WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 120: Impossible? What’s That, Something to Eat?
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[Team 1, Cheonhwa Department Store clear. Two targets eliminated. Please provide further instructions.]
[Team 2, Black Dragon Restaurant clear. One target eliminated. Recovering five seriously injured personnel. Will report when finished.]
[Teams 3 and 4 are engaging at Shao Trading House. Two targets located. We will handle them within ten minutes.]
[Team 5, Black Dragon Bank...]
[Team 6...]
A room filled with countless monitors.
Modeled after Leviathan's situation room, it was now flooded with calls and reports rivaling Leviathan's own.
There were three differences.
First, these were reports from the Infinity Guild, not the Black Dragon Clan.
Second, not one of them was a request for rescue or an emergency alert.
Third, one person was overseeing all of it.
“Team 1, stand by for further attacks. A new intruder has been detected by the Guardian System.”
“Team 2, move to Four Flowers Hall as soon as recovery is complete.”
“Teams 3 and 4...”
Weiling, the woman disguised as a man, frantically issued orders, like an Asura with three heads and six arms.
‘Sword Duke, I’ll kill you next time I see you.’
Rimon had suddenly signed a security service contract with the Infinity Guild, forcing her to spend several days and nights dealing with the aftermath.
And recently, she had not only added an emergency response system to the Guardian System.
She had also taken over command in an emergency.
Weiling had nearly died of overwork, and was still working herself to death, so her resentment was entirely justified.
‘If I really die of overwork, my family will never live down the shame.’
Yet the fact that she had handled all of it flawlessly was proof of Weiling's exceptional competence.
Even the situation management she was handling now would have been more than enough work for three or four people.
‘...Still, it’s true that we got past the worst of it because of that.’
Weiling had practically built and commanded the Guardian System on her own.
That was why she knew.
Her strenuous preparations had saved the subsidiaries and clan members that had been on the brink of collapse.
And that it was all thanks to Rimon.
Signing a security service contract with the Infinity Guild had been impossible in the first place.
And without the Infinity Guild, one of the Ten Great Guilds, even mobilizing several massive guilds would not have been enough to handle this crisis.
They could not even say they had fully contained the situation yet.
‘The subsidiaries on our side are at least stable. The rest are the problem.’
Weiling frowned as she checked the status of subsidiaries not registered with the Guardian System through the monitors linked to Leviathan's situation room.
Only the subsidiaries contracted with Guardian had seen their situation improve.
The rest were still fighting bloody battles against Ryu Gang-cheol's duplicates.
‘We can’t send support.’
Weiling made a cold judgment.
The contract only covered protecting subsidiaries that had joined the Guardian System.
Even if they belonged to the same Black Dragon Clan, the Infinity Guild would not help other subsidiaries without a separate contract.
And even if they did, there would be another problem.
‘We don’t have enough forces to protect every subsidiary.’
Even the Infinity Guild did not have unlimited manpower.
Meanwhile, every time one of Ryu Gang-cheol's duplicates was killed, another emerged from somewhere and attacked a subsidiary.
If they spread their forces out to help those without Guardian contracts, only for contracted subsidiaries to collapse as well, it would defeat the point.
Killers in the level 80s that kept appearing without end were that troublesome an enemy.
Unless they were high-level Players of level 60 or above, or masters of equivalent skill, they could not even be deployed effectively.
‘Unless we have three times our current forces... At the very least, twice as many, there’s nothing we can do.’
After calculating the minimum force needed to protect every subsidiary, Weiling shook her head.
Only part of their strength had been mobilized, but the forces fighting Ryu Gang-cheol now were the Seven Dragons Society's combat units and the Infinity Guild's raid teams.
They were top elites on the level of a nation's military power.
Perhaps it would be possible with a few days' time.
But there was no way they could reinforce their forces by that much immediately.
[Hey, smart fool.]
That was when a call came through.
Weiling caught the call buried amid the flood of reports, one she might easily have overlooked, and frowned for an entirely different reason.
“What have you been doing that you’re only contacting me now?”
[We can discuss that later. Make me a route and send it over.]
“What kind of route?”
[The subsidiaries without Guardian contracts. A route that lets me cover the most endangered places as quickly as possible.]
It was an abrupt request.
Understanding what it meant, Weiling made an odd expression.
“...You intend to take responsibility for everyone else's subsidiaries by yourself?”
[I wouldn’t call it taking responsibility. I was thinking of taking a walk and doing a little sword work to pass the time.]
“It’s impossible.”
Weiling spoke firmly.
Of course, she knew Rimon was strong.
He had crushed Ryu Gang-cheol by merely giving advice over the phone.
If they fought directly, Rimon could deal with Ryu Gang-cheol in thirty exchanges at most, perhaps within ten.
But that would only be true if there were one Ryu Gang-cheol, in one place, and killing him once solved the problem.
There were already dozens of confirmed locations, and Ryu Gang-cheol kept appearing again like a zombie no matter how often he was killed. No one could stop all of them alone.
[Normally, it would be impossible.]
Unexpectedly, Rimon readily agreed.
Just as one hand could not block ten hands, the difference in numbers was the ultimate unfairness in itself.
[But, smart fool, I’m not normal.]
There was only one proviso.
[I’m a Sword Master.]
“...”
There were always exceptions in this world.
And Sword Masters were those exceptions.
Weiling remained silent for a moment after hearing Rimon's declaration.
It was not because his shamelessness, saying something so arrogantly with such confidence, had left her speechless.
If anything, it was the opposite.
For some reason, her own mind found those absurd words plausible.
“I’ll send it shortly. Please wait.”
[Good. I’ll look forward to it.]
“...”
As though they had said enough, Rimon casually ended the call.
Weiling immediately began organizing the route to send him, muttering absentmindedly.
“Looking forward to it, is it?”
She knew.
That expectation concerned only her capabilities.
Rimon, who never trusted the Seven Dragons Society, would surely doubt even the information she sent, judge it for himself, and act accordingly.
Yet the fact that she felt a strange sense of pride the moment she heard those words probably meant there was something wrong with her.
‘This is all because of that man.’
After fighting Ryu Gang-cheol with Rimon's guidance, Weiling had changed.
Whenever she closed her eyes, a sword came to mind.
So whenever she had a moment, she picked up a sword.
But no matter how much she swung it, she could not feel any satisfaction.
She could never reproduce the same swordplay she had performed under Rimon's guidance, nor did that feeling, more than joy, nearly ecstasy, ever return.
The more she swung her sword, the stronger her thirst grew. Yet she could not stop swinging it. It was an endless hell.
‘If it weren’t for that man...’
What she should have felt was hatred.
She should have resented the person who had pushed her into hell.
But what rose within her was longing.
The mere sight of him brought that sword from then to mind and made her heart race.
She loathed him terribly, yet admired him. She did not even want to speak to him, yet wanted his instruction.
To avoid that contradictory turmoil, she had deliberately kept herself busy since that day and avoided meeting Rimon.
Yet merely hearing him say he was looking forward to it shook her resolve.
‘It’s a pointless concern.’
Weiling shook her head.
This was no time to be distracted by such trivial thoughts.
Beep.
Even while lost in thought, she had swiftly arranged a route based on the subsidiaries' information, then sent it to Rimon's pager.
“...No matter how I think about it, it’s reckless.”
She had only done it because it was an order.
Weiling remained pessimistic.
The more rationally she considered it, the less sense it made for Rimon alone to protect so many subsidiaries.
Beeep.
‘As expected.’
She saw the red light marking the first subsidiary on the monitor map suddenly turn green.
But disappointment rose in Weiling's eyes.
‘Too slow.’
About three minutes had passed from when he received the information until the first subsidiary was cleared.
It was an exceptionally short time for rushing there and dealing with a Player in the level 80s.
But it was not short enough.
There were more than ten subsidiaries in immediate danger.
Even if he cleared one every three minutes, by the time he had covered three or four places, the remaining five or six would already be bloodbaths.
‘What was I expecting?’
She mocked herself for feeling disappointed at such an obvious result, then forced herself to stop thinking about Rimon.
Instead, she directed the Infinity Guild and focused on saving at least the subsidiaries contracted with Guardian.
No, she tried to focus.
Beeep.
‘Already?’
Less than two minutes had passed when another red light turned green.
‘Was the second subsidiary especially close?’
Weiling analyzed the possible factors.
Perhaps Rimon moved faster than she had expected. Perhaps it was geography, or luck.
That was as long as she could remain calm.
Beeep.
‘Again?’
This time, the light changed after one minute.
Even Weiling had to raise her eyebrows at such an extreme reduction in time, one that could not be explained by any possible factor.
But that was only the beginning.
Beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep-beep!
Fifty seconds, thirty seconds, fifteen seconds, ten seconds.
The times kept shortening.
The status board rapidly turned green like neon signs in the night, while the signal tones became so frequent they sounded like an alarm.
‘What is this...?’
Not even ten minutes had passed.
Yet Weiling drew in a breath as she watched forty percent of the red lights covering the map turn green.
Even a high-level Player with spatial Skills would find it nearly impossible to make consecutive long-distance jumps at such absurd speed.
And Rimon, who was not even a Player, was crossing distances of dozens of kilometers in the blink of an eye and saving subsidiaries.
At this point, the possibility that a virus or hack had caused the status board to malfunction felt a million times more realistic.
But Weiling did not think so.
No, more precisely, she could not.
Rimon's lofty words.
Her experience of receiving his instruction.
Above all, the racing of her heart.
They told her more clearly than any evidence that this was not an error, but reality, and the result of Rimon stepping in.
So Weiling could only stare at the status board with confused eyes and mutter.
“What on earth are you doing, you crazy Sword Master?”
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