Counterattack
I plunged the air gun deep into the guy's gut. His face twisted with pure confusion, despair, and utter frustration.
As I yanked the weapon free, blood gushed out in thick, sickening spurts.
I drove the blade through all fourteen captives, one after another, and ended their lives with cold precision.
Their pleas for mercy rang out—screams, sobs, and the desperate calls of mothers. They cursed, they begged, they whimpered.
Killing a person cleanly takes time if you don't sever the neck in one stroke, and even then, the sounds of death before the end are loud. Not to mention that snapping a neck outright is no easy feat either.
**Soul Absorption 14**
**Super Regeneration: 85**
Fourteen souls. And growth.
"Just grab the weapons. I'll hide inside and wait. I'll slaughter them all and come back. It might take a while."
"N-No, Hyung... Are you really going alone?"
"It's better if I'm alone right now. Just make sure the place is secure while I'm gone."
I raced straight back to the apartment.
The moment I stepped inside, the women hiding in the room looked up at me with tear-filled eyes, babbling about how lucky they were to be safe.
They were the weakest of the weak—almost useless in combat.
Yeah... They were pretty faces and bodies, after all. I was only keeping them around because of that. If they weren't attractive, I'd have tossed them out the second I could.
I grabbed my armor, helmet, air gun, ammo, and extra weapons in record time. Fresh tape went over every wound I'd already patched.
"A-Are you leaving again... You're all covered in injuries..."
The female teacher spoke with genuine worry in her voice. Good. Having someone who actually cared was nice.
I gave her hips a playful slap, squeezing the firm flesh through her dolphin pants as I spoke.
"If we want everyone to survive, we have to move now. Don't fight each other—stay calm and stay put."
Leaving the worried women behind, I hurried outside once more.
I already knew the layout of the residential-commercial apartment complex from before. It was midnight, but the sky was lit up with countless stars and auroras, so it wasn't pitch black. Moving at a light jog, I reached the vicinity in no time.
The building was designed with a commercial floor on the ground level. At the massive entrance, two men stood like sentries, air guns raised and ready.
I slipped into an alley about a hundred meters away and melted into the shadows. That distance was basically the outer limit for an air gun kill shot. Beyond that, accuracy and penetration took a serious hit.
No need for headshots. Straight to the center mass.
**Paf!**
The man clutching his chest crumpled. The one beside him yelled in shock and rushed over.
I twisted the barrel, slammed in another round, and folded the weapon shut again. Reloading took roughly five seconds...
I fired once more at the last remaining enemy.
The bullet hit his back and he screamed, shouting that an intruder was here. The air gun's power had limits. If it had been a real rifle, the guy might already be dead.
The pellet lodged in his body. Of course it was fatal and caused heavy bleeding, but it didn't tear the flesh like a real bullet or punch a massive hole.
A moment later, a group of them burst out the entrance. I fired again and dropped one.
Someone pointed at me and yelled. They'd figured out my general position.
I sprinted back down the alley and ran for several minutes until I reached a nearby villa. I claimed a spot on the third-floor hallway and sat down to wait.
The guys the air gun had hit wouldn't die right away. But with no proper medical care, surgery to extract the pellets would be nearly impossible. Those who didn't receive treatment would only slow me down—incapable of fighting and just liabilities.
Distant shouts echoed from somewhere, searching for me. Finding even one person in the tangled villa alleys of Seoul wasn't easy.
With fewer than a hundred men total, it was practically impossible. And those hundred wouldn't all be elite fighters anyway. There would be women, middle-aged men, all sorts. None of them could sprint around and fight properly.
I sat back comfortably, resting and letting my stamina recover. Most of the minor wounds on my limbs had already healed, leaving only faint scars. The deeper ones I'd taped over would follow soon.
Tonight, I was going to bleed every last one of those bastards dry before I ended them.
After resting for about thirty minutes, I stood up, walked slowly down the alley, and headed back toward the apartment complex.
That's when I spotted three men emerging from the alley ahead. They held weapons, clearly searching for me. They'd probably split up the group to cover more ground—smart, but ultimately suicidal.
**Paf!**
One of them took a hit and dropped.
"Where the hell are you?!!"
They knew an air gun had struck, but they couldn't pinpoint the exact spot and kept glancing around frantically. By then I'd already fired again.
The last man facing me locked eyes with mine. He hesitated, gripping his air gun. Alone, he had to decide whether to run or fight. But he still managed to reload in that split second.
He chose to charge me bravely. He was young and surprisingly fast. I put three rounds into him before he closed the final ten meters, and he collapsed face-first.
**Gack... Gack... Ugh... S-Spare me...**
I put a final shot through the choking man's head to confirm death. I finished off the other two as well.
**Soul Absorption 3**
**Super Regeneration: 88**
I kept moving toward the apartment complex. About six men stood clustered at the entrance, deep in some kind of meeting.
They must have thought I wouldn't come back. Pathetic.
One shot dropped one of them. As they roared in fury, I put another bullet through a second target. The moment they realized my location, the survivors turned and bolted.
***
"You bastards! You fucking bitches! You damned whores!"
Park Seung-chan, the leader of the residential-commercial apartment complex, was rutting into a naked woman with savage force. His hair was starting to gray, but he still had the stamina of a much younger man. The woman he was pounding looked far too young for his age, and her face was twisted in pure agony—clearly not enjoying a single second of it.
Another combat squad had been wiped out by the same mysterious bastard. Ridiculous.
That guy had taken heavy damage, yet not only had he wiped out the squad, but now he was holding an air gun and methodically picking off his own men one by one.
The young woman in front of him, arms tied behind her back and already pale, was clearly one of the captured sex slaves. Every time Seung-chan slammed into her with brutal force, she let out moans of pain she couldn't quite tell apart from pleasure.
"It hurts... P-Please, just a little gentler..."
As he squeezed and thrust her breasts like he was trying to crush them, Seung-chan suddenly snapped.
"You fucking bitch! You damned whore! Where the hell do you get off opening your mouth?!"
His fist crashed into her face. Blood sprayed from her lips, and another punch knocked out her teeth.
The woman now only cried, bleeding from every wound, and said nothing more.
At that moment the door opened and someone entered.
"Leader. More injured men..."
The newcomer was an incredibly beautiful woman. She had the kind of face that made men drool, but since she was the only pharmacist in the group, Seung-chan refused to touch her. Without a doctor, a pharmacist was the only one who could act as a medical professional, so her position was critical.
"What? Hyeon-gyeong? Just wait a moment. I'll finish soon and be out of here."
Hyeon-gyeong bit her lip at the sight of Seung-chan raping the captured woman and beating her face until it was a bloody mess. But there was nothing she could do.
Right now Seung-chan treasured her as the pharmacist and often sought her advice because of her high education. But she still had a clear line she could never cross.
After filling the woman's womb with thick ropes of cum, he stepped out of the room.
"Ah, you fucking bitch. All that talking. Fine. How many are dead now?"
In the living room, three more men waited with Hyeon-gyeong—captains and lieutenants.
"After that bastard appeared... more than ten men have been hit by the air gun. The search teams sent out to find him aren't coming back, so the odds of death are high."
"Confirmed one?"
"Based on the speed of the shots, it looks like only one."
"...Everyone have any good ideas?"
The room fell into a heavy silence. Then Hyeon-gyeong spoke up.
"We have two pistols, right?"
They'd looted two pistols after killing police. One belonged to the leader, Park Seung-chan, and the other to the second-in-command, Kim Hyeok-su.
They'd used them before when the group was small, but as they grew larger, these pistols had become the only real weapons they carried for self-defense.
"No, these pistols have such a short range. Accuracy is terrible..."
Kim Hyeok-su shook his head.
"Still, they can fire faster than an air gun. And we have two of them. The odds aren't bad."
Her words carried some logic. But the real problem was who would risk their life to fight.
Giving the best weapon—the pistol—to subordinates was risky, and neither the leader nor the second-in-command wanted to stand in the front line themselves.
They both knew it. Once things got this big, they only wanted to hide inside, eat, and guard the women and food.
They had started the group through combat and leadership, but now that stability had come, all they wanted was comfort. That was simply human nature.
"Ugh... Just a little longer... Let's wait."
Park Seung-chan ruffled his hair, frustrated that no answer was coming.
Two hours passed. Five more men were hit by the air gun.
An air gun wound wasn't instantly fatal, but it was serious enough. And without proper treatment, infection would only make the death rate rise with every passing minute.
Inside the apartment complex there were still more than sixty men left, yet not a single one was willing to step outside.
Without any guns, they would simply stand at long range and die slowly. The bastard was also skilled at hiding after each shot and had proven himself dangerous in close combat.
At that moment, an order came from above. The leader and everyone else were to go out and search for the enemy.
They all knew the leader and second-in-command carried pistols. If those pistols could beat the bastard, there was hope. But the majority of the men here would simply be cannon fodder, getting picked off by the air gun before anything else.
Everyone grabbed their gear. A few even ripped open the doors of furniture and held them up like makeshift shields. Whether those would stop the air gun was unknown, but carrying something that wasn't a real shield looked exhausting.
As they lined up and stepped outside, someone else took a hit from the air gun and collapsed.
"There he is! About a hundred meters ahead!"
Someone shouted. Everyone froze, hesitation thick in the air.