The Importance Of A Single Stroke (2)

Countless splashes of blood scattered in all directions.

It was all enemy blood, and as the golem cast off one layer of earth covering it, its slightly slimmer form began to emit a brilliant cluster of light from its entire body.

“Didn’t you say you were going to take me prisoner?”

It was a provocation, and the few who had barely endured it could not take their eyes off Go Yu-jin as they tensed at the sight of their comrades, all collapsed and unmoving.

“In war, we were always overwhelmed by numbers, and in the end, we too surrendered to you, lost, and were taken captive, but not a single one of us was ever treated properly. It would have been the same this time as well, if we had lost!”

Go Yu-jin remembered the countless atrocities committed by the Chinese Communist forces in the last war, and even now those memories remained vivid and unforgettable.

That was why she harbored no mercy whatsoever, and it was then.

A familiar presence descended from the air and came to stand beside her.

“You have quite a free hand with enchants. It also seems the damage isn’t being transmitted inside, either.”

Go Yu-jin nodded as she looked down at Geum Seong-chan speaking calmly.

“Mercy toward the enemy only needs to be shown at the very end. And on the battlefield, the mercy we can grant an enemy is simply killing them cleanly.”

At that moment, black fog spread in every direction and obscured the view, and in the meantime, she could feel countless enhancement spells being cast upon Go Yu-jin’s golem.

‘Amazing, is this what an 8th Circle-level buff is like?’

Once such an unimaginably powerful buff was applied, it felt as though she was not wearing a golem at all.

So she lightly moved an arm, and because it felt nearly three times faster and more natural than before, she cautiously asked Geum Seong-chan,

“Could I… use this too?”

“It’s 7th Circle magic, so of course?”

“…This is?”

Go Yu-jin was so shocked that she could barely believe it, and while the flustered cries of the enemy were just beginning to erupt, Geum Seong-chan spoke.

“Let’s finish this. And since this is a spell you’ll have to make your own, you should feel it properly.”

“Thank you. And…. I’ll definitely succeed.”

Bang! With that sound, Go Yu-jin kicked through the darkness and began attacking the enemies in front of her.

The tremendous force contained in the fist she swung was enough to send chills through even Go Yu-jin herself, but the sight of an Awakener who had raised both arms to block it being crushed by the golem’s fist made her entire body tremble with an indescribable thrill.

When had she ever wielded power this strong before?

Not even once in her memory. Was that why?

Little by little, greed began to arise within her.

She became convinced that if she could make this power her own, she would be able to elevate the skills that had long been stagnant and unable to progress.

So she moved even more brilliantly and put the enemies to death, and when she had steadily crushed and killed every last one of them, she saw Geum Seong-chan once again releasing mana and surveying a wide area.

‘He’s an incredible person. Even after using this much power, he still looks at ease….’

When she had first met Geum Seong-chan, he had been a black mage who had only just barely surpassed the 3rd Circle. The gap between them had been so great that he had not even truly caught her eye.

But he had never stopped trying, and as he kept steadily hunting monsters and growing, by the time the Great Cataclysm ended, she had realized he had risen into the ranks of the 5th Circle and was aiming for Master level.

There were certainly people who showed rapid growth in a short period of time, and since there were many such people, she had thought of him as just one among countless Awakeners. Yet in the war between people and people, he had begun displaying extraordinary feats far beyond what his level of skill should have allowed, proving his worth.

And by the time the war ended, seeing him rise to stand at the same level as herself had been hard to believe, and now Go Yu-jin’s feelings grew complicated as she looked at Geum Seong-chan, who had become such an incredible person that she now had to look up to him.

Separate from the fact that she loved him, she vaguely envied his outstanding talent enough to feel jealous.

‘Could I do it too?’

She knew, at least, that she had to succeed, and she had steeled herself for it. But the wall of talent was thick and high. Her heart was about to collapse under that reality, and it was then.

“That’s impressive. Being able to withstand a buff of that magnitude is also a talent.”

“What do you mean?”

“Doesn’t a buff limit exist?”

She did know that. But because it was not a buff being applied to her physical body, in truth Go Yu-jin felt no burden at all. And the moment she realized this, something occurred to her.

‘…Could it be that the buff was applied beyond the limit only to the golem?’

She realized she had mistaken it for the feeling of having directly experienced the buff herself. So Go Yu-jin immediately began casting buffs she could apply to herself, and the instant she directly buffed her own body rather than the golem, something unbelievable happened.

‘Even… stronger!’

Geum Seong-chan seemed to realize it too, and said in surprise,

“…Did a double buff get applied?”

“It’s not double. The buff strengthening the golem is separate, and the strengthening of my own body is separate.”

There was no choice but to be shocked. But it was only natural that no one else would have known this.

In truth, Go Yu-jin was the only mage in the entire world who directly rode inside a golem.

The reason was simple. Part of it was due to ‘aptitude,’ but although Go Yu-jin was a black mage, she was also, unusually, an Awakener whose physical body had strengthened together with her magic.

That was why her aptitude for mana itself was very low, so even if her realm rose, there had ultimately been limits on the power she could handle.

But now she became certain that such a weakness was about to become an enormous strength.

“I… might be able to reach another realm.”

“It certainly seems so. This is a truly fortunate moment, since you’ve found the direction of your growth.”

At Geum Seong-chan’s words, she immediately slipped out of the golem and ran into his arms as if throwing herself at him, and when he embraced her dirt-covered self without the slightest hesitation and smiled, her heart once again pounded with feelings of love.

After the battlefield had been cleared up, many Awakeners came to find me.

“Thank you very much. We could feel it while fighting. That vicious cold, it was what incapacitated more than half of the Chinese Awakeners.”

At the thanks of the Gwangju Guild Master, who had effectively played the role of commander of this Jeolla-do region, and the bows of the other Awakeners, I raised a hand as if it were nothing and said,

“It’s a great victory. And once the cold eases a little, let’s enter the ships and take absolutely everything worth taking. The government won’t be in any position to complain about spoils of war.”

“Thank you again!”

As they scattered here and there preparing to board the ships, Go Yu-jin and I raised the corpses of high-ranking Awakeners and began examining their bodies.

In truth, no one was paying any attention to the enemies we had killed.

Even though they were high-ranking Awakeners and likely possessed quite remarkable relics, I was grateful for their thoughtfulness in not becoming greedy over them.

“There are quite a lot of relics. Is it really okay for us to take all of this?”

“It’s right to take them. They’re not things that need to be returned. And though it’s quite far away, I still feel like there’s more of the Chinese fleet left.”

Go Yu-jin was startled by my quietly spoken words.

“Are they coming this way?”

“The distance is increasing. It feels like they’re retreating.”

Go Yu-jin relaxed, saying that was fortunate. But from the enemy’s perspective, retreating was the correct choice.

They could not afford to clash with an enemy they were unable to handle and be annihilated.

As we were gathering a great many relics like that, people finally began boarding the ships, and through them, word of the internal state of the ships became known across the field.

The reason was simple. The ships were made of steel, and tremendous cold had penetrated them, causing them to contain an even more absurd level of cold.

In other words, most of them had simply frozen to death without understanding why.

Moreover, because they had not expected it to be this cold, they had been caught off guard by the sudden chill and frozen to death, whereas we had approached fully prepared to deal with the cold, so our situation was different from that of the dead Chinese soldiers.

Many people judged that it was now possible to go inside the ships and began searching them, and after confirming that there were quite a lot of supplies and spoils inside, everyone began grabbing things wildly as though they had struck a gold mine.

I had no intention of saying anything about that.

Those goods would help restore the region, and they would be used for the purpose of consoling the many victims.

Even if they were used for personal advancement or profit, I had no intention of objecting.

It was the privilege of those who had taken part in war.

“I wonder how the other battlefields are progressing?”

Before coming here, I had heard that the government was making a large-scale announcement. But I had not been very interested.

Because I knew that even if the Chinese and Japanese forces both poured in their strength, Korea’s underlying power was not something they could possibly handle unless they came with full-scale total war.

I judged that responding with only the regular army would be enough, and with the Black Mage Association and the Black Tower actively intervening and increasing the enemy’s losses, defeat was out of the question.

And that was not all. Han Sang-gil’s return to the battlefield after such a long time was also something worth noting.

“Most of the battlefields will end in victory, but what really matters is how much damage we ourselves have suffered.”

“…Will the great mages be alright?”

“Those people would still be fine even if someone held a ritual praying for their deaths.”

Go Yu-jin smiled lightly. Confirming that there was composure in that smile, I continued speaking.

“Japan’s state was split into countless warlord factions after the last war. Right now, they seem to have joined together under one benefit and invaded, but in the end, they’ll inevitably split apart over even a small crack. So the government, well aware of this, will actively exploit that weakness and target it, and China too will find it a problem that, because of its many defensive lines, it cannot focus solely on us.”

At present, China had grown by about 30% compared to before the Great Cataclysm.

That was because it had invaded several Southeast Asian countries and Mongolia and seized large amounts of territory.

As a result, it had naturally gained more enemies, and because it still had not stopped its expansionist policy, its front lines were extremely broad.

Even if the Great Cataclysm had drastically reduced the population, it was still a massive nation boasting more than a billion people, so its underlying strength could not be ignored. But precisely because it had so many enemies, the fact that it could not devote all its strength solely to us was a point that made this war by no means advantageous for China.

‘Wang Sun is only an excuse. In the end, Pi Jin-hyeok must be conducting all kinds of experiments beyond just the biological experiments he already performed. If they simply announced that openly, they would face condemnation from the world, so they might try to steal the technology from us and frame it as something they commercialized themselves.’

That was why the government was not using chimeras either.

Because the moment even a single excuse arose, China would start pouring out utterly absurd accusations.

That was why this war was one we could not help but win.