NOVEL NEXT Chapter 222
Episode 222. The Root of All Evil (2)
A few days ago.
Hasti was in the Seoul Branch training room, attempting close combat training with Nanami. Nanami was trying to teach seriously, but…
“You want to fight me?”
“Yes.”
Nanami tilted her head.
“Why?”
“Sparring. Since I can use body enhancement, I thought I could learn swordsmanship too.”
Hasti looked at Nanami. Nanami fiddled with the hilt of her sheathed sword.
“Hasti, do you know how fast a professional badminton player’s shuttlecock moves?”
“No.”
“It can reach speeds over 600 kilometers per hour. I’m physically superior to a professional badminton player. If I move well, the tip of my sword could exceed that speed, right?”
“Yes.”
“Think about it, Hasti. A sword is longer than a badminton racket. If the rod moves at a constant angular velocity, doubling the length of the rod would double the speed at the tip, right?”
If the rod is twice as long, the speed at the tip is also doubled. Hasti tilted her head.
It wasn’t a wrong calculation.
“Uh, yes.”
“Then, think about it. The tip of my sword could reach 1,200 kilometers per hour. If I add movement and twist my body, I could go even faster.”
Nanami swung her sword a few times from a distance. The sound of a whip cracking echoed.
“Can you hear it? The tip of the sword breaks the sound barrier, creating a sonic boom.”
“Yes.”
“This is the theoretical limit of Foundation-style swordsmanship for a human without supernatural abilities. If you mix in supernatural abilities, it becomes much stronger.”
Nanami sheathed her sword again.
“The tip of the sword is faster than a bullet. Several times faster than a flying bullet.”
She didn’t show her full power. If Nanami seriously swung her sword, she could cut a warship in half, and even top-tier supernatural beings would be sliced apart.
“I see.”
“If you enter the range of the sword, assume you’re dead. Don’t even think about parrying. You might not even have time to pull the trigger.”
“What should I do?”
“Use magic to throw them far away.”
The only counter.
Remembering Nanami’s words from before.
Hasti tried to throw the Omega Team Leader as far as possible, but the Spear of Longinus nullified the magic, making the effect minimal. Hasti quickly decided to distance herself instead.
Hasti used the Black Fog to fly away. She couldn’t give the enemy any chance to get close.
She had just seen it.
With one strike, the Black Dragon was sliced apart, and even its egg was destroyed. Enter the sword’s range, and you die. Get close, and no matter what you do, you die.
This was on a whole different level.
There were many ways to maintain distance.
“Ymir’s Earth.”
“Telekinesis.”
“Blessing of the Wind.”
After all, the enemy was human-sized.
The strike that took down the Black Dragon was an accelerated attack while falling. Now that it had stopped, it couldn’t do that again.
Support wasn’t something to rely on either.
This was the strength of the eastern offensive.
The Black Dragon was already dead, and the Anomalous Phenomena Response Bureau had no high-level combat assets. Buying time wasn’t enough; they needed to find a way to capture it.
The Spear of Longinus.
During the Seoul siege, Hasti had been taken down in one strike by a Foundation soldier wielding a replica of the Spear of Longinus. Dr. Kim’s doppelganger had rescued her.
This time, she wasn’t going to go down so easily.
First, block the approach. The tip of the sword might be supersonic, but the person wielding it wasn’t.
The enemy didn’t attempt to communicate.
Instead, they charged at Hasti with incredible speed, as if they had vanished. Hasti raised a wall of wind with elemental magic and tried to block the enemy with stone pillars.
It didn’t do much to stop them. Hasti just ran away faster.
Hasti looked back at the enemy she was facing. In their hand was an ancient spear wrapped in something plastic-like.
Probably an artifact restored and enhanced for use. They wore modernized armor, and their helmet had six eyes.
Creepy. Of course, they weren’t real eyes, probably cameras or optical devices…
At that level, they could probably fight blindfolded, aware of their surroundings.
Hasti circled around and returned to the armored vehicle she had been riding. The crew might still be alive.
Knock knock.
Tapping on the deck of the armored vehicle, it started moving as if it had been waiting. The enemy with the Spear of Longinus looked at the vehicle.
Come to think of it, it wasn’t just waiting—it had been waiting for Hasti’s return. Hasti gripped her staff again.
The infantry fighting vehicle Hasti had been riding was half-torn open like a tuna can hit by a sword, rattling as it raced across the desert.
Could it keep up with the armored vehicle?
Unfortunately, it seemed like it could.
Well, Dr. Kim carried around ten supernatural phenomena at once. It wasn’t unreasonable for someone like that to exist in the Foundation.
The human with the Spear of Longinus was following the armored vehicle. Well, earlier, they had flown and pierced the Black Dragon… No point in arguing.
Hasti finally used attack magic instead of trying to block the enemy. A black flash shot toward the enemy.
Thud. The enemy stepped on the armored vehicle again. Hasti still maintained a distance where the sword couldn’t reach, but…
No solution was in sight.
The spear moved again, and the armored vehicle was cut in half. But Hasti didn’t miss that split second and used binding magic.
“Now!”
The soldiers of the Anomalous Phenomena Response Bureau, who had been closely observing the situation, fired a recoilless rifle at the momentarily bound enemy.
The Foundation had been fighting humanoid supernatural phenomena for a long time. Many of them were transcendentally strong beings. Bullets didn’t work on them.
The Foundation used various methods to kill them. Collapsing entire buildings, spraying sleeping gas over an area, creating flamethrowers hotter than the surface of the sun.
The Bureau knew this well.
In this battle, they would face humanoid supernatural phenomena up close, and conventional weapons would be useless.
The Bureau remembered the Seoul siege.
They remembered the fear and despair.
One crazy woman with a bow had single-handedly annihilated three fully armed special forces squads.
They couldn’t blame it on supernatural phenomena.
That being didn’t rely on supernatural abilities to fight. She just shot ordinary arrows. Arrows that didn’t spin could penetrate bulletproof gear—that was all.
Small-caliber rifle bullets or pistol rounds were no threat to humanoid supernatural phenomena, let alone Foundation soldiers wearing bulletproof vests. A nuclear bomb? Just hide in a tank.
Especially for humanoid supernatural phenomena. Special enemies require special weapons.
The 84mm heavy Gustav recoilless rifle fired a type of fin-stabilized armor-piercing shell.
Several kilograms of explosive force concentrated into a single 7.62mm metal arrow.
A metal arrow moving at four times the speed of sound.
A weapon designed solely to kill humans and human-like beings. Accuracy wasn’t guaranteed, but increasing the number of shots would help.
Eight warheads flew toward the Omega Team Leader. The Omega Team Leader moved the spear. After all, anti-tank rockets or cannons couldn’t—
The Omega Team Leader grabbed their side. Something had pierced their armor. A recoilless rifle shouldn’t be able to do this—must be special ammunition.
A headshot would’ve been instant death.
They got careless.
They thought there was no way a tank shell could hit them. They didn’t expect the largest handheld gun to fire a needle smaller than a pinky finger.
Well, the objective was almost achieved. The Black Dragon was dead, and Hasti, its summoner, would be dead in a few moves.
The binding magic lasted only a second. The Omega Team Leader charged again. Tentacle wings spread from the black mage’s back, but…
The spear tip aimed straight for the neck.
Hasti finally understood.
A world without magic didn’t mean there was no magic. It meant a world where, if magic raised its head, a hypersonic metal arrow would pierce its skull.
The Spear of Longinus came close to Hasti again. Time froze.
It was good she had prepared her stance.
Compared to the speed of the spear tip, Hasti was practically standing still. The spear tip pierced Hasti’s staff…
The Spear of Longinus managed to stab Hasti, but this time was different. Hasti succeeded in avoiding a fatal blow.
Hasti’s left shoulder began to crumble near the Spear of Longinus. But it was better than having her head crushed, right?
Hasti grabbed her opponent.
The recoilless rifle fired again.
Just a few dozen meters away.
Several hypersonic metal arrows pierced the Omega Team Leader’s back. Some passed through and stabbed Hasti.
“Ugh.”
But since the bullets had passed through the Omega Team Leader first, the enemy seemed much more severely injured. Hasti gritted her teeth.