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I revved up the motorcycle.
It rolled over the corpses strewn across the ground. A humid wind battered my ears.
I felt Kyle turning toward me.
He tried to ram the motorcycle, but it seemed impossible. He would probably block the motorcycle's path with a sword slash.
I tensed my body, preparing to jump off at the right moment.
The bike crushed buildings and debris beneath its wheels.
It sped through the gaps between collapsed structures.
At some point, the kin came into view.
"Hilde."
"I thought you'd tucked tail and run."
Clang!
Our swords collided.
I focused solely on the fight. I didn't worry about Hecate, Sequoia, or Sion. Yoon was right behind me. He would provide support on his own.
Even if he didn't, there was nothing I could do about it.
When facing Kyle, I always had to go all in.
I felt the sword.
"What are you trying to do?"
I muttered while locked in a struggle of strength.
"What do you want now?"
"You think you've won."
His voice dripped with mockery and contempt.
I saw the gleaming golden eyes up close.
"Cowards who knelt before these things."
Boom!
The blades missed.
A circular shockwave spread out. The ground where we'd stood cratered from the impact. I heard the shock ripping through buildings, shattering their glass, and smashing the vehicles on the road.
But I couldn't turn to look.
Second clash.
There was no deflecting his sword.
Clang!
"Kyle. Just one request."
Our two swords met again.
Feeling the intensity and direction of the force transmitted through the blade, I murmured.
I knew that saying this would be a huge insult to him.
Even so, I uttered the words coiled inside me.
I pleaded.
"Surrender and come into the core."
Boom!
The impact struck my body.
Pushed back by the intensified force, I flew backward. The shock choked my throat. It hit my back next. I'd apparently crashed into something. Reflexively, I'd angled the blade away and avoided being impaled.
My internal injuries were severe.
Groaning, I narrowed my eyes.
I saw Kyle's rippling black hair.
I understood why I'd been pushed back so suddenly. He used absorption. When absorption began, faint waves formed around his body.
It had been a long time since I'd seen Kyle use it.
He'd converted the absorbed nutrients into force and shoved me away.
A furious refusal.
I pushed off the ground with my sword and staggered to my feet.
As I raised my head, Kyle was right in front of me.
Thud!
I was thrown back, slamming into something again.
I'd blocked sword with sword, but my strength fell short.
Unless I used absorption too, I'd be skewered.
"After taking one-third, you're still greedy?"
Ignoring the heavy pain, I focused all my nerves on the sword when Kyle growled.
I didn't immediately understand his words.
What one-third...
"You forced that many kin to kneel, and you're still not satisfied?!"
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!
Bullets flew.
Kyle twisted his body, deflecting the bullets with a sword slash. He'd reacted before the gunfire even rang out.
Boom! A deafening roar and a shockwave exploded right beside us.
It was a wise choice. Even Kyle wouldn't have emerged unscathed from a submachine gun barrage.
And the timing was perfect.
Because his words had momentarily distracted me.
Without support, Kyle's sword would have pierced my heart.
"Get it together."
A cold voice came from beyond the hazy smoke.
"You planning to let him slip away like last time?"
Kyle's attention flew toward Yoon.
He seemed intent on eliminating the human who'd unleashed the gunfire on him. He planned to cut him down quickly while I was off guard.
He'd taken his eyes off me for a split second, just like I had.
Seizing the moment his head turned, I raised my sword.
Boom!
The sword plunged vertically into the earth.
The sword slash flowed along the ground. The attack branched out in multiple directions, bursting the piled corpses. Things that would have bolstered Kyle's strength were pulverized and scattered into the air.
Kyle leaped back, dodging the incoming sword slash.
From beyond the smoke, Yoon muttered a curse.
"You don't distinguish friend from foe?"
"My apologies."
I apologized shamelessly.
"I didn't know you were in the trajectory."
"Yeah, right."
"See you in three hours."
Clang!
A sword approached, shoving aside the surrounding air.
Clang, clang, clang! Our blades clashed several times.
During the exchanges, I couldn't even glance around or speak. Blocking Kyle's sword and pressing my attack was all I could manage.
Boom!
The surrounding terrain crumbled into dust.
My vision wavered.
Damn internal injuries.
Even in perfect condition, Kyle was a tough opponent.
And stupidly, throughout our clashes, those words he'd spat echoed in a corner of my mind.
'One-third.'
'That many kin.'
But where were they?
I hadn't sensed any kin inside the core. All the presences I'd detected were outside the core. Right in front of me. Behind Kyle, who opposed me.
Hecate, Sequoia, and Sion were being handled by the seniors.
Ah.
Boom!
I briefly lost focus and nearly got stabbed.
I twisted away, deflecting his sword, and retreated. The barely deflected shockwave demolished the remaining building debris.
Pull yourself together.
Composing myself, I thought.
Winning seemed impossible, so I had to inflict as much damage as possible.
As I steeled myself and adjusted my stance, Sequoia shouted from within the smoke.
"Kyle!"
She dealt with Sophia and Ami using a creature encirclement formation.
"It's time to retreat!"
What?
"It succeeded! We have to go!"
Succeeded at what?
I was still alive.
The core hadn't fallen yet?
Widening my eyes, I quickly extended my senses. The senses I'd focused solely on Kyle spread to multiple areas.
Dulled by pain, but still functional.
With them, I perceived the creatures concentrated around the collapsed barrier. A full melee unfolded there. I couldn't sense the humans directly, but from the creatures' postures, I knew they faced off against the badgers.
But most of the creatures couldn't cross into the core.
Flying types kept entering, but they were shot down one after another. Even the one that flew farthest ultimately plummeted after hitting the military's artillery.
What the hell had succeeded?
Puzzled, I tried to extend my senses further when something rose from within.
I spat up a gush of blood.
"Shit."
"We could push through if we tried."
Irritated in the common language, I wiped the blood with the back of my hand as Kyle muttered.
He used the common language too.
More precisely, English, which was nearly identical.
"There are too many interferences..."
Pew-pew-pew-pew-pew-bang!
Boom! A sound like my eardrums might burst shook my ears.
Yoon had rejoined.
I'd thought he handled Sion.
The mentor had somehow closed in and detonated something.
I'd heard from the lab scientists that Yoon had no favored weapon. As someone more adept than anyone at using the terrain and objects around him, he picked whatever suited the situation.
In balanced combat ability, he fell short of Ye-hyeon. In raw power, he couldn't beat Walker; in speed, Ami; in endurance, Richard Green; in recklessness, Jason Tvain.
But in terms of lethality, Choi Yoon stood at the top.
Sion was...
"No."
The moment my sharp senses caught a kin collapsing and dying on the ground, Kyle muttered.
My senses prickled.
Boom!
We both kicked off the ground simultaneously.
Kyle would have arrived first. If not for the landmine Yoon had placed in his path exploding.
Click—a sinister sound, followed by an explosion. It was massive enough to throw me off balance as I rushed toward Sion, sending me tumbling across the ground.
Kyle rose, blood pouring from his pierced leg.
Absorption would restore his leg soon enough.
But because of that, he was a step too late.
Now I stood beside Sion.
Gripping my sword, I looked down at the kin bleeding out on the ground.
Sion wasn't a child of the World Tree. He wasn't even a formal knight. I vaguely recalled he was a mercenary.
Our connection was so tenuous I couldn't even be sure of that.
Yet I couldn't stop my hand, which held the raised sword, from trembling.
Even when I'd killed for the first time, my hand hadn't shaken like this.
I met the eyes of the kin looking up at me.
"Tell me you'll surrender."
I pleaded in a quavering voice.
"Please, I beg you."
Sion gazed up at me steadily.
Then he grinned crookedly.
"Fuck off."
Ah.
Ah...
"Hildebert!"
"Kyle! We have to retreat! There's no more nutrients to transfer nearby!"
"You cowardly bastard, you coward!"
"It's hopeless anyway. Just finish it quick."
Kyle shouted my name in the common language, Sequoia rushed to grab him, Hecate raged while blocked by Ricardo and Kal.
Sion's faint mutter.
I looked down at the man and whispered darkly.
"Eternal blessing upon you."
It was volume only for Sion's ears.
"Eternal rest."
Then, with the sword's tip aimed at Sion's heart,
"May all blood reach the place of peace."
I raised the sword,
"Rest in peace."
And plunged it down.
Squelch.
I felt life end.
One kin had vanished. The presence I'd felt snapped away. Standing still, I felt the death transmitted through the sword's hilt.
Someone spat pain and resentment, but I barely heard it.
Someone screamed, but that too barely registered.
I sensed an incoming attack, but I had neither the time nor the will to dodge.
Kisis.
I was sorry.
I...
Boom!
My body tumbled.
Agony racked me. My vision shook wildly.
When the shaking stopped, my view was soaked in red. I thought I heard Ami's scream. Someone called my name, but I couldn't tell who.
Tinnitus and dizziness made it impossible to grasp the situation.
So I lay there stupidly, staring at the sky.
Until someone approached and bent down to grab me.
A cold voice fell.
"I let you kill him with your own hands."
The mentor supported me to my feet.
"Kept him alive on purpose for that. But seeing this, I shouldn't in the future."
"No."
Panting raggedly, I lowered my eyes.
In my blurred, stained vision, I saw Yoon's uniform soaked in blood.
"Thank you."
It was sincere gratitude, without a trace of falsehood.
"For handing me the end."
I didn't want to see kin die by human hands.
Lifting my head, I met those cold black eyes.
Eyes whose thoughts I couldn't fathom, fixed on me without wavering.
Brushing over the cruelty in those eyes, I smiled faintly.
"Please do the same from now on."
The scent of blood stung my nose.
Yoon didn't reply.