Translator: miraclerifle
Abe started to panic after realizing his artifacts were missing.
He could not understand this situation at all.
He had lost the Korean in the prophecy and his artifacts had disappeared?
It made him want to commit seppuku.
‘What is going on?’
Abe suddenly recalled the incident with Ju-Heon at the convenience store. Ju-Heon had picked up his ID at the time.
He had thought it was weird that something that should not fall out had fallen out.
Could it be that the bastard had stolen his ID instead of it falling out?
‘Did that bastard take the artifacts too?’
Abe soon shook his head.
‘No, what kind of crazy human being would have such skilled hands?’
Of course, there actually was someone like that.
But regardless of what happened, Abe was in a difficult situation. The Japanese research team would soon fly over to investigate the artifacts he stole.
So, what would happen if he was to tell them that he lost them?!
‘And Muramasa as well.’
The bigger issue was that the artifacts were not the only thing putting Abe in danger right now.
It was because the civilians who had been listening to his conversation with Ju-Heon were starting to get suspicious.
“Hold on. What do they mean by prophecy or artifacts......?”
“What was that talk about the gold axe earlier?”
‘Damn it.’
A few people who understood Japanese started to chatter away, causing Abe to have even more of a headache. The Japanaese government wanted to hide information about the tombs and artifacts from the Korean government.
‘But that bastard used an artifact in front of civilians!’
What could he be thinking?
It was obvious that they would be in a difficult situation if this information ended up in the Korean government’s ears.
A Major like himself could not look down on such diplomatic issues.
‘Shit, what do I do?’
The original plan was to stealthily take the artifact before letting the civilians out with false information.
If that didn’t look like it would work, he would kill them all and say it was an accident, but he had lost his weapon as well.
‘What to do.’
Abe’s back was covered in cold sweat.
He could not go back out of the tomb like this.
Information would be revealed.
While Abe was worried about that, Ju-Heon didn’t care at all.
Why?
It didn’t matter to Ju-Heon whether people learned about tombs and artifacts.
The < Great Tomb Appearance > that leads to everyone in the world learning about tombs and artifacts would happen soon. That was why hiding information about an artifact's abilities was one thing, but hiding the existence of tombs and artifacts was useless.
Furthermore, Ju-Heon actually hoped that information about tombs and artifacts would get out.
There was a simple reason for it.
Artifacts and tombs were things that gained strength through ‘stories,’ such as mythologies, legends, folk tales and popular novels.
That might be the reason for it. Whether the discussion was good or bad, artifacts and tombs became more active when people were talking about them.
That would lead to an increase in the number of tombs and in the speed of appearance, which would make it beneficial to gain more artifacts.
‘So, it is better for me if I can get a few more artifacts before the Great Tomb Appearance.’
That was the thought on Ju-Heon's mind as he inspected the artifacts he stole from Abe while he walked to his destination.
One was a bracelet made from a rope while the other was a suspicious looking gyeongdan inside a square wagashi box. [1]
The so called bracelet was just a rope tied in the shape of a bracelet and the green gyeongdan looked like a round rice ball. Abe was probably the one to put it in the wagashi box.
Ju-Heon knew the identity of these artifacts.
‘Does that Japanese bastard know about the Korean version of the Sun and Moon legend?’
The Korean version of the Sun and Moon legend.
This was talking about < The siblings who became the sun and the moon >. This suspicious gyeongdan was probably the rice cake the tiger begged the mom to give while this rope was probably the rope that descended from the sky.
Neither of them were high in rank but they were both useful artifacts. That should mean that it was not easy to get them.
But thanks to Abe, he was able to snatch useful artifacts and as a result, a familiar message window popped up in front of Ju-Heon’s eyes.
[You received the < Cheap Hand Skills > title and a skill has been revealed.]
[Tomb Raider basic skill Dexterity(F-Rank) has been awakened.]
[Dexterity (Awakened)]
Level F-Rank
Quickly learn how to use any item even if it is your first time using it.
Speed of consumption decreases ever so slightly when using consumable artifacts.
Skillful in artifact maintenance and restoration.
Chances of stealing artifacts from other people increases.
Tomb Raider Basic Skills (4/4)-
Spy(F-Rank)
Linguistics(F-Rank)
Tomb Exploration(F-Rank)
Dexterity(F-Rank).
The mission window popped up along with the message window.
[You have successfully awakened all four dormant skills and have awakened as a proper Tomb Raider.]
[Mission completed. You will receive a reward after leaving the tomb.]
The mission that he had seen in the police station had been completed. Ju-Heon found this game reward-like system to be funny, but he was curious as to what the reward would be.
‘It looks like I need to quickly gain Muramasa and leave.’
Ju-Heon came out of a side route while thinking about that. He had used a longer but safer route as the path toward Muramasa was filled with traps.
That Abe bastard was probably struggling with the traps as he wouldn’t know about this secret route.
‘The civilians will be able to leave once I clear the tomb.’
It happened at that moment.
Ju-Heon heard some unexpected noises when he was almost at Muramasa’s location.
“Aaaaaaaaaak!”
He heard a familiar scream coming from nearby. It was coming from the route filled with traps that Ju-Heon had avoided.
He saw a terrible sight as he walked toward the source of the noise.
“Aaaaaaaaaaah, save me!”
“Please save me!”
The screams were coming from the ground around one of the alleyways. There was a giant sink hole in the middle of the passage.
It seemed to be about 7m high. There were about 50 people screaming inside the pit that had knives on every side.
They were the civilians who had been swept up by the tomb.
‘It’s the artifact's trap.’
Thankfully, nobody was dead yet.
But Ju-Heon saw a red aura bridge over the pit. Ju-Heon instantly knew what it was after seeing the bridge.
‘A sacrificial trap.’
That was the case. This was one of Muramasa’s traps, the bridge of sacrifice. In simple terms, you needed to put other people into the pit as sacrifices to create the bridge. Then you could use the bridge to get to the other side.
Lo and behold, it looked like someone had already walked across the bridge.
The people who noticed Ju-Heon started to shout with urgency.
“P, please save us! Please!”
There was another reason they were shouting so desperately. One of the 50 people inside the pit had turned into a homicidal maniac. One of the female students had a dagger in her hand as she tried to kill the others. There were some people who were already stabbed by her. This was probably one of Muramasa’s terrible pranks.
The people who were stabbed by that dagger would also turn into homicidal maniacs. The bridge over the pit would also reset once everybody in the pit died.
That was how this trap worked.
Whenever the people inside the pit got close to the sides to climb up, they would run into the sharp blades.
Ju-Heon clicked his tongue while looking into the pit.
“Who threw you guys into the pit? Was it that Japanese guy?”
The people started to cry.
“Yes, he said to follow him because he knew where the exit was...! But then something like this suddenly appeared!”
“Then he said all of us needed to die for things to remain a secret......!”
It was obvious what happened.
Abe, Sabe, whatever his name was, that Japanese bastard was trying to shut the civilians up so they could not talk about the tomb.
‘I thought that he wouldn’t be able to do anything because he lost his weapon and I took his artifacts.’
That wasn’t it. He also knew how to get past the trap.
‘Looks like it’s that seer’s doing again.’
According to his memories, Prince Shotoku’s artifact user should be an idiot who didn’t know how to use the artifact properly.
But based on how Abe had the sun and the moon artifact as well, she seemed to be using it better than Ju-Heon expected.
Ju-Heon slowly started to despise that seer. Of course, Abe had been the one to throw the people into the trap, but the ones who ordered him to silence the civilians would have been his superiors.
Did they think they were extremely important because they had Prince Shotoku’s Future Diary?
‘I was originally planning on leaving those bastards alone for now, but...’
It looked as if he couldn’t let them be.
He heard people start to scream again. The woman being controlled by the dagger was starting to move again.
People did many different things, including swinging their clothes at the student to keep her away. Her movement was so skilled that even a bulky young man could not stop her.
“Aaah! Don't come this way, don't come!”
“Get lost! Aaah!”
The moment Ju-Heon looked inside the pit and heard the screams...
He jumped into the pit. He was sliding down along the side of the pit.
The people started to shout in shock.
“T, that’s dangerous! There are blades coming out of the sides!”
However, Ju-Heon took a knife out as he slid down the side. It was the Egyptian priest’s knife. All of the blades in Ju-Heon’s way broke apart with a light swipe.
“Ah......”
The people were shocked for a different reason.
The female student being controlled by the dagger charged toward Ju-Heon at that moment. She seemed to have selected Ju-Heon as her next prey.
“Kyaaaa! Watch out!”
Ju-Heon moved his hand. Of course, Ju-Heon had no interest in sending an innocent young girl being controlled by an artifact flying using Jeet Kune Do.
What Ju-Heon did was to take out the rope bracelet, one of the artifacts he stole from Abe.
[Rope from Heaven (C-Grade:General-Grade/Consumable Artifact)]
- Remaining Uses (940/1000)
Ju-Heon channeled his dominance into the bracelet and gave an order.
“Bind.”
The artifact flashed and instantly became longer. Then it moved as if it was a living snake and charged toward the female student.
“Kyaaaa!”
The female student being controlled screamed and fell to the ground once the rope tied her up. The rope seemed to be able to extend without a limit as it instantly wrapped the woman around like a mummy.
The only thing still visible was the hand holding the dagger and her face.
The people in the pit dropped their jaws at what they saw.
Ju-Heon walked toward the flailing female student. The woman being controlled by the dagger glared and growled at Ju-Heon.
“Shhh, sit still.”
Ju-Heon gently tried to calm her down before instantly taking the dagger away. Unlike when he was dealing with a person, Ju-Heon’s hands were very stern and strong when handling artifacts.
The heinous dagger started to throw a fuss once Ju-Heon took it away.
It seemed to be even more riled up after meeting up against Ju-Heon’s strong dominance.
[Kill. Kill humans.]
He could even hear the artifact’s thoughts in his mind.
However, Ju-Heon just found it to be ridiculous.
“How dare a damn artifact try to order me around.”
Ju-Heon then channeled his dominance into the dagger.
1. Gyeongdan or Korean rice ball cake is a type of tteok (rice cake) made of glutinous rice or other glutinous cereal flours. Wagashi are traditional Japanese confections that are often served with tea, especially the types made of mochi, anko and fruits.
Comments