Chapter 138

Nameless Divine Arts God-Killing Technique: Iron Blood Cross.

JiHan drew a horizontal line with Eclipse, and the Russian Warriors' armor and weapons turned to dust. The particles of metal followed the sword's trajectory before reforming into steel and piercing the ground.

Swoosh-!

Next, he performed a smooth, water-like vertical cut with the Phoenix Flag.

Considering the bizarre energy from the sword a moment before, it was a simple technique, no different than drawing a cross in the air, but…

"What… the…?!"

Badump! Badump-!

Vladmir's heart aggressively pounded against his ribcage. It was a simple, two-swing technique, but his Berserker senses were sending him an intense warning.

Not only was the metal in his axe and armor behaving strangely, but the blood-red ki suffusing his axe dissipated and merged into JiHan's vertical cut.

Swoosh-!

Vladimir was sent flying away, and his Blood Rage ended without even a trace of its power left behind.

"Agh!" He knew the opponent was strong. Though he was just a Gold, he was still wary of him due to his amazing feats and ability to send a Diamond-level national player flying in a single hit.

It would be one thing if JiHan were simply overpowered, but…

'My Blood Ki…!'

He could've never expected his unique power as a Berserker, Blood Ki, to be taken and used against him.

WHOOM-!

The ground instantly shifted into a pattern of a horizontal line of steel intersected by a vertical line of blood—the image of a cross.

"Ugh!"

"I… I can't… move!"

"…!"

The Blood Ki from Vladimir's axe was all that was taken from him, but the other Russian Warriors were in much more dire circumstances. Blood flowed from their bodies as if it were sweat and soaked the ground.

When he saw what was happening to them, Vladimir returned to his senses and shouted, "I'll take care of JiHan! Run!"

Rather than risking their lives to kill the opponent, crossing the gate was the best way to get points. All they had to do was pass through the entry!

'I'm going to push myself to the limit!'

Vladimir charged at JiHan with all his might and activated Berserk again.

Swoosh-!

His armor disintegrated and joined the pattern on the ground as he approached, and his Blood Ki weakened.

'This should be enough…!' He'd already decided to pour everything into this attack, and he couldn't be dissuaded.

BOOM-!

His axe collided with JiHan's sword, and a huge shockwave shook the area.

"Ugh…!"

Vladimir stumbled back, his eyes wide open. He'd used his full Berserker strength with the triangle formation's buffs focused on him, but he hadn't even been able to match JiHan's AOE skill.

"It can't be!" Vladimir yelled. He swung his axe again with all of his might, as if trying to deny reality.

Clang-!

JiHan easily parried the attack with the Phoenix Flag as he continued to smoothly wield his sword and spear—two weapons with very different reaches.

Vladimir couldn't help his amazement when he saw how JiHan was wielding the two weapons. 'It's like I'm watching the Sword King…!'

JiHan might not have been as overwhelming as the Sword King yet, but the issue was that he was still a Gold Leaguer. Just how much stronger would he get in the future?

It was anxiety-inducing to think about, and he decided he had to secure Russia's victory while he still could.

A few Russian players tried to move along the edge of the pathway and get to the gate.

"We'll be going first…!"

"Okay. Don't stop!"

It was kind of funny to see elite Warriors who were all above level 225 being so cautious around a Gold, but they were dead serious.

'We have to take this win now because we might not be able to in the future!'

JiHan was already able to keep Russia's greatest Warrior, Vladimir, in check, so it was clear that he would become a disaster in the future. They needed to win while they still could.

"Hmm…" JiHan glanced to the side.

"Where are you looking?!" Vladimir shouted and launched a desperate strike.

Their weapons collided several times, and Vladimir even succeeded in making a few counterattacks while he was being pushed back.

'It… it worked…!'

One Russian Warrior finally reached the gate's entrance. Though 25 had initially rushed in, more than half had been swept away in JiHan's attack, and the rest were picked off by the Korean Archers until only three were left.

'It doesn't matter how many; we just need one player to cross the line!'

Paf-!

JiHan stuck the Phoenix Flag into the ground, and the earth began to vibrate around the cross.

WHOOM…!

"…!"

A brilliant white light shone from the center of the cross. Vladimir sensed something very ominous about what was happening.

"This is…! Run!" He hurriedly shouted to his other teammates.

The light was eating through the center of the cross. Under another circumstance, he might have thought JiHan's skill had reached its limit and was fading.

'That's not what's happening!'

Flash!

The light flickered once, and a white liquid seeped into JiHan's spear as the cross vanished in an instant.

Click-

"Cough…!"

The remaining Russian Warriors all vanished without even a smidge of resistance.

'What… What just happened?!' Vladimir's vision blurred. The Warriors had already endured their blood being drained, so why had they vanished like that? Just what was going on?

A system message appeared before him.

[Instant Death has been activated.]

[You belong to the human species. You've failed to resist.]

[You've died.]

Instant death?

Vladimir uttered his last words of the game before turning to dust. "What the fuck…?!"

With that, the entirety of the Russian team's Warriors were annihilated.

The commentators thought the game was already over when the Russian players ran past JiHan.

= Ah! JiHan fought well, but… I guess nothing can be done against a numerical advantage!

= How regrettable… At least they put up a good fight in this match!

Then…

= N-no… Wh-what?!

= Why is everyone suddenly disappearing?

= What's happening?

They couldn't understand why the Russian Warriors vanished when JiHan stuck his spear into the ground.

"Haha…" Coach YeongJun laughed in disbelief.

It was hard to believe that Vladimir could be defeated so quickly by a single skill.

'No wonder he said the starting Warrior lineup wasn't necessary.'

The starting round ended in South Korea's victory.

The players began to emerge from their connectors, and they all seemed confused at the game's abrupt end, including the Korean Warriors, who'd been defending with JiHan.

"Woah… Instant death? Instant death?!"

"I don't know… It was… scary…"

Unfortunately, the few Korean Warriors who'd survived the initial Russian attack also turned to dust when JiHan completed his technique. They'd received the same system message the Russians had and were trying to figure out what happened.

How could such an overpowered skill exist?

Flash-!

Unlike the others, JiHan hadn't bothered with a connector and appeared from thin air.

"G-good job!" The Warriors who'd been fighting alongside him greeted him with deep bows, and those who'd died from technique trembled when they saw him.

"J-JiHan… Good job."

"Not at all," he said. "We almost lost the match due to my deficiencies."

Deficiencies? What? They couldn't believe what they were hearing.

'I still have a long way to go.' JiHan thought to himself. 'Despite the buffs I received, I was unable to use my full strength.'

Unfortunately, Korea's buffs hadn't been very effective, and he thought he would've won more easily if he'd been able to utilize his full strength.

It was true that Russian Warriors were said to be stronger than Korean ones, but it wasn't like they were all stronger than Dong-woo. They'd only been able to hold out against him for so long due to their buffs.

They were able to fully enjoy the effects of their buffs, while Martial Soul made it so that buffs didn't have significant effects on him. That's why he'd been unable to finish them with a single punch like he'd done to the Korean team during his test.

'I need to become more proficient with Martial Soul. As it is now, the only God-Killing Technique I can use is Iron Blood Cross.'

Unlike his Heavenly Lightning Technique and Shadow Secret Technique's light and darkness attributes, the God-Killing Technique's five separate moves each conformed to a different element: wood, fire, earth, metal, and water.

The only thing they had in common was that they each belonged to one of the five elements.

'Iron Blood Cross is considered a metal-attribute technique, and it's the easiest one to use.'

The technique required two different weapons, and one had to be a spear because only a spear could pierce the cross's intersecting lines.

Though the Iron Blood Cross dismantled armor and absorbed life force, its true power revealed itself when the cross broke.

'The 'instant death' effect on humans is still the same.'

When the cross broke, all nearby humans other than the caster instantly died, without exception. Not even the world's best tank would be able to resist instant death.

That's why, whenever he used the technique in his past life, everyone always started running away. They knew that no amount of defense in the world could save them if they were in range.

'It's a good thing nobody knows about it yet and they were caught. Also, I never realized it before because I always used it as a skill, but it's a very strange technique.'

'Why do I even need to make a cross in the first place?' He wondered.

It wasn't a bad technique, but there was a limit to what the first two cuts could do to the enemy. It would've been nice if he could activate the 'instant death' effect without having to go through the process of creating the cross.

'There's some sort of hidden logic here that I don't quite understand. If only I could take the instant death effect and modify the technique…'

As he was pondering the technique…

[Martial Soul has increased by 1.]

'Huh?'

Why had it suddenly gone up when investing stat points wasn't enough?

It looked like he needed to do more research on the Iron Blood Cross Technique and enhance Nameless Divine Arts if he wanted to increase his Martial Soul stat.

"JiHan… What was that technique?" Coach YeongJun asked before the next match.

"It's a light instant death technique that works on humans."

How could he call an instant death effect 'light'? Did that mean it killed less compared to another technique he knew?

Coach YeongJun couldn't quite understand, but…

'Well, I guess it doesn't matter since he's on our team…'

He decided not to think about balance when it came to his allies being strong. Who cared if it was a cheat? Winning was all that mattered.

"When is it most effective?"

"It's an effective skill on maps with critical points like South Gate. Now that I think about it, we're the attackers this time, right?" JiHan smiled and said, "Let's give them another instant death."

Iron Blood Cross had many weaknesses, and all you needed to do to survive was run out of range. When it came to maps that were based on a certain point like South Gate, though, it was very effective.

= Huh! The enemy's line is collapsing!

= They can't do anything against JiHan's skill! Vladimir is screaming about how an instant death effect makes no sense!

= We screamed about how his Berserk skill didn't make any sense in the past! Hahaha! Isn't it all coming full circle?

Thanks to Iron Blood Cross, JiHan easily won the next match as well, and while he was busy using the God-Killing Technique…

A certain being on the Wandering Martial God's Fight Star stood up and yelled, "Who dares…?!"

"Ah, did you wake up on your own?" Dongfang Shuo asked. "No… I think it was JiHan who woke you up…"

He turned to the figure.

"Hello, Longinus."