Chapter 183 – Guerrilla Warfare (2)

Hoffman gazed up at the sky from behind the window of a four-story building.

Lightning streaked across the cloudy sky, flames erupted, and were then torn apart by blades of wind.

“I never thought I’d witness a battle of grand mages like this,” Hoffman muttered, clicking his tongue as he watched the spectacle of magic lighting up the sky.

A Lich, shrouded in a translucent black shield, was unleashing spells in all directions, while the Daughter of the Divine Tree, flitting through the air like a swallow, dodged the spells and attempted to break the shield.

Watching the two fight, Hoffman was reminded of the war between the Empire and a southern kingdom before the battle with the Demon King.

Back then, the royal mages of the Empire and the grand mage of that kingdom had clashed in the sky just like this.

“Didn’t the grand mage win that time?”

At the time, the kingdom’s grand mage had crushed the entire area with gravity magic, causing the Empire’s mages to fall from the sky to their deaths.

Hoffman remembered how awestruck he had been by the grand mage’s power. He had even thought the Empire might lose.

Of course, the war had ended in the Empire’s victory.

The kingdom had only one grand mage, while the Empire had many mages, not counting the ones who had already died.

Moreover, the kingdom had no warriors capable of matching the Empire’s knights.

“A knight…”

Like a grand mage, a knight was a strategic weapon, a knight among knights.

And such a knight was traveling with Hoffman.

If it were Ea, Zahina, who was now flying through the sky, could have shown the true power of a grand mage.

Yerim too… In fact, she possessed divine power worthy of being called a saint.

Even Yelena, who had joined later, was a skilled battle mage, and the girl from this world whom he had taken as a disciple was a prodigy.

Among such extraordinary companions, Hoffman was the only one who was less than ordinary.

Unlike the others, he was just an ordinary mountain soldier.

“An old soldier barely holding on with potions, at that.”

He knew well that he didn’t fit in with them.

He had only stayed by Yerim’s side under the pretext of having traveled together from the beginning.

Now, it seemed there was no longer a need to protect Yerim or help her get accustomed to battle.

The group didn’t even need a pack mule anymore, so there was nothing left for him to do.

Besides, he had gained a lot.

He had experienced incredible adventures and obtained treasures he had never dreamed of, so he could return home and live comfortably with his children.

‘I was planning to part ways this time…’

He had intended to leave the group and return home once they reached the capital.

His mandatory service period had long passed, and with the Demon King driven away, he thought it was time to go back.

Though the mission had turned into something resembling a hero’s grand adventure, he felt it was time to return.

Of course, he had never voiced these thoughts.

Speaking such things on the battlefield was taboo.

‘Surely, just thinking about it couldn’t have caused all this, right?’

If the unexpected events that had unfolded were due to his thoughts, that would be troublesome.

Even if he planned to return home, he couldn’t start holding back now.

Partly out of loyalty to the group, but also because he had never held back before.

If he had, he wouldn’t have joined the vanguard or become a potion addict.

“It’s been a while since I’ve done this.”

Hoffman pulled out a small container from his pocket.

It was covered with red X marks.

He grimaced as he swallowed the powder inside.

“Damn, this stuff doesn’t even get you addicted.”

Immediately after swallowing the powder, his body trembled in pain.

Veins bulged across his body, and his skin turned red.

Then, his mana surged.

The powder was a drug, or rather, a poison, extracted from the monsters of the northern mountains.

A poison that caused mana to run wild.

It allowed him to use several times more mana for a short period, but left him half-crippled afterward.

Not everyone who spent a long time in war became a potion addict.

People didn’t easily become addicted to potions even if they were injured multiple times.

No one deliberately injured themselves for that.

Yet, potion addicts emerged among soldiers because there were those who got injured enough to become addicted.

Those who were injured to the brink of death or crippled themselves.

They were people like Hoffman, who forced themselves to survive.

As the pain subsided, Hoffman’s eyes began to glow with mana.

He blinked a few times to adjust and then peered out the window to the north.

A horde of zombies had passed by, and he could sense three undead approaching from behind the buildings.

A sensation he wouldn’t have felt before.

“Is this what Sir Egar feels?”

Until now, Sir Egar, the knight, had been far more perceptive and aware of his surroundings than Hoffman, a former thief turned mountain soldier.

Add to that the mages who used magic to survey the area and Irene, who could track with her abilities.

It made Hoffman feel even more useless.

“No, it’s probably more than this. Sir Egar could sense things from much farther away.”

Depending on the situation, Sir Egar could sense undead from much greater distances.

“Well, I shouldn’t compare myself to him.”

This was enough for him.

After all, he wasn’t supposed to fight head-on; his role was just to lure the enemy.

Before the enemies appeared in front of the building, he nocked an arrow and drew the bowstring with all his strength.

*Whoosh.*

Unlike before, the bow, which he had obtained in this world, drew smoothly to its full extent, easily withstanding his enhanced strength.

The arrow was still imbued with the divine power Yerim had infused into it.

The faintly glowing arrow.

Infusing divine power into an arrow…

Zahina had been baffled by infusing mana into bullets, but Yerim infusing divine power into arrows was just as absurd.

A priestess worthy of being called a saint.

“Someone like her wouldn’t lose to the undead.”

And for a short time, he too could wield the strength of a knight.

Leaning against the windowsill, he aimed the bow toward where he sensed the undead.

The next moment, three figures—no, three undead—appeared on the street.

They seemed to be walking slowly, but they were approaching faster than a normal person could run.

Hoffman fired an arrow at the gray-haired woman between the two Death Knights.

*Thwack!*

The arrow shot out like a bullet.

To him, it seemed almost as fast as a bullet.

*Thud!*

The arrow struck the gray-haired woman in the chest.

*Whoosh!*

Her clothes and body burst into flames from the divine power.

The gray-haired woman looked down at her burning chest, then turned her gaze toward Hoffman.

Though her face wasn’t visible from this distance, the moment she looked at him, he felt something slimy seep into his mind.

‘Undead aura!’

Hoffman immediately grabbed another arrow.

The moment he held the arrow imbued with divine power, the dreadful feeling vanished.

“Even with the poison, it’s this bad. If I hadn’t taken it, I might have been done for.”

She had been a saint in life, and even in death, she had become a terrifying undead.

Sir Egar often grumbled about his bad luck, and it seemed he was right.

Hoffman doubted Sir Egar had expected him to fight while drugged, but if he hadn’t taken the poison, things could have gone very wrong.

Enduring the lingering pain, Hoffman continued to fire arrows.

*Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.*

The arrows flew in rapid succession.

*Thud, thud, thud.*

But the subsequent arrows didn’t reach the woman.

The Death Knights beside her cut down every arrow.

Each time they cut an arrow, their swords caught fire, but the flames quickly died out.

The flames on the woman’s clothes and body also extinguished.

The translucent black aura surrounding her snuffed out the flames.

They had rendered Hoffman’s attacks useless, and one of the knights began to charge toward him, but Hoffman remained still.

It wasn’t time to move yet.

“Wait.”

The Death Saint, who had pulled out the arrow devoid of divine power, stopped the knight who was about to rush toward the archer.

Instead of looking in the direction the arrow had come from, she turned her head to look behind her.

*Clang. Clang.*

Simultaneously, the two knights raised their swords.

Behind them, on the roof of a low commercial building, stood a knight.

A knight no one had noticed until now.

A proper knight, worthy of the Death Knights drawing their swords first.

Seeing the knight, the Death Saint tilted her head.

“Isn’t that the knight we saw earlier? I thought he ran away.”

At her words, the knight, Egar, silently looked at the Death Knights.

The Death Knights flinched under his gaze.

Looking at the Death Knights and the human knight, the Death Saint frowned.

“What is this? It’s not like the Demon King’s Four Heavenly Kings are appearing one by one. Why are they showing up one at a time…”

She didn’t finish her sentence.

*Thwack!*

Another arrow flew in, cutting her off.

Of course, the black aura surrounding her prevented the arrow from setting her clothes and body on fire again, but it was enough to irritate her.

*Thwack!*

The arrows kept coming.

The Death Saint looked toward the direction the arrows were coming from and then at the mages flying in the sky before finally turning to the knight.

“Are you suggesting that knights fight knights and mages fight mages?”

The knight gave a slight nod, and the Death Saint clicked her tongue.

What an outdated notion.

But it was the kind of thing her companion, the hero, would have liked for its romanticism.

It didn’t sound bad to her either.

That knight wasn’t a hero.

He seemed skilled, but he couldn’t defeat two Death Knights alone.

The mage flying above looked like a fly dodging spells.

She wanted to test the divine power that was irritating her.

The divine power in the arrows wasn’t hers, nor was it any divine power she knew.

A new kind of divine power. As the Death Saint, and as a saint in life, she was extremely curious.

From what she could sense with her aura, there was only a knight-level soldier and a saint, so she was more than a match for them.

“Knightly, I suppose. It was nice meeting you. I hope you don’t come back to life. Let’s not meet again, even in death.”

She waved at the knight on the building and then said to the Death Knights.

“Destroy them. Leave no trace of their bodies.”

That was the last mercy she could offer to a knight the hero would have liked.

With those words, she flew toward the direction the arrows were coming from.

At the same time, the two Death Knights leaped onto the building.

Seeing the Death Saint charging toward him, Hoffman began to flee toward where Yerim was,

while I drew my sword to face the two Death Knights.

Death Knights created from the former hero’s party.

They were the perfect undead for a swordsman to fight.