—————————————————————–
Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: JayM
—————————————————————–
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
The next day.
Just as I had done yesterday, I put the mask on my doll and then sent it to the place where I had promised to meet Yeon Mi-rae.
“……”
Although there was still some time left until the promised time, I could see that Yeon Mi-rae had already arrived and was preparing her luggage.
From the looks of it, she had come here to prepare as soon as her classes had ended.
“Are you Ms. Yeon Mi-rae, who’s supposed to be the porter at 5:30 today?”
“Huh? Ah, yes!”
My doll approached her and asked that.
A porter’s job wasn’t just to put monster byproducts in a backpack and carry them.
Of course, there were such porters, but those were only beginners who hadn’t done much porter work yet….
Usually, a porter also managed consumables like healing potions and food, so they tended to carry a lot.
“You’ve prepared more than I thought.”
“Yes. Ah, should I explain them?”
“No, I can tell by looking. The items you’ve laid out are all things I know.”
They weren’t just simple healing potions or food, but there was also a survival kit and some signal flares in case we got isolated in a dungeon, and so on….
They were items I had also used frequently before my regression, so it wasn’t hard for me to recognize them.
Of course, all the items she took out looked old-fashioned, but that was only from my perspective… They were probably the latest survival kits and signal flares at this point in time.
After finishing her check, she packed all the consumables into her backpack, and then I told her.
“There’s still a little time left until the appointment time, but… shall we go straight to the dungeon?”
“…What? But….”
At my words, Yeon Mi-rae looked around.
There was no one else around us.
“What about the other party members?”
“Hm? Ah….”
Come to think of it, had I not said this?
“Only the two of us will be going to the dungeon.”
“…Ah, are you perhaps an examiner? Well, to be a porter for an official assault team, I suppose you need to see my skills.”
It seemed like she was greatly mistaken, so I decided to correct her.
“I am the only party member.”
“……”
At my words, Yeon Mi-rae’s expression hardened.
Well, that was natural.
An assault team was normally composed of a minimum of 3 and averaged at around 5 members.
Cases like mine — of entering a dungeon alone — were extremely rare.
‘Only an Awakener with out-of-spec skills like me or someone who is confident in their stealth technique and is sure that they won’t be detected by monsters would enter a dungeon alone.’
Or if not that….
‘Or an Awakener who boasts that they can handle most dungeons on their own.’
To Yeon Mi-rae, I probably looked like a boastful Awakener.
A dungeon was a place where you could die at any moment even with 5 people in a party, yet I was saying that I would go in alone.
“…Yes, I understand.”
But she didn’t say anything else.
Still, we had already made a contract, and she must be desperate right now.
And so, she, who had shouldered her backpack, stood up from her spot.
“Then, which dungeon are we going to?”
“It’s right in front of us.”
In the first place, I had set the meeting place near the dungeon, so I said that and led her to the dungeon gate.
Of course, since I was the only one who had discovered it, there were no other people here.
‘I put up a barrier right after I discovered this dungeon yesterday.’
While I was thinking that inwardly, I looked at the gate.
And looking at the flow of the gate, I roughly identified what kind of monster would be inside.
‘An Orc Dungeon.’
Well… it was a lower-level dungeon compared to the Wyvern dungeon I had gone to yesterday.
It was also a dungeon that even my main body, which was weaker than this doll, could clear with ease.
But I chose this dungeon because I thought it was of a sufficient difficulty to gain Yeon Mi-rae’s trust.
‘Clearing an Orc Dungeon is mainly about pushing through with pure strength, after all.’
An Orc Dungeon would be enough to show her that my martial power wasn’t ordinary.
It would have been good to find a dungeon with monsters stronger than orcs, but unfortunately, among the dungeons I had discovered before hiring Yeon Mi-rae as a porter yesterday, the strongest monster that appeared was an orc.
‘There were many dungeons with monsters of a similar level to orcs, but it would have been a bit much to go there with Yeon Mi-rae, though I wouldn’t have minded going alone.’
Like a dungeon where succubi, who performed mental attacks, appeared, or a dungeon where lizardmen, who were hard to fight against due to the terrain being entirely made up of a swamp, appeared.
Yeon Mi-rae would be vulnerable to mental attacks because she couldn’t use aura, and similarly, her stamina would be greatly consumed in a swamp for the same reason.
The risk of taking Yeon Mi-rae to such places was high.
For the most part, I would protect her, but this was only to prepare for a “what if” situation.
‘It’s not like there are no problems in an Orc Dungeon since orc shamans appear here, but….’
Still, among the spells used by orc shamans, there were none that directly affected her mind or her life, so even if she was hit by a spell, Yeon Mi-rae wouldn’t be in danger.
I could just protect her then.
Anyway…
“…Hoo… It’ll be fine. There’s no way a Wyvern will suddenly appear or something, right?”
Yeon Mi-rae muttered that with a clear look of nervousness as she followed me into the dungeon.
I then said to her.
“As you can see if you look ahead, this is an Orc Dungeon.”
“…I see.”
At my words, Yeon Mi-rae looked at the orcs in front of us.
They had done it in the dungeon that appeared at my elementary school last time, so it seemed like waiting at the entrance was the trend for orcs these days.
“Gwee-ik…!”
“Bu-hee-hit…!”
The orcs that discovered us were about to charge at us, so I took out my sword from the subspace artifact and said to Yeon Mi-rae.
“From now on, I’ll speak casually. Stick behind me if possible, and if that’s not feasible, use the terrain or your backpack as cover.”
“Y-yes!”
At my words, she nodded her head and stuck close behind me.
And I lightly swung my sword.
Chwaak!
Of course, as always, the result brought about by my light sword swing wasn’t really light.
The bodies of the orcs that were about to charge at us were cut right through.
“…Hm.”
But I felt a strange sensation from me cutting them.
Should I say that they weren’t ordinary orcs….?
“Y-you’re incredibly strong…”
“If I wasn’t strong, I wouldn’t have tried to enter a dungeon with just a porter.”
More importantly….
“These orcs… They don’t seem to be ordinary orcs.”
I said that while looking at the corpses of the dead orcs.
“Different…? How so…?”
At her question, I pondered for a moment, then spread my internal energy in all directions to check the interior of this dungeon.
And, as I had expected, I was able to confirm that the orcs in this dungeon were different from the ordinary orcs I knew.
“They’re forming a line.”
“A line…?”
“Yes. If you paid attention in your school classes, you should have a rough idea of what this means, right?”
At my words, Yeon Mi-rae’s eyes began to tremble.
“…For a monster that doesn’t usually form a line to suddenly form one means…. Does it mean that there’s a commander-type monster here?”
“Yes. From what I can sense… I think there’s an Orc Warlord here.”
An Orc Warlord.
A monster above the Chieftain I had killed in the dungeon that appeared at my elementary school.
Chieftain, Great Chieftain, and above that, Warlord.
It was an individual two ranks higher.
Not only was the Orc Warlord itself much more powerful in combat, but in a dungeon with a warlord-level commander, all the orcs in the dungeon would act in formation, so the danger level would rise sharply compared to before.
“…Then shouldn’t we run away immediately and report it?”
And such a dungeon couldn’t be handled by a normal assault team.
Just as numerous Awakeners had gathered during the Greenskin Wave in Yeouido, a large-scale assault team of at least 30 members would have to be formed to have some chance of victory here.
Therefore, Yeon Mi-rae’s judgment was, under normal circumstances, an extremely correct judgment.
“Unfortunately, it seems like they’re not too happy about us leaving, are they?”
Pajijik…!
No sooner had my words ended that the gate we had just used to enter the dungeon shook with an unpleasant sound.
The orc shamans had destroyed the gate we had come through.
“Our escape route is blocked.”
“No….”
At my words, Yeon Mi-rae made a despairing expression.
…Actually, it wasn’t impossible for me to repair the gate, but for now, shall I keep quiet about that?
Not only would it take quite a while for me to do it, but the orcs wouldn’t just stand by during that time.
It was much faster for me to just clear the dungeon instead.
“Why…? Why does this always happen only to me…?”
Yeon Mi-rae, who didn’t know my thoughts, muttered that and sat down.
And she began to cry, unable to hide her sorrow.
“Sob… I worked so hard… To think that the result of all that is such a futile death….”
She began to curse the world that didn’t recognize her efforts.
After crying like that for who knows how long, she, as if having resolved herself to something, took out a single dagger from her pocket.
It was a dagger originally used for butchering.
Seeing that, I grabbed her hand and stopped her.
“…What is it, so suddenly?”
“Are you thinking of killing yourself?”
“Yes, of course. The monsters here aren’t just any orcs, they’re orcs with a warlord-level commander… It’s obvious what kind of future awaits a woman if she’s captured by such orcs, isn’t it?”
‘I’d rather just die cleanly than have that happen to me.’
She said that and told me to let go of her hand.
Of course, I didn’t grant her request.
“Good grief… That’s the conclusion you came to after crying for so long?”
“I’ve given up. So please leave me alone.”
“How hasty….”
Think carefully please.
“You cried for so long… Don’t you think it’s strange that we haven’t been attacked yet?”
“…Huh?”
At my words, she, as if realizing that it really was strange, looked around.
In her surroundings, she saw….
“…These orcs… Why are they like this?”
There were orcs all around us who looked like they were going to attack us at any moment, yet they were unable to do anything.
“It’s simple. We’re their enemies, so they have to kill us, but when they actually think about killing us, their bodies won’t move because of fear.”
“…What?”
Whether she misheard my words, she heard them correctly but couldn’t understand their meaning, or she understood their meaning but couldn’t believe what she was hearing…
I didn’t know which it was, but Yeon Mi-rae looked at me with a dazed expression.
“Don’t worry too much. As long as I’ve hired you and brought you here, you’ll be safer than anyone else in this dungeon.”
I said that, smiled at her, and then took a stance.
It was a stance where I held the sword with both hands, lowered my body, and kept the sword horizontal.
“…Wait, that sword, and… that stance is definitely….”
The horizontal slash that had annihilated the ogres and trolls that poured out of the dungeon during the Greenskin Wave in Yeouido.
Of course, what I was about to do now was not just a horizontal slash.
Woooong….
The sword I was holding vibrated.
It seemed to be protesting, saying that it couldn’t withstand the technique I was about to unleash.
Well, in the first place, this sword I was holding was a low-quality sword I had taken from the Orc Chieftain.
Rather, I would praise it for having endured all of my techniques so far.
‘Farewell.’
Still, it was time to part ways with this sword.
I thought that and swung the sword.
I swung it around my body in a wide circle and then returned it to its original position.
“…Ah…?”
Right after that, the vibration that started from the sword spread out in all directions.
And….
Crack…!
Not only the orcs that were surrounding us, but even the entire surrounding terrain shattered.
It literally shattered.
How should I explain this…
Should I describe it as space shattering?
“…The aftermath is big. As expected, cleanly cutting through space was impossible.”
Crack…!
Along with a result that was more disappointing than what I imagined, the sword in my hand also shattered.
And then….
“……”
Yeon Mi-rae, who was looking back and forth between the completely shattered surroundings and me, was at a loss for words.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
T/N – Well, this novel can be a little slow sometimes. Like this chapter. Nothing much happened here, but the space slash at the end was pretty badass, not gonna lie.
If you find any mistakes, feel free to point them out in the comments.
