Gourmet Gaming

Chapter 410: Penalty Shoot-Out

Root often met up with the members of Let’s Eat Sect for get-togethers. The members did not care and treated Root warmly like they were family, even after knowing that he lived alone and that he had a body that was uncomfortable to move with. This warmth gave Root a new driving force to move forward and turn the Archery Representative Root into the Athenae Representative Root!

[Goaaaaaaaal!]

[And that’s a goal!!! Korea has scored with the golden ball!!!]

[Unbelievable! Calauhel’s blow added a fierce momentum to the ball which increased its speed tremendously to the point that we couldn’t even follow it with the naked eye! How was he able to graze that with his arrow?!]

[My jaw just dropped open at the sight.]

[Oh my god! Root, the only archer player in this game and the player that everyone thought would be useless in the game, is doing a good job! He’s making Korea soar higher!]

Minhyuk nodded at Root and Ali as they made eye contact. Root, who was smiling slightly, raised the bow in his hand and let loose a series of arrows. The arrows that were flying fiercely in the skies were no different, no, perhaps even more shocking and stronger with the help of Athenae’s game system, than the arrows that he had sent flying during his heyday as a national archer representative.

Root’s arrows accurately struck the ball’s red dot.

Thump—

Fueled with the force of Root’s arrow, the ball went straight into the goal post.

Thud—

The sight of the goal post shaking wildly left the entire world in shock.

[Another goal!!! Unbelievable!!!]

[Root accurately struck the red dot on the ball, sending it directly to the goal!]

However, Root’s hand did not stop moving.

Ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping, ping—

Root’s arrows accurately struck the balls’ red dots which sent four of them straight into the goal posts!

[Ko… Korea\'s team has reached a total of 26 points! The gap between them and the other teams has widened!!!]

[P… Player Root has proven himself to be a great variable!]

President Kang Taehoon, who was working as a special commentator, sat among the other commentators and explained the situation.

[Player Root’s skills with the bow are completely unbelievable! According to our analysis, striking the ball’s red dot with the player’s individual ability and Athenae’s archery skills is comparable to scoring the highest score in the Archery Olympics.]

Kang Taehoon’s explanation made the fire in the hearts of the Koreans burn even brighter. However, because of Root’s outstanding display, the other representative teams had come to a consensus.

“Kill him!”

“Kill that archer!!!”

“You want to take away our scores, huh?!”

That was right, Root became their number one target. Minhyuk nodded quietly after making eye contact with Ali. Then, with Calauhel at the lead, dozens of rankers rushed to attack Root with their skills, magic, and basic attacks.

However, before they could reach Root, Black Mage Ali, who they had believed to have regressed back into being a novice player, stepped forward.

“Ali?” Alex murmured while sending plenty of Fire Balls at Root. But not long after, he laughed to himself, ‘What can you do?! Huh?! You have lost all of your power!’

All of the players were thinking the same thing.

‘You’re just here to fill the numbers…!’

‘We will definitely kill Root!’

‘Mage Ali will just die with him. Heh.’

[Mage Ali steps forward to protect Root!]

[However, I don’t know why Mage Ali stepped forward to protect Root.]

[Ali has not taken any action so far so plenty of people said that he just participated to fill in the numbers.]

Ali, on the other hand, was looking at the stands where the Korean Team’s families were seated. He saw his beloved hyung, Yoon Ji-Seok, standing among them and holding a placard that he wrote himself. Although his letters were a bit crooked, the message still brought a gushing warmth to Ali’s heart.

[Strongest Mage Ali! Fighting!!!]

Ali wanted to tell his hyung, ‘Hyung, you don’t need to worry about me anymore. Hyung, your brother, Yoon Ji-Hoo… that little boy that had a social anxiety disorder has grown up and has overcome his fears.’

Dozens of skills, magic, and basic attacks started to fall down on Ali and Root. However, in Ali’s eyes, everything was moving in slow motion. He smiled slightly before raising his hand and snapping his fingers.

Snap—

With a snap, everything stopped. The dozens of powerful magic and skills and even the players with their swords, spears and maces stopped. The wide area covered by this huge stadium, this entire space, stopped for Ali. His smile grew wider as he looked at the Fireball that stopped right at the tip of his nose. Even the stands seemed to have stopped as their eyes focused on him.

“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaah!” Deafening shouts shook the entire world! Among them, was Ali’s hyung, Yoon Ji-Seok, with a bright and wide smile on his face. Ali had shown them another miracle. And the scene created by that miracle made them doubt their eyes.

[N… no way! That magic is not ‘Space Stasis’ right?!]

[It’s totally unbelievable! The Space Stasis can really stop anything and everything around the caster but I haven’t heard anything about it having such a wide radius!]

[No. I think that’s really Space Stasis. Its range of effect is entirely dependent on the caster’s mana, stats, and class.]

Then, one of the commentators asked…

[Th… then if that’s the case, how high has Ali reached now?]

[…]

Silence reigned among the commentators.

Meanwhile, Ali brandished his Staff of Despair. With a swing of his staff, all of the magic and skills that aimed for him and Root started to move again. But this time, they were moving back to the players that sent them.

Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!

Fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh—

“Keuhaaaaack!”

“Keheok!”

“Keok!”

“Keuaaaaaaaaaack!”

The opposing players shrieked in pain. They could not understand what had happened, let alone what was going on. However, there was someone among them that understood. This man was none other than Alex, the world’s official number one mage.

Tremble—

Alex’s body trembled wildly, his thoughts stunned into silence. For a moment, he wondered if he could display even a fifth of the level of the Space Stasis that Ali had just casted. But he knew that he could not.

It was at this point in time that they realized that Ali, who everyone laughed at, and Root, who they ignored, had proven themselves to be huge variables in this game. This was something that all of the people from all over the world had witnessed. After all, almost everyone was tuned in and watching them since this was the very first game of the very first World War.

“Impossible!!!” Alex shouted as he summoned one Hellfire after the other.

Crackle, crackle—

“Alex…!” Alexander’s face crumpled in annoyance as he shouted at Alex. They were in the same team and he knew that Alex, as a mage, should save his MP. Besides, using AOE magic required high concentration, which would put him at a risk of gaining the attention of everyone and receiving the attacks of the enemies that were spread out in the field.

However, for some reason, Alex felt that he would forever remain in second place if he failed to kill Ali at this point in time.

Crackle, crackle—

Gigantic fire from hell shot straight towards Ali. Alex smiled after hearing the notification about his passive skill, a skill that ignored the opponent’s magical defense and increased his magic’s penetration by 40%, getting triggered.

However, Ali just stretched out his index finger and said, “Dispel.”

Shwaaaaaaaaa—

The Hellfires rushing towards Ali disappeared into thin air. Then…

Fwoosh—

…two golden spears created from a more powerful ‘Diss’ stretched out from Ali’s fingertip and pierced through Alex’s chest, one after the other.

“Urk…?”

Alex was a mage player. Most mage players had low HP and defense as a balance for their ridiculously high magical defense and mana. But then, there was Ali’s magic.

‘What kind of ridiculous damage is this…?’

Ali’s magic was at a level where Alex’s magical defense could not keep up with.

Collapse—

It only took 1.7 seconds for the world’s official number one mage, Alex, to lose the battle against Ali.

[Mage Ali forced America Team’s Alex to log out in one shot!]

[The scene that I’m witnessing right now is completely unbelievable!]

The entire world was left in shock. Ali had logged out the world’s official number one mage in just a single shot! His display of magic placed him at a level where no one could easily touch him. However, the flamboyant display also made him into a target.

‘I didn’t know that Korea is hiding such variables!’

‘I definitely heard that Ali has regressed back to Level 1. What’s going on here?!’

‘We have to kill him! Otherwise, they’ll get the gold medal.’

The thoughts of everyone present were divided into two. There were those that wanted to score goals since the others were fighting against each other, and there were those that wanted to eliminate the most dangerous enemies first.

Among those that chose to eliminate the enemies, Calauhel stood at the forefront. Calauhel was completely furious about his golden ball getting stolen.

But, as they narrowed their distance with Ali and Root, one man continued to silently do his job. This man was none other than Minhyuk.

Thuuuump—

Minhyuk watched as their opponents approached his teammates, while calmly scoring one goal after the other.

Thuuuuuump—

With every goal that he scored, the approaching representatives felt their mouths twitch. Only then did the other players take the time to look at how much time had passed in the game.

[First Half. 21 minutes 41 seconds.]

More than twenty minutes have passed in the game, so how come Minhyuk was still going strong?

‘What the hell? How come his buff is still not ending?’

They expected the buff, which increased Minhyuk’s attack by 1.5x, to have a short duration. It was a common occurrence and balance to buff abilities that increased power by a tremendous amount. So, how come? Just when they were wondering about that…

“Ellie’s Swordsmanship.”

Shwaaaaaaaaaa—

…a red current appeared and surrounded Minhyuk before it got sucked inside his body.

“…?!”

“…?!”

“…?!”

Only then did they realize…

‘He wasn’t using any buff skill?!’

‘Are you telling me that his basic attack and damage is 1.5x higher than ours?!!!’

Terror. Yes, terror.

Right now, the player named Minhyuk struck fear and terror, along with a sense of helplessness to the national representatives.