Although a Villain, My Wish is World Peace

—It seems you need to find a way quickly.

Kim Jae-ho’s body was gradually becoming blurry. Unlike earlier when only his fingertips were dyed black, now his whole body felt like it was becoming blurry. Kim Jae-ho’s pupils were also starting to be dyed a distinct purple.

‘That’s definitely not a good sign.’

—Right! If a little more time passes, that guy will freely use his talent too!

It’s hard enough to deal with him now, but deal with Kim Jae-ho hiding in shadows? Unlike now where the trajectory of the daggers is somewhat predictable, if I play a dagger-dodging game against Kim Jae-ho jumping around in shadows, I’ll become a cold corpse in 3 minutes.

‘Oh, that can’t happen.’

—Just shoot one big one.

Ray shouted as if frustrated, but what can I do when my heart sinks as soon as I think about potentially hurting Kim Jae-ho?

—The ice spears…

‘Do we need to make our kid into a skewer?’

—After all, lightning seems better…

‘He’d be well-done, cooked all the way through.’

Damn it, everything I think of hits a wall. Killing Kim Jae-ho is simple. But knocking out a kid rampaging like that? It’s not easy.

My hands trembling isn’t just because of excessive blood loss.

I tried methods like making the surrounding air a vacuum, or suffocating him by putting on a helmet made of water, but it was difficult unless I completely sealed Kim Jae-ho’s movements.

I needed to tie him up for at least 1 minute, but there was no answer since he instantly broke prisons made of ice spears and obstacles made of soil.

At times like this, the simplest method can sometimes be the surest solution.

—What are you trying to do?

‘Something crude.’

I summoned ice spears. Even if I couldn’t directly attack Kim Jae-ho, there was no better way to restrict his movement than this.

When blocked by ice spears, Kim Jae-ho raised his hand to draw his longsword. That was the timing I aimed for. Soil grabbed Kim Jae-ho’s legs.

Kim Jae-ho holding the longsword cut the soil, but another soil obstacle that appeared again blocked his front. Kim Jae-ho who saw the soil wall blocking his view angrily cut the obstacle with his longsword.

But soil appeared faster.

The mana bracelet heated up, and I pulled out all the magic power from the bracelet to bury Kim Jae-ho in soil.

The dagger flying towards my side got stuck in the soil wall I created.

The moment Kim Jae-ho broke through the soil mound, I stretched out my leg to trip Kim Jae-ho. As Kim Jae-ho raised his body, I stretched out my foot to dig into Kim Jae-ho’s chest.

—Is this the answer you found? Close-quarters hand-to-hand combat?

Ray said as if finding it ridiculous.

‘Somehow this method seemed safer than any other, kuuk!’

It’s not a method I recommend to beginners, but well, isn’t it better than frying or roasting someone?

I raised my elbow and struck Kim Jae-ho’s face.

“Hap!”

When hit strongly in the face, the brain shakes momentarily. No matter how modified a human is, you can’t strengthen the brain inside the skull. Even the sturdy Kim Jae-ho won’t be able to regain his senses momentarily.

As expected, Kim Jae-ho’s body staggered.

Taking advantage of that gap, I went behind Kim Jae-ho and wrapped my right arm around Kim Jae-ho’s neck. And using that arm as support, I started strongly choking Kim Jae-ho’s neck.

“Kuh, kahk!”

It’s a crude method, but I couldn’t think of any other way.

“Please, please…”

The daggers started moving following Kim Jae-ho’s hand gestures, but I was faster at building soil walls.

Thud, thud thud. Thud!

Daggers got stuck in the outside of the soil walls I built. The daggers trembled following Kim Jae-ho’s magic power and dug into the soil. Little by little. Soon the daggers poked out from the opposite side of the soil wall. Damn it, I need to build soil walls again. At that moment, Kim Jae-ho’s nails dug into the wound on my right arm.

“Urgh.”

A groan involuntarily came out from the pain. As my mind wavered, the soil walls I was building collapsed.

I started choking Kim Jae-ho’s neck more strongly. Kim Jae-ho’s face was dyed red with blood dripping from my right arm. Though I felt like I would lose my mind from the pain, I endured and endured.

Please, please faint.

The moment I felt the daggers poking out of the soil wall flash, I tightly closed my eyes. But my face wasn’t pierced. As Kim Jae-ho’s body went limp, the daggers flying at me lost strength and fell beside me.

The tension in my body was suddenly released.

I finally succeeded in subduing Kim Jae-ho.

“Huh, huh.”

While hugging Kim Jae-ho, I laid my body on the ground.

Only then did Ray’s voice enter my ears.

—You’re definitely crazy. Yes! You’re crazy, you’re crazy! You’ve already lost your mind long ago.

“Haa…”

—If that guy had fainted a little later, you would have been the one to die.

“But I didn’t die.”

—Really, every time you say that, I don’t know how lamentable it is that I don’t have a body.

Ray went quiet as if at a loss for words. I pushed Kim Jae-ho’s body away and raised my body.

—What are you doing? Rest a bit more. Your body condition isn’t normal now.

“If Jae-ho regains consciousness like this, all my efforts will be in vain.”

I took out rope from my backpack to tie up Kim Jae-ho. Since my right arm barely moved, even taking something out of my backpack wasn’t easy.

“Ugh.”

My forearm was torn to shreds with bone exposed, stabbed by daggers and Kim Jae-ho’s fingers digging into the wound. This is the first time my condition has been this serious.

—Do you know what your face looks like now? It’s just white like a lead-painted doll!

Ignoring Ray’s words, I took out a potion from my backpack and sprayed it on my forearm. I want to save potions as much as possible usually, but the wound was too large.

“Kuk.”

It felt like boiling oil was sprayed on my arm.

I curled up my body and exhaled. It hurt like hell.

—Pull yourself together first.

I shook my head even at Ray’s words. I tried moving my right hand. It still hurt like hell every time I moved, but it wasn’t enough to faint.

After tightly tying up Kim Jae-ho’s body with rope, I raised my body.

“…I need to go find Seo-hyeon and Song-jin.”

While Kim Jae-ho was rushing at me, Cha Song-jin and Han Seo-hyeon disappeared. Those two must have been mind-controlled like Kim Jae-ho.

Now I have room to think.

“This is definitely not a C-grade Gate.”

Monsters coming out of a C-grade Gate can’t make Kim Jae-ho like this. And without me even noticing? It’s absolutely impossible.

The method of estimating a Gate’s grade is simple. Measuring the magic power flowing out of the Gate. The stronger the monsters inside, the higher the mana concentration in the Gate, so the magic power flowing outside has to be stronger… that was common sense.

But very rarely, existences that overturn common sense like this appear.

I brought Cha Song-jin along to prepare for such exceptions, but unfortunately the opponent was too bad.

Before properly facing that monster, I was torn to shreds and lost all my precious comrades.

I don’t even know what kind of bastard the owner of this Gate that screwed me over is.

Usually high-grade Gates kindly let intruders know ‘which world’ they’ve entered. Like Serena’s Ice Palace that kindly displayed a system window as soon as we crossed the Gate.

But the Gate here was different.

It ambushed us without any warning or notification window.

This is breaking the rules.

“All the anomalies that happened around here might have been because of this Gate.”

—It affected the surroundings even before the Gate appeared?

“Strange things happened around here, and then this strange Gate appeared. Is all this a coincidence?”

—It’s certainly strange, but…

“Anyway, I need to find the kids quickly. I don’t know what’s being done to them.”

But my body wouldn’t cooperate. I who had sprung up immediately fell back down on my butt.

“Huh, huh…”

—I think it’s better to rest a bit more, you lost too much blood.

Certainly my body condition wasn’t good, to the point of getting dizzy as soon as I stood up. My extremities that blood wasn’t circulating to were even getting cold.

“Why is blood regeneration so slow?”

—That’s because your stored stamina is only that much. Regenerating the most serious wounds first, then treating minor wounds… Eat something if you want to speed up regeneration.

At Ray’s advice, I chewed an energy bar taken out from my backpack.

Though it wasn’t the situation to prepare a feast, I needed calories to recover my body. While chewing the energy bar, I fell into thought.

“Why did they leave Kim Jae-ho behind?”

—To deal with you, isn’t it?

“If killing me was the goal, it would have been better to leave Han Seo-hyeon here too for a joint attack.”

—Wasn’t it to buy time to use talents? Even looking at just Kim Jae-ho, he couldn’t properly use his talent.

“That could be, but… if the purpose was to eliminate intruders, it would have been better to leave them here. Whether to kill me, or to kill those kids.”

If the purpose was to kill us, it would have been enough to watch us hit each other and die.

But that bastard deliberately removed Han Seo-hyeon and Cha Song-jin.

Would there have been any reason to do that without some purpose?

“I need to find the kids quickly.”

I don’t have a sense of what that purpose is yet, but it’s certain that the longer we spend time, the worse it gets.

As soon as the dizziness subsided, I hoisted Kim Jae-ho onto my shoulder. Kim Jae-ho’s limp body was heavy enough to make me groan. I barely took one step like that, but I immediately fell forward.

—This method won’t work.

Certainly, as Ray said, it was too much to move while carrying a body larger than mine.

In the end, I chose the method of floating Kim Jae-ho’s body with magic power.

After filling the bracelet with a new mana stone, I moved my steps to where Han Seo-hyeon and Cha Song-jin had been.

Traces of the two people moving their bodies urgently remained on the ground. I quickly moved my steps following the two people’s footprints.

“…Damn it.”

—What did you see?

“Until just now there were footprints of two people, but from here on there’s only one person’s left.”

—You’re right.

I rubbed my face.

“It seems Seo-hyeon used his talent.”

Using sand, Han Seo-hyeon can float and move through the air. It means he doesn’t have to walk on his own feet.

Fortunately, footprints that seemed to be Cha Song-jin’s remained, but…

“We can’t rule out the possibility they split up here.”

What if I follow Cha Song-jin’s footprints and Han Seo-hyeon isn’t there?

—You don’t have any options now anyway. For now, you can only follow the visible traces.

“…Yes.”

I nodded at Ray’s words and added:

“If there’s anything fortunate, it’s that subduing Cha Song-jin shouldn’t be too difficult.”

—You can make jokes in this situation?

“I’m making jokes because it’s this situation.”

Otherwise I’ll really go crazy.

I forced a smile, ignoring my finely trembling fingertips.

Seo-hyeon will be fine. He’ll be just fine.

“But I really don’t want to fight Seo-hyeon.”

—Well, I don’t want to fight that kid either.

“Yes. I really want to beg for forgiveness already. No joke, don’t you think he’ll be several times stronger than me?”

—Time to settle the karma you’ve accumulated.

“What karma?”

—How many times have you pissed off that kid? Take a good beating this time. You need it.

Perhaps reading my desperate desire to somehow lighten the mood, Ray went along with my words.

Meanwhile, I had already reached the end of the footprints.

What I found at the end of those footprints was Cha Song-jin.

The moment I saw him curled up in a corner, I bit my lip hard.

Because Han Seo-hyeon was nowhere to be seen beside him.

Putting aside my disappointment for now, I carefully approached Cha Song-jin.

“Cha Song-jin?”

Cha Song-jin turned his head back at my call.