Sword, revealed itself.
Formless Vajra Art (無相金剛訣) Formless Lightning Body (無想電身).
The senses of my whole body become clearer than ever.
Even the wind passing over my skin and the smell of soil tickling my nose feel more than twice as strong as usual.
Even the sensation of the two curved swords flying in from behind, aiming for my neck, cutting through the air.
Two steps were enough.
To avoid the attack and swing my sword to cut off his neck.
Swish, a terrible smell of blood wafted through the air.
Fortunately, a breeze quickly blew in and drove away the blood smell that filled the forest. Looking at the corpse piled up in front of me, I got a headache thinking about the cleanup.
It’s unpleasant, but I put the corpse in my inventory.
I’ll have to throw it away in a suitable gate or another world later.
I decided to just leave the bloodstains.
Without a corpse, the police won’t transfer the case to the association.
It’s best to just assume he was eaten by a monster and close the investigation.
Of course, there’s a chance that the case could be transferred to the association, but the association isn’t free enough to care about a case that happened in a forest like this, not even in the city.
I rummaged through the team leader’s bag lying near the tree trunk.
Among the wallet, dagger, and miscellaneous personal items, I saw what I was looking for.
[Information on the newly acquired item is being collected.]
[Anti-Hunter Binding Chains
Grade: Rare
Temporarily suppresses the target’s flow of magical power.]
‘Anti-Hunter Binding Chains’ are not artifacts, but they are magical tools treated as quasi-artifacts due to their bizarre performance.
They are specialized in suppressing those who handle magical power, such as hunters and mages.
However, depending on the concentration of the main ingredient, ‘Ines’s Blood,’ the price and effect vary greatly, from billions to trillions.
I heard that some can even suppress upper-tier A-class hunters, but this one didn’t seem to be that strong.
They estimated me to be an upper-tier B-class fighter, so it must be able to suppress at least B-class hunters.
‘I know it’s expensive, but I don’t know the exact market price.’
But I didn’t feel like selling it. It was a magical tool that was so strictly managed that it was difficult to obtain even if you had money.
If I put it in my inventory, there will be a use for it someday.
“By the way, the Director of Urban Planning…”
Bwoooong, I saw a familiar license plate passing by on the road.
I felt like I was lucky for the first time in a long time.
I threw myself towards the vehicle.
Bang! I landed on the hood of the vehicle.
The impact caused the rear wheels of the vehicle to lift up, but soon stopped.
Through the front windshield, I saw Ham Seok-jae, the Director of Urban Planning.
His eyes were filled with fear.
“Good evening, Director.”
It was a night when a strange sound, whether it was the cry of a roe deer or a human scream, echoed.
***
“Damn it, damn it!!!”
Bang, bang! Yoo Jin-tae, the Chief Secretary of the Black Mountain Guild, slammed his desk with his fist.
The desk was shattered beyond recognition by the anger of the A-class hunter.
The chief secretary, who was watching the scene from the side, quietly lowered his head and examined the pattern on the floor.
“They’re all… you’re telling me they’re all dead?!”
Yoo Jin-tae, who had sent the 1st Squad to Yongin with the authority he had received from the Guild Master, felt like he was burning inside.
Normally, the regular report should have arrived around dawn.
But even until the moment the sun rose, there was no contact from the 1st Squad.
Anxious, he urgently dispatched guild members, but all that came back was a bleak report that traces of blood, presumed to be from the 1st Squad, had been found.
Not even a corpse was found.
Instead, as if to mock him, traces of a battle presumed to have been fought by Team Leader Cha Myung-jin and a third party were found throughout the forest.
And not far away on the road, even the body of Ham Seok-jae, the Director of Urban Planning, was found.
Thanks to this, the area around Namsa-eup was bustling with an unprecedented number of people.
Fortunately, the members of the 1st Squad were all orphans taken from orphanages, so they weren’t even registered as residents.
Even if the police found their bloodstains, it wouldn’t harm the Black Mountain Guild.
But even so, there were still problems.
The 1st Squad was one of the guild’s main forces, composed of members who had been raised with the guild’s assets for a short 10 years and a long 20 years.
Not only were they annihilated overnight by an unknown guy, but they also lost the Anti-Hunter Binding Chains, worth trillions.
There was no mistake like this.
Even though the situation had become like this, Yoo Jin-tae felt so wronged.
In the first place, his plan didn’t even include the premise that the 1st Squad would fight the culprit.
This mission was practically just for show.
Even if the Director of Urban Planning died, he needed an excuse to tell the Guild Master that he had made efforts to catch the culprit, so he sent them there.
In the first place, the rest of the guild’s forces were escorting the Governor of Gyeonggi Province last night.
“If I had known this would happen, I would have sent the 2nd Squad too..!!”
Yoo Jin-tae clutched his head as his blood pressure rose.
He had found out that the culprit’s target was corrupt public officials and some committee members involved in the Taepyeong-dong redevelopment project, but he couldn’t find out the exact target.
He had no choice but to disperse the escort forces to the remaining likely candidates, except for the most certain Governor of Gyeonggi Province.
Tting-
Yoo Jin-tae trembled at the notification sound from the side.
[Come up.]
With that short message, Yoo Jin-tae lost strength in his legs and collapsed pathetically to the floor.
