Chapter 30
Seong-Hwi stared at the Fallen Knight walking past the altar, its armor clanking. The Shen-rank Chaos could only use physical strength when fighting. They were subcategorized into Blood, Bone, Flesh, Skin, and Armed—a Fallen Knight began as an Armed Chaos. Some of them devoured the os of other Chaos monsters to awaken Chaos Mana and become Lapang-rank or even higher. However, the Fallen Knight before him was a mere Armed Shen-rank Chaos.
“Though I can only say that because of my abnormally high stats,” Seong-Hwi mumbled to himself.
The Fallen Knight was a nightmare against regular newbies. The magical resistance of an Armed Chaos was in a league of its own compared to the lower subranks. The power of normal F-rank skills was halved against it.
People were given two choices to obtain a Teleport Rock against the powerful enemy. The first was to provide a living offering to the sacrificial altar. The sacrifice would cause the Fallen Knight to be annihilated on the spot and leave a Teleport Rock. The one with the Teleport Rock could head to the Mirror World whenever they wanted. The second was to work together to hunt as many Fallen Knights as the number of people in the team.
The first method is infinitely easier.
Most experienced betrayal in this stage, and some of them, due to trauma, developed an unshakable distrust of humans in the Mirror World.
I wonder what they’ll do, Seong-Hwi thought as he summoned his D Weapon.
He admitted that Shin Jun and his teammates worked well together, but wondered whether they would avoid betraying one another until the end.
Even if they are betrayed, I wonder if they can overcome the shock.
[Activating Unique Skill: Symbol Embodiment.]
[Penetrating Spear, one of the symbols of No.7 The Chariot]
A sturdy steel spear appeared in Seong-Hwi’s hand.
𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮
He mumbled, “If you wish to create an unbreakable pillar by weaving countless branches together, you shouldn’t hesitate to abandon the rotten branches.”
***
[A live offering was not given.]
[The Fallen Knight acts to eliminate the intruders.]
The Fallen Knight unsheathed its sword. Two crimson balls of light shone from inside the black helmet.
Jun quickly commanded, “Clutch Bag and I will be in the first line! Sword and Sledgehammer, on our sides! Yarn and Yo-yo, provide support from the second line! Smartphone and Bow, cover us from the third line! The rest, stand by in the rear!”
Calling teammates by their D Weapons meant they were in battle. They each got into their familiar positions and prepared for battle. The Fallen Knight walked toward them, its eyes gleaming brightly. It then stomped the ground and rushed at them with incredible speed.
“Here it comes!”
“Chaaa!” Jun shouted as he moved his mana, tracing the mana pattern of his skill, Immovable.
[Activating Skill: Immovable.]
It immediately activated and covered Jun with brown mana. He looked as reliable as any enhancer tank. However, he was blown backward with a single kick from the Fallen Knight, a sound akin to an explosion echoing.
“Kurgh!”
“Jun!”
[Activating Skill: Melto’s Tongue.]
Hee-Gyeong, in the second line, used her skill to grab Jun with her whip.
“Kurgh! Clutch Bag!”
“I know! Haaa!”
Seong-Tae filled the vacancy in the vanguard left by Jun. He tried to keep the Fallen Knight back with his sword, but a single swing of the Fallen Knight’s sword split Seong-Tae’s sword in two as if it were a rotten fish.
“Dammit!” Seong-Tae shouted, thinking he had blundered.
“No, well done!”
Ho-Geun and Seung-Jun on the sides charged at the Fallen Knight, not missing the opening from the Fallen Knight swinging its sword too widely.
“Raaah!”
Ho-Geun moved his mana along his skill’s mana pattern, which instantly activated the skill. It looked as if pressurized air had enveloped the sledgehammer’s head.
[Activating Skill: Focus Strike.]
Ho-Geun’s skill struck the Fallen Knight directly on its chest. Although it was pushed back, it did not seem to have suffered much damage.
“Chaaa!”
Seung-Jun charged this time and moved his mana around his eyes along the mana pattern he wanted.
[Activating Skill: One Point.]
The offensive detection skill, One Point, allowed Seung-Jun to see a gap in the Fallen Knight’s armor.
“Right here!” he shouted.
[Activating Skill: Double Slash.]
Mana enveloped Seung-Jun’s sword, and the skill aimed for an articulation of the Fallen Knight’s armor. However, the Fallen Knight shifted so that the attack would strike its breastplate.
“Argh!” Seung-Jun grunted.
Ho-Geun shouted, “That armor’s magical resistance is too strong! We won’t deal much damage even if the skill hits it!”
He had no difficulty smashing his opponents thus far with his sledgehammer, but he could only leave scratches on the Fallen Knight’s armor.
Jun quickly returned to the first line beside Seong-Tae and shouted, “Bow! What about your Foresight?”
Min-Jae shouted from behind, “It’s... no use! I don’t see a trajectory!”
Min-Jae had his bow drawn with an Old Iron Arrow nocked, but couldn’t let it loose—he could only sweat. He and Ha Rin were the only ones on their team who had set rules for their D Weapons.
As someone who was used to seeing an arrow’s trajectory between himself and his target, Min-Jae thought hard about what he could do so that he could always hit the ten-point zone on his target. He then recalled the odd feeling that he sometimes felt after he raised his Sense stat. The moment he let his arrow loose, he could more or less feel whether the arrow would hit its mark, a sense that normally one could develop only after firing tens of thousands of arrows.
Even on Earth, Min-Jae had occasionally felt it through endless repetition of firing arrows. It felt as if his soul was linked to the inanimate arrow, sending sparks from his fingertips throughout his body, filling him with certainty that the arrow would hit its mark. He was only an athlete in a minor corporate archery team who had never been to the Olympics, but he never quit because that feeling was as addictive as a narcotic.
Min-Jae took to heart Card’s advice that one’s subconscious, trauma, wish, and background were important when establishing a rule on one’s D Weapon. Hence, he wished to obtain that sense, which kept his archery dream going, as a skill.
His wish created the skill Foresight, which formed an imaginary target on a subject when he nocked an arrow on his bow and instinctively let him know whether the arrow would hit its mark. As a result, Min-Jae was a phenomenal help when the team hunted the flying Pirupikos. Since he knew whether his arrow would hit before he even fired it, he could never miss. However, even this skill was useless against the Fallen Knight.
Min-Jae stared at the Fallen Knight recovering from the impact, and an imaginary target appeared on it. The innermost yellow rings scored ten and nine points, red rings scored eight and seven points, blue rings scored six and five points, black rings scored four and three points, and white rings scored two and one point. However, the target on the Fallen Knight was currently all white, meaning the arrow wouldn’t deal any significant damage.
“Someone has to destroy its armor! Only then will my arrows go through!” Min-Jae shouted.
“Sledgehammer!” Jun called Ho-Geun, believing he was the only one who could break the Fallen Knight’s armor.
“Urgh!” Ho-Geun grunted, gritting his teeth.
His earlier attack had been his best attack. He needed something more if he wanted to break the armor.
The Fallen Knight charged toward the vanguard.
“Gaaah!” Seong-Tae shouted, abandoning his broken sword and focusing entirely on defense.
The Fallen Knight continuously thrust its sword, which easily went through Seong-Tae’s F-rank shield.
“Kurgh!” Seong-Tae grunted, his flank turning bloody.
“Fall back!” Jun shouted as he dashed forward, covering himself in brown mana. He endured the Fallen Knight’s attacks and shouted, “Yarn!”
Hee-Gyeong activated her skill and wrapped the Fallen Knight with her whip.
“It worked!”
“Not yet! Yo-yo!”
“Okay!” Do-Hyun placed a knife in his sling and spun it.
[Activating Skill: Slingshot.]
However, the knife shattered once it hit the Fallen Knight’s armor.
“Keep firing!”
“Ahhh!” Do-Hyun screamed as he continued to shoot knives with all of his mana.
Just then, the whip began to rip, unable to handle the Fallen Knight’s strength.
“I can’t hold it for long! Ho-Geun!” Hee-Gyeong shouted.
Ho-Geun got even more impatient.
He thought, I need something else! I need to set a rule for my D Weapon!
He could already do so since his D Weapon stat was at F(52).
As Card mentioned, I’m surely an enhancer. But what? What kind of ability should I establish? What should I visualize?
Ho-Geun’s mind was going blank from the pressure of needing to live up to his team’s hopes, the Fallen Knight on the verge of breaking free from the whip, and thoughts about his D Weapon. He felt like he was going insane from Card’s words spinning inside his blank head.
Subconscious, trauma, wish, background, culture, family history... family? Yeah, that’s it.
The only reason he was struggling so frantically to go to a place known as the Mirror World, which he knew nothing about, was in the hopes that his wife and daughter were there.
Yeah... my family. All for my beloved family!
Ho-Geun’s blank head began to regain its color.
***
A demolition building was enveloped in white fabric like a giant greenhouse.
“Thank you very much, sir,” Ho-Geun said as he bowed to the construction project manager.
“Not at all, Mr. Park. Good work today, as always. You can clock out once you check the purifiers,” the project manager replied informally, despite being twenty years younger.
Ho-Geun had no name on-site. He was only Mr. Park.
Why don’t you greet me again after you’ve learned some manners, damn brat?
Ho-Geun inwardly cursed his project manager with a smile as he walked away. Although he was nameless on the demolition site, he had people who called him by his name at home. There, he turned from Mr. Park to Park Ho-Geun.
Waking up before dawn and waiting at the labor office, fighting the urge to buy a two hundred-won vending machine coffee as he waited, and going to various demolition sites and breaking walls with his sledgehammer in a world filled with toxic air—none of it was tiring as long as he thought it was for his beloved family. Every single day was a gift to him.
***
Ho-Geun rode the subway to and back from work because the labor office that his close friend owned was seven stations away. It was a worthwhile investment because he wouldn’t have to deal with the manager secretly pocketing his money.
The subway ride to work was fine, but the ride home was a toil. He bothered the other passengers with his terrible stench, which came from the sweat he perspired when working, and the dirt that never fully came off, no matter how much he shook off.
Hence, Ho-Geun never took a seat on the subway and always stood in the corner on his two sturdy feet, enduring the fatigue with the fact that he had earned enough money for his family to not go hungry for another day.
Some people occasionally frowned at his filthy self. In extreme cases, they blocked their nose and moved to a different car. Most of them were people in suits and students wearing school uniforms.
I’ll buy my baby girl a clean uniform just like that.
Ho-Geun’s hurt feelings were washed away by the thoughts of his daughter and left him with a smile. He hugged his oxygen tank close to himself so that it would not obstruct the others whenever he saw people frowning at him.
I’m sorry. I will earn enough money to buy a car one day.
***
Ho-Geun’s wife and daughter were always worried about him because he was constantly covered in transdermal pain relief patches.
He always shouted, “I was born to work on demolition sites! No one uses a sledgehammer better than me. Even the project manager says I’m the best! I take one swing to deal with what others need three to four swings to do!”
I’m not ashamed of what I do, Ho-Geun thought proudly.
He swung his sledgehammer to make a living. He enjoyed hammering away at old walls if he thought they were misfortunes blocking his family’s bright future.
My hammer is a golden hammer that brings happiness. It lets me earn money, feed my family, and it helps me take care of them.
Dirt flew each time he swung his golden hammer to break the walls. A bright future existed beyond the walls. He might one day own a house under his name in one of the sites he demolished. He wished that the house would be warm enough to embrace his wife and daughter.
However, he returned home one day and saw that his wife and daughter were not home.
Did they go grocery shopping? Ho-Geun wondered.
He did not think much of it and turned on the TV.
The news anchor reported, “The metal pillar that appeared in a basketball court at Hangang Park vanished today. Authorities roughly estimate three thousand citizens were Lost, and...”
“Tsk, tsk. Not this again. Why are so many people disappearing?” Ho-Geun said as he shook his head.
People who wanted to build new houses decreased as more people disappeared, turning architecture into a dying industry.
I hope I can keep swinging my hammer until my baby girl graduates from university.
It took Ho-Geun two days to realize his loving wife and daughter had been Lost.
***
Ho-Geun turned into a bum who lost all hope. There were no incidences of the Lost being found anywhere in the world. His wife and daughter had vanished forever. He no longer went to demolition sites or wielded his sledgehammer because there was no reason to anymore. He had been reduced to a man who was only alive because he was. He simply ate, slept, peed, pooped, and cried—living without meaning like a machine programmed that way.
He was also Lost one year later and saw hope in the Mirror World. He thought his wife and daughter might still be alive there.
Park Ho-Geun. A human, a wonderful husband, and a dependable father. Pick up your sledgehammer again. You’ve gained a reason to break the walls.
***
The Fallen Knight was almost free from Hee-Gyeong’s whip.
Ho-Geun shouted, “I establish a rule!”
[Commencing rule establishment of Destiny Weapon: Sledgehammer.]
[Please establish an ability.]
He couldn’t do anything complicated. All he knew how to do was break walls for his family—it was the one thing he was proud of.
“The skill name is Demolition Hammer!”
Ho-Geun visualized a golden hammer. According to Card, the two most important factors when establishing a D Weapon rule were a powerful wish and a vivid imagination.
He needed a golden demolition hammer that could destroy any wall. The world was simply a series of walls to break.
[Ability established.]
[Unique Skill: Demolition Hammer.]
[The unique skill stat is shared with the Destiny Weapon stat.]
[Please establish a restriction on the ability.]
“Take my mana and health!”
Skills naturally required mana, and one would naturally be tired after demolishing walls.
[Establishment complete.]
[Converting Destiny Weapon Sledgehammer to Wallbreaking Sledgehammer.]
...
[Wallbreaking Sledgehammer (Destiny Weapon)
Rank: F(52)
Description: A sledgehammer used to break walls at demolition sites for one’s family. It is imbued with the power to break any wall blocking the path forward in exchange for mana and health.
Unique Skill: Demolition Hammer]
The Fallen Knight ripped the whip apart and charged with its sword as if making up for wasted time, its armor clanking with each step.
“Kurgh! Retreat! We’ll re-strategize and challenge it later!” Jun quickly commanded.
He judged that since the Fallen Knight seemed to be protecting the sacrificial altar, it would most likely not chase after them if they got far enough from the altar.
Jun thought, We’ll have to think of another way to—
“Ahhh! Everybody get out of the way!” Ho-Geun shouted, interrupting Jun’s thoughts, as he charged at the Fallen Knight.
“No, ahjussi! We have to retreat first—huh? What’s that?” Jun noticed the change in Ho-Geun’s sledgehammer as he was about to stop Ho-Geun’s reckless charge.
A... golden hammer?
Ho-Geun’s sledgehammer was slowly enveloped in golden energy. The small particles of golden light gathered to form the golden head of a hammer, ten times larger than the sledgehammer’s head.
[Activating Unique Skill: Demolition Hammer.]
“Break!” Ho-Geun screamed.
He could tell from his rapidly depleting mana and the onset of fatigue that this one strike was his last. He had to destroy the Fallen Knight’s armor with this attack. He had swung this hammer tens of thousands of times. No wall or human had been left standing against his swing.
My wife and daughter lie beyond this bastard! he shouted inwardly.
Ho-Geun saw the Fallen Knight as a giant black wall.
I’m a moron with a hammer who only knows how to break walls.
He could only do things that involved using his body because of his lack of education, but he knew one thing. His hammer had the power to break through any misfortune in his path.
This is a golden hammer, Ho-Geun thought as he swung the hammer.
The Fallen Knight took the blow with his breastplate, the hardest portion of his armor and one with the highest magical resistance. Ho-Geun’s golden hammer destroyed the Fallen Knight’s breastplate, its skin underneath, its flesh, and its ribs. Just a little more power and he could have destroyed its os as well.
It’s done.
Ho-Geun was sure it was enough since their team had an exceptionally talented bowman. Min-Jae drew his bow, aiming for the shining yellow ring of his target, and activated two skills simultaneously.
[Activating Unique Skill: Foresight.]
[Activating Skill: Crush Arrow.]
Min-Jae let the arrow loose without hesitation. The arrow flew through the air, guided by the wind, to its target.
It’ll hit!
Min-Jae’s fingers trembled. The feeling of his soul linked to the arrow felt strong. He could tell it was ten points.
Min-Jae’s arrow pierced the Fallen Knight’s os. Its black armor fell to the ground piece by piece, black blood and smoke seeping out of its articulations. A white rock flowed out along with the black blood. It was the Teleport Rock. Only after seeing that did Ho-Geun relax and fall to the ground.
“Huff! Huff!” he panted heavily.
They had defeated a Fallen Knight.
I knew it, Ho-Geun thought to himself.
He had always broken the sturdy walls of life one by one. There was no way he couldn’t crush a mere black tin can.