Chapter 9
Chapter 9
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 9
Chapter Title: Murderer (2)
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“Get some rest. It’s about time for the night watch shift change anyway.”
“Yeah.”
At Kang Hyun-soo’s words, Song Ha-na gave a short reply and entered the cave.
‘She must be pretty exhausted.’
She hadn’t slept a wink standing watch, then went through an intense battle.
On top of that, it was her first kill.
She had to be drained both physically and mentally.
‘Devour it all.’
Kang Hyun-soo concentrated his mana into the Gluttony Sword.
Sssrrrrk!
The Gluttony Sword devoured the items left behind by the dead players.
[The Gluttony Sword has grown from E-Rank to D-Rank.]
The Gluttony Sword had leveled up.
‘Nice.’
A satisfied smile crept across Kang Hyun-soo’s lips.
‘Pretty profitable.’
Thanks to those guys ambushing them, he’d racked up a ton of achievements, experience, and even a skill.
And as if that wasn’t enough, his Gluttony Sword had ranked up too. No wonder he felt great.
But the gains Kang Hyun-soo could squeeze out of this weren’t over yet.
‘Squad Composition.’
He activated the job-exclusive skill for his One-Man Squad: Squad Composition.
Shaaaa!
Mana poured out from Kang Hyun-soo’s body, enveloping the spot where the players had died.
Crack! Crack!
At the same time, the formless mana began to take on solid, tangible shapes.
A moment later.
Ten soldiers made of pure mana appeared.
[One stack has been consumed.]
[All stats have been permanently depleted.]
[You have formed a new squad.]
[The previous squad has been disbanded.]
‘Finally made a squad out of players instead of monsters.’
Whenever the cooldown was up, Kang Hyun-soo kept using the Squad Composition skill.
Each time, all his level-up stats vanished permanently.
But the result?
[Squad Composition has grown from F-Rank to E-Rank.]
[You have achieved an amazing feat.]
[Title: Job Skill Rank Growth in Tutorial (A-Rank) has been granted.]
His job skill, Squad Composition, had ranked up.
‘The stats from early levels were ones I planned to ditch anyway.’
Right now, raising the Squad Composition skill’s rank mattered more than stats from leveling.
Kang Hyun-soo already had plenty of stats from countless achievements.
Even if the level-up stats vanished for good.
He was still the strongest in the third tutorial.
‘Among the One-Man Squad’s job skills, Squad Composition is the only one I can grow.’
Squad Leader, Squad Summon, and Squad Recall were fixed to the One-Man Squad job’s rank.
Which meant.
‘To raise the job rank, I have to steadily use Squad Composition, even with its 24-hour cooldown per stack.’
The problem was that using Squad Composition permanently burned through level-up stats.
‘A cheat-level job comes with hefty penalties, after all.’
But he had no reason to worry.
Kang Hyun-soo had his unique skill, Replica.
With Replica.
‘Penalties like the One-Man Squad’s are no big deal.’
Kang Hyun-soo opened his status window.
The new achievements had unlocked a bunch of titles.
He’d even scored some free skills.
‘PK rewards are always stacked, huh.’
Hunting players beat monster hunting for rewards every time.
Plus, their corpses dissolved into residual mana, making cleanup a breeze.
‘That’s why Atlantis dimension was crawling with lunatics.’
Those consumed by madness.
They preferred hunting humans over monsters.
‘If it weren’t for those guys.’
Humanity could’ve repelled the demon king’s forces way easier.
‘This time, I’ll uproot them completely.’
Even before his regression, Kang Hyun-soo owed those bastards big time.
So this round, he planned to pay them back with interest.
* * *
The same routine repeated.
Kang Hyun-soo and Song Ha-na hunted monsters from the outskirts, piling up experience and achievements.
About half a month passed like that.
[Replica has grown from F-Rank to E-Rank.]
[You have achieved an amazing feat.]
[Title: Unique Skill Rank Growth in Tutorial (A-Rank) has been granted.]
Replica, stuck at F-Rank for so long, finally hit E-Rank.
‘Success.’
Joy lit up Kang Hyun-soo’s face.
Truth be told, he’d already set up an easy way to rank up Replica.
‘But this achievement is tutorial-exclusive.’
Rank it up after the tutorial ends, and there’s no reward.
Rank it up during, though, and you score an achievement.
‘Now just the job rank left.’
He’d gotten an achievement from ranking up the job skill Squad Composition.
Next up: Evolve F-Rank job One-Man Squad into E-Rank One-Man Company.
That’d net him another achievement.
‘Perks of a low rank.’
Fat chance, but if Kang Hyun-soo had picked a D-Rank mage job?
Ranking it up in the tutorial would’ve been near impossible.
‘Song Ha-na’s got potential too.’
Her Magic Swordsman job started at E-Rank, so not easy.
But with her talent?
She could push Magic Swordsman to D-Rank before the third tutorial ended.
* * *
Time flew by relentlessly.
In the meantime, Kang Hyun-soo cleared out tutorial-exclusive achievements one by one.
One downside: No more info on items like the Guardian Ring from the Starting Room or the Gluttony Sword from the second tutorial.
‘There’s gotta be gear exclusive to the third tutorial.’
Unfortunately, no intel on it.
Not every top ranker blabbed about how they got their gear like Guardian God Lee Cheol-min or Sword God Lee Kwang-ho.
‘No need to sweat it.’
The tutorial was just the beginning.
Once he hit Atlantis dimension.
‘I’ll sweep it all.’
He’d monopolize items and achievements using everything he knew.
‘Sun’s setting.’
Time to call it.
“Let’s find a spot to crash soon.”
“Yeah, sounds good.”
The two searched for a suitable shelter.
Places near water that could be defended from monsters weren’t common.
‘Usually spot one or two while hunting.’
Not today. Zero finds.
‘Worst case, tree perch works.’
Sleeping on the ground was comfier, but trees weren’t impossible.
Kang Hyun-soo and Song Ha-na followed a stream, scouting for a stay spot.
That’s when they ran into a group of players.
“Huh?”
“Enemies!”
Clang!
The players drew weapons at the sight of Kang Hyun-soo and Song Ha-na.
“We’re not looking to fight.”
Kang Hyun-soo raised one hand slightly as he spoke.
“How do we know you mean that?”
The apparent leader eyed them warily.
‘Annoying.’
If Kang Hyun-soo wanted a fight?
They’d already be cold corpses on the ground.
“If I did, I’d have attacked already. Let’s just go our separate ways.”
Kang Hyun-soo replied in a voice thick with irritation.
“You’ll just bring friends back after we split? Drop your weapons!”
The leader shoved his weapon at Kang Hyun-soo’s throat, barking threateningly.
The other players quickly surrounded them.
‘What the hell happened to these guys?’
Murderer groups who PK’d like it was breakfast would’ve attacked leveraging numbers.
But these just threatened and demanded weapons dropped.
‘Hands shaking too.’
They encircled fast, but tension was obvious.
Most were probably greenhorns who’d never killed, maybe not even fought players.
‘Yeah, that’s the average.’
PK nets tons of exp, items, skillbooks.
‘But most don’t even know that.’
Even if they did, they wouldn’t jump straight to PK.
Killing people ain’t easy to begin with.
Seeing them as exp and item bags?
‘Only possible if you were a psycho back on Earth or got twisted in the tutorial.’
“Drop your weapons now!”
The leader raised his voice.
‘Kill ’em?’
The thought crossed his mind briefly.
Kill enemies.
That’s how Kang Hyun-soo survived Atlantis dimension.
But...
Staring at these rabbit-eyed players yelling desperately in front of a tiger, he couldn’t bring himself to.
‘Gotta cut rookies who can’t even hold it together some slack.’
Thwack!
Kang Hyun-soo’s fist smashed into the leader’s face.
“Gah!”
The leader crumpled, nose gushing blood.
“I won’t kill you.”
No killing rookies.
No killing.
Thwack! Thwack!
“Argh!”
“Ouch!”
Each swing of Kang Hyun-soo’s fist sent players screaming to the dirt.
Song Ha-na, who’d stayed put till now, drew her scabbard and started subduing them too.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
“Aaaagh!”
“Mercy!”
For a while, the sounds of beatings and pitiful screams echoed through the forest.
“I said I didn’t want to fight, right?”
Kang Hyun-soo glared darkly at the players kneeling on the ground.
“Yes!”
“Why pick a fight when you wouldn’t believe me?”
“Sorry!”
“We deserve death!”
“Please, just spare our lives!”
The battered players begged Kang Hyun-soo with teary eyes.
“I’ll let you live. But if you don’t want this again, don’t start trouble.”
With that, Kang Hyun-soo started to stand.
“We had our reasons!”
Then the players’ leader shouted, blood streaming from his nose.
“So?”
“Huh?”
“Reasons or not, what’s that got to do with me? Does having reasons make it okay to shove weapons in faces and threaten?”
“That was truly sorry. But we had no choice. The reason was...”
“Stop.”
Kang Hyun-soo cut off the leader mid-ramble.
“When did I say I wanted to hear your sob story?”
“W-well, no, but...”
“I’m not big-hearted enough to hear out guys who threatened me first, sympathize, and help. No time. Move.”
Kang Hyun-soo ignored the kneeling players and walked past.
Song Ha-na’s eyes flickered at his actions.
But the hesitation was brief.
Her gaze hardened again as she fell in step beside him.
That’s when it happened.
“Only made it this far?”
Another group of players emerged ahead.
Over twenty at a glance.
“A bit disappointing.”
The newcomers drew their weapons.
‘Who the hell are these?’
Kang Hyun-soo’s face twisted savagely at the new group.
He’d hunted monsters all day, fatigue piling up.
Stomach growling too.
Wanted to find a rest spot, eat, crash hard. But obstacles kept popping up.
Irritation boiled over.
“Oho, prey numbers went up? Think more heads means you can take us?”
“You murderer bastards!”
“Like we’ll go down easy!”
Clang!
Irritated or not, the two groups faced off, weapons drawn and curses flying.
‘These guys were being chased by murderers?’
Eavesdropping on the chatter painted the picture.
Didn’t kill the irritation, though.
“Kill them!”
“Run first!”
Standoff broke. The two groups moved.
One charged to kill, the other turned tail.
“What’s this guy?”
The murderer leader, at the front, thrust his spear at the idly standing Kang Hyun-soo’s head.
Clang!
Song Ha-na stepped in, blocking the spear.
“And who’s this bitch?”
The leader lunged at Song Ha-na.
But no quick win.
‘Might as well clean up around.’
Kang Hyun-soo drew his sword.
Slash!
The player charging him split in two.
That kicked it off.
Slash! Slash!
Kang Hyun-soo’s sword danced through the air.
Slicing down every foe lunging his way.
Three down in a blink.
“Wh-what?”
The sudden chaos startled the players who’d been gunning for the runners.
Thud!
Ignoring them, Kang Hyun-soo leaped, swinging and unleashing attack skills.
“Gurk!”
“Monster!”
No one blocked his strikes properly.
Each swing or skill cut lives short.
The enemies shifted, targeting Song Ha-na—who’d been fighting their leader—over Kang Hyun-soo.
‘No need to help her.’
Even outnumbered, Song Ha-na dominated.
Kang Hyun-soo focused on mopping up the rest.
Thanks to him and Song Ha-na, the enemy count—twenty-three strong—plummeted fast.