『 You have acquired the EX-grade Trait ‘Talent Adjustment (EX).’ 』
『 From this moment forward, all Experience you receive will be multiplied by 100,000x. 』
After reading the messages, I simply blinked.
Had I misunderstood something?
It wasn’t 10x.
It wasn’t even 100x or 1,000x.
100,000x.
Had I really understood the message window correctly?
Shrrrk!
As if to refute my doubts, blue message windows instantly flooded my vision.
『 You have suffered severe damage. 』
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Toughness Lv.1 ]. 』
『 You have gained an enormous amount of Experience related to this Skill. 』
I had never seen so many messages in my entire life.
Messages I normally might not have seen even once over the course of a lifetime—
poured out in a single instant.
『 Skill [ Toughness Lv.2 ] acquired. 』
『 Skill [ Toughness Lv.3 ] acquired. 』
『 Skill [ Toughness Lv.4 ] acquired. 』
…
『 Skill [ Toughness Lv.10 ] acquired. 』
『 The Skill ‘Toughness’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
My eyes widened more than ever before.
I couldn’t believe it.
The only Skill I had acquired in my entire life was Strength Lv.1.
And even that had taken everything I had to obtain.
Yet now, in a single instant, I had acquired a Skill at its maximum Level.
『 Damage Taken -25%, Pain from Damage -30%. You can now continue acting even after suffering critical damage. 』
The agonizing sensation constricting my entire body diminished in an instant.
My trembling legs steadied, and strength returned to the hand that had barely been gripping the sword.
Swipe.
I wiped the blood from the corner of my mouth.
My body can move.
It wasn’t as though all the damage had disappeared.
The pain remained, and moving was still difficult.
The situation was still unfavorable.
But now I was at least in a condition where I could struggle.
“Krrk?”
Maybe it noticed the change in my eyes.
Kuhullen tilted its head, then adjusted its stance.
Clink.
Its two scabbards struck against each other with a metallic sound.
But it was still holding only one sword.
That meant it was still looking down on me.
Fine by me if you want to keep doing that.
Did pride matter in a fight where your life was on the line?
That was something only lofty geniuses could afford to care about.
For someone like me, whose only concern was survival, I couldn’t care less.
If the enemy was careless, I should be thanking it.
Thump!
Grass and dirt burst from the ground.
At the same moment, Kuhullen shot toward me like a projectile.
I reflexively raised my sword.
CLANG!
The instant I blocked its sword again—
Shrrrk!
Alerts began pouring out like crazy.
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Swordsmanship Lv.1 ]. 』
『 Skill [ Swordsmanship Lv.2 ] acquired. 』
『 Skill [ Swordsmanship Lv.3 ] acquired. 』
…
『 Skill [ Swordsmanship Lv.10 ] acquired. 』
A violent blast of wind from Kuhullen’s sword swept over me, but I felt almost refreshed.
A faint smile appeared at the corner of my mouth.
It was ridiculous.
100,000x Experience.
The meaning of that was broader than I had imagined.
It didn’t apply only to my Level.
It applied equally to Skill Experience.
And so, simply crossing swords once had given me the equivalent of 100,000x Experience.
『 The Skill ‘Swordsmanship’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
The Experience I accumulated took shape as a Skill, and its Level rose.
Even the sensation of holding a sword has changed.
A gap I never could have crossed normally had been filled in an instant.
Every individual finger gripping the sword felt alive.
From my elbows to the tips of my feet, every part of my body that had previously been awkwardly positioned seemed to settle naturally into its proper place.
The sword I had raised haphazardly became part of a swordsmanship built on a firm foundation.
Maybe I really can do this.
I could feel it clearly.
Everything was different now.
As our swords pushed against each other, the direction in which I needed to redirect its blade came naturally to mind, as though following the flow of water.
Scrrrk.
Red sparks flew from where the blades met.
I was redirecting its sword.
And simply redirecting it wasn’t the end.
If I used its own strength and drove it straight into the ground—
“Krrk!”
As expected, the enemy before me wasn’t easy.
Sensing my intention, Kuhullen poured strength into its sword and shoved me away.
A powerful recoil surged through me.
Thud!
“Urgh!”
I lost my center of gravity and slammed my back against the tree behind me.
At the same time it pushed me away, Kuhullen retreated and readjusted its sword.
“Krrrk!”
Apparently amused by me, Kuhullen let out a mocking laugh.
If it had followed up immediately with another attack, I would have been in danger.
I steadied my stance and focused.
Damn it.
I could gain 100,000x Experience in an instant.
By common sense, it wouldn’t have been strange if I had already swallowed this thing whole.
But the goblin in front of me was an existence that defied common sense.
That alone wasn’t enough.
The gap between us was still overwhelming.
What do I need to do to close the gap?
Was there no way to surpass the talent it had accumulated?
Think.
If I didn’t, even surviving would be difficult.
First, watch its movements.
I had heard that those who reached the level of true masters could read an opponent’s strength before they even moved.
High-rank hunters did the same.
They would stand motionless, reading each other’s possible moves and waiting to respond with something better.
I concentrated, determined to catch even the smallest movement Kuhullen made.
Perceive the enemy’s movements.
Perceive the surroundings.
Everything would begin there.
And then—
Shrrrk!
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Perception Lv.1 ]. 』
『 Skill [ Perception Lv.2 ] acquired. 』
『 Skill [ Perception Lv.3 ] acquired. 』
…
『 Skill [ Perception Lv.10 ] acquired. 』
『 The Skill ‘Perception’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
That’s insane…
Amazingly, another new thought had opened another path forward.
I had acquired the Perception Skill.
And it had jumped from Lv.1 straight to Lv.10.
The amount of information entering my vision changed on an entirely different scale.
I began to instinctively sense tiny movements from my opponent that I had never been able to perceive before.
My awareness of the space I occupied also became completely different.
So this is the power of Perception.
I understood the exact position of the tree behind me and the plants filling the surrounding area.
To exaggerate only slightly, I could almost feel the movement of individual leaves.
Even the way I looked at the world was on an entirely different level from before.
Kuhullen had probably surpassed this stage a long time ago.
No wonder I could never beat something like this no matter how desperately I struggled. We were looking at completely different worlds.
Whoosh!
With the sound of air being torn apart, Kuhullen shot toward me once again.
Unlike before, I could perceive the space through which the sword in its hand was moving in three dimensions.
I can see the trajectory.
It was an attack I could block.
Keeping my feet firmly planted, I swung my sword from a stable stance.
The Swordsmanship ingrained into my body through the Skill naturally manifested itself.
I met its slash head-on.
CLANG!
The clear ring of colliding metal struck my eardrums.
Once I understood it, saw it, felt it, and blocked it, there was nothing particularly difficult about it.
I could block the attacks that followed just as easily.
The sword of Kuhullen, which had once seemed like an enormous wall, was now clearly visible to me.
Dozens of exchanges passed between us.
Just as I began to think I might actually be able to push it back like this—
“Krrk.”
Kuhullen suddenly let out a low growl.
At that moment, the look in its eyes changed slightly.
Swoosh.
The sword in its hand moved in an incomprehensible way.
It scattered afterimages as it traced a bizarre line through the air.
It was a trajectory I couldn’t understand with the Swordsmanship I possessed.
“?!”
Bizarre.
Unorthodox.
Those were the only words I could use to describe it.
Kuhullen’s sword came at me along a strange path that ignored the rules I knew.
Shit!
Even though I aimed my blade directly at its sword, the two blades never met.
Kuhullen’s blade slipped straight through and came flying toward my neck.
Too late to block.
There was no way to block this.
And if I couldn’t block—
I had no choice but to dodge.
Just one step…!
I could only make that judgment because my Perception had risen so drastically.
Rather than awkwardly swinging my sword again in an attempt to block, I needed to move out of the way.
Just one step…
I barely managed to take half a step backward.
“!”
And then a whole new world opened before me.
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Footwork Lv.1 ]. 』
『 Skill [ Footwork Lv.2 ] acquired. 』
…
『 Skill [ Footwork Lv.10 ] acquired. 』
『 The Skill ‘Footwork’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
“Uh…?”
Before I even realized it, the distance between us had widened in an instant.
I had done it instinctively, but even I didn’t understand the principle behind what I had just done.
Whoosh! Thunk.
Kuhullen’s sword cut uselessly through empty air and buried itself in the ground.
It raised its head and stared at me in apparent surprise.
“Krrk…”
The mockery was gone from its face.
There were things about it even I had no choice but to acknowledge.
Strength.
Stamina.
Speed.
There was a difference in every basic attribute.
Normally, there would have been no possibility of me defeating Kuhullen.
Normally.
But I was still growing.
Swoosh!
This time, Kuhullen leaped high into the air.
A barrage of consecutive attacks rained down from above.
Only a few minutes ago, I had struggled to block even one.
Not anymore.
CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!
If I poured every nerve I had into it, I could block them.
By reading the trajectories with Perception and responding in advance, I could compensate for my inferior strength and speed.
And when I combined it with Footwork, I gained even more room to defend.
This time…!
And if I used that opening to force in an attack of my own—
Slash!
Kuhullen staggered from the unexpected strike.
After dozens of exchanges, my iron sword had finally reached it.
“How’s that?”
I stared at it with a crooked smile.
A thin cut had appeared along Kuhullen’s cheek.
A faint trace of red blood seeped from it.
The wound was extremely shallow.
But it was more than enough to wound its pride.
“Krrk…”
The blue glow in its eyes intensified.
***
Outside the gate.
A hunter trudged out of the Hunter Association building.
C-rank hunter Yoon Seohyeon.
With an expression full of irritation, she shouted into her smartphone.
“What kind of idiots get stranded in an F-rank gate? I’m telling you, I’ll go there and find absolutely nothing wrong.”
She was the rescue team the Vanguard Guild had been desperately waiting for.
The reply coming through the smartphone was predictable.
They had exceeded the scheduled time, so someone had to go check no matter what.
“It’s like talking to a wall. Yes, yes. Fine. I get it. I said I get it.”
In truth, remaining inside an F-rank gate for too long was not a good sign.
Since gates were closed environments, illegal activity occurring inside them was often the real concern.
Beginner guilds in particular were poor at dealing with even minor accidents, which made Hunter Association oversight essential.
『 Skill ‘Teleportation Lv.2’ has taken effect. 』
Yoon Seohyeon half-listened to the nagging on the phone and used her Skill to move through space.
The area around her briefly distorted, and the problematic F-rank gate came into view.
It wasn’t even particularly far from the Hunter Association.
It was near a quiet mountain.
What the hell are they doing that’s taking them this long in an F-rank gate?
The Vanguard Guild, was it?
She had checked the relevant records.
It was a perfectly ordinary guild.
A typical beginner guild that had been hunting without any major problems.
Which was exactly why she wished they would assign this annoying work to someone else.
That was the problem with being a Hunter Association hunter.
What, are they having a drinking party in there or something? It wouldn’t exactly be the first time…
Working harder didn’t earn her any recognition.
It didn’t earn her any more money either.
Compared with hunters belonging to independent guilds, her position was honestly pretty miserable.
If her older sister hadn’t recommended the job, she would have quit ages ago.
Still complaining to herself, Yoon Seohyeon entered the gate.
“Ugh.”
She frowned and covered her nose.
The smell of blood filled the entrance from the moment she stepped inside.
Goblin corpses were scattered everywhere in a gruesome mess.
Their original shapes were barely recognizable.
“They really went all out right from the entrance.”
It never even occurred to her that human bodies might be mixed among them.
She moved deeper inside, calling out as she searched for signs of people.
“Vanguard Guild! Where are you?”
As she went farther into the gate, strange sights began to appear.
Every nearby tree had been cut down.
They had been severed so cleanly that it was hard to believe the area had ever been a forest.
The entire surroundings looked like an empty clearing.
Only then did Yoon Seohyeon stop.
Something’s strange…
This wasn’t normal.
The interior looked far too different from the gate described in the report.
Wait. That’s…
A blue-eyed goblin.
And a male hunter standing in front of it.
The goblin was holding an absurdly long sword, but one of its arms was missing.
It seemed to have suffered a severe injury to the head as well, because it only had one eye left.
Whoosh.
The goblin turned toward Yoon Seohyeon.
“…?”
Without realizing it, Yoon Seohyeon took a step back.
She was frightened.
By a mere goblin.
Something was wrong.
Then something even stranger happened.
The goblin turned back toward the man—
and spoke.
“Krrk… My name… is Kuhullen.”
Human words came from the goblin’s mouth in a rough, metallic voice.
Yoon Seohyeon doubted her own ears.
Even more unbelievable was the reaction of the man facing it.
“So what?”
Yoon Seohyeon could only stare blankly at the scene unfolding before her.
A goblin is talking? That vicious little thing? Am I actually seeing this right?
As far as she knew, goblins were creatures that had little to do with intelligence.
They screamed wildly and attacked humans.
That was the image of goblins in Yoon Seohyeon’s mind.
The goblin in front of her was different.
It inspired a fear she couldn’t explain.
The goblin laughed as though dumbfounded by the man’s flat response.
“Ha… Krrk. Remember it. Because I’ll remember you too.”
Then the goblin raised the sword in its hand high into the air and slammed it down into the ground.
BOOM!
A cloud of dirt erupted and swallowed the spot where the goblin had been standing.
“!”
The man belatedly rushed forward to catch it, but the goblin had already disappeared.
Yoon Seohyeon finally managed to pull herself together.
She had no idea what was going on, but she still had a job to do.
“Excuse me. You’re with the Vanguard Guild, right? You need to come out now.”
Yoon Seohyeon approached the man, who appeared to be a hunter.
His condition wasn’t normal either.
His body was covered in cuts, and blood ran down from wounds all over him.
His eyes were already half closed.
He looked at Yoon Seohyeon, then pointed a finger at her.
“I saved your life. Remember that.”
“What? What are you—”
Thump.
The man collapsed on the spot.
Considering his injuries, it was almost stranger that he had remained standing at all.
“Ha…”
Yoon Seohyeon stood there for a moment.
She had absolutely no idea how she was supposed to explain what she had just seen.