Max Talent Player

The Orc Warrior stood up, its nostrils flaring. Its body was nearly twice the size of regular Orcs.

“Chwik?”

It smelled like something delicious… the smell of blood.

“Chwiiiiiiiik!!”

The Orc Warrior’s eyes turned red. It didn’t see that the ones bleeding were fellow Orcs and became completely intoxicated by the smell of blood.

Hyukjin confirmed that the Orc Warrior’s eyes had changed.

‘It worked.’

The Orc Warrior was weak to the smell of blood. With this much, it would instantly go completely bonkers. Now, it would start hunting its allies like a train running off its tracks.

Cruuuunch!

The Orc Warrior ripped off an Orc’s arm and chomped it down whole, crunching down on bone.

“Squeaaaaaaaal!”

Its hapless victim squealed. The Orc Warrior grabbed it at the waist and began to consume it, chomping and munching from the head down.

Completely intoxicated by the smell of blood, the Orc Warrior became even more fevered.

Delicious things!

Delicious things!

Delicious things!

Only one thought, ‘prey’, dominated the Orc Warrior’s instincts.

The Orc Warrior roared, dark red blood flying out of its mouth. The Orcs began to flee in terror.

“Chwiiiiiik!”

A notice came in at the same time.

[The Orc Warrior’s innate ability, ‘Orc Fear’, has been triggered.]

Hyukjin grinned.

‘There it is. Orc Fear.’

Actually, this wasn’t an Orc Warrior-exclusive innate ability. It was a technique most ‘boss monsters’ had. 

‘Normally, it’s an ability that freezes Players or makes them unable to flee.’

But not right now.

‘Right now, it’s to prevent the escape of its delicious prey, the Orcs.’

This ‘Orc Fear’ wasn’t aimed at them, the Players, but at the fleeing Orcs. As a result, Hyukjin and the others weren’t greatly affected.

‘And… the Orc Warrior isn’t a super high level boss monster.’

He didn’t know for sure, but he believed it was very unlikely that the Orc Warrior would use its fear move again. It probably had an extremely long cooldown. With the really high ranked monsters, they would fire fear at random and make things difficult for Players. But not the Orc Warrior.

‘The cooldown being extremely long basically means that its innate ability has been used up.’

In that case, it would be much easier to face from now on.

“Squeaaaaaal!”

The Orcs became sacrifices to the Orc Warrior. The great beast chomped down Orcs as soon as it could grab them, as if the word ‘satiety’ did not exist in its book.

[The Orc Warrior has evolved into an ‘Advanced Orc Warrior’.]

Breathing hard, Yeonseo asked Hyukjin, “Can we really leave it be? Even though its body got bigger?”

It was already a hulking lump, but it became even bigger.

“Hyungnim. The definition of its muscles has become crazy high. I think it’s gotten a lot stronger.”

Hyukjin nodded.

“Fighting one Advanced Orc Warrior is better… than fighting the Orc Warrior and its horde of Orcs. At least for us.”

The choice he had made was to fight one general rather than hundreds of soldiers. That was Hyukjin’s choice—to fight one strong being rather than a multitude of weak ones.

‘This method is our path to survival.’

He also knew its limits. It couldn’t grow all the way to a High Orc anyway. If it stopped here, that would be great, but even if it grew a little more, it would stop at a ‘Great Orc Warrior’.

‘It’s going to be dangerous anyway, so… it’d be fine to evolve into a Great Orc Warrior, at least…’

The perceived difficulty would be similar. Both the Advanced and Great Orc Warrior were monsters that he and his party members couldn’t defeat at their current level without knowing the strategy, anyway. Both of them were strong. The perceived difficulty would be similar, but the quality of the items they dropped would be completely different. Since things had come to this, Hyukjin thought it would be good if it evolved into a Great Orc Warrior.

Cruuuuunch!

The now Advanced Orc Warrior was in a frenzy to murder and consume its allies. It ate yet another Orc, bones and all.

It didn’t show the slightest interest in the Players, Hyukjin and his party members. That was because the delicious scent—the smell of blood—was exceedingly weak on them.

“Squeaaaaaaaal!”

Inside the tent, the last Orc disappeared inside the Advanced Orc Warrior’s belly.

[The Advanced Orc Warrior has evolved into a ‘Great Orc Warrior’.]

It finally seemed full. Only then did the Great Orc Warrior begin to have an interest in the Players.

[A flash quest, ‘Kill the Great Orc Warrior’, has been triggered.]

[Kill the Great Orc Warrior]

Kill the Great Orc Warrior. You cannot kill the Great Orc Warrior with your current abilities alone. However, the Courageous Lion King will watch over your courage and guts.

Quest reward: Special ability ‘Mettle’

It wasn’t a quest given to just Hyukjin. Yoohyun, Yeonseo, and Sunhwa got it as well.

‘Mettle.’

Mettle: A person’s grit and resilience in dealing with difficulties, no matter what they were.

‘This… came out here?’

There were a great number of ways you could acquire this ability. Hyukjin had also written up a plan to acquire Mettle, because it was one of the key abilities for Rankers. If you had Mettle, your resistance to mental attacks became much higher, and it would negate a good portion of boss monster fears.

‘…I have to do it.’

It was unexpected, but he was happy about it.

‘How unusual that the damned courage-lover is being helpful for once.’

In any case, he could earn Mettle with this.

‘As long as I can kill that monster, that is.’

Raids were always one or the other. It came down to whether the foe died, or you did. Whether the monster died, or the Player did. It would only end with one or the other.

‘It’s big.’

It was about 3 meters tall, so enormous that it made even the giant Yoohyun look small. Yoohyun and Yeonseo stood on either side of Hyukjin, and Sunhwa stood right in front of him.

“Boss. Hyukjin. This… is gonna be fine, right?”

“…”

Hyukjin didn’t know.

“We have to hope that our plan worked.”

If it didn’t? Then they would die here. There was no other way. In this scenario, which had changed because of the ‘True Master of the Heavenly Demonic Mountain’, there was no other way for them to survive.

* * *

Yeonseo regripped her sword. A bead of sweat ran down her forehead, traveling over her cheeks and down her nape. She stared at the ‘Great Orc Warrior’ with a piercing intensity. It wasn’t making any real movements yet. This was the calm before the storm, the moment before two forces collided.

Thump!

Thump!

Her heart trembled. Yeonseo kept her nerves stretched taut.

‘At least…’

The good thing was that the current situation was perfectly in line with what Hyukjin had schemed.

‘Hyukjin created this situation.’

This was definitely the desired outcome of Hyukjin’s tactic.

Hyukjin said, “I’m going in.”

“Oppa. Won’t it be better for me to go in? I’m sturdier.”

Hyukjin chuckled. “Being sturdy means nothing. One hit, and it’ll be over, anyway. The level indication shows up as question marks to me.”

The Great Orc Warrior’s level was around 37. Sunhwa as she was now would not be able to block a single hit from such a monster.

“So it’s better for me to go, since I have a slight chance of being able to dodge.”

Hyukjin moved forward.

‘Did it really… work?’

Seeing as the Great Orc Warrior hadn’t moved this whole time, it did look like their plan worked, somewhat.

‘It ate a lot in a hurry, so its stomach must be very bloated.’

And most likely…

‘The Mutant Wolf’s Fang should have taken effect.’

The Mutant Wolf’s Fang was an item Hyukjin had steadily collected ever since the Tutorial. It was also essentially the first item he acquired in the Tutorial Field.

[Mutant Wolf’s Fang]

The fang of the poisonous Mutant Wolf. It possesses a fatal ‘paralyzation poison’.

The Orc Warrior had swallowed the Orcs whole. Hyukjin knew that it would do so in advance and had embedded ‘Mutant Wolf’s Fangs’ all over on the Orcs’ bodies. The reason why they left the Orcs alive, why they pulled them all the way into the tent, and why they made the Orc Warrior eat the Orcs was all for this outcome.

“Hyungnim. Will that really have an effect?”

‘A few wouldn’t have made any difference.’

He drew even closer to the Great Orc Warrior.

‘But this guy swallowed at least seventy fangs.’

He didn’t expect the fangs to be able to completely paralyze the monster. Mutant Wolf’s Fangs were unable to completely paralyze a Great Orc Warrior, of all things.

‘But—’

They could greatly slow down the monster’s movements. Hyukjin slightly lowered his center of gravity.

The Great Orc Warrior saw a Player coming near it. For some reason, its body felt sluggish, but it was fine. That puny human was nothing—one bite, and it would be over. The Great Orc Warrior did not feel much danger.

Hyukjin used the special skill ‘Flash Step’ by title switching. The monster ahead would be unable to react to his speed.

Whoosh–!

The Great Orc Warrior swung its massive, 1-meter large club.

‘It’s faster than I thought.’

The Great Orc Warrior reacted a little to Flash Step. It was definitely a high-level monster.

‘But this much, I can manage.’

It was only a little faster than he expected, not something he couldn’t handle. Hyukjin whipped around to the back of the Great Orc Warrior using Flash Step.

“Yeonseo!”

Giving a signal to Yeonseo, Hyukjin swung his sword at the Achilles tendon of the Great Orc Warrior.

The monster raised its left foot, as if it had eyes on the back of its head. Then, it whirled rapidly around. Despite suffering from the effects of paralyzation poison, it evaded Hyukjin’s attack very easily.

In the meantime, Yeonseo used Heavenly Demonic Flying Step to get close.

‘That guy is aiming for Hyukjin.’

Its back was unguarded.

‘My goal is the ribs.’

She couldn’t deal a fatal blow in one hit. They had to pare down the monster’s health little by little.

‘Here I go!’

But just then, the Great Orc Warrior swung down its arm.

Clang!

Its arm blocked Yeonseo’s sword. Even though it wasn’t wearing armor, the sound was like steel meeting steel.

‘How can its body be so sturdy?’

That meant at Yeonseo’s current level and attack power, she was unable to penetrate the monster’s skin, especially the tough skin of its arm.

Hyukjin saw it all.

‘The look in its eyes has changed.’

Those were not the eyes of prey being hunted. The beast in front was full of confidence. The Great Orc Warrior was convinced that it was the predator here. Even though its body didn’t move as it wanted, it could catch and swallow these measly humans no problem. Those were the thoughts Hyukjin saw in its eyes.

‘The eyes of a predator.’

He had been waiting for this very moment. They would only have one chance. In order to come this far, he had designed and painted the situation stroke by stroke.

‘Now.’

The opportunity had come. Hyukjin moved, determined to make a miracle happen.