The Swordmaster Wants To Live Peacefully [EN]: Chapter 13

Swordmaster Wants to Live in Peace – Episode 13

Swordmaster Wants to Live in Peace 13

Meteor Shower (3)

After defeating the Death Knight, Meteor Shower found an old key.

Even at a glance, it was no ordinary key; it possessed a strange power that made him hesitate to pick it up.

Nevertheless, Meteor Shower frowned, picked up the key, and examined it from all angles.

“What could this thing be used for…”

He muttered unconsciously, then fell silent.

Contrary to his worries, the key didn’t transform into a hulking figure.

Meteor Shower scrutinized the key further, but unable to determine its purpose, he pocketed it for the time being.

The fact that the mid-boss, the Death Knight, dropped it meant it was definitely something useful.

And that probably had something to do.

“With the Black Fortress.”

He turned his head toward the clearly visible fortress wall.

The jet-black Black Fortress stood silhouetted against the faintly glowing crescent moon.

In Meteor Shower’s memory, there was no key among the obtainable items in the City of Eternal Night.

Neither in the publicly available information nor in the intelligence gathered by Yoo Ji-woo’s Meteor Industries.

“Hmm.”

The Death Knight of the White Fortress.

And the Black Fortress and the key.

There was definitely a connection between these three.

Meteor Shower dove through the clearly visible hole in the fortress wall.

Now that he had conquered the White Fortress, it was time to venture into the deepest part: the Black Fortress.

* * *

Only one party was hunting near the Black Fortress, the deepest and most dangerous area.

The monsters near the Black Fortress were stronger than those in the White Fortress, and unless it was a scheduled clearing, no one would deliberately risk entering.

They mainly fought against groups of monsters that had strayed from the Black Fortress.

Lower vampires or packs of draugr [undead creatures from Norse mythology].

Ghostly monsters such as banshees and wraiths, which could only be damaged by weapons or magic imbued with aura, also occasionally appeared.

The party of six, having hunted near the Black Fortress for a long time, skillfully handled the situation and continued their hunt.

Suddenly, the undead group they were fighting began to retreat.

“What? Where are those bastards going?”

The diver [tank/frontline fighter] wielding the sword wondered aloud and retrieved his weapon.

They didn’t consider chasing after them.

Undead weren’t intelligent enough to lure them into a trap.

Stepping into unexplored areas just because the undead were running away would only put them in danger.

“I’ve never seen this before. I’ve never seen undead run away in my life.”

“Don’t the spirits have anything to say?”

“They’re a little agitated. It’s strange because spirits who have lost their reason due to death and instinctively crave life wouldn’t run away like this.”

“So, what’s the conclusion?”

“It’s clearly an anomaly. I think it’s best for us to return to camp for now.”

So said the diver from the Osaek Mudang Society [a fictional shamanistic group], letting out a long sigh and watching the retreating undead in the distance.

For some reason, the undead looked like they were running away in terror.

* * *

People never enter the Black Fortress as a single party.

The vicinity and interior of the Black Fortress were so notoriously terrifying that it could be considered a completely different dimension.

The constantly changing internal structure.

The endless stream of monsters pouring from unknown locations.

It was a very difficult task for a single party to handle.

Besides, since conquering the City of Eternal Night was considered impossible, there was no reason to risk one’s life heading to the Black Fortress.

“Why do these bastards run away as soon as they see me?”

Meteor Shower, heading toward the Black Fortress, felt a sense of unease.

He had left the White Fortress and was leisurely making his way to the Black Fortress, intending to do some hunting, but as soon as the undead saw him, they fled in a hurry.

Meteor Shower was also surprised by this extraordinary behavior.

Undead running away.

“I’ve seen high-ranking undead flee in fear, but this is the first time I’ve seen mindless ones run.”

If he had a necromancer acquaintance, he would have asked about the situation, but unfortunately, he had no necromancer friends.

He had plenty of enemies, though.

Still, the path Meteor Shower had to take didn’t change, and he eventually reached the Black Fortress.

According to the information, the Black Fortress wasn’t easy to enter.

Previous attackers had to fight through several small-scale sieges before gaining entry.

But Meteor Shower faced a different situation than the information suggested.

What greeted him in front of the Black Fortress’s gate wasn’t a siege force.

It was a colossal skeleton sticking its head out from beyond the fortress wall.

“What is this now…”

Another unexpected entity, not mentioned in the information, appeared. The skeleton, emitting a blue glow, had a hideous structure upon closer inspection.

The bones of numerous skeletons were gathered to form one large skeleton.

Was it some kind of amalgamation?

Wasn’t that a technique only high-ranking necromancers could perform?

Meteor Shower made his own guess and reached for his sword.

Caw- Caw- Caw-
A crow-like screech echoed.

The huge skeleton’s cry, as if pounding on the eardrums, shook the sky and the earth.

Soon, the skeleton that had climbed over the Black Fortress wall reached out with its massive hand.

An attack of overwhelming mass, striking from above.

Meteor Shower responded by extending his sword, the blood-colored aura-filled blade piercing straight through the hand.

With a shattering sound, the hand made of numerous bones disintegrated.

But the shattered hand instantly reformed and glared at him.

Meteor Shower jumped between the fingers to avoid the attack and slashed his sword again, leaving a large gash on the skeleton’s upper body.

“Ah, damn it.”

However, the skeleton didn’t stop, even with Meteor Shower’s fierce sword strike.

Instead, it swatted Meteor Shower, who was floating in the air, sending him flying.

He crashed into the ruined temple site near the Black Fortress and stared at the sky while sprawled on the ground.

“The moon is so dark…”

He had no injuries, but he realized the skeleton was a tricky opponent.

Usually, even undead would pause if they sustained a large wound, but this thing sacrificed ‘bone’ for resilience.

Meteor Shower hated this type of enemy.

Even if he cut it, it wouldn’t feel like much, and only meaningless attrition would occur until he broke the medium sustaining its form.

Meteor Shower raised his head while lying comfortably in the ruins, looking toward the skeleton.

As he moved farther from the Black Fortress, the skeleton hid its figure again behind the fortress wall.

“There’s definitely a caster involved.”

If so, what was the medium that made up that thing?

If he destroyed the ‘core,’ it wouldn’t be able to maintain its form and would shatter.

Meteor Shower got up from the ruins and dusted off his waist.

What kind of hardship was this in his later years?

He thought he would only be playing games and eating after returning to Earth.

Instead, he was fighting the undead, which was not his destiny.

‘…No, is this just fate?’

It was a useless thought.

Meteor Shower shook his head to clear his mind and pushed off the ground.

As he approached the fortress wall again, the giant skeleton stuck its head out once more.

Meteor Shower drew his sword-wielding right arm far back and threw the sword like a javelin.

A sonic boom erupted, and the sword flew through the air.

The next moment, the head of the skeleton that had emerged from the fortress wall ‘exploded’.

“There it is.”

The head, made of numerous bones, scattered in all directions, revealing the core within.

The core, resembling a blue crystal, was about the size of a fist.

It would have been difficult for anyone without exceptional eyesight to find it in that pile of bones.

Having located the core, he pushed off the ground and leaped.

He jumped tens of meters into the air in an instant, and as he reached out his hand, the sword that had flown away returned as a cluster of light.

“It won’t work twice.”

This time, the skeleton tried to sacrifice bone for resilience.

The huge hands converged where he jumped.

But he wouldn’t be fooled by the same trick twice.

He spun around in the air, creating a fierce whirlwind.

The storm of sword strikes he created shattered the hand bones rushing in from both sides.

At the same time, he used the shattered pile of bones as a stepping stone and propelled himself forward once more.

Inside the skull of the skeleton that was just beginning to reform.

He reached the core faster than the skull could regenerate and grabbed it.

Then, he pulled himself out of the fortress wall again, and the skeleton collapsed, unable to maintain its shape.

“I should take this to Ji-woo as a gift.”

At first glance, it contained a lot of magical power, and a high-level formula was inscribed on it.

It would be something that could help Yoo Ji-woo, who was in the magic world.

He stopped the magic circuit of the core by pouring his energy into it, and then confidently walked to the main gate of the Black Fortress.

With the gatekeeper defeated, all that blocked his path was the Black Fortress’s large gate.

He swung his sword mightily and slashed the gate diagonally, and the steel gate fell, clearing the way for him.

“This is the Black Fortress…”

He entered through the gate, kicked open the inner gate, and stepped into the gloomy interior.

The flames of the chandelier hanging in what appeared to be the lobby were dim, and bloodstains and cobwebs were everywhere.

The musty smell that stung his nose further confirmed that it was a den of undead.

This was the 3rd class Abyss [a high-difficulty area].

The deepest part of the City of Eternal Night, the Black Fortress.

“Tsk.”

As soon as Meteor Shower entered the Black Fortress, he was greeted by a swarm of enemies.

Various undead swarming from all directions.

“All the bastards who ran away were gathered here.”

“These 씨부럴 [sshibyeol – a Korean curse word] guys…”

Meteor Shower muttered quietly, took a deep breath, and firmly gripped the sword hilt.

At the same time, he began to sweep around, raising a blood-red sword aura from his blade.

Every time his sword swung, dozens of skeletons collapsed at once.

The zombies and ghouls that were approaching were also cut into pieces and scattered on the floor.

The banshees and wraiths, being 영체 [yeongche – spirits/ethereal beings], couldn’t approach due to the ominous momentum alone.

When he had filled the lobby with the corpses of undead.

“Ha, is this a defense game?”

After defeating all the undead at once, a second wave swarmed in, like some kind of defense game.

As if he had finished the first wave, there were also some that seemed to have more numbers and were 강화 [gwanghwa – enhanced/strengthened].

Meteor Shower felt a sense of incongruity here.

The Black Fortress internal attack method in the information he received wasn’t like this.

Although the internal structure changed every time he entered, the lobby was always the same.

The key was to attack the various corridors, using the lobby as a safe zone.

However, hundreds of undead were pouring into that lobby, which was supposed to be a safe zone.

The information received from Yoo Ji-woo was a collection of data accumulated over dozens of attacks.

He couldn’t predict the changes in the dungeon, but he couldn’t ignore the accumulated information either.

It was also strange that the dungeon was changing at the time he entered.

“It seems like there’s something they want to hide so badly…”

Otherwise, they wouldn’t try to eliminate him so blatantly.

Meteor Shower almost instinctively realized that what the City of Eternal Night was trying to hide was related to the key he possessed.

The change inside the City of Eternal Night began from the moment he defeated the Death Knight in the White Fortress and obtained the key.

A kind of hidden piece.

A vicious gimmick that appears when certain conditions are met.

Meteor Shower smiled as he tightened his grip on the sword.

If the owner of the Black Fortress wanted his death.

He would bring death with him.

“Wait, you corpse bastard. I’ll let you know what it’s like to die twice.”