Chapter 111
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 111
Chapter Title: The Marksman (4)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Silence filled the small room.
Seated at the desk, Eun-young stared at the chessboard on the table.
Seeing the complex arrangement of pieces, Ji-han approached from behind her.
“Pawn.”
“No, the knight.”
“Pawn!”
“Aaargh! Shut up! Stop telling me what to do!”
Ignoring Ji-han's advice, Eun-young moved her knight.
Chae-young moved her bishop, capturing a nearby pawn.
Eun-young’s face turned pale as she looked down at the board.
“Checkmate.”
“Idiot.”
Feeling Ji-han's sharp gaze from over the sofa, Eun-young sighed.
Yoo Chae-young, her legs crossed, smiled at Eun-young.
“Should we stop?”
“Hey. Murderer.”
Ji-han, who had been practicing with his sword in the back, turned around, wondering if he had misheard.
Eun-young had turned from the sofa and was now glaring at him.
It was obvious to anyone that the murderer she was referring to was Ji-han.
Ji-han was dumbfounded.
“I haven’t killed anyone. What’s with the ‘murderer’?”
“You’ve never killed anyone?”
“Is that even a real question?”
“What do you know, you are a murderer.”
Eun-young brazenly retorted.
At first, Eun-young had found Ji-han uncomfortable, but after being trapped in the same space for over two weeks, a strange sort of affection, born of dislike, had begun to form.
Though calling it affection might be a stretch.
“Who calls someone a murderer to their face?”
“You call me ‘woman, woman’ all the time! You tried to kill me, so you’re a murderer! You murderer!”
“I haven’t killed you yet! So what?!”
Sheathing his sword, Ji-han approached irritably.
Eun-young pointed at the chessboard.
“Help me.”
“It’s over.”
Ji-han had clearly heard Yoo Chae-young say checkmate.
He didn't understand what she wanted him to do with a finished game. Eun-young pouted.
“It’s not over yet.”
Yoo Chae-young had asked Eun-young if she wanted to end the game.
If it were truly checkmate, there would be no need for such a question.
Chae-young's words were a provocation meant to draw out Eun-young’s surrender.
Even knowing this, Eun-young couldn't see a plausible move to break the deadlock. That was why she had called for Ji-han.
Ji-han looked at the board and scoffed.
He wasn't unaware that Chae-young's words were a psychological tactic to get Eun-young to end the game.
He just found Eun-young's reaction all the more absurd.
“Do you know who I am?”
“The biggest asshole the world has ever seen?”
“I’m going to kill you.”
“I’m aware that you’re not exactly fond of me.”
“Then just flip the board and start a new game.”
It wasn't a life-or-death situation, just a friendly game to pass the time.
Since there was nothing special at stake, there was no problem with just resetting and playing again.
Ji-han couldn't understand why Eun-young was so hung up on a game of chess.
What Ji-han didn't know was that Eun-young's competitive drive was far stronger than he imagined.
“Losing is worse than death.”
“So you’re willing to borrow a murderer’s hand to win?”
“A win is a win. Ever heard of fighting fire with fire? So, can you win or not? Just tell me that.”
Though it was annoying, Ji-han's chess skills were a level above Eun-young's.
Eun-young planned to flip the board immediately if Ji-han said he couldn't do it.
Ji-han slowly looked over the chessboard.
He pointed to a bishop tucked away in a corner.
“Two spaces diagonally to the left.”
As the bishop moved, Yoo Chae-young uncrossed her legs.
“Oh!”
It felt like a tangled knot was coming undone.
Ji-han leaned in, scanning the board.
“Not yet.”
All he had done was block her once.
Yoo Chae-young moved just as Ji-han had predicted.
As Eun-young followed Ji-han’s instructions, the board quickly opened up.
After a few more turns, only a handful of pieces remained on the board.
Eun-young’s head throbbed. Ji-han, who had been simulating moves with his fingers, threw his hands up.
“It’s a draw.”
“What? Really?”
“You’re right, it’s a draw.”
Like Ji-han, Yoo Chae-young had also finished calculating the possible moves for the remaining pieces.
Clearing the board, Eun-young leaned back in her chair and stretched.
“Still, a draw is better. A draw is good.”
Without Ji-han, she would never have been able to force a stalemate.
Now that the game was over, she was starting to feel hungry.
Being trapped in one place for over two weeks was making her dizzy.
The silver lining was that Ji-han, who was with her, had a surprising amount of food.
Thanks to an ingenious item she'd never seen before called a Shower Ball, even washing wasn't a major issue.
Thanks to him, Eun-young was living in relative luxury despite being trapped in an unknown space.
It was unlucky that she’d almost been killed by Ji-han, but it was lucky that she’d entered this place with him.
The only inconvenience was the lack of internet access.
“An item window, though… I’m jealous of that.”
Ji-han's item window held everything from convenience store lunch boxes to ramen and snacks.
Eun-young popped a Water-fill with her teeth, sipping the water as she checked the community forum.
She had recently started contacting Choi Soo-hyun.
She had been genuinely surprised when Soo-hyun suddenly appeared on the forum.
Eun-young had realized that Choi Soo-hyun had become a follower of the god Soter.
In response, Soo-hyun had chided her in the comments, saying he had come in early because of her.
Noticing that Eun-young was on the forum, Ji-han spoke to her.
“Hey, woman. Give me an update on the outside world.”
“You disrespectful bastard.”
He looked about the same age as Han-gyeol, but she couldn't understand why he spoke so differently.
If only his speech was half as good as Han-gyeol's, he might actually be popular.
Or at the very least, he could just not talk.
Looking at Ji-han, Eun-young once again felt the fairness of the world.
He had been given looks and skills in exchange for his personality.
‘His skills are pretty insane, though.’
Eun-young’s competitive spirit was strong enough to drag in her enemy, Ji-han, just to secure a draw in a friendly game, but she also had a cold, rational side.
It was impossible for the current Eun-young to defeat Ji-han.
Even when fighting Jeong Hyeon-seong, who had become a demigod of Veritas, Ji-han hadn't used his full power.
Eun-young checked the comments Soo-hyun had left.
“The raid… it seems to have started.”
“When?”
“The last comment was posted two hours ago.”
If they were in the middle of a raid, not even Choi Soo-hyun would be in a situation to check the community comments.
Still, just in case, Eun-young left a reply asking for a brief update.
“Hey, woman.”
Ji-han, holding his heavily bandaged sword, glared at the seated Yoo Chae-young.
That manner of speech was clearly just a habit of his.
Even when talking about Jeong Hyeon-seong, who had become a demigod in the crevice, he had never once called Eun-young by her name, no matter how many times she told him.
“Isn’t it about time you told us what you want?”
Ji-han rested the sword on his shoulder, glaring at Yoo Chae-young from a crooked stance.
It had been almost a month since they were trapped.
Ji-han felt he had been patient enough.
At his attitude, Yoo Chae-young wore an indifferent expression.
“What I want isn’t you. You should know that, right?”
“But we’re trapped here because of you.”
“Is that really the case?”
A strange current flowed between Yoo Chae-young and Ji-han.
This had happened more than once while Eun-young had been staying here.
Yoo Chae-young was friendly towards Eun-young, but with Ji-han, she maintained a delicate balance between goodwill and mistrust.
Soo-hyun and Han-gyeol had planned to use the Dragon Orb, a reward from the raid, to get Eun-young out.
There was some debate about whether the Dragon Orb could truly grant wishes, but according to Han-gyeol, the magic within it was powerful enough to at least create a crack in the temple.
Eun-young had something she was more curious about than getting out.
“You know, why me?”
Yoo Chae-young treated Yoo Ji-han as little more than an uninvited guest.
The difference in her attitude towards Ji-han and Eun-young was palpable.
She had been thinking about it constantly while staying in the temple's crevice. But no matter how hard she thought, Eun-young couldn't find anything that made her better than Yoo Ji-han.
As a Hunter, that is, not in terms of personality.
In this world, the strong made the laws.
Ji-han's rotten personality was only possible because his skills backed it up.
Until she met the god Soter through Han-gyeol, Eun-young had been an unaffiliated Hunter, just like Jeong Hyeon-seong.
At Eun-young's question, Chae-young gave a bitter smile.
A mix of emotions could be read in that smile.
It was as if she had been hoping Eun-young would ask, but at the same time, felt the inevitable had arrived.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Well… If you had a favor to ask, I thought it would make more sense to ask this guy instead of me. He might be a rude jerk, but his skills are undeniable. It's been a while since I Awakened, but I've been active as a Hunter for less than a year. I'm still lacking in many ways.”
“It’s not that you’re lacking, it’s that you’re weak.”
Eun-young threw a punch at Ji-han's face.
All Ji-han did was open his palm and block her fist.
The palm that met her fist felt incredibly large and thick.
It wasn't like Eun-young had been slacking off for a month.
She had challenged Ji-han to a few spars, but had never won.
One might think he would go easy on her or at least pretend to, but whenever Ji-han faced her, he never let things slide.
Go easy on her?
That was simply unimaginable.
Not that Eun-young actually thought she could land a hit on Ji-han when she threw the punch.
Huffing, Eun-young lowered her fist.
“You’re special.”
“Me? No way.”
Eun-young waved her hand dismissively in the air.
Not long before becoming a Hunter, she had been an ordinary woman in her twenties, working an office job and contemplating marriage.
She wouldn't say her life was without its stories, but she felt the word "special" didn't fit her.
Being special meant you were better than others at something, didn't it?
“I’m not just saying that.”
“What’s so special about me?”
“Woman, you were unaffiliated all the way until you met Soter, right?”
The answer to Eun-young's question came from Ji-han.
The reason Eun-young wouldn't give up on Soter was related to that as well.
“So what?”
“It’s been bothering me for a while, too.”
“Bothering you? What has?”
“That guy, Jeong Hyeon-seong, was also unaffiliated, right? The only thing you two have in common is that.”
“I know that much.”
But having something in common didn't automatically make it the source of the problem.
Even if that really was the issue, neither Eun-young nor Ji-han knew what the problem was.
Ji-han ticked off his fingers as he spoke.
“You. Jeong Hyeon-seong. Any other Hunters?”
“Huh?”
“Or how many cases are there of someone being unaffiliated for years and then Awakening like you?”
At Ji-han's question, Eun-young frowned.
Her mind suddenly became a complex mess.
It was a perfectly natural question she should have considered at least once, but for some reason, she never had.
Or perhaps it wasn't that she hadn't.
The problem was that she had simply accepted it as a given.
Since when had she started thinking of it as a given?
Ji-han felt a sense of unease as well.
It was such a basic question that he felt a sense of self-loathing for not having thought of it sooner.
After a long silence with a hardened expression, Eun-young finally answered.
“I don’t think there are any.”
It was strange.
She was sure she had heard of unaffiliated Hunters, but she couldn't recall a single one.
As if he had known what her answer would be, Ji-han muttered.
“Existence Erasure.”
“What’s that?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. The ones who remember you ever existed in the world disappear. That’s why you and other humans can’t remember unaffiliated Awakened Ones. And Existence Erasure is one of the most severe forms of divine punishment.”
“What is that?”
Divine punishments, the Abyss—it was all a string of words she couldn't understand.
Hearing Ji-han's voice, Chae-young spoke.
“Unaffiliated Hunters, most of them disappear into the Abyss less than a year after Awakening.”
Ji-han clicked his tongue as if to say, "I knew it."
Eun-young's eyes widened.
If it was true that unaffiliated Awakened Ones disappeared like that within a year…
“Then what on earth am I?”