Arena Chapter 135:

Chapter 135 – The Harbor Battle (Part 1)

 

“If Heising were smart, he would stop fighting and withdraw his troops . ”

On our way back to the harbor, Cha Ji-hye voiced her opinion .

I nodded my head .

“That’s the amount of damage just from me, one person . If he wants to avoid further damage, it would be right to stop fighting . ”

“But with his personality, chances of that are slim . ”

Explained Cha Ji-hye .

“Even coming out to fight to begin with, it was to make up for his failure last time . Probably, Lee Chang-wee goaded him into doing it . ”

“I think so too . ”

Funnily enough, Lee Chang-wee was expecting quite of lot from me .

After meeting me last time, he seemed to have some faith in me?

That I would cause Heising some trouble, it seems he was expecting that of me .

“Anyway, there is no need or wiggle room to go easy on Heising . Our side must carefully focus on the pirate battle . If possible, it would be good to not let Heising return alive . ”

“Yes . ”

While we were conversing, Vincent rowed silently .

And right at that time, the harbor dock came into view .

“We have arrived!”

Shouted Vincent in a good mood .

“Waahhhh!”

“They’re back!”

“Vincent ajusshi!”

From the lighthouse, we could hear shouting . The fisherman gathered at the lighthouse waved their hands and greeted us .

It seems they were rejoicing at the sight of seeing us safely return,

The sailboat landed at the dock .

The soldiers guarding the dock lined up alongside it .

And a middle aged man taking care of the soldiers walked briskly between them .

It was regiment commander Ajen .

Unlike his usual self, his military uniform and hair was clean, he looked like a different person .

“You’ve returned . ”

“Yes . ”

“I’m glad, you don’t look injured . How did it go?”

“Among the 32 pirate ships, 9 are down . ”

“A whole 9?”

Regiment commander Ajen’s eyes grew wide .

“Is that true?”

“You’re not lying?”

“Regiment commander! I saw it with my own eyes . You won’t disregard my eyes because I’m old will you?”

Vincent interjected .

Regiment commander Ajen nodded his head .

“The eyes that God gave you, how could I dismiss them? Tell me what happened . ”

“He was incredible! The long and strange weapon he had, every time it spewed fire, one of their masts broke and eventually the ships tilted and sank . ”

Vincent excitedly explained the fight that he saw himself .

“My sailboat zoomed with the power of the spirit . Really, I’ve never had such an interesting experience in my life!”

Vincent pointed to me and continued his excited speech .

“This man, he also fought with Heising!”

“You don’t mean that pirate leader Heising?!”

“Yes! That **** Heising, he jump ran at us on top of the water and this man was flying around the sky and had a big fight with Heising . He traversed sea and sky and fought it was really……!”

Listening to Vincent chatting away, the faces of regiment commander Ajen and his soldiers were overcome with awe .

And from those gazes looking over, I could see that they had started to respect me .

Then regiment commander Ajen grabbed my hands .

“I am truly moved! What this country could not do, you single handedly did! You are a hero!”

“No, really . ”

“Their morale will be strongly shaken . Since they know now that a hero like you is at our harbor . ”

“Well, no doubt they will feel very discouraged now . They’ve suffered a rather big and chaotic loss, they won’t be able to recover from it all . ”

Rescuing the pirates from the sunken ships, reforming the messed up ship formation, on top of the mountain of other things they need to manage and fix now .

“But we can’t relax because of it . They took a huge hit but the pirates will not give up on the attack . ”

At my words, regiment commander Ajen agreed .

“Of course, we must avoid carelessness and cannot let our guard down . Today, we must surely repel their advance and make it so they can never attack this port again . ”

I nodded along in agreement .

Somehow, its not like there weren’t any parts going according to Lee Chang-wee’s wishes but there was no doubt that this was a good opportunity .

In the midst of the fight, by eliminating a ton of the corrupt examinees, it was a great opportunity to get lots of karma .

From the fight just now, I killed a whopping 5 . The more the better .

***

Under regiment commander Ajen’s orders, everyone was immersed in preparations for battle .

I alone sat on a hilltop overlooking the harbor . I decided to set up here to snipe .

Oh by the way I should see how much karma I got from killing those corrupt examinees .

“Board summon . ”

-Name: Kim Hyun-ho

-Class: 33

-Karma: +16,500

-Mission: block the pirate attack

-Time limit: none

‘Wow!’

I felt like rejoicing . 16,500 karma!

The result of one fight .

These bad people, acting as pirates and working with black magicians, had accrued a lot of minus karma .

Then if I kill the leader of the pirates, Heising, how much karma could I get for that?

Thinking about that, it made me want it that much more .

‘Am I somehow the same as them?’

Those **** kill people to collect majeong, I kill them to get karma .

The awful sight of body parts exploding from the giant sniper rifle, I felt nothing from it now .

Rather, I just felt satisfaction when it was done in one shot .

“Weapon, AW50F . ”

I summoned the AW50F and put it on the ground, lay down, and assumed my position .

They’re bad people anyway .

What’s so bad about gaining some from killing the bad guys?

… . . Thoughts like that kept taking root in my mind .

I suddenly questioned .

How many people are there that want to clear the missions in this world?

The capitalists and politicians who had invested heavily into the Arena, I’m sure they don’t want a situation where it becomes impossible to collect majeong .

The Chinese examinee group is acting most openly about it but honestly, everyone must feel the same .

But was that just how the investors thought?

I don’t know if a majority of examinees themselves don’t want the clear the missions .

The identity of an examinee!

The specialness, knowing you are different from others, it gave you the pride of being a chosen one .

If all the exams are cleared and you never have to do the exams again, then what?

And all the skills you got from doing the exams, what if they disappeared?

I would return to the plain old me that I used to be .

Spending my days hung up on the civil service exam . Just a nobody .

I won’t be treated as the important person I am now .

Will I be able to handle that?

Money wasn’t the problem .

The fear inside an examinee’s head, it’s probably something like that .

Perhaps the corrupt examinees now, they are afraid of that and maybe that’s why they chose the path they did .

‘I’m not too sure about skilled people like Cha Ji-hye though . ’

Originally even before being an examinee, Cha Ji-hye was skilled . I don’t know what she might think .

But I am afraid of my past self . I’m scared I may return to that time .

But despite that, I will clear the exams .

Lee Hye-su .

Lee Jun-ho .

Kang Chun-seong .

My friends that died in the 3rd round . How badly did they want to live?

At the cost of their lives, I could live .

Thinking of that, aside from the ultimate goal of completing the final exam, I could have no other goal .

I wondered how much time passed .

Deng, deng, deng .

In the deport harbor, a bell rang out loudly .

Looking far out at the water’s edge, I could see the pirate ships appearing .

5 pirate ships encased in defense magic led the way with the other pirate ships trailing behind .

It’s a plan specifically targeted to protect themselves against me . Huh, seems like they’re starting to use their brains a bit .

‘Can’t be helped . ’

First, I decided to give up on aiming for the pirate ship masts .

I would observe the fight a little longer and when a strong opponent appeared, I planned on killing them right away . A strong pirate on the ship? Chances were high that it was a corrupt examinee .

The battle began on both sides .

The pirates got off the ships and attempted to land .

Starting from the docks and all the way in from the water, the soldiers began to rain down arrows .

The pirates were continuously falling down after being shot with arrows .

The pirates were relentlessly trying to land so they could launch their counterattack but it wasn’t working .

I could sense a bit of panic spreading amongst the pirates .

‘I see . They didn’t realize there would be this much resistance at the docks . ’

In the past while they were in concert with consul Adsel and regiment commander Decker’s help, they had always just walked in and achieved a bloodless victory .

From the position of the pirates that don’t know of those two’s deaths, this was a shocking situation .

At the relentless arrow attack and the pirate advancement being halted, regiment commander Ajen must have given out orders because the soldiers yelled out .

“Waaaaah!”

“Waahh!!”

“ADVANCE!!”

He was shouting as if we had already won . I think regiment commander had succeeded in getting the soldiers hyped up .

Anyway, this was a great start .

The pirate horde was actually using their brains so first they attempted to have the 5 ships encased in defense magic land .

When the landing was complete, they’ll cast defense magic on the other ships so they can land . At least it looks like that’s what they were planning .

‘They must only have about 5 magicians then . ’

It was a tactic to prevent me from shooting their ships but there was a huge hole in that plan .

If only those 5 protected ships attempt to dock instead of the entire fleet all at once, then the concentrated attack from the port’s defenders was enough to relentlessly beat them back .

Also, it looked like Heising has given out an order .

The pirate ships that were hiding in the back began to approach the shoreline .

‘I’ve been waiting for this . ’

I aimed for the ships without defense magic and pulled the trigger .

Taang-

I didn’t ask Sylph to hide the sound so the gunshot rang out .

One ship’s front mast fell to the left .

Taaang!

Then the back mast shattered .

Not able to keep its balance, the pirate ship tilted and smashed into the pirate ship next to it .

“Waaaa!”

The harbor defenders shouted again .

Taang-tang-taaang-!

I kept shooting .

With the same method, another two ships went down .

Of course, the pirates weren’t staying still either .

The pirates that had jumped off the ships were working together and falling off the ships like ants and started to climb ashore .

The harbor defenders resisted them by pouring down arrows but eventually the pirates were able to make it to land and **** heads with the soldiers .

With shields and spears in the front, the soldiers confronted the pirates and began to fight .

The harbor defenders were in a better formation but the pirates were bold .

Against pirates with plenty of fighting experience, the harbor defenders and soldiers who had been running away from these battles for so long could only hold their positions .

In the midst of this, I was enthralled in shooting down the pirate ships masts .

But then .

One figure from the harbor jumped up into thea air .

Looking more closely through the scope, I could see his face .

It’s Heising .

With an incredible take-off, in an instant he jumped over the defense and landed on the shore .

And he jumped from one building to the next, flying through the air .

Heising was headed straight for the hilltop I was on .