GRAAAAAH—!
The Corpse Giant’s pain-filled roar mingled with that voice.
Kim Han-yul did not even have time to ask how the unknown man knew her name.
No, in truth, she did not even have time to decide whether she had heard him correctly.
Joo Do-gyeom’s voice continued in rapid succession.
“You’re a Manifestationist, right? How long do you need to make a motorcycle?”
“T-Ten... ten seconds?”
Her answer leaped out before she could ask what he was talking about.
Joo Do-gyeom nodded.
“Five seconds.”
Don’t be ridiculous!
She wanted to shout, but the words refused to come after she saw the great hammer Joo Do-gyeom swung blast apart the Corpse Giant’s descending palm.
GRAAAAAH—!
Another roar erupted.
It was a cry she had never heard even with the ace team she had assembled.
‘What is with this guy?’
Time passed even as questions swirled through her mind.
Mana rapidly gathered in her hands, and a motorcycle took shape in an instant.
‘Did I just barely make five seconds?’
In the meantime.
Joo Do-gyeom, who had smashed not merely the Corpse Giant’s palm but an entire arm, kicked off empty air and landed on the motorcycle’s driver’s seat.
Kim Han-yul climbed on behind him before she had time to be shocked or demand an explanation.
She had judged that escaping the area came first.
However, after stowing the great hammer in his Inventory and grabbing the handlebars, Joo Do-gyeom turned them in a strange direction.
“Wait…… that way leads back inside…….”
Without a word, Joo Do-gyeom twisted the throttle all the way.
VROOOOM—!
The roar of the exhaust rang out, and the shadow of the Corpse Giant’s palm looming above their heads slammed into the ground.
THUD—!
The earth shook.
In that instant.
Joo Do-gyeom drove the motorcycle through the gap between the Corpse Giant’s spread legs and answered.
“We’re heading to the center of the city.”
Who decided that?!
Before Kim Han-yul could protest this time, Joo Do-gyeom answered again.
“You want to kill the Corpse Giant, don’t you? Then do as I say.”
It was ridiculous.
Having fought it herself, she thought it was impossible.
Yet at the same time, she found herself wanting to trust the man holding the handlebars.
After worrying it over, she lightly bit her lower lip and asked.
“Who are you?”
“Joo Do-gyeom.”
Joo Do-gyeom answered briefly.
The motorcycle sped onward.
Behind them, the Corpse Giant and the zombie horde gave chase.
***
From Joo Do-gyeom’s perspective, meeting Kim Han-yul was quite fortunate.
‘I could kill it alone, but I’d thought it would inevitably take quite a while. With a Manifestationist at my side, though, it’s a different story.’
Manifestationist Kim Han-yul.
Even in the distant future, she would be one of the highest-ranked players.
‘Was her peak ranking thirty-fourth? Right.’
Her specialty, true to the name of her Class, was Manifestation.
She could manifest not only objects she imagined, but also spirits and even living creatures.
It was an absurdly powerful ability, but its limitations were clear.
The range of things she could manifest was limited by her aggregate Rank.
In the future, she would possess as many as ten varieties of Manifestation.
The most overwhelming among them was Battle Angel Manifestation.
Before the battle against the Demon King of Annihilation.
During the fight against the Earth Demon Dragon, one of the worst enemies humanity had ever faced, mankind might already have gone extinct without her Battle Angel.
The regrettable part was—
‘Kim Han-yul died in that battle too.’
They had not been close.
Kim Han-yul had been rather cold at the time, and Joo Do-gyeom was not particularly sociable either, so they had barely spoken to each other.
But as he had said repeatedly, her ability was the real thing.
‘Her own combat ability was lacking, but as a supporter, she was on par with a top-ten ranker.’
To the point that if she had still been alive during the battle against the Demon King of Annihilation, the outcome might have been very different.
He had never imagined she would be going through hell in a place like this at this point in time.
‘Either way, this isn’t bad.’
As he had said, the Corpse Giant was a boss with some troublesome patterns.
Fighting it alone would inevitably take a long time.
But Kim Han-yul’s arrival had completely changed the situation.
Zombie hordes pursued them from every direction.
Even in such a thriller-like situation, Joo Do-gyeom’s gaze remained utterly steady as he asked.
“Kim Han-yul. How many items can you currently manifest?”
Kim Han-yul flinched and asked in return.
“Who the hell are you, really? How do you know so much about my ability? You even knew my name.”
She had decided this was no longer something she could brush aside just because the situation was urgent.
Joo Do-gyeom’s mind spun rapidly.
Should he brush it off?
No.
He needed to be convincing.
Conveniently, he had already prepared an excuse for situations like this.
“I’ve been looking for companions. You’re one of the candidates.”
“So you dug into my background?”
“If that bothers you, you can walk away here. But then I’ll be killing that thing alone. What’ll you do?”
An appropriate answer, followed by appropriate coercion.
Kim Han-yul could not understand his confidence.
No, she thought it made no sense.
‘He’s going to kill that horrific Corpse Giant alone?’
Yet at the same time, she felt certain that Joo Do-gyeom might actually pull it off.
Amid her confusion, Joo Do-gyeom spoke again.
“Five seconds.”
“What?”
“Three, two.”
“Fine! Fine! I’ll cooperate for now! But afterward, you’re going to explain…….”
“One.”
“Motorcycle, mana pistol, chain net, floating slime…….”
“Enough.”
Joo Do-gyeom cut her off and said.
“Make the largest, heaviest chain net you can and throw it over the bastard. That’s all you need to do.”
“It won’t mean anything. With the Corpse Giant’s strength, it’ll tear through it before long.”
“That’ll be enough.”
A faint red light glimmered in Joo Do-gyeom’s eyes, then vanished.
He was not joking.
That brief moment.
That opening would be enough.
‘I can kill it.’
No matter how powerful a monster the Corpse Giant was, Joo Do-gyeom possessed the Heavenly Killer’s Sure-Kill Eye.
***
He did not ask again whether she was going to do it.
Kim Han-yul did not argue either.
They had already returned deep into the city center.
There was no retreating now.
It might have been different if she could find the teammates who had entered and joined the raid with her, but—
‘They must’ve already run away.’
The moment the flame mage’s all-out attack failed, everyone would have assumed the raid was lost.
Before long, the motorcycle, with the zombie horde and Corpse Giant in pursuit, reached the innermost part of the city center.
Directly before the towering mountain of corpses.
Two tall buildings stood side by side like twins.
Joo Do-gyeom gestured toward them with his chin.
“Get inside and climb as high as you can. You know what to do next without me explaining, right?”
“Okay. But if it charges into the building…….”
Kim Han-yul had barely stepped off the motorcycle when Joo Do-gyeom cut off her question.
“That won’t happen.”
VROOOOM—!
After that brief reply, Joo Do-gyeom charged toward the Corpse Giant on the motorcycle.
He had once again pulled the great hammer from his Inventory and held it aloft in one hand.
Kim Han-yul watched his back and clicked her tongue.
‘Insane. He’s driving while holding that massive hammer in one hand? Is his Strength really D-Rank or lower?’
He should not be able to violate the dungeon’s rules, should he?
Questions or not, Kim Han-yul climbed the building as Joo Do-gyeom had instructed.
***
Kim Han-yul was right.
With only D-Rank Strength, no one could possibly wield that great hammer one-handed.
All the more so while riding a motorcycle.
Even with Joo Do-gyeom’s Strength reduced to D- by Contempt for the Weak, it was difficult to swing the hammer freely.
However, there was a way.
Among martial arts, there were techniques known as Detonation Arts.
They explosively raised one’s abilities for an instant, but afterward, the body suffered the backlash.
The Reverse-Flow Roc-Wing Art he had used in the Cannibal’s Mansion was one such Detonation Art.
What he needed in this situation was—
‘Divine Beast Latent Power Art.’
As its name suggested, it was a Detonation Art that called forth the tremendous strength of a divine beast.
To operate it, he drew up internal energy from his dantian and made it collide within his energy channels.
This time, rather than accelerating it, he swelled the Eight Extraordinary Meridians with a heavy pressure.
Then—
CRRRAAACK—!
Along with the sensation of something tearing, strength incomparable to anything he had felt before coursed through his entire body.
『Skill, Divine Beast Latent Power Art (1-Star), acquired.』
『Temporary Strength Rank increase: D- => D』
『Duration: 10 minutes.』
Not bad.
But it was still not enough.
‘One more time.’
He felt no guilt toward the body that had only just barely recovered.
As he had said repeatedly, he was used to this.
BOOM—! CRRRAAACK—!
『Skill, Divine Beast Latent Power Art, upgraded to 2-Star.』
『Temporary Strength Rank increase: D => D+』
『Duration: 7 minutes 30 seconds.』
The great hammer now felt as light as paper even in one hand.
With the motorcycle’s acceleration added to his swing, Joo Do-gyeom slammed it into the Corpse Giant’s leg.
KABOOOM—!
With a sound like an artillery shell exploding, the Corpse Giant’s entire leg collapsed.
GRAAAAAH—!
The Corpse Giant roared and wildly reached for Joo Do-gyeom.
Joo Do-gyeom gave the bastard a sinister smile, wheeled the motorcycle around, and smashed its other leg as well.
Then he began circling the Corpse Giant’s torso.
The zombies charging in from all around?
They were not even worth laughing at.
The wind pressure from a casually swung great hammer alone reduced them to chunks of flesh that scattered in every direction.
The problem was that even so, there were far too many zombies.
They did not dare cling to Joo Do-gyeom.
But they could cling to the fallen Corpse Giant and regenerate the bastard’s body.
And that was not all.
GRAAAAAH—!
When the Corpse Giant roared, part of the mountain of corpses collapsed, and a fresh horde of zombies rapidly joined the battle.
It was one of the patterns that made the bastard so difficult to defeat, but Joo Do-gyeom paid no attention to such trifles.
Instead, within the other consciousness he had partitioned using the Divided Mind Art—
He focused solely on the Corpse Giant’s mark of death, which he was observing through the crimson-glowing Sure-Kill Eye.
It was large.
And deep.
Simply looking at it drained his internal energy at a staggering rate.
He was currently fighting mainly through raw physical force, relying entirely on his enhanced Strength.
Without the internal-energy recovery speed of Heaven Formula Qigong, it would not have been strange for him to have already collapsed from exhaustion.
But one hit would kill it.
‘Without fail.’
That was the Heavenly Killer.
An endlessly regenerating boss gimmick.
The characteristics of an undead.
All of it would become meaningless.
‘Just one blow.’
As long as he could land it properly there.
Just as he reached that thought—
BANG—!
A blue mana bullet rang out with a thunderous report from atop the building.
It was the signal.
Joo Do-gyeom turned the motorcycle, which had been circling the Corpse Giant, toward the towering building.
At first, the Corpse Giant crawled across the ground on both hands.
Then it regenerated its legs in the blink of an eye and once again chased after him at high speed.
Joo Do-gyeom counted inwardly.
‘10, 9…….’
8, 7.
…….
2, 1.
He yanked the rear brake as hard as he could.
SKREEEEE—!
The front wheel lifted high, and the motorcycle began to topple.
It did not matter.
Using only the strength of one arm, Joo Do-gyeom reversed the motorcycle’s direction and slammed the raised frame forward.
THUD—!
The lifted front wheel struck the ground with a deafening crash.
The enormous chain net that had fallen from the sky now completely covered the Corpse Giant’s torso.
The bastard strained both arms, trying to break free.
Joo Do-gyeom twisted the throttle all the way again.
VROOOOM—!
The motorcycle tore violently across the road, climbed onto the edge of the chain net, and continued over the jagged path.
Up the struggling Corpse Giant’s body.
Higher.
Higher still.
Before long, he was airborne.
Joo Do-gyeom abandoned the motorcycle.
Instead, he soared into the sky and flipped upside down.
Directly beneath him.
Filling his vision.
The crown of the Corpse Giant’s head, covered in red points.
Joo Do-gyeom fixed it with his crimson-glowing eyes and raised the hammer high.
He spun his body.
For one fleeting instant.
Time seemed to slow, then accelerated once more.
In that opening—
『Skill, Thousand-Catty Drop Qigong (1-Star), acquired.』
The strike combined the added weight of Thousand-Catty Drop Qigong, the principles of the Heavenly Strength Axe Art, and the full power of the activated Divine Beast Latent Power Art.
It came crashing down precisely upon the Corpse Giant’s mark of death.
What followed was—
KABOOOOOM—!
An explosion like a bomb had fallen.
Then the gigantic corpse erupted.
He had struck its head, yet the Corpse Giant’s enormous body shattered into pieces, scattered in every direction, and rained down upon the ground like a downpour.
THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD—!
At the center of it all.
“Haa…….”
Joo Do-gyeom exhaled deeply.
Standing atop the Corpse Giant’s remains, his cold eyes gleamed.