Terrorist — Part 2
What should I do?
I accelerated my thoughts.
Charleon entered the house, our eyes t, and I rose to greet him politely—all the while my brain was working at full speed, sparking with ideas.
“Hello. I heard you called for …”
The thod was simple.
I just had to reveal that Charleon wasn’t actually a mutant and that he had deceived Grizzly Bear and the mutants of the Monster Village.
The problem lay in the specifics of how to do it.
Words alone wouldn’t work.
Mutants don’t believe anything until they see it with their own eyes.
Even in the ga, you had to go through trendous effort to prove it.
‘But there’s no ti for that.’
I made my decision.
Pretending to exchange pleasantries and maintaining a fa??ade of respect, I subtly switched my traits.
[Giant’s Strength]
[Mana Soul]
[Sigurd Cultivation Technique]
[Grand Assault]
[Close-Combat Mastery]
[Subjugation]
Thud!
I imdiately lunged at Charleon.
The distance was a re two ters.
Close enough that I could reach him with just an outstretched hand.
“Huh?”
Charleon gasped in surprise.
“What are you doing?!”
Grizzly Bear roared in fury.
“Gasp!”
Skeleton Snake reached out her hand.
Too late, all three of them.
Before they could react, I had already pounced on Charleon like a lightning bolt.
Crash!
We tumbled to the ground as a single mass.
“Gaaah!”
Charleon scread in pain as we collided with a solid wooden dining table, smashing it into pieces.
The impact struck his entire body, leaving him howling.
Pinning Charleon down, I wrapped my thick right arm around his neck and squeezed with all my strength.
His face turned blue almost imdiately as he struggled violently, but it was futile. He’d already been subdued.
Charleon was Level 6, a tier higher than .
But that didn’t matter.
He had been caught completely off guard and ambushed.
Besides, Charleon, true to his na, was skilled in transformation and stealth, not direct combat.
Grizzly Bear stood up, his face red with rage.
“What do you think you’re doing?! How dare you attack one of our own in front of ! No matter how much of a benefactor you are to our village, do you think I’ll let this slide?!”
In contrast, Skeleton Snake remained calm, her expression composed.
“Chief, why don’t we listen to Black Tiger Swordmaster first? He’s not the kind of person who would attack one of us without reason.”
“Whose side are you on?! I don’t care how much you love ice cream; you think we should trust a human?!”
“Not a human—Black Tiger Swordmaster’s intelligence. He’s not an idiot. I trust that he understands what it ans to attack one of our own in our village, especially in front of the chief. Isn’t that right, Black Tiger Swordmaster?”
I nodded firmly.
“Of course. Allow
to explain.”
For mutants, showing is always more effective than telling.
While keeping Charleon restrained with my right arm, I used my left hand to rip his clothes apart.
To be precise, only his upper garnts.
As expected, his reptilian, scaly torso was revealed.
Grizzly Bear narrowed his eyes.
“Why are you stripping him? Are you so kind of pervert?”
Skeleton Snake, on the other hand, remained as stoic as ever, her gaze fixed on
as if she couldn’t understand what I was doing.
Their reactions left
bewildered.
‘What’s wrong with them? Can’t they see it?’
“Don’t you see?”
“See what?”
“What exactly are we supposed to notice?”
“…Hah.”
Even when it was laid out so blatantly, they still didn’t get it?
I glanced down at the back of Charleon’s head.
Thanks to the [Bright Eyes] trait I had switched in, sothing caught my attention—sothing no ordinary person would notice.
A navel.
Now, let’s think about this.
Do mutants have navels or not?
The answer depends on the type of mutant.
Mammalian mutants, like Grizzly Bear, or demon-type mutants, like Yacha or demonized beings, do have navels. They are gestated in a womb, mature, and are born that way.
However, plant-types, bird-types, and reptilian-types like Charleon do not.
They develop inside eggs for three months, drawing in mana to mature, and then awaken by hatching from the egg.
Therefore, Charleon shouldn’t have a navel.
But he does.
A navel pierced with a mana core earring, emitting waves of sensory distortion mana.
The problem is that neither Grizzly Bear nor Skeleton Snake noticed the navel.
This can’t be explained by simple sensory distortion mana waves.
‘There’s only one possibility.’
In the Terror Organization quests, you sotis encounter Monster League terrorists as random spawns.
When you capture them, they occasionally drop treasure maps.
If you follow the maps to the treasure vaults, you can find consumables like one in particular—Loki’s Mockery.
A target-specific transformation consumable.
It doesn’t work as a buff for the user but rather as a debuff for others.
If this item was used on the Monster Village, it explains the current situation.
If it wasn’t sothing of this level, it wouldn’t have been enough to fool Grizzly Bear.
‘This guy got too complacent.’
He probably thought that equipping a sensory-distortion mana core would suffice to trick them.
He likely didn’t expect , a promising warrior, to possess perception and detection-type traits like [Bright Eyes] or [Sixth Sense].
He might have considered the possibility of [Bright Eyes], but not this level of scrutiny.
“Ugh! Let
go, let go!”
“Nope.”
“Chief! Save , please!”
“You just wait right there.”
Grizzly Bear stretched out his arm.
An arm thicker than most people’s height, more like a tree trunk than a predator’s limb.
I clicked my tongue and spoke curtly.
“Just stay quiet. Chief, you don’t even have the right to speak right now.”
“What?!”
“If you can’t realize that you’ve been duped, then just stand there and watch. You were fooled, plain and simple.”
“What did you just say?!”
I ignored him.
Whether Grizzly Bear started breathing fire or not, I focused on my work.
[Purification]
It’s a trait I hadn’t used in a while, included in the Vajra Body configuration.
[Purification] isn’t limited to myself—it can be used on others too.
I cast [Purification] on Charleon repeatedly.
Mana waves surged around him in rapid succession, engulfing his body.
Perhaps he sensed sothing was happening, as he twisted his neck and began screaming in desperation.
“P-please spare ! H-he’s trying to kill !”
“Stop this at once!”
Grizzly Bear roared in fury.
“You can see what I’m doing. Why don’t you stay put and watch quietly?”
Grizzly Bear, who looked like he was about to explode, suddenly froze. His massive paws trembled slightly as he observed the mana waves I was emitting.
Even without perception or detection traits, a Level 7 being could still vaguely understand what was happening just by feeling the mana flow.
“S-spare …”
Charleon’s voice began to weaken naturally.
After all, Grizzly Bear was glaring at him as though ready to kill.
Not at his face or eyes, but at his navel—the spot where the mana core piercing was embedded.
“How dare you… How dare you!”
Grizzly Bear’s fury, once directed at , shifted its focus.
Now, it burned solely for Charleon—the impostor who had pretended to be a mutant, deceived the village, and endangered everyone.
Grizzly Bear raised his arms high and let out a roar.
“How dare you deceive !”
Fwoosh!
Crimson energy flared like a volcanic eruption.
Gone were the gentle, cow-like eyes of Grizzly Bear.
All that remained was a raging wild bear.
A chill ran down my spine.
The blazing red energy enveloping him—a manifestation of ultimate martial mastery at Level 7—was crackling like a storm of lightning.
“Wait!”
Still pinning Charleon, I raised my left hand to stop him.
“You can’t kill him!”
“And why not?!”
“This bastard must have subordinates! If we kill him, we won’t be able to catch the rest of them!”
A deputy leader wouldn’t be traveling alone.
Grizzly Bear gritted his teeth as he glared at Charleon.
“You rotten scum! You should be grateful! If it weren’t for Black Tiger Swordmaster, I would’ve torn you to pieces and fed you to the children!”
Skeleton Snake approached quietly.
She snapped one of her fingers, then multiplied the fragnt into a chain of bones, which she wrapped tightly around Charleon.
It wasn’t just physical restraint—it sealed his mana as well.
Charleon, gasping and choking, glanced back at .
“How did you know?”
“Know what?”
“My disguise was perfect! I used everything I had—my full abilities and even rare treasures passed down in the organization!”
“Guess it wasn’t enough to fool . I knew the mont I saw you. Don’t you know about a warrior’s intuition?”
“A warrior’s intuition… damn it!”
Charleon spat out a string of expletives, too vulgar to repeat.
Before he could say more, Skeleton Snake smacked him across the mouth.
“Shut up.”
Whack!
The sound was sharp and satisfying.
Charleon coughed up blood, along with several white teeth that clattered to the floor.
Grizzly Bear grinned nacingly.
“Well done. Hit him one more ti for .”
“Sure.”
Thud!
This ti, she struck the back of his head.
Charleon slumped over, unconscious.
“You’ve done us a great favor again. This could’ve turned into a disaster. If it weren’t for you, Black Tiger Swordmaster, our entire village might’ve faced ruin.”
Grizzly Bear’s voice had softened, his earlier rage dissipating.
“It’s nothing. The truth would’ve co out eventually. No matter what that guy used, there’s a limit to how long soone like you could be deceived, Chief.”
“Even for a mont, it’s still a problem. I was too naive. Like you said, I was a pushover. I should’ve thoroughly verified and tested him before letting him into the village, but I got blinded by the thought that he was one of our kin.”
Grizzly Bear looked genuinely remorseful.
It had been a close call.
This was a terrorist.
What if he had set off a bomb inside the village?
Not a regular bomb, but a special magical bomb that could trigger mutant berserk rampages. That would’ve been catastrophic.
The entire Monster Village could’ve been turned into rubble.
“Who knows what that bastard might’ve planted in the village. Check the areas he’s been in for bombs or traps.”
“You’re right. I didn’t even think of that. Skeleton Snake, could you take a look around?”
“Why is it always ?”
“Because you’re reliable.”
“…Fair enough. I’ll go.”
“Also, check the barrier. There might be his subordinates hiding nearby!”
“I doubt that’s the case, but fine. I’ll look.”
Skeleton Snake dragged the unconscious Chaleon out of the house.
Not long after, a commotion erupted outside.
“What the—hey, what are you doing, Skeleton Snake?!”
“Why are you tying up that poor guy?”
“Let him go! Whatever mistake he made, let him go!”
“Idiots! Open your eyes and look!”
“Huh? A… a navel?”
“He’s not one of us?”
“He’s not? He’s human?”
“What? No way!”
It seed Charleon’s arrival had been a major topic of conversation throughout the Monster Village.
Listening to the escalating chaos outside, I let out a bitter chuckle.
“Ugh…”
Grizzly Bear sighed deeply and collapsed into his seat.
He clapped his hands loudly, causing the mana in the house to ripple. A door swung open, and to my surprise, humans entered the room.
Humans?
“Chief, you called for us?”
“Yeah. Make
a big bowl of ran. I need to calm my nerves.”
“Uh… and that guest is…”
“Oh, make another bowl for him too. As you can see, he’s human. Make it human-style, got it?”
“Yes, Chief.”
The humans, dressed in white chef uniforms and wearing tall hats, bustled off to prepare food.
I stared at them with a bewildered expression.
They were chefs.
Grizzly Bear chuckled.
“When you’re stressed, eating is the best redy. How about it? Care to join ? Haven’t you missed a al by now?”
“Sounds good.”
I sat across from Grizzly Bear.
With the table destroyed, we had to sit on the floor to eat.
That seed to suit Grizzly Bear just fine—he was clearly used to it.
Given his massive size, he probably always lived like this.
Having been born during the Japanese occupation, it made sense that Grizzly Bear was more accustod to sitting on the floor.
Slurp!
Surprisingly, the ran was delicious.
It felt like a cross between Japanese-style ran and Korean instant ran.
The handmade noodles were cooked to perfection, with a spicy broth and a generous amount of toppings. It gave the impression of dining at a trendy spot in Hongdae.
As I quickly devoured my portion, barely tasting it as it disappeared down my throat, Grizzly Bear lifted an entire pot and drank the broth straight from it.
“Isn’t it too salty?”
“The saltier, the better! Human ran is too bland. Anyway, I’m always grateful to you. Without you, I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy anything like this.”
“I didn’t expect you to hire chefs.”
“Heh heh. It’s all the rage in our village these days. You noticed the chimneys, right?”
“Of course. It looks like you’re using firewood as well as gas.”
“You can’t mix mana core powder with a gas stove. But we installed city gas too—it’s convenient for quick cooking.”
“You installed city gas? Out here in the middle of nowhere?”
“If you’ve got enough money, it’s easy.”
The chefs standing nearby chuckled awkwardly.
Well, he wasn’t wrong.
With enough money, you could install city gas or anything else, no matter how remote the location.
Even the chefs themselves must have been lured here with promises of high salaries and excellent benefits.
Regardless, it was a positive change.
The village, which once felt like a primitive, barbaric place, now had the atmosphere of a place where people actually lived.
“What do you plan to do with Charleon?”
“We’ll interrogate him and then hand him over. Whether they roast him, boil him, extract his mutation genes, or turn him into a berserk mana core, I don’t care.”
“That’s rather cold of you.”
“Hmph. Why should I care if a human dies? Ah, except for you, of course. You’re our village’s friend and benefactor.”
Grizzly Bear finished the last of the ran broth in his pot.
“It’ll probably take about a day. It’s getting late, so why don’t you stay the night?”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. You have no idea how much the villagers have been waiting for you. Especially after what you did with Charleon, they’ll be even happier to have you here. Who knows, soone might even propose to you.”
“Well, about that…”
“I’m joking, I’m joking. Honestly, do you think our village’s won are the type to attract humans? But hey, if you find soone you like, I won’t stop you.”
Grizzly Bear winked playfully.
With his cow-like eyes sparkling mischievously, I couldn’t figure out how to respond.
I ended up chuckling despite myself.
The night in the Monster Village was unforgettable.
The mutants celebrated with more passion than any Nordic warriors I’d encountered, reveling in drink, song, and dance.
Despite their fearso appearances, their hearts were pure.
For the first ti in a while, I was able to set aside my worries and enjoy myself.
But at dawn.
As the joyful night gave way to the cold rays of the morning sun, the entire village lay in a peaceful slumber.
That was when an explosion—no, a deafening blast—shattered the tranquility.
“Terrorists!”
–TL Notes–
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