Chapter 78: Chapter 80

Hector’s condition was terrible.

It was difficult to tell it was him at a glance, he was so bloody. More than his wounds, though, it was his exhaustion that seemed the bigger issue.

One could tell that he had been swinging his sword the entire day with how many wolf corpses surrounded him.

Woof!

I punched a wolf that was charging me.

My flame-covered fist slammed into the wolf’s lower jaw. I felt its teeth and jawbone both shatter from my punch.

Crunch.

Right after breaking its jaw, I grabbed its extra-large mane.

Grasping its coarse hair, I picked up the wolf and threw it forward.

The wolf was sent flying and collided with the other two wolves that were charging at me.

They had their mouths open, which ended up being filled with the wolf’s corpse.

I looked at the staggered wolves and thrust my right palm forward.

White Sun Form. Second Technique

Flaming Wheel.

Maybe it was thanks to diligently making time to train with the mystic bead, but my flaming wheel was double the size it’d been the last time I’d used it as it swept up the wolves.

The remaining ones...

There were four wolves left, but I didn’t need to kill them myself.

My team members had already succeeded in dealing with them.

Crunch!

Sharyl’s mace shattered the spine of one of the panicked wolves.

“...Fuu.”

Seeing Sharyl let out a deep breath, I joked, “I told you, coming out here lets you relax a bit. And it’s good exercise!”

“Are you really saying that right now?” Sharyl noted that Hector was about to collapse, so she quickly ran over and supported him. “Sir Hector, are you okay? My goodness, look at these injuries...”

When she immediately went to take out the potion, I stopped her.

“Sharyl.”

“What now!”

“That’s something we bought with our points. We can’t just use it lightly.”

“Are you joking right now?”

“Do you think I am?”

The potion had been bought with the points of all our members.

It would be fine to use it on one of us if we were injured, but using it on someone from another team was a completely different matter.

“...”

Sharyl bit down on her lip.

She wasn’t stupid, so she should be able to understand my intentions.

“But... at this rate, Sir Hector will...”

“He’s not even that injured.”

“What?”

“Even though he’s covered in blood, most of it isn’t his blood. He should be fine if he sleeps for a bit. Right, Hector?”

Hector had an expensive body. He had consumed all sorts of elixirs while he was growing.

His body was on a completely different level than an ordinary young hero’s.

Hector slightly pushed Sharyl away as he said, “...It’s as Luan says. I’m fine.”

He then looked at me and let out a sigh.

“I’m in your debt, Luan. This debt...”

“You won’t forget and will repay someday?”

“...Yeah.”

I smirked before looking up at Charon in the trees.

“We’ll talk about that later. I want to talk with him first.”

Jump.

Unexpectedly, Charon jumped down from the tree.

He then glared at me.

“Why were you only watching?”

“Are you saying I needed to save Hector Bednicker or something?”

“If you weren’t going to, you should’ve pissed off. I’m asking why you were just sitting there and watching it all happen.”

“He refused my offer.”

I’d arrived in the middle of the battle, so I didn’t know exactly what had happened.

However, judging by the attitude Hector had shown in the end and Charon’s words, I could guess.

“I didn’t expect you to be so obsessed with points even in a situation like this.”

“Hector’s danger is an opportunity for me. I’m not a fool that would kick away an opportunity that found me.”

“Do you even know what’s going on in this forest?”

“It seems demons have appeared.”

“...”

I was speechless.

So even while understanding the situation, he was threatening Hector for some points?

“Luan Bednicker, I knew from the beginning that you were hiding your strength. You were intentionally half-assing all the lessons to seem weak and detestable.”

“You’re mistaken about that.”

I hadn’t hidden my strength.

I hadn’t half-assed my lessons either.

I’d panting while running because I hadn’t wanted to use my internal energy, but Charon had mistakenly thought that I was acting weak instead.

“But you aren’t the only one who has hidden his power. For you all, the training camp is a place of suffering, but not for me. I have never lived in a more comfortable place in my life.”

“...”

“Even if you are a child of the Great Houses, you’re just a fragile flower protected by those houses. I am on a different level than you.”

He had a weird sense of pride.

Like something you would hear from an old man, perhaps?

I have suffered so much more than you, so compared to what I’ve experienced, your experiences are nothing...

People who said things like that tended to have terrible personalities.

“Then should we settle this here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Your points.”

Hearing that, Charon’s eyes lit up.

“Are you saying we should bet our points? On a duel?”

“No. Just give me all your points. Everything you have.” I extended my arm toward Charon, elbow bent, and motioned twice with my hand, fingers curling inward. “Or get stomped here like a rat.”

* * * * *

* * * * *

Charon looked at me for a moment before smirking.

“I’ll take that as an invitation to fight.”

“W-wait. Are you really going to spar here? This isn’t the time to—”

As Evan quickly tried to interject with logic, Charon drew his shortsword from its scabbard and then immediately charged me.

Melee?

His specialty should be long range.

In any case, this wasn’t a bad battle for me.

Charon swung his shortsword.

We were still about ten steps away from each other. Forget a sword, even a spear wouldn’t reach me at this distance.

Vwoong!

Charon’s shortsword emitted something.

I narrowed my brows.

It wasn’t sword ki. Only sword masters were capable of launching an attack with sword ki.

Even if it was Charon, that was impossible.

Meaning...

It’s his blessing.

I couldn’t see the attack properly because the surroundings were so dark, but the attack was so loud that it wasn’t difficult to dodge.

After dodging the slash, I looked in front of me, but Charon had disappeared.

Slice!

I heard the air tear behind me. Even without looking, I could tell that it was an arrow.

I grabbed the flying arrow with my bare hand.

“...!”

I could sense shock coming from Charon, hidden somewhere in the forest.

I threw the arrow back in his direction, and Charon’s presence instantly disappeared.

It wasn’t that he’d stealthily hidden himself; he was teleporting short distances.

Another blessing.

Short-range teleportation was actually pretty common among blessings.

The Lord of Blood and Iron had something similar, as did Sellen.

Charon probably had a similar blessing as well.

I’d guess he has three or four blessings.

If he’d received five or more blessings, it would’ve been a hot topic. I would have heard about it.

Also, there were countless types of blessings.

Since it was unlikely that all his blessings were related to combat, I probably only needed to be wary of his ranged slash and his teleportation.

Charon’s presence repeatedly appeared and disappeared around me.

It was a trick to try and dull my senses, but frankly, it was useless.

Bang!

I slammed my right foot down and made the earth quake.

The corpses of the wolves lurched into the air as the terrain around me was disturbed.

“...!”

And Charon, who had just finished another short-range teleport, stopped moving for a moment.

This was one of the tricks I’d learned while living as a mercenary.

A weakness of skills like teleportation was that the user was naturally slow to take in information about the terrain around them.

It wasn’t like they were moving directly while observing their surroundings; there was a delay in their reactions because their surroundings before teleporting suddenly looked different afterward.

It was a short pause, less than a second long...

But one second was more than enough to end a fight.

Crack!

“Kugh...”

Charon stumbled after being punched in the face.

Even as he did, he used his right hand to aim for a critical strike against me.

He definitely had more experience in real fights than most young heroes, but he was still just a baby chick.

He was much weaker than the average mercenary or even the cult assassins I’d fought in the Gem Mountains.

Grab.

I stopped the attack of the shortsword aimed for my neck and kicked Charon in the stomach.

“Keuk...!”

Charon gritted his teeth as he swung his left hand, but most of his attacks were blocked by me.

“What are you doing? Is this all you can do?”

At that moment, Charon’s expression shifted.

I sensed killing intent from his eyes and his expression, and he began to attack me while ignoring his own safety.

They were reckless attacks, the kind I would expect from assassins, and they were much sharper than any of his prior attacks.

I could tell what he was thinking as well.

If I were inexperienced, I would’ve shrunk back from these attacks.

Even if I had real combat experience, feeling the weight of death was an entirely different matter.

I stopped his shortsword with my palm.

“...!”

Charon’s eyes widened to the point that I thought they might tear.

He was more surprised than I had ever seen before.

With my left hand now punctured, I kicked Charon’s face.

“Ugh...”

“Who did you learn this attack from? It’s not a skill a young hero should have. Was it your father?”

“Shut... up.”

“No.”

I didn’t imbue any internal energy into my palm as I slapped his face.

“No, no, no, no, no.”

Slap, slap!

Every time I hit his face, Charon’s head spun left and right.

Honestly, because his face was pretty lean, there wasn’t any texture, but I intentionally only slapped his face.

There were two reasons for this.

Firstly, people like him—who lived and died on their pride—didn’t have any tolerance for humiliation.

And secondly, focusing my attacks on one place was my specialty.

“I’ll kill you...!”

At first, Charon glared at me in defiance...

Slap, slap!

“S-stop... Let go...”

But after a dozen slaps, his resistance faltered significantly...

Slap, slap!

Around twenty slaps in, he declared defeat.

“I-I los—”

Of course, even though his face was now bloated, he still had a surprising amount of energy left, so I didn’t stop slapping.

Slap, slap...!

By the time thirty slaps had turned to forty...

Charon was no longer resisting. He was just mumbling quietly.

Around this point, I stopped.

I listened closely to try and hear what he was struggling to say.

“...rry...”

“What?”

“Sor... I... sorry...”

“Aha.”

He fell unconscious.

I finally let go of Charon. As I turned to Hector, I recalled having done something similar.

“...”

Hector’s eyes had been clenched shut the entire time.