Chapter 165: 165

“No wonder why…” Su-hyeun muttered .

Pitapat, pitapat—

Su-hyeun closed his eyes and felt the sound more clearly . He couldn’t feel anything other than the heartbeats . It didn’t make sense with Su-hyeun’s incredible senses . But still, he could hear the sound . That meant this heart was huge, and the heartbeat was absurdly loud .

As Su-hyeun knew, there were only a few monsters with a heart that size . And, among them, there was only one monster that lived under the ground or near the sea or a river .

Rumble, rumble—

The ground began to shake . No . It wasn’t the ground that was shaking . It was something under the ground .

The Titan Turtle began to move . Su-hyeun opened his eyes wide but stood up with a calm face . The tremor, sounding like an earthquake, grew louder .

Grrr, Grrr—

Miru bared his teeth and roared . The Titan Turtle had such a menacing presence . In fact, the Titan Turtle was more dangerous than any monster Miru had ever met .

“Hey, Miru,” Su-hyeun called .

Purr—

At Su-hyeun’s call, Miru began to fly up, carrying Su-hyeun on its back . Soon, the ground that Su-hyeun and Miru had stood upon shook apart . Debris flew into the air .

Rumble, rumble—

Crack, crack—

The ground turned upside down, and the trees that grew on it fell down . Su-hyeun was convinced, watching what was happening .

The Titan Turtle was one of the gigantic monsters . Moreover, before Fafnir had appeared, the Titan Turtle had been eating everything that it could see . It was the same for the other monsters . After Fafnir, the head of the monster army, disappeared, the Titan Turtle ate other monsters as food . So, it was natural that the other monsters didn’t go close to the Titan Turtle, which was now the top predator in the food chain .

Grrr, Grrr—

Miru began to roar louder . At first, Su-hyeun though Miru was frightened by the Titan Turtle . But his reaction was a little off for that .

“Why, Miru? What’s going on?” Su-hyeun asked .

Grrr, Grrrng—

It wasn’t a fear reaction; it was close to excitement instead . A giant shell started to appear . Miru reacted without rhyme or reason at the grey turtle .

Su-hyeun knew that Miru didn’t like fighting much . In terms of personality, Miru was very similar to Su-hyeun . Unless it was a necessary fight, Miru didn’t like to fight against strong opponents for no reason .

Su-hyeun looked down at the Titan Turtle, which was sticking its head out from its shell .

>

Miru was a descendant of the Dragon King . He didn’t like it yet, but he was . If the Cintamani was closely related to the dragons, it explained why Miru reacted like this .

Su-hyeun thought .

The Titan Turtle was one of the monsters that survived the war and still stayed in this world . But, for some reason, it had remained in the forest and hadn’t moved . The Titan Turtle, Su-hyeun knew, was a monster that ate anything it could find, without rest . There must be a reason that the monster’s appetite was suppressed for so long .

There were two options . First, there might be something suppressing its appetite . Or second, Fafnir’s influence might still exist . And in either case, it was very likely that it had the Cintamani .

Su-hyeun had no intention of avoiding the fight against the Titan Turtle from the beginning . So, he thought it was a good thing if the Titan Turtle had the Cintamani . The trial would go more smoothly .

Su-hyeun flew up high into the sky, riding Miru and closely observed the Titan Turtle . Its huge shell was dozens of times bigger than the World Cup stadium . It almost looked like an island . In terms of size, this monster was comparable to Ouroboros . But that didn’t mean that Titan Turtle was as dangerous as Ouroboros .

On the other hand, the Ouroboros of the 30th-floor’s trial was just the background of the trial . It wasn’t a monster that he had to kill that time .

Su-hyeun calmly muttered as he reflected the Titan Turtle with his sword, Balmung, “I guess today we’re playing for keeps . ”

***

There were two ways for awakeners to attack dungeons . The first was to enter the dungeon with overwhelming power . People usually gathered as many other awakeners as possible . That usually happened when there was no detailed information about the dungeon or when there wasn’t much time before the dungeon outbreak . And, most of the time, Su-hyeun had to attack dungeons that way . Because he always had to raid the highest difficulty newly appeared dungeons . He couldn’t go into dungeons with much information .

And the second way was to prepare for the attack with plenty of information . That was much easier than the first option . Even with fewer people involved, people could know the weaknesses and patterns of the monsters . People usually used that method when they attacked low-grade dungeons . Monsters that appeared in those dungeons were pretty obvious, so there was already a lot of information about them .

That was the biggest difference between Su-hyeun’s past life and his current one . Unlike his past life, Su-hyeun had most of the information about monsters ahead of time . And that was a greater weapon than any sword, right at the moment .

Slash, slash—

Scratch, scratch—

Thin scratch marks were carved onto the back of the Titan Turtle .

Swish, swish—

Roooaaar—!

The Titan Turtle stuck its head out, revealing its teeth to Su-hyeun . It was the reaction that Su-hyeun had expected .

[Leap . ]

Su-hyeun quickly jumped up and increased the distance between himself and the Titan Turtle . Soon after that, he snapped his fingers .

Boom, boom, boom—!

Kyaaaak—!

The Flame skill exploded along the sword scratched in the turtle’s shell . The Titan Turtle stuck its head out and screamed in pain . The huge body of the turtle trembled for a moment . At the same time, Su-hyeun flew over the shell of the Titan Turtle again .

Scratch, scratch—!

A sharp blade began to cut the shell of the Titan Turtle again . Since it was too hard, he couldn’t cut deeply even with magic in his sword . But this was enough . He didn’t plan to cut through it all at once, anyway .

thought Su-hyeun .

The Titan Turtle was a monster known for having the most durable defensive power in existence . It was pretty agile compared to its size, but it wasn’t so agile that Su-hyeun couldn’t avoid it . The attack pattern was also very simple . Su-hyeun’s strategy was simple; slow but steady . The moment Su-hyeun broke the Titan Turtle’s shell, the actual attack would start .

Su-hyeun stood on the shell and stabbed his sword into the half-cracked shell .

Stab—

The sword penetrated the weakened back skin . Su-hyeun began to inject his magic into the sword .

[The Wave Sword – Explosion Style . ]

Rumble, rumble—

Balmung began to tremble . The sword shook as if it would explode soon . It spread magic through the crack lines on the shell of Titan Turtle .

Boom, boom, boom—!

Soon after, the sound of a massive explosion came from inside the thick shell . The powerful magic began to trigger a series of explosions through the cracks in the shell .

Crack, crack—

The hard shell started to crack more . In one moment, Su-hyeun, who had been cracking the shell of the Titan Turtle for several hours, started his final work .

“Hey, Miru!” Su-hyeun said when he jumped up from the cracked shell of Titan Turtle, “Give it one big shot!”

[High Breath . ]

Miru had been saving his power so far . High Breath was the most powerful attack skill that Miru could use .

Whoosh—!

Miru shot a huge white flame over the cracked shell of the Titan Turtle . Su-hyeun, who was moving away from the turtle, was surprised and had to use the Leap skill quickly one more time .

Su-hyeun thought .

Roar—!

The Titan Turtle screamed . It meant the heat from the High Breath penetrated through the shell and reached to the skin of it .

Su-hyeun wondered .

Su-hyeun had told Miru to save some energy . But his High Breath was more powerful than Su-hyeun had expected . It was a completely different level from the High Breath Miru had been using before .

Miru hadn’t grown much after a certain point . Of course, he was helpful enough so far . The maximum number of breaths he could use had increased, and the power of his High Breath became much stronger . High Breath was comparable to other high attacking skills . But what Miru did right then was something Su-hyeun never expected .

Rumble—

Soon, Su-hyeun could see the shell swept by the High Breath . The place he had cracked wasn’t broken, yet .

Even with this level of breath attack, the back shell didn’t come off . The crack became worse, but Miru’s Breath wasn’t enough to destroy the shell of the Titan Turtle . It wasn’t because his power was too weak .

It would be the worst opponent for dragons, who relied on magic and breath skills rather than physical ability or attacks .

Su-hyeun thought,

The thick shell that surrounded Titan Turtle was almost broken . It would be the same as a soldier who lost his spear and armor jumped into battle naked .

Su-hyeun thought .

Su-hyeun had enough strength and magic power . Until now, his attacks were just relying on the cutting force of Balmung alone .

Su-hyeun flew up onto the back shell of the turtle again .

Swish, swish—

Slash—

And, at the same time, his sword cut a wide gash into the back of the Titan Turtle .

Roar—! Roar—!

Ironically, the only weakness of the Titan Turtle was connected to its greatest strength . Titan Turtle was the monster with the strongest defensive power . In other words, it only had defensive power . Without its shell, it was just a matter of time before Su-hyeun won .

Rumble, rumble—

Su-hyeun injected a lot of magic in his sword once more .

Whoosh, whoosh—

[Flame . ]

[The Wave Sword – Explosion Style . ]

[Immortality . ]

Although it would only work for a short moment, he used the Immortality skill to maximize his physical and magic ability . Balmung, the sword made of adamantium, began to make a cracking sound, as if it would shatter soon . That meant there was a lot of magic gathered in the sword .

Grrr—

The Titan Turtle put its half-stuck out head back into the shell, as if it felt something was coming . It had a strong instinct for survival . It retracted its head so quick that Su-hyeun couldn’t aim for it .

“But now, I can break your shell . ”

Su-hyeun’s eyes were fixed on the cracked shell of the Titan Turtle .

[Leap . ]

Swish, swish—

Su-hyeun flew into the air, leaving an afterimage behind him . And, at the moment when he stepped onto the shell—

Craaack—!

—Su-hyeun’s sword finally broke the back shell of the Titan Turtle .

Splatter—!

And he cut off the Titan Turtle’s head, cowering inside the shell .