WeTried Translations
Translator: ZEROSUGAR
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Regression is Too Much
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Chapter 297
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The regressor fights (16)
Persuading the angel, the part I'd figured would be the easiest, turned out not to be easy at all.
"Ah, no, I can't allow that!"
"Come on, we're telling you we'll take care of it. Archangel Raphael already agreed to this."
"Still, no!"
I tried selling him on the Archangel's authority. I tried coaxing him. I tried threats. I ran through every method I could think of, but Jake the angel dug in stubbornly.
"Our Archangel will come and resolve this personally! I cannot allow it!"
"What if he doesn't come?"
"He will come!"
"...I told you, Archangel Raphael is the one who sent me to ask."
"Then it's even more out of the question! Floor 28 is under our Archangel's jurisdiction! If word ever got out that another archangel had to step in and clean up our mess, we would never be able to hold our heads up again!"
In other words, the problem happening was one thing, but they needed to be the ones to solve it themselves or their pride wouldn't survive it. Apparently having some "envoy of another archangel" swoop in and fix everything would be an unbearable loss of face.
"Fine. Fine, you win."
So I regressed again, no choice about it. Next cycle, instead of mentioning the Archangel at all, I tried a different story. I'd seen it in a dream.
"...You saw it in a dream? How does that make any sense?"
"I have some skill with souls. My sixth sense is open. Strange visions drift through my head every time I sleep, and among them, I saw Floor 28's future."
"..."
"The Archangel... won't come. Floor 28 will be destroyed by the Heavenly Demon. We have to stop that from happening."
I figured that much would be enough to convince him.
"A dream is nothing but a dream! Don't try to deceive me with such nonsense!"
"Ah, for fuck's sake."
Jake the angel held firm again. In the end I had to regress once more and change my approach entirely.
"I saw it in a dream. The Heavenly Demon, waking up."
"..."
"Of course, the Archangel does arrive eventually. But he's a little late, and by then the damage has already been catastrophic."
"T-that can't be..."
"But!!! Right now, we can still stop it! Head the situation off before it ever reaches the Archangel! What if we took down the Heavenly Demon ourselves, before it gets that far?"
"..."
The plan of "the Archangel does show up, just barely in time, but a little late, so things might turn out messy either way, so why don't we just handle it ourselves beforehand?" worked better than expected.
Under normal circumstances, there was no way he'd buy it. Angels aren't stupid. Who believes someone who suddenly claims they saw something in a dream? I'd count myself lucky if he didn't throw salt at me and tell me to get lost.
"W-well, should we try...?"
But right now Jake the angel was mentally and emotionally fragile. Desperate enough to disguise himself as a human and sneak into the Tower, knowing full well he shouldn't. He'd grab at any straw. He wanted to do something, anything.
"My companion and I will fight him first. If that doesn't work, we'll go find an Elixir at that point. Of course the Archangel could solve this the moment he arrives, but do we really need to bring out a butcher's knife just to kill a chicken?"
"That is... true..."
And so, we barely managed to talk Jake the angel into it.
I couldn't believe it had eaten up three whole cycles.
Whether the Archangel had dropped a hint somewhere, or whether this too was just some brutally precise algorithm adjustment...
"The next opponent Heavenly Demon Guntar will call out is Choi Ji-won-nim."
"Are you certain?"
"Certain."
The Heavenly Demon's next opponent had been set as Choi Ji-won. Honestly, I would have preferred jumping him two-on-one instead of one-on-one, but there was no way Colosseum Management would let anyone near the Heavenly Demon while he was holed up in his room, and even if they did, they'd have all kinds of countermeasures prepared. (Apparently Colosseum Management considered Guntar their next big star.)
The only way to drag the Heavenly Demon out of that room was to pull him into the ring. Fitting, really, for a place like the Colosseum.
Match day arrived.
"...You'll be okay?"
"I'll be okay."
Choi Ji-won finished her combat preparations.
The Heavenly Demon still hadn't killed a human yet. He hadn't put on any particularly memorable performance. The same went for Choi Ji-won. This match hadn't even been advertised by the Colosseum, so it drew almost no attention. Only a handful of people who'd caught wind of it somewhere bothered to show up. The small arena was, comparatively, quiet.
"...Hah."
I sat in the stands, fidgeting with my hands, staring down at the arena. I'd rather be the one fighting, honestly. Watching someone else fight, and watching Ji-won fight of all people, was murder on the heart.
No. Trust her. Trust Choi Ji-won. At the very least, she was the strongest swordsman I knew. If you asked anyone to name the five strongest players in the world, she'd be on that list.
The Heavenly Demon, at his weakest point, not yet grown at all. Choi Ji-won, fully prepared, in peak condition.
Earth's strongest swordsman. The universe's greatest demon.
"..."
"..."
Drones buzzed through the air overhead. Choi Ji-won and Heavenly Demon Guntar. Neither one spoke. They simply stood there, staring at each other.
Masters recognize masters. Had the fight already begun? The two fighters' eyes swept busily over stance, mana, weapon. Top to bottom. Bottom to top.
"...Ahem."
"Hmm, hmm."
The tension of that standoff spread through the stands somehow, and even the spectators chattering through their devices fell silent. The two of them just standing there was, oddly, impossible to look away from. Like a magnet, it pulled in every ounce of attention.
Shhk.
The Heavenly Demon. Guntar took one step. Not to attack. He'd picked up one of the weapons scattered across the floor.
"A sword."
The weapon Guntar picked up was a sword. Coincidentally, the weapon hanging at Choi Ji-won's hip was also a sword.
"Ha."
Choi Ji-won let out a short breath. Guntar didn't respond. At this point, the Heavenly Demon showed no emotion whatsoever. Later, after he'd fought a fair number of matches, he'd burst into mad laughter or flash a sneer, but this early on he kept a flat, blank expression the whole time. Probably because he hadn't yet secured full control of the body.
"Fighters. Are you ready?"
There was no dedicated commentator, so the drones buzzing overhead served as referee. In the round arena, so much like a Colosseum, the drones' mechanical voice was the only sound.
"..."
"..."
Neither fighter answered. They only adjusted the grip on their weapons.
"Begin."
That was the signal.
Chaaaaang!!!!
With a sharp ring of metal, two blurred shapes vanished and reappeared at the edges of the arena. Vanishing, reappearing. Vanishing, reappearing. It looked almost like flash step, complete with sharp sound and scattering sparks.
"...!"
Every mouth in the stands fell open. They'd come to this arena expecting nothing much. None of them had imagined they'd witness combat at this level.
"Ohh."
Somewhere in the crowd, a tentacled creature wrapped head to toe in turban-like cloth let out a sound of admiration. Its aura was steady, and a terrifying amount of mana churned inside its body. Clearly a considerable master.
The tentacle, which had been flicking its tip restlessly through the folds of cloth, spoke up flatly at some point.
"The human woman is losing ground."
That was true. The average spectators were still marveling at what looked like flashy teleportation, but if you looked closely, Choi Ji-won kept getting pushed back.
"The human woman's balance is good. But Guntar's sword is too heavy, and too fast."
Choi Ji-won was responding exactly by the book. No mistakes. She kept choosing the optimal move every single time.
It was just that Guntar was too fast, and too heavy. Every clash of blades cost Choi Ji-won something. And dodging instead of parrying wasn't an option either, because his sword paths were far too precise. Coercion. That was the right word for it. The Heavenly Demon was forcing losses on her.
"Ahem..."
"Hmm..."
Once the tentacle offered its commentary, the other spectators finally nodded along. Even Colosseum audiences developed a trained eye with enough time in the seats.
"..."
Meanwhile, I was smiling to myself. Right now Choi Ji-won looked like she was losing ground.
But she hadn't used Heart of Lightning Flash yet.
"Bung-bung. Let's go."
Flash!
Blue lightning struck down across the arena. Most of the crowd shielded their eyes against the blinding light, but a rare few of the stronger fighters kept watching the arena without flinching.
Kang! Kang! Kang!
The tide turned. Now it was Choi Ji-won pressing the attack. The only reason the Heavenly Demon had held the advantage until now was simple: he'd been faster and hit harder.
But now Choi Ji-won was faster. Now Choi Ji-won hit harder. The Heavenly Demon's heavy blade couldn't reach her anymore, while her lightning kept singeing his fur again and again. Now it was the Heavenly Demon giving ground.
"...!"
There was no way the Heavenly Demon wouldn't notice that shift. His stance, both hands gripping the sword tightly, changed. From a heavy blade to a fast, defensive one. Mana wrapped around his whole body to guard against lightning's incidental damage. A shockingly fast, immediate adjustment.
"He's found the optimal answer."
The tentacle commented. Yes, that Heavenly Demon was no ordinary Heavenly Demon. He was, after all, a "growing" Heavenly Demon. Someone gifted enough to steal another's martial arts just by watching them fight, a brutal slaughterer who had wiped out every human on an entire planet. The Heavenly Demon shifted into whatever form gave him the most efficient way to counter Choi Ji-won.
Blades clashed evenly again. The faster, stronger side was still Choi Ji-won, but the Heavenly Demon's swordsmanship held rock solid. His intentions were obvious. He meant to buy time. He'd apparently figured out that Heart of Lightning Flash was a technique built for short, decisive battles.
But after only six exchanges...
"?!"
"How?"
It was Choi Ji-won pressing forward now. Wounds multiplied across the Heavenly Demon's body. His blade visibly chipped. Blood-soaked fur scattered through the air.
The reason was simple. Choi Ji-won had shifted to counter his defense in turn. Change wasn't the Heavenly Demon's exclusive property.
We already knew the Heavenly Demon was a monster. We knew the sheer breadth of techniques he had at his command. We understood that victory demanded a fast finish, and that the Heavenly Demon might try to drag things out.
"That woman... is she a genius?"
Choi Ji-won had said she was confident. Sure, her opponent was a monster, but she'd given her whole life to the sword too, she'd said. Barely twenty years of a lifetime, but she swore that life carried more color and depth than anyone else's.
Time flows differently for geniuses. Something someone else couldn't manage in a lifetime, a genius pulls off in an instant. For some, it was barely a minute of combat. For her, it was more than enough time to take one more step forward.
The Heavenly Demon's swordsmanship shifted again. For a moment it looked even, then he was pushed back again.
Fast, light swift-blade. Dazzling illusion-blade. Overwhelming dominant-blade. Heavy blade. Soft yielding-blade. Fierce hard-blade. Ever-shifting transforming-blade. A crude imitation of Choi Ji-won's own style, an orthodox-blade.
None of them lasted past five exchanges. All of it meaningless before Choi Ji-won's blue lightning. Bung-bung swung. Blood sprayed. A long gash opened across the Heavenly Demon's chest.
The human woman might actually win. That was the moment everyone started to think it.
Chaeng!
Choi Ji-won took a step back. Her breathing broke rhythm as she deflected a sword the Heavenly Demon had suddenly thrown at her. She could have forced her way through and closed the distance anyway, but she didn't. The Heavenly Demon had already pulled a dagger from somewhere on his person. If she'd rushed him, she would have been stabbed.
"I acknowledge it."
"..."
"You... are a genius of the sword."
The Heavenly Demon spoke. Had he ever spoken this early before? Had this brutal exchange accelerated his growth? Choi Ji-won seemed to have reached the same conclusion I had, her expression hardening.
"So."
The Heavenly Demon picked up the whip lying on the ground. Dagger in one hand. Whip in the other.
"I shall show you the respect you deserve."
The blood-soaked beastman declared it. This was only the beginning.
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