Gourmet Gaming

Chapter 125: Reunion

“...P…Pinnacle Strong Men,” Genie mumbled, her body trembling slightly. This was not because of the abnormal status, Extreme Fear, but because one of the eight most powerful men was in front of her! As long as she hunted this man, she would be able to receive and gain tremendous reputation and fame, as well as an abundant EXP to level up quickly! There might even be plenty of artifacts!

Athenae?once released information about the continent’s Pinnacle Strong Men. The Great Mage Arfield. The Imperial Sword Rumad. The Iron Blooded Monarch, Overlord and the likes. Among these men, Rumad was placed last among the Eight Pinnacle Strong Men, and was considered to be the weakest. However, despite being tagged as the weakest, he was still an overwhelming powerhouse. Encountering one of the eight Pinnacle Strong Men meant only one thing.

‘We don’t know yet, but he will definitely drop an epic artifact at the very least, and possibly even a legendary artifact.’

The name ‘Legend Guild’ would also resound loudly and rise to fame as long as they could successfully hunt this powerhouse. Genie gripped the handle of her whip tightly.

“Hey, pretty lady. Are you trying to fight against me?” Rumad asked. It was as if he and his gigantic figure was telling Genie that he would still live even if he stood still and did nothing to block her attacks.

Genie grinned and said, “Don’t you know that a pretty lady can also be strong!”

Shwaaaaaaa!

Genie’s whip elongated as she activated one of her skills.

[Howling Whip.]

[A whip covered with blazing flames. Can melt anything down.]

Shwaaaa!

She brandished her whip as she retreated. The whip swayed strongly as it sent a blazing flame that turned into a firebird, threatening to burn everything.

Crackle!

Rumad took out his greatsword and held it with both of his hands as he exerted a huge force in the blade.

“Ha!”

Rumad struck the whip that was flying around wildly with his sword.

Slash!

His power was so great that the phoenix-like incarnation fell down to the ground without putting up any fight at all.

“...!”

Genie staggered in surprise. She thought,?‘Hi…his strength is really overwhelming!’

What was worse was that Rumad did not use any swordsmanship skills. He just used his sheer strength to break and block her skill.

Rumad quickly narrowed the distance between the two of them. He said, “Lady, you’re using some pretty rough whip there. It might be good to use it at night!”

“This perverted bas...” Genie tried to shout but she was already sent flying from Rumad’s kick, before she could finish her words.

Bang!

“Urk!” Genie groaned as she rolled on the ground. Her HP dropped by 15% in an instant!

‘Crazy...!’

Rumad’s damage was completely unbelievable. And in a blink of an eye…

Dash, dash, dash!

Rustle, rustle, rustle!

Dash, dash, dash!

…Genie was surrounded. However, there was one person among them that she could recognize. It was none other than Ares.

Ares was grinning broadly. His mouth was quirked so wide that it almost looked like it would rip apart. Finally! The time has come for him to kill Genie! He even brought Ares Guild’s first, second and third best offensive captains to this fight.

“Kill her!” Ares ordered. He was never one to play fair or square. Rumad turned around as if he had lost interest once Ares and his guild members had arrived.

“Tch!” Genie clicked her tongue as she swung her whip fiercely.

Shwaa!

Shwaaa!

Ares only brought 50 of his guild members since there was a limit to how many people could accept the quest. With those that died earlier out of the question, there were still at least 30 people left. He also has a 50-man squad accompanying him on this quest.

Genie had no choice but to use her most powerful skill, knowing that she would not be able to deal with the number of enemies in front of her.

[Scattered Whip.]

[Dozens of whips will fly and slash at a rapid pace!]

Shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa!

Her whip crackled wildly in the air, leaving only afterimages as she cut down her enemies one after the other. Even Ares and his offensive captains could not approach her easily.

‘This skill definitely eats a lot of MP...’?Genie thought, looking at her almost zero MP.

Shwa, shwa, shwa, shwa!

Genie sighed?the?moment her skill ended. The dust settled only to show the terrible scene of corpses of both players and soldiers littering everywhere.

“Ho,” Rumad let out an exclamation as he looked at Genie with a bit of admiration.

Meanwhile, Ares quickly narrowed the distance between him and Genie after suffering from little to no injuries.

[Lightning Kick.]

[Quickly attack the enemy six times with a fast kick.]

Ares’ feet glowed blue as he jumped up to deliver a powerful kick. The other offensive captains also jumped in to join the fray. Valk, the offensive captain that could transform into a beast, transformed into a lion and shot forward with a kick of his foot.

[Beast Roar.]

[Tear your enemy apart with your strong front paws.]

That was not all. The other two offensive captains triggered their skills as well.

[Quick Draw!]

[Cut your enemy down with all of your strength.]

[Death Scythe]

[A powerful scythe will cut down your enemy in one breath.]

Shwaaa!

Vwoooom!

Hwaaaaa!

Looking at the incoming skills, Genie felt…

‘It’s the end for me.’

But then, a man suddenly appeared in front of her. The man was none other than…

[Frying Pan Gigantification.]

[You can adjust the size of your frying pan depending on the mana that you will input.]

…Minhyuk! Minhyuk was nearby when he heard Genie’s voice so he ran to her right away. He quickly used the Mahava’s Ring’s Absorption skill on Ares’ attack.

[Absorption]

[You have a 50% probability of successfully absorbing the skill.]

[Lightning has been successfully absorbed.]

[You can only use the absorbed skill once and only within ten minutes of absorption.]

“Hmm?” Ares hummed in confusion as he landed on the ground, his katana colliding with Minhyuk’s frying pan.

Claaang!

“...?!”

“Crazy...! How can a frying pan have such a high defensive power?!”

There was only a slight dent where the katana collided with the frying pan. However, what was so surprising was the fact that he used 80% of his attack power in that attack. Usually, one would need at least two frying pans to block that attack. Then, Minhyuk heard a notification.

[The Frying Pan’s durability has dropped below 20%.]

Minhyuk frowned. He thought,?‘He’s quite strong...’

It was made clear to Minhyuk that rankers were different. They brought him to the point where he would not be able to use his frying pan in the meantime. Minhyuk quickly hung the frying pan on his back. Then, the transformed lion, Valk, charged at Minhyuk, slamming his huge paws at the latter.

“Oops!”

Thanks to Minhyuk’s natural reflexes, he was able to tilt his head away, only allowing Valk’s paws to hit his Armor of Immortality.

[Physical Damage Reflection! Returns double the damage received.]

Bang!

“Keuaaaaaah!” Valk screamed. The burning pain in his chest made him aware that his chest was torn. Blood gushed out from the chest of his lion form. Minhyuk did not miss the opportunity presented to him.

[Lightning Kick.]

[Quickly attack the enemy six times with a fast kick.]

Minhyuk jumped up as his legs glowed blue. Then…

Vwooom!

…a spinning kick landed on the still shrieking lion. Minhyuk attacked Valk!

Bang!

Valk was already brought into confusion and dizziness by a single kick but the skill did not end with just one kick. Five more kicks followed that.

Kick!

Bang!

Thud!

Slam!

Each kick fractured Valk’s bones neatly.

[Your HP has dropped below 10%.]

Valk could not move at all. And the final kick…

Baaang!

…was sent cleanly across the face of Valk, who then flew backwards and was forced to log out.

“What...!”?Ares shouted in shock. He could not believe his eyes. The skill that forced Valk to log out was his own skill, Lightning Kick!

A lapse of Genie’s attention allowed the scythe-wielding player to land a powerful attack using the gigantic scythe of the giant reaper behind him.

“Ugh!” Genie groaned, her body staggering as she lost more than 40% of her HP from the attack. Minhyuk quickly went back to her side.

“Wh…what is this… You’re quite strong,” Genie said, deeply shocked by Minhyuk’s formidable strength.

“Ronny is strong too.”

However, there was nothing else that Minhyuk could show right now. There were a lot of enemies surrounding them and he was even the lowest in terms of level. To be honest, he could only withstand it thanks to his artifacts’ effects!

“Damn bitch!” Ares shouted as he gritted his teeth in anger. In the end, he still was not able to kill her.

Float!

Ares suddenly felt his body slowly float in the air.

“Hey. Heyo!”

.

A man that lifted his foot up appeared in his sight. Then…

[Giant’s Step.]

[A huge foot will crush your enemies all at once.]

…the man’s foot suddenly grew to around three meters in size.

“Ack!” Ares shouted, instinctively crossing his arms to defend himself, body still floating in the air. Then, the man’s foot stomped down on Ares!

Baaaaaaaaaam!

Ares was flung straight down towards the ground.

“Ack!”

He vomited a mouthful of blood. Then, people began to pop out one after the other.

“Keuhahahahaha. Bring them down! Bring them down!”

“Sigh.?This crazy punk. He went batshit crazy again...”

Crazy Priest Locke laughed wildly as he rushed towards Luma. Luma was Ares Guild’s second offensive captain, the person that launched the Quick Draw skill on Genie.

“Keuhahaha! You’ve never seen anyone like me before, right? Let this Hyung heal you!” Locke shouted as he slammed his ax down on the man.

Puhaaaaa!

[Crazy Priest’s Heal.]

[Continuous Bleeding has been triggered.]

“Argh!” Luma moaned as blood continuously flowed from his arm. This was the injury inflicted on him by the ax and the weird heal that he received from the Crazy Priest.

[You’re bleeding.]

[You will be temporarily dizzy.]

Luma suddenly felt his head fog up and go fuzzy. Seeing Luma engulfed with a burst of dizziness, Locke took the opportunity to strike him with his ax on the head.

Slash! Smash! Slam!

“Heal, heal, heal! How is it? Do you think you’re healing? Keuhahahahahaha!”

“Noona, are you alright?”

Crackle, fwoosh!

The still-flaming Ace approached Genie and said, “I bought you a potion!”

It was a top-notch potion that cost about 10 million gold! Ace handed the potion over to Genie and watched her gulp it down before moving away.

[Hell’s Flame Horse]

[The horse covered in blazing flames from hell can easily burn down all of your enemies in one fell swoop.]

“Neigh!” A huge fire horse sprang up from the ground and neighed loudly, charging at the enemies fearlessly. The flames on its body licked the enemies and burned them down to ashes.

“Aaaaaack!”

“Keuaaaack!”

Their enemies agonized screams rang loudly in the background as the members of Legend Guild surrounded Genie.

“Where did our flower piggy get hurt?”

“You damn bastard! Who’s your damn flower piggy? I’ll make you into a flower piggy, stab a knife in your body and throw away your pork belly!”

“Aaaaaah. Wait. Our pretty GM’s face is ruined!”

The guild members of Legend Guild that popped out from all over the place started attacking the soldiers and player enemies. Ares was left in shock.

‘Damn crazy...!’

He knew that Legend Guild was a place where unofficial rankers were gathered. Even so, he thought that it would not make any difference since he brought his elite force with him, but it was not the case at all. Each one of them was at least in the top 100 of their chosen class.

Twaang!

An arrow pierced the neck of the soldier that was standing next to Ares.

‘Th, this is a live broadcast… those sons of bitches!’

Ares was aware that what he planned would be impossible if this continued like this… he only had one hope! He turned his head around and looked at the Imperial Sword Rumad. Rumad was now slowly beginning to move.

And Minhyuk…

“...What the hell. You.”

…was flustered when he saw the faces of Khan and Locke. They closely resembled the faces of his friends back in middle school. Minhyuk quickly shook his head to clear out the messy thoughts in his head. If that was the case, then who was Ronny? Looking back, he realized that her voice was a bit familiar. He turned around to look at Genie with confusion plastered on his face. Then, he saw Genie grinning at him widely.

“That’s right. I’m one of the two great pigs in the mountains. The wild boar.”

“...Gasp!” Minhyuk gasped. He was so shocked that he fell down on his bum.

Genie frowned and asked, “What? What’s wrong with you!”

“C…can a person even change so much like this?!”

Genie’s eyes narrowed sharply. She asked, voice bordering on dangerous, “Is that a compliment or a curse...”

At that moment, Locke, who was easily cutting down soldiers one after another, looked back at Minhyuk. He said, “Keuhahahaha! Every time we see each other, we also get surprised.”

Minhyuk slowly turned his head and said, “Jisoo, you…”

“That’s right, you shithead. I’m also really stro...”

“You really look ugly just like what Genie said in her message...!?Hiiiiiik!”

“...”

For a moment there, Locke pondered if he should just split Minhyuk’s head with his ax instead of his enemies.

Then, the King of Fist, Khan, said, “Let’s congratulate each other on our reunion later. Let’s take care of these guys first.”

He grinned at Minhyuk while Minhyuk looked at him with wide eyes.

At that moment…

“Yeah. Have fun meeting again in the afterlife.”

…someone slashed Minhyuk with a greatsword.

Slaaaaash!

[You have been struck by a greatsword. Your defenses have been ignored.]

[Your HP has dropped below 10%.]

[You have been struck with a powerful blow, you are bleeding and currently struggling.]

[If you don’t recover your HP quickly, you will be forced to log out due to excessive bleeding.]

Minhyuk’s body dropped forward.

“Minhyuk!”

“Ack!”

“Hiss!”

Bang!

Rumad smashed his greatsword on the ground with all his might. He said, “Isn’t it a bit sad that you forgot about me?”

The members of Legend Guild turned to glare at him as he laughed maniacally.