Chapter 112

Welcome To (4)

If I had to choose the most difficult opponent among all the creatures I had fought to the death, it would undoubtedly be the saber-toothed tiger.

A tiger’s natural ferocity. Its terrifying size. Its absurd regenerative ability.

Without Namu-Ppareumbo’s timely assistance, I would have died several times over.

That ordeal had allowed me to achieve tremendous growth. Without the saber-toothed tiger, I probably couldn’t have defeated the guardian either.

I had encountered all sorts of bizarre creatures since then, but I had never been defeated.

Whenever a beast that seemed likely to beat me appeared, I fled immediately rather than fighting it.

Fwoosh!

Aura surged around the Heavenly Demon’s sword like blazing flames.

I stared blankly at the gorilla chief holding the sword between its fingers.

Even though I had swung with all my strength, it had caught the blade effortlessly.

I might have understood if it had caught it with its entire hand.

But it had used only its fingers.

The fundamental strength I had gained from eating the eel and the additional strength I had acquired through cultivating internal energy—

Even with all of that combined, I had been stopped by three fingers.

"Urgh...!"

I couldn’t even pull the sword free.

No matter how much strength I exerted, it wouldn’t budge.

While I desperately struggled, the chief remained perfectly calm.

It was silently demonstrating just how vast the gap between us was.

There was a reason it had confidently declared that it would take one of my arms.

Release!

"Whoa!"

While I was desperately pulling on the sword, the chief suddenly relaxed its grip.

The resulting recoil nearly sent me tumbling backward in an embarrassing heap.

I barely regained my balance and faced the chief again.

It had even folded its massive arms across its chest.

"Bugou."

I had no time to access the Gallery in this situation.

Still, one thing was obvious.

It was looking down on me.

Realizing that, I decided to attack more carefully.

"Kyuu! Kyuu!"

At that moment, Wonmo, who had remained still until now, suddenly charged into the fight.

Apparently, he had identified the chief as an enemy.

Just as I was about to order Wonmo to stay back, someone else intervened first.

"Kyuu?"

"..."

It was Namu-Ppareumbo, who had climbed down from my back at some point.

Ppareumbo stepped in front of Wonmo and gestured for him to retreat.

Wonmo initially looked confused before turning his head toward me.

"Wonmo, do as Ppareumbo says."

"Kyuu..."

Only then did Wonmo retreat.

Ppareumbo went so far as to push him all the way into the cave.

Afterward, Namu-Ppareumbo didn’t climb back onto my back. Instead, he moved some distance away and began watching.

Observing from there would make it easier for him to intervene than if he were clinging to my back.

’Looks like he understands the situation.’

The chief’s personal guards were also standing still and watching.

This meant that it was a fight between the chief and me.

Ppareumbo seemed to have understood that as well.

Or perhaps, as always, he intended to intervene if I found myself in danger.

It seemed I could trust him a little.

I gripped my sword and shield and glared at the chief.

It remained motionless with its arms folded.

It didn’t even have a prominent nose, yet it still managed to look unbearably arrogant.

"Hmph!"

Then I would make it pay for letting its guard down.

I kicked off the ground and thrust my sword.

The attack came without warning.

Moreover, it was a thrust rather than a slash.

It utilized the exceptional sharpness of the Heavenly Demon’s sword to its absolute limit.

If it chose to block the attack as it had before, it would be severely injured.

Swoosh!

My sword pierced the chief directly in the abdomen.

At least, that was how it looked.

’What?’

But the sensation was strange.

I was certain I had stabbed it, yet it didn’t feel as though I had pierced anything.

It felt like thrusting into empty air.

The discrepancy between what I saw and what I felt was deeply unsettling.

Shimmer—

Shortly after that thought crossed my mind, a change occurred in the chief.

Its figure wavered like a mirage before vanishing entirely.

Startled, I hurriedly pulled back my sword and looked around.

’Where is it—?!’

A chill!

An ominous instinct sent a chill through the back of my head.

I had only lived in the Forest of Four Seasons for two weeks, but I had already learned something important.

I must never ignore an ominous feeling—my instincts.

This time, I chose to trust them.

Slash!

I spun around and swung my sword horizontally.

The flame-like aura swept violently through the air.

"Hmm."

The chief was standing behind me.

Unlike before, its arms were no longer folded.

Apparently, it had attempted to ambush me but failed.

I didn’t let the opportunity pass.

It was still underestimating me.

"Huaah!"

With a fierce shout, I slashed, thrust, and slashed again.

The chief must have been surprised by my ferocity because it made no attempt to counterattack and focused solely on evading.

Slash!

Again.

I had definitely cut it, yet I felt no resistance.

At the same time, the chief’s figure faded like a mirage.

What in the world was this technique?

Could Namu-Ppareumbo use it as well?

I hurriedly turned around, remembering to slash with my sword as a precaution.

Slash!

The gorilla wasn’t behind me.

There was nothing but empty air.

At that exact moment, the back of my head began to tingle.

It had completely fooled me.

However, I couldn’t simply turn around and slash again.

That would be impossible unless my waist could rotate a full three hundred and sixty degrees.

Therefore, I chose the next-best option.

’I have to block with my shield!’

I twisted my waist back into its original position and raised my shield.

Fortunately, my decision seemed correct because the chief’s fist was heading directly toward it.

Just how powerful was that fist?

It belonged to a creature that had effortlessly caught my sword.

I might be sent flying backward, so I should also prepare to break my fall—

"..."

Yet contrary to all my expectations, the chief’s attack was anticlimactic.

No impact traveled through the shield.

It merely felt as though the chief had gently placed its fist against it.

The chief pressed its fist against my shield.

That was all.

Confused, I looked into its eyes.

Its expression was perfectly serene.

’Why?’

Before that question could even fade—

Thump!

A strange sensation traveled through the shield.

Crack!

A sound like a snapping branch reached my ears.

At the same time, the shield slipped downward.

Even though I was gripping it firmly, it fell limply from my grasp.

Wondering what had happened, I lowered my gaze toward the shield.

Then I realized why the shield had fallen.

It hadn’t disobeyed my will.

Dangle—dangle—

My arm had broken, leaving it incapable of carrying out my commands.

I stared blankly at the arm hanging limply by my side.

But only for a moment.

The pain that my adrenaline had barely suppressed came surging in.

"Aaaaaaargh!"

The agony of a broken bone was beyond imagination.

Hadn’t I suffered from broken ribs only yesterday?

I even dropped my sword as I grabbed my dangling arm.

It felt as though someone were stabbing needles directly into my brain.

’H-How? It only touched its fist against my shield...!’

Its body dispersing like a mirage, and now this attack—

Everything about it defied comprehension.

The chief’s abilities completely surpassed my common sense.

"Urgh...! Haaah...!"

"..."

While I gritted my teeth and endured the pain, the chief silently stared at me.

Its expression seemed to ask:

Do you wish to continue?

I answered through my actions.

Swoop—

I picked up the Heavenly Demon’s sword from the ground.

One arm was broken, but the other remained intact.

I wrung out every last bit of mana I possessed and concentrated it into the sword.

Hummm—

Perhaps I had instinctively sensed the danger.

The aura that had previously billowed like flames gradually began condensing.

I couldn’t die here.

My desperate desire to survive pushed my concentration to its absolute limit.

Just as the flame-like aura began assuming a definite shape, the chief moved.

At first, it merely appeared to bend its knees slightly.

I reacted the instant I saw the movement, but—

Swoosh!

Before I could even register what had happened, the chief was standing directly before me.

Its speed equaled Namu-Ppareumbo’s—perhaps even surpassed it.

I slowly looked up at the chief standing proudly on two legs.

Had I ever been overwhelmed so completely before?

Its presence erased even the faintest desire to resist.

The feeling resembled what I had experienced while confronting the saber-toothed tiger, yet it was also fundamentally different.

Swoosh—

The chief pulled its right arm back.

Its hand wasn’t clenched into a fist.

It appeared to be preparing a palm strike.

The instant that palm struck me directly, I would die.

I had to move my body somehow if I wanted to survive.

Yet perhaps because I had already been utterly overwhelmed, my legs refused to move.

’I can’t die like this...!’

I struggled desperately.

I even bit my tongue as I forced myself to move.

Fortunately, that desperate resistance seemed to work, and I barely managed to move my legs.

Next came my arm.

Under the illusion that time itself had slowed, I tried to raise it.

Whoosh!

The problem was that the chief could also act within that fleeting moment.

The arm it had drawn back shot forward like a bullet.

Its enormous gorilla palm completely filled my vision.

Just as I resigned myself to dying—

Baaaaang!

The chief’s palm swept past the side of my face.

The explosive burst of air left my ears ringing, while my hair whipped violently in the wind.

Craaaaaash!

My one relatively functional ear allowed me to guess what had happened behind me.

The noise wasn’t merely something collapsing.

It sounded as though everything had been completely obliterated.

I desperately hoped the cave hadn’t been behind me.

"..."

I froze in place.

Only my eyes could move.

Slowly, I shifted my trembling gaze toward the chief.

For some reason, it was smiling.

The chief lowered the hand that had passed beside my face and placed it on my shoulder.

Even though it had merely rested its hand there, it felt unbearably heavy.

Pat, pat—

The chief patted my shoulder several times as though telling me to relax.

It had truthfully said that it would take one of my arms.

But it had never said that it would take my life.

The chief removed its hand from my shoulder and spoke in the language of the Central Plains.

"Wai wonni."

Welcome to the Forest of Four Seasons.

"Shinshou."

Youngster.

For some reason, I felt certain that was what it was saying.

"Zheoba."

The chief turned around and issued an order to its personal guards.

The spear-wielding guards merely glanced at me once before following it.

I remained rooted in place until the chief and its party disappeared.

"Phew..."

Only after they had been gone for some time did I finally manage to exhale.

I paid no attention to my broken arm dangling at my side.

More precisely, I was incapable of doing so.

My pounding heart felt as though it might burst at any moment.

It was like someone was forcibly pressing down upon my entire body.

The saber-toothed tiger had inspired an instinctive, primal fear.

The chief’s pressure, however, had felt almost deliberately manufactured.

’Who in the world...?’

At the same time, I became curious about the person who had taught the chief martial arts.

Just who was its master to have trained a gorilla into such an extraordinary expert?

I gradually organized my chaotic thoughts and came back to my senses.

My immediate priority was treating my broken arm.

Leaving it in this condition could result in severe lasting complications.

’Will an elixir even heal this...?’

I was carefully holding my arm to prevent the broken bones from twisting when I turned around and froze.

The chief had launched a palm strike beside my face.

I had clearly heard something being destroyed behind me.

I had assumed that a tree had simply fallen, but the reality far exceeded my expectations.

A "road" had appeared.

The area had originally been filled with densely packed trees.

But a single palm strike from the chief had sent trees crashing down or torn them out by their roots.

The unexpected road left me feeling faint.

’...Even Sun Wukong couldn’t do something like this.’

Then again, Sun Wukong wasn’t a gorilla. He was a monkey with a tail.

Whatever.

’Can I really survive here?’

Either way, my resolve had been shaken.