My Self-Indulgent Skill Book Episode 13
Episode 13
"My men were taken down?"
Soyu couldn't believe her ears.
Since the subordinates she had sent out still hadn't returned after some time, she had ordered someone to find out what was going on.
The report she received back was that twelve men, including one A-rank Hunter, had been taken down, and the rest had fled.
It was hard to believe, but thirty minutes later, seeing her subordinates carried into the mansion, she had no choice but to believe.
A report also followed that the merchants at the hideout had fled.
"Sumin."
"Yes."
The man standing beside her approached.
"Release three A-ranks and all the B-ranks. Don't miss a single one of the runaways and bring them all in."
At her order, her subordinates trembled. They would rather have died by that Hunter called Hwajin; at least then their corpses would have remained intact.
"And you and the remaining A-ranks go capture that Hunter. If the situation is unfavorable, just bringing back the corpse is fine."
"Understood."
Sumin directed the men and sent them out, then left the mansion with the other A-rank Hunters.
Left alone, Soyu stroked the head of Fenrir, who sat beside her.
The massive wolf, large enough to swallow three or four people in one bite, closed its eyes and rumbled softly, as though sulking.
'Just what is the true identity of that guy called Hwajin?'
Wondering if he might be hiding his Hunter rank, she had her subordinates look into it, but he was definitely D-rank.
'When I checked later, there were clear traces of a Hunter's mana on the mantis. If so, then he really did die and come back to life. Could it mean he was reborn stronger?'
Soyu abandoned the thought. It was a foolish deduction. A person couldn't die and come back to life.
'Anyway, anyone who raises a hand against me must be crushed.'
Hearing that mere merchants had joined forces to help that D-rank Hunter, Soyu's fury flared to the tips of her hair.
It meant that ordinary people who weren't even Hunters saw her as a joke.
'I'll capture them all and feed them to the monster in front of the market merchants. I need to set an example.'
Grrrrr.
Soyu stopped her hand on Fenrir's head.
Fenrir bared its fangs, looking at the closed door.
Creeeak.
The door opened and a man entered. The man who entered her room held a shield in one hand and a spear in the other.
"I guess it didn't work after all."
He spoke, looking at Fenrir, who stared at him, and Jang Soyu.
"Jang Soyu."
Soyu's facial muscles twitched.
Since she had taken this seat, no one had ever called her name so casually.
And at the man's next line, Soyu's expression finally crumpled completely.
"Let's fight."
***
Hyeongcheol and I hid outside Jang Soyu's mansion, watching the gate.
Before long, Hunters poured out and split into two groups, scattering.
"With that number, there won't even be three Hunters left in Jang Soyu's mansion."
Hyeongcheol muttered.
"I didn't think it would get to this point."
I had thought she'd at least leave behind a minimum of human bodyguards.
The situation had resolved much better than I expected.
Tens of minutes ago, I had told Hyeongcheol that now was the perfect opportunity to strike Jang Soyu.
"That woman is the type to release nearly half her subordinates just to catch me. She's famous for not forgiving those who oppose her. Without a doubt, she'll try to capture not only me but the subordinates who ran as well."
"Right. If they don't want to die by Jang Soyu's hand, they have no reason to return to her side."
"She couldn't catch me even after releasing that many Hunters, so this time she'll send several A-rank Hunters. Then the number of Hunters remaining by her side will decrease."
"Yeah. It's definitely the perfect opportunity."
After all the Hunters left, I stood up to enter the mansion.
"I Hwajin."
Hyeongcheol looked at me.
"Don't die. I haven't recovered the investment yet, let alone the value of that thing."
He pointed at the inventory hanging from my waist.
"Don't worry. I have absolutely no intention of dying."
Passing through the mansion's gate, crossing the garden, and entering the main building's hallway, I didn't encounter anyone.
'Jang Soyu is... over there.'
There was no need to wander around the massive mansion.
At the end of the hallway stood a massive door painted red, as if to show anyone that this place was important.
Creeeak.
Opening the heavy door and entering, there was a spacious room, a woman in a suit right in the center of the wall facing the door, and an enormous purple wolf.
'So that's the monster called Fenrir.'
Just as I had heard from Hyeongcheol.
Jang Soyu and Fenrir were looking straight at my face even after I closed the door. It was proof that [Stealth] didn't work.
'I expected it, but it's a shame. If [Stealth] had worked, things would have been much simpler.'
Jang Soyu didn't get up even after I entered, sitting with her legs crossed.
I aimed my spear at her face and said,
"Jang Soyu. Let's fight."
"Fenrir."
She muttered, still seated.
Awoooooo!
The wolf rose and howled.
'Ugh!'
An immense terror surged in an instant. I felt like turning on my heel and running away right this moment.
'This is Fenrir's special ability...!'
I raised my spear. And stabbed it straight into my thigh.
"Kuk!"
Pain spread, and the fear vanished.
'Charge!'
After the pain in my thigh faded, I charged at Fenrir.
"Grr!"
I saw Fenrir raise its front paw.
'One-Point Defense!'
Boom!
A sound like a wrecking ball demolishing a building echoed through the room.
Even though that massive front paw struck it, the shield protected by mana was intact. However, the effect of [One-Point Defense], which creates an opening for a counterattack, didn't activate.
"Heup!"
I stabbed the wolf's front paw that was pressing down on the shield with my spear. However, blood seeped from the wound and soon stopped.
I rolled to the side and freed myself from the wolf's paw. And the moment I rose, I stabbed the wolf's leg with my spear. The spear went in deeper than before.
"Rwooor!"
The wolf let out a sound that could have been a scream or a threat. The leg that had just been stabbed rose upward.
Boom!
I blocked the wolf's paw once again with [One-Point Defense].
"Fool. Did you think that pathetic spear would work on Fenrir?"
Soyu's voice came, dripping with pity.
Without rest, I thrust the spear again. The wound healed even faster than before.
"Grr!"
I dodged back, avoiding the wolf's moving leg, and used [Charge] again.
'Once more!'
After repeatedly dodging, blocking, approaching, and stabbing, I could feel my mana nearly depleted.
I took out a mana recovery potion from my inventory. It was a product from the uncle who ran a consumables shop among Hyeongcheol's colleagues.
It recovered only a tiny amount of mana while costing about 5 million won each, making it a luxury among luxuries.
With my mana restored, I persistently targeted the wolf's leg.
The wounds healed faster and faster, until eventually they disappeared almost the moment they were inflicted.
'What is he doing?'
Soyu couldn't understand Hwajin's actions.
From earlier, he had been continuously stabbing Fenrir's hind leg, but Fenrir wasn't taking any damage.
Rather, because he kept approaching without rest to stab the hind leg, Hwajin had nearly been devoured by Fenrir several times.
Despite that, Hwajin didn't give up stabbing the wolf's leg, drinking what appeared to be mana recovery potions several times.
'There's something to it.'
Feeling uneasy, Soyu decided to use her skill.
[Berserk].
A skill that strengthened the attack power and speed of a monster under her [Taming], but in exchange drove the monster crazy until it killed its opponent.
When [Berserk] was used, the tamed monster would crawl on its body to bite its opponent even if its limbs were blown off.
"Berserk!"
As Soyu shouted, Fenrir's eyes changed.
"Skree!"
Letting out an unearthly shriek that couldn't be imagined as a wolf's howl, Fenrir's movement speed increased several times over.
Slam!
"Kuehk!"
Fenrir used its front paw to send Hwajin flying backward. Unable to block with his shield, he was thrown all the way to the wall with the door.
"Kuhng!"
Fenrir lunged at Hwajin, who had collapsed, to devour him.
Thinking it was over now, Soyu tried to sit in her chair.
"Grr!?"
But the next moment,
Fenrir stopped.
"Fenrir!?"
Jang Soyu raised her hips, which had been halfway to the chair.
Fenrir's leg was swollen grotesquely.
"Damn. Took disgustingly long."
Hwajin smirked, looking at Fenrir's leg.
His short spear was embedded there.
I watched as Fenrir's body gradually broke down.
The collapse that started from the leg spread to its limbs, torso, and finally its head. Blood vessels swelled and burst, bones of impossible shapes tore through the hide, and just when the wounds seemed to heal again, they finally rotted away.
"What the hell did you do!"
Soyu screamed.
"My friend is a doctor... well, a quack, I mean. It was hard so I didn't really get it, but he said wound healing is ultimately cell proliferation."
I approached the lump of meat that could no longer move, which until moments ago had been Fenrir, and retrieved my spear.
"What happens if you force something to recover when it doesn't need to? He said it leads to death."
I raised my spear.
"So I forcibly applied recovery on Fenrir, who has strong vitality, using my skill."
Skill [Healing Spear].
The Words invested were
A bizarre skill that seemed to mix offense and support, healing the opponent stabbed by the spear, but it was perfect against Fenrir, whose vitality was excessively strong, and for deceiving Jang Soyu.
'If I hadn't had the mana recovery potions, I would have been finished before Fenrir died.'
Fenrir only showed abnormalities after being stabbed with [Healing Spear] nearly twenty times.
Thanks to that, I had no mana recovery potions left now. Thinking that I had poured 15 million won into my stomach gave me a strange feeling.
[You have acquired 200 Exp.]
As expected of a strong monster, the experience it gave was tremendous.
"You son of a bitch!"
A golden circle appeared above Soyu's hand. It grew larger and rose into the air.
'Charge!'
The moment I saw it, I used [Charge] to rush at Jang Soyu.
Under the circle, the legs and torso of a mantis were appearing.
'Flame Spear!'
Using every last bit of my remaining mana, I thrust my spear at Jang Soyu's chest.
Stab.
"Aaack!"
Jang Soyu screamed. At the same time, the golden circle shattered and the mantis vanished.
"Uurk...."
But even impaled by the spear, Jang Soyu moved alive. It was the vitality befitting an S-rank Hunter.
Jang Soyu drew a dagger.
Whoosh!
"Uk!"
I narrowly avoided Jang Soyu's upward slash by barely the width of a sheet of paper.
Moving with unbelievable speed for someone wounded, Jang Soyu created distance and threw the dagger.
Swish!
I blocked the dagger Jang Soyu threw with my shield.
Crunch!
Jang Soyu's dagger pierced through the shield and embedded itself. The gleaming blade was visible to my eyes.
'Even if I blocked it without a skill, how is this possible?'
Thud! Clang-clang!
Jang Soyu threw daggers without rest.
On top of that, as if adding insult to injury, another golden circle appeared above Jang Soyu's head. It meant she was summoning a monster.
'Damn.'
My mouth went completely dry.
No mana remained, a monster was being summoned, and the flying daggers made approach difficult.
On top of that, the shield was on the verge of breaking.
'What should I do...'
My head was filled with chaos. No plan came to mind.
'I can't lose after coming this far. If I fall now, Hyeongcheol, the others, and even Jinhui will die.'
I gritted my teeth.
If there was no way, I had to force one.
'Even if it kills me, I won't end like this without doing anything.'
I looked beyond the shield. Four daggers remained in Jang Soyu's hand.
I took a deep breath and hurled the shield with all my strength like a discus.
Tadadak!
At the same time, I ran forward.
I put my hand into my inventory and took out an HP recovery potion, dumping it into my mouth.
Jang Soyu leisurely avoided the shield flying at her and immediately threw her weapon again.
Clang!
I barely knocked away the first dagger by swinging my spear.
Swish!
The second dagger flew in.
Without the leeway to block with my spear, I raised my left arm.
Stab!
"Uk!"
Pain as the blade dug into my flesh made me clench my teeth tightly.
Jang Soyu's eyebrows rose.
Swish!
The third dagger embedded itself in my thigh.
For a moment I almost fell to my knees, but only a few steps remained to Jang Soyu.
I had no intention of giving her time to wield a fourth dagger.
I swung the Flame Spear widely and slammed it into the ground toward Jang Soyu, who was trying to step back.
"Uraaah!"
Drawing out every last ounce of strength left in my body, I brought the Flame Spear, which I had raised above my head, down with force.
Kraaash!
"Aaaack!"
The Flame Spear split both the dagger and Jang Soyu at the same time.
Crimson blood gushed, and Jang Soyu collapsed to the floor.
The golden circle in the air faded away.
"Unnngh...."
Jang Soyu writhed at my feet.
The moment I tried to raise my spear to finish her off, Jang Soyu extended her arm toward me.
"W-wait... Let's... let's make a deal!"
"A deal?"
"Yes! Cough!"
Jang Soyu coughed up blood.
"I'll give you all the money I've gathered... spare my life."
"Money?"
"Yes... All together, it should be about 20 billion won. To withdraw the money from the account... I have to go myself. I'll give you the money and leave this place. I promi--"
Crunch.
I stomped hard on the hand Jang Soyu had extended.
"Aaaack!"
"Right before I was eaten by the mantis you raised, I swore. I swore I'd definitely kill those who tried to use me as bait and targeted my little sister. I swore I'd make sure they could never touch my sister again."
"Uurk...."
"I can earn money later, but the chance for a D-rank Hunter like me to kill an S-rank like you is only now."
I saw the strength vanish from Jang Soyu's eyes.
"The moment you tried to use me as feed for your monster, it was all over."
Crunch.
Jang Soyu didn't scream when she died.
[You have acquired 300 Exp.]
Only after hearing the voice ringing in my head did I think it was truly over, and strength left my body.
[You have achieved all objectives for 'Elimination of the Enemy'.]
[You have acquired 1000 Exp.]
[Your Unique Skill is being upgraded as a reward for achieving the objective!]
"What?"
I, who had been about to sit down, sprang to my feet.
[You can now use the Words of the Action Category more freely.]
[The categories of Words have increased.]
The voice continued a little longer without pause.
I quickly summoned my book.
--------------------
-Status-
I Hwajin
HP: 100/100 MP: 0/30
Vitality: 5 Strength: 3 Mana: 3
Mental Strength: 4 Sense: 3
Unique Skill: [Edit Lv.2]
Exp: 3050
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'The level of Edit increased?'