Chapter 67
Chapter 67
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 67
Chapter Title: Riot and Super Giant Summoning
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Boom!
The top floor of Yeonhwa Palace. The outer walls had returned to their former splendor, but the interior finishing was still shoddy in the guild master's office.
“Di-did you call for me!”
The team leader of Gate Management Team B kicked the door open and stomped footprints into the office. The momentum kicked up dust, mixing with the fresh paint smell unique to a new build and acrid smoke that clogged his breathing.
“Cough...!”
In the end, the team leader coughed right in front of the guild master—an unforgivably rude act.
“......”
But Guild Master Choi Seong-han didn't seem to mind much. Instead, he flicked his cigarette to the floor. Crunch...! And ground it underfoot several times.
It was hard to see the action as anything but laced with emotion. The team leader gulped repeatedly. Strangely, he felt sweat trickling down his back.
It was December, far colder than usual, and in the highest spot in all of Korea. With no heating system installed yet. An environment that should have been freezing, yet the team leader felt like he was trapped in a hellish inferno.
“......Speak.”
Seong-han, the source of that heat, murmured lowly. His gaze remained fixed out the window. Toward the distant sea, perhaps.
To the perpetrator—the team leader's eyes—the view was nothing but the building itself.
But for an S-Rank hunter like Seong-han, he might be watching the construction site in Incheon. Finishing that thought, the team leader finally spoke.
His words came out at a rapid clip. Just in case he thought it was a slow report, a half-hearted one.
“W-we expanded the scanner across all of Seoul... and even Gyeonggi Province, but n-no additional detections.”
“......Do you think that makes sense? We provided ample mana samples.”
Molrangtori, Slime Ball, and even Molrangtex. The mana of the anonymous new S-Rank hunter in Korea—a monster summoner—extracted at premium prices, cycling through research teams.
If mana was used, the scanner had to pick it up. Just like that massive blood-clot monster that first appeared before their eyes long ago.
“Doesn't it strike you as odd? The scanner always operates the same way, so why haven't we found a single trace since that day?”
“Th-that's...”
“Even after Yeonhwa Palace ended up like this? Even after the Dragon Rider showed up recently? It's strange. Too strange.”
Seong-han didn't raise his voice. He'd maintained the same tone from start to finish.
That's why the team leader felt even more fear. Seong-han's aura, the mana pouring from him, prickled and tormented his skin.
Seong-han exhaled a long breath and rummaged in his suit pocket. What emerged was a cigarette. The strongest one from Hwaryeon, made exclusively for Awakeners.
So potent it was banned for hunters below A-Rank.
“H-here you go!”
The team leader scurried to his side. Click. He lit the lighter and held it up to Seong-han.
Less quick wits than raw survival instinct demanding it.
“Fuuu......”
Thick black smoke bloomed around them. Smog clung to the spotless glass windows, and cough! The unlucky team leader who inhaled it coughed again.
“......”
Sticky liquid on his hand. Blood? Or just saliva soaked in smoke?
No time for the team leader to fuss over such trivia. Wipe. He rubbed it roughly on his pants, then began his excuse... no, explanation.
“It seems like a type where the mana's properties change.”
“...Go on.”
“S-so, the probability is high that it uses differently structured mana each time it summons a monster...... that's our assessment.”
A fairly logical explanation. At least, that's how Seong-han saw it.
All the mana samples Hwaryeon had were extracted from items made using slimes.
And it wasn't an entirely impossible theory. There was that kitsune, right? A bizarre monster that could alter its own mana.
Just one sticking point: that blood-clot from back then. The only monster the Hwaryeon mana scanner had ever detected.
Some kind of glitch or fluke? Or... an accident from the user's inexperience?
“Fuu......”
Seong-han furrowed his brow. No clear answers. Doubts just spawned more doubts.
Did the S-Rank summoner summon their monsters outside gates? Or tame ones found inside and bring them out?
The realistic bet was the latter. Monsters from the Baekya Gate, as theorized?
Crunch! Convinced of the likelihood, Seong-han crushed his lit cigarette.
That's why gate mana extraction needed to succeed. Probably monsters from the S-Rank gate underground at Baekya. The very gate that founded Baekya in the first place.
They'd even prepped access tunnels to Baekya Castle's basement... though relentless purges had rendered them pointless now. Without that explosion, the mana theft would've worked.
Their luck was rotten. Beyond rotten.
Gates were usually stable; accidents like that didn't happen lightly...
......Boom!
A massive sound echoed. An explosion from far away. Even the dull-sensed team leader heard it clearly.
Black smoke from the dropped cigarette on the floor. And far off, smoke several times blacker billowing up.
“......”
Seong-han frowned. His face half crumpled. Because he could see it clearly.
An A-Rank monster rampaging on the bridge. Possible only because a gate had spawned over the sea—a rare monster escape from a B-Rank gate.
**
Does a monster's size correlate to its rank?
My answer to that:
‘It tends to, with high probability.’
Size alone doesn't gauge ability.
Even among humans. Not all S-Rank hunters were tall and built.
But if it's absurdly huge, odds are it's high rank.
Take the mini golem I'm about to create... no, just the golem itself.
“Then I'll begin.”
Over the three-day prep, Ha-young finished processing the massive Moon Shadow Stone, and I drew up blueprints for the golem to summon.
I ran simulations over and over, and even for me—a veteran in monster summoning—tension built.
Unexpected audience aside. My trusty trio of staff stood behind me, beaming like parents watching a kindergartener's talent show.
“Dawn, fighting~”
Unclear if teasing or sincere, I focused my mind amid the cheer. Before, I'd embed Moon Shadow Stones into summoned golems. Today, the reverse.
‘Build the golem around the Moon Shadow Stone.’
Stick to old ways, and the factory yard could've turned into a sandy beach.
Humm!
I wove the thinnest threads for a basic sketch. Then layered thick mana flesh over the frame.
Huge, but not crudely so. Do that, and it might be unusable—straight to scrap.
Reasons to summon it abounded, but the biggest one:
‘For mass-producing Molrangtex.’
Hence, it needed to be sheddable. A non-shedding type like Mini would've been like tossing the Moon Shadow Stone in the dirt.
Drip.
Sweat beaded, then fell. Whirr! Seolbaek-i on my head cooled me, stabilizing stray mana strands now and then.
“......Never seen anything like this.”
“Real deal S-Rank. Gotta treat Dawn better from now on.”
“Knew it, so I signed a lifetime contract with Dawn ahead. Jina, you're...... screwed. Might need to watch for info newbies jumping from Baekya instead?”
“Seojin worries me more than me. Honestly, wondering if field tests even matter these days.”
The three started whispering. Normally I'd tune in, but not today. No headspace.
Mana input was massive. At least on par with summoning Seolbaek-i.
Meaning the golem would have S-Rank potential—or pure S-Rank.
That fact pleased me plenty.
My first official S-Rank summon, after all? Low-rank spawn would've bruised my ego bad.
Humm!
Ten minutes of effort. The giant golem's form completed. Now, link to the Moon Shadow Stone.
Mini golems fused organically before. Today, variables possible.
So I connected the stone directly to the golem core. Thin mana threads into the stone, turning it into a mana conduit.
Flash! Light burst forth. The familiar pale purple glow. Power from the Moon Shadow Stone infused the massive golem body.
Rumble......
“Wh-whoa!”
The ground trembled slightly nearby. The golem, sprawled flat, rose on its legs.
“......Huge!”
Finally centered, I had to crane my neck fully to meet its eyes.
Taller than the dense mana grass. Eyes just above the factory rooftop outhouse stared down.
.........!
It grinned. Then extended a thick hand toward me. Palm flat as possible, for me to climb on.
Hop.
I accepted gladly. Still some gritty sand, but it fused into one organism fast.
Roooar...!
It placed me atop its head. Novel experience. I'd always put familiars on my head; now total opposite.
“Hahahahahaha!”
Couldn't hold back the surging emotion—let it burst free.
Already pumped for the plans ahead.