A heavy silence settled over the area.
Quiet.
“Wh-what was that?”
“D-did he block it?”
Every soldier stared in disbelief. A lowly Private Second Class had parried a Second Lieutenant’s attack. And not just any Private Second Class, but the weakest one, who had been passed over for promotion several times.
At that same moment, my body collapsed.
CRACK!
The sword split in half. Proof of just how tremendous the impact had been.
I wobbled before finally toppling backward.
No sooner had I fallen than laughter rang out.
“That’s what I thought. How could that bastard possibly withstand something like that? He just somehow managed to keep hold of his sword.”
It was Corporal Byeon Ji-tak. He had even sprung to his feet in shock, but now he mocked me as though that had never happened.
The others who hung around with him joined in with things like, ‘That startled me. I thought he’d actually blocked it for a second.’
They were only saying that because they didn’t understand what had happened.
The gap in our physical capabilities was so large that I had lost my balance, but I had genuinely parried Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il’s attack.
If I hadn’t, I’d have gone sprawling the instant our swords collided.
Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il didn’t use his full strength.
He had held back somewhat to account for my level.
But even so.
Just because an Ogre casually swings its fist doesn’t mean the punch itself is light.
So the power of [Efficient Parry] had been proven beyond doubt.
Now, I’ll never be taken down by monsters like Gnolls or Deriphons again.
“Gu Yun-ho, are you okay?”
“Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho. No issues.”
I got to my feet, dusting off my combat uniform. Unlike the soldiers, Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il’s face plainly showed his astonishment.
***
It came as a fresh shock.
Although he had held back to account for his opponent’s level, his attack had been blocked far too perfectly.
Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il was simply at a loss for words.
Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho’s skill was so poor that people said he was the worst among the recruits transferred in recently.
Some even said calling him the worst of all time wouldn’t be an exaggeration.
He had once talked about it with officers from the staff sections. They had all said what a blessing it was that a soldier like Gu Yun-ho had not been assigned to their own platoons.
He didn’t want some useless bastard dragging down his performance record.
‘…?’
Then came specialty training. Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il began to wonder whether his judgment and view of Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho might have been wrong.
‘This guy’s pretty good, isn’t he?’
Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho performed the fundamental forms of swordsmanship cleanly.
From taking his stance to the linked motions of thrusting and slashing.
There wasn’t a single wasted movement.
As though he had spent a long time doing nothing but this kind of training.
Up to that point, he could still understand it. Although he had emphasized the importance of the basics to the soldiers, Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il knew the truth as well.
The basics were ultimately just the basics.
So, to verify it, he called Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho forward. He wanted to see whether it was only his form, or whether he had achieved some kind of growth different from the other soldiers.
He wanted to confirm it for himself.
The result was as expected.
Even allowing for the fact that it was a training sword, there was no meaningful force behind Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho’s strike. It was unkind to say, but he looked as though he were swishing a thin tree branch through the air.
However.
‘?!’
Now that they had switched roles after he had concluded that Gu Yun-ho simply had good form, Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il finally realized how badly mistaken he had been.
Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho had parried his attack.
‘What…?!’
He might have understood it somehow if Gu Yun-ho had dodged, but he had met the sword head-on and parried it perfectly.
Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho collapsed afterward.
The sword in his hand snapped in two.
Several soldiers scoffed as though it had proved them right, but Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il had seen it clearly.
And he remembered.
That brief instant when his sword had failed to push Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho’s sword back.
‘If he parried my attack with physical capabilities like that… then he definitely used an ability.’
There were several abilities for defending against an opponent’s attack with a sword, including [Parry] and [Deflection].
What had just happened was probably the former.
But a simple [Parry] could never produce what had just happened. Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho’s physical capabilities were far too low for that.
No matter how good an ability was, it couldn’t show its true worth unless the user’s physical capabilities could support it.
‘Could he have Awakened? Did he achieve an Awakening into [Efficient Parry]?’
If it was an Awakening, that changed things. It raised an ability by one stage, greatly increasing its power regardless of physical capabilities.
“Yun-ho, you can go back now.”
“Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho! Yes!”
“Everyone should have watched my demonstration carefully. Switch roles with the person beside you as you train. Begin.”
“Begin!”
Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il gave the soldiers their instructions and sank into thought by himself.
He didn’t even look toward the soldiers.
He was rigidly by-the-book about everything, but right now his attention was completely elsewhere.
The shock had been that great.
‘Awakening has stages. [Efficient Parry] is only a first-stage Awakening. That’s why even ordinary soldiers who are relatively lacking in talent can still achieve it. But that soldier is Gu Yun-ho.’
He was even called the weakest soldier of all time.
Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho, of all people.
‘Does it make any sense at all for someone like that to Awaken an ability overnight?’
It would have been more believable if his Mana had suddenly been unlocked and he had become able to use magic.
‘At Gu Yun-ho’s skill level, he’d need at least a few years of training. No matter how good his form is, Awakening an ability is a different matter.’
Still, he couldn’t dismiss it as pure luck. Second Lieutenant Noh Yeong-il wasn’t such a novice that he couldn’t tell luck from skill.
He was, after all, an officer who had graduated from the Hunter Military Academy.
‘Did he gain some kind of enlightenment like the protagonist of a martial arts novel? I can’t explain it any other way.’
He was at such a loss that even that possibility occurred to him.
***
13:00.
As soon as the afternoon duties began, a line of two-and-a-half-ton trucks filed out of the base. Every available member of the company was mobilized, excluding the five-minute standby team, staff personnel, and those on guard duty.
The Dungeon that had formed at Song-su Station was that large.
‘I was paired with Byeon Ji-tak, wasn’t I? So the day has finally come when this bastard is useful.’
Inside the truck, I looked at Corporal Byeon Ji-tak, who was nodding off across from me, probably drowsy after lunch. He was the kind of bastard who would keep sleeping like that even after we entered the Dungeon.
I planned to take advantage of that.
‘I’ll slip away, dig up the Rune, and hurry back.’
I went over my memories once more. The exact location, and how to get inside.
Soon, it took shape in my mind.
It won’t be this clear every time.
Trivial events or unremarkable items might’ve been completely erased from my mind.
There must be things among those events and items that would benefit me too.
‘When I get the time, I need to make a timeline and organize everything. Everything I can remember. That way, I can move when I need to.’
The speeding trucks soon reached their destination. Exit 7 of Song-su Station.
The security detail that had left ahead of them had already established a cordon.
“Your task today is simple. Once the Search Officer and Search Soldiers tell you where to go, all you have to do is search those areas thoroughly. If even a tiny pebble seems suspicious, report it immediately. It could be a Relic. Understood?”
“Yes!”
The soldiers answered Captain Oh Jun-beom, the Company Commander, in a strong chorus. Behind the commander’s back, they grumbled, “Ugh, Piss-beom’s going to run us ragged again.”
It’s been ages since I’ve heard the Piss-beom nickname.
I gave a small chuckle and followed the column into the Dungeon.
“I detect an anomalous energy to the northwest.”
“There is some to the west as well.”
“It is weak, but I am picking it up to the south too. Company Commander, I think we can split up the personnel and head out immediately.”
The Search Soldiers and Search Officer ran a radar sweep the moment they entered. They possessed the [Search] ability, which let them find special substances and energies inside the Dungeon.
And that wasn’t all.
They could also find traps and help get them removed in advance.
They were indispensable assets in more ways than one.
“Understood. All right, from here on, each platoon will move to its designated area! Once you arrive, pair up and search every inch just as I said earlier! We are short on time, so move out immediately!”
“Yes!”
The soldiers scattered in an instant. As a member of 3rd Platoon, I headed west. Considering the Rune’s location, the northwest, where 2nd Platoon had gone, would have been better, but under Captain Oh Jun-beom’s orders, we would have to sweep that whole vicinity anyway.
I just had to move while keeping out of sight of the officers and NCOs.
The interior was forested, just like yesterday’s Gnoll Dungeon. Corporal Byeon Ji-tak, who had been paired with me, flopped down on a broad, flat rock as soon as the work began.
“Hey, I’m going to take a nap here, so go search around properly on your own.”
Yeah, you just lie there and sleep.
I’m going treasure hunting.
“Private Second Class Gu Yun-ho. Understood.”
For the moment, I pretended to search for special substances or energy just like the other soldiers, especially the Relic Captain Oh Jun-beom wanted so badly.
Then I quietly slipped onto a side path.
It was an area unusually thick with pine trees, and pinecones lay everywhere.
Enough that I stepped on one with every step.
‘Good, I’m in the right place.’
I walked for about five minutes using the pinecones as markers. I had gotten fairly far from the group, but Captain Oh Jun-beom had ordered us to search the entire area.
There shouldn’t be a problem.
‘It should be around here.’
There was supposed to be a small cairn if I kept going straight past the field of pinecones.
If I can just find that… Ah, there it is.
A small cairn tangled among the trees and underbrush.
Seeing it in person, it was even smaller.
It wasn’t very wide either, making it difficult to spot unless you already knew it was there.
Besides, I was already outside the area the Search Officer had designated.
That meant no one but me was going to come here.
“Then let’s get started.”
I clapped my hands twice and gave the cairn a hard kick.
CRUNCH!
The moment the cairn collapsed in a clatter, the ground began to rumble.
Enough to make me sway slightly.
“Open….”
I wasn’t fazed in the slightest.
“Sesame.”
Because once the tremor stopped, a sizable passage had appeared where the cairn had been.
It was a staircase leading underground.