WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 97: Sword Tower
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The owner of the voice sounded so utterly dumbfounded that he asked again as though he had just heard a particularly vicious joke.
But Weiling remained calm.
“It is immediately necessary for work.”
[No, I mean, a work situation requiring something like that...]
Rimon fell silent midway through what he had been about to say.
After a brief pause, he asked again, his voice more serious than before.
[...]
[Where are you right now?]
“Cheonhwa Department Store.”
[What is the situation?]
“Many dead, one injured, one enemy. The enemy is believed to be one of the assailants who attacked Black Dragon Construction.”
[Male or female? Weapon, height, weight, face?]
“Late twenties, between 177 and 178 centimeters tall, approximately sixty kilograms. He wears a Halloween mask and uses a knife.”
[Have you exchanged blows? You probably tried an ambush first.]
“He evaded Serpent Fang Probe, which I aimed at his heart from behind.”
[Perfectly?]
“He took it on his left shoulder instead.”
Perhaps because he understood this was not a joke, Rimon and Weiling quickly exchanged only the necessary information.
Listening to their call, the young man asked uneasily,
“...Comrade, isn't it a bit rude to describe someone like that right to their face?”
Yet despite saying that, he did not rush Weiling to interrupt her call.
He was curious what she could possibly be thinking, making a phone call at a time like this.
[I see. So it's that knife wielder who likes dissecting people.]
After hearing a few more details from Weiling while the young man watched, Rimon muttered as though he roughly understood the situation.
As if he now knew everything he needed.
Weiling quietly asked him,
“Can it be done?”
[One last confirmation. Is that bastard alone? There are no others?]
“Yes.”
[Hm, really? Then you're lucky. It would've been troublesome if it were either of the other two, but if it's that bastard, you'll manage somehow.]
A low laugh followed.
Too deep to be cheerful.
Too light to be serious.
At the end of that oddly nostalgic laughter, Rimon continued quietly.
[Consider it an honor.]
Even though Weiling might die at any moment, Rimon was neither shaken nor tense.
It was not because he felt no attachment to her.
The distance was too great to rush over.
The enemy was too powerful to face.
The danger was too great to resolve.
All of that was familiar to him.
As a hero who had faced enemies threatening the world, surpassed the impossible time and again, and saved humanity.
And as the first and last Tower Master of the Sword Tower, who had taught seven of the thirteen Sword Masters who had existed in history.
Rimon said with a laugh.
[Of all the swordsmen to pass through the Sword Tower, you're the first to learn swordsmanship from me on the spot in three minutes.]
* * *
[Are you ready?]
Weiling switched her smartphone to speaker mode.
She placed it in the welt pocket over her chest, secured it firmly, and answered quietly.
“Yes.”
[I'll say this just in case. If you're doing this, do it properly. What you're about to enter is a fight to the death where one moment's hesitation will cost you your head.]
“I understand, so make sure you don't make a mistake.”
[What a thing to worry about. Who do you think I am?]
“Aren't you the representative who leaves all the work to me and spends every day playing around?”
[That has nothing to do with this.]
“If you had simply come here on business, I doubt we'd be playing such a complicated three-legged race.”
[And isn't that why I'm giving you special tutoring for free? In the old days, even royalty had to empty their treasuries to receive a single lesson from me!]
“Keep old stories in the past.”
“...Excuse me, Comrade. I can't tell whether you're a young lady or not, but I'm confused here.”
After listening to their conversation for a while with a half-dazed expression, the young man raised a hand.
He scratched the back of his head, utterly unable to understand, then asked,
“You mean you're going to fight me like that?”
“Yes.”
“With that handheld phone, taking coaching from whoever's on the other end?”
“That is roughly correct.”
“...”
The young man's jaw dropped.
He had met plenty of lunatics, and he had a fairly accurate grasp of the fact that he himself was far from normal.
Even so, this was the first time in his life he had heard something so insane.
“Are you crazy, Chao Weiling?!”
Xue Rong, who had been watching from behind, was just as dumbfounded.
As someone versed in martial arts... no, precisely because he was, Xue Rong knew just how insane what Weiling intended to do was.
“I know it is insane.”
To be honest, Weiling knew she was attempting something extraordinary.
This was not Go or Korean chess.
She was going to fight for her life, where one wrong blink could decide everything, by listening to someone who was not even beside her.
Her odds of survival would have been better if she drove a racing car with her eyes closed, guided only by a navigation system.
Even so, Weiling did not reconsider her decision.
It looked insane to others.
And she was not fully certain herself.
But there was someone Weiling trusted more than herself.
“Still, I trust the Princess.”
“...”
Li Qing-yu's chosen companion.
If it was Rimon, whose greatness Li Qing-yu had emphasized again and again, then he could surely accomplish even this much.
Xue Rong found himself speechless as he looked at Weiling, who said that without batting an eye.
Even as a fellow Black Dragon Clan warrior, he could only be sickened by that faith-like trust and devotion she showed the Princess.
“Ha. Now this is interesting.”
In contrast, the young man chuckled.
Then he flicked his knife toward Weiling.
“Come at me as much as you like. As thanks for showing me something interesting, I'll let you have the first strike.”
“There is no need for you to concede...”
[Oh, he knows the code of a master. Go ahead and accept. That bastard says his arrogance is through the roof and he wants to do something stupid, so there's no need to refuse.]
“...Then I will gladly accept.”
“...Fine. Go ahead.”
Weiling's neck reddened with embarrassment at taking back her words, while the young man nodded awkwardly after suddenly becoming an arrogant bastard doing something stupid.
Having made both the one conceding and the one receiving it uncomfortable, Rimon calmly gave his instruction.
[Take the opening stance in the low stance of the Concealed Sword form.]
“The low stance...?”
Weiling hesitated for a moment.
In the Voidless Advancing Sword Style she had learned, the Concealed Sword form lowered the body and attacked upward.
There was no low stance with the sword pointed down.
[Why? Can't you do it? Then say so now. If you cannot immediately follow even this much, you will die there.]
No matter how exquisite the swordsmanship he taught her was, it would be useless if she could not execute it.
His words were half taunt, half warning.
“I did not say I could not.”
Weiling belatedly followed Rimon's instruction.
It resulted in an odd posture, as though she intended to drive her sword into the ground rather than fight a person, but she did not hesitate any longer.
The moment she decided to follow Rimon's coaching, she had already entrusted her life to him.
His warning made her realize that questioning every instruction would only tighten the noose around her own neck.
[Keep a distance of one jang, one cheok, three hundred thirty centimeters, from your opponent. Set your stride to twelve centimeters, and align the sword tip precisely with his ankle.]
“Done.”
[Good. From now on, do not answer. Move immediately as I instruct.]
“...”
‘Crazy...!’
Weiling answered with silence.
Watching her, Xue Rong swallowed another curse, but could not bring himself to say it.
He was a warrior too.
The moment she assumed her opening stance, the battle had already begun, and anything he said would only interfere.
As Xue Rong swallowed his groan.
As the young man grinned.
[Catapult Sword Shadow, Right Three Steps.]
Whoosh!
At Rimon's brief command, Weiling shot forward like an arrow.
“What an obvious tri...?”
The young man swung his knife mockingly at her frontal charge, then his eyes widened.
Weiling's already low posture dropped even lower as she rushed forward, and she slipped past beneath his left armpit as though sliding across the floor.
[Falling Wax Sealing Retreat, Reverse Heaven Stance.]
The young man turned with the terrifying reflexes of a high-level Player, trying to pursue Weiling.
But there was nothing where he turned.
Before he could fully turn around, Weiling had driven her sword into the floor with the momentum of her charge and launched herself upward from the recoil.
The moment she inverted herself in midair and planted both feet on the ceiling.
[Reverse Heaven Sky Fang, Lightning Strike Stance.]
Slash!
The sword fell like lightning from above and barely sliced across the young man's back.
‘W-What is this?’
Thanks to Rimon's voice reaching him just before Weiling descended, the young man barely avoided having the crown of his head split open, cold sweat dripping down his face.
Her speed had not increased.
She was not using different swordsmanship.
Yet for some reason, this sword was strangely harder to deal with than the ambush from behind.
The eerie sensation was like having his nose cut off in broad daylight, and it put the young man on edge.
But that was only the beginning.
[Shade Path Waves, Wind-Slaying Ghost Tracks, Chaos-Heart Tigers and Wolves, Consecutive Strike Stance.]
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
While nearly crawling along the ground, Weiling's sword relentlessly targeted only his legs, then she flipped herself over as if rebounding and stabbed him in the groin.
When he frantically avoided it, the blade that swayed like a butterfly caught in a storm took the chance to slice his thigh, however shallowly.
Sometimes it rampaged stealthily.
Sometimes it retreated dazzlingly.
Sometimes it attacked calmly.
Whenever Rimon gave an instruction through the smartphone, the sword extended in bizarre, ingenious ways.
The young man was so busy avoiding its blade that he could no longer see Weiling at all.
“Y-You...!”
The young man staggered backward.
Then, filled with bewilderment and frustration, he unconsciously screamed,
“What kind of black magic are you using?!”
It would have been one thing if she had contracted with a Constellation and received Skills.
But how could Weiling, who had been inferior to him moments ago, become so overwhelmingly skilled merely by following instructions over the phone?
The young man could not understand it and was left confused.
But at this moment, he was not the most shocked person watching this.
‘My god!’
Xue Rong swallowed a groan.
Though he was weaker than the young man, he was still an elite warrior of the Black Dragon Clan.
More importantly, because he was watching rather than receiving the attacks himself, he could roughly understand why the young man had been driven entirely onto the defensive.
‘Sword Duke, you crazy bastard...! He is reading that man's movements and devising counterforms without even seeing him?!’
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