Named Kill

Pook!

The blade hidden in the dark lunged.

Straight into Gilbert Graham’s thick, blood-red lats, into the bastard’s back that stared this way like a goblin.

A strike delivered from behind against an enemy caught off guard.

On top of that, the 「Blade in the Dark」 trait activated, a once-per-day trait that could reliably trigger a melee critical. Along with the Glass Die (⚅) that added damage on attack.

Separate from the complicated dice calculations happening in his head, the motion unfolding from Solomon’s fingertips was very easy to read.

And it was flashy.

Chwaaak!

The blade tip moved beyond blood-red muscle that resembled thick armor.

It was no ordinary blade, but a Ghost Whale bone blade.

The tip of Solomon’s blade burrowed precisely into the gap between the lats. It brushed past the fascia, sliced through a thick fibrous layer, and drove into the pectoral muscle.

Smooth and skilled, like a surgeon who had held a scalpel his whole life.

At the junction of flesh and bone, the blade tore muscle fibers, dismantled connective tissue, and in that state ripped open an aortic branch.

As if to say that no matter how sturdy and thick the armor was, it meant nothing before an attack that targeted its gaps.

All that surgical knowledge and execution aimed at that impossible ‘gap in the armor’ flowed together far too smoothly.

Blood sprayed. It was a blood fountain erupting to an outrageous degree.

The blood fountain that erupted destructively like water from a high-pressure pump was an attack effect that emphasized flashiness, and it carried meaning beyond that.

It was irreversible bleeding damage, the thoracic aorta cut so high-pressure blood had nowhere to go and poured out.

It was proof that he had taken ‘damage’ beyond imagination, enough to cause bleeding this absurd.

Literally, the liquid of life was pouring out in streams.

“!”

Even after that, he didn’t die. He was still alive.

Gilbert moved. Before Solomon even had time to pull the Ghost Whale bone blade back out of his back.

Hwoooong!

Still seated, he twisted his upper body back and swung a back-spinning elbow loaded with destructive force.

It was not a strike so sudden it could be called unexpected. Even so, even after seeing it and realizing it, Solomon couldn’t avoid it. It was too fast. Was this what it meant to get hit even when you knew it was coming.

His head knew, but his body wouldn’t follow.

Peo-eok!

Gilbert’s elbow struck Solomon’s abdomen head-on. He twisted his body at the last moment, but he still couldn’t avoid it. Solomon’s body lifted as if it were thrown and slammed into the wall.

“Kuh-heok!”

Crash!

With the sound of a culture-fluid glass cylinder shattering, something soft slid down onto Solomon’s shoulder. Solomon quickly pushed himself up and steadied his stance.

‘<Veil of Darkness>, activate.’

This was not the time to save any cards. No, it had been foolish not to make it certain from the start.

The moment he cast the spell, darkness fell over the area.

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「Veil of Darkness」

Tag — Level 2 spell, Shadow attribute

: Unfurls a veil of darkness. All attacks made within the area, by enemies and allies alike, are treated as ambushes.

: Within the veil, both enemies and allies suffer reduced accuracy, while Defense and Evasion increase.

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The effect was exactly what it sounded like. Within the veil, ‘accuracy’ became unfavorable for both enemies and allies, while ‘defense or evasion’ gained an advantage instead.

Lastly, attacks made within the veil were all treated as ambushes.

A spell that granted and withheld effects impartially, regardless of side.

Even so.

When the enhanced effect of the Bale family’s innate bloodline trait 「Shadow Bloodline」 applied, it was different.

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Enhanced Attunement: 「Lord of the Veil」

: The caster does not receive the negative modifier (reduced accuracy) within the veil.

: Hostiles do not receive the positive modifier (Defense and Evasion increase) within the veil.

: Hostile attacks are not treated as ambushes within the veil.

───
───

The disadvantage belonged wholly to the enemy, and the advantage belonged wholly to this side.

In the darkness, Solomon’s eyes gleamed like a nocturnal animal’s.

Solomon immediately aimed the Nightfall XR―10. The firing setting was, needless to say, full-auto. He pulled the trigger and fired all ten rounds in the cartridge.

‘…!’

The ten bolts that slammed into Gilbert’s upper body were limp, like arrows sticking into a shield. He couldn’t even tell if they dealt proper damage. The stopping power of ten shots did not even halt him. Even after swapping cartridges and dumping the other ten rounds, it was the same.

‘This monstrous bastard!’

Thanks to the Veil of Darkness, even the full-auto crossbow barrage treated as ambushes didn’t work.

“You bastaaaard…! What trash are you!”

Gilbert rose and charged this way. The force was like a rhino at point-blank distance.

“You loser from this vermin society…!! How dare you crawl up without knowing your place before a winner like me!!”

But inside the veil covered by magic, the disadvantage was his alone.

Reduced accuracy.

The advantage was Solomon’s alone.

Defense, Evasion increase.

Because of the very bloodline of Guild City’s Five Great Houses running in Solomon’s body.

[House Bale, Shadow Binders]

As a result, it was not difficult to avoid Gilbert’s movements themselves. And with the wound from earlier, he looked unsteady, struggling just to keep his balance.

‘Proof the wound is already deep.’

Gilbert’s movements as he tried to target Solomon in the dark were terribly futile and hollow.

“Trash into the trash can! Losers into the trash can…!!”

Hwoooong!

Like his shout echoing into emptiness, his indiscriminate punches were no exception.

Solomon flowed past Gilbert’s strike like a bullfighter and immediately took his back. The spot where an irreversible fatal wound had been carved by the earlier ambush.

The Ghost Whale bone blade was still lodged there.

Puook!

He adjusted his grip and slashed down without hesitation.

It was not a strike that unfolded as if he was possessed, along with movements he didn’t even realize, like before. This was to inflict pain, like squeezing the wound by force.

That was enough.

Chwaaak!

Over the wound already torn to shreds, a tearing strike came down again.

It didn’t end with the blade. Like driving in a wedge, he pulled the trigger of the Nightfall automatic crossbow. Bolts jammed into the gaps of the torn wound.

“Kwaaaaaaak!!”

Gilbert writhed in a scream of pain and dropped to his knees, unable even to think of resisting like before.

‘Winner, my ass.’

A ‘real winner’ is someone like Roach, a guy whose pancreas still works fine even after he shoves down two giant cheeseburgers at once, one in each hand.

Not some idiot who only knew work his whole life, holed up until he died with a knife hole in him.

Gilbert Graham died because he was the only one awake, trying too hard in the dawn while everyone else slept. At least, in Solomon’s view, it was the dumbest cause of death in the world.

Koong!

With the wedge-driving strike, Gilbert finally collapsed. Onto the marble floor where blood and scarlet culture fluid had already pooled like a lake.

A life that had been on the verge of snapping finally snapped with a sound. He was disgustingly tough.

[Named Kill!]

He brought him down. Against an enemy he likely could never beat in a fair fight. The voice echoing in his head was proof.

“Hoo, hoo….”

[He was certainly not an easy opponent……. Thanks to that, your learning deepens, you grow, and you feel an insight that cannot be measured in experience points.]

Did he level up? Expecting that, Solomon steadied his breathing and waited for the next voice.

[Unfortunately, levels do not rise that easily.]

After that slightly disappointing voice.

[But is it because you have mastered striking people in the back of the head?

Upon a sea of blood overflowing in streams, you led to victory a fight you could never win in a fair duel…… and that insight has now sublimated into the Master of Ambush trait!

From now on, I should never show my back to this person.]

“…Who are you trying to screw with right now?”

His level didn’t rise. But it wasn’t as if he gained nothing. It happened sometimes. Rarely, when you won a difficult battle, you could gain a certain skill or ability at the Game Master’s discretion.

And 「Master of Ambush」 was a trait he knew.

A high-cost trait that consumed six Aptitude Points. He didn’t just vaguely know it.

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Trait 「Master of Ambush」

: On a successful melee ambush, add Damage 6.

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‘Because I was planning to learn it next, anyway.’

Of course, he couldn’t learn a high-cost six-point trait right away. That was something for after the character got on track to a degree.

Not anymore.

Did the Game Master know that and give him the trait for that reason. It was a question that would not produce an answer no matter how much he thought about it.

Either way, the trait itself was easy to understand. It did not even use a special die. It simply dealt 6 damage, no questions asked.

It was not even getting a free die. It was guaranteed to roll the maximum…… 6. The number 6 could feel small, but not in the world of a TRPG.

Then what about in this world?

What did fixed damage ‘6’ even mean? And then what was damage 1 to begin with? He didn’t know.

At least, this was not the time to think about it.

“Hoo.”

Adjusting his grip on the hilt, Solomon steadied his breathing. Only then did sensation begin to return to his abdomen where he had been hit. His face twisted on its own.

Come to think of it, the <Glass Die ⚅> would have added its number to Gilbert’s attacks as well.

‘Will it stop at a few ribs.’

Pain was trivial. Even though it hurt enough to kill him, what worried him more than the pain itself was the depth of the injury.

He could laugh off a few broken bones, but not an injury where organs ruptured and internal bleeding deepened. For now, he had no choice but to trust this world’s medical level.

It was this bad even though he wore the Nightweaver Coat woven with a double layer of shock-absorbing material. He didn’t want to imagine how deep the injury would have been without any gear.

In any game, gear was always worth having. And armor tied directly to survival even more so.

‘For now, I need to get out of here, and think about the rest later.’

And it wasn’t over yet.

‘Because it’s not over until it’s over.’

After thinking that, Solomon swapped the Nightfall crossbow’s cartridge.

Cheolkeok!

He replaced the cartridge loaded with ten rounds and pulled the trigger like that, toward the sewer monster still bound in the restraint device.

It was not pity or anything like that. They would give experience points.

After gunning down every monster left there with the automatic crossbow, Solomon left the project lab.

That fight would have caused no small commotion. It wouldn’t be strange if someone noticed an intruder. Fortunately, the restricted-section corridors were still sunk in the same silence and darkness, but there was no guarantee it would stay that way.

And it didn’t.

“It’s here…!!”

“It’s the room Director Gilbert is in!”

Voices echoing from far away. They didn’t seem to have fully grasped the situation yet.

‘There’s no time.’

Solomon didn’t go back the way he came, and instead crossed the restricted-section corridors.

After passing through several sections following the blueprints etched into his mind, a door leading outside appeared.

Hwoooong!

The moment he opened the door, a cold night wind brushed his face. He glanced down. The ground, dizzyingly far below, greeted him.

‘High.’

Solomon didn’t care. He hooked the grappling hook somewhere that looked suitable and let the rope hang down toward the ground. After tugging it a few times to make sure it wouldn’t slip, Solomon began to descend the rope.

The rope was far too short to reach the ground. There was no landing spot within a distance he could just jump to, either.

Even the nearest rooftop structure was at least dozens of meters away, up and down, left and right.

It was a distance that parkours couldn’t even attempt. At the same time, it was a distance where Solomon could barely activate ‘Shadow Mimic’. The rope tied to the hook had been prepared to that length from the start.

Because he had already learned the escape route and the activation range of his abilities depending on height differences.

He had two level 1 spell slots left.

‘<Shadow Mimic>, <Shadow Swap>.’

Without hesitation, Solomon created a Shadow Mimic and swapped positions.

The sensation of dropping into the bottom of the night sky. It felt like riding a roller coaster.

Before he knew it, he was standing with both feet on the rooftop of an unknown guild facility.

Behind him, the Biotech Guild’s fortress still towered into the night sky. The grappling-hook rope he had left behind dangled in a dizzying void.

Guhk.

At that moment, blood poured up as if refluxing through his throat. The injuries around his ribs and organs throbbed. Solomon spat out blood and kept moving. After a few steps, his balance wobbled without him meaning to.

Fortunately, he didn’t collapse. He was still breathing. So he walked. The next step, and the next.

This city was overflowing with illegal doctors who worked for contractors deep into the dawn. Solomon had already looked up a few facilities for tonight’s job.

He could head straight to the underground medical facility in District 6 right near the Biotech Guild.

But the opponent was the Biotech Guild, said to be the power of this district. If they grasped the situation and unleashed pursuers in all directions, trusting his life to a place here was far too dangerous.

‘I have to at least get out of District 6.’

Ideally, he would use Hotel Snark’s ‘Door Room’, but unlike leaving, doors you could use to return were extremely rare.

They were not spread everywhere across Guild City like bus stops, branching out like tentacles.

At that moment, Solomon ran into the city guard patrolling in pairs on the street, the Sword Watch.

“!”

The moment they saw him already covered in blood, unmistakable hostility filled the Sword Watch’s eyes.

Without a word, Solomon adjusted his grip on the hilt and hooked a finger onto the Nightfall automatic crossbow’s trigger with his other hand. In silence cold enough to freeze, a brief standoff formed.

“Ahem, ahem.”

“It’s cold.”

“Y-Yeah, it sure is.”

Fortunately…… the two Sword Watch members deliberately pretended not to see him and turned their heads away. Playing dumb, and trading a conversation that was utterly trivial.

Solomon also didn’t bother trying to shut their mouths, and kept walking his path. To the very end, keeping his finger ready to pull the trigger in case things went bad.

The streets of Guild City’s District 6, with dawn-darkness settled over them, were quiet and peaceful as always.