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Chapter 23

Splat! The head of a hobgoblin landed in one of Leonard’s footprints and bled into the dirt, dying it to resemble red clay.

There probably weren’t many people who were as experienced at killing as he was, whether it was in his previous life or his current one. He easily cut through skin, flesh, muscle, bone, and innards with a single swing as if they were paper. His sword was so sharp and fast that when he stuck his weapon into a hobgoblin’s neck and pulled it out, there wasn’t a single drop of blood left on the blade. In the same way that lumberjacks with decades of experience knew exactly where to split a log with one glance, he had intimate knowledge about where to slice humans and similar organisms.

Their muscles, bones, and tendons don’t seem to be arranged very differently from humans. In fact, he was so familiar with where to slice that he had the leisure to let his thoughts wander.

Hobgoblins are such strange creatures. They used tools and walked on two feet like humans. Leonard had known what they looked like thanks to his lessons at the training facility, but it was his first time seeing and interacting with one. Unlike supernatural entities and spiritual animals, they weren’t spawned through intricate methods. They were born and raised normally, and they even behaved like humans.

He understood now why the people of this world hated monsters so much. There was a sense of familiarity, but revulsion and hatred overpowered it. Monsters were deformed in their eyes, so they couldn’t tolerate their existence.

“Let me get a closer look.” Leonard’s sword glinted, and he severed the hand of a hobgoblin swinging a club made of stone. He sidestepped to avoid the spray of blood, then cut off the entire arm to get a sense of the hobgoblin’s anatomy.

The hobgoblin foamed at the mouth when its arm was amputated, and Leonard finished it off with a slice to the throat. There were still many hobgoblins, and using one that was on the brink of death wouldn’t allow him to assess their physiology properly.

Krr...?! Kree?!

Kreeee...! Krr?!

Though the hobgoblins were vicious by nature, Leonard’s actions made them tremble with fear. Having lived this long on Galapagos Island, they were very aware of the merciless rules of survival.

Kill or be killed.

Eat or be eaten.

It was survival of the fittest, and only the strongest lived. These were the two principles that ruled the land. No matter how desperately they struggled, they all knew they could die at any time.

K-Kree...! The hobgoblins had never prepared themselves for being dissected alive. If Leonard at least looked like he was enjoying it, the hobgoblins would have assumed that he was asserting his power according to the law of the jungle. His face, however, was expressionless as he drew precise cuts on another hobgoblin.

It was as if he was warning the other hobgoblins that they could be next.

Kreeee! Kree!

Kreeee!

The hobgoblins were thrown into a panic and began to run away without bothering to wait for their leader’s orders. The head of a group could only maintain power when they had more charisma than the enemy. Aspects such as loyalty, honor, and the potential for personal profit were needed in order to keep a group together. But alas, these bottom-feeders had none of these.

“Give up.” Leonard spun around and cut off the heads of three or four hobgoblins within a few steps. Their bodies fell to the ground.

If he was in a rush, all of them would already be dead. The only reason some were still breathing was that he still had questions about their physiology. His clean, bloodless sword shone like a light whenever he swung.

There were exactly two hobgoblins left. They stood frozen in place, trembling.

I should probably start with the stomach if I want to see their organs, right? But I’ll need more than two if I want to figure out which parts are the most fatal when struck... Well, I’m sure I’ll be able to find more of these monsters. Leonard made up his mind and decided the fate of the two hobgoblins.

I don’t have much to gain from keeping them. This isn’t something I can learn in a day or two. He finished the job and began to organize his thoughts. Veteran martial artists were almost as knowledgeable in anatomy as clinicians, so he’d still gained some insight.

They’re built similarly to humans, but there are some peculiar differences. The bones, the arrangement of the joints and ligaments... They’re also missing an internal organ or two, but they have organs that I’ve never seen before. I should find some books about this later.

Knowledge was power, and ignorance was weakness. Contrary to his title of Sword Emperor in his previous life, he accumulated a substantial amount of miscellaneous knowledge. After all, he’d learned yoga at the Potala Palace and about the Beast Soul Essence Bond in the Nanman Jungle.

Even if he didn’t use something in his everyday life, he believed that anything he learned would end up being useful someday. Furthermore, knowledge about monsters had a clear, practical purpose.

That was also why Leonard felt that there was something off about this world’s martial artists ever since his first real battle.

It might be unfair to expect this from children, but no one, not even the most powerful ones I’ve seen, has shown evidence of following a specific art.

Whether one trained in weapons or hand-to-hand combat, each martial art followed different principles that left visible traces on a practitioner’s body. Those who used the swift sword arts were built differently from those who used heavy sword arts, and those who used fist arts moved differently.

But the martial artists of this world had little to no such characteristics.

Leonard came to a realization and exclaimed, “It’s because they fight so many non-human entities, unlike in murim!”

Though the hobgoblins were bipedal and used tools, their weight distribution and range of motion were very different. Trying to fight them the way one would fight a human would result in disaster. Hobgoblins resembled people, but how much would the fighting approach change when facing a four-legged beast or something even less

human-like?

The people in this world need to be flexible with the shape and type of weapons they can use. There is no singular martial art that can defeat enemies of every size. They may not even learn from a specific school at all until they reach a certain level of skill.

In this world, it was hard to get by with only knowing one style of martial arts. For example, if there was a technique that was meant to cut off someone’s head with a swift slice, it wouldn’t work on shorter monsters like goblins. At the opposite end of the spectrum, that attack would never even reach the neck of a large monster like an ogre. One might instead settle for a hit to the chest, but an ogre could use that as an opportunity to counterattack. Since individual martial arts were based on a limited number of forms and movements, they didn’t account for such differences.

If only there was a martial art that could be used in any situation. Martial artists would become much more formidable... But that would be far too difficult to achieve. Only the top hundred or so martial artists in the world would be able to master this martial art.

However, the solution was simple. Though traditional martial arts masters would have the upper hand in a one-on-one battle, monsters required a different approach. A person didn’t have to master all the different arts and styles like the Sword Emperor Yeon Mu-Hyuk, but here, people were trained for versatility from the very beginning of their journey.

Leonard looked forward to watching the development of the martial arts himself.

“Hm?”

Suddenly, there was a flash of light from the battered hobgoblin corpses, and several mana stones crystallized into existence. Because monsters weren’t actually spawned from nature, their bodies didn’t decompose like normal and instead expelled the mana within them in the form of mana stones.

Even though Leonard had known this, he was still amazed at seeing it for the first time. Wouldn’t it be possible to create an infinite supply of mana by keeping the monster alive and harvesting the energy?

It was much easier said than done, and he hadn’t been the first one to think of it. Considering how high the demand for mana stones still was, no one had figured out how to make it work.

Leonard poured the ten mana stones into his subspace pouch, then walked deeper into the Forest of Wastes. Apparently, ten hobgoblins hadn’t been enough to satisfy him.

“I’m excited to see what comes next,” he declared.

As he happily strode away, the remains of the hobgoblins he left behind forewarned of the bloodbath to come.

***

The Forest of Wastes. As the name implied, it was the residence of the ones who were kicked out of the food chain or otherwise chased out. They survived by hunting each other.

The monsters there were also weak. The strongest one could possibly be classified as Rank D, and there weren’t any monster species in the Third Stage. That was why the danger rating was one skull.

Lower-ranking monsters also meant fewer mana stones.

I heard that most of the pages other than me are at least at the Ninth Degree Body Refining Tier, so they have no reason to come to hunt such weak monsters when it’s so inefficient. I don’t think it’s common for people to wander alone either.

A monster could pop out from anywhere, and that left people on edge, eating away at their mental well-being. Since they needed to be on guard at all times, they needed peers who could cover for their mistakes. Unless someone had gone through every imaginable hardship like Leonard had, going around alone was nothing but stupid and rash.

Inefficient hunting grounds led to small payoffs for the entire team, so naturally, they didn’t come to places like the Forest of Wastes.

But it works to my advantage because no one can see me.

Leonard stroked his pouch. It had grown heavier with every massacre—or at least it felt like it had. He’d consumed a thousand mana stones to reach the Fifth Degree, but he’d collected over a hundred in one day. He could replenish his entire stash within ten days. He had to thank all the monsters who were unfortunate enough to meet him.

This region has hobgoblins, slimes, kobolds, and lastly, gnolls. Gnolls are the only ones I haven’t encountered yet.

Though gnolls’ species classification was Rank D, they had formidable physical prowess. They were also intelligent enough to live in communities. They were typically bigger than humans, with their average height being two meters. Gnolls also had heads that resembled a dog’s, so they had keen senses, especially when it came to smell and hearing. Leonard also distinctly recalled reading that their bite force was so strong that they could break rocks.

“Hm.” There’s a stench coming from the tailwind, not the headwind... in any case, it looks like they’re underestimating me. Leonard stopped in his tracks. When he sensed monsters dashing toward him, he started laughing uncontrollably.

They didn’t smell like hobgoblins or kobolds. Though the stench resembled a wolf’s, there was a rotten undertone. It had to belong to gnolls.

“Ah... They\'re stronger than I expected,” Leonard observed as they drew closer. All his hairs stood on end when he sensed their power.

His body was warning him that he couldn’t defeat them as someone in the Fifth Degree Body Refining Tier. It warned, “The sword in his hand wouldn’t be enough. He had to run away.”

Ridiculous.

Leonard, of course, ignored the warning. He straightened his back instead of curling in with fear.

“They’re here.”

His eyes narrowed as he stared into the forest.

Keee! There was a horrible, vicious cry as a beast leaped over several trees in one jump and landed in front of him. The dog-headed creature was two, almost three meters tall. Its muscles flexed as it gripped a rusty axe with two hands. It was muscular to the point of being grotesque, and its skin had a yellow undertone that made it look all the more hideous.

This was a Second Stage gnoll in the Mature Demon Tier. An Aardgnoll.

Leonard didn’t flinch when the Aardgnoll landed. He simply looked it up and down.

“You’re no normal monster. Are you the leader?” Leonard asked casually.

Eehee? Heek!

This was the Aardgnoll chieftain, the strongest monster dominating the Forest of Wastes. It was so taken aback that it couldn’t do anything but laugh at the boy.

Eeheeheehee!

Kiyaaa—!

It suddenly let out a blood-curdling scream and swung its axe.