Chapter 520: Continental War: World Championship, Part Two (17)
(Master of Effort.)
Grade: Legendary.
Effect:
· You grew up hearing the story of a Monarch who pressed forward without ever tiring, and you know that effort brings its proper reward.
· You tire less than anyone.
· When your stamina drops to its limit, your mind will grow clear and your focus will sharpen.
A newborn child.
The core powers that made up White Tiger were fourfold.
Versatile, Master of Effort, Teacher’s Grace, and the title One Who Defied Death.
Versatile is a talent that lets him excel at anything he learns. But can a human truly do that?
Even if someone became better than others at everything, actually becoming versatile was difficult.
Because in the end, a human body was still only one body.
If he dabbles in this and that just because he’s versatile, he’ll only become someone who is good at many things.
In Hyunsoo’s personal opinion, being overwhelmingly good at one thing was better than being good at several.
Someone like Ben, who had reached the Extremity of the spear, or Barad, who wielded the sword with mastery.
So Versatile was both an advantage and a disadvantage.
But one power, Teacher’s Grace, allowed him to partially ignore that.
Depending on what kind of teacher he meets, he will grow greater and more exceptional.
He might not merely become someone vaguely good at one thing.
He might truly become good at everything.
Hyunsoo suddenly looked around.
“It seems best to begin by teaching him the Pythagorean theorem.”
“......?”
That was what Sage Arte said.
Wasn’t the standard thing to teach a newborn, later on, addition and subtraction first?
“Shouldn’t we start by teaching him how to hunt ogres?”
“......?”
Ogres were the exclusive prey of high-level users.
After Borne spoke, Luxiu clicked their tongue.
“This place is full of idiots.”
As expected, Luxiu had the bearing of a Commander.
So Luxiu is normal after all.
Hyunsoo felt relieved.
He should not have.
“You should teach him how to fight eighteen-to-one first.”
“.......”
“.......”
Actually, that did look the most efficient.
Hyunsoo, dumbfounded, held White Tiger in his arms and looked at each of them one by one.
Luxiu, the undefeated knight.
Bella, the genius of the sword.
Sage Arte.
Borne, the genius of horsemanship.
Akao, king of the sea.
And then.
Lucky Lump, KyooKyoo, Kkoko, Pretty, and the others were all with the newborn White Tiger.
.......
A chill ran down Hyunsoo’s body.
He grew curious what kind of synergy the bonds he had built until now would create in the future when they met this child called White Tiger, with his Versatile and Teacher’s Grace.
And then.
“......His Majesty Barad has arrived!”
The greatest swordsman of the continent, a man with an enormous presence, appeared.
At his arrival, the people who had only been thinking about what they would teach him, each claiming, “I’m the best!” looked at him for a moment.
That was right.
There were people outside too.......
Those outside figures might also help White Tiger grow.
Everyone focused on Barad as he made his grand entrance, showing off the dignity of the Sword King, and Hyunsoo too heard the intense words of the strongest swordsman before a dear friend.
“......He looks like me.”
“.......”
“.......”
He was late to the party.
Meanwhile.
There was one man watching White Tiger, surrounded by all those tremendous figures.
It was Pan.
Watching the people all insisting they resembled the child, he felt wronged.
No, he’s my son......!
*****
If a being in Hell interferes with someone’s life and death, they receive punishment.
That was the truth Aria knew.
When everyone was enjoying the joy of a new birth.
Aria knew she must not ruin the joy of those who simply believed he had stopped by.
And saying such a thing would shake Hyunsoo.
The God of Death.......
Inside the carriage on the way back.
Aria’s face had turned deathly pale.
The reason the God of Death stood in that place was because he was the most cold-blooded of all.
Just as a judge did not pass judgment according to emotion.
Even the God of Death was the cruelest one, never seized by emotion.
That much was clear just from the fact that he ruled Abyssal Hell.
Sir.......
Because she, too, knew Ben, her chest grew heavy and sorrow welled up inside her.
How much pain must he be suffering.......
At the same time.
The God of Death recalled Cerberus, who had overcome punishment not long ago.
Cerberus was still running down the distant road called the rainbow bridge.
Yet once again, a variable had occurred at the boundary between life and death.
......Is this because of Hyun again?
What in the world was that man, for this to keep happening?
Cerberus was a being whose natural body transcended humans by an immeasurable degree.
So he thought the old man, who had been human, would be different.
But.
The old man, thrown into the pain of having his entire body torn to shreds by blades, was strange.
“Oh, you say this is the pain of being torn apart by blades? Hoho. Then does that not mean I can become freer from the pain of swords and spears, and that my body can grow?”
“......?”
Was he insane?
There was no way such a thing was possible.
Yet the old man truly enjoyed it.
No, rather.
“......?”
He went all the way to the end of the hell of blades and returned on his own.
That was right.
One fact about those in Hell was that they did not die.
This Hell was a Hell where one suffered pain.
If someone “gave up” of their own will, they would not die.
They would vanish.
Yet the old man made fourteen round trips through the hell of blades.
When he left for the final time, he wore a satisfied smile.
[Defense against blades and spearheads increases by 15%.]
Because his body had grown by another stage.
Next came the pain of his entire body burning.
The old man seemed to find that pain fairly painful.
But then.
FWOOOOOOSH—
He sat cross-legged and felt the heat.
He controlled mana to manage the pain of fire and enjoyed the growth of his body.
In the pain of having his entire body burn away, where he was originally supposed to remain for one day, the old man stayed for five.
[Fire-attribute resistance increases by 30%.]
[Fire-attribute Attack Power increases by 30%.]
Next was the Hell where his entire body froze solid.
There, the old man froze pure white.
His eyebrows, his hair, his hands, even his legs.
He even felt the pain of his heart freezing.
And inside that pain.
The old man began to lose consciousness for the first time.
Good!
The God of Death rejoiced.
At last, that insane old man was vanishing!
At that moment.
FWAAAAAAH—
The increase in Fire-attribute Attack Power he had obtained just before.
That meant he could set fire to his own body.
Heat rose through the old man’s body, and his frozen flesh melted.
Then.
“Hoho. Hyunsoo once told me about bathhouses. Is this what they call a cold bath and a hot bath?”
Was he insane?
Or perhaps......
Is he a pervert?
The old man repeated his hot bath and cold bath(?) like that, enduring the Hell where his entire body froze solid.
To be precise, he trained there.
[Ice-attribute resistance increases by 30%.]
[Ice-attribute Attack Power increases by 30%.]
This time, it was the pain of his entire body being crushed under giant steel beams.
“So I will gain the endurance to withstand being trampled by massive monsters?”
The old man was crushed like a tomato hundreds of times.
At some point, he stopped being crushed.
He had awakened the strength to endure even when trampled.
Beyond that, he trained along paths of pain: the pain of hundreds of explosions going off, the pain of endlessly enduring without sleep, and many others.
[Resistance to explosions increases by 30%.]
[You will feel as though you slept soundly for 8 hours after only 5 hours of sleep.]
[Defense against all skill attacks increases by 20%.]
The Hell of Terror, where monsters endlessly tore into and devoured one’s entire body.
It was the Hell humans feared most.
But the old man holding a spear laughed heartily.
“Oh? What a fine opportunity to train my spearmanship.”
“GRAAAAAAAAH!”
“GRWAAAAAAAH!”
“GRWOOOOOOOOOO!”
Monster hordes numbering in the tens of thousands charged in to show “terror.”
The old man was unmistakably bitten apart and killed again and again.
But after it repeated more than dozens of times, his skill improved, and the eyes of the old man, who could not die, flashed with madness.
And then.
“Gr, grwwooooo.......”
“Grhuuuuuh.......”
“Grrrr, grrrrrrrr.......”
Abyssal Hell.
The monsters meant to embody terror became terrified.
The terrified monsters curled up or flattened themselves against the ground.
“Hoho.”
The sight of the old man standing before them with only a single spear in his hand shocked the God of Death.
The old man killed the terrified monsters.
[Spearmanship Mastery increases by +1.]
And so he completed his training by going through every Hell of pain.
The God of Death stared at him as if looking at a monster.
Then he came to realize one fact he °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° had forgotten.
[The most terrible Hell has been cleared.]
[A reward must be prepared.]
This place, in the end, was also a place where trials were carried out.
Of course, he had been dragged inside as the price for interfering with the boundary between life and death.
No, was he really dragged inside?
But the price had already ended by the act of entering and leaving that place.
The God of Death thought through several possible rewards.
Then he came up with the best reward he could offer.
Yes, that should do.
The God of Death walked forward to meet the old man, who had returned before the gate to the Hell of pain.
“I will reincarnate you.”
It was the reward humans wanted most.
Especially those trapped in Abyssal Hell.
And this was even more special.
“With your talent for spearmanship intact, just as you are now. You will live once more somewhere as a legend of the spear.”
It was a beautiful blessing.
To be born again as a human, not an insect, animal, or plant, and with one’s own talent at that.
But the old man said,
“No thank you. What I want is something else.”
At the old man’s words, the God of Death looked puzzled.
Could there truly be someone in Hell who wanted something more than reincarnation?
“......I would like you to tell me where the Spear God is.”
“.......”
“And after that, the way to become a Guardian Deity.”
“.......”
Only then did the God of Death understand.
“Yes. So that was it.”
The man called Hyun was a mysterious person.
The God of Death’s chest, which had once wept because of Cerberus, grew heavy again.
“There is no one who could endure the Hell of pain in such a way. It was only because he knew that overcoming this would let him draw closer to becoming a Guardian Deity.”
From the beginning, what the God of Death had seen.
It made no sense.
The old man had been overcoming pain in that seemingly nonchalant manner in order to reach the result he wanted.
Yes. The very idea that someone could enjoy feeling pain makes no sense. It was solely to become a Guardian Deity.......
Originally.
It would have been enough for him to tell the old man only where the Spear God was.
But the God of Death was moved.
A sheet of paper appeared in the air, and the method was written across it.
[You acquire a map showing where the Spear God is.]
[You acquire a parchment describing how to become a Guardian Deity.]
Soon, they were placed in the old man’s hands.
The old man smiled brightly.
To smile so brightly. How admirable.
Now the old man would leave for the place where the Spear God was.
The God of Death returned before the crystal orb.
A subtle smile hovered at the corners of his mouth.
Thank you.
It was because of Cerberus, and then because of the old man.
The God of Death had no emotions, and because of that, he was empty.
But the stories brought to him by the man called Hyun made him feel emotion.
His chest, swelling for the first time in ages.
His body, filled to bursting.
So this is emotion.
He was happy as he felt it.
Then the God of Death calmed that trembling chest and looked at the crystal orb again.
He trained as if it were nothing in order to pretend he was fine.
As he stared into the crystal orb, the God of Death’s expression turned puzzled.
Beyond the crystal orb.
The old man, after tucking the parchment and map into his chest, walked into the Hell of pain with his own two feet.
“Hohohohoho! You mean I can train again!?”
[Ben reenters the Hell of pain.]
“????????”
The old man made exactly fourteen round trips, grew stronger, and vanished while humming, saying, “That was enjoyable training.”
“.......”
That was right.
The old man really was insane.