Chapter 36
Chapter 36
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 36
Chapter Title: Cultist Hunt #4
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"Greedy usurpers, blinded by avarice."
"U, usurper...?"
A heavy voice echoed through the space, and one hunter voiced his doubt.
"Ignore it. That's just another scripted line from the manual."
If they had charged into the themed stage without Do-yoon's intervention and failed to please the cultists during the process of aiding them...
Their leader, High Priest Belnar Negrim, would step forward personally to drive out the hunters with lines like that.
In other words, it meant they had reached a point of no return.
"Leave our vessel behind and depart this place now. Do so, and we shall not hold you accountable."
"Hmph!"
Even faced with the threat to abandon her, the young true ancestor serving as the vessel showed no sign of agitation, merely snorting roughly.
No other hunter might matter, but Do-yoon would never abandon her.
She and Do-yoon were already bound by a bond as strong as family.
It stemmed from the 'mystery' brought by the Wine Lord's intervention, but what mattered was that both Eira and Do-yoon were fully content with their relationship.
"So you're the cult leader?"
"How dare you call the order I belong to 'cultists.' Do you have a death wish?"
"Kidnapping and torturing an innocent child without cause? If that's not cult behavior, what is?"
"All are mere trifling sacrifices for the greater cause."
At those words, Do-yoon glanced at Eira, who was clutching his hand tightly.
-Crunch!
An ominous grinding sound came from her molars; clearly, the cult leader had thoroughly irked her.
"Oppa, Do-yoon oppa."
"Yeah."
"Me."
But the emotions welling in her eyes weren't solely malice toward them.
"Did I really do something wrong...?"
What had started as a game had already led to the slaughter of dozens of cultists.
With her head cooled by the immediate satisfaction of revenge, Eira now had room to reflect.
On whether she herself was truly a monster for committing such acts.
"No."
Do-yoon met the eyes of Eira, who wore a sorrowful expression.
"You're doing great."
"...!"
Yet such guilt washed away in an instant at Do-yoon's affirmation.
Her gloomy face brightened, her cheeks flushing as she heard the answer she'd secretly longed for.
She could do as she pleased.
It wasn't wrong.
The result of finally confronting the answer she'd desperately yearned for amid endless hell...
Eira beamed radiantly and hugged Do-yoon tightly.
"Insane."
Belnar Negrim, watching them, felt a strange disconnect from the unbelievable scene.
'Th-that bastard is receiving aid from the object...!'
When he first received the report, he'd dismissed it as coincidence.
Their relationship was surely one-sided, coerced by threats against the true ancestor, not one of mutual complement.
After long experimentation that shattered her psyche, she could only exhibit such behavior—he was certain of it.
"Do you even realize what you're doing?"
"Ugh, so tiresome."
"...What?"
Do-yoon had heard those exact words countless times before.
Whenever anyone saw him with the object, they spouted the same lines.
"Is that another canned line?"
"Insolent...!"
Only then did the high priest grasp the implication, surging with rage as he drew forth his mana.
-Drip.
Blood-red lightning-shaped mana flowed along the ground, asserting its presence.
"...Do-yoon."
From behind Do-yoon, who held the object's hand tightly.
He turned at the anxious voice calling him, spotting the lanky hunter he'd seen before.
"What?"
"That guy's dangerous. Coordinate with the other hunters while..."
"I know. No one's rushing in close from the start anyway."
A brute force clash would be handled by Eira.
He just needed to support her as always.
If a dangerous strike came from a blind spot now and then, he'd step in to protect her then.
"Tell the other hunters too."
"...Got it."
To prevent any needless deaths, just in case.
Hunters were the type to go blind for immediate rewards, so they needed a tight leash.
-Swish.
At the spot where Do-yoon and the hunters gathered.
'Seven.'
Exactly that number remained on site.
The rest were out hunting the scattered cultists.
"I'll say it once more."
Gazing at the cultists massing behind the high priest, Do-yoon issued his final warning.
"Absolutely do not advance. We handle the high priest ourselves. Everyone else, deal with the regular priests only."
"..."
No reply came.
'Black-hearted bastards.'
Guessing the meaning behind that silence, Do-yoon swallowed a sigh and gripped his curved sword's hilt tightly.
"Grant these foolish usurpers a gruesome death."
"Only the true path endures!"
At the high priest's command, the priests simultaneously entered combat stance in unison.
"Here they come."
With Do-yoon's curt signal, the hunters surged into the battlefield without waiting for one another.
"Grab 'em and crush 'em!"
"Catch these guys and we get the rewards! That hidden piece!"
"If we head back from here, her and..."
"Hey, shut that idiot up. Don't raise flags here..."
"Hee hee."
With Eira's innocent giggle as the finale, Do-yoon's group clashed against the priests.
-Crackle!
"Magic! Block it!"
⚡ SKILL ACTIVATED ⚡ Barrier (D) As the priests' blood-red mana surged, the hunters swiftly deployed defensive magic.
-Boom!!
The two spells collided fiercely in midair, kicking up dust clouds that obscured vision momentarily.
"Where! Where are they!"
"You idiot! After a sudden blast like that...!"
If there was a flaw on the priests' side, it was their lack of professional combat training.
Specialized only in overwhelming foes with sheer mana volume—
They had scant experience clashing against comparable forces.
-Hiss...
They strained to peer through the gaps in the thick dust, but it was no easy feat with normal vision.
-Crackle.
And through it, the fruits of their own labor gleamed red, asserting a sinister presence.
"Idiots."
Following her cute contempt, iron-chain-formed mana shot forth.
-Crunch!
"Gahk...!"
A priest pierced through the heart in an instant vomited blood and was yanked away.
"Wh-what!"
"It's the true ancestor! True ancestor's mana! Brace for attack!"
A priest who recognized the attacker spat warnings frantically, but there was little they could do.
"C-can't see a thing...!"
-Crunch!
"Raine just got dragged! Need backup! Support, now...!"
"Don't panic! If the line breaks now, we're all dead! No fleeing!"
"Uwaa, uwaaaa!!"
Terror-stricken priests fired mana wildly in all directions, only exposing their positions further.
"Fun."
"Kiek!"
A cultist whose ankle was seized let out a shrill scream before vanishing skyward, ensnared by red chains.
"What in the..."
"Get your head straight."
The lanky hunter poked his head beside the dumbfounded hunter.
"Each of those necks means bundles of EXP. Don't miss, give it your all."
That was all he had to say.
The lanky hunter gathered strength in his legs, then charged the priests like a tycoon diving into a pile of cash.
"......"
Watching him, Rakiya Bells gazed at the axe in her hand, her black hair fluttering.
No desire to deny it now.
She simply wanted to gauge the limits of that man rampaging alongside the object up front.
'Just what.'
-Whoosh!
"Grk!"
The swung curved sword sent a cultist clutching his throat crumpling to the ground.
In the chaotic melee, where one might hesitate, Do-yoon pressed on relentlessly, as if every possibility were mapped in his mind.
His beast-like gaze fixed solely on one target.
"You rat!"
The high priest, nursing a headache from Do-yoon blocking attacks through the priests' gaps.
Her gaze lingering there, Rakiya Bells began cleaving other priests with her axe.
Though stymied by Do-yoon lately, her prowess among hunters was no slouch.
-Whoosh!
"Get lost."
With chilling words, the massive axe swung.
Catastrophic strength hidden by her slender frame unleashed alongside calamity's visage toward the offering.
-Splat!
The human-shaped chunk of meat flew through the air.
Rakiya Bells continued channeling mana, sweeping the battlefield.
'To that man.'
Instinctively pursuing the man's back she'd yielded to unconsciously.
'To that man, at least.'
If she couldn't claim results from the stage itself, she had to secure some somehow.
'Baby sis, go snag a decent guy—even kidnap him if you have to.'
'Our world's full of weaklings anyway~'
Rakiya Bells.
A hunter from a world where women overwhelmingly excelled in hunter aptitudes.
And her position there: the chieftain's daughter.
She bore the duty to secure worthy seed.
'It's clear.'
That man undoubtedly possessed reliable seed to entrust the future to.