Chapter 132

Chapter 132

Plop!

Lancelot’s spear pierced another orc’s heart. From a distance, a group of users were watching the scene.

“Wow! What’s up with that guy?”

The three-user party, consisting of a warrior, priest, and mage, had fought a few monsters and taken a rest more than six times already.

Lancelot had trained his cultivation technique and magic circuitry by creating a personal boundary space on the fringe of an orc colony. By alternating between training and rest, he had killed more than two-hundred orcs in a day. This method of fighting would thoroughly exhaust even the most hardcore grinders. However, Lancelot…

“He’s been fighting non-stop for how many hours now?”

“Since you said five hours earlier, it should be around twenty-two hours now… or perhaps twenty-three…”

“Is this humanly possible?”

Lancelot continued to step back and lunge with his spear. When an orc fell, another orc quickly took its place. Lancelot had been fighting like this for hours on end.

“Oh, he’s going up against the boss.”

“It’s a boss monster, but it’s only Level 5. Well, it might be able to take two spear strikes, which is more than the regular orcs. I guess that’s the benefit of being a boss monster…”

Boom!

Right then, the orc leader’s head exploded, accompanied by the shrill sound of wind. It was a grotesque scene, but this sort of scene was common for users who were familiar with combat in DIO. Before the orc’s corpse hit the ground, it turned into black smoke and disappeared.

“Oh? What was that? What skill was that?”

“Oh, dang. I couldn’t see it properly, I was distracted.”

The three users, who had been resting and slouched, instantly straightened up in surprise. That’s how tremendous the attack was. Even though the opponent was only Level 5, it was still surprising to see an attack that could instantly dispatch an orc leader…

“Wow, did he realize something and break through? I envy him.”

“Well, in martial arts, enlightenment is said to strike like lightning. But why isn’t it coming for me? Aside from realization, my skills and abilities become dull even if I just take a short break… anyway, camera!”

One of the party users brought out a hand-held camera and prepared to record. Of course, taking pictures or videos of other users without permission was a violation of personal privacy rights, but this was only if one uploaded content onto bulletin boards and got reported; if the pictures or videos were for one’s own record, it wasn’t an issue.

“Okay, when he uses that technique on the next orc, I’ll… huh?”

The orcs, who had been madly rushing toward Lancelot, suddenly paused and began to creep back. They seemed to be terrified, but this response was incomprehensible to the party members. The orcs had continued their onslaught even after their leader had been killed hundreds of times already… so how could they suddenly be struck with fear?

“W-what’s happening?”

While the observing users were bewildered, Lancelot, with his spear pointed downward, brooded over the sensation he had felt after exploding the orc leader’s head.

‘What was that? It felt like I broke through a wall… did I put more strength into that last attack?’

He tried to piece together what had happened, but the memory of the sensation dispersed in an instant. Lancelot planned to test out the attack again on the next orc, but that became an impossibility. The orcs were now running away.

/You have gained the title ‘Orc Exterminator’!/

‘Shoot…I gained a new title?’

To train, Lancelot had given up all his titles, but a new title had been applied to him. Even so, why were the monsters running away from him? Confused, Lancelot opened the title’s description and effects window.

[Title: Orc Exterminator

Strength +70Stamina +20

Having killed orcs nonstop, you have reached the milestone of having killed more than 10,000 orcs. Just by possessing this title, orcs within your surroundings will sense the deaths of their brethren by your hands. The ‘fear’ effect will be applied to the orcs, so unless an orc possesses a strong mental disposition or combat skill, it will run away. If you choose to focus your fear effect upon a single orc, that orc will be enwrapped in fear and be unable to move.]

“Ah, it must be because of this title’s fear effect.”

The title provided considerably powerful effects. Strength +70 and Stamina +20 were effects that were only seen in advanced titles. However, this kind of made sense; it was no easy feat for a single user to kill over ten-thousand orcs.

“Were the lizardmen Level 4 monsters? Anyway, I guess I’ll need to change my hunting grounds.”

After changing his gear, Lancelot promptly walked off. It was about time for the Iron Golem, Rochefort, to regen. Rochefort’s regen time was twenty-four hours.

Phew.

Lancelot focused inward as he walked towards his next goal. When he focused inward with his iron-like mentality, his depleted aura began to recover quickly. Aura power reflected mental power. Although his comprehension ability was low, so low that it caused fatal problems during combat, Lancelot was able to recover his aura quickly due to his steely mentality. This was a phenomenon that could only arise in aura power, not internal energy or magic power. If he had chosen a different kind of spiritual ability, Lancelot would never have been able to recover so quickly.

“Rochefort hasn’t spawned yet. Let's see… about thirty minutes left?”

Lancelot changed his gear, equipped his spear, and stood once more in front of a stone pillar. Since the stone pillars were quest objects, they’d be restored to their default settings even if they were previously destroyed.

There were two settings for public buildings or live plants in DIO. One of them was the non-destructive setting and the other was the automatic recovery setting. The effects were literally ‘unbreakable’ and ‘return to original state’. The non-destructive setting was usually placed on city grounds and major buildings. The automatic recovery settings were placed on streetlights, public space vegetation, training dummies, and trees for timber. Essentially, all the things that were shared and available for everyone. The automatic recovery setting was applied on the stone pillars in front of Lancelot, so even if the stone pillars were completely smashed, they would be restored within a minute.

Crack.

Lancelot’s spear embedded into the pillar. His stab was textbook; neat and efficient. However, if this was all that Lancelot could do, he would only ever amount to a one-trick-pony martial artist who only knew how to stab.

Crack.

Lancelot couldn’t do anything about this. His comprehension and analysis abilities were so poor that he didn’t have the skill to properly control his aura. Normal aura users who reached Level 5 could easily manipulate aura to create shapes in the air, and a few talented Level 5 aura users could even manipulate their aura to make letters. Lancelot could do none of this. All he could do was launch an attack and imbue it with his aura power. With his current ability, Lancelot couldn’t split his aura into two, nor properly circulate aura throughout his body at an acceptable speed. In other words, he couldn’t operate his aura simultaneously for defense and offense. If he couldn’t do that, and if he couldn’t properly transition from one to the other either, what could he do? He couldn’t just defend forever.

This was why Lancelot decided on solely training his spear stab. If he could defeat his enemy with one strike, then he wouldn’t need to defend. For a weakling like him, this goal seemed unattainably lofty, but Lancelot had made his decision, so he had no thoughts of stopping.

‘Faster.’

Crack.

‘More accurate.’

Crack.

‘Faster… more accurate… so that no one can block it!’

Bam!

Right at that moment, as Lancelot’s consciousness became hazy as he locked his focus on stabbing, the stone pillar suddenly disappeared without a trace.

“Hmm… what I just did…”

Lancelot was on the cusp of grasping something. A path, the most efficient and effective path to launch an attack upon one’s enemy. However, before Lancelot could think further, a magic circle appeared a few meters front of him.

Zing!

Bam!

The Iron Golem, Rochefort, emerged from the magic circle. It smashed its feet on the ground and lunged towards Lancelot. The vigor and spirit of the rushing Iron Golem was immense, but Lancelot, who was still in a daze, watched it approach until it nearly reached him.

‘Faster… more accurate… an attack that doesn’t need me to defend…’

Lancelot was in a daze, but his trained mind was recreating the ideal path. He stretched out with his spear along a set course.

Tick!

When Rochefort’s fist and Lancelo’s spear met, they both ceased moving as though time itself had paused. Rochefort weighed a ton, and had lunged at Lancelot with tremendous force, but the golem’s attack and momentum was neutralized by a simple spear stab. The scene seemed to defy the laws of physics, but that wasn’t all.

Boom!

Accompanied by the sound of compressed air bursting out, the upper half of Rochefort’s body disappeared. The Iron Golem, who was as strong as a high-level monster, collapsed from a single blow.

“Phew… ha… ha…”

Lancelot’s hands trembled. This was exactly what he wanted. The ideal path. A single attack that could penetrate any defense.

“Finally…”

Lancelot raised his head, holding back tears. Then, he started walking slowly. It was the end of January. After a hundred days of training and countless battles… he had finally realized the meaning of stabbing.

***

Yongno had ordered and was eating takeout fried chicken, something he hadn’t done in a long time. He had ordered one marinated and one plain fried chicken. In truth, an order of two whole chickens was a lot of food, but Yongno was known to eat a lot. He was nearly finished eating both of them.

“It doesn’t seem like there are many users training in the Golden Pill Immortal Technique. The only ones seem to be those who are optimizing themselves for PvP.”

Though the Golden Pill Immortal Technique could instantly output a large amount of internal energy and launch a powerful attack, the technique was unpopular amongst users because it had a relatively slow internal energy recovery rate. In Yongno’s case, his ability in the Golden Pill Immortal Technique was advanced, so this shortfall was, for the most part, covered. The Golden Pill Immortal Technique probably wouldn’t be so unpopular if one could expand their internal energy through No Living World, as Yongno could, but no one had been able to open No Living World except him.

Yongno went into the fan-run site, ‘Invincible’, and started reading user posts. The users trained in a large variety of martial art techniques, so it was hard to say which techniques were popular or trending. However, the most popular cultivation and martial arts technique, perhaps because of its name, seemed to be the Dark Northsea Divine Technique, with around ten percent of users choosing to train in it. The Masochist Divine Arts seemed to be trending as well. Recently, the so-called ‘Internal Energy Tycoon’ style of gameplay, using Masochist Divine Arts, was gaining popularity. Utilizing the relatively quick internal energy recovery rate of Masochist Divine Arts, users would use their bonus points to expand their internal energy capacities and fight their opponents with an abundant reservoir of internal energy.

“Well, none of this really matters to me since users can only choose to train in one cultivation technique… I wonder what’s people are saying about the Qi Gong Technique?”

Yongno clicked on the [Qi Gong Technique] bulletin board.

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