WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 12: Bizarre Oddity (3)

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My palms were completely scraped raw and covered in wounds.

I had missed my footing once along the way, leaving two fingernails torn and mangled.

It hurt terribly, but my desperate will to escape helped me endure that pain.

Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!

I ran wildly through the undergrowth.

There was not much time.

It had taken nearly four hours just to climb down this far.

Even with the body I had trained in my previous life, I did not think descending such a steep mountain would have been much easier.

He wanted me to go down and back within four hours? That mad old man.

Just finding food and returning would take over ten hours, even if I did not get hurt.

-Phew. It is truly frustrating that you cannot use internal energy.

‘Damn it. Do you think I want that?’

I almost wanted to hate the childhood I spent afflicted with Ki Rampage.

Even now, when I thought of that time, I still had questions.

This was not the time to complain.

I had to escape somehow to get away from that old man's clutches.

Rustle.

Then, in the blink of an eye, a shadow fell over me, darkening my vision.

Since I was pushing through the brush, I assumed the thick leaves had briefly blocked the sunlight.

Then the SoDam Sword suddenly sighed.

-Haa...

‘What is it?’

-You're pine-nutted.

‘What? Pine-nutted?’

At that moment...

Whoosh!

Something enormous and imposing landed lightly in front of me.

The sight froze me as though I had turned to ice.

The one blocking my path was the hairy savage, Evil Heaven, the Bizarre Oddity.

“You took this Venerable One's warning lightly.”

“N-No, that isn't...”

“You are prepared to die, are you not?”

Thud!

“Urk!”

Stars spun before my eyes, and I lost consciousness.

When I came to again, it was because of pain so intense that it felt as though my face would burst.

“Ughhh.”

My head felt heavy, and my face burned.

The moment I opened my eyes, I was horrified.

“Eek! Aaaah!”

The upside-down mountain peak before me made my vision spin.

When I slightly raised my head to look up, I saw a bottomless precipice stretching beneath me.

“This crazy bastard!”

The curse flew from my mouth without thought.

As if that were not enough, the pain of blood rushing to my face was unbearable.

I tried to move my arms, but they were tied behind my back.

What was even more absurd was that my ankles were bound as well.

I was hanging upside down from a cliff with my arms and legs tied.

“Aaaah! Somebody save me!”

How many people could remain calm in a situation like this?

An ordinary person might have gone mad.

At first, I screamed myself hoarse for help. Then I tried cursing. All that returned was an echo.

Screeeech!

The wind blew, making my body sway like a pendulum.

It was terror itself.

“Aaaah! Cough! Cough!”

I had screamed for help until my throat hurt, so even my screams came out hoarse.

Blood rushed to my head, the ropes swayed, and the sight of the precipice continued to make my heart feel as though it would burst.

“Ughhh!”

It was strange.

Perhaps prolonged fear strengthened one's will to survive.

To prevent blood from rushing to my head and face, I forcibly raised my upper body.

“Pant! Pant!”

My abdomen strained, but I did not care.

When I curled up, the blood that had rushed to my face flowed back down, making my face tingle.

“Ah...”

Fortunately, the rope was tied so tightly around my ankles that I did not think I would fall.

“...Damn it.”

The problem was my tied arms.

Even if I wanted to free myself, I had no way to do so.

I tried to hold myself curled up, but keeping my body folded while hanging there made it feel as though my waist would tear apart.

“Haa... Haa...”

After thinking for a while, I closed my eyes and straightened my waist.

I could not bear to look at that precipice.

As my waist and abdomen relaxed again, blood rushed back into my face and head.

“Ughhh.”

I could not stay like that for even a few minutes.

In the end, I curled up again.

My face and head felt better, but the pain shifted to my abdomen and waist.

“Urgh.”

That forced me to straighten myself again.

At some point, I had no choice but to repeat those actions over and over.

It was practically compulsory.

My waist and abdomen screamed in pain, but the agony of blood rushing to my face was no less severe.

This repeated motion continued for over two hours.

During that time, I even had the rare experience of vomiting while hanging over a cliff.

“Haa... Haa...”

It hurt too much.

I even thought I might die like this.

Then...

Tap! Tap! Tap!

Hearing the sound beside my ear, I curled up and looked above me.

“Gasp!”

I did not know when he had come down, but Evil Heaven was gripping the cliff with one hand and looking down at me.

In my misery, I pleaded with Evil Heaven, though my hands remained bound.

“S-Save me! Please save me!”

My throat was so hoarse that even I found my own voice pitiful.

“Heh heh.”

Evil Heaven let out his characteristic laugh, tucked me under one arm, wound the rope around his other hand, and rapidly climbed back up.

It did not take long to return to the cave where he lived.

Thud!

He untied the rope and threw me onto the cave floor.

It hurt, but I did not even have the strength to scream.

My abdomen and waist felt torn apart, and my throat was hoarse. I was a complete wreck.

‘Fuck...’

I cursed only in my head.

That damned old man truly was a devil.

I almost thought it would be better to get beaten up instead.

Then I noticed the Song twins shivering against one wall of the cave.

‘What?’

I had thought he was kindly teaching them Martial Arts.

But they did not look any better than I did.

Song JwaBaek, the older brother, bore signs of being beaten, and dried blood crusted over both his fists. Song WooHyun, the younger brother, had a scraped crown that was pressed flat.

Song JwaBaek looked at me with tears in his eyes.

Without making a sound, he mouthed the words.

‘That bastard is a devil.’

I nodded and looked at him as though he were a fellow soldier.

At this moment, I could not help feeling a sense of kinship.

‘Ah!’

Then I spotted the SoDam Sword lying on the cave floor.

I dragged myself over as though crawling and picked it up.

-Aaaah! I thought you were dead!

The moment I gripped the sword, it greeted me with tearful cries.

It said that when it saw him wrap me in rope and throw me over the precipice, it thought I was dead.

Grrrrowl!

At that moment, my stomach announced that it was empty.

I had not eaten properly all day, so I was starving.

The Song twins seemed to be in the same state.

Munch. Munch.

Yet Evil Heaven, seated on a stone chair covered in tiger pelt, was tearing into something.

It was dried meat.

Fury flared inside me. He had that, yet he told me to go hunting?

“Are you hungry?”

At Evil Heaven's question, the twins nodded fiercely.

Evil Heaven glanced at me, smirked, and said,

“This brat did not hunt and instead tried to escape, so none of you will eat.”

What shameless shifting of responsibility.

Surely they would not fall for that.

‘...’

Song JwaBaek trembled, perhaps in despair.

Then he glared at me with blazing eyes.

He really was simple-minded.

But he was not the problem.

“H-Hungry... I want to eat that too...”

Song WooHyun, clutching his scraped head, pleaded with Evil Heaven, who was eating dried meat.

Flustered, Song JwaBaek tugged at his pant leg.

“Idiot. Endure it!”

Then Evil Heaven took something from his robe.

The sight left me stunned.

-What is that?

‘This is insane.’

Evil Heaven held a small flute.

The problem was that it was no ordinary flute.

When he played it, the Blood Worm inside one's body would run wild and cause unbearable pain.

“You foal-like brats. You know what this is, do you not? Heh heh.”

The twins had no way of knowing.

When they looked puzzled, Evil Heaven put the flute to his lips and blew softly.

Peeep!

“Argh!”

“Ugh!”

At that moment, the twins clutched their chests and collapsed with cries.

Their faces reddened as their bodies trembled in convulsions. For a brief moment, I hesitated, then fell to the floor like them and screamed.

“Argh!”

“You brats cannot be taught with words. Heh heh.”

Laughing as he watched us suffer, he truly was a mad old man.

There was a reason everyone avoided him and called him the Bizarre Oddity.

Perhaps because he had blown the flute only briefly, the twins soon came to their senses, breathing roughly.

“Pant! Pant!”

I matched their breathing.

Then the SoDam Sword spoke to me.

-You... are not in pain?

Since it was attached to me, it noticed immediately.

That was why I had curled up facing away from Evil Heaven and screamed, so he would not see my face.

‘That's right.’

I barely stopped myself from grinning.

I felt no pain at all.

When I heard that flute, my chest should have hurt intensely, but I was completely fine.

‘Did something really happen to the Blood Worm?’

I had thought it strange that I no longer felt the usual discomfort and foreign sensation in my chest.

But when the flute had no effect on me, I could not help suspecting that something had truly happened to the Blood Worm.

‘What could it be?’

The SoDam Sword spoke excitedly at my question.

-What else could it be? You struck it rich!

I truly hoped so.

But I could not be certain yet.

If I had internal energy, I could have confirmed it, even if it caused pain.

What a shame.

But the Blood Worm was not the problem right now.

“Go out at dawn tomorrow and bring back food. I will give you four hours.”

This was driving me insane.

Even when my stamina and condition had been fine, climbing down the cliff alone had taken nearly four hours.

How was I supposed to accomplish that?

“If you try to escape again or return late, you had best prepare to hang from the cliff again. Heh heh.”

‘!!!’

At Evil Heaven's words, the SoDam Sword said gloomily,

-You're pine-nutted.

* * *

The second day.

I woke before dawn and had no choice but to perform the bizarre feat of climbing down the cliff.

After hurriedly descending the day before and hanging from a rope, I had felt as though my body would fall apart. Strangely, when I woke, the pain across my entire body had vanished without a trace.

It was strange.

But I had no time to think about it. I had to climb down the cliff.

-Are you giving up?

The SoDam Sword suggested trying to escape again, but that was impossible for now.

After my first attempt, there was no way that mad old man would not be watching me.

At the very least, I needed time to put him at ease.

For now, I had to do my best not to end up hanging upside down from that cliff.

But it still took nearly four hours.

I spent two hours wandering through the nearby forest to hunt.

Thanks to my experience doing every sort of chore as a low-rank warrior in the Blood Wolf Squad, I set a trap and successfully caught one pheasant.

Then climbing back up the cliff took another five hours.

After returning to the cave, I immediately had to hang upside down from the cliff for over four hours.

As on the previous day, I screamed until my throat became even hoarser.

The third day.

As on the second day, the cliff ordeal began at dawn.

I desperately descended the cliff to meet the time I had been given.

I nearly fell to my death.

Even when my fingernails tore and my palms were scraped raw and crushed, I could not bring the time it took to descend below four hours.

I even failed to hunt that day.

The moment I climbed back up, the mad old man beat me to a pulp before hanging me from the cliff.

Gu SangWoong, the Tyrannical Blood Commander, came to bring extra Antidotes and clicked his tongue when he saw me dangling there.

.

.

The seventh day.

Crossing the cliff in four hours was difficult.

For someone who had never learned a movement skill and did not even possess internal energy, it was nearly impossible.

I gradually adapted to climbing down the cliff, but I had only reduced the time by about fifteen minutes.

As expected, I hung from the cliff again.

But as I adapted to that as well, it became far less frightening.

Still, blood rushing to my head remained painful, so I had no choice but to keep curling and straightening my body.

My abdomen felt as though it was gradually hardening.

.

.

The tenth day.

I was slowly getting used to descending the cliff.

Since I climbed the cliff every day, muscles naturally formed across my body.

The calluses on my palms had hardened.

To shorten the time I spent hunting, I made a bow.

I did not know why I had not done so sooner.

In less than an hour, I successfully caught two pheasants.

Perhaps he was in a better mood because there was more food. Even though I returned late, he let me finish hanging from the cliff after only two hours.

I was absurdly happy over something so small.

But Song WooHyun, the younger twin, developed a large bald patch on the crown of his head.

What kind of training was he doing to return with a blood bruise on his scalp? Perhaps because of that, hair was not growing in that spot.

.

.

The fifteenth day.

The day had finally come.

After obediently complying for around half a month, the ironclad surveillance had loosened.

Certain that the mad old man had lowered his guard, I attempted to escape once more.

This time, I had even mapped out my route.

Yet less than fifteen minutes after I descended the cliff and ran into the forest, the mad old man knocked me unconscious and dragged me back.

After being beaten half to death, I had to hang from the cliff for more than half a day for the first time.

.

.

The one-month mark.

I had become very familiar with descending the cliff.

I began to notice routes that were easier to step along, and I could see the same paths when climbing up.

Perhaps because of that, I successfully shortened the round trip by an hour.

I still could not overcome the barrier of completing the round trip, including hunting, within four hours, so I could not avoid hanging upside down from the cliff.

But unlike before, I did sit-ups the entire time as though I were training.

Now, I even had a six-pack that I had not possessed before.

In only one month, my stamina and strength seemed better than when I had trained as a third-rate warrior in my previous life.

It was probably because I spent all day climbing cliffs.

.

.

Another month passed.

-I'm sick of it. Is our slave's day starting again today?

‘Do not provoke me.’

-Yes, yes.

I shook my head at the SoDam Sword's mocking reply.

Who would want to do this?

Now I did it out of sheer spite.

‘I will survive, no matter what!’

But this hellish hardship had brought unexpected benefits.

The muscles across my entire body had developed evenly.

My thighs had grown thick enough to resemble a horse's, and my abdomen was as hard as stone.

I had not reached this level even when training as a low-rank cadet.

I had never known climbing cliffs was this effective for training.

-What are we going to do about him?

‘Hmm...’

Song WooHyun's head had taken on a unique shape.

The bald patch had become far too large.

I had never seen hair like that before. Was this baldness, or partial hair loss?

‘I do not know. It is not as though he cares about his hair anyway.’

Song WooHyun only cared about his older brother and food.

He had no interest in anything else.

More importantly, I had to worry about my own life.

I did not know how much longer I would be trapped here, climbing cliffs and hunting.

‘That damned mad old man.’

I glared at Evil Heaven on the stone chair covered in tiger pelt.

That old man never slept lying down.

He was always seated upright like that.

‘I should just stab him.’

If I followed my temper, I wanted to stab him with a Short Sword while he slept.

Then Evil Heaven suddenly opened his eyes.

-He is awake!

‘Gasp!’

Frightened before I could stop myself, I hurriedly turned my head to avoid meeting his gaze.

Then Evil Heaven rose and said to me,

“Has it been around two months?”

“Pardon?”

After saying something I did not understand, he suddenly lifted me under one arm, left the cave, and used a movement skill to climb the mountain cliff.

It was my first time reaching the mountain peak.

The dawn peak was full of mist, as though immortals might wander through it.

Evil Heaven looked me over from head to toe.

“You are finally ready.”

I could not understand what he meant.

It was frightening. What harm was he planning now?

As I grew uneasy, Evil Heaven asked me an unexpected question.

“What would you do if there were a way to wield internal energy without a dantian?”

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