Chapter 74
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 74
Chapter Title: The Scramble (3)
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“I can’t believe there were two Lindworms. I never would have imagined.”
“And you killed them by yourself?”
“Is he a monster?”
I had three tickets in my possession.
Han Jong-ho had taken Han Seong-cheol’s ticket.
Han Seong-cheol was dead, and in my hands were three tickets.
As long as Ju Seo-hye took one, I didn’t care who took the rest.
According to our agreement, the pre-designated hunters were supposed to take the tickets.
But no one could complain if I said those hunters had died in an ‘unfortunate accident’ or an ‘intense battle with monsters’ in the dungeon, leaving me with the tickets instead.
Resting my sheathed sword on my shoulder, I scanned the hunters who had come to kill me.
“Setting Ju Seo-hye aside, why is everyone else getting along so well?”
Among the hunters who had come to kill me were members of the Raon Guild.
Hey, those guys aren’t your friends.
“Hmph, don’t misunderstand. We’re only here because it’s first come, first served.”
“I feel a little bad since we’re in the same guild, but I still want that ticket.”
Their goal—me—was the same, so there was no need for them to fight each other.
Right, that’s a hunter for you.
“Okay. No one here better complain if they end up dead.”
“What a bluff. You look like hell right now, you know?”
Ju Seo-hye, sword in hand, stepped forward.
She must have thought I’d be weakened after killing the Lindworms.
I had pushed myself, but still.
“I don’t think I’m about to die at your hands. I’ve got a long life ahead of me. But let me ask one thing first. Why did you sell out Han Seong-cheol? Weren’t you two planning to take me on together?”
“We were.”
“Then why?”
“The situation changed, that’s all. You could call it improvising. To be precise, we had a difference of opinion. He was too proud of his Black Holdings background to work with Raon.”
Ju Seo-hye had wanted to join forces with the Raon Guild to kill me, but Han Seong-cheol had refused.
For that to work, Ju Seo-hye must have already had some sort of arrangement with Raon from the beginning.
However.
“Does Representative Yoo Se-yeon know about this? We’re not supposed to be fighting each other, are we?”
“Oh my, you expected me and Han Seong-cheol to betray you, yet you say we shouldn’t be fighting? Isn’t that a contradiction?”
Yoo Se-yeon, who recommended Ju Seo-hye, and Park Si-woo, who recommended me, were in an alliance.
Of course, it was an alliance that could be flipped on its head at any moment.
“That’s that. So, did you really join hands with Raon?”
Working with someone from the inside was a completely different matter from working with an outsider.
“You said you’d only ask one thing. A man shouldn’t go back on his word.”
“Hey, that’s a cheap shot.”
At Ju Seo-hye’s signal, the hunters charged all at once.
*CRASH.*
Magic and skills flew wildly, kicking up a cloud of dust.
This was getting complicated.
‘Should I just make a run for it? No…’
That woman, Ju Seo-hye, was too much of a problem.
And the Raon Guild issue wasn’t resolved either.
Ju Seo-hye burst through the dust cloud.
“Don’t regret this. You started it.”
“Hmph, you’ll be the one with regrets!”
Ju Seo-hye’s main skill was physical enhancement.
It seemed she had even conserved her mana in preparation for fighting me.
I don’t know why there are so many strong people around me.
Ju Seo-hye’s sword clashed with my Sky Sword.
“I don’t like that man, Park Si-woo.”
“Ah, right. I heard your friend died during an expedition a while back?”
“You bastard!”
Ju Seo-hye swung her sword relentlessly.
Her wild movements seemed to make the hunters who were planning long-range attacks hesitate.
But not all of them.
After dodging an attack from a hunter aiming for my back, I closed in on him.
I swung my fist at his chest.
As his body fell, I grabbed his arm and hurled him straight at Ju Seo-hye.
“Wait…”
Startled, Ju Seo-hye quickly retreated.
Was he someone she knew?
Judging by her hesitation.
Sword in hand, I ran and kicked at the hesitating Ju Seo-hye.
She staggered back, gasping for breath.
“That man…! He truly respected Park Si-woo! The reason he volunteered for the Cockatrice Farm was because of Park Si-woo. After the expedition failed, Park Si-woo said nothing about the hunters who died! Dammit! That man isn’t fit to lead others!”
“You’re just taking it out on me. What do you want me to do about what Park Si-woo did?”
“I know Park Si-woo cares about you! If you die, maybe he’ll realize what he’s done!”
I had no idea where to even begin with that logic.
Ju Seo-hye’s mana surged to its absolute limit.
Her movements grew faster and faster, as if she had raised her enhancement level.
The other hunters, who had been testing the waters, began to attack as well.
Even I had trouble with being ganged up on.
To avoid a fireball falling from above, Ju Seo-hye and I jumped almost simultaneously.
“This ends now!”
Ju Seo-hye’s mana-infused sword glowed red and grew in size.
“You’ve got something seriously wrong!”
I barely managed to block the attack using Moonlight Slash.
“Even if I die, Park Si-woo won’t bat an eye.”
“How can you say that…!!”
“That’s just the kind of guy he is.”
I didn’t know the full story about Park Si-woo.
But there are always people who would willingly forsake their humanity for their beliefs.
It’s not that I couldn’t understand how Ju Seo-hye felt, having lost a friend.
I could probably offer a word or two of comfort.
But what would that change?
It wouldn’t bring the dead back to life.
If you don’t want to die, you become strong enough not to. If you still die, then being weak is the only sin.
Feelings like sentimentality were meaningless in the face of overwhelming power and violence.
Such things were nothing more than fleeting sweet talk.
[The 4th Stage Blessing activates.]
“At the very least, if you hadn’t sold out Han Seong-cheol, I would have let it slide.”
It wasn’t that I had any special feelings for Han Seong-cheol, but there was a certain code of conduct.
I struck Ju Seo-hye’s sword with all my might.
The blade was knocked away, and Ju Seo-hye’s body was thrown off balance for a moment.
I pointed the tip of my sword at her.
Sensing the danger, Ju Seo-hye tried to shift her stance, but it was too late.
There was no way Ju Seo-hye could match my speed.
The Swift Sword pierced through Ju Seo-hye’s chest.
“You, what on earth…”
Those were her last words.
I stood before Ju Seo-hye’s fallen body.
The other hunters, weapons in hand, backed away.
“W-What the hell! Are you really a C-rank?”
“I’m B-rank! You bastards kept going on about C-rank, C-rank, so I ranked up a while ago! God, you rank-obsessed idiots! What if I’m C-rank, what if I’m B-rank! Hey! Does the country feed you if you’re S-rank?”
Ah, well, the country does sort of feed you if you’re S-rank.
In any case, I was sick and tired of all this talk about ranks.
The hunter who had spoken flinched as I pointed my sword at him.
“E-Even if you just became a B-rank hunter…”
The hunters’ eyes shifted between the corpses of the Lindworm and Ju Seo-hye.
Even if I just became a B-rank, it’s impossible to kill an A-rank boss alone! That’s probably what he was trying to say.
I know your whole script, you rookie!
The truth was, they were right.
But in life.
“There’s always some bastard who cheats.”
C-rank, B-rank hunter—those were just labels to make it easier to identify and manage each other.
Most people fit into those categories, but the world also had outliers.
The hunters’ faces turned red.
They seemed to be under the delusion that I had used some illicit method to become stronger.
“You, you…! That’s cheating!”
“The world is full of cheaters.”
If everyone were honest, there would be no need for laws.
I aimed my sword at the hunter’s neck.
And there’s one unchanging rule in this world.
“Dead men tell no tales.”
My sword slashed down on the hunter’s body.
The other hunters gripped their weapons, tense.
“You two were in the same guild! Don’t you have an ounce of mercy?!”
“So what?”
Ju Seo-hye had colluded in Han Seong-cheol’s death.
Then she had genuinely tried to kill me.
There was no mercy to be shown to someone like that.
“Honestly, you people only talk about guilds and comrades when it suits you. Next. No, this is a pain. Just come at me all at once.”
One of the watching hunters charged at me.
That was the signal, and the surrounding hunters attacked even more fiercely.
These were the kinds of people who had made it this far.
A soldier is a soldier, even in death.
The same must be true for hunters.
With every swing of my sword, flesh was torn and blood splattered everywhere.
—So? What’s this favor you wanted to ask for in the dungeon?
—It’s nothing much.
I threw Angervadil at a hidden hunter.
A few tried to signal their surrender, but I didn’t care.
This whole expedition had been planned this way from the start.
“P-Please, spare me! I surrender! I-I’ll never do it again!”
*Slish.*
The Sky Sword sliced through the chest of the man begging for his life.
These were the hunters who had come with Ju Seo-hye to kill me.
If you decide to kill someone, you should be prepared to die yourself.
Surrender? Mercy?
There was no reason to grant such things to someone who had tried to stab me in the back.
—To put it bluntly, you won’t have any allies in the dungeon.
After killing the charging hunters, I looked for the exit gate.
The Raon Guild hunters, startled by my sudden appearance, warily stepped back.
“You are…”
“Ju Seo-hye and the other hunters should have gone already.”
The relatively calm Han Jong-ho raised his staff, preparing to use a skill.
He must have had some idea of what happened from my blood-soaked appearance.
But he probably didn’t want to think about it.
—Six tickets. Collect them all.
—And anyone who gets in the way?
—Kill them all.
Ju Seo-hye was gravely mistaken about Park Si-woo.
He was the type of man who would cast aside any greater cause for his own objectives at a moment’s notice.
A beam of light shot toward me.
*BOOOOM.*
The area around the exit gate was a wreck.
In that respect, Park Si-woo and I were similar.
For someone like me, who knew nothing but studying, the only thing I could do was survive.
I wanted to live even a little longer in that hellish world.
I did whatever it took to survive.
I don’t resent or pity Ju Seo-hye.
She wanted to kill me until the very end, and I killed her because I didn’t want to die.
In the end, I, the stronger one, survived, and Ju Seo-hye died.
It was as simple as that.
Blocking the incoming beams of light, I leaped high into the air.
“I doubt you’ll just hand over the tickets and scram if I ask nicely.”
“Hmph, of course not!”
I swung my sword in a wide arc, drawing a line on the ground.
A long gash was left where the ground had been cleanly sliced.
Han Jong-ho ground his teeth.
He looked as if he hadn’t expected me to kill all the hunters there and come after him.
“My number one specialty is killing people. Number two is hunting monsters.”
On top of that, I had already killed quite a few Raon Guild hunters.
The Executioner’s Sword grew stronger against a specific group the more of them I killed.
This was by no means a benevolent skill.
In the first place, I had never been on the side of good.
If I were truly good, a divine name like that would never have appeared.
‘I really didn’t want to use this a second time.’
Han Jong-ho, who had been relentlessly firing magic skills from the start, was getting on my nerves.
They were certainly different from the guys who had attacked alongside the Aria Guild.
More organized, perhaps.
“Dammit! It’s just one guy! Why, why can’t we kill him?!”
The tip of my sword glowed blue, leaving afterimages.
The foundation of the Swiftstrike Sword Art wasn’t just about striking fast and retreating.
—What does it mean to be fast?
—Fast is fast! Ow! Stop hitting me!
—I heard you were a good student. How did you study with that brain of yours?
I can’t count how many times I was beaten while learning this from him—from Luciel.
Thinking back, he wasn’t exactly normal either.
Blond hair and red eyes, yet he taught martial arts.
At the time, I was too busy learning to question or think about such things.
—So what does it mean to be fast then!
—To be fast is to be precise.
Precision, he said, comes from a calm mind.
If you have the confidence and skill to cut through with certainty, that is the fastest and truest path.
I calmly moved my sword against the downpour of skills and the hunters rushing in from all sides.
Magic was sliced apart with every pass of my blade, and hunters holding weapons fell like autumn leaves.
Sword of Falling Blossoms and Scattered Petals.
“I’ll be taking the tickets.”
Closing in on Han Jong-ho, I raised my bloodstained sword high.
[Kang Han-gyeol – Possessed: 6]
The game was over.
* * *
It was dawn when I left the dungeon.
The number of people, which had been close to seventy, had been reduced to less than half.
Most of them were Aria Guild hunters.
Fewer than ten Raon Guild hunters remained.
They were the ones who had hidden and surrendered after Han Jong-ho and Jeong Ho-il died.
‘It’s not that I couldn’t have killed them if I wanted to.’
But I didn’t feel the need, so I decided to let them be.
I needed witnesses, too.
After seeing my skills, they didn’t seem to covet the tickets anymore.
The Raon Guild hunters who came out of the dungeon watched me nervously.
“Go on.”
“……”
“I said, get lost.”
The hunters’ faces turned pale as I placed my hand on my sword.
“J-Just you wait!”
“You’ll r-regret messing with the Raon Guild!”
“Stop talking like some third-rate villain and scram! I swear, I’ll just!”
I couldn’t kill them outside the dungeon, so I was debating whether to send them off with a smack each when someone approached me.
Huh, this guy is…?
Hmm, I don’t know him.
But I got a strong feeling he was sent by Park Si-woo.