The Shield That Turned the Blade
“What are you doing here? Why are you here?”
The woman who snapped at him in that sharp, cutting voice was Hye-jin. They had been dating until yesterday, but the moment she saw Hyun-jun’s face, her expression twisted with obvious disgust. There was not a trace left of the warm, affectionate woman she had once been.
“Are you stalking me?”
Hyun-jun was struck speechless. As Hye-jin’s voice rose, one of the hunters who had been chatting nearby came over and spoke to her.
“Hye-jin. What’s wrong? Do you know him?”
“Not at all, Sang-cheol oppa. He’s just some irritating person.”
Watching her coo at the hunter who had approached her, Hyun-jun bit down hard on his lip. Just some irritating person? He was beyond speechless; he was so dumbfounded he couldn’t even get angry. Right. She was trying to erase the miserable past and leave it behind.
With a short sigh, Hyun-jun shook his head and wiped the last remaining trace of Hye-jin from the deepest part of his heart.
It seemed her feelings had already left long ago.
“What’s that? Did a porter bring a shield?”
Sang-cheol’s gaze, which had been calming Hye-jin, shifted to the shield in Hyun-jun’s hands. Then he spoke in a blunt, casual tone.
“Yes. It’s a shield. I thought porters were supposed to bring their own gear?”
“Unbelievable. Is this your first time as a porter? If you’re hauling around a heavy shield like that, how do you expect to carry the mana stone bag? Even if you’re new, try not to walk around showing off how thoughtless you are...”
Sang-cheol made no effort to hide his contempt for Hyun-jun. In a world where the dungeon raid era had arrived and the incompetence of F-Class hunters had been proven, it was nothing unusual.
“Idiot...”
Hye-jin, watching from the side, shook her head as well. It was not the attitude of the woman he had once loved.
Was it all just an illusion that we loved each other?
A sigh escaped him. He was appalled. Angry, too. A tangle of emotions tightened in his chest and made it feel suffocating.
“You’re ignoring me now? You’re an F-Class hunter. Know your place.”
While lost in other thoughts, he had inadvertently seemed to ignore Sang-cheol’s words. The problem came next.
Though he was still in a dream, the countless deaths he had suffered there had left him under severe strain. That irritability showed plainly in his eyes as they settled on Sang-cheol. He had not meant it that way, but he ended up giving Sang-cheol a challenging look. There was no way a hot-blooded man like Sang-cheol would simply let that pass.
And his opponent was an F-Class hunter, treated like a bug in the hunter world. His hand moved first. He hadn’t drawn a weapon, but the punch aimed at Hyun-jun’s face was lethal to an F-Class hunter.
I can see it!
The dream memories, in which he had been skewered thousands of times by Carthago’s spear, came surging vividly back to life. He could tell where Sang-cheol’s fist was aiming. He didn’t know why. For just an instant, though, he could see the trajectory. By the time he came to his senses, Sang-cheol’s fist had already skimmed past Hyun-jun’s left cheek by a hair’s breadth.
Blood burst from his cheek.
“Oppa! You scared me! If you kill him here, it’ll be a pain!”
It was absurd. Was she saying it was fine to kill someone in the dungeon?
Then I’ll kill first.
A cold murderous intent settled into Hyun-jun’s eyes. But for now, no one noticed.
“R-right? I was just trying to threaten him.”
At Hye-jin’s rebuke, Sang-cheol answered with an awkward expression. His gaze remained fixed on Hyun-jun.
How did he dodge that...?
He had thrown the punch with full force in a burst of anger. He had put real intent behind it, so there was no way it should have been avoided.
An F-Class hunter dodged that...? Impossible...
At the unbelievable turn of events, Sang-cheol was at a loss for words.
“Gather up. We start the raid in ten minutes.”
At the dungeon entrance, the voice of the party leader, Ahn Seong-su, rang out. Hyun-jun wiped the blood from his cheek and moved forward.
“Everyone’s here, right? I’m checking attendance. Two porters and six raid members... everyone’s present.”
Seong-su confirmed the faces and names of the gathered hunters. Once he had verified that everyone was there, he turned his gaze to the Dungeon Management Bureau employee waiting nearby.
“We’ll open the dungeon gate.”
The tightly shut iron doors opened.
“We’re moving. Sang-cheol, you take the front-line tanking, and I’ll handle the second-line DPS. The rest of you, just act as briefed earlier.”
“Yes!”
“Understood!”
As they descended the stairs into the underground, Seong-su quickly issued his orders. Formation took shape. The porters were positioned near the party’s only magic-type hunter. It was the place that seemed safest, but in truth, it was also the place where they would be the ones to die in the event of a sudden ambush instead of the mage.
“This is the dungeon.”
The stairs ended, and the dungeon began. But something felt different.
“Lighting drones on. Tank, forward.”
“Moving. Let’s go.”
Sang-cheol drew his greatsword and stepped out ahead. The drone cast its light forward. The party advanced through the darkness. At first, no monsters appeared. The deeper they went, the more Hyun-jun couldn’t shake an ominous feeling.
Then came the moment they opened the second iron door and stepped inside.
This feeling...
The same sensation he had felt right before being pierced by Carthago’s spear.
Killing intent.
Green light flashed in the darkness. Hyun-jun realized it on instinct.
This is my chance!
It was time for revenge and proof.
*
- Carthago’s Righteous Shield protects you. So long as that great guardianship remains with you, nothing can threaten you.
Someone’s voice rang out. Then he saw it. A spear flying toward him, wrapped in green aura!
“It’s coming!”
“Fast!”
“Dodge!”
The hunters shouted warnings to one another. Behind them, still not even finished with their defensive stances, Hyun-jun had already raised his shield and prepared perfect defense. A faint blue aura clung to the face of his shield.
“A-Aura Shield? That’s impossible!”
Someone cried out in shock, but the voice was swallowed by the shriek of the green spear tearing through the air like a missile.
It’s coming!
Carthago had not taught him anything special here. The way to block a thrown spear, the fundamentals of stable shield technique, had simply flowed in from somewhere and branded themselves into his brain. Hyun-jun obeyed that knowledge as though it were instinct.
BOOM!
Shield and spear collided with a thunderous blast. The shockwave shook the earth, and a cloud of dust burst upward.
“K-kugh!”
“Agh!”
The force was enough to make the ground tremble for an instant. Two D-Class combat hunters staggered.
“Who got hit?”
Seong-su, the party leader, tried to confirm the damage.
“I think one of the porters got hit! He’s probably dead!”
“It was a direct hit!”
Everyone assumed he must have died, but Hyun-jun, who had somehow taken the full brunt of that spear, was in fact perfectly fine. Aside from his Aura Shield being shattered, he had taken no damage.
“Wh-what?”
“He was alive?”
“No way!”
Everyone was stunned.
I’m back...
Ignoring their shocked voices, Hyun-jun tried to make sense of the situation. As if the guardianship had ended, his enhanced dynamic vision returned to normal, and the shield-related knowledge that had been branded into his brain for a brief moment vanished, leaving only a tiny fragment behind.
What was that?
He had no idea what had just happened. What in the world had that voice he heard a moment ago been? He was confused, but there was no time to think deeply.
“It’s a Skeleton Knight!”
“Why is a B-Class elite monster appearing here?”
Because the monster had revealed itself.
“Ghk!”
The Skeleton Knight leaped over Sang-cheol, who was serving as the tank, and penetrated deep into the party’s formation, swinging a short sword. The blade, wreathed in aura, slashed deeply across the throat of one D-Class combat hunter. With a pained groan, a fountain of blood burst out.
“Kraaaaagh!”
Another scream erupted. The Skeleton Knight pressed deeper, and its sword pierced the abdomen of the other porter who had come with Hyun-jun.
“Jin-seong!”
“What is the tank doing!”
“Damn it, it’s a B-Class elite monster!”
The party descended into chaos at the appearance of a B-Class elite monster, something that should never appear in a C-Class dungeon unless it was in the boss room. From B-Class upward, both hunters and monsters existed in the realm of the transcendent. Seong-su, a C-Class combat hunter and the party leader, hurriedly moved to engage the Skeleton Knight, but it was obvious at a glance that he was being pushed back.
“F-Fireball!”
A lower-tier spell slammed into the Skeleton Knight’s skull. Staggered by the unexpected attack magic, the monster faltered, and Seong-su, together with Sang-cheol who had joined belatedly, poured out everything they had in a desperate assault.
“Haste!”
Hye-jin cast a buff. As the hunters attacked with everything they had, the Skeleton Knight could no longer endure and collapsed limply. The moment Hyun-jun confirmed that its breath had been cut off, he rushed forward and looted the mana stone.
“Party leader! What is going on?”
“Wasn’t it supposed to be true that monsters of B-Class or higher only appeared in the boss room of a C-Class dungeon?”