Chapter 7
Chapter 7: Oppa, How in the World Did You Do That?
Having finished an early meal, we reached the entrance of the D-rank gate slated for our raid that afternoon.
Designed to challenge an expedition of two hunters, the portal was typical of its rank, serving as a known den for lizardmen.
“Sia, did you bring your combat gear?”
“Sure did! My dimensional pocket is completely stocked. Don’t tell me you forgot yours, oppa?”
“No, I have my kit. I was just curious if you managed to keep yours.”
Given that my circumstances had stayed relatively static over the previous twelve months, the items kept in my personal subdimensional cache were untouched. Sia was an entirely separate matter. My assumption had been that her prior pocket dimension—and all the armaments contained inside—would have dissolved when she was reborn.
That presumption led me to believe she arrived empty-handed, yet she stood there utterly prepared, as though such a deficit had never even crossed her mind.
Without warning, she materialized an initial artifact from the void, and I could only blink in astonishment.
“…?”
Before me was a blade whose mere silhouette commanded reverence. One did not need to grip the hilt to recognize that it possessed staggering, lethal might.
Even so, a sense of deep bewilderment washed over me as I looked at her.
The concept of a mighty dragon drawing cold steel inside a trivial D-rank gate bordered on the surreal. Beyond that lay a far more glaring inconsistency: Sia claimed to be a spellcaster. If she wanted the world to accept her guise as an ordinary D-rank mage, shouldn’t she be holding a staff or a wand rather than brandishing a blade of slaughter?
Before I could voice the confusion, Sia tilted the weapon toward my hands.
“Take it, oppa. You should swing this.”
“…Wait, what?”
“It’s a gift. I thought the design would fit you wonderfully.”
Her spontaneous generosity left me utterly speechless.
“Is it not to your taste? I can pull out another option if you prefer.”
“No, that’s not it at all. Even if you offered me a wooden splinter, Sia, I’d cherish it just because it’s from you. It’s just so sudden that my mind went blank. Thank you so much. I promise to wield it with care.”
“Oh, but I’m not finished yet, oppa.”
“What? You mean… there’s still more?”
“Mhm. Give me just a moment.”
As it turned out, that magnificent blade was merely the prologue.
One by one, she began retrieving a staggering assortment of artifacts from her spatial vault: tailored chest plates, a sturdy helm, an exquisite mantle, enchanted trinkets, and defensive baubles. Assessing the caliber of the blade resting in my palms, none of these supplementary items seemed remotely mundane—a suspicion immediately validated the instant I fitted them to my frame.
Each component emanated a distinct, overwhelming aura of sheer potency.
“I truly appreciate this, Sia. I’ll guard every piece with my life.”
“Hold on, oppa. You haven’t seen the rest yet.”
Artifact after artifact continued to pour from her endless pocket dimension. She had casually remarked before that dragons obsessively piled hoards of priceless riches into their caverns, but the mountain of wealth she unveiled far surpassed any mental estimate I had formed.
As she busied herself rearranging the remnants of her stash, I focused back on the blade in my hands.
“Sia, does a weapon like this carry a title?”
The auxiliary defensive gear was magnificent, yet gripping this edge sparked a subtle resonance deep within me, as if some invisible bond tied the weapon directly to my core. Although my fingers had never touched the wrapping until today, the balance felt startlingly natural, reminiscent of an extension of my own arm honed over decades.
Sia blinked, appearing genuinely caught off guard by the inquiry.
“Its true name is… the Dragon Bone Sword.”
A Dragon Bone Sword. The phenomenon went far beyond the weapon simply possessing exquisite craftsmanship; there was an inexplicable, primal alignment resonating through its frame.
Nevertheless, carrying a divine relic of such catastrophic power simply to cull low-level lizardmen within a mundane D-rank gateway felt almost comical in its overkill.
With our armaments sorted and ready, we lingered at the shimmering border of the portal, pulses quickening. Part of my tension stemmed from being away from the vanguard for such an extended period, yet an overwhelming wave of nostalgia washed through me, evoking memories of our past descents side by side.
Then, a sudden worry struck my conscience like cold water.
‘Can Sia truly handle being here?’
The thought had slipped my mind amid the excitement, but it was precisely within the depths of a dungeon portal that Sia had previously endured a gruesome, agonizing demise. Even if over twenty-five centuries had elapsed from her own chronological viewpoint, was it not common knowledge that ancient dragons retain memories across eternity without fading?
The psychic scars of her loss had torn at me throughout the past year. Even if she put on a brave face, could she genuinely be devoid of all lingering trauma regarding these spatial tears?
“”Are you feeling alright?””
The very syllable I uttered to check her wellbeing coincided identically with her asking the exact same thing of me. We froze, staring at one another in dumbfounded silence before breaking into synchronized laughter.
“You were fretting over whether I’d be terrified, weren’t you, oppa?”
I offered a small, sheepish nod. Seeming deeply touched by my instinctual worry, she leaned up without warning and pressed a gentle kiss against my cheek.
“I am perfectly fine, truly, so set your mind at ease. What matters far more is… how are you holding up, oppa? Regarding the tragedy back then…”
“I’m completely fine too. I braced myself for panic, but being here feels shockingly natural.”
Truth be told, a knot of apprehension had tightened in my stomach before passing through the veil. Yet once our feet crossed the threshold, the dreaded shivers and nervous cold sweats never manifested.
Instead of dread or crippling terror, a peculiar, vibrant thrill began to spark in my chest for the trial ahead.
“I’m so glad. Let’s wrap this clearing up swiftly so we can go grab some spicy mala tteokbokki for dinner!”
Hearing her lighthearted banter, an outsider would easily assume we were strolling through a park instead of entering a lethal zone of hostile beasts.
Still, with Sia standing right by my side and artifacts of legendary stature guarding my flesh, the environment lacked any genuine menace. The excursion truly felt far more like a romantic outing than a perilous operation.
We walked unhurriedly across the cavernous expanse, waiting for the native creatures to initiate their assault.
Before long, a patrol of lizardmen surfaced around our ten o’clock perimeter. They slunk forward with hissed warnings, watching our postures with aggressive wariness.
“Oppa, over there.”
“I see them!”
“I’ll observe from back here. A squad of that size shouldn’t pose any trouble for you alone, right?”
“Not at all. I’ll make quick work of them.”
Sia offered an encouraging cheer, assuring me that if the impossible occurred and I faced genuine mortal peril, she would step in immediately.
Realistically, any intervention on her part would be ludicrous overkill. The divide between an ancient calamity like her and these minor reptiles was vast beyond comprehension.
Contrasting our absolute serenity, the predatory instincts of the lizardmen picked up the lingering danger, prompting them to bare their fangs and brandish their crude weapons.
“Kieeeek!”
The moment distance collapsed, the steel blade hummed against my palm with a rhythmic, intoxicating vibration, and I carved the weapon downward in a broad arc.
SLASH—!
The lead lizardman failed to register the blur before its severed skull tumbled away from its neck.
I had harbored anxieties that my physical reactions might be terribly sluggish after such extended downtime, yet perhaps the evaluation trial from this morning had oiled the rusty gears. The arc of my blade met zero resistance.
Indeed, whether fueled by the extraordinary relics or some latent surge within me, my body functioned with far greater precision than during my prime.
My edge danced with liquid fluidity, while every microscopic shift of the beasts unfolded before my eyes in slow detail: the reach of their strides, the flawed trajectories of their swinging axes, every single opening laid bare.
It was as if I had returned to my native element, continuing to execute lethal strikes without pause.
The previous version of me could never dream of finishing off D-rank combatants with singular strikes, yet with the absurd armaments Sia had provided, the outcome was predetermined. The pack tumbled into the dirt one after another, denied even the briefest opportunity to mount a defense.
“Phew.”
While I anticipated the high-tier gear making the engagement manageable, the total, effortless devastation far exceeded my wildest expectations.
Turning back toward Sia, I expected her to shrug off the skirmish with mild disinterest. After all, obliterating a few low-tier critters using an overpowering relic meant virtually nothing to a draconic sovereign.
Yet what I encountered was Sia staring back with eyes round with genuine, unfeigned astonishment.
“Oppa… that was utterly spectacular.”
“Come on, don’t exaggerate. It wasn’t anything remarkable.”
From the vantage point of a dragon, culling minor fodder should have been a source of amusement. I assumed she was showering me with hyperbolic praise simply to lift my spirits.
“I’m not flattering you just to make you feel good, oppa. I am dead serious.”
The unwavering sincerity echoing beneath her words confirmed that she was genuinely shaken by the spectacle she had just witnessed.
‘Wait… could she actually mean that?’
The armament Sia had passed into Minjun’s care was no pedestrian blade. It was a Dragon Bone Sword, an artifact shaped directly from the skeletal essence of an ancient dragon.
The craftsmanship alone ensured peerless destructive potential, meaning Sia had fully anticipated Minjun cutting through fodder with extreme ease. That baseline performance was not the catalyst for her shock.
‘He tapped into the dormant resonance of the blade.’
Though Minjun had plainly lacked deliberate intent, his strike had unequivocally stirred the dormant essence trapped within the relic’s core.
The wisp of power he managed to coax forth was infinitesimally small, but the mere reality of waking it held earth-shattering ramifications. Historically, every individual who ever succeeded in drawing out the dormant spirit of a Dragon Bone Sword was an entity destined to warp the world.
‘Weapons crafted of dragon bone… evaluate the innate destiny of their wielders.’
Long before Sia returned across realms to modern society, blades forged from dragon bone carried the reputation among martial masters as “swords that choose their sovereigns.”
Legends told of an ordinary recruit rising to become an undisputed Sword Master armed only with a single such edge, and the sovereign of a crumbling, fragile realm who united an entire landmass beneath one such weapon. These historical titans were merely two examples among an array of mythical legends whose exploits echoed through songs across centuries.
‘Could oppa truly rise to become a legendary figure of that scale?’
Envisioning Minjun eventually immortalizing his legacy upon the apex of hunter chronicles, a fond, bright smile touched Sia’s lips.
Yet there was one critical secret of ancient lore that remained completely hidden even from her knowledge.
In the deepest annals of her previous reality, the single being who possessed the greatest mastery over awakening the dormant wrath of a Dragon Bone Sword was an entity whose very appellation was stricken from all speech, forever forbidden upon the Throne of dragonkind.
As they gathered the remnants left behind by the slain pack, Sia shared the hidden truth regarding the weapon. She detailed how he had somehow managed, however faintly, to awaken the slumbering legacy sealed inside the bone, emphasizing the world-shaking feats recorded by those who had awakened that same phenomenon across historical eras.
To Minjun’s ears, the tale sounded like pure fantasy.
“So if I’m understanding you right… this weapon isn’t just an elite tool. It holds an extraordinary origin… and my swings actually unlocked a portion of that ancient potential?”
“Precisely, oppa.”
Even with the concept laid out in plain terms, Minjun’s expression remained blank with disbelief.
“A gift like that existed inside me…?”
Beneath his quiet murmur lay a glaring, logical paradox.
‘If I genuinely carried such latent genius, how on earth did I languish at the bottom ranks for all these years?’
No diagnostic assessment had ever signaled the slightest hint of this attribute, and within a modern world utterly barren of real dragons, how could he have formed an affinity with such beasts in the first place?
Possessing raw talent was undeniably advantageous, yet Minjun felt far more perplexed than triumphant.
“If things proceed at this pace, oppa could easily breach the ranker brackets within a single year.”
Sia spoke with an airy giggle, yet beneath her teasing demeanor, she was weighing the concept with absolute gravity.
Even prior to learning about this bizarre aptitude, Minjun reaching the peak of hunters was an achievable goal so long as Sia leveraged her ancient might to carry him forward. In truth, that exact plan had been her initial intention.
Yet if Minjun truly held an inherent reservoir of peerless potential within himself, he might scale those unfathomable peaks entirely under his own power without clinging to her coat-tails.
It would present a grueling path, certainly, but the horizon was undeniable.
“Hearing you speak with such certainty, Sia… I guess I have no choice but to give it everything I have.”
“Why does my oppa have to be so charmingly dependable?”
His steadfast resolve only rendered him that much more endearing in her eyes. Reaching out with affection, she affectionately ruffled his dark locks.
“Hey, Sia, you’re ruining my hair.”
“It highlights a completely different kind of appeal.”
Flustered, Minjun shielded his reddening cheeks with one forearm while playfully nudging her hand away. Sia merely giggled at his flustered reaction, watching him with soft, nurturing fondness.
“Alright, onwards we go!”
The moment had arrived to press forward and hunt down the remaining scattered packs.
The two traversed the rocky corridors of the gate with an easy stride, soaking in the quiet surroundings as though enjoying a romantic walk. After some time had passed, the sharp silhouettes of an isolated band of lizardmen emerged far down the cavern path.
Observing their formation, Minjun mapped out an ambush approach.
‘If this steel genuinely holds such dormant power, I need to treat these low-tier monsters as target practice to figure out how to trigger it at will.’
During his opening charge, complete ignorance had guided his swings. Now that he understood the reality of the weapon’s sealed essence, he could no longer afford to swing blindly.
‘Disregard everything extraneous. Pour every ounce of focus into waking that dormant edge.’
Naturally, simply willing it into existence would not suddenly grant him command over an ancient phenomenon. He remained utterly blind to what emotional state or physical alignment had coaxed it out in the first encounter, lacking even the faintest grasp of what kind of force it truly represented.
Nevertheless, one method remained at his disposal.
‘Visualizing the phenomenon in my mind is the only way forward.’
Having uncovered the path forward, he was determined to polish the technique using every ounce of effort available.
Minjun traced his thumb across the polished guard of the weapon, then surged forward the instant the timing fell into place.
“Kieeek!?”
As the reptilian sentries squealed in disorientation at the surprise raid, Minjun brought his blade down across the vanguard beast without hesitation.
His form felt weightless, his senses anticipating the monster’s clumsy parry with crystal clarity. Yet the specific pulse of power Sia had described failed to answer his call.
‘Nothing. I don’t feel it.’
‘Try once more.’
The edge shot forward with ruthless accuracy, driving straight through the chest cavity of a second reptile.
‘What was the exact sensation she was pointing to?’
Even as he altered the angles, pace, and intent behind his strikes, he couldn’t replicate the spark of power he had supposedly summoned earlier.
Meanwhile, the remaining lizardmen collapsed around him in droves, entirely incapable of withstanding his assault.
Yet from Sia’s vantage point, as she watched him carve through the pack, Minjun was unmistakably unlocking the dormant majesty sealed within the Dragon Bone Sword.
The only distinction was that his manner of drawing it forth was entirely unlike any master who had ever laid hand upon the blade before.
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