The Druid Who Devoured the Great Nature

Woooong!

A faint haze rose from Lian’s entire body. The hem of his clothes floated up on its own, and his hair stood on end. A graceful and grand flow of mana was felt from his entire body. It took a single breath to prepare, and an instant to pour out the attack.

Kwaaaa!

A menacing killing intent, enough to suffocate, formed at the tip of his blade and rushed towards me. An attack that raged breathlessly, as if embodying the image of a waterfall pouring down. It wasn’t just fast. It seemed to be swayed by instinct and swung wildly, yet it was sharply aimed at my vitals.

Spot!

It was a close distance where only the opponent’s upper body was visible in my sight. Lian didn’t stop there. Half a step, then another step. He approached a distance where a fistfight would be more appropriate than swinging a sword. Was his purpose not to give me time to come up with a countermeasure? It was a slugfest that had abandoned the interval.

Sgaaak!

I narrowly avoided the attack and grasped Lian’s movements. Compared to his excellent physical ability and reflexes, his swordsmanship was surprisingly not special. His strength was probably the instantaneous change of ability through his mask. He was specialized in catching the opponent off guard rather than subduing them with standard methods.

It was the same now. It was as if I were facing multiple personalities sharing one body in turns. Well, if he had such a unique ability and was also excellent at swordsmanship, he would have made a name for himself long ago. However, if you faced him for the first time, it would be extremely difficult to deal with. That must be why the other two contractors had been defeated by Lian.

But for me, he was an easier opponent than a orthodox swordsman. If this had been a battle to compete with each other’s skills, it would have been much more troublesome. I too was not the type who had properly learned martial arts. Therefore, his tactics were also familiar to me. Movements that blatantly aimed only for the vitals rather than subduing the enemy with skill and wits. The essence revealed after stripping away the flashiness is just a trick.

Tricks could be crushed with overwhelming power.

Jjeong!

“Kuk!”

The Totem of Protection. Lignification. I parried his sword with my wrist, which was doubly protected by a barrier. As the blade was repelled with a spark, Lian’s wrist couldn’t withstand the rebound and bent. The reason he could pour out such a flashy and fierce onslaught without wavering was not because of his strong upper body. It was thanks to the support of his firmly rooted lower body.

Even at this moment when his sword was pushed back, his legs were still firmly holding his center. In other words, it meant a fixed target.

I lifted my foot and stomped down.

Kwajik!

Lian’s shin, trampled by my heel, split in half. The distorted expression revealed through his mask exposed the pain he must be feeling. However, even if it was a critical hit, it was not enough to completely incapacitate the opponent. Enduring pain is something contractors are used to.

He spun around on his good leg and changed his mask. A mask with an angular shape like a rock. For a moment, I had the illusion that his sword had become huge enough to crush a person.

Kwaaang!

When he swung his sword, instead of a sharp sound of wind, I felt a dull pressure crushing the air. The stairs caught in its trajectory collapsed, and the railway was crushed and plunged below the ground. Not only was a pit dug at the point of impact, but the ground was split in a straight line like a furrow.

Had he abandoned lightness and chosen weight? His flexibility in modifying his strategy according to the situation was praiseworthy. But just as his strengths were clear, his weaknesses were also clear.

A tactic of actively changing masks according to the situation. That would be the cause of his defeat.

Tatatat!

The bullets fired from the M2 Maximum collided with the side of the sword. The trajectory of the sword, which had been plunging straight down vertically, was twisted diagonally. Stone fragments and concrete crumbled, and a black dust rose faintly like a fog. His sword, once again, failed to reach me and just pointlessly shattered the floor.

Kwajik!

I wrapped the whip-like stem around the sword he was trying to pull out with force. The tree bark covering the stem added weight. It was a move that would be an extreme burden for him, with one of his feet broken.

Ppudeudeuk!

Lian, gritting his teeth, bit his lip and struggled. My sensitive hearing caught the sound of his muscles, which had been pushed to their limit, tearing. He was trying to retrieve the sword rather than letting it go. A judgment engraved in his instinct, something a swordsman couldn’t help. That was the opening I had aimed for.

Ppeok!

A straight punch, delivered with a twist of my waist, hit his left cheek directly. It wasn’t an ordinary punch. The aura, concentrated to the point of forming a halo of light, not only shattered his mask but also, sharpened like the talons of a bird of prey, tore his skin.

Kwajik!

Then, I kicked him hard in the stomach. With the monstrous strength loaded into the kick, Lian’s body flew not in a parabola but in a straight line. His tenacity in not letting go of his sword even in this situation was remarkable. Though it was a useless stubbornness.

Kudangtang!

“Keoheok!”

Lian, who had hit his back on the front of the train, coughed and vomited blood. The color, which was closer to black than red, was probably not because of the dark lighting. Compound fracture, muscle rupture, internal bleeding… Even if he was called a superhuman, it would be hard to overcome such details. It was a situation where he had to worry about his life, not whether he could continue the battle.

“How are you feeling?”

“Krrreuuu!”

“Are you ready to admit that you were greedy now?”

The change in ability through the mask. It was surprising, but that was all. It was a fatal move against a low-level or an equal opponent, but not against a master. Should I call it a textbook example of being strong against the weak and weak against the strong? The potential seemed sufficient, but it was a flaw due to his own lack of ability. He must have been engrossed in learning how to handle the mask rather than swordsmanship after getting his hands on it.

Of course, the result was this, but his skills were not to be belittled and disparaged. The two contractors had already been defeated without even being able to put up a decent fight. It wasn’t for nothing that he had been commissioned by Councilor Sorbet. If his opponent hadn’t been me, he might have achieved his goal.

And Lian’s fighting style was impressive to me.

‘It’s quite a lesson.’

Right after awakening the druid’s abilities, I had first focused on developing the World Tree’s abilities. I had established my current fighting style, which combined a gun and aura, only after accumulating numerous battle experiences. In game terms, it would be close to a hybrid character.

‘My current fighting style is not wrong.’

In the game, the one specialized in one ability was evaluated as better than a hybrid character. But this world was now a reality. Eliminating weaknesses was more advantageous for survival than maximizing strengths.

‘The standards would be different in the world of monsters, though.’

Lian’s fighting style, which engaged in close combat relying on the ability of his mask, could be said to be similar to mine. That’s why the weakness of his that I had dug into also applied to me. Even if not, if his swordsmanship had been excellent, it would have been a much harder fight.

‘There’s no need to worry now, getting scared in advance.’

It was unknown what kind of ability development I could achieve if I succeeded in retrieving a spirit beast. For now, it was enough to be aware of my weaknesses. If I kept it in mind, I might be able to come up with a way to overcome it someday.

“……It’s been a long time since I’ve felt this kind of powerlessness. Yes, I admit it.”

Lian stood up, trembling, holding onto the front of the train. The concentrated mana, like water, dripped from the broken mask. His body being broken was secondary. The source of his ability was that mask. Now that the mask was broken beyond repair, the victory was completely on my side.

“I didn’t recognize that you were an opponent I couldn’t win against. I guess I’m paying the price for being arrogant, drunk on the power of an artifact.”

Lian muttered, wiping the mana liquid flowing from his mask. I felt no particular emotion. Choices have consequences. The fact that the consequence was, in nine cases out of ten, death, was the limit and common sense of this vulgar industry.

“If you want to make a confession, why don’t you try to be a little more productive?”

“Do you have something you want to ask me?”

“If you give me a satisfactory answer, I might let you go alive.”

Even if one was prepared for death, everyone would be afraid in the face of a life-threatening crisis. It wasn’t shameful. It was human to cling to a way to live if there was one.

“What’s the point of you letting me go here? I’ve ruined Councilor Sorbet’s plan and even got on the Brotherhood’s bad side. Even if I live, it won’t be a life.”

“That’s not something I should care about. Find a way yourself, whether it’s getting a broker to launder your identity or seeking asylum in another city.”

“……”

Lian squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them.

“I heard that the Brotherhood decided to make a deal with Councilor Sorbet with this deal as an opportunity. What was so coveted that he even hired a contractor?”

That item that Kurt had mentioned. I had a rough idea, but it could have been a wrong guess. It was a light confirmation process rather than trusting his words. If it wasn’t a wrong guess and was as I had presumed, my motivation would certainly soar.

“I don’t know what Councilor Sorbet had his eyes on. I was just asked to remove the obstacles in this deal.”

“Fine, then next. Who are the higher-ups in the Brotherhood who planned this deal?”

The scale was too large for Brotherhood Branch 52 to have planned and managed it. They were just minions. The reason I had started this big fire was to find out who their higher-ups were. If Lian had heard who they were, even in passing, it would be a great harvest for me.

“I think I have something to say about that. I overheard it from Councilor Sorbet.”

“Tell me.” Tʜe source of this ᴄontent ɪs noᴠelfire.net

“That is…”

Lian hesitated in his answer. And then, as if washing his dry face, he raised his hand, which was pooled with the concentrate of mana, and touched the broken part of his mask.

「The World Tree warns of something suspicious!」

There was no crack in the place where his hand had descended. A crudely restored mask. The mask stuck to his face as if it were seeping in. Then, something that looked like a blood vessel along the outline dug into his skin and pulsed.

“……You were careless!”

Mana amplified explosively from his body. From the blade of the sword held high above his head, a huge amount of mana was discharged as if from a broken faucet. An indiscriminate discharge without compression or refinement. That’s why its size was enormous. The blade of mana, which had temporarily taken on a form close to an aura, reached the ceiling of the depot.

Soon, he gripped the hilt with both hands and brought the sword down.

Kwaaaaang!

The blade of mana, which had drawn a semicircle, cut through everything in its path and split the depot in half. The bright sunlight of the morning, after the dawn, shone down from the split ceiling. A deep furrow was engraved on the floor, as if a giant snake had passed by.

A slash that crushed with its surface, not its line. It was Lian’s hidden trump card.

In the midst of the collapsing building and the raging storm, he and I stared at each other. The power was great, but it wasn’t an attack that could reach me, who had moved far away. In the first place, he hadn’t even swung the sword aiming at me. I realized that fact when I saw his face, which had become one with the mask, smiling.

Kkigigik!

It was the sound of the railway, which had been cut off, connecting outside the depot. He too had been in charge of subduing one of the control towers. He, who had been hiding his intention to save the Brotherhood, had only pretended to break the control device.

‘Did he squeeze out his strength to break the depot door?’

To get the train out. It was good that he had admitted he had been greedy. But it was a pity that it had turned to screwing me over.

Deolkeodeong! Deolkeong!

The train was pushed by Lian’s hand and moved forward. As he pushed with the monstrous strength of the mask, the wheels broke the locking device and rolled like crazy. The guy, hanging from the driver’s cabin window, brushed past me. It takes time for a train to pick up speed even after it’s started. He was probably just trying to get out of the place first.

“……”

Once the departed train reached its top speed, I wouldn’t be able to catch up. Wasn’t that why I had tried to subdue the control tower first, to prevent such a thing from happening? Lian knew this well, so he had made a plan to escape by train.

His laughter came to me on the wind. I stared blankly at the back of the train moving away.

“You made the wrong choice.”

For an improvisation squeezed out in a cornered state, it was quite something. That was all.

“You were greedy this time too.”

He should have just spilled the beans and left when I had said I would spare his life. It was unreasonable to try to leave with the wealth in hand as well.

Sabak!

I came out of the depot. And I brought my hand to the dry blades of grass that were spread near the railway station. In District 20, where the hand of management had withdrawn, the place was full of dry blades of grass. It was also the reason why the fire from the vehicle explosion had not stopped spreading.

‘The fire probably hasn’t been put out yet.’

At first, I had understood nature affinity as a stat that enhanced the World Tree’s abilities. It was a mistake. The unique stat, nature affinity, was the source of a druid’s power. With the high nature affinity I had gained after going through various hardships, even this was possible.

Swaaa!

My consciousness spread through the blades of grass. Sensorially, it was similar to a domain declaration. I imposed my will on the plants in the area. I wasn’t trying to perform a great miracle. I just wanted to adjust the direction of the plants and lead the fire to where I wanted. To the railway that was spread like a spider’s web in District 20.

Huuung!

My vision, which had soared high into the air following the Guardian Hawk. I could see a huge fire, like the sulfur fire of hell, burning the railway ahead of Lian’s train.

I couldn’t stop the train that had gone far away. In that case, I would just destroy the path. The body of the train withstood the fire, but the wheels could not run on the deformed railway.

The derailed train bounced and then overturned.

(End of Chapter)