How an A-rank Hunter Lives - Chapter 82

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Arsène

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ How an A-Rank Hunter Lives ◈

Chapter 82: Australia's Calamity, Phoenix - [3]

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The flesh and bones struck by my hammer were crushed all at once. I could feel it clearly through both hands.

Monster flesh and blood splattered across my face.

There was no time to wipe the filth away.

I brought the hammer down, swung it, then brought it down again. I struck hard in front of me, then used the recoil to smash whatever was behind me too.

As I kept swinging the hammer without pause, the blizzard seeping into my force field felt wonderful. I could feel my body, overheated from the intense exertion and repeated Spatial Teleportation, slowly cooling down.

Baek Dambi was not slacking off either.

“Ratatatat!”

My ring girl had mounted a light machine gun on top of the building and opened fire. She was not blindly firing into the air. Every shot was aimed precisely at them. Well, she was an elemental, so she could probably see the souls inside the blizzard.

The Deathclaws seemed to realize that their kind were dying too. Maybe they were trying to escape the danger despite being unable to see ahead.

The Deathclaws that had been standing still in the blizzard began to run.

They did not watch where they were going. They simply ran. Charging about wildly, their hook claws struck their own kind.

They sliced and bit each other in the process, creating complete chaos. Still, there were so many of them that a few managed to run straight ahead unharmed.

At this rate, some of them would escape the blizzard. That would be a problem. Even a few rampaging Deathclaws were a disaster for ordinary people.

Sure enough, the Deathclaws escaping the blizzard were caught by my mental net.

But... oh.

The thing I had worried about, Deathclaws escaping the blizzard, entering the tunnel, and infiltrating the shelter, did not happen.

Outside the blizzard, someone was moving faster than an arrow. With a sword in hand, he cut down every Deathclaw that burst out of the blizzard before it could do anything.

I did not need to confirm who that swordsman was.

It was Han Hee. Until now, he had only taken on the role of helper, but now that things had gotten this bad, it looked like he had finally decided to kill Monsters himself.

As the blizzard gradually died down, I stepped out of the space filled with Monster blood and flesh.

Han Hee stood ahead with a sword in hand. The sight of that swordsman standing on Deathclaw corpses looked unbelievably cool.

I gave him a broad grin, and Han Hee awkwardly smiled back.

Han Hee said, “Please keep this a secret...”

“Wouldn't that be a waste? You earned yourself some credit, but you have to keep it secret? That's ridiculous... Anyway, sure!”

“Thank you. Really.”

“No, thank you! Anyway, this is the first time I've seen a Hunter kill a Monster with a sword. It's pretty good in its own way. As far as I know, I'm the first person in Korea to kill a Monster with a hammer. Does that make you the first person in Korea to kill one with a sword?”

Han Hee smiled faintly at my words. A few compliments seemed to have put him in a good mood.

To make him feel even better, I patted his shoulder to show he had done well. Han Hee flinched, but he still grinned. Saying he would find a new magazine this time, he quickly disappeared.

Baek Dambi came down from the building. She looked up, then asked me, “We're going to catch that now, right? The Phoenix?”

I looked at the sky she was watching.

The Phoenix was flying above us.

I looked back at her and shook my head.

“We can't catch that. Why, do you want to?”

“Yes. If possible...”

This woman really was just as greedy for credit as I was.

That was what I liked so much about her. She really was a cute bitch.

“You want to win that award you mentioned earlier? The Golden Arrow Award?”

“Yes...!”

“Still, no. Look at it. It won't even come down. How are we supposed to catch that?”

That was when it happened.

Baek Dambi, who had still been watching the sky, opened her eyes wide.

I turned toward where I had been pointing and flinched.

The Phoenix was flying toward us. Why?

It even looked much bigger than before, and it did not seem to be an illusion.

The thing had apparently enlarged itself to make hunting easier. The Phoenix, whose wingspan had grown from ten meters to sixteen, was diving toward us at an absurd speed.

I immediately grabbed Baek Dambi's wrist and used Spatial Teleportation to reach the rooftop of a nearby building.

A moment later, the Phoenix's blazing wing swept through the place where we had been standing. The asphalt melted, and my heart dropped.

It had ignored me no matter what I did until now, so why had it suddenly...

I was about to voice that question when I looked at Baek Dambi and understood the situation.

She seemed to have reached the same conclusion.

“It looks like it's targeting me?”

I looked at the Phoenix rising toward the rooftop where we stood and muttered, “It certainly looks that way...!”

As the Phoenix tried to attack us again, I used Spatial Teleportation with Baek Dambi and moved as far away as possible.

After it targeted us twice, it was clear. That bird saw Baek Dambi as prey it absolutely had to hunt.

Ice ability users were easy targets, but valuable prey. That was why Monsters inside Gates tended to target ice ability users, and even an Ice Elemental that had grown stronger could not escape that fate.

Just as I could absorb strength more effectively when I hunted Monsters with Body Enhancement or Gigantification abilities, the same applied between elementals. To a Flame Elemental, an Ice Elemental might look like a pink baby mouse born to be eaten.

I was considering whether I should put Baek Dambi inside the shelter when she asked, “Then can we catch it now?”

It was such an unexpected question that it took me a moment to understand.

It was not difficult to understand, though.

“You want to use yourself as bait?”

“Yes. If we lure it like this, we can draw that bird close enough for your hammer to reach it...”

I thought about it for a moment, then nodded. If there was a chance to hunt something, you had to hunt it.

That infamous firebird was especially worth taking a risk to kill. It was an elemental from Earth, not one born in Sword World, so there was a good chance it did not know how to open Gates on its own.

Once all this hunting was over, it might not return through the Gate by itself. It could continue wandering around the Korean Peninsula.

It would be best to kill it while we had the chance.

“So what do we do now? Should I stand in the road and sing to lure it in?”

Baek Dambi's words made me answer, “Luring it in from the road won't do much, will it? It's not like we can harpoon it and tie it to the ground. And Dambi, I heard you humming last time. If you start singing, I think that thing might run away...”

“What?”

Baek Dambi's eyes widened, and I hurriedly explained.

“I mean we lure it into a building. Once it gets inside, we'll make it hard for it to escape. You get what I mean, right?”

Of course, I had already seen that the firebird could enter a building and immediately fly back out. We would need to make preparations if we wanted to stop it from escaping.

「Jangsil? The situation is mostly over, right? If you have time, can you help us out? We're going to catch that Firehawk...」

After communicating over the radio, we carried out the operation once everyone was ready.

I found the Phoenix's location, then used Spatial Teleportation into a nearby building with Baek Dambi.

“Here it comes!”

The bait worked perfectly. The Phoenix had been flying ahead, then suddenly dived straight down.

It was clearly targeting us because it knew we were inside. Even inside a building, an elemental could see souls.

The Phoenix that had been diving reached the third floor where we were in an instant.

Then it burst through the opening in the window and entered this level of the building.

The firebird had shrunk to pass through the window, but the moment its body began to grow again, I grabbed Baek Dambi and used Spatial Teleportation.

I moved her to the floor below, then returned alone.

Repeated Spatial Teleportation.

I faced the Phoenix flying toward me by myself.

When it came right up to me, I brought down my hammer.

“Boom!”

My hammer passed through the Phoenix's fiery body and struck the floor. The shockwave that erupted from it swept through the Phoenix's body. Part of it scattered, then gathered together again.

Even after being attacked, the Phoenix had no interest in me. Looking around, it seemed to be trying to find the vanished Baek Dambi.

It had been the same before Baek Dambi arrived. The thing did not seem to want to hunt me. As an elemental, it could probably tell that I was a force-field exoskeleton user. With my heat resistance, it likely knew I would be difficult to kill.

Just as I expected, when it could not see Baek Dambi, the Phoenix tried to leave instead of fighting me.

The Phoenix flew ahead, trying to escape through the window.

Then an enormous, unbelievably enormous giant's face blocked the window it was heading for.

Seok Jangsil.

Seeing his massive stone palm, the Phoenix stopped before it could fly in that direction. Even it must have known not to let that monstrous hand grab it.

The Phoenix eventually changed direction. It turned in place, trying to escape through the side, flew a little, then stopped in midair again.

It was an unnatural stop, like it could not process the sudden situation.

Every exit from this floor had been blocked by ice.

The windows throughout the building were freezing over. More than that, walls of ice had formed, swallowing the windows and the areas around them.

Earlier, the fire trucks had been driving around spraying water everywhere. The floor of this building was soaked with enough water for Baek Dambi to use her ability. We had not chosen this place for nothing.

All four walls froze over so completely that not even air could escape. When even the entrance froze, the firebird had nowhere left to go.

Only two things remained on this floor now.

Me and that Monster.

Baek Dambi's ability activated again.

Just as before, a blizzard began raging across the floor.

It was even denser than before. The blizzard swirled around, battering the walls, ceiling, and floor. It battered the firebird and me too.

Even though I could not see my own hand in the blizzard, the firebird's presence was unmistakable.

No, trapped inside the blizzard, it somehow seemed even clearer.

Fire and ice were meeting and violently reacting with each other.

Even in the blizzard, I could see the Phoenix's brilliant glow, its body of flame, and the steam spreading where the blizzard touched it.

An elemental could see souls, so it could probably see me too.

And when a Monster and a Hunter clearly recognized each other, there was only one thing left for them to do.

“Look at me, you bastard!”

I charged, and the Phoenix flapped its wings fiercely.

Each wingbeat carried scorching heat.

The Phoenix retreated while counterattacking. Its blazing claws raked through the air.

I did not dodge. I kept charging forward and brought down my hammer through the flames.

“Boom!”

The shockwave from the hammer scattered the Phoenix's body. It gathered together again, and as if it had finally become enraged, it flapped its wings more violently than before.

Its huge wings swept over me.

Holding my breath amid the flames, I brought down my hammer again.

“Boom!”

The two of us began fighting inside the blizzard to the death. Neither could land a decisive blow, and we exchanged nothing but heat and impacts.

Whenever I scattered part of its body in every direction, it covered me in heat and flames without fail. If not for my force-field exoskeleton, I would have burned to death long ago.

Heat and flames were slowly filling the inside of my force field too. The heat from my intense movements was warming my body as well.

Even as my body felt like a fireball, I smiled.

It was thrilling.

That firebird before me, scattering fire and steam like some creature from myth. Me, facing it with nothing but a hammer in my hand.

At that moment, I could truly feel that just as the firebird before me was special, I was special too.

The non-awakened scraps, those ordinary people, had never experienced a moment like this and never would.

If I opened my mouth, heat would enter it, so I roared silently and brought down my hammer.

After exchanging another blow of hammer and heat, it became difficult to endure the heat seeping into my force-field exoskeleton.

My opponent was not unharmed either. Before entering this floor, the Phoenix's wingspan had been sixteen meters. Now its wings had shrunk to around seven meters.

I finally knew the time had come.

Just before suffocating, I used Spatial Teleportation and left that place.

I was not running away.

I was preparing for one final counterattack.

Midair...

I was in midair. At a height so great that calling it the sky would not have felt strange.

After taking a deep breath and savoring the cold air, I began to fall.

Taking in the air of the sky and gravity, I remained still for a moment without doing anything.

I enjoyed the fall with my entire body.

When the acceleration became more than even my body could endure, I finally used Spatial Teleportation.

Back to that place filled with heat, steam, and blizzard, where my enemy waited.

The moment the mythical Monster, still producing steam, appeared before me again, I brought down my hammer.

I think I shouted, “Long live Incheon!” at the same time, but I could not hear it.

A far greater sound filled my ears.

One hammer strike ended everything.

It was a hammer strike carrying all the acceleration from the sky.

The moment my hammer split through the Phoenix's body and struck the floor, the impact reached me too.

My force field shattered because it could not endure the shock. The remaining impact spread through my arms and legs, causing internal bleeding throughout my body, but that was fine.

As long as I did not die.

Then the shockwave spread.

A shockwave that swept across the entire floor as if an aerial bomb had exploded.

I watched every flame making up the Phoenix get swept away by the shockwave. Blizzard and flames surged together in every direction like waves. Steam exploded outward as well.

Everything about it was overwhelming.

When the shockwave finally spread outside, only steam and I remained on the floor.

The Phoenix was dead.

Joy rose within me as my name was chanted in my head, but I could not enjoy it for long.

Ah...

I coughed up blood in the hot steam.

When I tried to move my legs, they would not move. The shock seemed to have spread to my head as well, because I tried and failed to use Spatial Teleportation.

I tried to use Spatial Teleportation again and failed once more.

The shockwave had shattered every window and ice wall.

That was when a bird flew in from outside through the now-open exterior.

It was a bird made of ice.

Its wingspan looked to be around ten meters.

“What is this now...?”

It had a body made of ice, but it looked exactly like the Phoenix from before, so I flinched for a moment. Still, I quietly let the bird grab both my shoulders.

I could guess who had sent it.

The ice kite carried me through the hot steam and out of the building.

Then I saw the road outside.

And my ring girl standing below.

“...Baek Dambi?”

Baek Dambi was looking up at me from beside a fire truck.

My vision had been blurry just moments ago, but my Super-Regeneration had activated and restored my sight.

With my restored vision, I saw Baek Dambi looking at me with concern. She shouted in a voice that matched her expression.

“Are you okay? Something exploded, and it looked like you couldn't move!”

Before long, I could move my neck too.

I nodded and smiled.

I smiled with genuine happiness.