Chapter 237
Chapter 237
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 237
Chapter Title: Flare Gun
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“Hey, Destroyer.”
“Yes.”
“Why the hell do you always wear that creepy mask?”
Yeom Geumja, draped in her luxurious fur coat, pointed at the [Carcosa’s Mask] covering my face. It was more familiar to me now than my own skin, but she clearly wasn’t a fan.
“Well, for the same reason you picked this dingy, abandoned factory as our meeting spot, Madame.”
“What the hell? You little shit.”
She took a drag from her cigarette, exhaled the smoke, and continued.
“Oh, you want to hide your identity? Got some secret life you’re enjoying under that mask? Makes sense for a wizard like you—this kinda crap is just a boring hobby.”
A natural assumption.
Wizards who reach a certain level can rake in astronomical sums without dipping into filthy crimes or suicidal dark dealings.
Especially those from artifact-crafting schools of magic.
So Yeom Geumja figured I was some immature wizard out for a thrill.
“Something like that.”
Too bad I didn’t have that kind of life.
The peaceful daily routine I could’ve enjoyed with my real face had been stolen by transcendental beings who dictated this world’s fate.
And ending up in this dank, shadowy factory haggling with dozens of criminals was just one desperate kick in my struggle to take it back.
“Anyway, why don’t you check the goods?”
“Show me.”
“Hyun-deok.”
Jang Hyun-deok fetched the item from the Kolban that even he called a “toy gun”—embarrassingly enough.
“Here.”
“Hand it over.”
“Yes.”
Yeom Geumja might have a lax demeanor for a big-time crime boss, but the dozens of thugs lined up behind her glared at us with murderous intent, ready to tear us apart at the slightest provocation.
“Madame, you grip it like this.”
I worried he might screw up, but Jang Hyun-deok seemed surprisingly at ease handling spots like this and people like her.
‘Well, dealing with fixers and crooks was his old line of work.’
Yeom Geumja examined the “toy gun” Jang Hyun-deok handed her and grimaced.
It was a shoddy mess, cobbling together trash and gems. Only after confirming the embedded stones were magic cores did her expression ease slightly—but she was still dissatisfied.
“Fuckin’ hell, it looks like straight garbage no matter how I squint. Hey, Bomber. This piece-of-shit thing really work like you said?”
“Wouldn’t it be better to stick to one nickname—Destroyer or Bomber?”
“Ha, fuck off. What a waste of pricey magic cores on this crap.”
Ignoring me and my suggestion with a curse, she fiddled with the “toy gun” some more.
“I’ll admit it looks rough. But it’s exactly as I described.”
“Like this?”
She awkwardly aimed it at an empty lot in the factory.
“Don’t shoot the pillars—the building might collapse.”
“Huh? Fine. Then blast that shitty wall over there. Ammo?”
“Put one of these in there.”
“Fuck, isn’t this just a screw?”
“Anything magnetic works.”
“Hmm—”
*Click—zzzt—fwip—*
*BOOOOM!*
[Protection Circle]
[Spell Enhancement: Multi-Cast]
[Spell Enhancement: Maximize]
“Gahhh!?”
A massive explosion rocked the area, dirt and dust billowing everywhere. A thick factory wall had been blown clean through.
If I hadn’t timed the protection circle perfectly, someone might’ve gotten hurt.
“No way……”
“Whoa……”
“Real deal Bomber……”
The Bongil Cheonpa thugs behind Yeom Geumja dropped their stern facades, murmuring in shock.
Normally, she’d chew them out for slacking, but she was just as stunned.
“What the fuck? How the hell does this garbage pull that off?”
“It converts mana from the magic core into electricity, then launches the projectile via electromagnetic acceleration. In the process, it imbues the round with penetration, explosion, homing, lightning, and other attributes—”
“No—stop! No explanations needed! Fuck—this is a straight-up people-killer! That’s all I care about!”
Yeom Geumja whooped with delight. Her eyes gleamed with greed and madness.
“Sure, it looks rough, but think of it as a lightweight, no-recoil grenade launcher with homing.”
“Yeah! Yeah! Perfect, fuck yeah! This’ll shred that Jeokdu bastard and his crew.”
Lately, Yeom Geumja had been oddly chipping away at Jeokdu’s turf, growing her own power.
Jeokdu, already battered by Cheongho-pa under Jeong Hyeon-a, had pulled a new card that put her in a real bind.
With a steady supply of these, that bind would snap in an instant.
“How much? What’s the price? How many can you make?”
“I’ll let ’em go cheap. And quantity won’t be an issue.”
Unlike others swayed by the blueprints’ madness into making random variants, I had [Abyssal Madness]—no such problem for me.
If I wanted, I could churn out identical ones endlessly.
“So, what’s the exact number?”
I quoted a rock-bottom price—barely covering materials. Giving them free would just breed weird suspicion.
“That cheap?”
“Yeah. But you know about the issue I mentioned before, right?”
“At this price? I’ll take it.”
“Good. Mind if I ask a favor while we’re at it?”
“Fuckin’ knew it.”
“If you say yes, I’ll throw in plenty of those magic core grenades and disposable artifacts I mentioned.”
“What is it? Spit it out.”
I spread my hands, projecting a massive hologram into the empty factory space—a 3D map of Paju.
I highlighted several spots with glowing lights and said,
“Here, here, here, here. And here.”
A high-rise, an abandoned house with unknown owners, a half-built structure left to rot, a bizarre pillar in the mountains, another derelict factory like this one, and an empty lot.
Roughly, “places known for that kinda thing.”
“What about ’em? What do you want?”
“Whenever you get a chance, could you blow them up?”
“……What? Oh—fuck, you think I’m your errand boy now—?”
“No, no. Calm down. Once you hear why, you’ll like it, Madame.”
I explained my reasons for picking those spots, and Yeom Geumja was satisfied.
* * *
“Wizard! Wizard!”
Jang Hyun-deok was buzzing with excitement the moment I slid into the driver’s seat.
“Yeah?”
“I thought that toy gun was just some gimmick, but that’s what it does?”
“You saw it yourself. You asked if it was a railgun—didn’t guess the power?”
“Yeah! No clue!”
“……”
Jang Hyun-deok was an idiot, but a bold one. Bold enough I didn’t even feel like teasing him.
“Wow! How’d you make something that awesome?”
“Not that impressive.”
I could fire ten magic arrows at ten times the power without it.
“Could I buy one? Seems faster than learning magic.”
“Oh, so that’s what you were thinking.”
What I wanted from Jang Hyun-deok wasn’t firepower. If it was, I’d have grabbed him an assault rifle and grenades from Incheon and turned him into [Armored Jang Hyun-deok] ages ago.
“C’mooon—”
“What’s with the whining? Plus, it’s unstable as hell—super high failure rate.”
“Failure?”
“Yeah. Might not fire, or self-destruct.”
“S-self-destruct?”
30% failure rate. Not that it always explodes on failure—a luck check kicks in, and critical failure triggers the boom.
Oh, and no, I didn’t scam Yeom Geumja.
I was upfront from the start.
She still begged to buy it anyway—that sealed the deal.
“Yeah. Self-destruct. Those folks have no backsies, so they love risky shit—but you want one?”
“Does it blow hard?”
“Bad luck? Takes out everyone nearby.”
“Good luck?”
“Maybe just the shooter dies.”
“Eugh.”
With meticulous care, it wouldn’t explode, but would her goons baby it like that?
“Anyway, Jang Hyun-deok.”
“Yeah?”
“Why do you wanna learn magic? From what you said earlier, you don’t really need it.”
A magic wand would suffice if that’s all he wanted—no need to bother with spells.
“Uhmm—”
He thought for a bit, face serious, then said,
“Money.”
“Money?”
“Yeah. I wanna make a ton. I drive ’cause it’s all I know, but I want real money.”
Paju’s security taxis were the riskiest—and highest-paying—gig for non-powered drivers.
Fancy name, but mostly aiding criminal getaways.
Nail a top-tier escape quest, pocket hundreds to thousands overnight—but it’s life on the line.
“If you’re risking your neck anyway, why not become a powered fixer?”
“That why you wanted magic? To be a fixer? I already pay you plenty.”
“Psh, can’t rely on you forever, Wizard. And I need way more.”
“Oh, that immigration fund story?”
“Yeah.”
“That much? You could settle yourself without the death-defying stuff.”
Jang Hyun-deok flashed a wry, self-mocking smile.
“Well, it ain’t just me.”
“Who else?”
“About 40?”
“40?”
“Doesn’t even have to be overseas. Just need enough for 40 of us to settle safe somewhere.”
“Tha—”
Almost said orphanage—or nursery.
“—your little sibs?”
“Yep. The place I was at was a real shithole. They begged donations like crazy, but those fuckers wouldn’t buy the kids proper clothes? Even skimmed cash meant for us.”
“Skim money from kids? Isn’t it government-run? Mob joint?”
“Huh? Government?”
Jang Hyun-deok looked baffled.
“They don’t oversee it at all?”
“Oh, Wizard, you don’t know about this stuff? I mentioned my security taxi days?”
“Six years, right?”
“I’m 22.”
“22? Huh.”
Means he started half-assuming he’d die at 16.
And security taxi probably wasn’t his first gig.
Before that, he’d done god-knows-what in this death-trap [Cthulhu World].
“What oversight? Heard they dropped it all after the Great Collapse.”
Got it. This wasn’t like the “normal” nurseries back home.
The Great Collapse killed untold millions.
And humans here dropped dead constantly. Tons of orphans matched the dead parents.
But the government here couldn’t manage jack.
“So you’re gonna make bank and get all your buddies outta here?”
“Eh…… Just a dream. Dreams are free, right?”