The Devils Clan Annihilated!
The Devils Clan annihilated!
“Are you okay, Uncle Yeong-gwang?”
“Ugh……”
No matter how much I shook him, Uncle wouldn’t regain consciousness. Only weak, deflated groans slipped from his parted lips.
He’d taken quite the beating. His condition looked serious.
If only he’d just handed over the evidence or whatever. What good is that kind of loyalty anyway……
It was a shame. And here I was, supposedly a priest of a goddess, without even a single decent healing skill to my name.
Of course, if I had one, I would’ve used it on Grandpa first… but healing skills had never once appeared in my choices, not even after Cradle of the Dead.
Maybe it was because my class was still listed as ‘Apprentice’? I couldn’t be sure, and right now I didn’t have time to dwell on it.
First things first. I need to get Uncle to a hospital.
“You lot. Keep a close eye on these bastards until I get back. If they try anything funny, cut off their arms and legs. As long as their heads stay attached, that’s good enough.”
Kikik!
The goblin minions nodded, flashing eerie smiles. The villains swallowed hard, their already rigid bodies stiffening even more.
The moment I turned around with Uncle on my back—
Go to hell, you fucking idiot!
Jeong Gu-jun, the man in charge here, had been waiting for exactly this opening. His eyes bulged as the dagger lying beside him suddenly shot forward like a bullet.
He was a B-class Level 29 psychokinetic. Launching a single dagger at bullet speed with his powers was child’s play.
It was thanks to this hidden ace that he’d rocketed up the ranks after joining the Devils Clan.
The same went for the arrogant brat in front of him. Jeong Gu-jun had no doubt the kid would pay dearly for looking down on him and humiliating him.
But then—!
“What the—?!”
Jeong Gu-jun let out an involuntary gasp.
The dagger flying at bullet speed had suddenly bounced off something and embedded itself in the wall.
What deflected his dagger was, astonishingly, an arrow. A single arrow had knocked aside a projectile moving at that velocity.
Never mind how such a feat was possible—Ahn Humin didn’t even turn around as he gave his order.
“Goblin Hood.”
Kik.
“Feel free to experiment on that bastard. See how many arrows it takes before he dies. Report the results later.”
Kikik!
“W-wait! What the hell—!”
Thud!
“Aaaargh!”
Leaving behind Jeong Gu-jun’s continuous screams, I stepped outside, loaded Uncle into the back seat of the car they’d arrived in, slid behind the wheel, and started the engine.
“I only got my license recently, so my driving might be a little rough. Just bear with me, Uncle.”
I tore down the mountain road, following the GPS, and somehow made it to the nearest large hospital.
After leaving Uncle in the doctors’ care and returning to the safe house, I clicked my tongue at the sight of Jeong Gu-jun. Even though he looked like a human pincushion, he was still breathing.
“Is Goblin Hood’s skill that impressive, or do you just have ridiculous vitality? Or both?”
“J-just… kill me……”
I ignored Jeong Gu-jun’s desperate plea and turned to his frozen subordinates.
“Think carefully before you answer. If you don’t want to be Goblin Hood’s next test subject. Who do you work for?”
“Th-the Devils Clan.”
“I think I’ve heard of them. The clan that handles contract killings, contract assaults, kidnappings, and illegal detentions for the right price, right?”
“Y-yes……”
“Where’s your hideout?”
“That’s……”
When no one dared speak, I pointed at the closest one and called out.
“Goblin Hood. Let’s use this guy next.”
“……!”
The designated villain glanced at Jeong Gu-jun—who had become a pincushion and was now very much dead—then broke out in a cold sweat and finally spilled everything.
“I-I’ll talk! The address is……”
Once I had the information I needed, I asked again.
“This is accurate, right?”
“Of course! How could I lie in this situation……”
“Good. If it turns out to be a lie, I’ll cut off the remaining two parts too.”
“What? The remaining two? W-wait a second!”
Two limbs severed
Leaving the villains—who had now lost at least two of their four limbs—behind, I headed for their hideout.
Somewhere in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province.
On the surface, it looked like an ordinary building whose construction had been suspended. In reality, this was the Devils Clan’s true headquarters, a fact known to only a handful of people.
I walked toward the building without hesitation. The nearby CCTV captured my image, and clan members who confirmed an intruder grabbed their gear and rushed outside.
“Who the hell are you? This isn’t the kind of place you stumble into by accident, and I didn’t hear anything about guests coming today.”
“Take me to your boss. No one has to get hurt.”
The clan members gathered there couldn’t hold back their laughter at the sight of me standing my ground and even threatening them.
The forty-odd Devils Clan villains assembled here were all awakened beings averaging B-class, Level 30.
With that many people, they wouldn’t be afraid even if an S-class of similar or slightly higher level stormed in.
Of course, anything SS-class or above might be dangerous, but those kinds of monsters were already well-known in Korea, and there was no way one would show up alone in the middle of the night.
“What is this idiot saying? Hey, go drag him over. I want to know what kind of crazy bastard would crawl in here by himself.”
At their superior’s command, the clan members swelled with power and swarmed forward in a wave. As expected of awakened beings, their movements were so fast that ordinary people would have trouble following them with their eyes.
“Cradle of the Dead.”
I watched the swarm of villains rushing at me from every direction and spoke.
“It’s fine to cut off their arms and legs, but don’t kill them.”
At those words, goblin swordsmen and warriors serving under Goblin Rex burst out from the black smoke.
“What the—?!”
“He’s a summoner?!”
The Devils Clan and the goblin minion forces collided at the same time.
The gap in power was horrifyingly one-sided.
Limbs flying through the air
Kikikik!
Keeek!
“Aaaargh!”
“My arm… my arm!!”
Severed limbs painted the air with blood, and the cruel laughter of the goblins mixed with the humans’ agonized screams to create a nightmarish harmony.
The monsters they had dismissed as nothing more than goblins were far beyond anything they could have imagined.
Leaving the one-sidedly slaughtered clan members behind, I trudged through the pool of blood and descended the stairs through the entrance they had come from.
There, the true owner of the hidden basement hideout beneath the abandoned building—Devils Clan leader Seong Ki-su—stood waiting with his executives, ready to greet me.
“It sounded noisy outside, but you cleaned them up faster than I expected. I don’t recognize you. Who might you be?”
“The person who commissioned the kidnapping of the owner of Yeong-gwang Detective Agency. Who was it?”
“Straight to the main topic without even introducing ourselves? Fine by me.”
Whoosh.
The moment Seong Ki-su finished speaking, the executives surrounding him vanished.
The Devils Clan executives were all A-class, Level 50 powerhouses. They were the kind of strong individuals that most awakened beings would hesitate to even make eye contact with.
However……
The executives who had closed the distance in an instant to ambush me were now blocked by the goblins’ swords and shields, unable to advance any further.
These aren’t ordinary goblins.
Even so, the goblin minions seemed to find them tougher than expected. They couldn’t overwhelm them like they had above and instead traded blows back and forth, resulting in a closer fight than anticipated.
“These goblins are impressive. Just what are they? I’ve never heard of a hunter or villain who could summon monsters like these.”
“It’s true… taking on the clan executives one-on-one is still a bit difficult.”
“……What?”
“Cradle of the Dead.”
At that moment, Seong Ki-su’s eyes widened slightly.
The instant I activated the skill, black mist rose and more goblins emerged from within, reinforcing their comrades.
Does that mean he can summon even more goblins with strength comparable to our executives?
Seong Ki-su’s expression darkened. To command that many monstrous summons, the caster had to be at least S-class. And probably far higher level than himself……
I need to finish off the summoner quickly or this will get troublesome.
Fortunately, he was confident in that area.
He was an S-class Level 45 Assassin. Once the conditions were met, slitting a summoner’s throat was as easy as pulling a coin from his pocket.
Click.
The moment Seong Ki-su pressed the button in his pocket, the lights in the underground hideout went out, plunging the entire space into darkness in an instant.
This was also why he had built the hideout underground. Once the lights were off, whether it was day or night, this space became his domain.
Shhh.
Hidden within the darkness, Seong Ki-su used Shadow Step to approach me silently and instantly.
Even in the pitch-black gloom, his eyes saw everything as clearly as midday.
He could already picture my face as I died without realizing what was happening, followed by the twisted expression I would make while writhing in pain.
But then—!
He swung his dagger on pure reflex. The instinctive warning that he would die if he didn’t had shaken his mind, so his body moved first.
The result was correct.
Crash!
Seong Ki-su was sent flying backward, smashing into a table. A voice that didn’t belong to a human reached his ears.
“Your senses are sharp, human. Reacting to that couldn’t have been easy.”
What the hell?!
Seong Ki-su looked up at the culprit who had repelled him.
A goblin wearing gleaming golden armor even in the darkness. The extraordinary presence that clearly set it apart from the other goblins left even Seong Ki-su stunned.
Goblius? Isn’t that the boss monster from the tenth floor? How did that thing get here? Don’t tell me the summoner actually called it?!
Seong Ki-su knew Goblius well. He had lost count of how many times the creature had humiliated him.
But the idea that it was an unbeatable monster was a thing of the past. At his current level, it was nothing more than a monster he could defeat with his eyes closed.
So what was going on?
Why……
Thud. Thud.
Why are those memories coming back?!
As the golden Goblin King walked steadily toward him, Seong Ki-su felt the memories and terror of the time he had faced death resurface.
“That’s impossible. There’s no way I would lose to a mere Goblius!”
Seong Ki-su forced the fear down and launched himself at Goblius. His skill at melting completely into the darkness and striking from a blind spot was clean and razor-sharp.
But……
It blocked this too?!
“If your proficiency is lacking, you should at least have understanding. What a crude assassination attempt, relying entirely on the skill’s raw power. Truly vulgar. Did you really think such an attack would work on me?”
“Shut up!”
Swishswishswishswishswish……!!
Seong Ki-su activated Berserk Malice, doubling his physical abilities.
His stamina drained three times faster, but his movements became so fast that several afterimages lingered behind him.
However……
Goblius effortlessly parried Seong Ki-su’s dazzling sword strikes, then swung his blade in a single clean motion and severed the man’s right arm at the shoulder.
“Aaaaaargh!!”
Seong Ki-su let out a horrific scream, clutched his bleeding shoulder, and collapsed to his knees.
“You dared aim for my Lord’s life with such pathetic tricks? Pathetic. Tsk tsk……”
Goblius clicked his tongue and naturally stepped aside. I approached and looked down at the kneeling man.
“The person who commissioned the kidnapping of the Yeong-gwang Detective Agency owner. Who was it?”
“Fuck… off. You think I’m going to tell you, you son of a bitch? Just kill me, you idiot.”
“Grrraaagh……!”
At my glance, Goblius unhesitatingly severed the man’s left leg.
“You seem to be misunderstanding something. The option to kill you is the most merciful choice I can offer. So don’t even dream of begging me to kill you.”
“……!”
Only after all four of his limbs had been cut off did Seong Ki-su finally reveal that the client was Oh Se-jun and hand over the insurance evidence he had kept.
The Devils Clan has been completely destroyed.
📍 Result: All executives and members eliminated
🎁 Acquired: Evidence against Oh Se-jun
He was expelled from the guild without knowing he was EX-class.