Chapter 371

Chapter 371

Eat The World Tree.

Episode 371: Yuli

“Mon chéri~”

“Yeah.”

“You’ll definitely come again next time, right?”

“Tell me whenever you have time, I’ll come right away.”

“Really? You said it?”

Blanche spread her arms out in front of the airport.

“You didn’t forget anything… did you?”

“Hehehe. I wonder.”

“…You forgot this, right here?”

She lifted her hat just enough for me to see, and then offered her cherry-red lips.

‘She’s being openly cute now.’

It was so sweet, it was almost overwhelming.

“Are you going to make me wait?”

I was momentarily stunned. I brought my face down to her blue bangs.

As I bent my knees slightly, I felt the blissful sensation immediately.

“Uung… yeah.”

Maronnie’s legs wobbled.

Her tiny attempt to close the height difference by lifting her flower-like feet was adorable.

Immediately after the kiss, her soft tongue peeked out.

She lightly licked my upper lip and then stepped back.

Her alluringly tilted eyes were hidden by her bangs.

All that was visible on her shadowed face was her short tongue licking her lips.

“Mon chéri. Have a safe trip.”

I stroked her hair, and she smiled.

And so, we said our farewells.

My next destination was Russia.

Where Sansuyu was.

I often found myself wondering.

Where did my current level stand?

“Hyung? I haven’t really seen you properly, so it’s ambiguous…”

I was getting stronger by the minute.

More than anyone who grew stronger by experiencing all sorts of fortuitous encounters.

But I still didn’t have the confidence to surpass Baekdo from that time.

Speed, strength, judgment, mana.

I couldn’t surpass her in any area.

Was my martial arts inferior to Baekdo’s?

No.

I had perfectly mastered the Heavenly Demon Divine Art’s formulas, absorbed them into myself, and even successfully modified them to suit me.

Then was it talent?

I had achieved this much in just half a year.

“Hyung. There are beings in this world that defy comparison.”

“That’s right! Just like our wonderful Suwang-nim~”

A girl suddenly responded to Taeyang’s advice.

A girl who looked to be about sixteen, walking with us.

Yuli, an informant for the ‘White Ants’.

Silver hair, lifeless eyes, pale skin. A staff in her hand.

Her head was turned, but her eyes weren’t looking at us.

“Why are you just walking with us so naturally?”

She joined us without a word and is walking right next to Taeyang.

“Hey, Yuli. I told you not to call me Suwang-nim anymore.”

“Ah, then should I call you Taeyang oppa?”

“Oppa to your superior is… ugh. Call me whatever you want, just not the king.”

“Yay~!”

It felt like a refreshing color had been added to this bitter party.

Her way of speaking was like a middle schooler’s, so I thought she was around that age, and I was right.

I tilted my head, looking at Yuli.

Her gray eyes were somehow strange.

“Ah, those are artificial eyes.”

“Artificial eyes?”

“She’s blind. They were eaten by rats, or something. Her eyes were full of bugs, just…”

“…That’s enough.”

There was no point in saying more, it’d just make me feel sick.

I didn’t doubt Taeyang’s skills anymore, I had seen too much of them by his side.

“Hehe~!”

Yuli, who was walking ahead, put her hands on her hips triumphantly, having overheard our conversation.

“I was picked up by Taeyang oppa~ and joined the White Ants~”

“I see~”

She used her artificial eyes as an artifact, trading her sight for the ability to see mana.

Yuli could perceive the world made up only of mana, like a mid-level spirit.

The staff she was holding was because she couldn’t see.

“Activating the artifact puts a lot of strain on her body. Normally, she walks by sensing presences. She’s probably the best at handling mana here, except for you, Hyung.”

“The king handles mana that well?”

“Use honorifics, Yuli.”

“Tch, fine.”

I might be better at handling it, but in my case, I was not as sensitive to external mana as Hwangdo or Blanche.

It was just a comparison against the insurmountable ones.

It was a different category.

So, I didn’t particularly argue.

Then, Yuli seemed to be annoyed by that.

“But oppa. Honestly, I don’t understand.”

She stopped walking and pointed her staff at me.

“What?”

“How can we just accept it when you suddenly bring someone and tell us to follow someone else instead of you?”

Taeyang’s face hardened.

“Yuli.”

Taeyang spoke her name. Yuli seemed tense, beads of sweat forming on her forehead.

She put strength in her voice, as if trying to prove that she wasn’t wrong.

“I, I can accept it. But other people might not.”

She was not wrong. If they blindly followed without seeing my qualifications, they were just machines.

As long as their loyalty was to Taeyang, I was just a figurehead boss.

“Hah.”

Taeyang sighed.

Being blind meant being more sensitive to other things. Yuli’s body flinched at the warmth of the sigh and the subtle movement of the wind.

Taeyang reached out his hand. Yuli, who didn’t know anything, was staring intently at Taeyang.

-Thwack!

A flick landed on her forehead.

Aori burst into a snicker.

“Ow!”

“That kind of talk usually comes from the most dissatisfied person, you little brat.”

“Oppa, oppa hit me… waaaah.”

Ah, she was really a kid.

Contrary to the description of them being veterans of the underworld, she fit her age.

She was about the same height as Aori, and they’d get along well.

“Hyung.”

Leaving Yuli, who was holding her forehead and wiping away tears, Taeyang spoke to me.

“You said you were wondering how strong you are, right?”

“I did.”

Taeyang pulled Yuli towards me, grabbing her hair.

“Ack!!”

“You tend to underestimate your skills, Hyung.”

Ignoring Yuli’s screams, the mana emanating from Taeyang sent a signal to me.

A mana signal towards the two pursuers I had been intentionally ignoring.

“Hey, you…”

If I scattered mana so openly, they would notice and run away.

Yuli, aware of this, opened her mouth and shouted.

“What, what are you doing! We lowered their guard like this! Are you sending a warning to the pursuers? Oppa, you’re really stupid…! We can’t catch them now!!”

“Hyung.”

Taeyang blatantly ignored Yuli’s words and murmured to me in a low voice.

“You can do it, right?”

“What, do you think I’m a sniffer dog?”

“If you can do it, Hyung, you’re the best among those below the realm of transcendence.”

They were already escaping at top speed.

At this speed, they would soon be beyond my detection range.

“I’m the king, right? Is this how you treat me?”

“She still can’t accept it, can she? Hey, tell me quickly. If you resolve this, will you acknowledge him or not?”

Yuli’s face turned pale. She was so frustrated that her face turned red and her body trembled like a vibrating phone.

“No, oppa, you idiot!! The people tracking us are inquisitors, we can’t catch them if we don’t hurry! Two of us have already been captured!”

“…Huh?”

“Seriously!!”

A level of boldness and clumsiness that’s hard to believe from the leader of a force.

I guess it would look better if I packaged it with some fancy words.

But Taeyang’s face just looked like a foolish commander who made a stupid move.

“Uh, Hyung, can you… do this?”

“……What are inquisitors?”

Taeyang scratched his cheek, stammering. Yuli, who had been struggling, finally escaped from his grasp.

“Well, that’s… they’re selected from the World Tree Order’s Seven Colored Knights, only the most skilled are sent…”

“Forget it, just catch them now!”

Yuli shouted at me.

Taeyang’s impulsive actions always have bad results.

I realized that while eating tree fruits for a few days.

-Hyung, if we release these kids and wait, won’t they bring back juicier and sexier burl girls? For revenge, they said.

I thought he had a plan, so I let them go, but then dozens of hunters stormed in.

I almost got my identity exposed, so Taeyang was kicked out of the dorm and spent the night in the hallway.

How had he been running the White Ants until now?

I smoothed my stiff face and pulled up enough mana.

‘…Is my dantian state precarious?’

This long journey started with the goal of getting my whole body to full condition when I settled in Russia.

My body was still not in perfect condition.

But as long as I didn’t use the Black Path, I could move somehow.

“Huuuuh.”

I couldn’t cause a commotion in the middle of the city.

I calmed my mind and leaped.

-Whoosh!

A heat mark engraved in the air.

The mana instantly subsided and disappeared.

I reached the rooftop of a building that looked about seven stories high in one leap, checked the two figures that hadn’t escaped yet, and put strength in my feet.

“My King!”

Aori, who had been silent, leaped similarly to me.

“What?”

“Right side!”

Shoes, socks… where were her pants?

Aori, wearing only her underwear and a top, exposed her thighs to the world.

“I’ll take the left.”

Her white legs bent, and she rushed forward, creating a circular ripple in the air.

Controlling one’s own mana also reduced the recoil.

I spread a formation in the air and summoned two birds onto my shoulders.

[Cheep!]

Luci and Eleonore.

[What is it, master?]

[Master~! I missed you!]

With them on my shoulders, I could now unleash my energy without burden.

Running through the buildings while hiding my presence as much as possible widened my peripheral vision.

-Sizzle!

Black mana flowed through my body. Luci immediately scattered the traces of mana.

Thanks to the spirits growing little by little to match my movements, they were moving at my level.

They weren’t high-grade spirits for nothing.

I had heard about this from Taeyang before.

-Hyung, you do so many things for granted. You need to know that. Normal hunters can’t use magic.

-Hmm…

-Spirits? Martial arts? What do they know? You do everything so casually. Sometimes your achievements might seem less impressive. Remember that. Even the World Tree can’t freely use spirits, high-level magic, and martial arts.

The mystery of magic made the impossible a reality.

Creating flames in the air, healing wounds.

There were no limits to its possibilities, even controlling smell and taste.

Spirits were beings who have mastered such actions.

High-grade spirits could perceive even changes that wood people or humans could not detect.

Tracking geniuses often received help from spirits.

[There.]

Eleonore, still at the high-grade level but the spirit king’s daughter and with top-tier talent, tracked the trail.

Complex calculations and computing specific coordinates.

If you did the calculations while moving your body, you would naturally have more things to worry about and the output would also decrease.

It was like installing new memory and processing units in a computer, linking with spirits.

-Swoosh!

Then, if you found them?

“…!”

Then, you just suppressed them with force.

Following the shadow that flashed before my eyes, I gathered my mana.

I couldn’t see it with my eyes, but it was definitely there.

“Oppa, aren’t you really too stupid?”

Yuli rebuked Taeyang in a very angry voice.

“No, even so… such recklessness…”

“Haha.”

“Aori unnie did it, but the person called the king hasn’t come yet.”

Aori was pulling up her pants haphazardly where Yuli’s staff was pointing.

-Thump!

Aori lost her balance and fell because her legs didn’t fit into her shorts properly.

Yuli’s face turned sour.

“Ugh!”

“Can’t you even put on pants properly now?”

Taeyang looked at Aori in disbelief.

And next to Aori, a woman who had been subdued looked even more dumbfounded.

Guseul blinked listlessly.

“Why are you here again?”

“…Should I have done a mass shooting here? Tsk… if it weren’t for the executive’s orders.”

“Executive orders… to Hyung?”

“No, it’s not something you need to worry about… not to investigate the Tree Spirit King, but to investigate Lee Shiheon.”

Not the Tree Spirit King, but Lee Shiheon?

Question marks appeared on Taeyang, Aori, and Yuli’s faces simultaneously.

“…Isn’t that the same thing?”

“Exactly! Why are they asking what he had for dinner? Anyone would think we’re lovers.”

“……”

Flower had finally lost their minds, it seemed.

Taeyang thought so anyway.

“Ah, that’s not the problem… oppa, so what are you going to do? That person isn’t coming…”

Taeyang smiled at Yuli, who was about to rebuke him again.

“Are you laughing now?”

“Hey, don’t underestimate Hyung too much.”

“…It’s not underestimating, it’s just that the opponent is an inquisitor…”

“Is that the problem?”

He was a man who’s going through all sorts of trials to catch up with those in the realm of transcendence.

Taeyang hadn’t seen Lee Shiheon’s full power, but he had a rough idea.

“At least in a one-on-one fight… there aren’t many people who can match Hyung.”

“What?”

A hunter’s strength was measured by rank.

Conversely, the Order and Flower were determined by position.

[Experienced S-class hunters]

[The Pope’s Knight Commander]

[Flower’s Deputy Executive]

These three were commonly considered equal.

[Some Association Presidents of Hunters and Guilds, a very small number of S-class hunters.]

[The World Tree’s Proxy]

[Many Flower Executives]

These three were linked in the same rank.

This is a subjective standard that Taeyang had seen directly.

From here, surpassing and mastering the principles is expressed as transcending the realm.

Of course, even they could be eaten by the beings in the line below if the numbers, situations, and conditions didn’t match.

In fact, the moment you reached that level, you were already counted within the number 100 in the world.

Only 100 in the entire world.

It was by no means a small number.

“That’s just the recent perspective, and I don’t have clear information yet, so some proxies and Flower executives may have already transcended the realm.”

At best, it was an inquisitor who was about a department head in the Knights.

No matter how specialized they were in tracking and escaping, there was no way Lee Shiheon couldn’t catch them.

Taeyang’s eyes narrowed.

His eyes were like those of a chilling snake.

“He is someone who can match the World Tree’s proxy if they are in good shape, how can they not handle just one inquisitor?”

-Kooong!

A sound of the sky splitting was heard.

Two silhouettes flying from above.

Yuli’s face, who was watching this, gradually hardened.

“Is it worth acknowledging now?”

Taeyang smiled.