“KHUK...!”
The Chair coughed up blood and collapsed to his knees.
One side of his head had been completely flayed—skin torn away to the point bone was visible.
His left arm had been ripped clean off and was rolling across the ground.
Every muscle in his legs had been severed, leaving him unable to even stand properly.
“KHUHK....”
The ones who had faced him weren’t fine, either.
All of them had taken injuries bordering on critical.
And in the case of a few squad leaders and deputy squad leaders—
they were slammed into the ground in a state where you couldn’t even tell if they were alive or dead.
But even so.
“Chair...!”
“Why did you betray us?!”
The side that had won the battle—
was the Assault Team, excluding the Chair.
Leaving the Chair who had become a complete wreck,
a few people shouted through tears.
“Lee Yura....”
At that,
the kneeling Chair gave a hollow laugh and answered.
“If you’re that curious, fine. It’s not like I can’t tell you.”
“......!”
“I saw their power.”
The old man continued, his eyes filled with despair.
“I... believed in the power of Awakeners.”
“.......”
“If I could become this strong, then wouldn’t others be able to become as strong as me if they just had time? And if all Awakeners fought as one, we could overcome anything... that’s what I thought.”
A united Association is strong.
That was the reason the Chair created the Association,
and the origin of the slogan they shouted in battle.
“It was a ridiculous delusion.”
“What do you mean?”
“Their power isn’t something you can deal with just by getting strong like that. So what else was I supposed to do?”
He smiled faintly and said,
“If you want to survive no matter what, you’ve got no choice but to stick to the stronger side.”
“You really... for a reason that stupid...!”
People frowned.
Those who had been captivated by the Chair’s strength
often assumed he would also possess character worthy of that strength.
But the ones who had been with him knew.
‘He might be a hero, but he’s not the kind of man you’d call a sage-hero.’
The Chair was certainly strong.
But when it came to wielding that strength, he was a man without hesitation.
If someone stood in his way, no matter the reason,
he was the type to actively use his power and crush their skull first.
‘He’s closer to a tyrant.’
Even so, there were many who followed him,
because he tried to lead others with that power, and many had been helped by it.
But in the end, even that was something he did because it was advantageous to his own survival.
It meant he was the kind of man who could betray others at any time,
as long as there was a reason good enough for him.
“There’s no way the Chair means it.”
“......Mister.”
“He might’ve been hit by some other kind of mental attack.”
A man who said the Chair had once saved his life.
Park Sanghyun said that and turned his back.
“For now, we knock the Chair out and restrain him, then we somehow hold off the monsters that are coming.”
“......Setting aside whether that’s even possible. After that?”
“We go back to the Association.”
He shot a sideways glance at the Chair lying there with his eyes shut, then said,
“They’re enemies who did that to the Chair. They might be far stronger than we thought.”
“.......”
“Especially if they have power in the mental or soul category... with our current strength, we can’t fight that.”
He looked over the other executives besides himself.
“Don’t forget. We’re not that ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) small party that was scrambling to survive back in that hellish Anyang. We’re a large-scale guild, [Gyeonggi Province Survivors’ Association].”
“We know that.”
“We’ve handled every hard fight up to now. But this time feels different. We need to request cooperation from other branches.”
Park Sanghyun continued, eyes ominous.
“The Association’s strength isn’t just our Central Branch. If we borrow the power of the other branches, we can resolve any crisis no matter how big it is. We retreat first, somehow treat the Chair’s mind too, and then try the assault again.”
“Treat it? Are you really sure it’s a mental-type attack, Sanghyun?”
“I’m not sure... but I heard Han Iseo in the Northern Branch is an Awakener specialized in that category. If we get their help, we might be able to find the exact cause.”
They were almost at their destination.
And yet, it had become a situation where they had to retreat after reaching it.
“Going back, huh.”
“Like last time in the Demon Realm. Lately, we only ever fail.”
“How are we supposed to explain to everyone else that the Chair ended up like that....”
People’s expressions weren’t good.
But [Priest] Seong Jinhye gave a small smile and comforted them.
“Still, compared to the Demon Realm, no one died, right?”
“Well... that’s true.”
“And the side holding off the monsters—since Squad Leader 1 went there, they’ll be holding up well.”
Warm holy power gathered in her hand,
and she pushed people forward with that hand as she spoke.
“Don’t get so depressed! In the end, what matters is that you’re alive. If we’re alive, we can look to the next time.”
“......You’re right.”
In the end,
after holding off the incoming monsters, the Assault Team chose to retreat as safely as possible.
“Then everyone, hurry! The others will be fighting desperately to hold back the monsters!”
“Yes!”
“Maybe the battle over there is far harder than here.”
The people exhausted from battle turned their backs
and started toward where the other Assault Team was fighting—
“Everyone, steel yourselves—”
SLICE-
“H... huh?”
Park Sanghyun, moving with his back turned.
A blank sound leaked from his mouth.
‘Huh?’
THUD....
His moving steps collapsed,
and his view dropped sharply.
When he fell completely to the ground against his own will,
the last thing reflected in his closing vision was—
‘Old man...?’
The Chair, who had looked like he didn’t even have the strength to stand.
Gangsan, swinging that greatsword.
*****
[Awakener - Park Sanghyun has become combat-incapacitated!]
[The fear spread across the battlefield, ‘Senior Knight’s Roar,’ is neutralized.]
THUD....
“......What!?”
“We tore every muscle—!?”
The old man they were sure they had neutralized raised his body again,
then cut down Park Sanghyun, who had been moving with his back turned.
The only person who could endure the Chair’s attacks in a frontal fight.
When Park Sanghyun collapsed helplessly—
“Tsk!”
The first to react was the assassin.
Jin Sahyeok.
SWISH-
Without hesitation, he kicked off the ground and got behind the Chair at tremendous speed.
Then,
he clamped the Chair’s head with both hands crossed—
CRACK...!
“......!”
With power so strong it didn’t seem believable for an assassin,
he snapped the Chair’s neck a full 180 degrees.
“My god, Sahyeok—!”
“He might’ve been hit by a mental attack, and you killed him...!”
No matter what, he had been their leader.
They thought they should subdue him, but not kill him—
and yet Sahyeok killed him in a single motion.
People panicked at the sight, but—
“This is what it took.”
Despite the people’s shaken eyes,
Jin Sahyeok spoke calmly.
“I don’t know what it is, but he moved even after we tore every muscle in his body. I don’t know what kind of anomaly might happen, so we have to make sure he’s dead—”
And then.
THUD!
“......KHUK!”
The old man they thought had died with his neck snapped.
That old man swung his arm—
and drove his elbow into the assassin’s solar plexus as the assassin was holding his neck.
‘...How!?”
Assassin.
Even as he was sent flying through the air from that blow, Jin Sahyeok thought—
‘I kept my right hand with the weapon ready, just in case....’
He wasn’t a fool.
The man they believed was completely neutralized had risen again.
He thought an unexpected counterattack might happen, so he stayed on guard.
...But what the old man swung wasn’t his right hand.
‘The left arm Park Sanghyun cut off....’
Frost rose where the left arm had clearly been severed,
and that frost gathered, moved, and replaced the missing arm.
“......The Chair is still standing!”
“Press him! We have to kill him completely!”
What he had shown before—
that unknown ability that handled ice, and the sudden boost in physical capability—was shocking enough.
But he hadn’t shown anything this absurd.
Those who grasped the situation took their battle stances again.
“Got him!”
A squad leader’s sword strike
cut clean through the Chair’s neck.
SLICE-
The young swordsman, feeling the clean bite as he passed through the neck, thought to himself,
‘That was the cleanest slash out of every sword I’ve ever swung in my life!’
He was already a powerful swordsman—an Awakener at the squad leader level.
The best strike of his life.
It was such a beautiful sword path that even he wondered if he could ever swing a strike like that again.
‘No matter how monstrous the Chair is...!’
That attack worked even on the powerful Chair.
The old man’s severed head flew through the air—
and then.
GRAB.
“......Huh?”
The Chair calmly reached out,
caught his own head mid-flight with one hand—
and then—
CRUNCH.
“KHUK...!?”
With the other hand holding the greatsword,
he thrust—
and stabbed straight into the squad leader’s chest as the man stared blankly.
Then—
“......Hoo!”
SQUELCH....
He shoved the head he’d cut off back onto his neck,
and the old man spoke with an indifferent voice.
“As expected, you have a sharp hand, child.”
“.......”
“I thought you had talent. But to think you could deliver a strike like that.”
Frost formed along the severed line,
and the head that should have been separated smoothly reattached.
People who saw it muttered blankly.
“An immortal...?”
Even after that, the fight continued.
After confirming the Chair’s ability, they fought while conserving their bodies as much as they could.
But even so—
‘He won’t go down.’
Even if they cut off his head.
Even if they split his spine in two.
Even if they crushed his skull.
Even if they pulled out his brain and tore out his heart.
Even if they scorched his entire body with intense flames.
“You’ve... become a monster...!”
The Chair—
never fell.
“I told you, didn’t I? You can try to kill me as much as you want.”
The Chair said with a smile.
“No matter how much you try to kill me, I won’t die.”
“.......”
“And... if I just don’t die, then time is on my side.”
The meaning in those words was easy to grasp.
“S-squad leaders...!”
“......You—!”
In the middle of the battle,
an Awakener came running from behind them.
“Why are you here! We sent you to stop those monsters!”
“Where’s Squad Leader 1, and you’re—!”
“S-squad leader is... khuk.”
That Awakener
shouted through tears and snot.
“Squad leader... was captured by the monsters.”
“......!”
“The ones left are holding out somehow... but most have already been taken by them.... We—we can’t hold any longer...!”
A dark shadow fell over the faces of those surrounding the Chair and fighting him.
‘The Association’s elites are already wiped out...?’
‘No. It’s not that they were wiped out already.’
They were overpowering the Chair—
but they couldn’t subdue him.
‘That means time passed.’
‘A lot more time than we thought.’
Much more than when they first thought they’d brought the Chair down.
‘This Chair alone is an impossible enemy.’
‘If the monsters swarm in here too....’
They—
could only be annihilated.
“.......”
“E-executives? What should we order...?”
Normally,
they would’ve judged there was no chance and ordered a retreat.
But—
[Active Effects]
[Curse of No Retreat]
[This is a curse cast with the full power of the ‘Cursed Dark Knight.’]
[Unless the curse caster dies or becomes unable to maintain the curse, the curse targets cannot leave the battlefield.]
[However, the curse caster also cannot leave the battlefield.]
“So that’s why you used this instead of the [Curse of Decline] you always used.”
“......You planned this from the start!”
The curse rooted beneath their feet
blocked even retreat.
“Jinhye! You’re a priest. Can’t you do something about this curse?!”
“I can’t. The Chair’s curse is too strong....”
“No...!”
No answer in sight.
Everyone was about to fall into despair—
when—
“......Wait.”
One of them
spotted something and shouted.
“Yunseong!”
“......Squad leader?”
The beginning of this fight,
and the one who had to watch every battle from the ground
after being wounded by the Chair—
Ha Yunseong.
“Run!”
“R-run...?”
The Chair’s curse can only apply one per individual.
“......!”
Because of [Curse of No Retreat], a black shadow lay beneath every Awakener’s feet—
but beneath his feet....
it did not exist.
*****
‘[Curse of No Retreat] isn’t rooted there...?’
It was only a brief moment, but—
‘Ha Yunseong was the first person to be struck by the Chair’s initial ambush....’
‘He suffered a different curse, so he isn’t a target of the Curse of No Retreat!’
Those who saw that no shadow lay beneath Ha Yunseong’s feet instantly grasped the cause.
And then—
“......Everyone, move!”
After all making the same judgment,
they began to move fast.
[Priest] Seong Jinhye approached him
and placed her hand on his body.
[Blessing – Light Steps]
[Intermediate Holy Healing]
“Mr. Yunseong. Listen carefully.”
“Y-yes...?”
“You have to run.”
That pure white light that descended from her hand
made Ha Yunseong—whose thigh had been cut—into a body that could walk.
“R-run...?”
“You have to run... and inform the Association.”
“Inform them... of what...?”
The one who answered that
was Ha Yunseong’s direct superior—his squad leader.
“The Chair fell for the enemy’s scheme!”
“......!”
Seo Younghee stood beside Ha Yunseong with a shield raised as if to protect him and shouted,
“We still haven’t identified what caused the cold, but this confirms it’s not a fortunate existence... so we have to subjugate it no matter what!”
“B-but....”
The defeat in this battlefield was thick.
Probably—
everyone here would end up kneeling to those monsters.
And in that situation, telling only him to run—
“How can you tell me to do that...!”
“......To begin with.”
And then,
there was an uninvited guest who cut into that conversation.
“Who said I’d let you go?”
“Khuk...!”
Seo Younghee hurriedly blocked him,
but she couldn’t withstand the power packed into the old man’s greatsword and was blown away.
The moment Ha Yunseong was about to be split in two—
CLANG!
“......You’re annoying to the very end, Sahyeok.”
“Like you have room to talk....”
The assassin appeared without even wiping the blood at the corner of his mouth.
Jin Sahyeok’s dagger forcibly twisted the sword’s path away.
“Huup...!”
The Chair tried to cut down Jin Sahyeok—
TWANG!
[Pushing Arrow – Modified]
“......You really going to do that to your sworn brother, Jihan!”
“Bullshit—how long are you going to drag around some sworn brotherhood you made while blackout drunk?!”
Shooting Unit Captain Jang Ji Han’s shot, fired with trembling hands,
pushed the Chair several meters back.
[Fire Pillar]
“I... I don’t have mana.... I can’t hold this long, so hurry...!”
The gap formed between the Chair and Ha Yunseong—
was filled by a wall of fire.
As the Chair tried to break through the wall of fire and reach them—
GRAB.
“Run!”
“......B-but!”
Jin Sahyeok
grabbed Ha Yunseong by the nape.
“This isn’t a request—it’s an order!”
THROW!
“Fighting here is our role! So you have to take the role you’ll need when we lose!”
Jin Sahyeok shouted as he threw him with all his strength.
“There are still many people left in the Association!”
“......!”
“So that they can avenge us...!”
Ha Yunseong, flung by Jin Sahyeok,
focused on that order even as he flew through the air.
“So that they can survive the battles that are coming...!”
In his head,
only one order was carved in.
“Tell others what you saw here...!”
*****
As his vision blurred,
Ha Yunseong thought.
‘I wanted to tell them... but because of this curse, I couldn’t open my mouth.’
If he somehow survived and returned,
he wanted to tell others what he had gone through—
but—
[Blade of Silence]
because of the curse’s effect,
he couldn’t speak.
A curse that didn’t even appear in the status window,
a curse that made it impossible—by his own will—to say anything that would harm the Chair.
-The Chair is enduring it!
‘...The Chair.’
The moments he wanted to reveal the truth he knew—
after that, there were dozens.
No—hundreds.
‘I’m sorry... I’m sorry....’
Each time,
Yunseong clenched his teeth and suppressed the words trying to burst out of his throat.
But it wasn’t because he feared death.
‘Not yet....’
When he ran away alone, abandoning people, and survived—
when he was given a single mission by those people—
Yunseong made a vow.
‘Still... not yet.’
That he would die if he violated the restriction of this curse was a settled fact.
So—
‘Just once.’
When he was most certain.
When it could deal the greatest damage to the Chair.
‘Yeah... right now.’
That was when he would open his mouth.
*****
“I never once thought we could beat the Chair. Even so, the reason I came this far... was to become certain.”
“What are you—?”
“I’ll probably only get one chance to speak, so listen closely.”
Feeling the touch of blades closing in to pierce his heart,
he clutched his own chest and opened his mouth.
“The item the Chair first obtained... when he formed a party....”
“......?”
“I heard the reward back then was a blade.”
I heard that too.
The Chair formed a party as the second-fastest in the Republic of Korea—
and he said he received a blade as the reward.
“If it’s that greatsword, it doesn’t look like anything special.”
Naturally,
I assumed that greatsword he was swinging was the reward.
But—
“......No.”
Apparently,
that was my mistake.
“I’ve heard it from the executives. The reward the Chair got back then wasn’t some greatsword like that.”
“......Then what?”
“A dagger!”
...A dagger?
“They received a dagger as the reward. And the Chair took it.”
“......!”
“But from a certain point on, that dagger stopped being seen. Even the executives didn’t know where it went... but now I’m certain.”
“GRAAAAAAAH!!!”
As he began to speak,
he could feel the blade lodged in his chest begin to stab into his heart—
but even so—
“KHUK....”
Yunseong spat blood,
bit down hard,
and said while clutching his chest.
“Right... here.”
“In the last fight and in this fight... the Chair didn’t care at all whether his head got cut off, his heart got torn out, his brain got crushed... but... there was one place!”
The only person who had witnessed the Chair’s combat more than once.
“The dead center of his chest!”
“......!”
“He protected that place no matter what...!”
A fact only he could know.
