“Again!”
Dohyeon shot upright and shouted, startling everyone in the barracks.
“What do you mean, again? Morning comes every day. What’s so unusual about it?”
Kang Uk, who had been on sentry duty, clicked his tongue.
Dohyeon looked around. He had feared the worst, but relaxed when he saw that this was not the MSU’s old barracks.
These were the barracks in front of the Gate on the Croat Continent.
In other words, it was the morning after he had defeated the Dark Elf chieftain and won the battle.
“Brother Kang. I killed the chieftain yesterday, right?”
Dohyeon double-checked just in case.
“Oh, I see. You wanted to brag about it? My goodness, look at our squad leader. You even killed a Dark Elf chieftain. What a good boy. There, there.”
Yun Du-sik said this as he rose from the bunk beside him. Dohyeon glared sharply at him and kicked him hard in the ass.
“Hurry up, wake the squad, and get everyone assembled on the training ground!”
“H-Hey! This counts as abuse, right? Bae Man-deuk! Take a picture! I’m going to put it in the grievance box!”
The 17th Squad was exceptionally noisy from first thing in the morning.
Throughout the run on the otherworld training ground and the meal that followed, Dohyeon tried to deduce how he had died today.
But he could not find an answer.
Just as he was about to drive his sword into the Ogre’s heart, something had flown in at the perfect moment and struck the back of his head with tremendous force.
He had no idea whether it had been an Orc’s club, a Magic Bullet fired by an ally, or a fireball launched by a mage.
Dohyeon searched his memory.
Who had been behind him, and what had each of them been doing?
‘There were five soldiers behind me. Two were firing Magic Bullets toward one o’clock, and the other three were firing toward nine and eleven o’clock. Song Ha-jun was...... in the middle of shooting an arrow, wasn’t he?’
Dohyeon’s gaze shifted toward Song Ha-jun, who was using the personal maintenance period after breakfast to tend to his equipment.
‘Did that bastard hold a grudge and shoot me in the back of the head?’
The suspicion suddenly occurred to him.
But that did not seem likely.
Even if Song Ha-jun was an Elf, he had no reason to bear Dohyeon a grudge.
‘It’s not as though he’s a Dark Elf like the chieftain I killed yesterday.’
Four kinds of Elves lived on the Croat Continent.
The first were ordinary Elves, the kind everyone knew, who loved forests and cherished nature.
The second were High Elves, who were even nobler and more capable.
The third were Dark Elves, who used particularly vile dark magic and cared only about destroying nature and twisting the natural order.
The fourth and final kind were Half-Elves, born from humans and Elves.
In Dohyeon’s estimation, Song Ha-jun was either an ordinary Elf or a Half-Elf.
A noble High Elf had no reason to take human form, join the MSU, and willingly suffer through such hardship.
‘If it wasn’t Song Ha-jun, then who the hell was it? What bastard hits someone in the back of the head that mercilessly?!’
Dohyeon ground his teeth.
He had barely escaped the infinite loop and was in the middle of enjoying his leave, only to meet such an absurd end.
‘Is today going to repeat infinitely again?’
The infinite loop had already begun spinning once more.
There were two possible ways to escape it.
‘I either kill the Ogre or find and kill whoever attacked me from behind.’
Dohyeon began calculating the timing of the attack that had flown toward him.
At that moment, an NCO entered the barracks with Park Gyu-ho and five recruits.
The new personnel joined the squad, and Dohyeon and the other seven surviving members received Reward Leave.
Once again, Park Gyu-ho agreed to remain behind and train the recruits.
As soon as Dohyeon returned to Earth, he had to take Song Ha-jun to his sister’s house.
Song Ha-jun was essential to the coming battle.
Without his support from the rear, even Dohyeon would not last long.
Song Ha-jun also had to accompany him so that Dohyeon could confirm whether he truly was not the culprit who had killed him.
This time, they went straight home without buying any ingredients.
That saved them some time. Dohyeon spent the remaining hours in the first-floor training room, practicing Infinite Path with a wooden sword.
‘I need to find a way to break off my attack at the critical moment and evade whatever comes from behind.’
But there was no chance of that being easy.
Infinite Path poured everything he had into a single instant, so once he launched the attack, he could not stop midway.
THUD—!
He stamped the floor with his right foot, spun his body, and thrust the sword straight ahead.
Yesterday, the attack had struck at this exact moment.
‘If I want to break off the attack here.......’
Dohyeon stamped the ground hard with his left foot.
The instant all his rotational force and body weight converged on his left leg—
“Urgh!”
His knee buckled under the strain, and he collapsed to the floor.
“Damn it!”
This method would not work.
Even if he forcibly used his left leg to halt his rotation, his knee could not withstand that force. He would lose his balance and be slaughtered by the enemy.
‘And even if that doesn’t happen, I’ll still die from an attack to the back of my head.’
He needed another method.
‘What if I only pretend to attack, then turn around and identify the culprit first?’
Once he learned who it was, he could find and kill the culprit in advance when the day repeated again.
But that was only possible if the ambusher was human.
By the time he finished repeatedly practicing Infinite Path, it was nearly noon.
“What’s gotten into you? Why are you practicing swordsmanship even while on leave?”
Song Ha-jun looked at him as though he were observing a strange creature.
“Haven’t you heard that if you know your enemy and yourself, you’ll win every battle?”
“But there isn’t an enemy anywhere who fits that saying right now.”
“There are countless monsters hiding in the human world. I need to remain prepared at all times if I don’t want to take a blade to the back of the head and die before I even realize what’s happening.”
Dohyeon subtly tested Song Ha-jun’s reaction.
“An Awakened would ordinarily notice even if a blade came flying at the back of his head. How many idiots would let themselves get hit without realizing it?”
Song Ha-jun had spoken without any particular meaning, but Dohyeon grimaced.
To his ears, Song Ha-jun had just called him that idiot.
“Let’s eat.”
Dohyeon enjoyed another excellent meal with Song Ha-jun.
“You’re a good cook. Why don’t you change careers and become a chef?”
“At this level, I couldn’t even hand out my business card anywhere. How could I call myself a chef when I merely learned from cookbooks?”
“It’s a hundred times better than the food at some restaurant with nothing special about it.”
“No, thank you. I’m satisfied with occasionally cooking for the younger children at the orphanage when I visit them.”
“When you put it that way, you make me feel like one of the kids from your orphanage.”
“Right now...... isn’t that more or less what you are? Our Dohyeon?”
Song Ha-jun smirked as he spoke. Dohyeon hurled the chopsticks in his hand at him.
***
While Song Ha-jun rested briefly after the meal, Dohyeon returned to the training room and practiced Infinite Path again.
Infinite Path allowed for countless applications. The more he mastered it, the more varied the sword paths he could execute.
There were tens of thousands of ways to respond to an opponent’s movements.
He therefore had to train repeatedly until his body remembered how to respond in every situation.
When it was nearly two in the afternoon—
“Song Ha-jun. Come with me.”
Dohyeon took the resting Song Ha-jun outside.
Then he headed toward the place where the Gate Precursor Phenomenon would soon occur.
“Where are we going?”
“For a walk.”
“Who takes a walk at two in the afternoon?”
“Do you sense anything unusual nearby? Maybe mana gathering in one place?”
Song Ha-jun concentrated for a moment at Dohyeon’s abrupt question.
But there was no reason for him to feel anything.
“What kind of Orc-grazing nonsense are you spouting?”
“Oh, right. Orcs. Don’t you get the feeling those bastards are about to appear nearby?”
“What kind of bizarre......”
Just as Song Ha-jun was about to snap at him for talking nonsense—
RRRRRUMBLE—!
The ground shook with a tremendous noise, as though an earthquake had struck.
A dazzling light erupted not far away.
FWOOSH—!
The light gathered into one mass and created a watermelon-sized hole in midair.
“A Gate?”
Song Ha-jun’s eyes widened.
“See? I was right. I told you it felt like mana was gathering here.”
“How did you know a Gate would form?”
“I had a feeling. Just a feeling.”
Dohyeon gave a vague excuse and checked the timer floating above the hole.
[00:09:49]
The Gate would open in ten minutes.
Orcs and Lycans would pour out again, and an Ogre would eventually appear.
When that happened, Dohyeon had to find whoever attacked him from behind, no matter what it took.
Some time later—
WEEEEOOOO—!
A siren wailed, and the Defense Unit arrived.
As he had the day before, Song Ha-jun stepped forward in Dohyeon’s place. They met the Defense Unit’s company commander and received weapons.
Dohyeon chose a sword as his primary weapon, while Song Ha-jun chose a bow.
‘A lot of them are going to die...... Should I just tell them all to run?’
The young soldiers of the Defense Unit looked pitiful in Dohyeon’s eyes.
They knew nothing of what was coming and were preparing to stop the monsters that would pour from the Gate. Once it opened, however, this place would become a vision of hell.
How many of them would survive the battle?
‘If they don’t buy us time, every civilian in this area will be massacred.’
Dohyeon surveyed the densely packed houses in every direction.
If the Defense Unit failed to hold this position, there would be at least several thousand casualties.
They had to defend this place until the Gate Response Unit arrived.
‘Come to think of it, why didn’t the Response Unit arrive on time?’
Ordinarily, a Response Unit should arrive roughly thirty minutes after a Gate opened.
Yet based on what Dohyeon had experienced yesterday, nearly an hour had passed without so much as a glimpse of them.
‘This whole situation is riddled with problems.’
Dohyeon instinctively realized that the battle involved complications just as tangled as those surrounding the battle against the Dark Elves.
‘One at a time. I’ll solve them one at a time.’
Dohyeon sensed that this day would repeat until he was sick of it as well.
There was no need to rush. He decided to calmly search for countermeasures one by one.
Before long, the ten minutes had passed.
RRRRRUMBLE—!
The watermelon-sized hole abruptly expanded to five meters, and monsters poured from within.
As expected, Orcs and Lycans emerged, roaring as they formed a defensive line.
When the Defense Unit’s company commander ordered them to fire, a deafening roar erupted.
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM—!
RATATATATATATAT—!
An enormous storm of Magic Bullets poured from the autocannons and rifles.
And with that, the battle began.
Once again, Dohyeon charged toward the Orcs.
With swordsmanship honed even sharper than before, he cut down the Lycans and tore through the Orcs’ muscles.
Song Ha-jun performed brilliantly as Dohyeon’s supporter from the rear.
Alternating between arrows and Fire Cannon, he kept Dohyeon from becoming isolated.
Roughly thirty minutes passed.
It was already after three in the afternoon when—
THUD—!
A massive monster emerged from the Gate.
It was a four-meter-tall Ogre.
The fat Ogre charged toward Dohyeon, swinging a massive club.
Dohyeon rushed to meet it and used Infinite Path to deflect the club with his sword.
SCREEEEEECH—!
Sparks erupted as the club slid to the side.
BOOM—!
Dohyeon kicked off the ground and spun his body.
But he did not thrust his sword.
This attack was not meant to kill the Ogre. It was a trap intended to expose the traitor attacking him from behind.
WHIRL—!
Dohyeon rapidly completed two rotations and turned around.
FWOOM—!
Something flew toward his face at tremendous speed.
‘Shit!’
It was unimaginably fast.
But Dohyeon evaded it with extraordinary reflexes.
SWISH—
It grazed his neck, spraying blood.
‘I dodged it!’
Dohyeon narrowly evaded the attack and tried to check the direction it had come from. At that very moment—
THUD—!
There had not been only one attack.
Something buried itself in Dohyeon’s face.
FLASH—!
His vision went dark in an instant.
TOOT-TOOT, TOOT-TOOT-TOOT, TOOT-TOO-ROO-TOOT-TOOT...
The morning bugle sounded once more.
Dohyeon opened his eyes and slowly sat up.
‘It was an arrow.’
The object that had just punched through his face had undoubtedly been an arrow.
The pain had felt as though a massive hammer had struck his head.
Dohyeon could not help grimacing fiercely.
There had been two attacks, and both had come from Song Ha-jun’s direction.
But Song Ha-jun had not fired them.
His bow had been lowered, and his palm had been extended in the stance for firing Fire Cannon.
‘Who the hell was it?’
How could he have turned to look behind him and still failed to see whoever had fired the arrows?
Dohyeon had never realized that an arrow could be so powerful.
He had fought Dark Elves born with tremendous talent for archery for 698 days, yet he had never experienced an arrow this powerful.
Moreover, there had been little delay between the two arrows.
‘Two seconds at most.’
Two arrows had flown at him within that brief interval, both carrying tremendous force.
It felt as though each arrow bore the weight of several hundred kilograms.
But what sent the greatest chill through Dohyeon was the fact that—
‘The arrow...... curved.’
The arrow fired by the unknown assailant had curved through the air.