Translator: HunterW
Editor: RED
Mexico…
Pedro was standing by the foot of Popocatépetl, an active volcano located about seventy kilometers away from Mexico City, looking down at the city where the headquarters of the NCR Guild was located. It was near impossible to push forward. He had fought against a hundred to fifteen hundred NCR Guild soldiers every day and won, but now, he was out of time.
==[Advance (1/1), (Passive)
There once was a time when you could take out an advance loan if you were in desperate need of cash. Why not take out an advance on time if you don’t fear death? Take out an advance on your time to gain tremendous power. However, be aware that this means you will be paying with your life.
You will die a permanent death once you run out of time to borrow.
The more you borrow time, the more you can borrow at a time and gain increasing power each day.]==
—
Pedro had managed to escape to South America where the Mad Butcher, Cantana Alejandro, could not reach. Once he reached Columbia, he could finally take a breather. But it was a short breather, as all he lived for now was to take revenge. He went around begging and pleading to be taken along in party hunts and managed to slowly raise his level. Pedro had roamed all around Columbia and Venezuela while being spat on and ignored, but Pedro had already set foot in Hell before; such treatment did not faze him. All he cared about was that each step he took brought him closer to his goal.
But he quickly realized that it took too long. No matter how hard he tried, his dream of vengeance was just too far to reach. The more he leveled and the stronger he grew, the more he knew that killing Cantana was going to be impossible. Pedro soon fell into despair from the irony of it all. Pedro had to become a deva just like Cantana and the members of the NCR Guild to clearly see how high their position was.
Pedro soon fell into a pit of depression and roamed around aimlessly, until that day when he learned the Random Skill, Advance. It was like the Devil himself had felt Pedro’s despair and presented him with a contract, a contract that Pedro signed without hesitation. If it meant he could destroy the NCR Guild and see Cantana’s face scrunch up in fear, Pedro was more than willing to sign that contract a hundred times over.
——
“Can I do it?” Pedro calculated the time he had left. He had borrowed the maximum amount of time each day and now, he had just four days left. No, it was more precise to say that as the minutes ticked on, he had three days and a few hours left. It was hard to say if he had enough time to break into the NCR Guild’s base, find Cantana from whatever hole he was hiding in, and kill him.
Pedro bitterly laughed. “I have to do it.” He already took an advance on his own life and he was no longer a deva who could die and resurrect by merely losing Stat points. Once he ran out of time, he was going to die permanently. It was too late to stop now. He had to fight!
If there was one thing he found unfortunate, it was that his past, present, and future were just inadequate. If only he had Lee Jiwon’s life, he could have completely done away with the NCR Guild and at least left behind a legacy. But Pedro knew that because of his sudden appearance, he was not going to be remembered for long.
“But I just don’t know. I just don’t know if that Lee Jiwon guy is helping me or not.” Pedro had also heard the rumors about Lee Jiwon being a coward, but Lee Jiwon still did not show his face around in Mexico. It was as if Lee Jiwon was purposely attracting all of the outside attention so that Pedro had more freedom to move around.
“I just don’t get him, and I won’t ever find out what he’s thinking. I don’t have the time to. But I won’t squander the chance he’s given me, willingly or not,” Pedro said to himself as he slid back into the shadows. He didn’t have even four days left. Sleep was a luxury he could not afford. Pedro disappeared into the darkness, imagining how it would feel to have his hands around Cantana’s neck, staring into the sick bastard’s horrified eyes. Pedro smiled. It wouldn’t be long now…
——
The next day in Seoul…
-‘I like banana candies!’-
I was in my room watching TV with the Dungeon Mole in my hand as it ate another piece of candy. Next to me was a new report the Sunbin Guild had sent over to me. “Hmm… I don’t know if he can do it.”
The NCR Guild’s base was located about thirty kilometers away from the outskirts of Mexico City. In the past, the guild had done its best to prevent it, but Mexico City had allowed Pedro to enter the city. If Pedro could take out the leaders of the NCR Guild, the rest of the guild would soon follow. That was what I remembered happened in the past; the people of Mexico City and Pedro agreed to work together and reconstruct the destroyed guild until Pedro suddenly disappeared. But the one thing different about today and the past was that Pedro was three days ahead of schedule.
“Well, at least he still has some time left.” I leaned back on my sofa and carefully observed what was going on in Mexico. I still had a stake in it, after all. If it looked like Pedro was going to fail, I was going to step in. That promise the NCR Guild made to me was still in play and if I stepped in just five minutes before Pedro’s death, then I could make it look like I killed him and take my rewards. I was that greedy. I had already done enough to help Pedro succeed this time, and I had no reason to finish the job for him.
—
Two days later…
I clearly remembered the moment when Pedro suddenly disappeared. His body had suddenly burst in mid-battle, killing him, and he didn’t resurrect three hours later. It was all the papers and news channels talked about for a while. I knew for a fact that he had fifteen hours left, but…
“Hmm…was it impossible for him from the beginning?” I had made it possible for Pedro to get this close to the NCR Guild, sooner than he had in the past, but he still hadn’t appeared with fifteen hours left on the clock. It actually looked very difficult for Pedro to get through the guild’s defenses, which had included Mexico City this time around.
“He should have accepted help from at least one of the guilds that came to him. He should have lied about his ability and just destroyed the NCR Guild by now.” I was still supporting him even though it meant I could lose out on a Rank 8 item and two billion golden rings.
“Hmm…” In fifteen hours, Pedro was going to disappear into the sands of time. I wanted to meet him at least once before then. “If he can’t do it even after I’ve done so much for him, then I may as well step in and take my payment.” If he was going to fail, killing him five minutes prior to his death wasn’t going to make me feel guilty.
I got up from my seat and began to secretly move to Mexico.
——
Outskirts of Mexico City…
“Stop him! Don’t let him get through!”
“Thick Earth Shield!”
“Thunderstorm!”
“Chain Lightning!”
The NCR Guild’s 2nd and 3rd assault teams did their best to stop Pedro from advancing. Just stopping him wasn’t going to defeat him, however. To do that, the guild’s Special Forces team was flanking around the battlefield with black chains in their hands.
The Windsor Guard had participated in the war for only a short time, but had taught the NCR Guild a way to capture Pedro. The NCR Guild didn’t have the same golden chains the Templar soldiers had, but they did have a thousand black chains and a thousand fighter-class devas who could use them.
Pedro, on the other hand, knew that they were surrounding him and began to slowly pull back. He was annoyed that he couldn’t break through the guild’s first line of defense after coming this far, but he knew it would be the end for him if he let himself get captured.
“Don’t let Pedro move on his own!”
“Attack him! Keep up the pressure!”
“Yes sir!”
The NCR Guild was putting everything on the line as well. Pedro was getting stronger by the day and if they couldn’t stop him now, they definitely couldn’t stop him tomorrow. This was the only choice they had, as they did not know about the truth of Pedro’s ability.
“Fuck off!” Pedro slammed his greatsword into a tank deva.
“Gah!”
Pedro was only level 97. When he learned that his dream of vengeance seemed impossible, he had stopped leveling up. He also only had cheap, low-ranked items. But even though he was only level 97 and wielded a Rank 2 greatsword, he was able to send the higher level tank deva meters flying. The tank died when he landed hard on the ground.
Pedro couldn’t find any satisfaction from the kill. This was his final battle of his life, and he continued to attack the NCR Guild. To him, they all had a hand in killing his family.
“AHHHHH!”
“Stop him!”
“We can’t let him get through!”
“This battle decides our fate as well! ATTACK!”
The fierce battle continued, and a lone man watched from the roof of a ruined hotel.
—
“Hmm…” The battle felt fiercer when watching it with my own two eyes. Both sides were literally fighting with their lives on the line, and without any sign of stopping. I shifted my attention to the other side of the battlefield. A thousand soldiers were circling around the battlefield, with black chains in their hands. I knew right away these were the soldiers trained by the Templar.
There were still about seven hours left. If those special soldiers managed to surround Pedro, there was a chance Pedro would die to them instead of to his own skill. In the past, the NCR Guild had actually never fully recovered after the war against Pedro, because they didn’t kill him themselves. It left an emptiness within the guild and soon, the remnants of the guild scattered to the wind. But if they actually managed to kill Pedro themselves this time, the NCR Guild could actually recover quickly and become stronger than ever, and I did not want that happening.
“Ha… I have to do everything.” If things went on like this, I would have to end up fighting by Pedro’s side with no benefits to me. “And I can’t just sit on the sidelines, either. If I let them kill him, I will definitely lose out on the rewards.” I continued to watch the fierce battle from the broken rooftop.
“I mean, they’re the bad guys, so why are they fighting so hard? I thought all bad guys cared about their own lives.” I half-expected many of the NCR Guild members to break rank and run for it, but each soldier fought with their lives on the line. That camaraderie of theirs actually outshone Pedro’s ferocity.
The special soldiers drew ever closer to Pedro. “Ha…” I heaved a heavy sigh and jumped down from the ruined thirty-story building to the ground. I wanted to have a word with Pedro.
