S-Rank Calamity (1)
I glanced back just in case and caught sight of Kim Seongmin scrambling to gather his gear and hurry after me.
He’s following just fine on his own.
I climbed into the official vehicle and turned the key. By the time the engine of the fifteen-year-old junker truck finally caught, Kim Seongmin had hopped into the passenger seat.
“Are we really going to the public health center?”
I answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“Of course we are. When a calamity breaks out, dispatched clinic healers are supposed to assemble at the public health center.”
“I know that already!”
“Even contract workers have to fulfill their duties. Healing injured civilians is a healer’s job, isn’t it?”
I did my best to keep my voice calm as I soothed him.
An S-rank calamity had appeared. I couldn’t pin down its exact origin, and part of me desperately wanted to run right then and there. At the same time, as a healer who had awakened a Mystery of healing, a fierce sense of responsibility to rescue the wounded filled my chest.
I was only F-rank, but a healer was still a healer. When abnormal phenomena of calamity grade or higher struck, healer-type Awakened were the ones who could get aid to civilians the fastest.
“Put on your protective suit and reinforce your mental barrier… F-ranks like you will corrupt the second you take even a little of the negative energy an S-rank calamity radiates.”
As if he had suddenly come to his senses, Kim Seongmin offered advice that almost sounded senior-like. I gave him a crooked smile.
“Don’t worry. I’ve been famous around the neighborhood for having a strong mind ever since I was a kid.”
With that half-joking remark I pulled on the protective suit. Once I confirmed Seongmin had finished changing into his own in the passenger seat, I drove the truck straight toward Donghae Central Public Health Center.
“Looks like a war broke out.”
Seongmin muttered from the passenger seat.
He was right—Donghae was in chaos as if war had truly come. The only silver lining was that everyone was fleeing the city to escape the S-rank calamity, so the road to the public health center was wide open.
Thanks to that, we managed to cut through the turmoil and arrive without being late.
“Security’s tight.”
“Of course it is. A calamity-grade phenomenon just happened.”
Soldiers and hunters packed the area around the public health center. The soldiers were helping evacuate blood-soaked civilians, while hunters armed with Mysteries moved in groups toward some destination.
“Those are the hunters under the local government, right?”
I asked Seongmin. He nodded and spoke.
“Yeah. They don’t look like they’re in great shape.”
We parked the truck haphazardly and ran into the public health center together.
“You’re the dispatched healers?”
As we rushed inside, someone in a protective suit hurried over and asked. I answered with a nod, and she pointed toward the central lobby stairs on the first floor.
“Head to the conference room on the third floor. Everyone else is already there.”
“Thank you.”
I replied and sprinted up to the third floor.
The conference room normally used for events was already packed with dispatched healers who had answered the assembly order.
Quite a few people must have fled, though—there were still plenty of empty seats.
“Civilian casualties at the calamity’s point of origin are severe. We need healers to support relief efforts on-site.”
Once enough dispatched healers had gathered, the director of the public health center stepped forward. With a rigid expression he explained that they needed volunteers willing to rush to the disaster site and rescue civilians.
No one stepped up. This wasn’t a B-rank or A-rank threat—it was an S-rank calamity. One that could erase an entire province like Gangwon-do on its own.
With no way of knowing when support from the capital-area hunters would arrive, not a single healer present felt bold enough to charge into a site where an S-rank calamity was running wild.
On top of that, the vast majority of the healers in the room were contract dispatched healers, and more than ninety percent of them were D-rank or lower.
If they faced the negative energy pouring off an S-rank calamity head-on, they wouldn’t last ten seconds.
Professional hunters on-site would raise barriers and provide cover, but no one wanted to risk mental pollution for the sake of civilians whose faces they didn’t even know.
Everyone’s being way too cold.
I clenched my teeth.
I understood why the healers hesitated, yet it still made me furious.
“I’ll volunteer.”
By the time I came to my senses, I had already volunteered for the relief team that would risk death racing into the city center.
The director of the public health center looked thoroughly startled—his eyes went wide. He probably never expected an F-rank healer to volunteer, without a shred of fear, to go save civilians in a place where an S-rank calamity was rampaging.
“Healer Lee Jinwoo. Excellent.”
A smile spread across the director’s face.
“I’ll volunteer as well.”
“Me too.”
“I’m not much, but I’ll join you.”
Volunteers stepped forward. There weren’t many, but it was enough to form a single team.
“Good. The equipment is already loaded in the vehicles, so let’s move out right away.”
Under the director’s command, the volunteers—including me—moved in crisp unison.
The moment the hastily assembled relief team members left the public health center building and reached the parking lot—
KWA-AAAANG!
An explosion and the shockwave that followed slammed into me.
“Gah!”
I was swept away by physical force I couldn’t even begin to resist and tumbled across the ground. Through pain so intense it felt like my bones were shattering, I barely managed to lift my head.
The Donghae Public Health Center building that had been perfectly intact moments earlier was now completely wrecked.
“Oh my god…”
Waves of pitch-black water rolled across the debris. From within them, a fish-man gripping a spear strode out on two legs.
The instant my eyes met the murky gaze of that fish-man—its rotting flesh wreathed in corrupted waves—horrific agony crashed over me.
“Ghhhaaaah…”
It wasn’t just my organs twisting; it felt like my brain was burning in real time. The pain was so extreme I could barely hold onto my sanity. I clutched my head and rolled on the ground.
I thought I heard gunfire and shouts—soldiers and hunters trying to counterattack—but my ears were ringing and my vision had gone black, so I couldn’t tell up from down.
“Healer Lee Jinwoo! Snap out of it!”
The director’s voice reached me, and the pain lessened. When I opened my eyes, the director was standing in front of me, maintaining a white barrier while confronting the calamity alongside the other hunters.
“Reinforce your mental defenses. One slip and you’ll corrupt on the spot.”
I nodded at his words and focused. Drawing up the power of my Mystery made the oppressive energy choking my head and chest thin out a little.
“An S-rank calamity—the Deep Sea Prince of the Corrupted Ocean. I thought the Formless Sword had already subdued it… looks like it still had some life left.”
The director explained.
“The subjugation team will be here soon. Don’t worry.”
No sooner had he spoken than hunters radiating powerful auras appeared from every direction.
“I-It’s the Lord of Gangwon!”
“A-rank hunters! The subjugation team is here!”
“We’re saved!”
Amid the cheers, the Lord of Gangwon and the rest of the subjugation team unleashed their Mysteries all at once, neutralizing the negative energy of the S-rank calamity.
It’s easier to breathe now.
My breathing grew freer, and the crushing pressure and pain that had been weighing down my entire body faded.
“I’ll take the lead on the attack. Team One, with me. Team Two, support the evacuation of the wounded and civilians.”
The Lord of Gangwon, dressed in flamboyant shaman’s robes, pulled talismans from his robes and flung them. Dozens of yellow talismans marked with crimson characters traced bizarre trajectories as they streaked toward the Deep Sea Prince from every side.
“Grrraaaah…”
The Deep Sea Prince raised black waves to block the talismans. But the Lord of Gangwon’s talismans released an uncanny power, sealing the prince’s waves into spherical forms and locking them in midair.
“Now!”
At the Lord of Gangwon’s command, the dealers who had been waiting charged the Deep Sea Prince. With all its black waves sealed, it looked defenseless—yet the Deep Sea Prince never lost its composure.
Come to think of it, even without its waves, the thing still held a spear in its hand.
“W-Watch out—”
A sudden sense of dread made me try to shout a warning, but the Deep Sea Prince’s counterattack was faster.
“Gyaaaaah!”
“Kh… kuhk!”
I didn’t even see it.
In that fleeting instant, hunters struck by the spear the Deep Sea Prince thrust out collapsed, blood gushing from their entire bodies.
“This is… gah!”
A hole opened in the Lord of Gangwon’s body as he reached for another talisman. He staggered yet still flung the talisman in a counterattack, but unlike before, this one had almost no effect.
“This can’t be…”
More than a dozen A-rank hunters had been taken down without a chance to fight back. Even the Lord of Gangwon—who was said to possess power approaching S-rank within the Gangwon region alone—was struggling desperately. I couldn’t help but feel despair.
Only moments earlier I had been armored in the noble spirit of sacrificing myself to save civilians. Now the desperate urge to run away was all that remained.
Facing a colossal calamity, the collapse of one’s resolve happened in the blink of an eye.
“Director… are you all right?”
I asked the director of the public health center with a stiff face. He had been maintaining a barrier that neutralized negative energy to minimize mental pollution, but ever since the Lord of Gangwon began to lose ground, keeping the barrier up seemed to be taxing him—he was pouring sweat.
“I can still hold for now, but if the Lord of Gangwon falls any further, I won’t last long either.”
We were only enduring because the Mysteries of the Lord of Gangwon and the other hunters were neutralizing the negative energy.
“I’m sorry. I’m just an F-rank who can’t even raise a barrier…”
If only I had a stronger Mystery—if I could have raised even a weak barrier—I might have been of some help.
Overwhelmed by sheer powerlessness, I hung my head. Just as the thought that this was the end of everything crossed my mind—
“What a troublesome fish-head you are.”
A woman in a black dress appeared on the battlefield amid a swarm of dark-crimson butterflies. I recognized her at a glance.
It was Baek Soyeon, the Formless Sword—the very S-rank hunter Haeun had warned me about over and over.
The S-rank hunter who should have been resting at a seaside villa due to mental pollution had just joined the fight.