Arena

Chapter 147 – Beast (Part 2)

“You’re not going to tell me anyway.”

“Aw, you never know.”

The baby angel smiled sweetly.

I hesitated for a moment but thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask.

“By any chance……”

“Not going to tell you.”

“You fucker!”

I fired my two Neilson H2’s madly. The baby angel, at a speed that couldn’t be seen by the naked eye, swooshed around and dodged them all.

“You damned piece of……!”

“Just kidding.”

The baby angel removed all joking from his face and became serious.

The baby angel flapped his wings and approached me.

He looked right at me and said.

“What you think is correct.”

“……”

“The person that is the key to completing the exams? It’s you, examinee Kim Hyun-ho.”

“……”

“Everything hangs on your decisions. I promise you that. Examinee Kim Hyun-ho’s choice, it will either change everything or change nothing.”

Paat!

The exam door appeared.

The baby angel quietly pointed towards the door.

“Now go. Find your answer.”

“Is there only one answer?”

“Who knows.”

The baby angel continued.

“But there can only be one result. Since there is only one you, examinee Kim Hyun-ho.”

“……”

Cha Ji-hye opened the door first and went through. I turned my back on the baby angel and followed behind her.

A blinding white light washed everything away from view.

***

The room at the inn at the Deport harbor.

The outside was noisy.

‘Right. It was right after we defeated the pirates.’

The people of Deport harbor were euphoric with the joy of victory.

All the past while, the pirates that had bothered them had been overwhelmingly defeated. So of course their pent-up anger was bound to explode in joy.

“Have you checked your exam?”

Asked Cha Ji-hye.

“Ah, I’ll check now. Summon board.”

Pat!

The board was summoned.

-Name: Kim Hyun-ho

-Class: 40

-Karma: +600

-Mission: suppress the pirates

-Time limit: 364 days 23 hours

Suppress the pirates?

I got a feeling of relief.

“Thank goodness, it isn’t a difficult mission.”

Heising and his posse have all died for sure. Just suppressing some pirates will be no problem.

But, the thing that does catch my attention was Lee Chang-wee.

The defeated pirates that returned and Heising’s group that he completely eliminated, there as a good chance that Lee Chang-wee was still at the pirate island.

Probably.

The guider skill showed me which direction Lee Chang-wee was in.

To the ocean.

The exact direction of the pirate island.

“There’s lots of time, shall we wait for now?”

“That sounds good.”

Cha Ji-hye seems to have picked up from my cues that Lee Chang-wee was at the pirate island as well.

Cha Ji-hye made a sudden suggestion.

“Then how about in the meantime you look for beasts to train?”

“Ah, that is a good idea.”

We decided to search for strong beasts that inhabit the kingdom of Aman.

Well, might as well go out for a drive too.

Us having played a pivotal role in the pirates’ defeat was well known throughout the harbor.

Gathered in front of the inn, hordes of people were asking to see the heroes.

The inn owner, who was blocking their entry, was pretty great.

“Go out quietly through the back.”

“Okay.”

We opened the window and jumped out.

“Sylph!”

-Meow!

Sylph raised me and Cha Ji-hye into the air.

“Huh?”

“There they go!”

“The heroes!”

“Where are they going!”

“Grab them-!”

From the ground, clambering noises could be heard. But did I hear them wrong? I thought for sure I just heard them say to grab us.

Having escaped out of the Deport harbor, we checked that there was no one nearby and come down to the ground.

“Shall we go for a drive then?”

“Sounds good.”

Cha Ji-hye, who had been petting Sylph, had a look in her eyes. She really does love cats and cars.

“Retrieve, MSM-2!”

Pat!

A compact supercar with a length of 3.3 meters and width of 1.84 meters appeared.

Instinctively heading towards the driver’s seat, Cha Ji-hye looked at me then turned around and headed towards the passenger seat.

Cha Ji-hye went around the car once so I squinted my eyes at her and asked.

“You were just trying to drive, weren’t you?”

“No.”

“You just went around the car to the driver’s side.”

“I was checking to see if anything was wrong with the car.”

“Lies. Your gaze was fixed on the driver’s seat.”

“I have no reason to lie.”

What a talented poker face that doesn’t change even when lying.

“I was going to have you drive, oh well. I’ll just do it.”

“The, um driving, I can do it.”

Cha Ji-hye stumbled on her words a bit.

“So you can also means you don’t have to?”

“I’ll do it.”

“No, its alright. I’ll just drive.”

“……”

Cha Ji-hye glared at me with slightly dissatisfied eyes.

“Do you want to drive?”

“……yes.”

Finally, she accepted it.

“Cuddle time, one hour.”

“30 minutes.”

“I guess I’ll drive then. I’m looking forward to speeding off road through Arena.”

“…… fine.”

Cha Ji-hye sat in the driver’s seat and I sat next to her and stroked her hair.

Sweeping her smooth hair felt nice.

Good to the touch.

Because it IS so hard to do it made it more special.

Cha Ji-hye , who was usually embarrassed by my touch, was completely immersed in driving instead.

Because of that I could stroke her hair for over 30 minutes. Thanks to the physical strength buff at intermediate level 5, my arm didn’t get tired either.

How far did we race this way?

Right about when I was going to tell Cha Ji-hye to stop, I suddenly recalled the radios.

‘Ah, with the radios, I should talk to some people.’

I took out a radio from the virtual space and made a call.

The other number was the elves.

-Um, so this number is Kim?

I heard the mumbling and flustered voice of the elves’ eldest mother.

“Yes, this is Kim.”

They were still awkward at using the radio.

-Oh my, it really is. Have you been well?”

“Yes, how about The Brown Mountain?”

-We are well of course. Our numbers increase every day. Among us elves, the rumor is spreading that this is a good place to live.

“I see. Thank goodness.”

-This is all thanks to you. But what is it you are calling us about?

“Just checking in and I had something that I wanted to ask.”

-I see. You are always welcome to ask us anything.

“Are there any strong beasts living on Brown Mountain? Not monsters.”

-Of course there are.

“What are they?”

– The tines of a rake eagles inhabit the southernmost territory of Brown Mountain inhabit.

“Tines of a rake eagles?”

“The fiercest birds of prey in the Arena. Very nice.”

Said Cha Ji-hye from beside me.

“Then that’s where we will go. By car, it’ll be quick.”

“Okay.”

It would be a long drive but Cha Ji-hye showed the slightest hint of glee. Probably because she’ll get to drive a lot.

“We’ll be at the Brown Mountain shortly.”

-Oh my, really? How wonderful!

The eldest mother welcomed us joyously. That too made my heart warm.

A place that welcomed me without expecting something of me was a very pleasant feeling.

***

We took turns driving and we raced the entire distance.

During the drive, any time we encountered a monster we shot them dead and harvested their majeong to use as fuel.

I don’t know if the tires were made of some special material too but even though we were racing through bumpy off roads, the tires didn’t take a hit at all. This car cost me 12.2 billion won so it better not be weak.

When crossing borders, I put the car in the virtual space and used Sylph to go up the sky and jump over it.

And then afterwards, took the car back out and drove again.

In two weeks’, time we got to the Brown Mountain at the south of the continent.

“Huh? Kim?!”

“It’s Kim! How have you been?”

As soon as we got to Brown Mountain, the elves that had been patrolling the area welcomed us.

I spent years with the elves, so I was able to recognize all of their faces.

Pine village, Maple village, Thuja village, I went around and greeted them all, then I arrived at Zelkova village.

“Sylph, Kasa!”

-Meow!

-Bark!

“Now, go play!”

The two spirits shot off into the village.

There was a fuss amongst the village elves. Cute, superior spirits, Kim’s spirits, all kinds of compliments came forth.

The young elf children chased after Sylph and Kasa and the adult elves greeted us.

“Kim!”

“Are you back for good?”

“Your wife has come with you I see.”

“Hm? Didn’t he have another wife?”

I shared greetings with the elves and then went to the mothers.

“You have arrived.”

The eldest mother, as the representative, welcomed me calmly.

“I am sorry. I haven’t come back for good, my primary goal is to catch some rake eagles….”

“Yes, you won’t have a problem with that, but still be careful. It is a very strong and ferocious beast.”

“Yes.”

“By the way, the energy of nature within you has grown immensely.”

“Yes, I was lucky.”

“Incredible! Even for us elves, our spirit summons don’t grow as fast as you.”

The mother’s faces were filled with awe and shock.

The mothers really got into the chatting now.

Each mother, one by one, added information about the rake eagle.

It was very disorienting but thanks to them I learned a lot.

Excluding flying monsters, rake eagles were the birds of prey with the biggest bodies.

The reason they had the name of tines of rakes was because of their sharp and strong talons. If you got caught by one of them, even a fairly tough beast’s flesh would be torn apart and killed.

A male and female live together for a lifetime and raised their young. When the male and female hunt together, they also hunted large monsters.

‘If I just catch the one, I’d feel bad for the rest of the family.’

I decided to capture one male and female set along with all their babies.

“Let’s check it out.”

“Okay.”

If these tines of razor eagles that were strong enough to hunt monsters were to be trained by me, how would they change?

Thanks to my growth acceleration mastery their bodies would grow to three times their normal size and their strength would be increased by three times as well.

With that much strength, it would be enough to easily dominate another examinee!

Cha Ji-hye and I walked towards the southernmost tip of Brown Mountain.

As the scenery of the deep forest of Brown Mountain spread before me, I felt good.

Maybe it was because I was within an area that contained the grand nature of three Trees of Life.

Honestly, I was more comfortable than anywhere else because the energy of nature was constantly filling me with energy.

After walking a long while we arrived at the rake eagle habitat.

“Bbeeeek-!”

“Bbeeeeeeeek-!”

Screeches similar to a hawk rang throughout the sky.

One and all came at us as if they had found some good prey and I thought of using Sylph to catch them all but I stopped.

‘Because I have to catch a whole family.’

It’d be too sad to leave babies without a father and a mother.

Maybe it’s because I lost my father when I was young, but I thought with things like this I’m very tolerant.

I had Sylph envelop us in a strong whirlwind to shield us.

The rake eagles were unable to approach the whirlwind and backed off.

I looked to Cha Ji-hye and said.

“Shall we go look for a nest?”

“Yes.”

We headed on in search of a rake eagles’ nest.

They said normally the nests were built between rocks along the cliff so we should look in that general vicinity.

With a relaxed attitude, we headed on the hunt.

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