“That sword is special.”
The crack on Loren’s bone armor was no bigger than a hair. Loren gently swiped his finger across it, and it disappeared without a trace. However, Loren’s expression remained serious.
His bone armor contained the history of the Baus family.
The bone armor held the history of the Baus family. Crafted from the bones of undead monsters, it was cherished by the family's head’s lineage, passed down from one heir to the next, serving as a vital safeguard that enabled the Baus family to continue their legacy despite facing numerous enemies.
Until today, Loren had thought the bone armor was invincible.
“What is the name of that sword?”
Loren’s eyes burned as he stared at Jae-Hyeok’s transparent, red sword. Either he got his hands on it, or he destroyed it so no one else could—he could accept only those outcomes.
Kang Jae-Hyeok retorted, “Why do you want to know?”
“Better to know before it disappears for good.”
Loren poured mana into his gauntlets. He would bury Kang Jae-Hyeok along with the ominous sword that cut his armor.
From the start, I alone am enough to be Do-Jin’s friend.
More bones grew from Loren’s gauntlets, twisting and shifting until dozens of ivory tubes took form around his wrists. Loren raised his hands.
Bang bang bang bang bang!
Bone shards sprayed out in a wide cone, chewing up the dirt and splintering trees. The destruction rivaled that of mini guns.
Even so, Loren stepped back, wary of Jae-Hyeok closing the distance.
Meanwhile, Jae-Hyeok’s hands were a blur as he blocked the non-stop barrage of bone bullets with Iyarugt and his scabbard. Steadily, he was moving forward.
Fortunately, this was a forest. He only needed to counter the bullets while moving between cover, dashing behind giant trees and rocks.
“Annoying sword.” Loren frowned when he saw that Jae-Hyeok had narrowed the distance quite a bit. He was surprised by the undamaged appearance of Iyarugt.
Let’s end this quickly.
Loren used his ultimate move. Hundreds of skeletal hands grew from the ground, looking like a blooming field of lilies—that is, until they moved, turning from a sea of flowers into a tide of white snakes.
The scene was nightmarish. The skeletal hands mounded around Jae-Hyeok and began linking together. They formed projections that climbed into the sky and assembled into a dome.
Jae-Hyeok was sealed.
“Be buried with your sword. Bone Explosion.” Nᴇw ɴovel chaptᴇrs are published on novęlfire.net
The bone prison exploded with enough force to overturn the ground and flatten the surrounding trees.
No. Do-Jin fell to his knees.
When Jae-Hyeok had first appeared, Do-Jin had felt happy and relieved. He’d thought that Jae-Hyeok would definitely rescue him and had been cheering him from afar. Jae-Hyeok had given him faith as someone who could equal the National Treasure candidates.
Do-Jin stared blankly at the ruin in front of him.
Jae-Hyeok had lost. He couldn’t even fight back against Loren and was buried in the explosion.
A skull rolled down from the pile of bones and hit Do-Jin’s leg. For a moment, Jae-Hyeok’s smiling face seemed to overlap the skull.
“Jae-Hyeoooooook!” He tried to run to the pile of bones but was grabbed by two skeletons with unique coloring.
The two Named skeletons held Do-Jin back with ease.
“Loren! Get these bastards off me! Leave me alone for once!”
“Do-Jin, you won’t have any freedom until you arrive in Austria.”
“You damn bastard! Who do you think you are to take me away?”
“I am your only friend and brother,” Loren said while reaching into his inventory.
The two coffins that appeared made Do-Jin’s heart freeze.
“In addition, didn’t I say it was your parents’ wish? How about talking directly to them this time?”
Do-Jin’s sense of reason was already crumbling after witnessing Jae-Hyeok’s possible death; now, it completely collapsed.
Do-Jin roared. His muscles swelled with tension, and the veins in his eyes burst. Then, he vanished.
Flash Steps required a calm mind and careful calculation, which was the furthest thing from Do-Jin’s current state. His use of Flash Steps was beyond reckless.
When Do-Jin appeared, he was upside down and with his leg partly clipping into Loren’s shoulder. The pressure of matter occupying matter immediately caused an explosion. A chunk of Do-Jin’s leg disappeared, as did a chunk of Loren’s shoulder.
Wolfgang had been concentrating on his fight with Shinra Kyeong. But the sudden explosion brought him to his senses. Although he’d ignored Loren’s orders earlier, that had been out of bone-deep hatred for the Yaksha. Seeing his master heavily wounded sobered him.
Do-Jin also regained his senses. The pain of having his entire leg torn open was excruciating. Do-Jin stared at the insides of his leg intently.
Only he could save Jae-Hyeok...
D-Jin swallowed his screams and poured a potion on his wound.
“I can sense your feelings,” Loren muttered. He was smiling despite suffering a wound similar to Do-Jin’s. “Do-Jin, you might talk as if you hate me, but you don’t really want to kill me.”
He stretched out his hands to measure the distance between his shoulder and his face, and his smile deepened. Had Do-Jin intended to kill him, he would’ve attempted to teleport inside his face, not his shoulder.
“After your parents' deaths, I'm practically all that remains of your family.” Loren’s eyes were warm. “I guess you also don’t want to lose me.”
“Shut up! It was a mistake!”
Do-Jin gritted his teeth against the pain and used Flash Steps again.
Right now, he didn’t care about Loren. He only wanted to dig through the grave—no, the bone hill behind Loren and rescue Jae-Hyeok.
Are you still alive?Huh?Kang Jae-Hyeok?
Kang Jae-Hyeok was just a first-year student, and Do-Jin had relied on him too much. He’d always felt that Jae-Hyeok was amazing, unlike him, and could easily overcome any difficulty.
It was a fatal mistake.
He ended up misjudging Jae-Hyeok’s talent and putting him on the same level as a National Treasure candidate. For all he knew, that could have cost Jae-Hyeok his life.
Do-Jin used Flash Steps to break through the pile of bones, wildly swinging his limbs as he struggled through the debris. He was determined to find and rescue Jae-Hyeok before drowning in this sea of bones.
The wound on his leg had only been partially healed from the earlier low-grade potion. Now, it reopened as bone fragments dug into his wound.
Dizzy with pain and blood loss, Do-Jin tore his shirt and bound his leg, growling as he tightened the knot.
His red eyes blazed as he continued deeper at an unfaltering pace. He sifted through the bone debris with his hands and kicked them aside with his feet.
“Kang Jae-Hyeok! If you hear me, answer me!”
The good news was that Loren’s level was still low.
The Bone Explosion used by the head of the Baus family was notorious for creating a mountain of bones, while Loren’s Bone Explosion only managed to create a small hill.
“Jae-Hyeok! Kang Jae-Hyeok!”
After barely moving ten meters, Do-Jin finally found Jae-Hyeok.
From his toes to his upper body, it looked like his entire body had been pierced by bone fragments.
He’d protected his face by crossing the sword and scabbard in front, but the injuries to his body looked catastrophic. Blood flowed freely from his torso. It was as if all his organs had been smashed.
Do-Jin slumped over Jae-Hyeok.
“Because of me! Because of me!!”
I was stupidly kidnapped again and relied on him to save me.
In the midst of his sobs and screams, Jae-Hyeok’s faint voice entered Do-Jin’s ears. “I’m okay.”
Do-Jin hurriedly looked up.
“You got to me just in time.” Jae-Hyeok slowly raised his blade and pointed it down the passage Do-Jin had dug.
There was the sound of approaching footsteps, and Loren’s bright voice echoed eerily in the tunnel, “Do-Jin, stop crying and come out here. From now on, I am the one who will take care of you.”
It’s finally over; Do-Jin, I can’t wait: soon, we’ll be back together in Austria!
Do-Jin paled as Loren’s footsteps grew louder. Jae-Hyeok currently looked like a living corpse; he’d nearly lost his only friend for trying to resist Loren. What would happen if he resisted again? For the fight time, Do-Jin wavered in his determination to fight Loren to the end and get revenge no matter the hardships.
I should’ve been alone.
Until now, he hadn’t realized how difficult his path was and ended up paying a heavy price for making friends...
As if sensing Do-Jin’s regret, Jae-Hyeok whispered, “I also have moments of regret like you... ”
Blood trickled from Jae-Hyeok’s mouth with every word, and Do-Jin’s heart clenched.
“...At that time, you will have to be the one who supports me.”
“Do-Jin?” Loren arrived behind Do-Jin, but was surprised when he met Jae-Hyeok’s eyes.
Jae-Hyeok smiled, showing bloodstained teeth. “This is going to sting.”
Loren’s sixth sense, trained in countless wars, caused him to summon his bone armor instinctively.
Too little, too late.
Two scythe-like auras appeared next to Jae-Hyeok and swept toward Loren in an instant. At the same time, Traces of Thunder Tribulation triggered, and a thunderbolt pierced through the ceiling of the tunnel.
Gold and white light filled the space.