Chapter 69 : Chapter 69
Volume 1
Chapter 69 : The Love God’s Whisper (9)
“What kind of joke is this?”
Looking at the man standing upright before him for the first time, Muen could not stop the corner of his mouth from twitching.
Before coming here, he had already made all sorts of assumptions and prepared himself for the worst.
That was why he had not hesitated at all.
He had rushed straight at Eluka as fast as possible, intending to end things quickly.
He had almost succeeded.
But the way things unfolded still went beyond Muen’s expectations.
He had never imagined that this man, who had already been swallowed by Eluka, could split back out from that grotesque mass of flesh and stand in his way again.
He did not seem to have become one of those hundreds of faces.
Most importantly, he himself seemed to be strong.
That was right.
Just from that single move earlier, Muen could already tell that unlike himself, who only knew a few hastily learned tricks, the man in front of him was a truly powerful warrior forged through real combat and relentless tempering.
And that kind of person was exactly the kind Muen feared the most right now.
“Big brother, could you step aside for a moment? I need to have a private talk with your wife.”
Rubbing his hands together, Muen tried a friendly smile as he spoke to the man.
“Don’t worry, it’s just some wholesome conversation about world peace and life goals. It absolutely won’t affect the harmony of your marriage, so could you let me have a little time alone with your wife?”
“...”
The man remained silent.
Muen could not even tell whether those vacant eyes were truly looking at him, but he stood there in front of him with no intention of moving aside.
“Heehee, did you really think I hadn’t noticed your little trick, Mr. Muen?”
Eluka, who was still locked in fierce combat with Ann, suddenly threw him a mocking glance and sneered:
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but my intuition tells me I absolutely cannot let you do whatever you want. So you can just have a nice little game with my husband instead.
“And by the way, my husband is a genuine B-rank adventurer, and one standing right at the peak of that rank.”
“B-rank.”
Muen’s heart sank sharply.
By the usual standards, a B-rank adventurer was at least a third-rank warrior, perhaps even stronger.
After all, anyone who could climb step by step as an adventurer was no fraud.
And yet here he was, someone who had only just entered the second rank, expected to fight a seasoned third-rank veteran.
Was that not the sort of leapfrogging battle that only the protagonist was supposed to enjoy as a special privilege?
Where was the protagonist?
Could the protagonist come save him for once?!
“As if... she would come save me.”
Muen laughed bitterly at himself.
Judging by the timeline, the protagonist, Ariel, was probably still happily enduring harsh training under the guidance of the remnant soul of the beautiful older sister in the ring, all so she could one day stun everyone at Saint Marika Academy.
So there was no one he could rely on.
He could only rely on himself.
From the moment he made this choice, there had been no path of retreat left.
And besides...
“I refuse to believe that you’re still in perfect condition!”
Muen let out a low shout and suddenly burst forward like a hunting leopard, pouncing at the man.
Strike first and gain the upper hand!
The two short blades in his hands slashed toward the man’s vital points from treacherous angles.
Muen knew there was a gap in strength between them, so from the very start, he went all out with a surprise attack!
“Die for me!”
His blades flashed like shadows, his roar crashing out like thunder.
And at that moment, the man finally reacted.
His gaze shifted slightly, as though it had locked onto Muen.
Faced with two short blades aimed straight at his vital points, his expression still did not change in the slightest.
He merely lowered his body a little.
Then Muen suddenly felt as if his vision had skipped.
It was like a video dropping frames, two completely different images stitched together in a way that felt utterly unnatural.
One moment, the man had still been standing there without moving.
The next moment, he had already arrived right in front of Muen.
Close.
So close that both slashes from Muen’s outstretched arms missed entirely, while his wrists instead slammed heavily into the man’s shoulders.
Wrists could not do much damage.
The man immediately used the momentum to ram upward.
Muen’s hands went numb with pain, nearly losing their grip on the blades.
“What—”
Muen’s eyes flew wide open as he stared in shock at the man now only inches away.
The man looked at him quietly. In those dead, lightless eyes, something flickered.
And in that instant,
Muen had no time to do anything.
He had just completed his slash and was caught in that brief moment when the old force had gone but the new force had yet to arise.
And the numb pain in his wrists meant he could not draw his hands back to defend himself at once.
His centerline was wide open.
The man reached out and lightly placed a hand against Muen’s abdomen.
Then his five fingers clenched tightly, forming a fist!
BOOM!
The punch did not even seem to be thrown, yet an earth-shaking explosion erupted right beside Muen’s ears.
Instinctively, Muen lowered his head.
He saw his abdomen cave inward before his eyes.
A perfectly neat half-circle dented into it.
Then the pain arrived.
But before he even had time to fully feel it, Muen’s world began to spin.
The man’s other hand seized his shoulder.
Twisting through the waist and hips, he hurled Muen away with force.
Muen was instantly flung through the air like a broken sandbag.
“Young Master!”
Ann, who had been watching this side all along, instantly had tears spring into her eyes.
No longer caring about keeping Eluka occupied, all the metal around her trembled and crashed toward Muen’s direction.
“Hehe, Master, did you think I’d let you get away with that?”
Eluka let out a cold laugh.
She no longer paid attention to Muen’s side.
Because in her eyes, Muen did not have even the slightest chance of winning.
So all she had to do was focus on dealing with the Master.
And thus, offense and defense reversed.
Ann controlled the metal and sent it surging toward Muen like a madwoman, desperate to rescue her Young Master.
Meanwhile, Eluka poured all her attention into stopping her.
Warped limbs writhed, hundreds of faces wailed in unison, and they crashed again and again against that forest of steel.
...
“Cough, cough.”
Muen forced himself upright, feeling as if his insides were overturning.
It felt as though his internal organs had just gone through a full-body massage, leaving behind a violently sour and agonizing sensation.
He coughed a few more times, trying to spit something out, but all that came up was a pile of foul-smelling acidic fluid.
“Damn, he’s that strong?”
Muen muttered in disbelief.
He had originally thought that after spending so many days as a dog, the man could not possibly still be at full strength.
Maybe, just maybe, he would have the slightest chance.
Now it seems...
He had been thinking too much.
Even if the man really was not in top condition, he was still not someone a half-baked fighter like Muen could challenge.
“I need another way.”
“I still can’t face him head-on. I have to make use of Shadowstep’s mobility.”
“Even if he can interrupt Shadowstep, that move should still have some kind of range.”
“If I circle around and use the metal pathways Ann built, I might be able to bypass him.”
“But that means ending this quickly is impossible now, especially after he threw me this far.”
Being pulled away from Eluka again completely shattered Muen’s plan to finish things in one decisive strike.
Which meant getting close to Eluka again would be far harder than before.
“Damn it. Talking about how I’m different now, and in the end I’m still just too weak!”
Muen slammed a fist into the ground in frustration.
With his current strength, let alone bringing Eluka salvation, if the ground had not been soft enough, that violent throw alone might already have left him seriously injured.
Unlike now...
Hm?
Wait.
The ground... was soft?
That was not right.
If the man had thrown him away, he should have landed either on the ground or on one of those metal bridges far from Eluka.
But how could either earth or metal possibly be called soft?
Could it be...
Muen stared blankly at the “ground” beneath him.
It was slick, secreting nauseating slime.
Beneath the translucent skin, he could see black veins and writhing flesh.
Of course it was soft.
He was lying on one of the monster’s largest limbs, extremely close to its main body.