One Man Army

For now, Sang Hyuk didn’t tell Gye Baek and the Dark Knight about the Dragon God Artifacts. It was not an item that could be produced even if he told them about it at this point anyway.

It was much better for him to help them in many different areas, and he could help them later when they were actually able to produce the Dragon God Artifacts.

Dragon God Artifact was not a wearable item, but a special item that was imprinted on the soul. The engraving was a tattoo on the back of his right hand. For this reason, it was taboo to ask an unfamiliar user to show his right hand in Sang Hyuk’s previous life. (Ed: It seems both the Magic Armor and Dragon God Artifacts used the same equipment slot)

A red fang engraved on the back of Sang Hyuk’s right hand….. Sang Hyuk was proud to see it

Sang Hyuk logged out as soon as he came out of the temple. Anyway, the Ink Black Dragon had been anchored in this hidden Sky Island, so he can log in again after contacting Gye Baek and the Dark Knight, who were resting offline.

After logging out and leaving the capsule, Leah came home after a morning workout. Sang Hyuk had been unable to do morning exercise for four days to focus on the Temple of the Seven Dragons.

“Oh, is it over?”

Leah is now very good at Korean. This was a natural result because she has a good brain and studied hard.

“Yup, it’s done perfectly.”

“Wow, amazing as always!”

Leah laughed and with her thumbs up.

“You guys have worked hard since I’ve asked you to wait for me.”

[Of course we had to wait. The stronger the ace, the stronger the team will be.]

She still had to borrow the power of the real-time translator since there were difficult words to say but at least it was perfectly understandable when he heard it.

[So, is only attacking the Red Bearded Whale left?]

“Yes. But it seems a little hard to do it directly…. rather, we have to do some preparation for a week to have a perfect attack.”

[The chance to challenge it is limited so we have to be as careful as possible.]

There were thousands of ‘Sky Whale’s Hearts’, which had been collected by the Team Rush by now, but the ‘Temporary Soulstones’ needed more Sky Whale’s Hearts as it got closer to the Continent of the Sun.

There were exactly eight Temporary Soulstones, each of which allowed Team Rush to install on a Sky Island in the Red Zone, a Soulstone, where the three of them could store a save.

This meant that they could re-challenge again for eight times at the Red Zone when the three of them had a team wipe.

If they left the Red Zone and created the Temporary Soulstones at the Storm Zone, they had enough hearts to make up to 16, but then the re-challenge time was too long. (ED: Additional transit time from the Storm Zone to the Red Zone)

Temporary Soulstones could only be created on a Sky Island in the outermost border of the Red Zone, so it would be foolish to scatter the Temporary Soulstones in the whole area because there will be insufficient hearts.

However, Team Rush has a very small number of members, so the number of re-challenging using Temporary Soulstones would be high. If the team had 20 players, it was common to have only enough Temporary Soulstones to re-challenge at most once.

So, if the other raid teams fail, they can collect the heart again, raise their levels and specs, do some Sky-Whale hunting and re-challenge.

“If we can’t succeed in the 8th time, we’ll have to gather the hearts again, and then the time to move on to the Continent of the Sun will be very delayed.”

The only advantage of Team Rush with the small number of members was that it was much easier to get a lot of re-challenge opportunities than the other raid teams.

Therefore Sang Hyuk planned to make the most of it and somehow defeat the Red Bearded Whale within 8 challenge opportunities.

Team Rush had already picked one of the islands at the beginning of the Red Zone, installed the Temporary Soulstone, and all three had registered their souls.

If there had been a permanent soulstone, it could have been used constantly and challenges made until it worked but the existence of the permanent soulstones in the Middle Layer itself was null.

Because their souls had been registered, Team Rush had been able to log in to the area where the Red Bearded Whale was found.

Of course, if they were wiped out from the first challenge, they had to run hard and challenge it again along the sailing route they had already pioneered.

When they were sailing back along the sailing route they had pioneered, the sky-ship gained a speed bonus and the probability of the Sky Whale or ghost ship appearing was slightly reduced, which could shorten the time.

But, even if it was shortened, it would take at least ten days.

This meant that even if there were eight re-challenging opportunities, the challenges themselves would take a very long time.

‘If it is not too much I want to finish it at the first challenge…. Is it possible?’

The only thing in Sang Hyuk’s head was the Red Bearded Whale. He was going to challenge the red Bearded Whale hunt after raising the probability of success.

In that sense, what they were doing now may be trivial in the big picture, but from the standpoint of Sang Hyuk, who was trying to increase the probability of success even a single percent, they couldn’t neglect it.

“If it was this much, it looks enough, isn’t it? Or is it still not enough?”

Gye Baek lifted another chunk of red meat and stared at Sang Hyuk.

The things gathered around the area where the Red Bearded Whale hunted were floating materials left by the Red Bearded Whale.

More precisely, it was a lump of meat of the Red Bearded Whale that they can get with a very low probability when they catch the floating parasites that are shed by the Red Bearded Whale.

Sang Hyuk’s team continued to roam the area for about four days, continued to find and hunt the floating parasites and as a result, they were able to secure about 20 chunks of Red Bearded Whale.

“How many of them?”

“Exactly 20.”

“Hmm… Let’s get 4 more.”

If you cooked and ate Sky Whale meat, the damage you receive during your fight with a Sky Whale could be reduced slightly or slightly increase your attack.

The effect itself was not so great, but Sang Hyuk intended to increase the probability of success as much as possible in this way.

Not only that, Sang Hyuk constantly ran scenarios in his mind in search of a more perfect Red Bearded Whale hunting method while hunting the floating parasites.

Sang Hyuk reviewed all the information about the Red Bearded Whale and wondered if he had missed anything or if there was a better way, as a result, they were able to complete their best strategy.

“From now on, let’s find the Red Bearded Whale while hunting the floating parasites. Check out all of your equipment, Magic Armor charge status, consumable items and the others, just in case.”

Sang Hyuk finally confirmed their readiness.

The highest and thickest last barrier.

But, Sang Hyuk was definitely going to cross or break through this barrier.

“It’s not going to be easy to fight the Red Bearded Whale. But obviously, although we said we have Temporary Soulstones, don’t think about re-challenging! Just think that there is no re-challenging. We are fighting with our backs to a cliff right now!”

Sang Hyuk thought that mindset was the most important thing.

The moment they thought about the next re-challenge, everything was over.

In that sense, Sang Hyuk was saying that the Temporary Soulstone took an unbearably long time. But he believed in Gye Baek and the Dark Knights.

Both of them were as mentally strong as himself so he thought that they would fully understand and accept what he had said.

“Well, let’s go!”

After all the checking, Sang Hyuk grabbed the key of the Ink Black Dragon and moved on quickly to the deepest part of the Red Zone.

Edited by Userunfriendly, and Captain Ahab.