Chapter 117: Vicson

Pabak.

‘To the monster’s blind spot…’

Muno’s movement, charging from the slightly distant forest to the village along the ridge and through the shadows of the forest, was truly like that of a ghost, but.

Chwileuk.

The lizard giant, who had been attacking the white-haired man who had turned to smoke, immediately recognized Muno’s presence as he angled in from behind.

“Kyaaaak! What random bastard!!!”

Thump.

Sgak.

Paaaaaang!

Ignoring the white-haired man’s attack, it immediately turned around and swung its fist at Muno.

‘Ho?’

Even though a fist bigger than his own body flew towards him like a cannonball, Muno’s expression was unwavering.

‘Its reaction is faster than I thought, but…’

Its movements looked so large because of its size, and its speed wasn’t particularly threatening either.

Kwadeuk.

Kwang.

‘Wind Sprint.’

Paaaaaang!

Muno’s body, which had accelerated even more for a moment, dodged the lizard giant’s fist at an angle and dug in.

“Ha!”

Boom.

Right at the creature’s feet, Muno planted his left foot into the ground, and swung ‘Blade’ with all the force of his charge and body weight.

A gray haze shimmered on the huge two-handed sword.

The black, straight greatsword was drawn towards the lizard giant’s shin.

Jjeok.

The left leg, like a pillar, was cut off below the knee as easily as if it were a lie.

Paaaaaang!

Kwakwakwakwakwa.

“Kyaaaaaaaaaak!”

The aftershock caused by the blade that had cut through the air and the lizard giant’s scream spread out in all directions almost simultaneously.

But Muno’s attack did not end there.

‘Ha?’

Was it because it was cut so cleanly in one go?

The moment he felt the leg of the staggering lizard giant, its severed surface, was trying to reattach itself as if it were a lie.

‘Hmph!’

Boom.

Muno’s roundhouse kick, who had spun his body magnificently from the same posture he had swung the blade, sent the severed foot flying into the forest.

At that, the lizard giant’s gaze naturally turned from the white-haired man to him.

“You baaaaaaaastard!”

Thump.

A huge body approaching as if to crush the small human who would barely reach its knee.

However.

Pushuk.

The moment the creature lowered its head to look at Muno, a long sword shot out from its neck.

Chwareureuk.

Boom.

In the meantime, Muno, having tied a chain to the giant’s other ankle, slipped through the falling giant’s crotch like the wind.

Kuuuuuuuung.

“Kyarreureu, kkeureuk!”

The fallen lizard giant’s hand went to the back of its neck, but its huge hand only grasped the uncatchable white smoke.

“Kkeu…?”

The lizard giant, belatedly realizing its mistake, tried to forcibly move the demonic energy in its body, but.

“Kkeureuk!?”

The demonic energy that was draining out like an ebbing tide from the chain wrapped around its good ankle did not listen to its master at all.

And.

Pushuk.

As soon as the translucent sword was pulled out from the creature’s neck.

“Keuheup!”

A knight in pitch-black armor rushed to the front of the lizard giant’s throat as it took a deep breath.

‘Heh.’

Muno smiled inwardly, feeling the gaze of the white-haired man who was escaping the giant’s grasp by turning into smoke.

He thought he knew one more weakness of the white-haired man’s strange technique.

‘Right. Stabs or fast slashes are probably the most he can do.’

A mysterious technique that turns the entire body and weapon into smoke.

But in close combat, weight is power.

The white-haired man, turned to smoke, would have weak instantaneous power, so his destructive force when dealing with a huge monster like this would inevitably be insufficient.

In comparison.

‘My strength is my weight.’

The floundering, prone lizard giant.

Thinking that its posture resembled that of a sinner kneeling at the guillotine.

Muno looked at the lizard’s vertically slit pupils and swung his blade.

“Ha!!!”

The greatsword, with the added power of his charge, massive weight, and overflowing mana blade.

The moment the character crest engraved on the blade shone even brighter, a powerful blow fell on the lizard giant’s neck like the blade of a guillotine.

Jjeooooook.

“Kkeu…?”

The creature’s thick neck, which had recovered from penetrating wounds in an instant, was severed by the greatsword shimmering with a gray haze.

Soon, the huge head fell to the ground.

The moment he thought the lizard giant’s vertically slit pupils were staring at him.

Kuuuung.

The lizard giant’s body, its head now gone, fell flat on the ground.

The monster, which had been so powerful that he had suspected it might be stage 4, or even stage 5, had been instantly slaughtered by the combined attack of the white-haired man and Muno.

And Muno naturally thought that 80 percent, or at least 70 percent, of the credit was his.

After all, he was the one who had provided the turning point in the stagnant battle and delivered the decisive blow.

That was why he looked at the white-haired man who had landed beside him with a confident ‘how about that!?’ look.

The gaze that met his was not friendly.

In fact, the white-haired man even avoided his red eyes from him and was seen clicking his tongue briefly.

Well, I’ll be?

He didn’t like to show off, but this couldn’t help but make him defiant.

“You should at least say thank you when you receive help, right?”

“It was useless help. It was only a matter of time before I caught it anyway. Besides…”

“Ha?”

“…Now that you’ve completely blown its head off, I can’t even interrogate it.”

Look at this disrespectful little punk.

“You…!?”

Just as he was about to retort.

“There are plenty of mouths over here.”

Hearing a familiar voice, he turned his gaze and saw Rauel, beckoning with her fingers from among the fallen masked men and mercenary-like punks scattered around.

Most of them seemed to be dead, but seeing a few masked men groaning with arrows stuck in their limbs around her, a chuckle escaped him.

‘No wonder it was so quiet.’

While he was focused on the fight with the lizard giant, Rauel had already cleared out the surroundings.

The white-haired man also seemed to have just noticed it, as he was seen flinching.

He showed a very small change in expression and immediately returned to his emotionless face, but.

Muno had already seen that small change.

“Now then, shall we receive the ‘well-deserved’ thanks?”

“…”

“Hey you, you know what manners are, right?”

At that, the white-haired man, who had been looking back and forth between him and Rauel, finally bit his lip tightly.

“Hooo… Damn it.”

He let out a sigh with a strangely contorted expression and scratched his head nervously.

“Th-thanks…”

At the words that came out in a very small voice a little later, Muno could only be dumbfounded.

It was a relief that he didn’t seem to be hostile.

‘My, is it that hard to say a single word of thanks?’

He couldn’t even hear that thank you to the end.

“Hmm!?”

Psssssssss.

The moment a strange sound and a bizarre presence were felt, the white-haired man cut off his words.

But Muno couldn’t blame him.

His gaze, too, had to immediately turn from the white-haired man to the lizard giant’s corpse.

And.

Psssssssssss.

Before their eyes, the lizard giant’s corpse began to ‘evaporate’.

The feeling of the huge monster’s corpse crumbling like dust and melting into the air.

It was a characteristic of magicians for their corpses to decay as the residual demonic energy disappeared upon death.

A monster’s demonic energy is originally dissolved in its blood, so its corpse does not decay well.

But for it to decompose like that?

“What in the…!?”

While frowning, the keenly raised senses of the Demon Devourer busily scanned the scattering corpse.

But he couldn’t find out anything other than that it was a phenomenon caused by the complete disappearance of demonic energy from the corpse.

It was as if the matter that constituted the lizard man was scattering into the air along with the demonic energy.

What was even more absurd was.

Passsssss.

“Uh… huh?”

What was left in the place where the lizard giant had evaporated(?) was the corpse of a naked man with his head severed.

He had a menacing-looking face, but his body definitely looked like that of an ordinary human.

“Hul…”

Did the law of conservation of mass go to the dogs? Or was the matter that had disappeared as if melting into the air…

‘Ah, no. That’s not what’s important right now.’

It was so absurd that he found himself contemplating scientific principles he normally didn’t care about.

Naturally, Muno was not the only one who was surprised.

“Sir Muno!? What in the world…?”

Rauel approached in surprise.

The red pupils of the white-haired man, who had firmly closed his mouth again, were seen to have sunk heavily.

He had no basis for it, but he had a gut feeling.

‘That guy, he knows something.’

That thought immediately came out as words.

“You, you know something about this, don’t you?”

“…I do not. I was just chasing a human trafficking organization that kidnapped children.”

The white-haired man answered calmly, but he had clearly felt a slight hesitation just before he opened his mouth.

‘This punk…’

Even as Muno’s eyes narrowed, the white-haired man just shrugged his shoulders calmly.

“It’s a rather absurd experience, but with a person turning into a monster and that monster even talking, is this really a big deal?”

After glaring at such a guy for a moment, Muno let out a chuckle.

“Well, we’ll find out when we interrogate the remaining ones. Rauel.”

“Yes.”

“Take the captured ones separately… ah, I’d better do it.”

Chwareureuk.

The four chains that shot out wrapped around the four masked men that Rauel had left alive.

“Let’s go, Rauel.”

“Yes.”

At that, the white-haired man’s expression crumpled slightly.

“…Those are the ones I was chasing.”

“Hmm? So? We’re the ones who caught them.”

At that banter, the white-haired man’s eyebrows furrowed, and then the expected words came out with a sigh.

“…Let’s cooperate, with each other.”

Right, that’s how it should be.

But I’m not an easy man.

“You said you didn’t know anything.”

“…I have information I learned while chasing these guys.”

He hesitated again for a moment.

That confirmed it.

‘That guy, he knows about this demon cult.’

That white-haired man…

“…What kind of guy is he?”

Oops.

What he was only thinking again came out of his mouth.

Well, he didn’t think he could get a proper answer anyway.

As expected.

“A mercenary, Vicson.”

The white-haired man answered with nonsense.

“Heh… A 4-Star-level Corporeal Arts user is a mercenary?”

Even in Iron, the kingdom of knights, the level of a common knight in the Steel Knightly Order, which boasted the largest number among the royal knightly orders, was 3-Star.

Moreover, considering that guy’s strange, no, frankly amazing characteristics, it wouldn’t be difficult for him to receive a title.

“Do you have a peculiar constitution where you get a plague if you settle down somewhere? Or are you a murderer who’s crazy about killing people?”

As he naturally became sarcastic, the white-haired man who called himself Vicson added one more word.

“…Wouldn’t a free knight also be called a mercenary?”

…You’re full of shit, punk.

Fortunately, he managed to hold back that inner thought.

‘Ah, I’m also technically a free knight…’

A slight sense of common ground was formed in the midst of it all.

And.

“If you’re also chasing these guys, I think it would be better to cooperate.”

The moment Vicson was about to spill some at least slightly reliable information, Muno couldn’t help but nod inadvertently.

“…Alright. That’s true. Then shall we exchange some information we know with each other?”

At those words, a slight smile appeared on Vicson’s face for the first time.

However.

“But, why do you keep talking down to me?”

Eh?

The words that followed right after were not to his liking.

His senses, which could guess the mass of the body and even estimate the number of evolutions just from the opponent’s movements, could also roughly see the degree of development of that body.

‘A body that is almost done growing… just became an adult, or right before. At most, he would be one or two years different from me in age.’

He had been aware of that fact from the first time he saw him.

In his eyes, who also had memories of his past life, a seventeen or eighteen-year-old was just a kid.

That was why he had spoken down to him without realizing it.

‘A mistake…’

But he couldn’t back down in this situation.

“…If you don’t like it, you talk down to me too. We look about the same age.”

However.

“No thanks.”

Vicson rejected the proposal, which he had made while trying to act composed, in a single stroke.

On top of that.

“If I treat them the same way they treat me just because they’re being rude, then I’ll become a rude person too.”

“…”

A tongue that pricked his conscience.

“Shall we just share the necessary information with each other?”

Heh…

He didn’t know what kind of guy this was, but at least one thing seemed certain.

‘This punk, I really don’t like him.’

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