Kim Ki-Rok moved swiftly through a corridor within the Final chanical Monster's Keep. After sending a chanical monster flying with a swing of his mace, he hurriedly bent backward at the waist just in ti. In the next mont, a Humanoid's sword sliced through the air just above him.
Instead of counterattacking, Kim Ki-Rok hurled himself farther back to dodge the next strike. Launching himself backward left him unable to regain his balance. He hit the ground awkwardly, rolling several tis before finally coming to a stop.
He quickly pushed himself upright and scanned the scene. He had managed to gain so much-needed distance from the Humanoid. However, the S-Class monster was fast, powerful, and relentless, as one would expect. With a light push off the ground and a short dash, it could close the gap in an instant.
Although he had only monts to react, Kim Ki-Rok quickly scanned his surroundings, checking the remaining distance between himself and the rest of his enemies. Then he hurled both maces he was holding at the chanical monsters directly ahead of him.
Both maces flew forward, each crushing the head of a different chanical monster that was charging at him. Even with those two down, many more were closing in.
Kim Ki-Rok watched calmly as the remaining monsters barreled forward, bursting through the flying debris of their fallen comrades. He channeled mana into his arms, increasing its density until a thick aura surrounded his limbs. Attacks made with mana might not be especially effective against chanical monsters, but that didn't an he couldn't use it to reinforce his defense.
"Hmph!" He kicked off the ground with a grunt, launching himself at the nearest Humanoid.
With his physical stats and senses strengthened by mana, Kim Ki-Rok swung his fist through the air. But as expected of a dangerous S-Class monster, the Humanoid followed his movents and t the blow head-on with its own fist.
Their fists collided in a huge explosion that sent both Kim Ki-Rok and the Humanoid flying backward, separating him from his enemies once more. The crucial difference was that Kim Ki-Rok stood alone against the chanical monsters' overwhelming numbers.
Grimacing from the impact, he twisted his body midair and landed safely this ti. However, the chanical monsters held the nurical advantage and weren't willing to wait for him to regain his footing. A nearby Animaloid leaped toward the spot where he was about to land.
Imdiately upon landing, Kim Ki-Rok drew a small hamr from his belt and swung without even checking his surroundings. The hamr struck the leaping Animaloid midair, sending it flying backward.
The fight, however, was far from over. Kim Ki-Rok still had to singlehandedly block these three hundred monsters from entering the room behind him.
He reached into his subspace pocket with his left hand. When he drew it back out, he was holding a massive rectangular shield. Kim Ki-Rok drove the edge into the ground and positioned himself behind it, covering most of his body.
An Animaloid leaped at him from the left, but in the next mont, it slamd into the shield instead of reaching Kim Ki-Rok himself. The shield, like all the gear he'd brought to this Gate raid, was forged from Pastera and sturdy enough to withstand the raw force of a chanical monster.
The creature tried to crush him under its weight, but Kim Ki-Rok reached around the shield and slamd his hamr into its head. The blow wasn't enough to finish it off, but it hit the spot that would correspond to a human's eyes, damaging the caras responsible for its sight and wiping out a large portion of its field of vision.
He twisted his body, shifting the shield in front of his chest. Then he let go and drove his right foot into it. The blinded chanical monster, its skull already dented, was blasted backward along with the shield and slamd into the wall.
"Haaah..." Kim Ki-Rok sighed exhaustedly. "There are still 270 left..."
By now, the floor was littered with the bodies of thirty chanical monsters that had either stopped functioning completely or had parts of their bodies destroyed.
***
Team One was in charge of the First, Team Two handled the mid-bosses scattered throughout the keep, and Team Three's job was to stop reinforcents from the city before they could break through.
mbers of the last team were stationed along the wall surrounding the central keep. One of the Hunters, Nam Dong-Wook, pulled back his bowstring with a grunt of effort. His arrow flew straight into the forehead of an Animaloid leading its pack. Without waiting to confirm the hit, he was already nocking another.
The shafts and heads of his arrows were forged from Pastera, more than enough to pierce chanical armor. Nam Dong-Wook's mission was to take out as many chanical monsters as possible. He couldn't stop them all, but he'd destroy what he could, or at the very least, damage them enough to take them out of the fight.
—Hunter Nam Dong-Wook, they've found another way in!
If the city walls were the outer defenses, then the ones around the central keep were the inner walls. Standing atop them, Nam Dong-Wook fired arrow after arrow at the approaching chanical monsters. He turned quickly when a voice ca through the communication device he had placed on the ground nearby.
Three chanical monsters had penetrated the Hunters' defenses behind the walls and were running toward the keep. Hunters were also stationed in the garden below, but they already had their hands full dealing with other chanical monsters and couldn't handle the new arrivals.
So that's why they called for help, Nam Dong-Wook realized, pulling back his bowstring again.
The chanical monsters raced straight toward their target, making no attempt to evade. As soon as Nam Dong-Wook released the arrow, it flew at extre speed and pierced through a chanical monster's back. Rather than stopping partway, it pierced straight through its body and partially embedded itself in the ground. Since even the shaft of the arrow was tal, it didn't snap, even as the monster's weight anchored it to the ground.
The Animaloid stumbled and fell, unable to move forward because the arrow stubbornly pierced its abdon. It reacted instantly, swinging its sharpened tail to sever the arrow, but the blade bounced off with a clear, resonant ring.
"Just like the Guildmaster suggested," Nam Dong-Wook muttered, drawing a new arrow and setting it on his bow. "Going with these all-tal arrows was the right decision."
One of the Hunters below managed to kill the chanical monster he was facing and moved to block one of the two remaining monsters, so Nam Dong-Wook only had one left to deal with. Just as before, his tal arrow tore through the chanical monster, pinning it to the ground just a few steps in front of the keep's wide-open doors.
The Animaloid imdiately tried to cut through the arrow, but after several failed attempts, it shifted tactics, bending its legs as if to leap. It wasn't trying to break the arrow anymore; it was going to rip itself free. But the Hunters weren't about to let that happen.
Two more Hunters, having finished off their own targets, rushed over to the monster Nam Dong-Wook had pinned at the gates. It might take so ti to bring it down, but with both of them keeping it occupied, there was no chance it would make it into the keep.
Nam Dong-Wook turned and aid at the first chanical monster he had pinned to the ground. Like the one at the gates, it had figured out the strategy of trying to pull the arrow out with a jump.
Since its goal was only to dislodge the arrow, it didn't jump very high, wary of the Hunters around it. However, this made it an easy target for Nam Dong-Wook, shooting down from his high vantage point atop the walls.
The chanical monster leaped, only to be sent crashing back down as it was struck by another arrow. After confirming that it was pinned to the ground again and seeing other Hunters already moving to finish it off, Nam Dong-Wook looked back out at the city.
He let out an exhausted sigh. "Phew! At least it seems like their numbers are finally shrinking."
If before there had been at least ten chanical monsters running into the city at any mont, now there were only about five. Considering how many they had to get through just to move from the outer walls to the inner walls and finally secure a defensive position to block further reinforcents, the decrease was obvious.
"Hoooh! Haaaah..." Nam Dong-Wook steadied himself and aid his bow at yet another monster charging right at them.
***
Elsewhere, Kang Seh-Hyuk from Team One sprang into action, leaping forward to cover an S-Class Hunter who had landed in a clumsy roll after losing balance midair. Planting himself in front of the fallen Hunter, Kang Seh-Hyuk raised his shield and braced himself.
A tal cable ca whipping down from above, striking the shield instead of its original target. On impact, the cable suddenly lost tension, slumping over the shield as if sothing had gone wrong with the force driving it. Even so, Kang Seh-Hyuk kept his shield raised, not letting his guard down. He couldn't afford to take any chances, not when their opponent was the First.
Soon, the cable that had gone slack, as if held up only by his shield, began to move again. The end of the cable rose into the air as if coming back to life, then shot straight toward Kang Seh-Hyuk like an arrow. anwhile, the length of cable lying atop the shield suddenly doubled in weight, pressing down on him with trendous force.
Normally, Kang Seh-Hyuk would have used his Aura Armor for protection. However, he was currently working with the other S-Class Hunters to defeat the First, which, like all chanical monsters, was resistant to mana.
The Hunter who had fallen behind earlier suddenly sprang to his feet and blocked the cable's attack from impaling the now defenseless Kang Seh-Hyuk. Swinging his mace in a huge overhead blow, he pulled the cable down to the floor and stepped on its end with his right foot.
"Thanks," Kang Seh-Hyuk said with a grunt.
The Russian S-Class Hunter turned his head and replied with a smile, "I'm the one who should be thanking you."
From their position, they could see the other S-Class Hunters in their team using the cables still attached to the First's body as stepping stones to get closer, while the monster tried to direct its cables to knock the Hunters down.
With the distinct whir of telescoping lenses, the cara that served as the First chanical Monster's sole eye snapped into motion. It locked onto an S-Class Hunter leaping across its cables. The sound ca again, sharp and deliberate, making every Hunter tense instinctively as the monster began its counterattack.
The S-Class Hunter being tracked by its eye let out a curse. "This is fucking crazy!"
His reaction was understandable. Even more tentacles, or rather, thin cables with sharpened points, sprouted from the First's shoulders. So of these cables imdiately shot toward the S-Class Hunter.
He quickly pulled a shield from his subspace pocket, grumbling to himself, "This is really going too far."
Just before he could raise his shield in defense, he caught a glimpse out of the corner of his eye of more giant cables, and even more thin cables, approaching from a curved angle.
"Don't co here!" he shouted as the other Hunters turned to help, then activated one of his prepared artifacts with a special command. "Blink!"
With a burst of light, the S-Class Hunter vanished from his previous spot, causing dozens of cables to collide with each other in a ssy tangle. This accident kept many of the smaller cables that had sprouted from the First chanical Monster's shoulders from attacking the other Hunters.
"Haaah! Haaaah!" he reappeared, panting, hands on his knees from the adrenaline surge.
After the permanent Gate to the Yuashiel Dinsion was established, artifacts inscribed with high-Circle spells began appearing on the market. They sold for extrely high prices, as the one setting those prices—Kim Ki-Rok—did so with Yuashiel's priorities in mind, not Earth's. Still, anyone with enough mana could now access powerful artifacts imbued with high-circle magic.
One such artifact had just saved an S-Class Hunter, allowing him to narrowly escape the cables' encirclent with a 5th-Circle short teleportation spell. He slowly lifted his head to gauge the First chanical Monster's reaction, only to flinch. Its eye was locked onto him, unblinking and focused, as if analyzing everything about him.
Should he stop attacking and focus on defense until the First turned its gaze elsewhere, or keep attacking, risking even more of its attention?
Though he hesitated for a mont, the S-Class Hunter didn't take long to decide. He straightened up, cracked his neck from side to side, and charged in.
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