The Weapon Genius: Anything I Hold Can Kill
Chapter 141: The Maze

Chapter 141: The Maze

They fell together, but not for long.

Jisoo’s voice vanished first, swallowed by the darkness. Then Yujin’s flicker of movement dropped out of sight. The wind screamed, but Jin kept his eyes open.

He didn’t flail. Didn’t panic. His body moved with the fall—shoulders loose, spine coiled, legs shifting beneath him like a spring waiting to land. He’d dropped through darkness before.

This was nothing new.

When the ground came, it didn’t greet him kindly. But he didn’t crash. He rolled, slid across aged stone, and came to a stop in a crouch. The air was stale, metallic. He rose slowly.

The space around him pulsed with quiet.

Stone walls stretched high in either direction, sculpted into jagged, towering ridges—unnaturally smooth, yet ancient. Faded torches hung in iron sconces, unlit. Everything smelled of dust, copper, and old weight. A dead maze long left to rot.

Then the walls lit.

Not with fire—but with breath. Golden glyphs flared to life beneath his boots, spreading in a circuit up along the walls. Sigils blinked in sequence, waking something ancient.

A deep tone vibrated through the floor, like a gong muffled beneath sand.

Then came the voice.

"Ah... so this is where they dropped you."

It didn’t come from ahead or behind. It came from above.

Jin looked up.

There—floating just above the lip of the labyrinth—a new Dokkaebi appeared.

Larger than any before. Draped in a gleaming robe trimmed in gold leaf and swirling white marble, it looked more sculpted than born. Its face was hidden behind a bronze helmet carved like a lion’s, with two horn-like crests spiraling back. Wings spread from its back—not feathered, but shaped like abstract blades of wind and memory.

A god trapped in theater.

It hovered with lazy grace, gazing down at Jin—and likely at others elsewhere in the maze.

"The Labyrinth," it said, voice smooth and sonorous, "is one of the oldest games in recorded myth. A place meant not just to trap a monster—but to reveal those willing to walk toward it."

Its head tilted.

"I remember when it was simpler. A boy. A sword. A thread. A beast."

A pause. Its smile widened.

"But the system... oh, the system was young then. Not yet refined. It watched men build walls, then watched monsters wait inside them. It saw fear become legend."

"And it wondered..."

The creature’s arms stretched wide, wings flaring in radiant arcs behind it.

"What if the walls learned to change? What if the corridors hunted back?"

The glyphs around Jin flared again, pulsing once like a second heartbeat.

"This is your second trial."

"No more mirrors. No more selves to fight."

"Now you face the unknown."

Jin said nothing. His hand rested casually on the strap across his chest, near Muramasa’s hilt.

"Reach the center," the Dokkaebi intoned. "Eliminate the Warden."

"You will not be alone."

"You will not be helped."

The torch beside Jin flickered to life—gold and red, casting long shadows behind him.

"There is danger here," it continued. "The kind you don’t always see. Until it’s too late."

Then, the dokkaebi’s form unraveled—light breaking apart like scattered dust across the maze ceiling. It left no trail, no echo. Just silence.

Jin stood there a few seconds longer, watching the place where it had hovered.

Then he exhaled—slow, quiet, not quite steady.

His hand dropped from his strap.

"...Right."

He looked down both ends of the corridor again, gaze sweeping stone to stone. There was nothing special about either direction. The air barely moved. It was like standing inside a painting that hadn’t decided what to become yet.

He ran a hand through his hair, shoulders shifting with a breath he didn’t quite know how to place.

"Yujin?" he called, not loud enough to carry far. "Jisoo?"

No answer. Just the maze. Watching.

He muttered something under his breath—then, more out of habit than plan, cupped his hands and called:

"Marco!"

It echoed back dully. No response.

"...God, that’s dumb," he mumbled, rubbing the back of his neck. "That’s so dumb."

But his voice gave the corridor shape. The walls didn’t move, but the way the echo bent and returned gave him just enough to feel slightly less... aimless.

"Marco!" he called again, this time louder.

Still nothing.

He winced and shook his head. "They’re gonna kill me for that."

He stepped forward. Slowly. Each footfall quiet but certain.

Torchlight continued to flicker on just ahead of him—like the maze was lighting a stage one step at a time. But the way it did felt wrong. Not welcoming. Just... aware.

Jin kept his left hand on the wall, trailing fingers across the carvings. Old Greek-style reliefs lined the stone. A series of bulls. A man in a helm. A spiral pattern, repeating and twisting.

He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for.

Not really.

But there was something in his mind scratching at the edges. A memory. A story.

The hero didn’t just fight the monster.

He had help. He had a way back.

Jin slowed, hand still brushing along the cool stone.

His eyes traced the carving more carefully now. At first, he’d only noticed the main figures: a warrior—sword raised high—facing off against a horned beast with fire for eyes. It looked like a tale etched for drama, nothing more.

But then he saw it.

A detail just behind the swordsman’s heel. Small. Easy to overlook.

A line.

Faint at first glance, but deliberate—etched into the stone with the same care as the warrior’s blade. It curled down from his wrist like a loose ribbon, coiling behind him, threading back through the mural. Not tangled. Not broken. A guide.

Jin stepped back, head tilting.

It wasn’t just a flourish.

It was a string.

He followed it with his eyes as it wound across the wall—leading toward another carved figure, far smaller, cloaked in shadow. Not a warrior. Someone standing at the entrance of the maze.

His brows furrowed.

"...He didn’t beat the beast alone," Jin murmured. "He had a thread."

It wasn’t just to help him get out.

It was so he could find his way through.

That was the part people forgot. Theseus didn’t conquer the maze by brute force—he navigated it with help.

With connection.

With someone waiting.

Jin blinked, pulling back to the present. The flame in the torch beside him flickered, casting dancing shadows across the carved bull’s face.

And suddenly, the silence felt heavier.

"Yujin!" he shouted again, louder this time.

He turned and called in the opposite direction. "Jisoo!"

Still nothing. Just more stone. More maze.

He stared down the corridor, then exhaled.

"Marco!"

It echoed again, bouncing between the ancient walls. Still no reply.

His shoulders tensed, but he kept walking. "They’re not that far. They can’t be."

His voice wasn’t confident. Not really. But it had weight. Weight he needed to believe in.

Jin moved ahead, a little faster now, weaving around the next corner. More torches lit as he passed, trailing behind him like breadcrumbs.

The path split. He paused, glancing both ways—then glanced back at the wall beside him.

The carvings continued. Now the warrior stood further into the maze, surrounded by twisting corridors, the thread still tied to his wrist, stretched taut and trailing off-screen.

Whoever had carved this had known the story.

Maybe more than the story.

He narrowed his eyes.

"...Not a map," he muttered, "but close."

He turned left.

The torches ahead hesitated to light—then blinked alive in pairs. One after another.

Still no sign of the others. No sound of footsteps. No shadows ahead.

But he kept moving.

Kept calling.

"Marco!"

And somewhere—maybe close, maybe not—a faint voice echoed back.

"...Polo?"

He froze.

Then took off running.

Not blindly, not fast—but with purpose. One hand skimmed the wall beside him, fingers grazing the etched lines of the old story. A compass made of instinct and stone. Each torch that flared to life ahead gave him another heartbeat of clarity, another step closer to—

"Polo!"

The echo rang clearer now.

But something about it...

Jin slowed.

He wasn’t sure what caught him first. The pitch? The cadence? Or maybe the way the word came a beat too fast, too sharp, like it wasn’t really waiting to hear him—just mimicking him.

He stopped outright, boots grinding against the stone.

His fingers tightened against the wall. The carvings were different here—less myth, more warning. A spiral of bull horns. A broken sword. A body lying face-up, a thread slipping from its hand.

Jin’s hand slid to Muramasa’s hilt.

He drew it in one clean motion, the black-and-white blade catching the light from the nearest torch with a faint shimmer. The hum was low, steady.

"Didn’t sound like them," he muttered, scanning the corridor ahead.

It had been a man’s voice. That much he was sure of.

Not Jisoo. Not Yujin.

Not anyone he recognized.

The torchlight stuttered.

His stance shifted instinctively—weight balanced, blade low, eyes tracking every angle of the corridor. His free hand brushed the wall again, looking for something, anything, to tell him where the sound had come from.

Then—

Whistle.

A sharp, slicing sound—fast and shrill.

Jin’s body moved on reflex.

He threw his shoulder into a turn, blade flashing upward just in time to catch something barreling toward him from the right.

CLANG—!

The impact was hard. A shock rippled down his arm as metal met metal—or something close enough to it. Sparks sprayed across the torchlit stone, scattering like fireflies. Jin slid back half a step, teeth clenched, blade angled high.

His eyes snapped up.

Atop the wall ahead, perched casually like it was the edge of a rooftop, stood a figure.

Human.

Grinning.

Long coat. Bare chest. Lean build with wrapped forearms and a jagged scar running from collarbone to ribs. He held no weapon in his hands—at least not visibly—but the pressure in the air around him said otherwise.

"Not bad," the man said, tone chipper. "Fast reflexes."

Jin didn’t answer. He didn’t lower Muramasa.

"Who are you?" he asked flatly.

The man tilted his head. "Ahh, names. Maybe later."

His smile widened. "Gotta say, though—I’ve been waiting to see you move. Sword Saint, right?"

Jin’s stomach turned.

"How do you know that?"

"Oh, come on," the man said, stretching like this was a warm-up. "You’ve made a name for yourself. Killed a Qi Sha. Split Gugwe-mok’s spine. Planted a tree that’s messing with territory borders. You think the system doesn’t keep track?"

He lifted a hand—and the air shimmered again.

"Besides," he added, flexing his fingers, "they wanted to see how you handled another anomaly."

Jin’s grip on Muramasa tightened.

"I’m not here to fight you."

The man hopped down from the wall with a casual thud, landing like a cat, rolling one shoulder.

"Sure you are."

And with no more warning, he lunged.

Jin twisted, blade rising, body reacting before thought could even catch up.

Another whistle through the air.

Another impact.

Steel kissed the ground in sparks.

And in the half-light of the maze—

Jin cursed under his breath.

Because apparently, the Trial wasn’t done testing them just yet.