The feeling of pulsing blood vessels could be clearly felt at my fingertips.
I made eye contact with the magic archer I just killed with my own hands.
There was no guilt for the first murder I just committed. No, I didn’t even feel it.
‘Because I only killed him so I could live.’
“What, what’s wrong with him? It can’t be blinking, right?”
The leader-class warrior shouted when he saw Baek Yu-Seol’s quick movements.
“He’s using unusual movements! Hurry up and kill him!”
My blink’s cooldown had not returned yet. I turned the archer’s body and pushed it away with a kick
Pushuuk!
“Uhhhh”
A fountain of blood gushed out from the body and obstructed the sight of the men approaching me, and one even fell down on the body.
I rolled on the floor holding the arrow from the archer in my hand and used blinking toward the tree branch located diagonally above.
Turk!
“Ugghhh”
It was my first time using an upward blink; thus, the distance adjustment was confusing at the first. I couldn’t place my foot properly and slipped.
I barely grasped the branch with one hand and gave it all my strength, surprisingly, my hard shoulders and back muscles lifted me up the tree at will.
Without a moment to tie the strings to the bow, I quickly hid behind the wooden post, and a lump of flames flew and set off.
Pugh!!
The small explosion ripped through the top of the tree, but the fire did not blow properly.
Maybe it was because of the snow, but the tree was moist.
Squeak–
I hung an arrow on a string, used blink with a branch on the opposite side, and turned the aim to shoot the arrow at the back of a sloppy spearman, who was chasing my afterimage.
“Aww! My feet, whoa!”
‘Did I miss it?’
The aim was slightly off, and it ended up hitting the spearman’s foot.
Although arrows in this world had some degree of ‘aim guidance’ magic on them, I still missed them because I had never used an arrow in my life before.
Luckily, I was able to hit the feet.
‘Nevertheless, I made him unable to move, moving on to the next.’
Whoops! A ball of flame came flying toward me again, but I jumped off the tree without any regrets.
“I, I…!”
Still, it was quite high, thus a dangerous situation that could break a bone if I fell by mistake.
The guy standing in the position where I fell raised his arms in anticipation of the impact with me, but I thrust the knife into the gap between his arms.
Too much! The immediate loud noise meant I had collided with him rather than stabbing him with a knife, so I forced myself to face the front before falling to the ground and immediately used blink.
One of the special features of blinking.
That the momentum immediately prior to using blinking is conserved.
“Ugghhh!
As I took a deep breath while looking at the wizard casting magic from the front, a huge shock came.
“Fire Be… Oops!”
‘Uh-huh…!’
It hit the floor with a stifling sensation and I could feel the swirl of mana.
It was the first time I felt mana today, but because of the situation just before, I realized what this phenomenon was called, just by instinct.
“Magic Rebound!”
It is one of the phenomena that occurs when magic casting fails. When rebound occurs, an explosion occurs according to the magic stage of the caster, and the caster takes damage.
If it was a game, I would have suffered damage from the explosion alone, but is that the same in real life too?
Having gotten to that point, I crouched down as much as possible.
Koo-!
Engulfed in the small explosion, I rolled over the floor several times to disperse the impact.
Perhaps the level of the wizard was lower than expected, the rebound explosion was nothing like a powerbomb, but since I was close, my skin was slightly burnt.
‘Aaahhhh’
I was forcibly coughing out of the stinging pain, but at the creepy sensation of something approaching my head, I unknowingly lowered my head.
Pew!
An arrow flew through my hair and hit the tree next to me.
“Huh, that’s very unusual.”
Now, the only remaining pursuers are a warrior with armor and a magic archer.
Since both of them have their necks exposed, it would be possible to get rid of them if I aim for a vital spot.
Slowly holding the dagger, I got up and took a stance. The warrior raised the corners of his mouth.
“Reaction speed like a ghost and a unique sword for magic. Who the hell are you?”
My anti-engagement speed was far better than that of any professional gamer, so I always appeared on special broadcasts in any game.
I had also won first place in a world competition where they test the speed of response with clicks.
However, no matter how fast it is, humans cannot avoid arrows.
It becomes even more difficult to dodge them without seeing when they are fired at such a close distance.
“If you were a skilled wizard, it would still be understandable with your high sense… But you’re just an idiot who can’t even use magic. I don’t understand. Why don’t you tell me before you die?”
The Mana Leakage Delay, which strengthened all human senses, showed some amazing physical abilities even though it was almost useless in the magical society.
But I didn’t have any intention of talking, and the warrior giggle as if he noticed it.
“Yeah, let’s see if you can move quickly with that injured body?”
A provocation to me was childish, and I often refused to respond to such provocations.
“… Do you have any potions?”
“I have something to drink.”
“Good.”
I took a stance as I drew the dagger little by little.
“I’m going to kill you and drink it, so be careful not to lose it.”
[Blink]
At the moment when Baek Yu-Seol’s body became blurry, the warrior raised his shield and covered his neck and face.
‘I’ve already figured out how you use blinking!”
Baek Yu-Seol always uses blinking and then stops and swings a dagger, so it never carried the momentum of blinking. Moreover, the dagger he wielded was not very threatening.
The rest of his body was protected by armor, so he decided to only protect his face and neck. And another one, Baek Yu-Seol unconditionally approaches the opponent’s face using blinking.
The warrior who thought that far raised his shield and, at the same time, slammed his foot hard on the floor.
“Wave Break!”
Immediately after, the ground in front cracked in a fan shape and the ground shook.
Overconfidence!
“I caught you, you bastard!”
Class-1 basic magic that destroys the enemy’s posture within a certain range! This should be enough to bind his opponent’s movements.
“Die!”
Convinced that Baek Yu-Seol was stunned, the warrior swung a large two-handed sword as it was.
“… Huh?”
‘I have 10 years of PVP experience. Even though this was my first time fighting an actual battle, I am so familiar with ‘magic warfare’ that it makes me cringe.’
Couldn’t I have met an enemy who couldn’t keep up with my blink and put wide-area skills in front of me in advance?
“… the back!”
Baek Yoo-Seol was already moving behind the warrior and swinging a dagger toward the archer’s back.
However, perhaps the archer was also unaware, he rolled over the floor to avoid it, and fired several arrows at Baek Yu-Seol with his crossbow.
Pew! Pew!
“-Ugghhh”
If there was continuous blinking, such a counterattack could have been lightly ignored, but it was currently impossible. I had no choice but to dodge the arrow by rolling myself even if I regretted it.
2
I hurriedly looked up and saw the warrior approaching me, slashing with an ignorantly large two-handed sword.
1
After rolling back one more time, I got up and looked in the opposite direction, the warrior exclaimed, giving up the thought of following.
“He will blink over there!”
They realized it, too. The direction of Baek Yu-Seol’s blink must be the direction he looks at while blinking.
However.
It was a fake that I did to make them think I was using blinking in the first place.
I turned my body once more with the same recoil I had when turning, and fired a round kick, the warrior raised his elbow in bewilderment.
My bones!
“Close!”
“Kyukkk…”
His elbow barely succeeded in guarding him, but I suffered a huge pain as his armor cracked my shin. The warrior staggered from the impact and I used blink.
[Blink]
The archer, who had been shooting a predicted shot at that point thinking that I would blink in the distance, opened his eyes when I suddenly approached him and hurriedly leaped backward.
However, the reaction was delayed because he was aiming from the crossbow.
Pukkk!
My dagger successfully cut through the archer’s neck.
“Kwauk….”
Plump!
“Ugh….”
After the archer fell, I also couldn’t stand the pain in the shin and thought of kneeling on the floor.
“Whew…….”
‘It hurts. It hurts like hell that I want to cry. But I clenched my teeth and struggled to endure the pain.
Looking back slowly, the warrior was glaring at me with blazing eyes.
“You ran away like a rat who’d never been in a fight before, and suddenly the mood changed?”
“……I did before. Thank you for letting me have the experience.”
The reality was different from the keyboard and mouse games. I felt that point right through my bones.
And, it made me realize that this world was real.
“Now that you are alone, what are you going to do? If you’re waiting for two people to come to join you and attack me at the same time, wake up from your dream.”
The warrior’s eyebrows twitched.
“You rotten child…”
“You really thought five of you would be enough to catch me. Who knew it would be so ugly to get beaten like that?”
Actually, this was a lie. I don’t even know what they’re doing. I was just saying it to weaken the other party’s fighting spirit.
But, instead of getting discouraged, he raised his two-handed sword.
My leg bones were almost broken, making me unable to move freely anymore. But, there are already too many limits to believe in blinking alone.
When I tried to hide the wound on my leg and aimed the dagger at his neck, he hardened his expression and covered his upper body with the shield.
… In the meantime, I was frankly admiring the guy’s ability to manage his facial expressions.
‘I guess I’m trusting that guy who’s pretending to faint behind me.’
Earlier, I had confirmed that the spearman, who was hit by my misdirected arrow in the foot, fell to the floor while sobbing.
The spearman has not yet died, nor has he lost his consciousness. My sixth sense, which became sensitive thanks to the suppression of magical power loss, made me feel his presence clearly.
The distance between the spearman lying on the ground and me was only 3m. If I move even a little closer, he will be able to stab and subdue me in a single moment.
“What should I do?”
Should I throw the dagger backward to subdue it? No, that’s not right. There is no guarantee that I will kill him just by throwing, and the risk of losing my only weapon is high. Did I not realize it when I threw the arrow? I am a beginner with no skills at the moment.
Even so, it was burdensome to use blink. The distance from the warrior in front was only 5m.
The moment I use a backward blink to kill that bastard, he will immediately narrow down the distance. He doesn’t have to cover all the 8m. The distance is short, and he also has magic that can shake the ground.
‘I must not use Blink to kill him.’
When I thought about it up to that point, I acted as if I had thoroughly calculated.
I lowered my posture, and almost threw my legs back slightly as if I was about to charge at the warrior in front of me.
As I retreated a bit like that, the distance to the rear became closer. However, his spear hasn’t moved yet. It was a distance that barely reached the tip of the spear, but I was aiming for a more certain timing.
However, such a golden opportunity will never return.
When my body moved, the warrior immediately reacted and slung his shield, but without using the blink, I ran backward and stabbed the back of the spearman lying with the dagger held in both my hands.
Poom!!
He died instantly without even being able to give out a flurry of death.
Immediately, I took the spear and stepped back slightly. The warrior, who had narrowed the distance, raised his shield again. Since the blinking still remained, it was not easy to approach me.
“This guy…!”
The warrior tried to say something stupid, but I threw the dagger without giving the other person a chance to think.
Naturally, the warrior raised his shield and slashed the dagger in layers. However, the action that I took immediately after that was important.
I was looking at the side of the warrior. The spear spun round and round, taking the shape of a big swing.
As if to blink behind the warrior.
At this point, the warrior made a decision.
“… Right. His forward blink can be counterattacked by my magic, so after guiding me to defend the front with a dagger, he’s moving to my side and aiming at my back!”
The warrior immediately turned the shield wide from the position that blocked the dagger and slammed it behind him. If his judgment was correct, Baek Yu-seol would have been aiming at his side and rushing in to attack.
Huh?
However, there was nothing behind him. Because I had even expected that, and this time, I really dug into the front.
‘Shit!”
The warrior looked forward again with a desperate expression, but it was already too late.
The tip of my spear had reached his throat earlier.
Puhhh!
[Episode 1 ‘Escape from the pursuers’ has been completed.]
[Experience points acquired!]
[The story unfolds in a unique way, and the ‘Constellation Project’ promises additional rewards.]
– – – End of Chapter – – –