Chapter 49: Mimicking

Chapter 49

Kim Jinsung never intended to go all out against Yoon Aram from the start. He found Yoon Aram’s use of mana extremely fascinating. He could set his entire body on fire and cause explosions, gather it to throw fireballs, or create an inferno while hiding underground and causing earthquakes.

“He really uses mana as smoothly as flowing water.”

It didn’t seem like he was using skills. If all the fire attacks he had shown so far were skills, Yoon Aram would need to have at least 10 skills.

“And when using skills, the flow of mana isn’t usually this obvious.”

This made Kim Jinsung even more curious about Yoon Aram’s method of using mana.

“Could I use Magi in the same way?”

From the moment he had this thought, Kim Jinsung abandoned the idea of fighting with full power. He fought just enough to keep it even, focusing on observing the flow of the burning mana covering Yoon Aram’s body. Naturally, he didn’t even consider using status effect skills to ensure Yoon Aram could use his skills freely.

After about 20 minutes of receiving Yoon Aram’s attacks, Kim Jinsung began to feel familiar with Yoon Aram’s attack patterns. Familiarity meant…

“Has he shown everything he can do?”

At some point, Yoon Aram stopped showing new ways to use mana and started repeating a few patterns. Realizing this, Kim Jinsung stopped pretending to be evenly matched.

He immediately mimicked Yoon Aram’s finger-fired mana arrows. The result was a resounding success.

“…What, what is this?”

Yoon Aram, stuttering in shock as he looked at the shattered tree, confirmed that Kim Jinsung had successfully copied his technique.

“And you threw the fireball like this, right?”

Kim Jinsung didn’t stop and gathered Magi in one hand. He formed a large black sphere and threw it at the tree where Yoon Aram was standing.

“Gasp…!”

Yoon Aram gasped and threw himself to the ground.

**Boom!**

A much louder explosion than the mana arrows came from the tree. The black energy engulfing the area disappeared, and the tree that had been there was gone, obliterated by the Magi explosion.

“No way! This is insane!”

Yoon Aram shouted in disbelief. It was shocking enough that Kim Jinsung had copied his mana usage in just 20 minutes, but the fact that it was much more destructive was even more surprising.

“What kind of mana is this strong? Who the hell are you?!”

Yoon Aram shouted at Kim Jinsung, who didn’t respond. Instead, Kim Jinsung thought to himself with a slightly surprised expression.

“It’s much more destructive than the fireball.”

The fireball Yoon Aram had thrown earlier was powerful enough to burn down an entire tree. But it was nothing compared to the power of Kim Jinsung’s Magi sphere.

“Is Magi inherently more destructive? Or is it because my level is much higher?”

He briefly wondered but quickly dismissed the thought. It wasn’t something worth pondering over.

“I’ll just kill him and gain his fire ability to compare.”

Having made up his mind, Kim Jinsung charged at Yoon Aram. As he closed the distance, the Magi swirling around his body began to gather in front of him. To Yoon Aram, it was a familiar sight.

“That’s what it looks like when I explode fire mana!”

Realizing what kind of attack Kim Jinsung was about to use, Yoon Aram instinctively jumped back, transforming into a cheetah.

**Boom!**

The ground where Yoon Aram had been standing exploded, narrowly missing him. He felt a chill run down his spine.

“The firepower is twice as strong as the fire explosion…”

In terms of firepower, he couldn’t compete. And now, Kim Jinsung had perfectly copied his mana usage. The only advantage Yoon Aram had left was his ability to transform into animals.

“What should I transform into to win? I can’t think of anything…”

As he pondered, his vision suddenly started spinning.

“…What? What…?”

The flaming cheetah stumbled, making a distressed noise. He had been hit by Kim Jinsung’s confusion skill.

“What’s happening? I need to take a status recovery potion…!”

Instinctively, Yoon Aram reverted to human form and tried to pull out the status recovery potion from his pocket. But Kim Jinsung was faster.

“Is this how you attack from underground?”

“…!!”

Hearing Kim Jinsung’s voice from right beneath him, Yoon Aram felt a life-threatening danger. He instinctively jumped as high as he could.

That decision saved his life.

**Boom!**

**Rumble…!**

The ground where he had been standing exploded and collapsed. In the middle of the Magi-filled crater, Kim Jinsung looked up at Yoon Aram. But Yoon Aram, still in a state of confusion, couldn’t process this.

“Damn it! I’ll let you off today! Consider yourself lucky!”

Yoon Aram shouted as he transformed into a large phoenix. Despite his dizziness, he managed to fly up quickly. Aiming for the moonlit sky, he succeeded in soaring into the air.

“I need to fly as high as possible and then think… Huh?”

Yoon Aram, flapping his wings with all his might, soon felt something strange. His wings seemed to be gradually stiffening. Upon closer inspection…

“What the?!”

Yoon Aram saw that his wings were indeed turning into gray stone. A few seconds later, his entire body had turned into solid stone, and he began to plummet to the ground.

“Oh no… damn it!”

He wanted to scream in panic, but his mouth had already turned to stone, rendering him speechless. As he fell helplessly, Kim Jinsung stood below, gripping the hilt of his sheathed sword, waiting.

“It looks like I can release Magi this way too.”

After muttering to himself, Kim Jinsung used the ‘Draw’ skill on the stone bird falling towards him. As he swung his sword skyward, he tried to release the Magi gathered in the blade. Sure enough, the Magi flew up in a crescent shape.

“Success!”

As Kim Jinsung celebrated inwardly, the crescent of Magi sliced the falling stone bird in half. At the same time, a notification appeared before Kim Jinsung, confirming Yoon Aram’s defeat.

—

▶ You have defeated an evildoer.

▶ You have earned 50 beast Karma points.

▶ You have acquired the trait ‘Friend of Fire.’

▷ Friend of Fire: Allows you to convert mana into fire properties.

▶ You have acquired the trait ‘Animal’s Sixth Sense.’

▷ Animal’s Sixth Sense: Makes you more sensitive to the flow of mana around you when transformed into an animal.

▶ You have acquired the skill ‘Animal Transformation.’

▷ Animal Transformation: Allows you to transform into desired animals. However, you can only transform into animals you have defeated at least 10 times. Consumes 50 mana.

▶ Do you want to delete an existing skill to acquire ‘Animal Transformation’?

—

“As expected. The fire ability wasn’t a skill.”

Just as Kim Jinsung had predicted, Yoon Aram’s various fire attacks were not skills but different ways of using mana.

“Animal’s Sixth Sense… So that’s why he could detect me even when I was in shadow form.”

Kim Jinsung recalled the moment when Yoon Aram had immediately noticed and exploded mana as soon as he moved near the rabbit burrow.

“The Animal Transformation skill requires meeting conditions to transform?”

This meant he couldn’t transform into a bird or cheetah right away. He hadn’t encountered any cheetah-like creatures during the five days in the forest.

“I’ve encountered many monsters… But can I transform into monsters?”

Kim Jinsung wondered. Except for their aggressive nature, monsters weren’t much different from other animals.

“I haven’t seen him transform into a monster, so maybe it’s not possible…”

If Yoon Aram could transform into monsters, he would have done so at least once during their fight.

“Well, I’ll find out after defeating ten of them.”

Instead of pondering, Kim Jinsung decided to take action. Having decided to acquire the ‘Animal Transformation’ skill, he now had to choose which existing skill to delete.

—

“Wow! Kim Jinsung wins!”

“Nice!”

“I knew it!”

“I told you, if he could fight Forghinae, he could definitely take down a player!”

“Oh no ㅠㅠ”

“Aram ㅠㅠ”

“I thought it was an upset, but it wasn’t…”

As soon as the result was confirmed, the chat was filled with reactions. Most celebrated Kim Jinsung’s victory, while a few lamented Yoon Aram’s defeat. The reactions in the monitoring room were similar.

“Alright! Kim Jinsung wins!”

“Wow, I was so nervous, thinking he might lose.”

“Yeah, replacing him with a new superstar like Yoon Aram is impossible right now.”

“But Yoon Aram, who we hyped up for two days, is now dead?”

“It’s really anticlimactic. It was the same when Kang Minhyuk died…”

Jang Seungwook, listening to the staff, spoke to Baek Jun.

“If Kim Jinsung dies, we’re in big trouble. You know he’s taken out all the other rising stars except Fade, right?”

Baek Jun didn’t respond, but his serious expression showed he felt the same as Jang Seungwook.

“If it comes to this, Kim Jinsung must survive till the end. The problem is Forghinae…”

Jang Seungwook glanced at a monitor. It showed Kim Jinsung, having finished his nighttime hunt, moving back into the secret passage. As Baek Jun feared, Kim Jinsung hadn’t given up on hunting Forghinae.

“This will be the crucial point for Group A’s success.”

—