《Demon to compete in Ashmoon Knight 193. Lower numbering, match 4》
《Who is the Demon? The Japanese Amateur League's first warrior to promote undefeated》
《Will he make it on the world's greatest stage too... on the 193rd night, with the moon stained ash gray, the Demon comes》
《Undefeated Demon's first American Pro League stage is match 4》
《Was the Japanese undefeated run a fluke... the Demon goes on trial in America》
《The next chapter of the undefeated legend, Ashmoon Knight 193》
The next day.
The moment it was officially announced that Go Tae-min would compete in <Ashmoon Knight 193>, the American Nova Arena community reacted fast.
【SteelCurtain_Hank】 Demon? That Japanese amateur undefeated promotion guy? Going by him being placed on the lower card, NAA already knows the answer
└The Japanese amateurs' first warrior to promote undefeated? What kind of level is it over there?
└Honestly it's way below ours. Their Pro League is about the level of our mid-tier amateurs.
└Really? Then isn't he going to die right away in his debut?
└That's the point, if anything. Watching how long he lasts could be fun?
【NovaFreak_Texas】 They say the match 4 keyword is Survival, so it's already over. Please let him last at least an hour, or it won't even be worth watching.
└How thoughtful.
└Hey, is that comfort or mockery?
└Both 🤣
【xX_BladeKing_Xx】 Can't trust him if he's out of the Japanese league. Over here it's a routine for their pros to debut, drop a double-digit losing streak and quietly disappear, and amateur undefeated? Is that even a selling point?
└Stop hitting people with facts.
└There has to be a reason NAA deliberately put him in match 4, doesn't there? Even if it's just for image consumption.
└Right, he does have a name at least. Use him in match 4 and throw him away and that's that.
└It's genuinely cruel, but it's true.
【quiet_nova_lurker】 Honestly I'm a little excited. Do people saying this know how hard an undefeated promotion is? Japan or anywhere, meeting that condition at all is abnormal!
└HAHAHAHAHA someone's playing teacher all by himself over here.
└He isn't wrong though, is he? However much it's the Japanese league, undefeated is a different story.
└Which is why we watch. Works? We respect it. Doesn't? Trash. That's what the American league has always been.
【DemonSlayer_official】 His name is Demon? Pfft, come to America and he'll just be an ordinary human.
└💀💀💀
└I'm screenshotting this comment and reposting it after the match.
└Please remember me, I'm genuinely prepared to be mounted on the wall.
└Whatever happens, I think this comment is going to get summoned.
└Let's wait and see for now. It might be nothing, and there might be something more than we think. But even if there is something, it'll end in match 4.
└So the realist was here.
└It's the most American reaction there is. Proving it with results is what this place is about anyway.
"......Overall the reaction isn't good."
Cold public opinion pouring in past the monitor.
Chae Geon-uk clicked his tongue and turned his chair.
On the screen, provocative words doubting Go Tae-min's level were still going up in real time.
At Chae Geon-uk's remark, Go Tae-min, who was putting in circle lenses over in the corner, asked flatly without even raising his head.
"What are they saying? Have they put money on me dying?"
"They just aren't expecting much. They're treating you like a clearance item near its expiry date."
"Well, they aren't wrong. It's true I'm being sold for money."
Go Tae-min started putting in his circle lenses again as if it were no great matter.
The hand easing a lens carefully into place with his fingertips was as calm as a man picking which triangle kimbap he wanted at a convenience store.
At that unreal composure, Chae Geon-uk finally grabbed the back of his own neck and let out a long breath.
"Hey, you can laugh in this situation? These bastards are betting on you not lasting even an hour right now."
"Is it a money bet? Can I bet on myself too? The odds would be tasty."
"It's a figure of speech, you punk! And you really do need to be careful. There are some fairly famous guys in this match."
Chae Geon-uk rolled his mouse wheel, and three profiles came up side by side on the monitor.
Juggernaut, a former American football player.
The Human Butcher, Joaquin.
And lastly the Ashen Ghost, Christopher.
NAA had picked Go Tae-min, with the plausible title of the Japanese league's warrior to promote undefeated, as the prey that would let these three warriors soar in style.
'......Maybe I should have just turned this offer down.'
As Chae Geon-uk saw it, however seasoned a mercenary his junior was, handling these three did not look remotely easy.
Anyone who had seen the three of them play would feel the same.
Which was why, looking at a junior this unbothered, he could only fret.
Whether he knew any of that or not, Go Tae-min finished with his circle lenses and turned his head.
"Ta-da. How's this?"
"......Are you seriously going out like that?"
"Why? Isn't it cool?"
"You'll be far too visible in the dark."
"But the presence is tremendous."
Go Tae-min chuckled happily at himself in the mirror.
Just as he said, the red glow bleeding out from under the demon mask was extremely imposing.
Add the black leather armor and the pitch-black robe thrown over it.
Seen in the dark, it would look as though only the demon mask were floating in midair.
Not stopping there, Go Tae-min drew the sword from its scabbard.
Then he looked the blade over up and down and nodded with satisfaction.
"Domestic really is best. The last one was Chinese, wasn't it?"
Chae Geon-uk opened his mouth with a sour expression.
"......That one was Japanese, though?"
"That explains it! If it had been domestic it wouldn't have broken."
"Hey, kid. Domestic snaps too if you bring it down on a rock."
"Don't slander it! Are you disrespecting K-steel right now?"
Go Tae-min cackled and sheathed the sword again.
It was a domestic blade he had dug out by combing every shopping site to enter this match, and for value for money it was the best there was.
It was not one of the famous blades in the hundreds of millions that the pros used, but it looked more than sufficient for staining tonight's match with blood.
"Ugh, if only you couldn't talk."
Chae Geon-uk ended up shaking his head at the junior puffing out his chest so brazenly.
He couldn't tell whether that baseless confidence was skill or simply money-blindness, but one thing was certain.
Tonight the Yanks were going to see one very peculiar lunatic.
"Fine, go and show them a proper taste of that precious K-steel."
"Don't worry. I'll recoup my costs and bring the bonus home fat on top. Oh, it's time."
Go Tae-min pointed at the clock on the wall.
Match 4 of <Ashmoon Knight 193> started at 3 p.m. Eastern Time in the US.
By Korean time, 4 a.m.
He was in the position of having to leap into a battlefield where blood would fly at the hour everyone else was deep in sleep, but Go Tae-min's expression was as flat as a man heading off to a night shift at a convenience store.
Just then, one question happened to cross Go Tae-min's mind.
"By the way, what happens if the match takes 10 hours? Do you have to wait here the whole time, hyung?"
"......I explained this before, didn't I. However long you fight in there, only 1 hour passes outside."
"Ah, was that it?"
Chae Geon-uk let out a long sigh.
"Time inside virtual reality is meaningless. That goes for people who connect by capsule and watch, too."
"Then what about people who just watch on a computer or a phone without a capsule? Does an hour feel like ten hours to them as well?"
"As if. They're watching footage edited in real time, like YouTube. The AI picks out only the highlights and shows them."
"Ah, I see."
"I see, my foot, you punk. That footage we watched earlier was all edited that way too."
Even at Chae Geon-uk's jab, Go Tae-min just scratched the back of his head and smiled brightly.
That face without so much as a trace of nerves, however hard you looked for one, seemed to take a little of the weight off Chae Geon-uk's unease.
"Right, I'll go and have a blazing good time. Get some rest."
Before long the appointed time came.
Go Tae-min waved lightly and pushed himself into the capsule.
With a mechanical hum the capsule's cover closed smoothly.
Watching him go, Chae Geon-uk murmured quietly.
"......Go and show them properly. And don't come whining to me about breaking your sword again."
With those words for a farewell, Chae Geon-uk laid himself down in a capsule too.
Before long both capsules in the office began to shine and power up at the same time.
***
When I opened my eyes, what spread out in front of me was dense jungle.
Through branches tangled thickly enough to hide the sky, broken sunlight was pouring down in splinters.
Air holding moisture pricked at the tip of my nose.
Ding!
[Match class: American Pro League - <Ashmoon Knight 193> match 4]
[Game name: Blood and Flag]
[Match type: Survival]
[Map: Red Moss Forest (Medium)]
[Current spectators: 107,274]
[Victory condition: Be alive at the moment the match ends]
[The instant you leave the forest you are automatically processed as disqualified.]
[Time remaining until match end: 72:00:00]
[Current survivors: 1,000]
[There are numerous Hidden Rules. (The rules will be revealed after a certain time.)]
[Match begins in 3 seconds.]
Clammy heat covered my whole body.
The hot, humid air went past simply feeling hot and slapped at my skin stickily, like a wet towel pressed over my face.
Even standing still, beads of sweat seeped out inside my leather armor and stuck to my hide in patches.
'An interesting map came up.'
Jungle has short sight lines, thanks to the giant trees rising tens of meters and the vines netting the spaces between them.
On top of that, wherever you look the scenery is much the same, so without a compass you were liable to lose your bearings after a few steps.
[Match begins in 2 seconds.]
Worst of all is the concealment and cover scattered everywhere.
Tree trunks thicker than a man's torso and ferns grown as tall as an adult made for extremely tricky ambush positions.
Because even with an enemy right in front of your face, if you failed to hear the brush shake, more often than not your head simply came off.
For running a cruel show by the name of Survival, there could be no worse stage than this.
[Match begins in 1 second.]
But it was also a space extremely familiar to me.
Jungle was exactly what I had experienced countless times in Africa.
By the way......
'What's this?'
I tilted my head.
White lines filled my field of view.
So far, nothing different from usual. These lines fluttering around me like ghosts were what I always saw.
But their thickness was on another level.
If what I usually saw were strands of thread, the ones cutting across my field of view now were, with only a little exaggeration, as thick as rope.
I had no idea why there should be such a difference, but thanks to it there was absolutely no chance of my confusing reality with virtual reality.
[Match start!]
The instant the message came up, the taut stillness running through the jungle snapped.
The sound of brush being violently shoved aside and screams burst out on every side.
'Let's check the map first, shall we.'
I moved between the undergrowth as if gliding.
In this jungle, the guys who run making noise are the weak ones.
The squelch of mud underfoot, the sound of a leaf scraping a collar, every single one of them was as good as a signpost announcing your position in this forest.
I passed flexibly through the gaps in the vines and surveyed my surroundings.
'Everyone's moving too impatiently.'
The rope-like white lines crossing the air had by now become as familiar as this map's terrain features.
I kept my stance low and slowly drew my sword.
At the same moment, a rustling came from beyond the undergrowth off to my rear left.
FWISH-FWISH—!
In that instant, a change appeared in my field of view.
A blood-red line, as thick and as vivid as rope, was drawn across air that had held nothing.
A trajectory flying in with the line of my throat squarely sighted.
Without even turning my head, I angled my sword up toward the end of that line.
CLANG!
-Oh! An engagement right at the start of the match! Raven is attempting an ambush on the Demon!
-Raven is a warrior 8 months into his American Pro League debut, and he consistently maintains above-average results in the lower numbering. His ambush work in particular is rated as named-tier, and the Demon has properly met his match right from the start!
-At Raven's level, in our American Pro League he's just an ordinary standard. He isn't a warrior singled out as especially strong either. And if the Demon struggles against that ordinary player....... that would tell us even more, wouldn't it.
-Honestly my expectations aren't high. The Japanese Amateur League and the American Pro League have different starting lines to begin with. Surely he won't be eliminated here, I think, and yet....... Well, we'll have to watch to see how it goes. Right, let's keep watching the match!
"......."
My opponent's silhouette emerged through the undergrowth.
A black cloak, twin swords, and a face noticeably stiff. It looked as though it had never even occurred to him that I might block it.
CLANG-CLANG!
But a pro is a pro.
He faltered for a moment, and then both swords came pouring in at once.
A crossing cut aiming at my left flank and right shoulder simultaneously. Two strands of blood-red line cut across my field of view.
He was trying to paper over the shock of a failed ambush with aggressive combinations.
I didn't bother swinging my blade to answer him.
Shff.
The minimum of movement.
When I twisted my body slightly, at the width of a single sheet of paper, those blue-steel twin swords grazed past nothing but my collar, barely.
"......!"
The man's eyes went wide.
He seemed unable to believe that an attack he had put his whole strength into had missed so emptily.
In that instant, an opening appeared at his chest.
SHHK—!
I laid the blade I had angled up flat and drove it in level.
A blow that ran through the starting point of the red line, which is to say his heart.
"Kahuck......!"
The body of the man who had been swinging twin swords so confidently a moment ago froze exactly where it was.
His expression said he didn't understand why the sword he had swung had missed, or when his opponent's edge had lodged in his heart.
[You have eliminated Pro Warrior 'Raven'.]
Before long his frame began to break apart into fine white particles of data.
'Easy money.'
I shook the blood off my blade and started walking again.