Surviving Restructuring

Rather than renting a corner in a building someone else had already made, Eun-Ho chose this harsh forest. Instead of a safe life tucked away in the back, he chose his own land with his own hands.

“Kieeeek—!”

“Kiyaaaaah—!”

Therefore, even as the shrieks stabbed at his eardrums, he had no intention of retreating. He was ready to charge in himself and tear out their throats within the ten minutes he’d promised.

Stepping forward, he extended his right hand diagonally downward. “Summon.”

Swoosh—

A faint current of wind brushed against his palm. A single strand of smoke, wavering between fiction and reality, condensed into a smooth, solid hilt.

Fwoosh—

At last, it became a radiant blade.

“Kieeeeeek—!”

Wooong—

The Sky-Shattering Blade trembled at the monster’s screeches. It was waiting for the coming battle, eager to slice through tender flesh, to cut throats, and be drenched in hot blood.

“Kiyaaaaah!”

In the next moment, a cloudlike shadow loomed overhead.

“Gah! My ears are going to bleed!”

“Isn’t this like nails on a chalkboard?!”

A flock of birds shrieked at the top of their lungs as they covered the sky. They descended, growing into a massive swarm like a school of sardines. Something shiny attached to its gigantic beak caught his eyes.

It’s a blade.

“Huh?!”

“What the hell is that?!”

Eun-Ho narrowed his eyes, wondering if he’d misseen it. Yet, in the sunlight flickering through the suddenly darkened clouds, he clearly saw the same monster from the start of the restructuring.

“Wait a second... Those are...”

[Defeat the Razor-Beaked Bird.]

“Fuck! Why is that bird bastard here?!” Swear-Master shouted.

“Kyaaah! Why is it showing up again?!”

Pitch-black feathers covered the creature like charred ash. Horn-like crests rose from its head, and its beak was so sharp it could probably cut someone with a mere brush.

“Fuck! Did the administrator interfere again?!” Swear-Master shouted again.

“What do you mean by that?!”

“Shit, look at them! They look exactly like those guys from before!”

The Swear-Master wasn’t entirely wrong.

“We need to tell the administrator—”

“They’re different ones,” Eun-Ho replied.

“Huh? What’s different?”

There were differences only Eun-Ho could tell.

“Their sizes vary. Feather colors aren’t uniform. The beaks are crooked.”

Swear-Master stared at Eun-Ho in disbelief. “What? How the hell would you remember that?”

Eun-Ho casually replied, “Because I sharpened them myself.”

“Huh?”

“Compare them to the sword you’re holding. Don’t they look different?”

“My sword?” Swear-Master looked back and forth between his Razor Beak Blade and the incoming Razor-Beaked Birds. “Well, now that you mention it, they do look different.”

He clicked his tongue in belated understanding. Leaving Swear-Master behind, Eun-Ho put some distance between himself and the others.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

The clearing created by cutting trees wasn’t very wide. If he fought right next to them, everyone would get caught up in the chaos. The watchtower, its framework nearly complete, would also be at risk.

Once he’d positioned himself a short distance away from the group, the cloud formed by the black flock swallowed the sky above his head.

“Kiyaaaaah—!”

“Kieeeeeek—!”

“Kiyaaaaaah!”

Darkness descended as the sun was blotted out, and shrieks drilled into their eardrums until the mind was washed blank white.

“How is he supposed to deal with that alone?!”

“Even if we all rushed in together, it’d be tough!”

Screams and shouts began erupting from near the watchtower.

“There are too many of them! Shouldn’t we retreat first?!”

“Yeah! No matter how strong the new employee representative—I mean, the team leader is, handling that alone is impossible!”

Most of the voices belonged to the few foreigners, who were probably encountering these monsters for the first time. Unlike the calm Swear-Master and Yoon Sol-Ah, they went pale, dropping whatever they were doing to prepare for battle.

[Your team members are feeling uneasy in the face of the overwhelming enemy presence!]

It was the first battle in front of anxious teammates, but this was an opportunity disguised as a crisis.

“No, I can handle this alone,” Eun-Ho said.

After all, it was almost nice to see them again after so long. He knew exactly how they moved and even how they could be used going forward.

“But still—”

“I believe in you, Hyungnim!”

“Everyone, keep working! That bastard does what he says he’ll do!”

Back then, all he’d had was Acceleration, so he’d had to run himself ragged just to endure the cooldowns. Of course, that was no longer the case now.

“Sword Force.”

Blue flames roared to life, cloaking the black sword. At the same time, a bird charged straight toward him, diving like a waterfowl after its prey.

He carved the blue light into a crescent and hurled it at the bird’s neck. “Blade Wind.”

Pitch-black wings flapped furiously, whipping the air into a raging vortex that vanished into the writhing throat behind a beak stretched wide. Blood scattered across the crowns of towering trees, the bird never even reaching the ground.

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

[You have earned 500 Welfare Points.]

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

[You have earned 500 Welfare Points.]

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

[You have earned 500 Welfare Points.]

...

The dense flock of birds burst apart like fireworks.

“What the hell?!”

“Holy shit! This is my first time seeing him fight properly but he’s insane!”

“That sword isn’t some insane item, right? That’s the team leader’s own ability, isn’t it?”

Hmm. They really shouldn’t be this shocked already. I’ve got much more coming up, Eun-Ho thought.

“Summon Ice Golem,” Eun=Ho said.

The real fight hadn’t even started yet.

[Summoning Ice Golem!]

***

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Thunk!

“Argh!” Swear-Master let out a strangled scream as he hammered nails. Watching Eun-Ho Keeping while swinging the hammer mechanically had come back to bite him. His index finger swelled red. “Holy shit!”

However, more than his throbbing finger, his eyes were drawn to Eun-Ho. Considering how solidly he’d smashed it, it didn’t even hurt as much as expected.

Huh?

In the past, this was the kind of thing that would’ve had him cursing up a storm in pain.

“He didn’t even move from his spot and wiped them all out! That’s straight-up insane, isn’t it?!”

“That bastard’s taking it easy right now! If he went all out, you wouldn’t even be able to see him!” Swear-Master shouted.

“Seriously?! That’s him taking it easy?!”

Swear-Master was busy explaining Eun-Ho’s strength to each and every newbie seeing it for the first time. From his perspective, it made sense. “He’s probably holding back, yeah.”

“L-look over there!”

Light and shadow met at the boundary where a brightly open clearing stretched toward the sky, and the forest pressed in with densely towering trees. Between them lay the dismembered corpses of monsters and splattered blood, spread across the ground like a grotesque painting.

At the heart of that chilling canvas, a pale, creeping cold seeped along the earth beneath Eun-Ho’s feet, drifting low like dry ice.

[The King of Snowfield Realm has appeared.]

It felt as if the king was declaring this land was his. A chill ran through Eun-Ho’s arms and down spines.

“Whoa, there was more after that?”

“Damn, am I the only one getting goosebumps right now?”

Everyone watching stood there, dumbfounded, rubbing their own arms. From empty air, pale frost and drifting snowflakes gathered together.

Then, an iceberg revealed itself. It wasn’t the first time seeing it, because they had witnessed Eun-Ho slay that monster during the Audit Bureau trial

“Gwooooor.”

The presence was so overwhelming that it made legs tremble, forcing even the Giant to bow his head.

With a single line, Eun-Ho commanded the mountain of ice like an extension of his own limbs, “Frost Storm.”

“Did it just freeze them?!”

“Heeik! What is that?!”

Arrows of cold shot out in all directions, striking hundreds and thousands of Razor-Beaked Birds. The moment they were hit, the birds had likely realized that something had gone terribly wrong.

“Kiek!”

“Kkiruk!”

From the tips of their blade-like beaks, bulging eyes, disproportionately small heads, long necks, and finally their enormous wings, the ice crept over everything.

Thud! Thud!

Then, they fell as hail, snapping densely packed branches in half and stripping every sharp leaf from the trees. Frozen so solid, even when they smashed into ancient trunks and fell, they didn’t shatter.

Swear-Master’s curse slipped out like an appreciative remark. “Fuck. It’s a giant.”

Inside the Swear-Master’s chest, something hot surged up, one that not even the frost storm could extinguish.

***

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

[You have defeated the Razor-Beaked Bird!]

...

Messages poured in.

[You have achieved the slaying of a hundred Predatory Birds!]

[You have acquired a title, Avian Slaughterer.]

[Predatory avian species feel fear before the Slaughterer’s might.]

[Attack power against predatory avian species increases by fifty percent.]

The name predatory birds implied that they were hunters, not prey. Today's event, however, would throw that name into doubt.

[Team Trial, Defeat the Monsters, has been completed!]

[Your team has earned 10 Team Benefit Points.]

[Ten Points and ten thousand Welfare Points have been granted as trial rewards.]

In any case, it ended well. Not even half of the promised ten minutes had passed, and the surrounding ground had already been churned into a muddy, bloody mess by the carcass.

“Team leader! I-I respect you!”

“That was insane! Every time I see you, you look like a different person!”

[The Labor-Management Cooperation Team Members express admiration for your performance!]

[Current Loyalty: 80%]

Demonstrating undeniable strength had boosted loyalty significantly.

But is it really over?

It wouldn’t make sense for such an elaborate quest to end with just dumping early-stage monsters en masse.

Did I miss something?

While everyone else cheered, he alone scanned the surroundings with eyes wide open.

“What was that just now? A summon?”

Amid the flood of system messages and overlapping cries of amazement, someone’s question cut through. “Is it finished?”

[Conditions met.]

The scattered blood seeped into the ground. As if overheated, the branches, leaves, and trunk of a massive tree began to glow red. With a low, ominous hum, a red light pulsed outward. The ground shook and snow, dirt, and the few remaining blades of grass were thrown into the air.

Thud!

A colossal pillar burst up from beneath the earth, like a gigantic worm forcing its way to the surface.

“Tree roots?!”

“Watch out!”

Roots as thick as a man’s torso lashed about like whips, so long their ends almost couldn’t be seen. Then, at the end of those roots was a tree. It was a monstrosity that seemed like dozens of towering trees fused into one, complete with something resembling a head and limbs. Spewing an eerie red miasma like a demon exhaling malice, its withered branches were soaked in fresh blood.

[Defeat the Corrupted Forest Guardian!]

***

Eun-Ho had once heard that the more moisture wood lost, the harder it became. At the time, he hadn’t thought much of it. When he felt the guardian’s bark, as hard as a fortress wall, it became clear that the saying was true. It was so dried out it had cracked open in places.

Even with Sword Force, it wouldn’t cut easily. No matter which of the forty-two people here attacked, it wouldn’t make a difference. That was how absurd its defense was.

Boom! Thud! Thud—!

The tree monster advanced, its mountain-like feet pounding forward, its attention fixed on Eun-Ho alone. The first step made the earth tremble, and the next step snapped trees underfoot. Then, the third step sent piled logs and snow shuddering and rolling.

Finally, it grabbed a towering tree and hurled it.

Swoosh—!

Where he dove to evade, massive roots lashed out like whips. Where he retreated, needle-sharp leaves shot toward him.

Thud!

“Get lost... from this land...!” the monster said, moving cracks in its trunk that passed for facial features. It was grotesque, but unmistakably deliberate. The line proved that the title Forest Guardian wasn’t for show.

“This land is mine now,” Eun-Ho said calmly.

He didn’t know what the creature had once protected, but one thing mattered more: hierarchy.

The red miasma pouring faltered for a moment, before surging back even more violently.

“I cannot... allow you...!”

Therefore, Eun-Ho countered, calling for a barrage of ice arrows. “Frost Storm!”

Or at least, tried to.

[The skill on cooldown. 20 seconds, 19 seconds, 18 seconds...]

In that gap, a red vortex stormed toward him. Needle-like leaves, shaken loose from conifers, became a slicing whirlwind. The red miasma mixed in, carrying a stench of rot. He clamped a hand over his nose, but it didn’t help.

[Caution!]

[You have absorbed the Corrupted Forest Energy.]

[Evacuate immediately!]

Seeing the danger, Jae-Hyuk, Ji-Eun, and the others rushed forward. However, none of them could handle this either.

“Hyungnim! We can he—”

“Acceleration.”

“eeelp—!”

Tick!

In just one second, the raging wind stopped. Everything slowed as if frozen in time. Branches that had leapt up to slash his cheeks stopped, and clumps of dirt floated in the air. He tore through the red storm made of shattered forest debris by sheer force of will.

Then Eun-Ho ran, locking his gaze onto the ring-like features etched into the Corrupted Forest Guardian’s head. Red-glowing branches and conifer needles stabbed into the soles of his feet like awls, but he didn’t stop.

Crackle—

He finally reached the monster’s calf.

Crack!

Finding the briefest opening where it stood still, he drove in.

Crack! Thud! Craaack!

He stabbed and stabbed again. At first, it was like thrusting an awl into solid rock, unyielding and resistant—until, at last, the blade slipped into a narrow gap along the grain of the wood. It wasn’t deep enough to call a stab, nor clean enough to be a cut. The tip had barely sunk in, but that was enough.

“Properly dried wood is best used as firewood,” Eun-Ho said.

Whooosh—!

Flames surged upward in an instant, wrapping around the dark, ominous energy. A red serpent of fire coiled tightly around its parched prey, flames licking as if trying to devour the blade itself.

[95.1%]

The ancient trunk, its fibers knotted like muscle, began to glow red-hot.

[91.6%]

Caught between the red miasma it had worn like armor and the invading blaze, it burned in confusion.

[85.9%]

It was an execution by fire, fierce enough to threaten the entire forest.

[82.4%]

[77.5%]

[70.0%]

...

As its health dropped in chunks, the ticking of a clock echoed.

Tick—

Jae-Hyuk seemed confused. “Huh?”

[64.6%]

[58.2%]

[44.9%]

...

The flames did not stop, neither did the falling Stamina, even as the stunned onlookers snapped out of it and began moving again.

“Eh? Eek?!”

“F-fire!”

At last, its Stamina neared the end.

[8.2%]

“Stop! Stoooop!”

Thud! Thud! Thuuuuud!

The burning Guardian thrashed in agony. Even then, it staggered toward the open clearing where people stood, perhaps worried it would set the forest ablaze.

“Get back!”

“Kyaaaah!”

[1.9%]

Perhaps thanks to the dry air, the flames spread terrifyingly fast. However, mercifully, the inferno consumed it before it could reach them.

“I... Or we... still cannot... allow you...”

[0.5%]

Thuuuud—!

“I-it fell!”

“Damn!”

It hadn’t seemed like something that would go down easily. Perhaps the affinity had been perfect. Despite its sheer size and presence, it ended more simply than expected, which was a relief.

Well, giving us office land only to kill everyone off immediately wouldn’t make sense anyway, Eun-Ho thought.

“That takes care of it,” Eun-Ho said. He was just about to issue new work orders to the flustered group. “Alright, then let’s resume—”

Ding!

Just then, a series of messages popped up between their stunned, speechless faces.

[Congratulations!]

[You have defeated the Corrupted Forest Guardian.]

[You have earned 30,000 Welfare Points!]

[The Wailing Forest awakens to the presence of a stranger.]

[You have obtained the Trial Compass.]

“Huh?”

[The Compass has discovered the first trial.]

[Overcome the trial and be acknowledged as the ruler of the forest!]

Wait. So even the forest needs to acknowledge me?

***

“The Wailing Forest, huh...”

Crunch—

An unnamed assistant instructor crumpled a palm-sized slip of paper in his hand.

“Of all places, he chose that one,” muttering to himself, he set the crumpled paper on fire.

After all, there could be no trace of him having received outside information.

Whoosh—

The faint flame illuminated the dark lecture hall. There sat the owner of the ancient classroom and others who had grown accustomed to the darkness, just like him. They all stood in a line, swinging their swords with brutish repetition.

“Enough,” he said.

They all froze.

“That’s all for today.” At the assistant instructor’s gesture, the sound of blades cutting through the air stopped. “It seems like your master is causing trouble again.”

At his words, the Skeletal Soldiers’ hollow eyes flared with sharp light. “Our captain?”

The flame from the burning paper vanished, plunging the room back into darkness. In the pitch-black hall, twenty violet lights gleamed solemnly.

“Yes.”

Their glow intensified and with a single command, their bones would all hum and resonate.

“I wonder how surprised he’ll be when he sees you all now.”