Earth, North Pacific.
In the vicinity of the collapsed Hell Gate Research Center, some of the remains of the buildings which could not sink were swept away by the waves and floated in the open sea. In the meantime, eight aircraft carriers, which mostly were filled with US troops camouflaged as UN peacekeeping forces, rushed forward.
The aircraft carriers with added etheric technology had a history of defeating SSS ranked great monster Kraken. Therefore, to honor that, all of these aircraft carriers were called ‘Kraken-class Aircraft Carriers (LPDs)’.
‘But, in reality, it’s the hunters who boarded the ship who beat it…’ Taylor Nine looked at the open sea with bored eyes as those thoughts running on her head. For her, whether there were eight Kraken-class aircraft carriers or not, it didn’t really matter.
“Tsk, I can’t even enjoy the sea view because of the boats.” The things that obstructed Taylor’s view weren’t just the aircraft carriers. Behind the parade of aircraft carriers, several destroyer-class ships followed closely. Even under the sea, submarines followed and fighter jets were flying in the sky.
-Hunter Taylor. We have arrived at our destination.
“Okay….”
-Can you come to the captain’s office?
“I was already on my way.” Taylor lied, answering through the remote radio placed in her ears. In all carriers combined, thousands of B and A rank hunters and more than 200 S-rank hunters gathered. However, only a handful of SS rank hunters had gathered here. Of the less than 100 SS rank hunters on the planet, including those affiliated with Murim, only 9 people had gathered here.
Under normal circumstances, this big of an army would rarely be seen moving together. It was only possible because the worst case scenario had happened: The collapse of the Hell Gate Research Center.
As Taylor scrambled down the hallway to get to the captain’s office, she opened her mouth wide when she saw a huge, red object that had begun to appear in front of the convoy.
“….” That object was the entrance to Hell Gate. The place she had heard a lot but saw it for the first time in her entire life.
‘He survived after entering that place through that?’ To be honest, Taylor was quite scared at the moment. Fear was something which normal people would feel when they were standing in front of Hell Gate. So, Taylor thought, ‘What was Yoo Seodam thinking when he entered such a place?’
“And now, he wants to enter that place again…” However, there was still a lot of time to go before she would follow him inside. Right now, she was here only to search the area, clear out any monsters that escaped from the Hell Gate, and recover the wreckage of the Hell Gate Lab. And, the ultimate goal was to install a temporary shelter.
The Hell Gate Research Center had a ‘special gate obstruction device’ installed, but thankfully, even when it had disappeared, all the professors shared the same diagnosis, ’Hell Gate’s expansion rate had decelerated.’
So for now, if she just does what she was supposed to do, nothing special will happen.
But…
“What the hell is that?”
Taylor approached the window, literally put her nose one inch away from it, and stared at Hell Gate. There, just like the corona radiating from the sun, something like an aurora was leaking out from the Hell Gate’s entrance.
It wasn’t only Taylor who discovered it, proven by the fact that the alarm rang loudly throughout the cabin.
-Anomaly occurring! Anomaly occurring!
Instructions to be prepared for battle had been issued, and the hunters and soldiers quickly ran to somewhere. However, unlike them, Taylor stayed there and looked at Hell Gate for a long time.
‘What the hell is that…?’
Something… felt ominous.
*
[13. If the protagonist is attacked by multiple enemies, the enemy will only attack one at a time.]
It’s a very historic cliché. The majority of people who attack the protagonist for some reason will always rush one by one instead of going together, and the next one will just get hit just like the one who rushed ahead by the protagonist.
That’s precisely the situation I found myself in right now.
[Body movement skill is momentarily suppressed by the skill ‘Protagonist Cliché’!]
“Keeukk…!”
At the same time, Seol Jungyeon noonim cut one of Monster 2’s arms, but she was promptly countered, which forced her to retreat. At the moment when the monster was showing a gap, if I had come forward and attacked it with a big magic shot, I could have landed a fatal blow, but unfortunately, I couldn’t move yet because of the monster’s skill where I couldn’t attack him till the monster regained its stability.
[The skill ‘Protagonist Hunter’ partially resists the skill effect.]
Fortunately, the debuff lasts shorter than normal debuff, but it was almost meaningless due to the difference in ability between him and me. When I was about to move, a sudden storm hit my body and threw me to the ground.
Thud! bang bang-!!
‘Damn, that cliché.’ As I was wiping the blood coming down from my lips, Noonim, who was visibly exhausted, raised her sword to the sky.
Although it was not strange for support to come late, with [9. While the protagonist is fighting the main villain, support never comes for the villain] cliche being triggered, so we could not even hope for it.
The level of influence it has on the world was just as dangerous as, or even more dangerous than, the protagonist who shifted the world’s common sense into his own, which I fought in the past. (P/n for those who forgot who this protagonist he mentioned is, it’s the Japanese protagonist from the long-ass world title)
If that protagonist was at a level where he can change the common sense and the laws of physics of the world, then Monster 2 is shaking the fate of this world itself. And in order to gain such great feasts, a lot of probability needs to be consumed.
In other words, Monster 2 was extremely dangerous. After all, the more it gets attacked, the faster the Earth will be on its way to destruction.
Now that I know that fact, another fact comes to my mind. That monster will never die. As long as Earth did not perish, and as long as there is even a slight probability left on Earth, it will live on until it has exhausted all the probabilities of this world.
What should I do?
How can I win?
‘Why isn’t the Protagonist Hunter skill not doing anything?’ This skill has been ignoring the probability of numerous protagonists and destroying them. But for some reason, it didn’t work right now.
‘Is it because my level is too low?’
No, if it was for that reason, it simply makes no sense. I even successfully hunted down the Supreme Dharma, who was far stronger than that monster. It means that the Protagonist Hunter skill can still interfere with the cliché of the protagonist on that level.
I’m missing something here. If the system was still here, she would surely have given me some advice.
If it’s Reina… What would she say to me in this situation? I wonder…
At that moment, my heart became surprisingly calmer than before. For some reason, I remembered the advice Reina had given me in the distant past. It wasn’t a very meaningful word but a simple sentence.
‘You can just do what you normally do.’
Why did I think of that moment right now? It felt too artificial, but I don’t care. Because that gave me a pretty decisive hint.
“Noonim!”
“I am still fine…” Seol Jungyeon noonim answered. She was breathing heavily, but there wasn’t even a single tremor in the hand which held the sword. It proved that she was still able to continue the fight.
“Can you trust me and use a great skill just once?”
“…” She looked at my eyes, obviously doubting my words. After all, it’s not like she deliberately didn’t use a big skill. It was just wasteful since the enemy would still avoid it in the end. If she performs such a skill again and again, it will only turn their winning chance slimmer than before once she expends all her stamina.
But her doubt didn’t last long. She nodded her head with a firm expression and raised her sword upright. Then the monster moved and tried to point his palm at noonim, but I shouted first.
“No matter if it’s an ally or an enemy, when they are preparing for a big skill, the protagonist never tries to distract them!”
At that moment, the attack which Monster 2 launched changed direction and blitzed towards me.
Boom-!!
The ground turned upside down as a shock wave swept the area after the attack clashed with the layers of defense I had erected.
Woooshhh-!!
However, at that moment, noonim finished her preparations. Contrary to magic, the preparations for the attack of the Murim Warriors were not very long, so it’s enough to just distract the enemy for a short time.
Whhiing-!!
As noonim slowly shook her sword, the movement of the air changed. Even Monster 2, who was able to forcibly manipulate the weather conditions, just stood there. It seems like the flow of air which noonim shook had reached the stage where it couldn’t be controlled.
Cheonma Heavenly Art (天魔神公)
Cheonma Sword Of Destruction (天魔震魂滅劍)
Soar (飛翔)
To me, it just looked as if the sword was drawn vertically down very slowly. But the next moment. I felt as if the world had turned black, and the sky was torn in half.
“!!!”
Amidst those illusions, only the trace of the sword that noonim waved showed off its presence!
But at that moment, time slowed down.
[14. Just before the protagonist receives the final blow, time slows down as they recall the past.]
In that slowed world, I desperately rolled my eyes. Drops of sweat, scattered dust, and even broken clouds could be easily seen. Everything was motionless, almost stationary even. Only me, who can resist the cliché, and Noonim, whose sense was already beyond the human realms, were aware of this fleeting moment.
Of course, even though we were aware of it, we couldn’t do anything. I could see the hand holding the sword tremble slightly as a bewildered expression was painted on noonim’s face.
[15. Someone’s advice always appears in the protagonist’s recollection of the past, and that advice plays a decisive role in the protagonist’s attempt to overcome the crisis.]
The protagonist’s cliché skill, which was almost like a cheat, was activated again, and the monster started to move its body again. It stepped away from the trajectory of Noonim’s attack to avoid being mortally wounded.
But it doesn’t matter. In the first place, I was aiming for that exact moment.
“An enemy who recalls the past before the final blow is always defeated.”
Again, this was a cliché. If the protagonist recalls the past, it will eventually become an opportunity for them to awaken and realize their latent abilities, but if the villain was the one who recalls the past, it was a sign that they will be defeated.
As soon as my words fell, Monster 2 stopped on its track. And then, Noonim’s attack cut its body in exactly half.
When its body parts into two, a message comes to my mind.
[Warning! Probability exceeded the limit!]
‘Use my lifeforce to offset it!’
[Impossible!]
‘Damn it!!!’
I can’t turn into a protagonist just yet. After all, I was never supposed to be the protagonist of Earth. Once I become the protagonist, I will be anchored to this world, and I will not be able to enter Hell Gate. On top of it, because of me, the world I loved will be destroyed.
‘I can’t.’
There is still a chance.
‘Then, can we move to the nearest dimension?’
[Precise movement is impossible without the power of the system.]
‘I bet that was the case. After all, you are nothing but a will that Reina left behind.’
The reason humans find it difficult to reach towards the unknown realms was because they have never experienced the unknown. However, while traveling to countless worlds, I made dozens of dimensional shifts, and in the process, I experienced a sense of melting into space several times and adapted to it.
Although I cannot perform it by myself, if it’s only moving to a dimension which is connected to Earth, such as a dungeon, crack and Hell Gate, I was certain I could do it.
“Keukk…!” I moved towards the monster whose body slowly recovered.
[17. When the enemy thought that the protagonist had suffered the final blow, it was nothing but an illusion, because the things inside their clothes blocked the attack…]
“You’re not wearing anything.”
Chijik!
The healing of the wound was canceled. Its power had become so weak that the cliché was canceled even with a single sentence from me. If not now, there will be no chance again.
I grabbed the monster’s head with both hands.
[Do you want to move right now?]
I looked into the eyes of Seol Jungyeon, who was slowly approaching me.
“What are you trying to do?”
“This is the only way to kill this monster.”
“What are you-”
“I’ll take this guy to Hell Gate.”
“What?” The bewildered expression of Noonim made it evident that my plan was nothing but reckless. But it can’t be helped.
‘It seems that the thought of crawling safely into the Hell Gate was me being greedy.’
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I thought so and told Noonim. “I’ll be back again soon, so please wait for me.”
“Wai-wait!”
Noonim hurriedly approached me using her movement technique, but she couldn’t catch me.
[Moving to another dimension…]