I Stepped on Their Shadows and Skills Started Copying Like Crazy - Chapter 5

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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05
Thump-thump-thump!
The boss creature charged forward with its massive frame, shaking the earth itself.
It was almost unbelievable that something so enormous could move with such speed.
“It’s coming! Scatter!”
My shout sent the party scattering in perfect coordination.
Even as we fled, I made sure to relay the plan.
“It’s targeting me! I’ll draw its attention as much as I can, so attack while you have the chance!”
“You’re certain? What’s your proof?”
“The system messages! It matches what I saw from tracking the boss’s position from a distance!”
“Gwuaaaargh!”
As if to prove my point, the creature ignored everyone else and charged straight at me.
“See?!”
Further explanation became unnecessary. I pushed myself to sprint, trying to shake off its pursuit.
“I’m heading out!”
A heavy thud echoed behind me shortly after.
Without even looking back, I could vividly picture its fist slamming into the ground.
“Come on, let’s move! We have to make use of the opening Kim Si-hyun created for us!”
And so began a relentless chain of pursuit.
The creature chased me, and my allies chased after the creature, desperate to capitalize on it being fixated on me.
Thump!
When I glanced back to check if we’d put some distance between us, the earth tremor came right on cue.
Each time, a violent wind pressure from behind made me dizzy.
‘One hit. If it lands even one hit, there’s no recovery, no nothing—just instant death.’
Behind me came the thunderous footfalls shaking the ground; behind that, the battle cries of my allies rang out ceaselessly.
It was absolute chaos.
‘If it wasn’t for Seolpi…’
That was where Seolpi proved its worth.
Without it, I would have been caught long ago.
In that gap lay the line between life and death.
Even as I ran for my life, I suddenly heard the battle cries of Kim and Park Jin-sung.
“Now! Pierce it—kyah!”
“Haah!”
Clink!
Clink? That was a different sound than I’d expected—something wrong.
A bad feeling washed over me before I could even turn to look.
“This is insane! What kind of hide is—”
“The blade won’t penetrate! Kim Si-hyun!”
At those words, I risked a glance back, and only then did the creature’s hind legs come back into view.
I’d thought it was just thick skin, but layer upon layer of hardened keratin was packed upon it.
‘Big, fast, and blades won’t go in. This is going to be a headache.’
Because of how massive it was, its upper body—uncovered by that keratin armor—seemed completely out of reach for any blade.
For Kim and Park Jin-sung, who’d spent all their time on lower floors repeatedly hacking down goblins, this was a situation they’d never encountered.
I could see the bewilderment plain on their faces as I barked out new orders.
“Stop thrusting and start slashing! The wounds don’t need to be deep! Even tiny scratches will do—just inflict as many wounds as possible!”
“You’ve got a plan, right?!”
“Yes!”
No need to say it twice.
There was always a plan ready.
Or if there wasn’t, I’d make one the moment the existing strategy fell apart.
Survival demanded it.
‘If a frontal assault won’t work…’
Then I’d have to resort to cunning.
“First, I need you to do something, hyung! Squeeze out your mana and use the Flash Cut as much as you can! Remember: don’t overexert yourself! We’re just multiplying shallow wounds!”
“Any wound counts?!”
“Any wound!”
“Got it. Let’s try.”
Kim clenched his teeth and shifted his grip on his blade.
Now the groundwork was nearly complete.
I focused on evading the creature’s attacks while, in the gaps between them, the two fought to carve shallow wounds across its hind legs.
“Si-hyun! Flash Cut—just one more strike and we’re done! Is that good?!”
Blood seeped from wounds scattered across the creature’s legs.
Easily a dozen injuries visible at a glance.
This was more than enough.
Just then, something small and dark skimmed across the shallow water, slipping past in an instant.
“One’s already here.”
I’d been sowing the seeds well enough—now it was time to harvest.
I drew out the dagger I’d borrowed from Kim and kept nestled carefully at my chest.
The target of my attack was….
Myself.
Slash.
The dagger in my right hand traced a long line across the blue vein in my left forearm.
The wound wasn’t deep, but the bleeding was heavy—blood flowed down my arm and dripped steadily.
“What—what are you doing?! Kim Si-hyun!”
“Si-hyun!”
My comrades startled, alarmed by this unexpected self-inflicted wound.
I wanted to explain my reasons, but there was no time for that.
“Explanations later! Everyone fall back!”
My teammates hesitated, uncertain, but they withdrew nonetheless.
That was enough.
It wasn’t about how much they trusted me—it was about following even when doubt crept in.
And that’s what I needed right now.
“Over here, you bastard!”
I deliberately lured it toward the deepest part of the Swamp, into the murkiest, most turbid water.
The water, which had barely reached my knees before, suddenly deepened until it engulfed my chest.
Dangerous for me, perhaps—but nothing for a creature of its size.
It seemed to know that too, licking its lips as it pursued me deeper.
A dark laugh escaped me.
“Come ahead, then.”
Drip. Drip.
Under gravity’s pull, a thread of red unspooled as blood flowed downward.
A few drops of blood in this vast Swamp shouldn’t have mattered—yet it did.
The creatures I was calling now were the sort to descend ravenously on even a single drop of fresh blood.
“Wait—there on the bottom—!”
“Leeches! Bloodsucking leeches!”
Two voices confirming that my plan had struck true.
Park Jin-sung and Kim.
‘Perfect.’
My wound was confined to my left forearm, but the creature bore far more than a few cuts.
Already, a swarm of leeches drawn by the scent of blood was converging on the boss’s legs.
The creature seemed unaware of what was happening to its limbs.
Only rage and hunger clouded its eyes.
The sight made a smile cross my lips.
“It enjoyed eating well enough.”
Those good days were finished now.
“Now it’s time for it to be eaten.”
This Swamp would be its grave.
* * *
Leeches swarmed across the surface, darkening the water.
It reminded me of frog spawn clusters I’d seen by ponds as a child.
Or perhaps masses of tadpoles, since they were moving.
So sensitive to blood, some were already crawling up my leg to feast on my arm’s wound—but that posed no problem.
‘Healing Touch.’
One use of the Engraved recovery skill and the wound vanished without so much as a scar.
Now only the boss was bleeding in these waters.
Soon the result became visible.
“Shriek! Shrieeeeek!”
The swarm of leeches clung relentlessly even to the creature’s minor scratches, ravaging every abrasion, thirsting for blood.
It lived up to its fearsome reputation indeed.
“Goodness, cutting yourself to lure leeches… that’s terrifying. Truly terrifying.”
Kim grunted with irritation, but I cut him off with a shrug.
“I’m betting on the Healing Touch, after all. Still, don’t let your guard down. We’re not finished yet. We need to keep that thing from shaking the leeches off.”
As our fortunes shifted, my companions’ tone grew noticeably more at ease.
“Kim. We’ll proceed as ordered.”
“Yes. Then we’ll focus on disruption rather than offense.”
“My mana’s completely full, so don’t worry about injuries! Just—don’t go out of your way to get hit, alright, everyone.”
Against the coordinated assault of humans and leeches alike, the boss was utterly helpless.
“Damn you!”
With a battle cry, Kim’s blade traced a crescent arc.
No matter how desperately the creature thrashed, fresh wounds accumulated across its body.
Of course, each new wound was quickly smothered by a seething mass of black leeches.
At first the beast had ignored the leeches, but now it seemed to grasp the gravity of its situation—it was spending more effort peeling them away than fighting us.
This freed us to move without constraint, and we carved fresh wounds into its flesh with growing ease.
Like a creature sinking deeper into a swamp the more it struggles, there was no escape to be found.
“Gurgle….”
Then, moments later, the boss’s movements noticeably sluggish—clearly it had swallowed a great deal of blood.
Victory seemed within reach.
“We’re almost there! Just a little more!”
Before those words even faded, the creature let out a savage roar.
Gaaaaaahhhhh—!
A cry that mingled anguish and battle fury.
Instinct screamed danger.
Something was deeply wrong.
“…!”
Then it raised both arms high, as if in triumph.
The raised arms crashed down against the earth with full force.
Crash—!
Water sprayed outward.
With a deafening boom, a wave erupted from the creature’s center.
A wave in a swamp.
It should have been impossible, yet that’s what it looked like.
“Brace yourselves—!”
No time for courtesy.
I drove my dagger into the ground the moment I shouted.
“Damn it…!”
Kim’s curse was drowned out by the sound of steel striking earth.
Then a wave of muddy water swept across our entire bodies.
The force was so tremendous that even with the borrowed blade as a third leg, I was on the verge of being swept away.
“Blegh!”
Once the waters passed, I scrambled to my feet and checked on my companions first.
‘The others…!’
Fortunately, the two who’d followed my instructions were unharmed.
There was variance in severity, but they’d merely been knocked down and rolled a few times.
The problem was Kim Min-ju, who’d had nothing to brace against.
“Min-ju!”
“Retch! Cough!”
Her face caked with mud, she was still gagging and expelling the muddy water she’d swallowed, unable to regain her bearings.
If she took another attack in that state, there’d be nothing left to recover.
‘Thank heavens the boss is fixating on me….’
Abruptly, a red message window flashed before my eyes.
[Warning: The Swamp’s Ruler has entered a Berserk state. It will no longer discriminate targets and will attack all enemies indiscriminately.]
“…!”
“Grrrrgh!”
The creature’s gaze snapped in a new direction.
Kim Min-ju stood at the end of that gaze.
It meant to strike her down while she was defenseless.
“No!”
Park Jin-sung’s desperate cry as he caught on.
Kim and Park were already sprinting toward Kim Min-ju.
I followed them at full speed to help.
‘Damn it, I’d rather be the only one it saw.’
That instant, the creature targeting Kim Min-ju suddenly shifted direction.
It was the fastest movement I’d seen from it yet.
Our gazes locked across the empty space between us.
“…!”
Eyes the size of a human head fixed entirely upon me.
“Grrrrowwwl…!”
Until now, I’d taken it for nothing more than a ravenous mass of flesh, blind with hunger.
But in this moment, intelligence flickered for the first time across those two eyes.
‘I’ve been had.’
A chill raced down my spine, cold and biting.
Kim Min-ju was never the real target.
She was only bait to draw me in.
What remained was a trap with no escape.
The momentum of my headlong pursuit drove me straight into its waiting claws.
Whoosh—!
A massive hand tore through the air, descending with lethal force.
My vision filled with green.
Death rushing toward me.
Defense was impossible from the start; evasion came too late.
There was only one way to survive this.
‘Cut it down.’
The hand before me, the killing intent coiled within it, even the unwelcome guest waiting at the end of all this—
‘I’ll slash through it all.’
But how? My Shadow Engraving slot held the Healing Touch, so I couldn’t rely on a skill.
All I had to trust was my own talent.
‘I can do this. No—I have to.’
My senses expanded. Time seemed to slow to a crawl, and I emptied my mind of all distraction, focusing entirely on the single blade in my grip.
The Flash Cut had faded, leaving only a ghost of its sensation in my thoughts, but that was enough.
‘I won’t be able to replicate it perfectly.’
But I could still follow it through.
A shadow mimic?
So what if I’ve only grazed the shadow? What does an Engraving matter?
You’re saying I can’t do it without those things?
That’s ridiculous.
I was doing all of this before any system came along.
‘I’ll show you.’
That without a system, this is how I survived.
I swung the blade and cut.
Without the system’s aid, following only the arc my body remembered.
‘Here.’
[Unrecorded Technique detected. Creating new skill ‘Flash’.”]
In that instant, a message flickered before my eyes, and a faint aura gathered at the blade’s edge.
And from that point, a single brilliant ray was born.
Flash—!
The light faded in a heartbeat, and the creature’s forearm, severed clean, flew through the air.
My vision bloomed crimson.
“Screeeeeeee—!”
They say imitation is the mother of creation.
I moved beyond imitation into understanding, and beyond understanding into creation.
A blade that belonged to me alone.
‘I did it.’
A sharp thrill coursed through me.
My ears rang with my pulse; my fingertips still trembled with the aftershock.
Yet the fight was far from over.
Writhing in pain, the creature drew its remaining arm far back.
As though pouring every last ounce of strength into one final, brutal swing at me.
‘I won’t fall for that twice.’
A transparent feint.
I could hear the gears turning in its skull from here.
The real attack would come from somewhere else.
From the head, for instance.
‘The head.’
Sure enough, the creature’s jaw yawned wide open.
That mouth and throat were so cavernous, so impossibly deep, that I couldn’t help thinking this must be what a chasm leading straight to hell looked like.
It meant to send me there, exactly as it appeared.
‘I knew it would come to this!’
I didn’t dodge.
Instead, I drove my blade toward that gaping maw and lunged forward.
“It’s over.”
Flash!
The radiant light blazed forth once more.
Where the fierce beam passed, a diagonal line remained etched in the air.
From that foul-smelling mouth eager to devour me all the way to the very crown of its head.
Squelch!
The skull split clean in two along that line.
Blood poured down like rain, soaking my entire body, and the lifeless bulk collapsed into two halves.
Boom—!
With the thunderous crash, water surged up once more.
“Haah….”
At last, silence settled over the Swamp, leaving only the sound of my breathing.
Nothing could have felt more exhilarating than this.
Finally, this wretched Kidnapping Event was over.
“You madman! You actually took it down! That monster!”
Kim was the first to rush over, slapping my shoulder hard with a wild grin.
“Hah… we made it.”
Park Jin-sung, his tension suddenly released, hurled his sword and shield aside and sat down laughing.
Beside him, Kim Min-ju had regained consciousness and was watching me with an odd gleam in her eyes.
“How… who are you, really? What on earth are you?”
I just laughed softly in response.
Identity. It was a strange question.
“I don’t know. For now, just someone who survived this godforsaken place? But does it really matter?”
She burst out laughing at that answer.
“You’ve got a point.”
Ever since I’d used the Healing Touch, she’d been wary of me, but now the tension seemed to ease.
“But shouldn’t the notifications pop up now?”
As if waiting for me to finish savoring the victory.
A message scrolled across my vision in response.
[You have defeated the ‘Ruler of the Swamp’!]
[Tower’s Guidance: ‘Ruler of the Swamp’ elimination quest complete.]
[Time taken: 5 minutes 39 seconds.]
[You have achieved the rapid elimination condition for the special quest ‘Ruler’s Wrath’!]
[Quest Summary]
▶ Time: S+
▶ Contribution: S+
▶ Overall Rating: EX
“Hm.”
S and S were fine, but that glittering ‘EX’ standing alone seemed ominous in a way I couldn’t quite name.
‘Maybe they’re giving something special? That makes sense, with a rating like this.’
Up to this point, everything had been perfect.
But what came next was strange.
[An achievement exceeding the intended strategy scope has been detected.]
“Huh?”
[Adjusting rewards according to the compensation system.]
Gulp.
My throat tightened without my meaning to.
Something… unforeseen was happening.
I only stepped on a shadow, yet the skill copied itself
Author|
Killing Part
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Samyang C&C Co., Ltd.
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Editorial Department
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Submissions |
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The contents of this book may not be used in any form or by any means without written permission from Samyang C&C Co., Ltd. – Dream Books.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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