“Are you saying you lured us in instead? Interesting. But what do you think you can do alone? Shouldn’t you lure people while watching who your opponents are?”

Assassin Burns couldn’t hide his disbelief.

They said this Hyunsoo was a Level 307 blacksmith.

“Even if you weren’t a blacksmith, we’re people who are pretty well-known in Ares.”

As if proving it, a notification rang out about the unknown status effect binding them.

[Your high resistance resists in 2 seconds.]

It was resistance so fast that even Hyunsoo was surprised.

In just about five seconds, the Lord’s Command that had caught the four of them was about to be removed.

Burns, in particular, was even more special.

[Assassin’s Wit]

[You instantly resist all status effects.]

[You control the skill-usable time of the one who inflicted the status effect for 10 seconds.]

Burns immediately broke free and moved.

“This is better, actually. That sword—just looking at it, it seems very rare. Where did you get a sword like that?”

Burns was an outstanding assassin.

Ordinary users in the 300s usually couldn’t even react to his attacks.

And if skill use was impossible for ten seconds, that was even more true.

‘What was that black current of energy getting sucked into the sword?’

Unfortunately, he couldn’t stop a skill that had already activated, but still.

Burns smiled as he dug into Hyunsoo’s side.

‘Games are control.’

In fact, he was the one who climbed to 8th place in the assassin rankings by control alone.

CLANG!

Burns’s expression soon colored with confusion.

‘What?’

The eyes of the man named Hyunsoo, who lightly lifted his sword and blocked, were sharp.

Burns created three attack points within his field of view and moved on him.

Left-left, right.

CLINK, CLANG!

Burns’s expression colored with confusion.

‘What the hell......?’

An unknown force could be felt.

Burns was a martial artist in real life as well.

But Hyunsoo didn’t seem like someone who had learned real-world martial arts.

And yet his movement was different.

‘My life-and-death has been many times.’

Hyunsoo felt it.

Before he blocked Burns’s attacks as smoothly as flowing water, he’d been worried, too.

Because this was the first time he’d properly crossed blades with users called strong.

And then he realized.

‘I’ve grown.’

He still had a long way to go, but he had definitely grown.

It came from many life-and-death moments that ordinary users didn’t know.

The Fifth Calamity, the Fourth Calamity.

The Giant King.

Frak, the Heir of the Sky King, and the Small World Tree.

‘Those piled up and piled up, and made me who I am now.’

WHOOSH—

Hyunsoo swung his sword up with all his strength.

SHRAK—

[A critical hit triggers.]

[You took 54,313 damage.]

“Kraaaagh!”

Burns, slashed diagonally, was looking at a notification he had never felt even once until now.

‘D-Damage in the fifty-thousands......!’

Burns had met a truly great many strong people here.

Among them there had even been a swordsman in the domestic top-40 range.

That swordsman’s damage was in the twenty-thousands.

[HP falls below 70%.]

‘Even if I’m an assassin, this is......!’

It was beyond common sense. The one fortunate thing was that the other three’s status effects were also removed.

Mountain Warden Doon.

[Mountain Warden]

[In the mountains, you become 30% stronger.]

In the mountains, he was someone even rankers around the 30s couldn’t do much about.

In particular, the reason he was dangerous in the mountains was because of this effect included in the skill Mountain Warden.

[The Mountain Warden’s power instantly pulls in nearby monsters.]

It happened in an instant.

All monsters in the Blessing Grounds were pulled in front of Doon as if being dragged.

Of course, he couldn’t freely control the monsters.

But at the very least, he could designate a single target and make only that target be attacked.

[You designate a target.]

[Snowfield Ettin Lv.331]

[Snowfield Orc Lv.325]

[Snowfield Ogre Lv.339]

There were as many as around sixty of them.

And their levels were far higher than Hyunsoo’s in front of them.

Of course, after killing the man named Hyunsoo, it might become a dangerous blunder even for them.

But Doon, as a Mountain Warden, had more than enough ability to avoid that blunder.

RUMBLE, RUMBLE RUMBLE—

And Hyunsoo’s expression was also colored with confusion.

“No matter how monstrous your damage is, you won’t be able to do anything about this many!”

Doon was a high-ranker.

He could stand there because he thought differently from ordinary people.

Doon had seen the damage that defied common sense when Burns was cut down.

He did not doubt for a second that it was temporary power.

And even if the sword’s attack power was enhanced, a Level 300 body’s defense power wasn’t enhanced.

Soon.

“Kuhoooo!”

“Kuaaaah!”

“Krahahahaha!”

“Kyahahahaha!”

A swarm of monsters numbering around sixty surrounded Hyunsoo.

Creatures around 2~4 m tall had him in the center and were launching indiscriminate attacks.

And Won, Burns, Bon, and Doon used skills toward Hyunsoo within that mess.

[Rending]

[Indiscriminate Cleave]

[Subtleties of Throwing Knives]

After using their respective skills, they saw Hyunsoo’s HP fall below 25% in just three seconds.

3 m.

They were already pushing through the monsters, and they burst into mad laughter.

“You crazy bastard!”

“You were acting so cocky, and now you end up like this in not even ten seconds!”

The four of them couldn’t help but laugh like lunatics.

Yeah, only about ten seconds had passed.

Since he made that cocky remark as if he had lured them.

They closed the distance even more.

1.5 m.

Doon, who had closed it to that distance, expected it.

‘Just imagining the face of a dying bastard makes me feel good.’

Doon, in particular, was the one who had vowed to kill him as painfully as possible.

Still not satisfied, he pushed through the monsters and finally faced the bastard.

“You goddamn—huh?”

Because of the tall monsters, Doon and the others hadn’t been able to see him, and they were forced to panic.

Hyunsoo’s whole body was a wreck, and he was dying.

No, even just looking at the HP bar floating above his head, he was dying.

But Hyunsoo, getting jumped in the gap between the monsters, was standing firmly and enduring.

And his chilling gaze made Doon shrink back.

‘W-What......?’

Even so, wasn’t the bastard right on the verge of death?

But then, as he looked at them now that they were right in front of him, he said,

“Thanks.”

Hyunsoo had been waiting for ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) a certain notification for a long time.

From Level 50 until now.

In this moment, the notification he had waited all those years finally rang out.

*****

The most recent time Barad and Hyunsoo met was when Hyunsoo was raised from Junior Baron to Viscount.

After receiving his title, Hyunsoo spoke with Barad about everything that had happened until now.

Among those stories, there was something that left an impression on Bella.

Bella recalled the two’s conversation.

‘The Sword King’s Swordsmanship Your Majesty passed down to me—it’s incredible swordsmanship, but strangely, the growth is slow. Is it originally like this?’

Barad had answered with a bitter smile.

‘Because you lack qualifications.’

According to Hyunsoo, Sword King’s Swordsmanship had not leveled up even once until now.

The swordsmanship that kingdom soldiers and knights used usually went up by one every time it reached Level 30.

At the latest, they would get a skill level-up at least once every 50 levels.

But Hyunsoo had learned it in the 50s and couldn’t level it up while surpassing 250, which was truly ironic.

“Your Majesty, may I ask something?”

“What is it?”

“Why is Viscount Hyunsoo’s Sword King’s Swordsmanship unable to grow?”

Barad smiled faintly.

‘Bella isn’t a child who takes interest in other people’s affairs.’

But only when it came to Hyun, she took an unusual interest.

Barad said the same thing he had told Hyunsoo.

“Because he was lacking. Back then, Hyunsoo was far too weak a being.”

In truth, he had been nothing but an outsider in the 50s.

A level where he had only just started to toddle.

“Even if he had grown and that strength became greater, his body wouldn’t have endured it.”

With average numbers, Level 100.

Even at Level 100, using Sword King’s Swordsmanship at all was something that broke common sense.

“Swordsmanship becomes superior the more you hone it, the more you improve yourself. But seeing Hyunsoo recently, I felt this.”

Barad smiled as he thought of Hyunsoo back then.

“......He became a fine martial artist.”

That meant Hyunsoo was growing.

And it meant the time was approaching for Sword King’s Swordsmanship to grow.

“As Hyunsoo says, the growth of Sword King’s Swordsmanship would have felt absurdly slow.”

Even by ordinary measures, other users would have raised their swordsmanship level above 5.

“The fun part is that this one time will show all growth up to now.”

“......!”

Bella could understand what it meant.

Even if it was incomparably slower than others, once it grew, it would be better than another skill’s five-level growth.

Bella realized.

‘This is the true subtlety of Sword King’s Swordsmanship.......’

The growth of swordsmanship is finite.

If you make Level 9 swordsmanship, you can’t grow it anymore and you have to learn new swordsmanship.

But that isn’t easy.

However, slow as it was, that power that encompassed five levels of growth in one growth could grow longer and stronger than ordinary swordsmanship.

Bella suddenly became curious. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

‘Just once.’

How much power that one growth would produce.

*****

For Hyunsoo, it was a moment he had waited for a long time.

[Sword King’s Swordsmanship levels up.]

The proficiency that had risen brutally became strangely steep the moment he reached Level 300.

And Hyunsoo, surrounded among monsters, hadn’t been dying.

It was to fill Sword King’s Swordsmanship’s proficiency that was at 99.1%.

He didn’t have to fill it, necessarily.

‘The monsters’ range far exceeds a 20 m radius.’

Hyunsoo needed a means to take them down in one shot.

[You are in possession of Asnium.]

[HP falls below 10%.]

[HP recovers to 15%.]

That was why he had waited with a strategy of giving flesh to take bone.

Level 250.

He felt exhilaration at the Sword King’s skill leveling up just once while raising that distant level.

Beyond satisfaction, it was astonishing.

Mountain Warden Doon shoved his face in through the monsters.

“Thanks.”

“......?”

Doon couldn’t understand those words.

What was he thankful for?

“Kill him!”

KIIIIIIING—

A clear cry that numbed the senses.

[Cry of the Sword]

The subtlety of Cry of the Sword lay in indiscriminate slaughter.

[You cut enemies 50% faster.]

[You indiscriminately cut all enemies recognized as enemies with 230% additional damage.]

[Even if you do not cut directly, if within a 30 m radius, they are cut, and all defense is ignored.]

Becoming faster meant he could deal 50% more damage than usual.

And Cry of the Sword normally had a fatal drawback.

That you had to go through multiple motions.

You had to lower your knees and breathe small, and draw the sword from the scabbard.

‘Not anymore.’

The four of them reached him close enough to stab or use skills, and they fell into a stun.

And Hyunsoo raised the Supreme Blade, strengthened by over 610%, and swung.

WHOOSH—

Originally, the price sound of Cry of the Sword was “KWAK-KWAK-KWAK.”

That sound changed.

RRRRRUMBLE, KRAKAKAKAK—!

The sound of hundreds—more than hundreds—of blades being swung.

Doon couldn’t understand it.

‘......What is this?’

A snowing mountain.

Every monster that had been surrounding Hyunsoo was being slaughtered and collapsing.

‘What am I even looking at......?’

His comrades were turning to ash.

The monsters split into dozens of pieces were the same.

THUD—

‘What the hell is this bastard?!’

Hyunsoo, holding a sword to his neck, smiled coldly.

Because the clear reason he had thanked Doon was now revealing itself before his eyes.

[3x experience and 3x drop rate are applied.]

Applied to around sixty monsters, and the four of them.

A notification that broke common sense was slamming into him.