Wild Hunt (1)

A deep rumble shook the ground—

"Wh-what is going on?!"

"Looks like the scouts are on their way."

"Scouts…?"

I scanned the area, then walked over to a group of hunters holding something that looked like oversized walkie-talkies.

"Are you communication-type Awakened?"

"One moment… Yes, ma'am! We're mid-emergency transmission right n—"

"Tell them the First Army is approaching. Say Goldy contacted you—they'll know who that is."

"First Army? Ah—this is Team Eleven. We're currently at the bathhouse building…"

After that, I turned back to Ha-eun.

"We're heading outside first. We need to figure out which direction they're coming from. I'll explain on the way."

"Y-yes!"

"You too, Terra."

"Yes, ma'am!"

Just in case, I summoned a bastard sword with magic and gripped the hilt.

And then—

Tap.

The moment we stepped outside the building, I went live.

A calamity on the scale of the Wild Hunt ought to pull plenty of aggro, right?

"Listen carefully, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Ha-eun. The Wild Hunt comes in three waves."

"Three…?"

"First Army through Third. We call them the Scouts, the Vanguard, and the Main Force."

True to the name, the Scouts were meant for reconnaissance… but given the sheer scale of the march, "scouts" was only a label. In practice, they hit like a vanguard and delivered the opening shock.

"Basically, the First and Second Armies are there to wear us down before the Main Force arrives."

"And the Main Force…?"

"The king who wrote the legends arrives in person. The scale is, of course, enormous."

"Wait here a second."

My wings unfurled with a sharp snap, and I shot high into the air.

The Wild Hunt had a habit of looking peaceful right up until the moment they appeared out of nowhere. There was no direction from which their arrival would be strange.

Then a siren wailed from below.

So the radio call I'd put through had gone through cleanly.

"I came for a subjugation op. Give me a second, kids—I'm a little busy."

The wind cutting past me was from the southwest.

Which meant the direction they were coming from was—

Tap.

I slung the bastard sword across my back and took a bow in both hands. Drawing the string long and taut toward the mountains in the northeast—

I loosed a golden arrow into the distance.

At the very least, that light would serve as a landmark.

My boots hit ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the ground.

"Unnie, what do we do now?!"

By the time I landed, a fair number of hunters had already gathered—maybe a quarter of the people I'd seen overall earlier had drifted this way.

"What do you mean, what. We brace for impact."

A distant, rolling thunder of footsteps—far away, yet somehow crystal clear.

That was a tactic meant to deceive the victims.

"Everyone—see that ball of light? Fix your facing on that direction."

"What? Who the hell do you think you are to—"

A sharp crack split the air.

"I don't take backtalk in an emergency."

I looked down at the man on his knees after my pointed finger.

"But if you really need to know… let's see. File me under Goldy, soon-to-be National-Level."

Steel whispered free of its sheath.

The Wild Hunt, huh.

It had been a while since I could cut loose without watching my reputation.

The Wild Hunt specialized in deceiving living things.

In particular, if the sound seemed to be receding, that meant they were getting closer.

I took the bastard sword in hand and closed my eyes for a moment.

Thud.

Thud-thud.

Sound. Mana wavelengths. Vibration.

Putting it all together, the arrival time was—

"…!"

Two seconds.

Steel rang as I deflected a blade that burst out of the dark without warning. Gripping the hilt in both hands, I drove the point straight into the figure in front of me.

A nauseating sensation crawled up through my fingertips, and black blood sprayed out.

"Wh-what was that?!"

"What the…"

"Snap out of it. Whatever's coming this way, we have to stop it."

They would have hit the other clusters of people too. For now, I had to hope people like Na Su-han would handle their own fronts.

"Their march speed is way faster than I expected."

Were they in a hurry on their end as well?

If something had gone wrong crossing dimensions, they might be weaker than before. We might not have to hold for a full week like last time.

"Judging by the scale I'm sensing, only the First Army is coming today."

True to the word "scouts," they were probably just here to take the measure of us.

I yanked the sword free of the dark and flicked the blood from the blade. A hideous stench of rot rolled outward, and the hunters around me wrinkled their faces.

They were A-class hunters—people who'd been through every kind of hell—but even so, this was something they'd never seen.

"This is what happens to those who join the march."

"Join…?"

"If those things kill you, you end up like that."

The scariest part of the Wild Hunt was that, unlike an ordinary monster raid, it kept growing its ranks. Even if you mustered an army, those soldiers would eventually be absorbed into the march—and end up calling more of them for free.

On top of that, once you'd entered their marching range, the way I just had—

"Th-the surroundings…"

—getting swallowed by darkness played its own part. Plenty of living things feared the dark.

A wet gurgle. A high, warped shriek.

"Ugh."

Monsters twisted and jumbled together, moving in grotesque ways.

I tightened my grip.

"Ha-eun, stick with me."

"Y-yes!"

I kicked off the ground and swept the bastard sword in a wide horizontal arc.

A straight golden sword-line carved through wraiths, monsters, fusion-things—every kind of them—and in the same breath shoved the darkness back.

What appeared inside that cleared space made someone laugh like they'd already transcended.

"Ha… haha…"

At some point the whole area had filled with a host ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of monsters—thousands, tens of thousands… no, millions. The end of them was nowhere in sight, a sight like the ocean I'd seen not long ago.

The difference was that the ocean had at least been a beautiful blue.

"Urgh…"

"Hey! Stay with me!"

Every single one of those things was so hideously warped it could contaminate the mind just by looking at it.

Gunfire rattled as hunters who'd awakened firearm abilities opened up from behind the fissure that was flooding back with darkness. Special rounds, maybe—bodies burst and tore away where the shots hit—only for the tide from behind to fill the gaps the instant they fell.

"You said your name was Goldy?! You look like you've done this before! How do we clear this?!"

Desperate hunters threw the question at me, but I only had one answer.

"How do we clear it? You all already know."

"Excuse me?"

"We hold out until the march passes without getting swept up in it."

They were all hunters under the banner of a subjugation, but the truth was this was closer to a defensive war. Hunting—except this time, if we weren't the ones being hunted and we simply endured, we won.

Funny, given the name "hunter," that the winning move was the opposite of everything they'd been doing until now.

"That can't be…"

The hunters who'd just seen that insane spectacle looked shell-shocked. But there was no turning back now. Once the march had started and the dark had settled, no one was leaving this place until at least the Second Army had been weathered.

"The First and Second Armies will hit all at once. Keep your heads screwed on tight. One slip and you'll get carried away."

Steel cut. Blood sprayed.

In a war of attrition like this, you obviously couldn't burn through your strength at the start. But if you only fought dull and safe, you wouldn't raise anyone's morale either.

We had to show them we could win.

"Terra—get a breath ready."

"Yes! Haaah—!"

The moment he heard the order, Terra sucked in a deep breath. Watching him, I closed my eyes for a second and stepped into the space of our contract.

Like gears locking into place, my power began to turn with Terra's mana.

A colossal laser streaked with golden particles erupted from Terra's mouth.

Everything the line touched melted and vanished as if the sea itself had been parted, leaving only a brilliant light behind.

"Huh…?"

"What the hell is that…?"

The monsters faltered for a beat—and so did the hunters, and even the stream chat froze for a second.

"See that? We can hold. So form ranks, everyone. I'll say it again."

Come to think of it, that was the name of this operation.

Because from here on, the real tsunami was about to hit.