Level 4 Human in a Ruined World - Chapter 31

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 31 10. Battle of Villains (5)

The fact that mutants and monsters would soon arrive was something both First Swords engaged in fierce battle in the motel corridor could clearly sense.

Thoom!

The sound of the light pillars appearing was loud enough, but more than anything…

[00:00:10]

A timer had appeared before both of their eyes as well.

But the time displayed within it was somewhat strange.

[00:00:09]

“What the…?”

“What is this?”

[00:00:08]

While the two confused First Swords briefly stopped their sword fighting, the time remaining until monster appearance dropped to 8 seconds.

Young-woo quickly checked his wristwatch.

‘…Exactly 1 PM.’

Perhaps from now on, monsters and mutants would appear at this time every day.

[00:00:05]

The remaining time had already dropped to 5 seconds, and finally the anxious Sangju First Sword was the first to propose a ceasefire.

“H-hey… how about we put out the urgent fire first?”

For him, quickly dealing with the mutants was far more important than dueling with a challenger who provided no benefit to his livelihood.

There was no point in ruling over a ghost city where everyone was dead.

“How about it? There’s no time, decide quickly.”

Sangju First Sword, Dokgo Se-hwan01.

This man who appeared to be in his early forties wasn’t even wearing underwear.

All he currently had was a single Early Bird he had hastily grabbed from the room earlier.

Thanks to this, his appearance was utterly ridiculous, but to Young-woo who had crossed swords with him, he only felt like a tremendously powerful monster.

“…”

That was also why Young-woo couldn’t outright reject the ceasefire proposal.

‘I can’t guarantee victory like this. His sword is too fast.’

Then was there a solution?

「Golden Punishment」 – Legendary Bracelet

【Inflicts pain on enemies.】

【Accumulated Golden Rain: 2】

Young-woo looked at the golden bracelet wrapped around his wrist.

It was the only equipment whose effects he hadn’t confirmed yet.

‘Clashing weapons doesn’t seem to work. Probably need to directly stab the opponent or have physical contact…’

But the opponent was so quick that even simple contact, let alone a fatal wound, wasn’t easy.

There was no clear strategy available right now.

‘Should I call Young-tae now? No, I only have one use left today, so I should save it for when I’m certain.’

After countless worries in that brief moment, Young-woo reached a conclusion before it was too late.

He would drag the Sangju First Sword to face the mutant, then steal the mutant’s Sense there and settle the match again.

“Fine. Let’s deal with the mutant first. If we leave it alone, innocent people will get swept up and die.”

Then Dokgo Se-hwan smiled broadly and stepped back a couple of paces.

“You’re not completely brainless.”

Then, while keeping his eyes on Young-woo, he began putting on clothes scattered around the motel rooms.

“Do you have time to get dressed now? Weren’t you naked most of the time anyway?”

When Young-woo said this while looking at the underwear half-hanging on Dokgo Se-hwan’s buttocks, the man frowned and growled.

“Watch your mouth, you young brat.”

At the same time, golden waves burst forth from his body, but they had no particular effect on Young-woo.

Young-woo’s eyes were likewise glowing golden.

“…”

Dokgo Se-hwan stared intently at Young-woo like that, then finished putting on the clothes he was holding.

Meanwhile, Young-woo walked out of the motel, leaving the Sangju First Sword in the room.

The timer that had expired long ago had disappeared from view, and instead countless blue pillars were tearing through the sky above Sangju City.

‘Where is the mutant?’

According to what he had heard earlier, there was a group in Sangju City that virtually monopolized monster hunting.

They were essentially the Sangju First Sword’s subordinates.

Therefore, the monsters scattered everywhere would be hastily dealt with by the First Sword’s subordinates by now.

So Young-woo just needed to find the mutant as his top priority. Only someone with First Sword-level skills would dare to touch that thing.

‘Is it over there?’

Eventually Young-woo’s gaze stopped somewhere to the north.

Though it was quite distant and appeared blurry, there was definitely a bright red light pillar shooting down.

“…”

The Sangju First Sword would follow on his own anyway.

Young-woo pressed down hard on the ground and turned his body north.

Then.

Whoosh!

He kicked off the ground and moved forward like a bullet shooting out.

Who would Sangju City’s second-day mutant be?

Based on the flow so far, stronger ones would definitely appear than yesterday.

The mutants he had encountered so far were just a kind of ‘small fry’ based on goblins and the like, weren’t they?

But as he had confirmed with his own eyes yesterday morning, someone had mutated into a high-level monster like a dragon.

It was just a matter of timing – they would definitely appear someday.

Whoosh!

While Young-woo continued heading north with these thoughts, strange scenery flashed by around him.

‘There are more people than I thought.’

What Young-woo saw were people moving in perfect unison as if they had heard an air raid siren.

People who had been outside all took shelter inside nearby buildings at once, while conversely, there were also people rushing out from inside buildings.

And the latter were all armed and had an extraordinary presence.

‘Those must be the monster hunters.’

Young-woo instinctively knew they were Sangju City’s privileged class.

Of course, the ‘monster hunters’ who had grabbed their equipment and rushed outside after seeing the timer disappear also realized something was happening when they saw Young-woo moving at high speed.

“What’s that?”

“That’s not the First Sword…?”

Realizing that the barefoot superhuman crossing downtown wasn’t a familiar face, they all flinched and drew their swords without exception.

But Young-woo himself had no leisure to pay attention to small fry.

Rumble rumble rumble!

Because Sangju First Sword Dokgo Se-hwan was following from behind, radiating a terrifying presence.

Now he even had a shield, making his armament complete.

“First Sword!”

Since they had never properly introduced themselves to each other, Dokgo Se-hwan only called Young-woo by his title of First Sword.

“Don’t forget! The mutant comes first!”

He reconfirmed the promise with Young-woo and instantly closed the distance between them.

“…!”

His mobility was spine-chilling.

Naturally, Se-hwan also had nothing covering his feet.

‘Mutant first, my ass. There’s no way you’d give up the reward.’

Young-woo alternately looked at Se-hwan who was starting to overtake him and the red light pillar that was already getting close.

At this rate, they would encounter the mutant within dozens of seconds.

“What about the elimination reward? Does whoever lands the killing blow get it?”

The moment Young-woo asked this question toward Se-hwan’s back.

Whoooosh!

Along with a heavy sound of cutting through air, a hologram of the Gumi Sword Technique appeared before Young-woo’s eyes.

In a posture lying flat on the ground.

“…!”

It meant an attack was coming that couldn’t even be blocked with a shield.

Young-woo immediately stopped all thinking and lowered his body, sliding forward as if falling.

Swoosh!

Se-hwan, who had been running ahead, also attempted a slide, kicking up dirt and dust.

He too was receiving guidance from the Sangju Sword Technique.

As the two First Swords moved identically like each other’s shadows, a message appeared only before Young-woo’s eyes.

「Your Sense stat has temporarily increased from the existing 100 to 480.」

‘Crazy.’

The numbers were clearly different from when he first crossed swords with Dokgo Se-hwan.

So this meant… he had stolen the senses of another being, not Se-hwan.

For instance.

「Graaaah!」

A being like Sangju City’s second mutant.

Whooooom!

With a sound as if space itself was being torn apart, a black blade passed over Se-hwan and Young-woo’s heads.

Young-woo felt all the hair on his body stand on end as he quickly got back on his feet.

Then he saw a black silhouette towering a full 10 meters ahead.

Its height appeared to be at least 5 meters, but it wasn’t a single entity.

The opponent was a knight mounted on a large black horse. It wore a cloak and armor as black as the horse’s dark skin, and in its right hand held a long sword with a blade that appeared to be at least 3 meters long.

“Fuck, what the hell is that.”

The mutant he had met yesterday didn’t have such imposing presence, so Dokgo Se-hwan’s face froze.

Seeing this, Young-woo told him in a low voice what today’s mutant was.

“It’s a Dullahan. A headless knight.”

“What?”

Instead of answering, Young-woo raised his finger to point at the knight’s left hand.

More precisely, at the head that hand was gripping.

“…Ugh.”

Se-hwan finally noticed.

The fact that there was no head attached to the knight’s torso.

The creature was gripping its own severed head in its left hand.

Moreover, the problematic head had its eyes wide open, and was grinding its teeth while trembling its lips as if extremely angry about something.

Therefore, Young-woo couldn’t help but quickly ask Se-hwan.

“Why did that person become a mutant?”

“What?”

That was because the name tag attached to the Dullahan’s torso was none other than.

[Sangju Mayor – Kim Hyun-ho]

The Sangju Mayor.

Becoming a mutant meant receiving public judgment, but how did the Sangju Mayor end up having his name on the filtering vote?

“Shit, so the mayor came back.”

Se-hwan, who belatedly checked the name tag, made a troubled expression.

Then he continued his words.

“There were suspicions of sexual favors.”

“Sexual favors?”

Young-woo made an expression of disbelief.

Coincidentally, didn’t it perfectly match Sangju City’s current theme?

“It’s not certain, the investigation started before the reset began.”

In other words, there were only suspicions of sexual favors, and public judgment occurred before the truth could be revealed.

“…Then he might actually be an innocent person.”

“He might be. Or he might not be. Of course, if he really was innocent…”

Se-hwan’s follow-up words that he would be extremely angry right now couldn’t continue.

Crack!

Because Sangju Mayor Kim Hyun-ho kicked off the ground with his horse’s hooves and swung his sword again.

Whooooom!

The same eerie sound of cutting through air occurred, and the two First Swords clearly saw.

The black sword he was holding extending to an impossible length.

Shiiiiing!

“Gah!”

“This damn…!”

The sword’s extension seemed to be at least 10 meters long.

“He brought something incredible. Did they give him that thing to sweep away all of Sangju City?”

As Young-woo barely dodged the black trajectory and said this, Dokgo Se-hwan spat on the ground.

“Stop talking nonsense and think about how to kill that bastard first.”

Se-hwan’s hands and feet were trembling slightly as he said this.

No matter how superhuman he was after monopolizing 3 million Karma, a death match with such a monster he had never seen even in dreams was bound to be frightening.

On the other hand, Young-woo’s situation was slightly better than Se-hwan’s.

At least he knew that monsters called Dullahans existed, even if only in human imagination.

‘I’ve only seen them in games… but encountering one in reality is truly incredible.’

What criteria determined the species of mutants and monsters?

Games? Novels? Or all of human imagination?

Tsk.

Young-woo thought only this far, then stepped back and took a combat stance.

Because the Dullahan… no, Sangju Mayor Kim Hyun-ho was pounding the ground with his horse’s hooves again.

‘Seeing how he won’t even talk to us, he must be planning to just kill everyone. It won’t be easy to make him a friend this time.’

Young-woo watched the Sangju Mayor’s movements while subtly closing the distance with Dokgo Se-hwan.

His plan was to deal with Dokgo Se-hwan first together with his ‘friend’ as soon as the mutant’s next attack ended.

‘Now my senses are more than double his. If I joint attack with Young-tae, there’s definitely a chance of victory.’

Whooooom!

Finally, with the characteristic sound of cutting through air, another black blade sliced through the void.

“Again? Doesn’t that crazy bastard ever get tired?”

As Dokgo Se-hwan recoiled in shock and pulled his body back, Young-woo also leaped backward and grabbed the amber whistle hanging around his neck.

And then.

Tweeeeeeet!

He blew the whistle forcefully, creating a loud, jarring sound.

“Huh…?”

At the unimaginable strange noise, Dokgo Se-hwan whipped around to look at Young-woo, and even the Sangju Mayor’s head, who had maintained silence until now, rolled his eyes around as he stared at Young-woo.

「What are you.」

And as soon as the mayor finished speaking.

「Hiyaaaaaaah!」

A massive slave came tearing through the sky and leaped down.

Grade 4 Human of the Ruined World (Serial)

Author │ Oetu

Publisher │ Kim Ju-hyeong

Published by │ J Plus Media Co., Ltd.

Marketing │ Han Jae-hyeok

Address │ Seoul Guro-gu Digital-ro 288, Room 204 (Guro-dong, Daeryung Post Tower 1)

Email │ [email protected]

Homepage │ www.jayplemedia.com

ⓒOetu2023

※This work is published by J Plus Media Co., Ltd. under contract with the copyright holder, and no part of the content may be used in any form or by any means without permission from our company and the author.

Violation of this may result in criminal and civil legal liability.

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