Trait Hoarder

Terrorist — Part 3

What?

Terrorists?

I snapped awake immediately.

I sprang to my feet as if propelled by a spring.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrng.

The air itself was roaring.

A sinister flow of mana swirled violently, pressing down on the entire area.

I quickly checked my mana circuits.

But the screams echoing from outside were far from normal.

“Ahhhhhh!”

“Gugh, grrkkk!”

“S-save me! My body, my body—!”

The worst-case scenario had happened.

A bomb capable of triggering rampant mana berserk in mutants.

It had to be a mana rampage bomb.

A curse escaped my lips.

“Damn it.”@@novelbin@@

What were Grizzly Bear and Skeleton Snake doing?

No—if I was being fair, some of this was my fault as well.

Instead of relaxing and enjoying the night, I should’ve been more vigilant.

I shouldn’t have left everything in the hands of the mutants, just because this was their village.

“Drink the holy water! Hurry!”

“Get to the chief’s house! Quickly!”

“Chief! Activate the barrier! Now!”

“I’m on it! Everyone, don’t panic! Stay calm! Compared to what we endured under the Japanese, this is nothing! We can overcome this!”

I dashed outside.

Grizzly Bear stood in the center of the village.

Thud!

He dropped to his knees and bowed toward his house.

The vibrations from his movements rippled through the earth.

Immediately, Grizzly Bear’s house—and the other houses in the Monster Village—began to glow like fireflies, radiating light.

The light accumulated, forming walls and a ceiling, constructing a barrier.

The energy emanating from it was cleansing in nature.

The mutants, who had been writhing in agony, gradually regained their composure.

“We’re saved!”

“Chief! You did it!”

“Thank you, Great Mother!”

It seemed the immediate danger had been averted.

Some of the more severely affected mutants were being tended to by others, who were giving them holy water and using traits similar to [Purification].

It didn’t look like I needed to intervene there.

That left one clear course of action for me.

[Bright Eyes]

[Sixth Sense]

[Insight]

[Detection]

[X-Ray Vision]

[Track]

I focused my gaze and activated my traits.

The [Bright Eyes] trait illuminated my vision in gold, allowing me to scan the entire Monster Village.

The mana inside the village was still writhing threateningly.

But outside, faint traces extended beyond the barrier.

‘There!’

What I found were human traces—specifically, superhuman ones.

Although the chefs were human, all of them were ordinary people.

The only superhuman entering and leaving the village at this time could be a terrorist.

Whoosh!

I launched myself into the air.

As I soared like a great bird, the mutants began murmuring in confusion.

“Huh? Where’s he going?”

“Hey! Stop right there!”

“Wait up!”

It seemed some of them were suspicious of me.

I chuckled and shouted back over my shoulder.

“Follow me! I’ve found the trail!”

“Huh?”

“What?”

No need for unnecessary misunderstandings.

To make my point, I deliberately slammed the ground as I landed.

The impact sent dirt flying like a landslide, leaving craters dozens of meters wide in my wake.

Although it slowed me down a bit, it was worth it to get the message across.

As I narrowed my eyes and focused on the trail ahead, a thought crossed my mind.

‘Now that I think about it, where’s Skeleton Snake?’

She had been absent the entire night.

While she wasn’t the type to lead the festivities, she wasn’t the type to pass up an opportunity to enjoy the rare delicacies the village had to offer either.

Born half-human, Skeleton Snake had gradually mutated fully into a mutant by adulthood. Among all the changes she underwent, regaining her sense of taste had brought her immense joy.

‘Could it be…?’

Did she get captured by the terrorists?

Though she wasn’t as strong as Grizzly Bear, she was still a Level 6 mutant.

Even in a village filled with Level 6 mutants, she was among the stronger ones.

‘No, wait.’

If she let her guard down, it was possible.

After all, I had been lax myself and ended up watching the village get attacked.

Level alone wasn’t everything.

Even with countless Level 6 mutants here, carelessness could be their downfall.

‘I can’t rush in blindly either.’

I combed through my memories.

Specifically, the consumables obtained from the Monster League’s treasure maps.

There were three particularly powerful consumables I remembered.

I had even bought them at auctions from time to time with gold.

Loki’s Mockery.

Set’s Whisper.

Britra’s Desolation.

What if someone used all three at once?

Think about it: you walk into a room, and suddenly Baek Sorin and Kali Kurat appear to welcome you.

While you’re distracted, they use Set’s Whisper to apply increased damage and mental attack debuffs, then follow up with Britra’s Desolation to drastically lower all your stats.

If they attacked at that moment, even I might be in trouble.

If my theory was correct and Skeleton Snake had indeed fallen to the terrorists, this was probably the process they used.

I slowed my pace slightly and reached into my golf bag.

I retrieved a vial of holy water that I had bought in bulk earlier.

Since I might not have time to drink it, I also took out an auto-injector.

The kind that could be used instantly with just a press.

After filling the injector with holy water, I picked up my speed again.

“Hahhh! Wait for me!”

“Is this the place?”

“Yes! I see it too! There are human footprints! No way they could fool me!”

“With those good eyes of yours, why didn’t you notice earlier?”

“I thought they were the chefs’ footprints.”

The trail led to a small cave.

Even from the outside, I could sense a sinister energy spilling out.

Just before entering, I hovered in the air, hesitating briefly.

‘Should I wait a little longer?’

Should I enter with the mutants?

At least five of them were trailing behind me.

All of them were Level 6 mutants.

No matter how many terrorists were inside, they would make short work of them.

But…

‘It’s better if I go in alone.’

Too many people can complicate things.

And there’s no telling what cunning tricks the terrorists might have prepared.

If they used a method similar to Loki’s Mockery, manipulating me and the mutants into fighting each other, that would be the worst-case scenario.

It would be safer to handle this alone.

Unless the Monster League’s leader had somehow risen from the dead and come here personally, no one inside could stop me.

And the leader had already been killed by the Eastern Army.

“There it is! I’ll go in! Please wait outside!”

“Huh?”

“Why?”

“You just want to have all the fun yourself!”

“The terrorists might escape. We can’t let them get away. They need to pay the price for daring to attack Hope Village!”

“That’s true.”

“Agreed.”

“Just leave it to us!”

“If you go in and get hit by another rampage bomb, it’ll be a disaster. A big one.”

“Now that you mention it, that makes sense.”

The mutants quickly scattered.

Fwoosh! Bang!

Some fired mana flares into the air.

I could probably trust them to handle the perimeter. Surely, they wouldn’t fail to capture any terrorists trying to flee.

Huuuup.

I took a deep breath, filling my entire body with mana.

[Vajra Body] [Indomitable] [Undying]

[Mana Soul] [Sigurd Cultivation Technique] [Mana Armor]

I equipped every debuff-resistant trait I had.

With this setup, I could even withstand curses from a Level 6 or 7 Dark Priest.

The only problem was that if my assumptions were correct, this set might still not be enough.

Deploying Aegis, I grabbed Mjolnir and stepped into the cave.

Inside the dark cave, the sound of dripping water echoed, tapping against my eardrums.

The passage was narrow, just wide enough for a single person to squeeze through.

Through [Bright Eyes], I could tell that the walls weren’t completely natural—they bore clear traces of artificial construction.

Whooosh.

A gust of wind passed through, sounding like a ghost’s wail.

The cave widened, funneling into a small plaza-like space.

Though shrouded in darkness, I could see with clarity the fluorescent lights installed on the high ceiling and the wireless mana-charging devices connected to them.

Flaaash!

Suddenly, a bright light washed over me.

“Huh? Teacher?”

Baek Sorin appeared before me.

“What brings you here, Black Tiger Swordmaster?”

Then I saw Manager Choi.

“Black Tiger Swordmaster?”

Even Kim Chulkwon was there, looking at me with confusion.

My vision wavered as if the world itself were twisting.

Reality seemed to distort.

Ah, right.

I had called them.

I’d asked Baek Sorin, Manager Choi, and Kim Chulkwon to come here to gain some experience and take care of a few tasks… Or had I?

A hazy fatigue clouded my mind.

A strange, floating sensation consumed me.

And just as a foreign concept began forcing itself into my thoughts, I instinctively plunged the syringe in my left hand into my thigh.

Thunk!

The sickening sound of flesh being pierced.

A fiery pain surged through me.

But even then, I hadn’t fully regained my senses.

“Hey, Sorin, I called you to gain some experience—”

What snapped me out of it was the cold liquid spreading through my veins.

The icy chill of holy water coursed through my body, awakening my mind.

A lightning bolt seemed to strike inside my brain, and in that instant, the true form of the “Baek Sorin” I had perceived slammed into my retina.

It was a monster.

A hairy beast.

The figure of a woman resembling a bipedal wildcat—a Reinforced mutant—was drooling as she crept closer to me.

From behind, I heard a warning shout.

“Be careful! Mockery didn’t work on him!”

“What? That’s impossible! It’s supposed to work on anyone below Level 7!”

“He’s using holy water! He had it loaded in an auto-injector!”

“Dammit, did he bring high-grade holy water? That stuff’s expensive!”

Sorry to disappoint, but it was just low-grade holy water.

I was short on cash after buying a house.

But I had trait swaps.

With the combination of traits included in Vajra Body—[Resolve], the ultimate debuff resistance; [Undying], the pinnacle of recovery; and [Mana Soul], which provides inherent resistances—the efficiency was equal to that of high-grade holy water.

Swoosh!

I didn’t waste time talking.

I immediately hurled Mjolnir.

The storm of lightning it created made the wildcat woman flinch and leap to dodge.

I tried to redirect its trajectory with my intent, but I failed.

The superhuman who had shouted earlier had fired a rocket launcher, forcing me to redirect my focus.

“You insane bastard!”

A rocket launcher? In this confined space?

To make matters worse, something about it felt off.

The danger-detection ring on my finger was heating up.

I shifted my focus to Aegis instead of Mjolnir, deploying a mana shield to block the rocket.

Boom!

A violent explosion erupted.

Mana flames surged wildly.

An incendiary round.

Equipped with magical resistance and [Black Flame], I managed to block it.

While I successfully defended myself, I had unintentionally given them precious time.

From the shadows, a swarm of terrorists emerged, surrounding me like a hive of wasps.

“Hmm…”

There were a lot of them.

At least 100.

The more surprising part was that every single one of them was Level 5.

Fortunately, there didn’t appear to be any Level 6s among them, but their sheer numbers made them an overwhelming force.

“Hmph.”

The wildcat woman bared her teeth at me, grinning.

“Should we call the ones outside to join us?”

“Do we really need to?”

I kept my eyes fixed on the man who had fired the rocket launcher as I spoke.

I could feel it.

He had Loki’s Mockery hidden in his pocket.

It wouldn’t work on me, but it would be devastating if used on the mutants outside.

Considering the mental interference and conceptual manipulation I had just experienced, the danger was clear.

As I had thought earlier, fighting them alone was a hundred times better than letting the mutants get involved.

“Tch.”

The wildcat woman scoffed.

“You think you can handle all of us by yourself? Dream on. No matter how famous you are, Black Tiger Swordmaster, you can’t defeat us alone.”

“You know me?”

“Of course. Do you know how much Massacre Empress has placed on your head? If we catch you, we can live the rest of our lives in luxury. Hell, we could retire to South America and live like kings forever!”

So that’s what this is about?

I scanned the area.

Most of them were beast-type Reinforced mutants.

But there were warriors, mages, and priests mixed in as well—almost half of the group.

The composition was very different from the Monster League I knew.

Quietly, I drew the Black Tiger Sword.

“This was a trap, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah. It was a trap. We just didn’t expect you to show up this quickly. And the fact that the Vice President’s cover got blown was unexpected too.”

“A trap, huh… a trap…”

I calmly surveyed my surroundings.

A hundred Level 5 superhumans.

By any objective measure, this was a force that should have made me panic, stomp my feet, and curse my luck.

And yet, why?

I couldn’t imagine myself losing.

Even my danger sense wasn’t activating properly.

There was only a faint tension, like a feather brushing lightly against my back.

“This is what you call a trap? Just this much?”

“What?”

“If you wanted to catch me, you should’ve brought a hundred Level 6s instead of a hundred Level 5s.”

A brief silence.

Then, laughter erupted.

“Puahahaha!”

“This idiot’s out of his mind!”

“What? A hundred Level 6s?”

“Wow, Black Tiger Swordmaster… No, warrior… Your guts must be spilling out of your belly!”

“Anyone listening to you would think you’re some Level 6 or Level 7 ultimate-stage superhuman.”

“Even a Level 7 wouldn’t stand a chance against a hundred Level 6s. You’d need an 8th-level transcendent for that.”

“Tsk tsk, looks like our dear Black Tiger Swordmaster has been riding his success too high. You think you’re the main character of this world or something? Hey, what are you all doing? Let’s show this so-called ‘hero’ what the real world feels like.”

“Yeah, let’s do it.”

“The Empress said to bring him in alive, as long as he’s breathing.”

“Got the bio-packs ready?”

“Yeah, we’ll cut off his head and stick it in the bio-pack. Don’t want to leave the body attached and risk him going berserk.”

Killing intent swirled around me, thick and oppressive.

The superhumans aimed their weapons at me in unison.

Yet, still, I felt no danger.

I gripped both the Black Tiger Sword and Mjolnir, holding them together in a dual-wield stance, and silently swapped my traits.

The first choice:

[One-Man Army]

A combination of Fury, Willpower, Onslaught, Destruction, Unstoppable, and Massacre.

This was a trait that only activated during combat.

Unlike the more universally applicable traits like [Giant’s Strength] or [Vajra Body], it lacked versatility.

But because of its limitations, its amplification was exponentially greater.

And there was one more critical detail.

[One-Man Army] was a necessary prerequisite for the top-tier trait [Hero].

One of the few top-tier traits in existence, divided into specific branches.

Traits like [Giant’s Strength] and [Vajra Body] ended where they were, with no higher evolutions.

But for the sake of my future beyond Level 7, [One-Man Army] wasn’t just an option—it was mandatory.

Boom!

A ripple of mana burst outward.

A hundred superhumans, all undoubtedly weaker than me.

Recognizing them, my mana circuits began to release overwhelming power.

The air itself seemed to distort.

My presence, infinitely expanding, began to warp the expressions of the superhumans around me.

They clenched their teeth, sensing deep down that something was terribly wrong.

“W-what the hell is this?!”

“This doesn’t make sense!”

“He’s supposed to be Level 5? That’s insane!”

“The intel was wrong!”

Cries of panic and terror filled the air as the realization hit them.

I exploded forward, unleashing my mana, propelling myself like a thunderbolt.

A black shadow loomed over them like the scythe of death.

The hunt had begun.

This wasn’t a battle.

It was a hunt.

–TL Notes–

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