Chapter 272: Artificial Superhuman
Blood sprayed in every direction from the body of the security guard whose head had been lost, and the other security guards who had suddenly been drenched in their comrade's blood blinked stupidly.
The reason their minds had gone blank was because the ally they had believed would deliver them from the present horrific situation had instead turned to attack them.
It had gotten so bad that even after witnessing with their own two eyes Etinel Pri launching its attack, they had thoughts along the lines of 'could it be the intruder who killed him?' — such was the extent of it.
It was the manifestation of a desire to believe that the lifeline of salvation descended from above had sohow not rotted away. One could also call it escapist thinking.
The killing machine, by design bearing nothing so inconvenient as a human heart, lightly trampled even that with its next action.
Crunch!
"···! W-what the hell!"
"What the hell do you researchers think you're doing!"
The security guards recoiled in horror at Etinel Pri attacking them with no apparent [friend-or-foe identification].
They tried every way to put distance between themselves and Etinel Pri, but it was a judgnt and reaction that ca far too late. They were too close to flee.
The biggest factor was that, fearing the intruder Baek Woohyun as much as they did, they had rushed forward toward Etinel Pri — how could they have imagined their ally would attack them?
Even had they known, there would have been no path available to the security guards.
Etinel Pri ahead of them, Baek Woohyun behind them.
Whichever way they chose, their deaths were effectively sealed.
Crack!
—Kiiing.
Etinel Pri, having annihilated every last surviving security guard in an instant, turned its head toward Baek Woohyun. As if fixing its gaze on him.
The main sensors embedded where the eyes of the blood-soaked marble statue would be blazed red. That precise gaze one would naturally imagine from a killing machine.
Despite an appearance that was truly terrifying, Baek Woohyun faced it with composure. To him, this too was a sufficiently familiar sight.
"······."
—······.
One person and one machine stood locked in confrontation within a frigid silence.
The atmosphere flowing between them was knife-edge tense and chilling, like the mont just before a guillotine blade drops.
It was because Baek Woohyun, drawing on his experience from 'that side,' and Etinel Pri, through information analysis, each knew precisely how formidable the other was.
A single mont of carelessness would lead directly to death. Person and machine arrived at the sa judgnt, and so the tension in the instant before combat comnced was all the sharper for it.
"······."
Grip.
It was Baek Woohyun who moved first.
He extended his right hand naturally toward Etinel Pri, then imdiately clenched his fist tight. As though intending to hold his opponent in the grip of his hand.
The power of his supernatural ability responded willingly to his will. The manifested telekinesis seized not only Etinel Pri but every inch of the surrounding space entirely.
An attack unleashing the full might of a supernatural ability build standing just one step away from [max level]!
Crrrunch!
Everything within the surrounding range, including Etinel Pri, crumbled and condensed toward a single point. Even the corpses of the dead security guards, every last one.
It was an utterly terrifying sight, as though even a single drop of blood was being sucked into so twisted space — aning it was that grotesque.
Well, it was a supernatural ability manifestation accompanied by a hand motion from a monster who could casually tear several people apart with nothing more than a glance, so that was only to be expected.
However, astonishingly, Etinel Pri endured the powerful-output [Distortion] with its bare body. Not only that — it outright ignored it and advanced a step further.
Etinel Pri's supernatural ability resistance having beco the perfect version, past the mid-version which had rely been at a level of possessing a certain degree of resistance, was that formidable.
To the point where area attacks targeting the entire surrounding range, rather than pinpointing itself alone, could be ignored without any special counterasure.
'As expected, this doesn't work.'
Even faced with Etinel Pri's counterattack, which claid his attack was 'not even worth acknowledging' and disregarded it entirely, Baek Woohyun was not in the least disappointed.
He already knew from his experience on 'that side' that with sothing at this level of a perfunctory greeting, he could not inflict so much as a scratch on an Etinel Pri of comparable caliber to the one he had faced there.
The reason he had attempted this first attack despite knowing that was simple. It was to test Etinel Pri's strength, and simultaneously to set up the groundwork for the next attack.
What that groundwork was beca apparent when, just as Etinel Pri was moving to close the distance in one burst, an irresistible repulsive force arose behind its back.
Kwaaaa—!
The space forcibly condensed to a single point through powerful telekinesis would, the mont the force holding it in place disappeared, be released — such was the nature of things.
The recoil generated as the distorted space unfolded pushed back Etinel Pri just as it had been about to charge in, and in fact suppressed its movent instead.
No matter how formidable a set of physical capabilities it possessed, Etinel Pri was humanoid in form. It could not simply ignore the shaking arising from the space itself.
Of course, this was nothing more than a temporary constraint. The spatial vibration generated through condensation-and-release was powerful, but also dissipated quickly.
It was entirely natural that Etinel Pri, which had been crouched and waiting, resud its movent the mont the shaking subsided.
Equally natural was that, the instant after it charged, it had arrived right before Baek Woohyun before one could even blink.
Whoosh!
''The speed is on par with the Etinel Pri from 'that side.' Its other stats are probably similar as well.'
The question of whether the stats of 'Reverse Planet's' Etinel Pri and 'that side's' Etinel Pri would naturally be the sa, given they were effectively the sa unit, was aningless.
Because the reason 'that side's' Etinel Pri had pursued physical capability above all else was the existence of the 'Superhuman.'
The research facility, having been beaten by Baek Woohyun so thoroughly, had ticulously tuned Etinel's improvents to counter him — and Etinel Pri was the result at the end of that process.
On the other hand, in 'Reverse Planet,' Baek Woohyun had not run quite as rampant as he had on 'that side.' At most, he had blown up a few research facilities — that was the extent of it.
Uncharacteristically so, for soone who had demolished dozens of research facilities, killed hundreds of security guards, and obliterated enormous research records and results.
Therefore, he had considered the possibility that 'Reverse Planet's' Etinel Pri might differ from 'that side's' Etinel Pri — but it seed that was not the case after all.
'The reason is, well — obvious, I suppose.'
In 'Reverse Planet,' whenever a being modeled after Baek Woohyun appeared, there was only ever one cause.
Deus's intervention. The artificial intelligence that fixated on him to an uncanny degree had doubtless shaped Etinel Pri into its current form as well.
Deus, who had gone so far as to spend long stretches of ti ticulously gathering information and then make the most perfectly crafted doppelganger of Baek Woohyun its own flesh — it would easily do sothing like that and more.
Gooo—!
Even as he speculated on the process behind Etinel Pri's creation, Baek Woohyun's response was perfect.
Not flustered in the slightest by Etinel Pri appearing before him in an instant, he seized his opponent along with the surrounding space and shoved it backward.
It was because he had judged that, having targeted Etinel Pri alone, the supernatural ability resistance might still block him when he didn't yet know how strong it was.
Indeed his judgnt proved correct — Etinel Pri, while resisting the telekinesis binding its body, could not prevent the space itself from being pushed back.
Furthermore, since Baek Woohyun had also applied telekinesis to himself to pull back as well, the distance that had just been closed widened even further than before.
Not that it ant much, since closing it again was all it would take — it amounted to buying nothing more than a brief sliver of ti.
Kiiing—!
"—!"
Etinel Pri steadily closed the distance, underpinned by its characteristic supernatural ability resistance. No matter how many tis it was pushed back, it advanced toward Baek Woohyun like a heavy tank.
The shell composed generously of minerals whose supernatural-ability-resistance-bearing and thus difficult-to-extract material was packed in without restraint endured even Baek Woohyun's supernatural ability techniques without difficulty.
On 'that side,' the research facility had given Etinel Pri the nickna 'Artificial Superhuman' — this was a sight that showed why.
'If close-quarters combat is what you want — fine.'
The ash-gray eyes of Baek Woohyun, watching Etinel Pri tear through the bound space and advance toward him, blazed alight.
The transparent flower blooming to envelop him, the Flower Of Annihilation, also blood into fuller flower. As if plainly proving that he was now exerting his full strength.
'I'll gladly oblige.'
Baek Woohyun released the telekinesis pushing back Etinel Pri and the surrounding space. Moreover, the telekinesis that had been pushing himself backward was reversed to act in the opposite direction.
In complete reversal of the monts just before when he had been trying every which way to widen the distance, he closed it instead. And that at a pace nearly equivalent to Etinel Pri's charge.
Person and machine sharing the sa intent, reaching the point of standing with only a single step between them was truly the work of an instant.
Kiiing—!
Even in a situation where an opponent that had continued refusing to give distance was suddenly approaching, Etinel Pri responded with agility. It was thoroughly chanical movent.
The killing machine with all emotion excised perford no such thing as being flustered even in unexpected circumstances — it simply and silently carried out its function.
Well, it was not particularly strange either, given that the being serving as Etinel Pri's foundation had likewise not batted an eye at more or less any situation.
Etinel Pri's grip reached out toward Baek Woohyun as though it had been waiting for this, and Baek Woohyun, having closed the distance so abruptly, looked as though he were about to be seized at any mont.
The Artificial Superhuman's grip strength could effortlessly tear apart even alloy steel — being caught in that hand would an, quite literally, not leaving a single bone behind.
Since he hadn't closed the distance in order to kill himself, naturally Baek Woohyun t it head-on.
"—!"
Kwaaaa—!
Just before Etinel Pri reached its objective, a pitch-black sphere of gravitational force materialized at the tip of the fingers Baek Woohyun thrust forward — and began devouring everything.
An absolute darkness from which nothing, including light, could escape, created by space condensed to the extre limit in a single point!
[Black Hole], which by the re fact of its existence distorted the surroundings in an uncanny manner, sucked Etinel Pri in as if determined to give it no chance of flight.
Tat!
Etinel Pri, having suddenly found itself leaping toward its own death, did not simply take it. It withdrew its extended hand and imdiately stepped back.
But would it have earned the na [Black Hole] if one could avoid it as one pleased? All the more so when it had been unable to escape damage even in the situation of already having attempted an attack.
Despite its swift evasion, with a crunch and a spine-chilling sound, part of the shell on Etinel Pri's right hand was torn away and vanished into the black void.
It had been proven that even tals that could not be scratched by ordinary supernatural ability techniques were rendered aningless before [Black Hole].
Kiiing!
"Hh—"
Baek Woohyun standing his ground boldly, as if inviting it to co again if it wished. Etinel Pri watching him with blazing-red main sensors.
The second standoff between two beings who had both departed far from humanity did not last long. One exchange of blows had been enough for the sizing-up to end.
Both Baek Woohyun and Etinel Pri, as if it had been arranged in advance, charged at each other simultaneously.
Gooo—!
Kiiing—!
A charge where one side used powerful telekinesis and the other used nothing but raw physical force!
The distance that had existed between Baek Woohyun and Etinel Pri ant nothing. Before one could even close their eyes and open them again, they were already face to face.
Arriving within the interval where hand and foot — or supernatural ability technique — whatever was extended would reach, they imdiately moved to kill each other.
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