When the Pope Becomes Competent - Chapter 158



Only Noblemtl

158. Skill 「Hand of Salvation (A)」 First use
2024.04.06.

Rubin nodded after hearing my question.

“Yeah, it’s probably because of the pheromone smell you got hit with earlier.”

“In other words, they’re not properly aware of my existence, but are attacking me because they’re chasing after that pheromone smell?”

“Right… …?”

Rubin answered in bewilderment.

Without giving a detailed explanation, I took off my coat.

The clothes that had been soaked in the pheromone liquid from earlier

were thrown beyond the defensive barrier formed by the Nerebloka shield.

Wheeze?

As expected, the soldier ants turned their heads in that direction as the clothes, heavily soaked in pheromone, were thrown far away.

Then they stopped chewing on the defensive barrier and approached the thrown clothes.

They were confused by the pheromone smell.

After releasing the shield, I was able to easily kill the confused soldier ants.

After that, I picked up the coat I had used as bait.

‘These guys, they rely heavily on their sense of smell.’

The clothes would still be heavily permeated with the pheromone scent that attracts ants.

I showed the pheromone-stained clothes to the group and said,

“I have a good idea. Let’s use this to attract the ants to one side.”

* * *

After that, I roughly explained my plan to the group.

It was so simple that it was embarrassing to call it a plan.

1. Stick the clothes with the pheromone scent in a corner of the ant hole.

2. Wait for the ants that smell the scent to flock to the clothes.

3. During that time, we quietly escape the ant hole.

… This was my plan.

The group seemed half in doubt as to whether such a simple method would actually be able to attract ants.

Still, there was no harm in trying, so we went to the farthest corner of the ant hole and threw the pheromone-scented clothes there.

After that, we moved to the food storage as far away as possible from the clothes and observed the movements of the ants.

‘It’s effective…!’

The ants smelled the pheromone and started to swarm toward the clothes.

As many of the soldier ants in the ant hole swarmed toward the clothes, the ants in other places became relatively less vigilant.

We were able to safely head toward the exit using the map during this gap.

When we didn’t encounter a single ant the whole way, Dionik looked at me and said,

“People really need to use their brains.”

“You said my plan was sloppy earlier.”

“Did I? I think I praised it as a great plan.”

I stuck out my tongue at Dionik’s shamelessness and pointed ahead.

To be exact, the giant ant hole in front of us.

“Anyway, we have to be careful from now on. “It was easy to get here, but we have to deal with the queen ant up ahead to get to the exit.”

The soldier ants were lured away with the scent of pheromones, but for some reason, the queen ant did not come out of her burrow.

Perhaps due to her nature, the queen did not move easily even when enemies invaded.

So the queen ant was still in her burrow, and the exit was beyond it.

In other words, it meant that we would inevitably encounter the queen ant to get to the exit.

I continued to tell my companions,

“Let’s get rid of them as quickly as possible. If we take too long, the soldier ants that were lured elsewhere might come back in the meantime.”

After hearing the companions’ powerful answers, I immediately assumed the second form of the Wolyeonggeombeop.

The direction my sword tip was pointed was, of course, towards the queen ant’s burrow that was visible in front of us.

‘Let’s first pour out attacks into the queen ant’s burrow.’

Following that strategy, I spread my form and swung my sword energy into the burrow.

Kwakwang!

The penetrating full moon’s sword energy flew straight towards the cave and exploded with a loud noise.

Following that, the other party members also activated their skills.

First, Luciana summoned blue rose petals and stirred up the inside of the cave.

Then, Cheonggwang blasted his sword energy again towards the inside of the cave that had become a mess.

‘That’s enough. If I stirred it up this much, whatever was inside the cave would have died.’

I made that judgment and slowly walked inside the queen ant’s cave.

And when I looked inside―

Kieeeek!!

A giant ant was rushing towards me.

Of course, I thought it was dead.

Surprisingly, the queen ant was alive and well, with only a few of its legs cut off.

I was caught off guard and got bitten on the leg by the ant’s sharp beak.

“… …!!”

The ant bit my ankle as if it was going to cut it off and threw me against the wall.

The impact canceled the Deification skill, and the ant immediately took a stance to rush towards me again.

“Nike!!”

Fortunately, Rubin bit my nape first and evacuated me to a safe place.

In the meantime, Luciana tried to restrain the ant with her persistent thorns—

kekeke!!

The queen ant easily cut the persistent thorns with her sharp beak.

I climbed onto Rubin’s back and spoke to the group.

“Just somehow corner the ant! This time, I’ll finish it off without a mistake!”

Luciana immediately showed her concern after hearing my shout.

“But Your Majesty, your ankle was… … .”

Just as she said, my ankle was torn to pieces after being attacked by the ant.

The question was whether I could finish off the ants in this state.

I answered the worried Luciana as calmly as I could.

“It’s okay. This is how it should be done.”

After saying that, I activated the skill.

It wasn’t a skill I was used to using up until now.

The skill I activated

was the new skill I had acquired after completing the surprise sub-oracle, “Hand of Salvation (A). ”

When I activated the skill and placed my hand on my ankle—

slurp.

The blood that had flowed out from my ankle seeped back into the wound as if it had been turned back.

That wasn’t all.

The skin that had been torn by the ant’s sharp beak healed again, and the cracked bone reattached itself.

Before I knew it, my ankle had healed neatly, as if it had never been hurt.

“Nike! Did you use that new skill you said you had acquired?”

“Yeah. The skill name is Hand of Salvation. It’s a skill that turns back time only for that part when you place your hand on the wounded area, causing the wound to heal again.”

When I first unlocked this skill, I thought it was just a healing skill.

The name itself sounded like it was just a healing skill.

However, after reading the detailed description of the skill again, I was able to figure out that it wasn’t just a healing skill.

[Hand of Salvation (A)]

– The time of the body part that the skill caster touched reverts to the past.

So this wasn’t just a skill that healed wounds, but a skill that turned back time for the wounded area.

If used well, it could be used to make wrinkled skin firm again, or something like that.

Anyway, that wasn’t the important thing right now, so I shouted at my party.

“There’s no time! We have to quickly corner the ants!”

The sleep demons who came to their senses after hearing me used their combined skills.

They then grabbed the ants that were rushing toward them and threw them straight into their hole. Then,

Cheonggwang fired a few sword blasts in front of the ants to keep them in check.

The ants gradually retreated as they continued to attack.

Then, when I was completely cornered.

‘Let’s use that technique.’

I took out the Baekhwamyeongwoldo from my inventory, held it straight, and walked straight toward the ant.

And I took a stance.

I was going to use the technique that I had been reluctant to use because I was not used to it.

Keeeeek!

The cornered ant roared at me as if it was going crazy.

I couldn’t waste any more time.

I immediately used the fourth technique of the Wolyeonggeom method, the quiet waning moon.

Crunch.

It wasn’t a noisy technique.

I just moved quickly… quickly, at a speed that exceeded my limits, and cut down the ant.

I cut down its solid exoskeleton, its snout, and its legs.

After that, when I put my sword away, my companions looked at me with bewildered looks.

As if they didn’t know what had just happened.

I quietly informed them.

“It’s over.”

“Huh? But you didn’t do anything just now—”

As Luciana continued speaking, the ant’s corpse was torn to pieces and spread out.

The group looked even more bewildered than before as they looked at the torn ant’s corpse.

As if asking me why it was torn to pieces.

I gave them a simple explanation this time as well.

“I tore the ant apart so quickly. You probably couldn’t see it well.”

Dionik and Elodie, who had un-transformed at some point, asked one after another.

“You just finished this off? You didn’t see anything?”

“You held the sword… and then suddenly the ant was cut off.”

I nodded at them and explained.

“That’s how the 4th form of the Wolyeong Sword Technique is. You attack so fast that you can’t see anything.”

Only then did the group seem to believe me.

They couldn’t help but believe it, since the ant’s body was torn to pieces in an instant.

Cheong-gwang, who had been watching the situation, suddenly approached me and said,

“Your Grace… could you possibly teach me that sword technique?”

“Me too! I want to learn it after seeing you use it, hyung?”

“I want to learn it too, Your Majesty.”

“I would learn it if I had hands, but it’s too bad… … . It would be difficult to hold the sword with my front paws, right?”

The group seemed to have been quite impressed by the 4th form of the Wolyeong Sword Technique, and they began to swarm me and beg me to teach them.

“Okay, okay. I’ll teach you all one by one later, so let’s head to the exit for now. You never know when the soldier ants might swarm you.”

Only then did everyone come to their senses and start walking.

After that, we were able to safely exit the ant hole through the exit hidden behind the queen ant hole.

The place where we exited through the exit was―

“It’s a jungle… …”

Just as I had muttered, the jungle was spread out.

I shook my head as I looked at the jungle plants that were so large that they were almost gigantic.

‘The animals and insects that live in this place are incredibly large… . I can guess what kind of monsters will pop out.’

I thought that there would probably be some really big monsters swarming around.

That was when

[You have entered the second labyrinth, “The Terrible Jungle.”]

A message saying that I had entered the second labyrinth appeared.

Then, the labyrinth map I was holding began to glow brightly.

When the light died down, the map had changed.

“It changed from the ant hole map to the jungle map.”

The map had kindly changed itself into the map of the second labyrinth.

I looked at the newly changed map and informed the group.

“Is this skull-shaped rock the exit? I don’t know what the ‘treasure’ written next to it is.”