Heroine-Saving System: Reborn In A Third-Rate Manga As The Protagonist-Chapter 50: Fate

Kōya pulled himself up slowly from the pile of rubble and broken concrete.

’Well, I already covered my entire body in a protective layer of mana before impact, so I didn’t sustain any serious injuries.’ Kōya thought while pushing debris off himself and standing carefully.

However, his body suddenly refused to respond to his mental commands. He collapsed flat on the ground against his will and lay there completely paralyzed.

He could only lay there helplessly and watch through the hole he’d created in the wall as the Screecher Apes approached slowly, their red eyes glowing with malicious intent and their long arms dragging on the ground.

Then text appeared in his vision.

「You are currently ranking up to Three-liner status」

「Please remain stationary during physical reconstruction」

’Fuck,’ Kōya thought with rising panic. ’Of all the possible times for this to happen—’

However, several concentrated beams of blood suddenly descended from the sky like divine judgment.

From his position inside the hole, Kōya could see that these crimson beams had struck every single one of the approaching monsters in the immediate vicinity with perfect accuracy.

The attacks destroyed not only the Screecher Apes’ bodies but also their internal mana cores completely.

The residual mana energy from the destroyed cores flowed upward into the air, and it was immediately clear that Victoria was absorbing all of it from above to recharge her depleted reserves.

Kōya regained full control of his body shortly afterward.

Unlike his previous rank-up from one-liner to two-liner, there was not even a single bit of pain whatsoever this time.

He just felt suddenly and noticeably much stronger overall, and when he looked down at himself, his body appeared leaner and more defined with muscle.

He couldn’t get a proper look at his face without a mirror, but it seemed like his hair had grown several inches longer as well, now hanging past his shoulder.

He stood up and stretched experimentally, testing his new physical capabilities.

’Did I actually grow taller?’ he thought with surprise.

There was definitely a noticeable difference compared to before... the ground was measurably further away from his head than it used to be, and he would know since he was constantly aware of such details.

「Affirmative. Host is currently 6’2" in height (188 cm)」

Kōya walked out of the hole in the wall and back onto the street. Victoria immediately landed on his shoulder in her bat form.

"Was that entire display meant to be some kind of elaborate trick or strategy...?" she asked with a clear deadpan look in her tiny eyes.

However, upon closer inspection, she couldn’t see any visible wounds on his body despite the violent crash.

"Oh, you ranked up to three-liner? That’s genuinely good progress."

She took off from his shoulder and flew in a small circle around him.

"At three lines of power, you should now be able to get a basic feel for what kind of elemental affinity you have naturally," Victoria explained knowledgeably. "And you can even start wielding small amounts of elemental mana directly, though actually transforming it into a proper structured spell will prove very difficult without extensive training and practice."

"I see..." Kōya said thoughtfully.

The original Kōya from the manga had possessed a fire affinity, which was honestly just flat-out classic and cliché for a protagonist. So what if his fire happened to be blue instead of red?

Akari Kagutsuchi could also use distinctive blue fire as the heiress of the Kagutsuchi clan’s bloodline.

He wasn’t special at all in that regard then Kōya looked around at the absolute wreckage surrounding him in all directions.

The street was completely covered in monster blood, shattered cores, and pulverized bodies.

He face-palmed hard.

"What did I specifically tell you about keeping the corpses intact?" he sighed heavily.

Victoria paused mid-flight, suddenly remembering. She had completely forgotten about that instruction in the heat of combat...

"I sincerely apologize..." she said, sounding genuinely regretful. "I got carried away."

Kōya shook his head and began walking down the destroyed street.

"It’s fine, we can still fin—"

He suddenly paused mid-sentence.

His Danger Sense was going absolutely insane... screaming warnings in every direction simultaneously. There was extreme danger everywhere around him?

He immediately leapt upward in a tight backflip, putting all of his newly enhanced physical power into the jump.

The exact spot where he had been standing just a fraction of a second earlier seemed to compress inward on itself before exploding entirely outward.

The detonation tore a deep crater in the ground at least three meters wide, and the shockwave spread outward, cracking the street and damaging nearby buildings.

’What the hell was that?’ Kōya thought as he landed and skidded to a stop several meters away. ’What kind of monster can do that?’

He was definitely deeper into the Outer Zone than recommended for his level, but he hadn’t heard of any monster with gravity manipulation abilities before in this area.

Victoria flapped urgently off his shoulder and soared high into the air, quickly scanning the surroundings with her superior aerial vision.

She spotted the monster responsible almost immediately.

It was positioned on top of a building about fifty meters away... a monster shaped like a massive dome-like stone head with no visible body, it was on the roof and didn’t look like it could move much.

As far as she could analyze, it possessed some special kind of magic that allowed it to compress and manipulate gravitational forces in targeted areas.

"Over there, Kōya!" Victoria yelled out urgently, pointing both her small wings in a specific direction.

Kōya followed her indication and spotted the monster. Victoria immediately dove sharply out of her current position.

The exact space where she had just been flying compressed violently with a distinctive warping sound.

Kōya’s enhanced vision immediately locked onto the unusual monster positioned on the building ahead.

「Stonehead, Iron-class」

’An Iron-class monster that can control gravity at range...’ Kōya thought as he dodged another compression attack that cratered the street behind him. ’What excellent training material. How convenient.’

He took a calculated step forward and activated Speed Burst and his body turned into a blur of motion.

However, this time he didn’t run in a simple straight line like before.

Instead, he immediately curved his trajectory, having learned from his earlier painful mistake. He took full advantage of the incredible speed to execute a controlled curve to the right, maintaining momentum throughout.

The Speed Burst duration ended, and he skidded to a stop on the cracked pavement. However, the gravity field around his new position immediately began shaking and distorting visibly.

Within just a few seconds, the Stonehead would compress that entire area.

Kōya activated another Speed Burst immediately, curving along the road once more in a different direction and directly in front of his path were several monsters that resembled oversized rabbits with distinctive horns.

He didn’t even get the chance to read their System identification names since he executed a sharp curve around them.

The Stonehead monster erected another gravity compression attack exactly where Kōya had been but hit the rabbit monsters instead.

What followed was a grotesque explosion of blood and pulverized flesh as the creatures were crushed completely flat, along with their internal mana cores being destroyed.

Victoria absorbed the released mana with a pleased smile. She was genuinely grateful to the Stonehead for doing all the hard work of killing monsters for her while she could simply collect the spoils effortlessly.

Kōya performed several more consecutive Speed Bursts in rapid succession, constantly changing direction.

Although his leg muscles were starting to feel like complete mush from the repeated strain, he had successfully reached the base of the building where the Stonehead monster was positioned and he was there for a very specific tactical reason.

The Stonehead erected another powerful gravity compression attack aimed directly at Kōya.

He dodged it deliberately, allowing the attack to completely eviscerate the entire front support structure of the building.

The gravity compression demolished the ground floor pillars as well.

Although some buildings in the Outer Zone were reinforced and structurally sound, many others had suffered degradation and lacked proper structural integrity after years of abandonment.

This particular building was definitely one of the weaker ones.

The entire front section including the roof where the Stonehead was currently positioned collapsed suddenly.

The monster was sent falling through the air, tumbling in several uncontrolled spins as debris rained down around it.

Kōya immediately gripped his blade firmly with both hands and activated Mana Mode, feeling the energy flow through his body.

As the spinning Stonehead dropped past his position, he executed a devastating full-power slash utilizing every skill and enhancement in his entire arsenal.

The stone monster hit the ground hard and its body had been cleanly cut into two perfectly symmetrical halves.

Kōya immediately backed away as massive amounts of rubble from the collapsing building continued falling dangerously around him.

’Fuck,’ he thought as his legs gave out. He collapsed onto one knee, breathing hard and Victoria arrived instantly and landed on his shoulder with concern.

"Are you okay?" she asked urgently as he shifted to sit fully on the ground. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

"We got the monster successfully," Kōya said, trying to catch his breath. "My legs just feel extremely numb right now..."

Victoria looked down at his legs carefully. If a bat could physically frown with genuine concern, she absolutely would have.

"You almost completely tore several major muscle groups in your legs performing that insane technique repeatedly," she said with clear disapproval. "You shouldn’t go around deliberately harming yourself like some kind of masochist who enjoys pain."

Victoria fluttered back down to the ground and transformed into her human form.

She knelt down and carefully raised his trouser legs up, revealing his severely strained leg muscles that were visibly throbbing.

She touched them gently, and Kōya couldn’t help but wince at the sharp pain.

"See exactly what I mean? We’re supposed to be training intelligently, and that doesn’t mean you should go ahead and cripple yourself permanently," she said with an actual pout forming on her cheeks. "If I wasn’t here with you right now, you would have genuinely become a cripple unable to walk properly."

Then she opened her mouth and allowed her healing saliva to pour onto his damaged leg. The liquid was surprisingly cold against his skin, but she carefully rubbed it around both legs thoroughly.

Immediately, Kōya could lift them up properly again without experiencing any sort of pain whatsoever.

The relief was instantaneous.

"Thank you," he said genuinely as he pulled himself up to stand and looked over at the bisected Stonehead corpse lying in the rubble.

"Let’s quickly stock up both the corpse and core before you mistakenly destroy them like the others."

"Hey!" Victoria protested.

Kōya walked over to the monster’s remains and absorbed both halves of its corpse and the intact mana core into two different storage rings on separate fingers.

’What were the actual statistical chances of an Iron-class monster like this showing up right now in a designated Rust-class zone?’ he thought analytically.

There should have been an extremely low probability since the System had specifically designated this particular area as suitable only for Rust-class monsters.

However, his Fate trait had made it happen anyway.

He was really starting to genuinely despise that particular trait with passion.

"Alright, should we continue hunting more?" Victoria asked, clearly expecting him to reply sensibly and suggest rest.

"For sure, we haven’t collected nearly enough materials yet— Ow!"

He was abruptly interrupted as she used her small hand to bonk him firmly on the head.

"What did you do that for?" he asked, rubbing the spot.

The vampire princess turned her face dramatically to the right, refusing to look at him.

"Whatever... Hmph. I’ll go hunt in that direction instead," she said while pointing at a completely random area.

She transformed back into her bat form.

"I’ll leave some cores intact and preserve a lot of corpses for you to collect."

And with that declaration, she flew off, leaving him standing alone among the wreckage and rubble. Kōya gripped his sword properly and immediately brought up the System Shop interface.

He desperately needed to acquire a healing skill for situations exactly like this.

Even if that meant using his very last monthly purchase slot, it was absolutely worth the investment for long-term survival.

After scrolling through the extensive skill section several times and comparing options, he finally found a proper healing skill that fit his needs and budget.

Buying anything B-rank and above was far too expensive for his current FP reserves, so he deliberately stuck around the C-rank tier for affordability.

「Unique Skill: Heal (C)」

「Utilizes the ambient mana present in the surrounding air to heal wounds and repair damaged tissue. Cannot be used to fully regenerate severed or torn limbs」

’The most basic healing skill present in literally every System-based manga or light novel.’ Kōya thought as he purchased it for 13,000 FP.

The instant the transaction completed, new text appeared.

「Your purchasing capabilities have been completely locked from System Store access until May 18th」

’Fuck,’ he thought with frustration.

It had locked him out for an entire month of purchasing but at least he had acquired the healing skill successfully, which was the most important thing.

「Unique Skill: Heal (C) is now taking effect automatically」

Kōya’s entire body felt suddenly rejuvenated and refreshed.

The residual muscle strain and minor injuries from training completely disappeared.

He gripped his sword properly with renewed energy and a genuine smile spreading across his face.

"Alright, time to hunt significantly more monsters," he said as he deliberately took the opposite direction from where Victoria had flown off to.

...

Approximately ten minutes later, Kōya’s legs were feeling noticeably wobbly again from repeated Speed Burst usage but he stood victoriously next to a respectable pile of monster corpses he’d accumulated.

Next to the corpses were their extracted mana cores that were glowing.

He planted his sword into the ground and took off his shirt, which now had several distinctive claw marks torn through the fabric.

He had been fighting continuously as soon as he’d arrived in this section of the Outer Zone, and the constant monster combat really helped keep his blood pumping and adrenaline high.

He could also now perform masterful directional swerves with Speed Burst consistently.

The only remaining problem was that he was still having significant difficulty using his sword to attack effectively while simultaneously executing those high-speed swerves.

The timing and coordination required were extremely challenging.

He raised the storage rings on his fingers and started systematically collecting the corpses.

’I traded those former basic ones and acquired much higher quality storage rings,’ he thought. ’Instead of having five regular storage rings with limited space... I now have just two rings that can each hold several rooms’ worth of materials and items.’

’The Broodminder hive raid really had substantial spoils honestly.’

He finished absorbing all the corpses into his storage and picked up his sword again, examining the blade carefully. There wasn’t even anything resembling a scratch on the high-quality metal despite extensive combat use.

Koya’s Danger Sense suddenly spiked violently with intense warning and he immediately used Speed Burst to move out of the threatened area, controlling the technique to swerve sharply to the side.

Something massive impacted exactly where he had just been standing. It was a Broodminder but far larger than any he’d encountered before.

Its enormous stingers collided with the ground where he’d stood, and the impact created a devastating shockwave.

The force toppled several nearby buildings instantly and created a crater beneath where its stingers had struck.

’If not for Speed Burst’s mobility, I would be completely dead right now,’ Kōya thought with genuine alarm. ’What kind of monster had I somehow offended this time...?’

’Fate trait is really escalating dang—’

The Broodminder slowly turned to look directly at him with unmistakable intelligence in its eyes. It was far, far bigger than the Praetorian Broodminders he’d fought before.

It was even more massive than the regular Twigspire variants or any of their related species and it also had a distinctive royal gold coloration covering its armored body. The eyes of this monster were deep crimson red with intricate net-like patterns visible within them.

It gave off an overwhelming aura of power that made Kōya’s breath literally catch in his throat with primal fear.

「Queen Broodminder, Silver-class」

「URGENT ADVISORY: RUN IMMEDIATELY!!!!!」

The very next instant, the Queen Broodminder shot toward him at incredible speed. Kōya activated Speed Burst desperately, curving out of the attack path.

The Queen’s massive stinger collided with a reinforced building behind where he’d been and what followed was a catastrophic explosion of concrete and steel.

Multiple buildings in the immediate area collapsed simultaneously from the shockwave.

The Queen Broodminder began actively chasing down the human who had systematically killed hundreds of her loyal subjects and she was absolutely not going to stop until he was dead.