Whirrrrr.
A rough, crude mechanical sound cut through the empty air of the training room.
Lee Chae-ho lightly tapped the old control terminal screen installed on the wall. The high-speed automatic shooting machine that had been shoved into a corner began warming up heavily as it shook off the dust.
He raised the terminal settings one by one.
High-speed rubber bullet random firing mode. Three irregularly moving targets activated simultaneously. The difficulty was set to the maximum level available in the basic training room.
It was an extreme setting that even ordinary Grade D Hunters would struggle to endure for a full minute and would not even consider looking at.
'Going into a dungeon right now would be insane.'
Chae-ho picked up the protective gear he had placed on the floor as he thought.
EX Grade.
That flashy title, a grade with not even a single official acquisition record, was exactly the kind of thing that could blind people.
Just looking at the skill's grade could make someone fall into the illusion that they could immediately cut down an S Grade monster and save the world.
But Chae-ho had learned reality the hard way after spending years as a party's dedicated porter.
He had seen with his own two eyes how Hunters who overestimated their abilities and charged forward in excitement ended up sprawled across dungeon floors.
No matter how incredible a skill someone obtained, the story changed if the body controlling it was still nothing more than an ordinary Grade D.
Power that could not be controlled was not a weapon.
It was merely a time bomb.
Chae-ho tightened the straps of his leather guards and secured the chin strap firmly.
Click.
A dull notification sound rang out, indicating that the terminal settings were complete.
Chae-ho walked to the center of the training room.
In front of him was the shooting machine with its black barrel gleaming, while human-sized moving targets began traveling irregularly along rails from the left, right, and behind.
He took a deep breath and lowered his stance.
Beep!
Along with a sharp warning sound, the training room lights flashed red.
Tat-tat! Tatatat!
The moment the warning ended, the barrel of the shooting machine spun wildly and spat out black rubber bullets.
They moved at such incredible speeds that even his normal dynamic vision would have difficulty properly following their trajectories.
At the exact moment the bullets tore through the air and flew toward him.
'Now.'
Chae-ho focused his consciousness and activated the skill.
Thoom.
As if the world's power plug had been forcibly pulled out, the deafening roar faded into a muffled low tone.
The barrel of the machine that had been spinning crazily jerked as if caught in stiff, rusted gears.
His vision became bizarrely clear.
The three rubber bullets flying fiercely toward him appeared as though they were floating in the air.
They had not completely stopped.
They were moving forward only slightly, as if passing through a thick, transparent jelly wall.
He could even clearly see the dust and tiny scratches on the surface of the bullets.
'Left shoulder. Solar plexus. Right thigh.'
Chae-ho traced the exact trajectories of the incoming bullets with his eyes.
At the same time, the next movements of the targets springing up from all directions entered his vision.
Just by seeing the angles of the metal target joints bending, the direction of the wheels, and where their centers of gravity shifted, he could clearly tell where they would attack one second later.
All the information poured into his brain.
The trajectories had already been completely read.
If he stepped half a pace to the right and twisted his upper body, he could avoid them perfectly.
The moment he deactivated the skill, Chae-ho put force into his right thigh and twisted his body.
***
Flash!
The moment the skill ended, the world returning to its original speed violently shook.
"Ugh!"
A short groan escaped Chae-ho's mouth.
Thud! Bang!
He was certain he had dodged.
But two rubber bullets struck his left shoulder and solar plexus in succession.
The dull, heavy impact knocked the breath out of him and sent his body staggering backward.
After rolling roughly across the floor, he barely managed to regain his balance and breathed heavily.
"Haa, haa......"
Holding his aching shoulder, the corner of Chae-ho's mouth twisted.
'My head avoided it, but my body couldn't keep up.'
It was a clear limitation.
His brain had completely analyzed the bullet trajectories and issued the command to dodge.
But his body, which was only Grade D, could not follow the speed of his brain's command in time.
Even though he saw everything with his own eyes and calculated the angle, his muscles reacted too slowly.
No matter how well he read attacks as if he were stealing a glimpse of the future, if his body was slow, he would still get hit.
Time Deceleration was not an all-purpose invincibility skill that allowed him to avoid every attack.
It was not magic that directly increased his strength or explosive speed.
It merely bought him time to make decisions.
However, there was no disappointment in Chae-ho's eyes as he rubbed his aching solar plexus.
Instead, a cold flame burned there.
If anything, he felt relieved.
'The skill isn't going to feed me everything. I have to take what I need myself.'
If it gave him a state of invincibility where he could avoid every attack, training would be unnecessary.
But if the skill only accelerated his perception, then he simply had to rebuild the way his body moved.
Chae-ho placed a hand on the floor and corrected his stance.
He decided to abandon the reckless method of seeing an attack come and then forcibly twisting his body to dodge it.
'I'm not going to dodge after seeing it. I'm going to get there beforehand and already be standing there.'
Read the opponent's movements and trajectories in the slowed world.
Then find the safest opening and claim that path with the minimum movement necessary.
Tatatat!
The machine fired again.
Chae-ho opened his eyes wide.
The moment the rubber bullets left the barrel, he activated the skill.
The slowed world.
The trajectories cutting through the air.
He did not throw himself around recklessly.
He marked the blind spot where the trajectory would not reach with his eyes, then immediately deactivated the skill.
Flash!
Within the normal speed of the bullets pouring toward him, Chae-ho took only half a step to the side.
He lowered his shoulder slightly.
Whoosh! Whooosh!
The rubber bullets passed dangerously close, brushing past his ear and shoulder guard.
The wind created by their passage struck his cheek, but there was no direct impact.
"I did it."
Chae-ho exhaled briefly and bit his lip tightly.
Minimal evasion.
The most efficient movement path.
To engrave that sensation into his bones, he continued throwing himself before the shooting machine.
***
Tat-tat! Tatatat! Crash!
The training room echoed loudly with the sounds of rubber bullets bouncing and moving targets colliding.
Chae-ho repeatedly activated and deactivated the skill like a madman.
0.5 seconds.
0.3 seconds.
0.1 seconds.
He split the skill into extremely brief moments, reading the paths of incoming bullets and moving his body.
He calculated the angles of approaching targets, tilting his head slightly or bending only his waist to let critical strikes pass.
The stubborn nature he had developed as a porter, observing monster habits and memorizing their patterns from behind everyone else's backs, was reaching its extreme limit at this very moment.
'Upper right. Next is lower.'
Each repeated activation of the skill made the overload in his head feel as though his temples would burst.
Nausea rose to the end of his throat, and his vision spun.
The unfamiliar sensation of time distorted his insides.
Even as bullets grazed his shoulder, struck his thigh, and sometimes knocked him down after colliding with moving targets, he did not stop.
The number of hits he allowed gradually decreased.
His body was becoming a wreck, but Chae-ho's evasive movements were becoming noticeably more refined.
Unnecessary motions disappeared, and he slipped between trajectories as precariously as if performing a dance.
Beep—!
Along with a long, sharp ending sound, the shooting machine stopped operating.
The moving targets that had been sweeping through the air also returned to their original positions and stopped.
At the same time, the red gauge in the corner of Chae-ho's vision completely emptied.
It was the result of squeezing out every remaining second from after the first test, using the full 10-second daily limit.
"Haa, haa......!"
Chae-ho's legs gave out, and he collapsed onto the spot.
His entire body was drenched in sweat, enough to form a puddle beneath him.
His shoulder and thigh beneath the protective gear throbbed as if bruised, and dizziness swept over him as though his brain had been forcibly wrung dry.
He leaned his back against the cold concrete wall and caught his breath.
Even while breathing heavily, a faint smile remained on his lips.
'10 seconds.'
It was only 10 seconds.
But the value of those 10 seconds, divided into dozens of moments, surpassed imagination.
In a real battle, it was enough time to avoid dozens of fatal wounds and create openings for counterattacks.
Chae-ho reached out with his trembling hand and took his smartphone from his pocket.
After roughly wiping the sweat from the screen with his sleeve, he opened the memo app.
The sensations he had learned by pushing his body today, muscle delay times, and the error range of his minimum evasion routes.
Before he forgot, he carefully recorded everything as text.
Time Deceleration was not simply a shield.
It was not a comfortable hiding place that allowed him to avoid enemy attacks while doing nothing.
It was a precise weapon that stripped bare the trajectories of an enemy's bones and flesh moving, allowing him to place his next step in the most fatal position.
After pressing save on the memo app, he shoved the smartphone back into his pocket.
As he rubbed his stiff neck and raised his head, he saw the large ventilation fan blades rattling as they spun.
"I guess I'll just have to grind myself to death."
Chae-ho placed a hand on the floor and slowly stood up.
His shadow stretched long across the floor of the training room.