WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B.
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 76: 076
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The straight-line distance from Jungnang-gu, where I was, to Itaewon-dong was about twelve kilometers.
By car, it would take around thirty or forty minutes.
It only took me about five.
That was because I rose into the air and flew there.
-Pororong.
Carried by Iing Iing's telekinetic flight, I sped through Seoul's night sky.
As I traveled, I looked down at the ground.
Chaos was unfolding below.
The wailing sirens.
The flashing lights of police cars and ambulances.
People held up smartphones everywhere, and the occasional broadcasting van could be seen too.
A battle had broken out in Seoul at night.
Naturally, the whole city was in an uproar.
The emergency alerts had probably gone out by now, right?
Looks like the citizens of the Republic of Korea wouldn't be getting much sleep tonight either.
Anyway, I headed quickly toward Itaewon-dong.
Then I finally saw it.
-Kwakwakwakwaang!
A fierce battle was taking place at Choi Yejin's large, luxurious mansion.
“You fucking Chinese bastards!!! Get the fuck out!!!”
The walls of Choi Yejin's mansion had been smashed apart, and half the ceiling had collapsed.
Standing on the roof, Choi Yejin cursed as she fired arrows.
-Pshoong! Pshoong! Pshoong!
Every time an arrow flew, it left a red trail behind it.
-Kwakwakwaang!
-Kwaang!
-Kwaaaang!
Every arrow destroyed the surrounding buildings wherever it landed.
The firepower looked decent enough.
Wasn't that about half the destructive power of my Railgun?
Choi Yejin was a Highest Floors Hunter, and she even had a Grade 1 artifact. She definitely looked strong enough.
I turned my attention to the Chinese Hunters facing her.
“That damned Korean bastard. She's more troublesome than expected.”
-Kang! Boom!
A man swung his sword and knocked away an incoming arrow.
I had no idea what he was babbling about, but from the grating tones, it was definitely Chinese.
He was one of China's Highest Floors Hunters.
“The arrows are troublesome.”
“She may only be on Floor 41, but she's a woman who cleared Floor 41 alone every day. Don't let your guard down.”
“Fuck. She should just surrender already...!”
Unexpectedly, the Chinese Hunters hadn't managed to overpower Choi Yejin right away.
They were knocking away her incoming arrows and slowly closing the distance, but...
They couldn't rush in and seize the advantage in one go.
Those bastards.
Why couldn't they take the upper hand when it was four against one?
China was the second-ranked country in Tower climbing after the United States, so they should've all climbed higher than Choi Yejin.
Could Choi Yejin be unusually strong for someone on Floor 41?
Anyway.
“Choi Yejin has their attention right now. This is the perfect chance to snipe them.”
If I sniped them from the sky like this, I could probably deal with them easily.
I took a steel ball from my pocket.
It was one of the steel balls I'd ordered earlier to use as projectiles.
‘Coins aren't suitable for long-range sniping.’
Coins had too little mass, and their material wasn't ideal for firing with Railgun.
Their range was only around a hundred meters.
Air resistance caused them to melt and disappear almost immediately.
Of course, a short range had been an advantage when I fought in Seoul, but...
When sniping from hundreds of meters in the air like this, I needed a different projectile.
Anyway, I took out the steel ball.
“Target in the center, switch.”
I fired Railgun.
-Kwaaaang!
A brilliant flash.
A deafening roar.
The steel ball I fired tore through the darkness as a blue trail and aimed for the Chinese Hunter's head.
At that moment.
“...!”
The Chinese bastard reacted.
He shifted his stance in an instant and tried to knock aside my Railgun with his sword.
Of course, it was pointless.
-Kwajik!
My projectile shattered his sword.
Then it completely blew apart his head.
Splatter.
Blood sprayed everywhere.
Half of a broken sword blade fell with a clatter.
“Wang Feng is dead!”
“What...?! Where did that come from?! Did another Hunter come to support her?!”
“With that kind of firepower, it has to be at least a Unique-grade artifact! Be careful!”
The dead Hunter's companions cried out in shock.
Damn. An expensive Grade 1 artifact had been destroyed.
What a waste.
Still, I was surprised.
“He sensed my attack and reacted from this far away? Is that what a Highest Floors Hunter is like?”
He responded to my Railgun.
There had been a warning sign from the flash, but still.
To detect and react to a projectile fired at hypersonic speed, then try to block it...
That reaction speed was clearly far beyond human limits.
As expected, they weren't just pretending to be Highest Floors Hunters.
Glancing over, I looked at Choi Yejin.
A bright smile appeared on her face as she fought desperately from the rooftop.
“Baek Jiho!!! You finally came! You bastard, I knew I could count on you, damn it!!!”
Perhaps she was happy to see reinforcements.
She jumped around while raising her bow high.
Choi Yejin nocked an arrow to her bowstring and shouted.
“I don't know what kind of artifact that is, but...! Let's kill all those Chinese bastards! I'll draw their aggro! You handle the sniping!”
She began firing arrows.
It was rapid fire.
-Patpatpatpatpat!
Countless red trails flashed through the air.
-Kwakwakwakwakwaang!!!
Wherever her arrows landed, destruction followed.
They pierced parked cars, shattered building rubble, and smashed innocent streetlights to the ground.
The whole area was getting torn apart.
It was fortunate the nearby residents had already evacuated.
“Stay alert! We don't know where that attack will come from!”
“Goddamn it...! Why does Korea have a Unique-grade artifact?!”
“Fall back for now!”
Unable to tell where my Railgun would fire from, and suppressed by Choi Yejin's covering fire, they gradually retreated.
I gave Iing Iing an order.
“Iing Iing. Let's circle behind them.”
-Iing!
Pororong.
Following my command, Iing Iing made a wide turn and took up position behind them.
Anyone who'd played FPS games seriously knew this.
Once you got caught in a crossfire, there was no answer.
After moving behind them...
-Kwaang!
-Kwaang!
-Kwaang!
-Kwaang!
I unleashed Railgun.
A cluster of blue trails poured down from the sky and struck their rear.
“Behind us! It's behind us!”
“Dodge!”
“Aaagh!”
Of course, Choi Yejin didn't stay still in front of them either.
“Die!”
Patpatpatpatpat!
The red trails of her arrows swept over them.
That was how they were caught in an attack from both sides.
Choi Yejin's barrage of arrows came from the front.
Railgun projectiles poured down from behind.
They tried to dodge and knock away the attacks coming from both directions, but...
It was impossible.
-Kwajik!
The weapons they raised shattered instantly against my Railgun projectiles.
-Peoseok!
Their pathetic dodging movements couldn't evade the countless Railgun shots raining down on them.
Blue trails blew apart their arms and legs.
They pierced through their torsos.
“Gaaaaah!”
“Aagh! Gaaah!”
“...!”
Boom. Kwajik. Peoseok.
The Chinese Hunters died in agony as rapid Railgun fire blew apart parts of their bodies.
Arms exploded.
Legs were severed.
Their sides were ripped wide open.
Chunks of flesh and blood splattered wetly across the ground.
At that disgusting sight, I frowned.
“No... just stop struggling and die comfortably. Aren't you dying more painfully because you keep twisting around since you don't want to die?”
They were annoyingly fast.
Their reflexes were annoyingly good too.
The Railgun shots I aimed at their heads and chests kept missing and hitting their arms and legs instead.
Even when I tried to send them off comfortably in one shot, they kept dodging, so their limbs were the ones getting blown apart.
Their arms and legs were completely torn off.
Their abdomens and waists were riddled with holes as they fell.
Then, shortly afterward.
-Kwaang!
The last Chinese Hunter's head exploded.
His brains and blood sprayed through the air.
Then silence descended over the area.
I muttered quietly.
“Stealth Longbow Apache really is the strongest.”
I had been a little nervous because they were Highest Floors Hunters.
They were humanity's strongest fighters, the ones who had reached the Highest Floors.
Even this Extreme Lunatic Hell Wizard Hunter couldn't let down his guard so easily.
But Stealth Longbow Apache's power was incredible.
Thanks to Iing Iing, I could rise high into the sky.
I could conceal myself with an invisibility artifact.
Then I could rain down one-sided firepower on the ground.
The enemy couldn't even put up proper resistance. They could only be ground down!
As expected, attack helicopters were the reapers of ground troops.
And I wasn't an ordinary attack helicopter now.
I was Stealth Longbow Apache!
No ground grunt could stand against this body!
Anyway.
“Iing Iing. Descend.”
-Iing Iing!
I slowly descended into the area littered with blood and corpses.
The place reeked of blood, with disgusting chunks of flesh scattered everywhere.
I deactivated the invisibility artifact.
Then.
“Thanks to you, I lived! Damn it, Baek Jiho! I really like you!”
“Choi Yejin. Don't use memes like that. People will think it's real.”
“A meme? What meme?”
“?”
Choi Yejin came running toward me.
Maybe she was relieved to have survived. Her face was beaming.
Once she reached me, she suddenly frowned.
“You fucking Chinese bastards! You cockroaches! Die! Die! You sons of bitches!”
She began stomping wildly on the battered corpses of the Chinese Hunters.
-Thud! Kwajik! Thud!
As expected of a Highest Floors Hunter, she used her incredible strength to crush the corpses beneath her feet as though dismantling them.
The already mangled bodies were being deformed like they'd been run through a hydraulic press.
It was even more disgusting than I imagined.
I frowned and said,
“Why are you taking your anger out on corpses? They're already dead. Stop it.”
“Do you know what that Chinese bastard said to me?! He told me to become his sex slave if I didn't want to die! That crazy perverted piece of trash! Die!!!”
“You know Chinese? Those guys were talking in Chinese, so I thought you wouldn't understand them.”
“I have a translation artifact.”
“Oh. An artifact that useful exists?”
I was interested.
A translation artifact?
Should I get one later?
Anyway, while Choi Yejin vented her anger on the Chinese Hunters' corpses, I looked around and said,
“This place is completely wrecked.”
The surrounding scenery was truly a complete mess.
The streets had been destroyed everywhere. Choi Yejin's mansion was half-collapsed. Nearby cars had been smashed to pieces, while roadside trees and utility poles had been snapped apart and toppled over.
It looked no different from a battlefield that had been swept by a bombing raid.
Choi Yejin brushed back her hair and said,
“This is usually what battles between Highest Floors Hunters look like. Once we fight, nothing around us survives.”
“Didn't Choi Yejin destroy all of it?”
“That's true. Those bastards kept dodging so quickly that I kept missing.”
It seemed most of this wrecked battlefield was Choi Yejin's handiwork.
Well, every one of her arrows was an Unlucky Railgun.
Since she'd fired them wildly, the area was bound to get torn apart.
“By the way, what was that blue beam you were firing? Did you get lucky and find a Unique-grade artifact or something? Can I try using it just once? It looked really good.”
Choi Yejin seemed deeply impressed by my Railgun.
Of course she was. It had been blowing apart Highest Floors Hunters like they were tofu.
It was bound to leave an impression.
I shrugged.
“It isn't an artifact. It's my ability. The truth is, I'm Longbow Apache. I recently evolved into Stealth Longbow Apache too.”
“What kind of bullshit is that... Fine. If you don't want to lend it to me, you don't have to. My Pshoongie is useful too, you know?”
Stroke, stroke.
She carefully stroked the blue bow in her hand as she spoke.
That was the Grade 1 bow artifact Choi Yejin used.
Apparently, she called it Pshoongie.
I heard she'd named it that because it made a pshoong sound every time she fired it.
Her naming sense really was something else...
Anyway.
We had wiped out the Chinese Hunters.
Choi Yejin had been rescued safely too.
“Is Japan all that's left now?”
I took out my smartphone and tried to make a call.
Naturally, I called Han Seonga.
-Ring... Ring... Ring...
Unlike Han Seonga, who always answered quickly, the ringing continued for a long time without connecting.
Could she be fighting the Japanese bastards?
I put away my phone and said,
“Choi Yejin. I think the National Intelligence Service is under attack right now.”
“Huh? The National Intelligence Service got attacked too? Did the Chinese bastards attack them as well?”
“Not China. They're probably fighting Japan's Hunter special operations unit. For reference, I just fought Russia too.”
“?”
“Anyway... We should hurry to National Intelligence Service headquarters. Japan's special operations unit may be weak, but our National Intelligence Service special operations unit isn't that strong either.”
The Hunter special operations unit of Japan's CIRO.
They weren't a particularly powerful force.
Like Korea, their Hunter special operations members had only reached the Middle Floors at best.
They were much weaker enemies than China or Russia.
But the problem was...
The National Intelligence Service's Hunter special operations unit wasn't very strong either.
If the National Intelligence Service's Hunter special operations unit fought CIRO's Hunter special operations unit head-on, they would definitely suffer major damage.
I should go support them.
Choi Yejin nodded.
“I don't know what's going on, but we need to help the National Intelligence Service, right? Got it. Let's go quickly.”
She checked the number of arrows in her quiver and the condition of her bow as she spoke.
She looked completely ready to help.
“You'll come with me?”
“Yeah. Those bastards are fucking incompetent, but if they're still in this country, their patriotism must be real. If we can save them, we should save as many as possible. Plus, I know quite a few National Intelligence Service employees.”
“...”
“Let's go quickly. Oh, just so you know, we're running there. You know we're faster running than taking a car, right?”
I looked at Choi Yejin and thought for a moment.
It didn't take long.
Her personality was a little strange. She was an alcoholic, foul-mouthed, and hot-tempered.
Still, her feelings for King Korea were genuine.
She had rejected the enormous privileges and wealth foreign countries offered her, and she had stubbornly remained in this country on the verge of collapse until the end.
She might not be as patriotic as this Extreme Lunatic Hell Patriotic Chungmugong Hunter, but she was probably the next most patriotic person after me.
I could trust her this much.
I said quietly,
“Choi Yejin. You became a Highest Floors Hunter, so are you really going to lose face and slowly run there on foot? A Highest Floors Hunter... in other words, someone at the realm of Transcendent Martial Arts, should travel through the sky! Don't you know how to walk on air? Walk on air!”
“What kind of insane bullshit are you suddenly talking about, you crazy bastard?”
“Don't be surprised. Iing Iing, ascend.”
-Iing Iing!
“?”
Iing Iing answered from inside my coat at my command.
Pororong!
Choi Yejin and I began rising into the sky.
Then Iing Iing peeked her head out from inside my coat.
When Choi Yejin spotted Iing Iing, her eyes widened as though they were about to pop out.
“W-What is that?!”
“Let me introduce her. Her name is Iing Iing, and she's a fairy. She helps me in many ways.”
-Iing Iing!
“A fairy? A fairy? Something like that exists?! And why is my body flying through the air...”
“Iing Iing. Let's go south. We just need to cross the Han River. Ah, right. I should activate the invisibility artifact too, but there's no point with Choi Yejin here... Let's just go.”
“????”
Choi Yejin wore an expression that mixed shock and curiosity.
Iing Iing giggled as though she found that expression amusing.
That was how we crossed Seoul's midnight sky, heading south over the Han River toward Seocho-gu.
National Intelligence Service headquarters came into view in the distance.
Footnotes:
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