It Actually Works?
On the border between Cambodia and Thailand, Woojin's vehicle crawled along a narrow dirt road slicing through the dense jungle. The air-conditioned cabin was far more comfortable than it had been before, and from the back seat Woojin kept replaying the map of Prasup's fortress that Jihyun had sent him. Hmph. They were already starting to enter the bastards' territory. Even while they were on the move, his experience kept climbing steadily, thanks to Gabi's goblins clearing out monsters along the way.
“Huh?”
Gabi's big eyes trembled faintly as they focused on the empty air.
“Why, Gabi?”
“Appa, the blade went home.”
Woojin set the map aside and turned to look at her. “What? Gabi, what do you mean? Who went home?”
“The strong sword Appa gave me! You know the Blade Goblin made from it, right? He just went back to Goblin Home. I think he lost while wrestling with his friends.”
Woojin's brow furrowed. The goblins Gabi was talking about—the ones made from the strong sword—were creatures he had personally pushed all the way to +5, using the sword itself as their core. By rank, they were at least equal to a low-tier B-rank monster, and with intelligence to match, they were the kind of thing that could leave even a typical hunter party gasping for air. If one of them had "gone home," that meant the enemy had some serious muscle.
In the driver's seat, Catherine met Woojin's gaze in the rearview mirror, tension sharpening in her own eyes.
“Woojin-nim, these don't seem like ordinary trash. If Prasup really does have Unliworld survivors mixed in among their ranks, then it looks like they can mount an organized defense. You should probably stay on your guard.”
But Gabi's reaction had nothing to do with tension. She snorted through her nose, glared toward the forest, and tugged on Woojin's sleeve. “There are lots of bad Kim Seobangs out there! Really bad! Appa, the goblins can tell me everything they see. They're bullying people. They're the bad guys you were talking about.”
Gabi's eyes flashed with a cold light.
“Can I kill them?”
Woojin fell into thought. The quest required him to kill a hundred people with his own hands, but Gabi had been born from his own mana and was practically a shard of his soul, linked to him at the level of spirit. A wild hypothesis flickered through his mind.
“...Gabi. For now, could you kill just one? Just one person?”
“Mhm! Okay!” Gabi gave a light snap of her fingers.
Scary Goblin!!
Snap—!
The goblin grew frightened—and stronger.
Woojin, curious, asked, “What was that, Gabi?”
“The goblin gets scared. Then it gets stronger.”
“R-right?”
Ding—!
Progress: 1 / 100
Woojin checked his status window and stared blankly, his mouth hanging open. “...It actually works?”
Once he thought about it, the logic was perfectly straightforward. Gabi had been created from a combination of Woojin's skill, his mana, and an enhanced item. Under the system, anything Gabi destroyed was naturally recorded as Woojin's own achievement. Even a summoned creature with a linked soul killing an enemy was counted toward his murder tally.
A strange smile touched Woojin's mouth. The fact that he could clear the skill without staining his own hands eased the moral weight on his shoulders. No—if anything, it only removed the last reason he had left to hesitate about taking out trash like Prasup.
“Catherine-noona, there are still plenty of enhancement materials and weapons left on the supply truck behind us, right?”
Catherine caught on to his intention and gave a small snort of laughter. “Of course, Woojin-nim. The supplies sent by Benedict and the DH Group are piled up like a mountain.”
“Good. Bring them all out.”
Woojin stopped the vehicle and stacked hundreds of weapons in the clearing at the forest's edge. Swords, spears, axes, and shields upgraded to +5 glinted coldly under the sunlight. By now he was a level 43 veteran enhancer, and with his mana reserves having grown by leaps and bounds, enhancing hundreds of items was child's play.
Catherine came to stand beside him. “You're planning to solve this with quantity?”
“Mm. I'm going to raise the quality too, while I'm at it.”
“Quality?”
“Yeah. I'm not just limited to that enhancement skill, you know.”
Woojin extended both hands toward the two stacked weapons.
Imbuement.
Golden mana poured out like a waterfall and wrapped around the weapons.
Woojin didn't stop at simply boosting numbers; he began fusing the essence of different weapons into one another. He gave the sharp edge of a sword the piercing force of a spear, and mixed the crushing power of a mace into a heavy shield. It was a bizarre, dazzling alchemical scene—swords acquiring spear skills, axes merging with shields, and countless weapons whirling in the air as they were reborn as "composite weapons" with two or even three traits and abilities layered together.
Gabi stared at the spectacle, mouth hanging open around a mango. “Woooow... Is Appa a goblin god?”
“A god?”
“Mhm! Only a goblin god could make such amazing things so easily! Goblins are born from good things, so Appa is both the father of goblins and their god!”
Woojin laughed at her innocent praise, finding it oddly convincing.
“Haha, maybe you’re right. I guess you could look at it that way. All right, Gabi. Breathe life into these little guys.”
“Everyone, come out—! Ta-da—!”
The instant Gabi's power touched the fused pile of weapons, the clearing flooded with golden light. The goblins born from Woojin's earlier weapon bodies had simply been monsters shaped like weapons, but these newly created Imbued Goblins were different from the ground up. There were goblins in the shape of asura warriors with four arms, each hand gripping a different weapon; goblins in the shape of paladins, their bodies wrapped in shields as they held maces; and even flying goblins that hovered like drones, spraying bullets in all directions. One and all, they radiated pressure on the level of at least an A-rank monster.
Woojin bared his teeth in a grin. “Gabi. Sweep away every rotten smell in the forest.”
“Yep!! Everybody, let’s playyy—!!”
At the same time, in Prasup's ambush zone, Wichit was in high spirits after the concentrated barrage had just wiped out a handful of blade goblins. Around him, awakened criminal gangsters strutted about as though they had already won.
They were convinced the goblins were limited in number.
“All right. Keep cutting their numbers down bit by bit, then hit the main body. Summoners go down, and the summons all disappear with them, after all... Huh? What’s that sound?”
Wichit's laughter died. From deeper in the forest came a monstrous rumble as the ground shuddered beneath it, followed by a bizarre metallic clatter.
“B-Boss!! We’re in trouble!! T-there... look over there!!”
“Why, what is it, you idiot? If it's just a few more goblins coming...”
The instant Wichit turned his head, his eyes filled with horror.
What emerged from the trees was nothing like the blade goblins he had seen a moment ago. Cloaked in a massive golden aura and armed with composite weapons wrapped in flame and lightning across their four arms, they surged forward like a tidal wave.
“W-what the hell are those!?”
“Their appearance just changed, that's all! Intercept them!! Don't stand there like idiots—fire!! Cast spells!!”
At Wichit's order, the Prasup members unleashed everything at once. Fireballs, arrows, and bullets rained down on the goblins.
But—
Clang—! Clang—!!
Once the shield goblins formed a massive reflecting barrier, every attack bounced straight back into the Prasup members' own faces.
“Bad Kim Seobangs, go to hell!! Kraaahhh!!”
Instead of the sing-song chant they had made before, the goblins now roared like beasts. Chaos erupted.
“Aaaagh!! My arm!!”
“It's a reflect skill!! Watch out!!”
The imbued goblins showed no mercy. The four-armed goblins pushed through the forest like brush cutters, and the shield goblins slammed into armored vehicles until they became scrap metal. Only then did the Prasup members realize they had never been the hunters at all—they were rabbits thrown into the cage of starving tigers.
Back in the vehicle, Woojin reclined into his seat and checked the situation through his status window. The system box hanging in the right corner of his vision kept refreshing like it had gone mad.
Progress: 12 / 100
Progress: 28 / 100
Progress: 45 / 100
...
As Gabi's goblins marched toward Prasup's fortress, the system approved the lives of every "bad guy" they encountered and converted them into quest progress. ...Could he really get away with coasting like this? Woojin couldn't help letting out a snort. Yesterday, he had lost sleep over how he was supposed to kill a hundred people, and now the worry already felt embarrassingly distant.
Catherine smiled quietly at his relaxed expression in the rearview mirror. “Woojin-nim, Prasup's outer defenses have completely collapsed. It's only about thirty minutes to the fortress proper now.”
“Got it. Gabi, what's the next fruit?”
“Mhm! Next I'm eating a coconut! Appa, there aren't many bad guys left now. They're all running away!”
“Only the bad Kim Seobangs, not the good ones, okay?”
“Yep! I know!”
“Ah, and catch the boss. I've got a few questions for him.”
“The boss?”
“Mm. Wouldn't the strongest one do?”
Gabi split the coconut open with her bare hands and grinned. “Okay! Got it!”
At Woojin's command, a louder explosion boomed from far away in the forest.
The criminal castle built on human greed was collapsing like a sandcastle beneath the feet of a single enhancer. At a speed that had been unimaginable just two days ago, Woojin could feel it: he might actually be able to complete his second awakening before the day was out.
“Let's advance. Might as well see what Prasup's boss looks like.”