The events in the Central Plains explain the protagonist’s growth process. Dokgo Seong is
the protagonist. Please keep that in mind.^^
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That something with green skin moved with astonishing agility. Even more surprisingly, the creatures
were carrying weapons. In other words, they were no ordinary beasts. From their strangely shaped
weapons, a sharp aura streamed out in waves. In an instant, Dokgo Seong examined the form of the
weapons.
“Is that a zhanmadao? It looks like a Green Dragon Crescent Blade, too.”
A long weapon with a keen blade, evident at a glance. The mysterious beings concealed themselves in
the darkness and launched another attack. A polearm, a weapon called a glaive here,
sliced through Dokgo Seong’s hair as it passed. He had avoided it by a hair’s breadth, but he was in no
position to relax. Another glaive was already thrusting toward the nape of his neck.
“There are two of them.”
He raised the longsword in his hand with all his might.
Clang.
He barely managed to block it, but the impact forced him to retreat three or four steps.
Barely steadying his off-balance body, Dokgo Seong managed to press his back against the stone wall.
He had already ingrained into his body the fact that in a fight against multiple opponents, fighting with
one’s back to a wall was the best course. Before him, two shadows, their forms only faintly visible in the
darkness, were advancing toward him.
Tilting his longsword into a defensive posture, Dokgo Seong wiped the sweat from his forehead with
his sleeve.
“Wh-what are these things? Their strength is truly tremendous.”
Forms gradually emerged from the darkness. His opponents were monsters with short but solid builds.
They walked upright like humans, covered in dense, short green fur, with heads resembling those of pigs.
They were orc warriors.
Having heard the history of this place from Shrekheimer, Dokgo Seong could soon guess their identity.
“I see. So these are the creatures called orcs. Then was this their intention all along? Good.
I might have died quietly, but I need to vent my anger for that nightmare…”
There was no leisure to think for long. As if they harbored a deep-rooted hatred toward humans, the orcs
swung the weapons in their hands and launched a fierce assault. Three or four exchanges of blades
followed. Though he barely managed to fend them off, Dokgo Seong felt his strength gradually being
drained.
“Damn it. To think I would be pushed by mere vermin like these…”
First of all, the longsword he was holding was an extremely unfamiliar weapon to him. Ever since he had
begun learning martial arts, he had trained only his Tiger Claw to the point of obsession, so when it came
to swordsmanship, he was almost a blank slate. Moreover, perhaps because the terrifyingly destructive
Heavenly Blood Demon Art had been the root of the problem, he had little understanding of forms, and
his body, which had suffered grave injuries, had not yet recovered. There was no way a battle against
two orcs could be easy.
Even so, he gritted his teeth and swung his sword. It made no sense at all that he, once counted among
the top ten experts of the Central Plains, should fall to such trifling creatures.
A bloody struggle in which he could not use internal energy at all. Yet, drawing on the countless real
battles he had experienced until now, he carried on a close fight against monsters he had never seen in
his life: orcs.
At the upper part of the underground prison, two figures stood watching the duel between Dokgo Seong
and the orcs. A faint magical field enveloped them, so no one noticed their presence. One of the figures
suddenly sighed.
“To think he swings a sword so clumsily. One glance is enough to tell he is no good. The plan has
failed.”
“That is not so. Though he is unskilled in swordsmanship, I believe his movements themselves are
first-rate. In particular, his evasive motions are truly as precise as if measured with a ruler. In my
opinion, it is probably because the weapon does not suit his hand.”
Sergei glanced at Benitez’s face. It was a handsome face that looked somewhat young.
However, Benitez was an old mage already past sixty. And a war mage who had spent long years on the
battlefield, at that. In other words, he was not a mage who had spent his years on magical examinations
within the court, but a practitioner of real combat who had honed battle magic on the battlefield.
Since Benitez possessed more combat experience than anyone, he must have been accurately reading
the other party’s condition. Trusting that fact, Sergei turned his gaze back to the prison.
“Then you mean that man used some weapon other than a sword?”
“Yes. When I first saw him there, he used a bizarre weapon that looked like a gauntlet fitted with blades.
With just those two weapons, he fought dozens of master-class swordsmen armed with swords without
yielding an inch.”
“You mean spiked gauntlets? Astonishing. But judging by his condition, it does seem true that he has
lost his mana. Seeing as he cannot properly block the orcs’ attacks…”
“It appears so. However, at that place, that man manifested an Aura Blade powerful enough to cover the
gauntlets completely. Though you may not believe it.”
While they watched, the fight inside the prison was gradually reaching its end.
At first, Dokgo Seong had certainly seemed to be somewhat on the back foot.
But now he had seized the advantage completely and was overwhelmingly driving back the two orcs.
Though his entire body had been cut several times and blood was streaming from him. The prison floor
was stained all over with the blood shed by both sides. Covered head to toe in blood, Dokgo Seong was
rampaging like an evil spirit.
Kirik.
As if overwhelmed by his momentum, one orc faltered and retreated. Dokgo Seong did not miss the
opening. The retreating orc thrust out its glaive as if to tell him not to come, but Dokgo Seong charged
in regardless. The glaive sank into Dokgo Seong’s thigh without the slightest deviation.
Pshuk.
With the glaive still lodged in his thigh, Dokgo Seong drove his sword into the orc’s chest.
Along with a chilling sound of flesh being torn, the orc’s sturdy body trembled violently. Dokgo Seong’s
entire body seemed to pause for a moment, but then, without hesitation, he rushed toward his second
target. The remaining orc had already lost its will to fight before Dokgo Seong’s fighting spirit and was
endlessly backing away.
An orc warrior, a symbol of bravery and fighting spirit, was instead frightened. But Dokgo Seong,
without the slightest hesitation, began hacking the orc’s entire body to pieces. Having already realized
that the Sevenfold Severance Prohibition did not activate when he killed orcs, he had no reason to hold
back.
“Chwieeeek!”
With a death scream, fresh blood sprayed in all directions. But Dokgo Seong did not stop moving. He
simply raised the longsword and brought it down again and again until the orc breathed its last. Thus,
the duel between one who had once been a martial arts master and a monster was deciding its victor
and loser.
“Still, he knows how to fight fairly well.”
Having watched the entire fight, Sergei gave a bitter smile. That outsider possessed a nature like that of
a wild beast. Like a vampire that could not restrain itself at the sight of blood. Benitez’s voice reached
his ears.
“What shall we do? Shall we continue testing him with monsters?”
“Is there any need? What we need is a Sword Master with the strength to stand against a hundred men.
Though his fighting spirit is admirable, we have no use for a man who barely manages to beat down two
orcs after being reduced to such a wreck. Any mercenary of a certain level could manage that much.”
“Then shall we dispose of him?”
After thinking for a moment, Sergei slowly shook his head.
“No, not that either. It would be best to test him further first. Heal him, and next time, have him fight a
troll. A troll, with its outstanding regenerative ability, is an opponent that even experienced mercenaries
shake their heads at. It should make for a good match.”
“Understood.”
“And it would be better to give him something similar to the weapon he used, would it not? The weapon
you said you saw before. I am curious. How, I wonder, will he use spiked gauntlets?”
“Understood.”
In the place where fresh blood and scraps of torn flesh were strewn everywhere, Dokgo Seong stood
blankly. His gaze was fixed on the corpses of the orcs that had died by his hand. The two orcs that had
seemed infinitely ferocious were now reduced to well-tenderized lumps of meat.
But in return, Dokgo Seong had suffered countless wounds all over his body. It was partly because the
weapon was unfamiliar to his hand, but it had also happened because he was accustomed to focusing on
domineering internal energy arts, relying on his profound inner power.
In the days when the Heavenly Blood Demon Art had been intact, all weapons had been rendered
powerless before Dokgo Seong’s Tiger Claw when he drew up his astral energy. Even divine weapons or
peerless blades would break without fail if they clashed with it.
But those days had now vanished forever. He was now a man who had completely lost his internal
energy. To block an orc’s glaive, he had to grip his sword with all his strength. From experiencing them
firsthand, their attacks were somewhat unfamiliar, but orcs were fundamentally inferior to humans in
combat ability. Of course, they could not even be compared to martial arts masters. For him to struggle
this hard against two such orcs was, considering his career, unimaginable.
With unfocused eyes, Dokgo Seong stared at the sprawling remains of the orcs. Fortunately, the
Sevenfold Severance Prohibition had not activated when he killed the orcs, but what tormented him was
something else.
‘Why must I fight to the point of spilling blood against mere vermin like these?’
In the Central Plains, rather than here, he had been forced to live a life calculated to the smallest detail.
Not according to his own will, but according to the intentions and thoughts of others. And yet, even here
in Truvenia, a place separated from the land where he had lived by an unimaginable distance in both
time and space, something had occurred that forced him to move according to someone else’s design
once again… Dokgo Seong simply could not understand his own fate, so endlessly wretched.
“Did I do something pointless?”
Suddenly, regret came flooding over him like a tide. If only he had allowed the orcs to kill him quietly,
then thoughts and anguish like these would never have arisen. As he stood there blankly, he heard the
grating sound of the barred door opening. Yet Dokgo Seong did not move an inch and merely stood in
place.
“Whew. Impressive.”
“He minced them up nicely.”
Unfamiliar voices came from behind him. Of course, there was no way the Truvenian common tongue
the soldiers were speaking would enter Dokgo Seong’s ears. He merely guessed through instinct that
other people had entered the prison.
As he had expected, a group of soldiers had entered the prison. Each of them wore a metal helmet and
chainmail armor. Judging by their simplified armor that covered only the vital parts of the body, their
status did not seem very high.
As if they were extremely wary of Dokgo Seong, they raised their swords and shields and took guarded
stances. But Dokgo Seong showed no reaction whatsoever. He merely remained silent, as though they
had not existed from the very beginning. At that sight, the soldiers took courage and began cleaning up
the interior of the prison. Four soldiers collected the orc corpses, and among them, the soldier who
seemed to be of the highest rank approached Dokgo Seong and pointed his sword at him.
“Follow me out.”
Naturally, Dokgo Seong showed no reaction at all.
“Right, they said he can’t understand our language.”
Tapping his own forehead, the soldier went and stood in front of Dokgo Seong. In that instant, the
soldier’s face twisted horribly.
“What an ugly face. Even an ogre would look better than this bastard.”
Even in the Central Plains, Dokgo Seong had been pointed at countless times for his ugly face. The
reaction of the Truvenians, whose facial features were entirely different, was the same. No, the feelings
they had regarding Dokgo Seong’s face were beyond imagination. First of all, they had never seen the
distinctive upturned eyes of a person from the Central Plains. In particular, Dokgo Seong’s eyes were
even more extreme. Narrow, slit-like eyes, and on top of that, the appearance of a hunchback with a
bent back—it was easy enough to imagine what the soldier felt. For that reason, an expression of
contempt briefly flashed across the soldier’s face.