Chapter 143 – #31_City Life (3)
#141
One.
I don’t know who coined the term “Tropical night”, But I think he is a person with a really good sense of language.
Tropical + night, can’t you catch the image just by looking at it?
Siwoo, who had been passing the time at 2:00 a.M., Sucking his fingers, bought a cigarette and left the house as usual.
It doesn’t mean much. It’s just a walk
It wasn’t until he was a slave that he couldn’t do it because he was tired. Siwoo often went out at night to clear his complex head or change the mood.
As long as Siu is wearing an eyepatch, it is impossible to confirm the stigma with only the naked eye, and few people know that Siu can use magic even inside Gehenna. .
Since nothing had happened during his leisurely days, he trudged along the road with a relatively loose mind compared to the early days of his return.
On the downtown side where Siwoo’s officetel is located, cicadas who forgot the night were crying in the colorful lights, but the gloomy one-room village that comes out when you get out of the downtown area is very secluded.
Electric poles, power lines, and sodium lamps, which are hard to find in a new city fortifications, illuminated the footsteps.
“It’s hot too.”
After a small complaint, Siu fluttered his shirt collar and found the vending machine under his street lamp.
A routine is important to keep the walk from being boring.
As everyone knows, land in Seoul is expensive.
A one-room village carved out of a mountain to make use of the narrow and expensive piece of land somehow. As he climbed the steep uphill road, there was a citizen park that preserved the top of the mountain.
The shabby vending machine at the entrance of the park is Siwoo’s routine point.
Climbing all the way up here, drinking a drink and smoking a cigarette, thinking about where to plan a walking route today.
“Cola.”
Without asking or asking, Siwoo pulled out a can of Coke and lit a cigarette.
He was able to breathe a little as the sweet and refreshing carbonation spread over his slightly dry body.
“Ah, that’s terribly uncomfortable.”
I was sweating so much while climbing the slope that the area where my eye patch and my skin were touching was damp with sweat.
“Fuck it, I’d rather have it in my balls. Witches are in the womb, why only me…”
It is quite inconvenient to have to cover one eye and go about everyday life.
Since it is a spiritual body, sticking to the outside eye won’t cause your eyesight to deteriorate or anything like that, but it will cause a problem with your sense of distance.
However, it was difficult to live with the blindfold off, as the sparkling golden eyes engraved with the magic formula attracted too much aggro.
Even if it doesn’t matter if it’s seen by the general public, if an outcast with a bad heart sees it… It’s obvious.
Siwoo, who was drinking coke like that, noticed something.
Would he have known a little sooner if he had looked away as soon as he took off his blindfold?
The air currents around are tangled.
Like a skein of thread floating in the water, or more like cotton.
To be more precise, the surrounding magic power is stagnant.
Magical power is originally an unknown ‘flow’ with no physical substance or anything.
However, it is not immune to external influences at all, so the magical energy floating in the air under normal circumstances floats leisurely like a flowing river.
But not now.
As if liquids of different temperatures contained in a cup convex, they stayed within a certain radius.
“……”
Siwoo put the blindfold in his pocket and stood up straight away to flick a cigarette butt.
It may already be too late, but it maximizes the coverage and intensity of the music box.
My heart raced.
Siwoo has experienced this phenomenon before.
A water bottle made by Ea Sadalmelik, that is, the ‘rear barrier’.
It is a kind of barrier ceremony in which one world is cut out and another world is drawn on top of it.
In Gehenna, which was already separated by Duke Keter, it merely serves to reduce the presence of magic, but it is different in this world.
The space separated by the barrier becomes another world, and everything that happens inside the barrier becomes separated from the present world.
To put it simply, the space A divided by the double barrier is replaced with the copied space B.
You don’t have to think about anything more complicated than this.
The important thing now is to deal with unexpected situations.
“Bloom.”
Siu quietly chanted a chant.
The magic that has been raised to the limit is immediately replaced by a black shadow.
Siwoo’s most confident and sure magic, Law of Shadows ver. It was 2.
I made an armor with the shadows I pulled out and wrapped it around my body.
The appearance of sleek plate armor.
On the surface, it doesn’t seem to have much defense, but its performance is probably better than any other protective clothing in the world.
Siwoo is fully armed except for the helmet that would obstruct his vision.
“Whoa… Whoa…”
Is it because of the secretion of adrenaline when faced with a crisis?
The heart, which had been calmed down by inert repetition in the tedious daily life, heats up blood flow to the extremities of the body.
When facing the smugglers at the inn, when facing the homunculus at Latifundium, when facing Ea Sadalmelik.
Everything was the same as now.
As far as Siwoo knows, there are two causes of the ‘barrier behind the scenes’ that suddenly unfolds in the present world.
“Are you an outcast?”
One, of course, a witch.
Before Gehenna was created, Duke Keter caught homunculus and studied them, and spread them widely.
Even at that time, the power of witches was comparable to natural disasters, and when witches clashed, the aftermath was so devastating.
For example, the Black Death, which struck all of Europe in the 14th century and killed one-third of the population, is said to have spread the curse of the plague witch in the course of several clashes between the ‘plague witch’ and Keter.
Believe it or not because it’s such an old document, but anyway, witches who came out of this world always use it after declaring a barrier when hunting or fighting in this world.
“Homunculus?”
The other is the homunculus.
As you can see from the fact that Duke Keter researched and created the homunculus, the homunculus’ ‘nucleus’ has a built-in magic formula that always declares a barrier.
That is why even though they roam the world leisurely, humans do not know of their existence, and even witches have trouble hunting them.
While carefully guarding her surroundings, she scanned the side of the barrier made in the shape of a large hemisphere.
When measured by eye, the diameter is about 100 m.
It includes not only citizen parks but also some one-room villages.
Looking at the texture of the border, it is not as sophisticated as Ea’s water bottle.
It doesn’t seem like a terrible magic formula has been implemented to melt the prey that escapes from the inside.
Then the best thing would be to carefully get out of the barrier.
“No.”
Siu shook his head. It can’t be the best
This is not Gehenna.
In this world, no one can directly help Si-woo, so he has to shake off the sparks that fell on his clothes.
In such a situation, do you leave it out as it is without confirming the existence of a potentially dangerous molecule?
You will be able to guarantee your safety right now.
However, the absence of information can return to a crisis someday without leaving room for prevention.
Siwoo checked the music box stretched to its limit and climbed the stairs in the Citizens Park.
The effect of the music box is excellent.
Not only does it block the waves of magic, human presence, and sound, but it also makes the opponent gaze at it like a landscape.
It is a kind of Ghillie suit.
Siu, who was ready to run away and engage at any time, carefully took one step at a time.
In fact, the facility is not as good as it is old.
The exercise equipment installed along the slope is rusted to the extent that it is impossible to tell when it was last used, and the wooden steps made to make it easy to climb are rotten in places.
As we climbed the trail a little further, there was a rustle of people.
No, the expression of this popularity was actually not very correct.
Because it wasn’t a human sound.
Orange sodium light.
An observatory overlooking the famous street, the university hospital across the street, and the campus at the same time.
A beast crouches above it.
About the size of a large large dog.
If you stretched out your crouched body and lifted your legs, you could easily touch Siwoo’s head with your forefeet.
“……”
There is no way that wild animals of that size roam the hills of Sinchon, not in rural areas or mountain villages.
In addition, the hidden barrier spread around here adds to Siwoo’s confidence.
The fact that that was a homunculus.
Lower yourself further and observe closely.
What covers the skin of a homunculus is not hair.
Instead, it was polished as if melted tar had been applied to thick rubber, and a single red pupil was stuck between the eyebrows.
Because it was so black, there was no three-dimensional effect.
“……..”
Siu held his breath.
Hunting homunculus is recommended only for witches with active self-defense, that is, 15th tier or higher.
Siwoo, who was not a formal stigma, had no self-defence and no means to accurately measure the hierarchy.
However, judging from the knowledge he has seen and heard and the comparison with those around him, Siwoo’s own level is approximately 14-15.
It is a level where you can catch the homunculus in a narrow way, or on the contrary, you can be defeated by the homunculus.
I hadn’t noticed this existence yet.
If she slips away quietly, she will be able to return without any problems.
Although he had already hunted a homunculus in Latifundium, it was only through luck.
First of all, there was the help of the twins to buy time by blindfolding them, and there was a clear weakness that the law of shadow used by the homunculus was weak against high-compressed magic power, and there was also a magic number nearby that could supplement the necessary magic power.
Now is?
Poor Siu has only one body.
Although the level of magic has risen to an incomparable level, there is a difference in the fighting power of each homunculus.
It is said that there is a high possibility that Siwoo will attack her and cause her to tour the station.
Leave it alone and let’s bounce.
That was Siwoo’s conclusion.
That was until I saw what the monster was doing, moving ominously in the orange light.
-Dumb, mumble, clatter
Siwoo’s brow twisted.
I haven’t confirmed it yet, but it’s strange enough to hear that loud sound from under the pinna.
That sound made it sound like digging through a piece of meat or biting into a hard object.
Shiwu couldn’t help but look back with instinctive disgust and displeasure.
– Knead, clatter, kkak
Then it comes into view
That the trees around the monster were glowing reddish.
What was thought to be a rope that was scattered around was the intestines forcibly pulled out from inside the ship.
It is certainly.
It was eating ‘humans’.
My head went blank.
He has experienced becoming a half-corpse, but this is the first time he sees a corpse.
When he came to his senses, Siu was already up from his seat.
Then it looks even clearer.
Probably the man who came out for gymnastics on a moonlit night.
The cheap mountaineering clothes are torn to shreds.
After that, the skin of the stomach, which had become almost hollow, spread out like a curtain and remained tattered.
The emotion that he was not aware of in the devastation that caused Si-woo, who was crouching, sparks like a flint hit.
The sight of the same human being devoured by a homunculus that was no different from a mere animal brought out nausea and anger before fear or horror.
“이… 개새끼가…”
“Kreur…”
The throat of the homunculus, who had been enjoying the meal until just now, went round.
The range of motion of joints that cannot be turned in living organisms.
Two emotions coexisted in the growl of the monster as he turned his head 180 degrees and looked at Siwoo.
One is the discomfort of being interrupted by eating.
Another is the joy of finding new prey.
“Bloom.”
Siu grabbed his spear.
