Chapter 22: 22

“T-Tiger…? It’s a tiger!”

“A Mutated Tiger appeared!”

“Everyone! Run away! Run for your lives!”

The hunters ran away as fast as they could.

“Hurry up! Hurry up and run away! Hurry!”

Even the ranch owner, Grandpa Bukati shouted as he dragged his old body away.

However, these people were actually being foolish since it seemed that they had forgotten who was in this place as well. Even though he might not be as amazing as Deus, Betelgeuse was still a Five Star Heaven, so a Mutated Tiger was something he could easily handle with a flick of his finger.

However, Grandpa Bukati and the hunters ran away because of the fear of tigers ingrained in them. After all, a tiger was considered to be the strongest predator out there if monsters were excluded from the list, and the fact that such a fierce predator was even mutated by an unknown energy only made it even more vicious and dangerous. A Mutated Tiger was incomparably much more dangerous compared to the likes of Mutated Wolves.

“Hoho!” Betelgeuse laughed, seemingly amused by the Mutated Tiger.

“Hmm… The world really seems to be messed up these days judging by the fact that these kinds of rubbish keep showing up,” he grumbled before turning around to Siegfried and saying, “Don’t you worry. I can easily take care of that oversized cat myself—huh? Where did he go?”

However, Siegfried was no longer there, and that was because…

“Hey! Where are you going?!” Betelgeuse shouted when he saw Siegfried running toward the Mutated Tiger.

***

Siegfried was being reckless.

He was Level 10, and…

[Mutated Tiger]

[A tiger mutated by an unknown power.]

[Level: 25]

[Ability: Dark Attribute Attacks]

The Mutated Tiger was fifteen levels higher than him. On top of that, the black tiger that resembled a panther had the ability to deal dark attribute attacks. A dark attribute attack had the ability to debuff its enemy and wear them down.

It was evident that the Mutated Tiger was too much for the Level 10 Siegfried to handle. But he still bravely charged toward the Mutated Tiger, even though he was aware of it.

‘Let’s test and see if I can overcome a 15-level difference,’ Siegfried thought. He wanted to know if he had the capability to surpass level gaps, and he wanted to feel it with his own body.

‘There’s no harm even if I die this time since most of my items are trash anyway. The 49 hours I’ll have to wait is a bit of a waste, but I’ll just think of it as an opportunity cost to test my limits…’ 

The penalty he would receive for dying was going to be insignificant since he was still a low-leveled user. However, he knew he had nothing to lose, and this was why he was able to quickly make the decision to charge recklessly at the Mutated Tiger.

***

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Betelgeuse grimaced after seeing Siegfried rushing toward the Mutated Tiger.

“How foolish! You shouldn’t do something so reckless out of overconfidence! Don’t get too cocky! Your recklessness will get you killed before you can even achieve your full potential!” he exclaimed.

Siegfried looked nothing but reckless in his eyes right now. To him, Siegfried was nothing more than an overconfident greenhorn rushing to his demise.

Betelgeuse could tell that Siegfried wasn’t strong enough to face the Mutated Tiger no matter his talent.

“I should go and save that punk before something happens…” Betelgeuse muttered and pulled out his gigantic sword.

Flinch!

However, he suddenly stopped moving.

“B-But… I’m curious…!” he exclaimed.

He wanted to personally witness Siegfried’s limits.

“He is the best one I had seen among my disciple candidates, and I’m sure that he will once again amaze me by showing me the depths of his limits…!” Betelgeuse muttered.

Curiosity. That’s right, the Sword Emperor wanted to witness the limits of the greenhorn who captivated him in an instant.

“Hmm… let’s just watch for now. Ehem… Ehem… He will come back to life even if he dies anyway,” Betelgeuse murmured as he watched over the battle between the Mutated Tiger and Siegfried.

***

The fight between the Mutated Tiger and Siegfried was fun; no, it was freaking fun to be more precise.

“Oh? Well, look at this punk,” Betelgeuse muttered, seemingly in awe.

“Is his reaction speed for real? Hoho. Not bad for a greenhorn. His control over his body is pretty amazing for his age as well. He looks as if he is controlling his body however he wants, and that’s not something anyone can achieve unless they had gone through excruciating pain. How tough was the training he had gone through…?” Betelgeuse muttered. He could roughly tell just how much of a torture the kind of training Siegfried had to endure to reach his current status.

Betelgeuse was severely lacking compared to Siegfried’s master—Deus—but he was still perceptive enough as a Master.

“He can perceive the gap between him and his enemy as well?!” Betelgeuse exclaimed in admiration.

The ability to perceive the gap between oneself and one’s enemy was an ability only Masters or those on the brink of becoming a Master possessed. It was an ability to instantly perceive every single thing about the enemy such as their height, weight, joints, attack range, and everything else to calculate how much space one had to keep between them and the enemy. This ability allowed one to completely dominate the battle, and it was one of those things that were easy to say but difficult to do.

It was easy for anyone to estimate the reach of weapons such as swords, spears, clubs, etc, and use it to their advantage, but the ability to make a decision after factoring in every single detail about their enemy was something entirely different.

It was an ability that would take years for most people to master and use in combat.

However, the greenhorn, Siegfried, was doing it right now.

Whoosh!

The Mutated Tiger swung its front paw.

Siegfried dashed closer to the Mutated Tiger to avoid its attack, and he immediately counterattacked in close range.

Those unfamiliar with combat would say that Siegfried was rushing to his death since getting closer to an enemy much stronger than oneself was a risky thing to do. After all, he was getting closer to the tiger when he should be creating more distance between them.

However, certain people on a certain level, like Betelgeuse for example, saw it in a different way.

“That’s right! That’s only possible since he can read his opponent’s attack! That’s the right choice. Excellent!” Betelgeuse exclaimed.

Siegfried’s decision to come closer to the Mutated Tiger did not seem reckless at all in the eyes of the Sword Emperor. In fact, he could immediately tell that what Siegfried did was the right choice.

Why?

It was all because even though it seemed dangerous to come closer to the Mutated Tiger, the tiger’s body structure actually made it the safest place for him at the moment.

“It seemed that his master isn’t a nobody, at the very least. He taught him the basics very well. Hmm… his master must be someone that is close to reaching the level of a Master…” Betelgeuse muttered.

The Sword Emperor had to admit that Siegfried’s master wasn’t someone ordinary thanks to Siegfried’s showcase of his abilities.

“Hmph! He is still a liar though. How dare he exaggerate his abilities to that naïve and gullible kid? Tsk tsk… what a pitiful man.” Betelgeuse grumbled while expressing his displeasure at Siegfried’s master.

After all, it was impossible to imagine that there was a person greater than the Grandmasters of the continent.

***

What Betelgeuse had observed was true. Siegfried was using the perception ability his master had taught him to gain the upper hand against the Mutated Tiger.

Siegfried avoided every single one of the Mutated Tiger’s attacks by combining the ability to control his body as he wanted and the ability to perceive his enemy’s attacks.

Puk! Pukeok!

He smashed his steel rod into the Mutated Tiger’s head numerous times and dealt a decent amount of damage to the tiger.

In fact, he was dealing an amount of damage an ordinary Level 10 player couldn’t deal thanks to the combination of Smite, Circle of Mortality, and Circle of Weakness.

[Mutated Tiger]

[HP: ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜]

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Thanks to that, the Mutated Tiger’s HP quickly fell by nearly sixty percent ever since the battle started, and as long as the battle continued to progress like this, Siegfried’s overwhelming victory would be inevitable.

However…

Swaaaak!

Blood spurted out from Siegfried’s chest.

“Keuk!” Siegfried groaned. He immediately jumped back and created some distance between himself and the tiger.

[You have been hit by a dark attribute attack!]

[Warning! All of your stats have fallen by 3%! This debuff will persist for the next 10 seconds!]

However, it was already too late—he had already gotten hit by the Mutated Tiger’s debuff ability.

Grit…

Siegfried gnashed his teeth while thinking, ‘My body is not listening to me. I think I’m already at my limit…’

His weakened body wasn’t reacting fast enough to his commands anymore, and every single one of his muscles was screaming. He felt like his lungs were about to explode, and he was finding it harder to breathe.

In the end, his Stamina ended up holding him back.

[You are bleeding!]

[Warning! Your HP will slowly deplete!]

On top of the debuff, he was bleeding as well.

[HP -10]

[HP -10]

[HP -10]

He was losing 10 HP per second.

“Grrr…!” The Mutated Tiger let out a low threatening growl as if it were aware of Siegfried’s current condition.

It seemed that the instincts of a predator identifying a weakened prey had kicked in.

“What are you looking at?” Siegfried gnashed his teeth and gripped his steel rod tighter.

“Do you really think you can kill me just because I’m in this state?” he added.

Siegfried did not give up. His body might have reached its limits, but he had no plans to become the tiger’s meal for the day.

“Come at me.” Siegfried taunted the Mutated Tiger.

“Grrr…!” The Mutated Tiger growled, but it didn’t fall for Siegfried’s taunt.

It seemed that the tiger was a bit scared of carelessly getting close to Siegfried after being one-sidedly pummeled by the latter’s steel rod. As such, it did not immediately rush in, even though it managed to land a hit on Siegfried.

The Mutated Tiger displayed its intellect. It waited until Siegfried was exhausted.

“You don’t want to?” Siegfried smirked and said, “If you don’t want to come… then I will go to you, then.”

He started walking toward the Mutated Tiger.

***

“W-What!” Betelgeuse shouted with his eyes wide open while observing the battle between the Mutated Tiger and Siegfried.

“Just where did this crazy punk come from?” he exclaimed once again.

The reason the Sword Emperor was so shocked was that the combat style Siegfried had used against the Mutated Tiger was quite… dynamic.

The battle between the Mutated Tiger and Siegfried was a fight to the death; no, rather, it was more accurate to describe it as a messy brawl to the death.

Their HP had fallen below fifty percent, and they threw everything they got as they fought with the aim to kill their opponent through whatever means necessary.

The battle between the two was pretty intense.

How intense you ask?

Well…

Crack… Crack…!

“Krruwaaaah!” The Mutated Tiger roared in agony.

Crack…!

Siegfried wrapped his arm around the tiger’s neck, trying to strangle it to death.

“H-He is even using his teeth?!” Betelgeuse exclaimed in surprise and admiration at the sight of Siegfried biting the Mutated Tiger’s neck.

A human biting a tiger’s neck instead of the other way around was truly a strange sight.

“Ooooh! Oooooh!” Betelgeuse was awed by Siegfried’s scrappy fighting style.

“This kid! This kid is really something else! He’s amazing! He’s awesome! AWESOME! Kwuhahahaha!” he exclaimed before boisterously laughing.

To be honest, which crazy bastard in the world would even think of biting a tiger’s neck in the first place?

The courage and bravery Siegfried was showing—it was something most people would never imagine, even in their wildest dreams.

His thirst for victory.

His hatred for defeat.

His obsession for survival.

Lastly, his unyielding spirit.

The Siegfried who Betelgeuse was seeing right now wasn’t just talented, but he was also born with all of the prerequisites required for someone to become a powerful being.

“I will certainly—without a doubt—do everything in my power—to make you my disciple!” Betelgeuse exclaimed as hearts started to appear in his eyes.

[Alert: The Sword Emperor Betelgeuse’s Affinity with you has increased by +1,000!]

[Warning: The Sword Emperor Betelgeuse’s Affinity with you is too high!]

[Warning: The Sword Emperor Betelgeuse’s Affinity with you has changed from ‘Interested’ to ‘Obsessed’.]

These messages suddenly popped up in front of Siegfried, who was in the middle of a fight to the death with the Mutated Tiger.

“Ah…” Siegfried muttered in disbelief at the messages.

He was so flabbergasted by the messages that he almost let go of the Mutated Tiger’s neck.

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