Chapter 60:
Chapter 60
“What, what the hell is this?”
Kim Han-jung couldn’t understand why he was lying on the ground.
He didn’t fight casually.
He fought with all his strength.
He pushed his abilities to the limit, and chose to become a monster that was crazy for blood.
He was confident that he wouldn’t lose to any ordinary collector.
“What is it, really?”
Why was Yu-hyun fine and he was rolling on the floor miserably?
And why did he look down at him with an indifferent expression, as if nothing happened?
It was impossible. It was an impossible thing.
“Don’t make me laugh!”
Kim Han-jung reacted violently to Yu-hyun’s gaze.
He jumped up from his seat and swung his dagger.
Yu-hyun easily dodged his dagger and kicked his chin with his toe.
“Kuk!”
His brain shook with the impact and Kim Han-jung rolled on the floor pitifully.
Even as he bled from his nose, he still seemed doubtful that his attacks didn’t work.
‘He has a good form of attack, but that’s all.’
Yu-hyun sneered at Kim Han-jung’s appearance.
He was definitely strong.
His movements were fast and he had no hesitation in killing someone.
Especially his stealth skill was very threatening. I
f he didn’t have the ability to read books, Yu-hyun would have been in trouble.
But even so, Kim Han-jung couldn’t beat Yu-hyun because there was an overwhelming difference in skill between them that couldn’t be filled by anything.
‘Does he know that I didn’t use any skills, and fought purely with my basics?’
Unlike Kim Han-jung who raised his [Power of Story] to fight, Yu-hyun didn’t use any skills. What he showed purely was his own skill.
The skill that he had honed desperately for survival for a long time.
Only his own skill.
Knowing that he had no talent, he clung desperately to all kinds of things.
To Yu-hyun, Kim Han-jung’s fight was too monotonous.
He didn’t use proper dagger skills.
He just used his stealth skill and his superior physical abilities to overcome any situation.
Yu-hyun found that ridiculous.
‘Those who think that what they have is the best will eventually collapse when they meet someone who doesn’t fall for it.’
A tower built without laying a proper foundation will eventually collapse easily.
Yu-hyun had already seen through Kim Han-jung’s inner thoughts.
His way of thinking, his attitude towards fighting, his small habits of where to target his opponent.
The skills and experience that he had accumulated for a long time analyzed and calculated Kim Han-jung from head to toe.
Just like now.
‘Right shoulder.’
As soon as Yu-hyun thought that, Kim Han-jung rushed at him like a beast.
He aimed for the right shoulder.
It was fast and strong, but there was no way he would take it if he knew the attack was coming in advance.
Swish
Yu-hyun twisted his upper body lightly to avoid Kim Han-jung’s attack, and immediately stabbed him in the vital spot with Baek-ryeon, which turned into a spear.
Kim Han-jung instinctively blocked it with his other dagger.
Clang!
Yu-hyun spun the spear shaft and hit the dagger at the same time, using the recoil to hit him in the jaw with the spear shaft.
Bam!
“Kuhuk!”
Kim Han-jung flew several meters away and rolled on the floor with a clean hit.
Yu-hyun changed Baek-ryeon back into a sword shape and clenched and unclenched his hand.
‘As expected, my physical condition is very good.’
He didn’t have the [Power of Story] that he had in his previous life, but the body that he had trained to the limit then was inherited by Yu-hyun.
Without relying on the power of points, Yu-hyun’s body was almost at the highest level.
‘If I invest the points I get here into my stats.’
He could become stronger.
And the existence of Baek-ryeon was also very significant.
Yu-hyun learned all kinds of miscellaneous skills without being biased towards anything.
Dagger, spear, halberd, blunt weapon, sword, shield, bow, etc.
He used all the weapons he could use, and for Yu-hyun, Baek-ryeon, which could freely change its shape, size, and weight, was the best weapon ever.
That’s why Kim Han-jung was pushed back by Yu-hyun face-to-face.
It felt like fighting dozens of people at the same time when facing Yu-hyun who used various weapons.
“What are you doing? Not getting up. Come on like before with confidence.”
“Uaaaaa!”
Kim Han-jung wiped the blood from his burst lip.
His spirit wasn’t broken yet.
That fact made Yu-hyun very happy.
‘Good.’
It was a stage he had prepared, so he couldn’t collapse here.
‘You have to make me more happy.’
Kim Han-jung was a sacrifice.
A sacrifice that would make Yu-hyun shine more on this stage.
So he didn’t like it if he gave up already.
“Come on.”
Yu-hyun snapped his fingers at Kim Han-jung and provoked him.
***
‘Wow.’
Kang Hye-rim couldn’t help but admire Yu-hyun’s performance.
I knew he was different from a typical teller.
He had a natural fighter’s instinct, even when he wielded a weapon.
But even so, I had doubts about how strong he really was.
The first time Yu-hyun fought was at the siege of Constantinople.
He showed remarkable performance there, but I was the real protagonist.
The next thing that followed was the conquest of the Theodolant swamp.
There were several battles there, even excluding the encounter with Scavenger, but in the end, it was me who defeated the boss-level phantom Lefra.
Was it because of these two incidents?
I unconsciously recognized Yu-hyun as someone I had to protect.
He was weaker than me, or so I thought.
Somewhere in my heart, I unknowingly decided that.
But as I watched Yu-hyun push Kim Hanjung one-sidedly, I had no choice but to change my mind.
‘What if I fought with Yu-hyun? Could I win?’
I instinctively sensed my defeat.
I was strong, but inexperienced.
The various weapons that Yu-hyun handled freely would surely entangle my limbs, and there was no way that Yu-hyun, a diligent hunter, would miss that gap.
‘In the end, I never trusted Yu-hyun.’
All this anxiety came from distrust.
I realized how foolish I was and gave a bitter smile.
And I felt grateful for Yu-hyun’s consideration, who showed me with his actions that I was wrong instead of scolding me directly.
‘I trust you now.’
He was my benefactor and a light that I couldn’t exchange with anyone in the world.
I straightened my back and watched the fight with a steady gaze.
***
“What, what the hell! What’s going on! What’s happening!”
Jinpung watched the whole situation from outside the stage and felt his fingertips tremble with anxiety.
He felt frustrated and angry at Kim Hanjung’s one-sided defeat by Yu-hyun, and at the same time, he felt a sense of doom that this was the end.
“Why! Why can’t you beat that damn teller!”
He felt like he was going crazy not knowing the reason.
Was Kim Hanjung actually just a flashy guy?
No way. Jinpung had seen Kim Hanjung’s skills himself.
He was a collector that he secretly raised in the pentagram department.
He had a high-grade trait and his basic specs were very outstanding.
He even gained real combat experience in the dark world without anyone knowing and achieved results.
He didn’t look like someone who would lose to Yu-hyun at all.
“From the beginning, the opponent is someone who hasn’t held a sword for long! But, what the hell is this! That skillful fighting style!”
That drove Jinpung mad.
Yu-hyun was skillful.
Too skillful.
He felt like an old veteran who had rolled around in a hellish battlefield for decades.
Even Jinpung, who had no eye for people, felt that way.
How about others?
‘Oh no. This can’t go on. If he loses like this, I’m doomed.’
He had bet everything on winning this death match.
When Yu-hyun first suggested it in reverse, he thought he was crazy and saw it as an opportunity.
I’ll devour you. And then grow bigger and make everyone look up to me.
That’s what he thought.
‘But it wasn’t me who devoured him…’
From the beginning,
he was nothing but prey for Yu-hyun.
‘Did he know everything!’
Yu-hyun knew it and deliberately followed Jinpung’s pace and set up the board.
To devour him efficiently. To make him despair.
“Who did I mess with?”
His voice filled with despair echoed hollowly in the waiting room for players.
***
Whispers.
I heard the sounds of the spirits being flustered.
I felt how they watched this fight, how they accepted it.
And how they looked at me, all of them.
All of it.
‘Yes. This is it.’
When I first came up to this colosseum, the reactions of the spirits were varied.
Some were happy to know me well, some were interested in me because they had heard some rumors about me, some doubted me because they did not believe the rumors, some wished I would fail.
But as time passed, and the fight continued, their evaluations became biased.
“Who, who is that guy?”
“Teller? Could it be that the rumors were true? A fighting Teller!”
“What the hell! Why didn’t I know this until now? Kang Yoo-hyun is a Teller? I have to go to his library right away!”
The eyes of the spirits toward me changed.
And it was the same for Kim Han-jung, who was facing me.
“Don’t, don’t come!”
He had been hit by me several times, and had rolled on the floor a few times, so his body was a mess.
Blood flowed from his wounds all over his body, his clothes were torn and dusty.
The armor he wore under his clothes had lost its function long ago.
He was a pathetic sight for someone who wielded the power of Jack the Ripper, the murderer of White Chapel.
Kim Han-jung’s spirit was broken, and he looked up at me with fear-filled eyes.
“Wha, what are you! What are you! This was supposed to be my stage! I was supposed to be the protagonist! You are, you are nothing but a sacrificial lamb to make me shine! Why, why am I like this!”
Kim Han-jung denied reality.
Surely, he had been promised victory before he came here.
But where in this appearance could he be called a protagonist?
He was not the protagonist of this stage.
He was just a mad killer.
‘He will surely kill many people in the future.’
Kim Han-jung will kill many people in the future.
Because that’s his nature. Because that’s what he likes to do.
‘So I’ll end it here.’
I walked slowly toward Kim Han-jung.
“Ah, ah!”
Kim Han-jung desperately crawled back on the floor, but he was blocked by the wall of the clock tower.
He had no way to escape.
The spirits held their breath and watched my actions closely.
Everyone’s eyes were on me.
‘Yes. They must be surprised. The Teller they had ignored until now, did something like this.’
There is a limit.
A kind of wall that cannot be crossed by humans.
There is certainly a limit that I draw myself.
But most of the time, people in the world draw lines for me.
Several lines were drawn in front of me as I approached Kim Han-jung.
It was the world’s evaluation of me.
You can only go this far.
You can’t cross this line any more.
It seemed to say that.
People who see the line in front of them end up hesitating to cross it.
Because everyone said so, they think they have to follow it too
And they accept it.
It’s ridiculous.
In fact, there is nothing easier than crossing it.
The limit line drawn by someone other than myself is nothing but an illusion that only I can see.
The world knows nothing and draws it arbitrarily.
It’s just graffiti.
Step.
I cross the line.
The moment I pass the line that seemed to block me, it scatters like dust.
Step. Step.
I just lightly and cheerfully step forward.
As I pass by, the lines scatter one by one.
That’s how I stood in front of Kim Han-jung’s nose after crossing the last line.
“In the end, you were intoxicated by your own power and didn’t try to learn anything. That’s your downfall. Look carefully. Who is the person who defeated you? Who is the winner of this place? Who is the real protagonist of this stage?”
“Sa, save…”
“This is my worth that you have ignored until now.”
I swung my sword and cut off Kim Han-jung’s neck.
At the same time, the last line that blocked me was cut off.