Chapter 22
As soon as I entered Buksan Mountain's Insubong Gate, I found a crowd gathered in front of the dismantling station.
Hunters who had finished their raid and the dismantlers were in the middle of negotiating the value of the monster.
Or rather, they were squabbling under the guise of negotiation, each side refusing to give an inch.
Had it really been two years since I started working with the dismantling crew?
Habits were terrifying things.
Before I even realized it, my feet were carrying me toward them.
I hurriedly changed direction, not wanting to stick my nose into other people's business.
I nearly greeted strangers with a friendly, "What seems to be the trouble this time?"
To clear my head, I shook it hard and headed deeper into the gate.
All I needed to do by habit was tap at my smartphone screen.
"Hm. Where's the Watcher likely to be?"
I looked around, but there was no sign of one anywhere.
Which made sense.
Their eyes were as huge as their heads, and just as sharp, letting them spot enemies from a very long distance.
If they were running away, they were probably already far beyond the point where I could notice it.
Besides, it was night.
Watchers could see their targets just fine day or night, but human eyes weren't nearly so accommodating.
And I didn't have a skill that let me track things flying through the air.
Even so, I strolled through the gate at an easy pace.
Watchers didn't live in packs, but they were monsters that knew how to cooperate.
When there were only one or two of them, they would run away from me. But once five or more gathered, their confidence swelled, and they would come flying in to kill me.
Just as I expected, a burst of colorful lights came flying at me in short order.
They were beams fired from the Watchers' eyes.
"Watchers...!"
The different-colored beams came at me fast and struck my vital points one after another.
Even from so far away that I couldn't clearly make them out, they aimed like seasoned snipers at the spots that would kill in one shot.
Head, neck, chest, both legs, and even my precious parts. One shot each.
From the number of beams, I could tell there were at least six Watchers gathered.
Maybe because I hadn't gone down.
Maybe they had planned a second attack from the start.
Either way, more of those colorful beams came flying in.
They hit the exact same spots as before.
It didn't hurt, thanks to the bark I had active.
It just felt very unpleasant.
"Ow, ow, that hurts~"
To fool the Watchers, I exaggerated my movements, spreading both arms wide and collapsing to one side.
If I stood there looking perfectly fine after taking a hit, the monsters would surely get spooked and run, even if their confidence had already shot through the roof.
So I played dead, making sure they would come over to inspect the prey they had dropped instead of fleeing.
And because I had turned my back to the direction of the beams, they wouldn't be able to see me tapping away at my smartphone screen either.
After I had been at it for a while, I heard the Watchers' shrill cries.
"Kieeeek!"
"Kiek, kieek!"
The sounds, impossible to tell whether they were calling to each other or just screaming, drew closer little by little.
At the sound, I stopped tapping the screen and instead peeked at the Watchers flying in from behind through the front-facing camera.
Six huge, spherical bodies with six enormous eyes covering half of each one flew quickly toward me, gave me a cursory look, then all at once turned their bodies around.
Then they opened mouths buried in octopus-like tentacles, ready to swallow my body whole.
Now!
I sprang up and thrust Warm Touch into the gaping maw of the closest one.
The moment my fingertip touched the roof of its mouth, the creature's jaws burst open and it died.
Just as I thought. Watchers were formidable attackers even among A-rank monsters, but their defenses were only at the level of B-rank monsters.
That was why they had earned the nickname "glass cannon," which meant even one blow from Warm Touch was enough to kill them.
"You too, die nicely!"
Two. Three.
Not wanting to miss my chance, I whipped my fingers around furiously.
In the end, the Watchers only realized what had happened after they found three of their dead comrades on the ground with their mouths blown open.
The remaining three fired beams of different colors.
With bark active, I didn't dodge and took the hits head-on while stabbing my index finger into them one after another.
If they had fled into the sky, I wouldn't have been able to chase them.
Whether they were trying to avenge their comrades or simply vent their rage, they didn't run. They fought to the end.
I stuffed the six corpses lying on the ground into my magic pouch.
"Hm. Better than I expected."
The Watchers' beams, infused with elemental magic, didn't work at all against the bark.
Even with attacks powerful enough to earn them the name glass cannon, the mana I spent blocking them was far less than the mana I recovered.
In other words, no matter how many times an ordinary A-rank monster attacked me, it wouldn't just fail to wound me. It wouldn't even be able to pierce the bark.
At this rate, maybe I could even stand toe-to-toe with that Skeleton Lord and win?
While I was thinking that, more colorful beams came flying toward my vital points.
Head, neck, chest, both legs, and even my precious parts. One shot each.
"......"
I let out a long sigh, then brushed my palms together.
The ones I had already killed were enough to satisfy the number of eyeballs Yu Jae-i wanted.
If I went straight to the dismantlers at the gate entrance, I could have the whole lot processed cleanly and head back to Jae-i's Blacksmith.
But... since I didn't have a sense skill, I had no way of knowing the quality of what was inside my magic pouch.
In other words, I couldn't tell whether it was good or bad.
If I was going to bring them back anyway, I might as well bring back the best quality I could.
"You soulless, inhuman eye monsters..."
More than anything else, I felt like I wouldn't be satisfied until I had avenged my precious parts.
＊＊＊
After my revenge, or rather, after the hunt, I stopped by the dismantling station.
I did have dismantling skills, but not enough to process an A-rank monster.
Medicine belonged to the pharmacist; monster dismantling belonged to the dismantlers.
As soon as I entered, the dismantlers who had been working on the Watchers glanced over at me.
Their looks weren't exactly friendly.
I walked over to the middle-aged dismantler with a thick beard.
"I'm here to have the Watchers dismantled."
"Put them down here."
The dismantler pointed behind him with his dismantling knife.
Just as I nodded and reached into my magic pouch to take out a Watcher, I met another dismantler's eyes.
He was the youngest one in the station and looked full of energy.
He stopped what he was doing and came over here.
He seemed to want to be ready in case some hunter caused a disturbance.
I might have thought he was overreacting, but I couldn't dismiss it that easily.
Hunters and dismantlers didn't exactly look at each other kindly.
Hunters often saw dismantlers as scammers trying to gouge them, while dismantlers often saw hunters as clueless brats.
On top of that, these guys had been arguing with the hunters earlier.
Even though I hadn't done anything, just being a hunter probably wasn't going to make me look all that good to them.
"I brought back quite a few. Is that all right?"
"Let's check their condition first."
I nodded and took the Watchers out of my magic pouch one by one, laying them on the ground.
The middle-aged dismantler and the young one both let out exclamations.
The two of them crouched down and slowly examined the Watchers I brought out.
"Oh..."
"Yeah, yeah. That's it."
The two dismantlers grinned as they looked at the dead Watchers, whose eyes had lost all light.
That was a little creepy, so I flinched and froze for a moment.
Both of them turned to me at once and asked, "You said you brought back a lot?"
I took out the rest of them.
As I pulled each Watcher from the magic pouch and laid it on the ground, more dismantlers began gathering around.
Just like the first two, they let out admiring sounds as they looked at the Watchers.
What was going on?
I couldn't make sense of their behavior.
What was so astonishing that people who dismantled hundreds of Watchers a day were gathering around and marveling like this?
The young dismantler stood and asked me, "Why didn't you stab them in the eyes? That's their weak point."
"Huh?"
What was this new and astonishing bullshit?
I had come here to get the Watchers' eyeballs.
So how could I possibly get the eyeballs if I stabbed them in the eyes?
"I came here to get the eyeballs. Why would I stab the eyes?"
"Exactly! That's it!"
"......?"
"These days, hunters just don't know that! They come because they heard Watchers are expensive, then after working hard to hunt them, they throw a fit about why they're only getting that much. They accuse us of scamming them!"
The young dismantler's eyes sparkled as he rattled off his words.
Listening to him, I could also understand why the dismantlers had been arguing with the hunters earlier.
And probably why they had been so amazed by the Watchers they must have dismantled countless times before.
"Watchers are expensive because of these eyeballs! If you stab and slash them all up and bring them in, what are you supposed to do then? Shouldn't they at least know why the thing they caught is valuable?"
"Hah, haha. Right, of course..."
"Park Il-seok, calm down. This hunter didn't do that."
"Ah... right. Sorry. You're right, boss."
"No, no. It's fine."
I waved a hand at Park Il-seok, who was apologizing.
I could understand why he was venting his frustration.
Back when I worked as a team leader in the management division at Baekuncheon, one of my main jobs had been mediating between hunters and dismantlers.
If people from the same guild fought like that, how much worse would it be for hunters and dismantlers with no shared affiliation at all?
"Hunters do tend to hunt them way too carelessly."
As I said that, I looked over at the Watchers the dismantlers were working on.
Most of them had been stabbed in the eyes or slashed across them.
The eyes were the expensive part, yet they had attacked them recklessly, treating them as a weak point.
If you did that, there was no material left to take from a Watcher except the tentacles and teeth.
In other words, after all that hard-won hunting, you couldn't even get a proper price for them.
It really was nothing short of foolish.
Maybe they were thinking the same thing, because the people gathered around me all nodded.
"That's right. If it weren't for those eyes, there'd be no reason to hunt Watchers at all."
That was true.
You could use a Watcher's tentacles and teeth.
They had their uses.
But they didn't sell like crazy, so you couldn't get a proper price for them.
There were plenty of things that gave better results for the cost.
"But the reason we're surprised is that you brought them in dead without a single scratch on the eyeballs."
"That isn't all. Look at this."
The man Park Il-seok had called the boss grabbed a Watcher's tentacle and lifted it up.
With its mouth hanging open, the inside was visible, and people leaned in to inspect it. The interior looked like it had been torn apart by a bomb.
"This wound is what killed the Watcher, and they're all on the mouth or under the eyes. That means you got close to these things."
"That's right. I got close and took them out in one strike."
"Exactly! That's the truly shocking part. Even if Watchers are glass cannons, most people hesitate to get close because of their attack power."
"And look at the number you brought in. I saw this kid walking past earlier when we were arguing with those amateurs."
"Huh? Then you're saying you hunted this many in less than three or four hours. Watchers run if they're injured partway through... Ah, but if you killed them in one shot, then I guess they couldn't run anyway."
The dismantlers left me standing there and started chatting among themselves.
Still, thanks to that, the ones who had been looking at me a little coldly had turned into people wearing satisfied expressions as if nothing had happened.
As for me, I was so embarrassed I wanted to get the hell out of there.
I figured I should change the mood somehow.
If I didn't, they looked ready to keep talking for another few dozen minutes.
"Um, how long will the dismantling take?"
"Hm? Ah! Good grief, look at us spacing out."
"It's understandable. It's been a long time since we've met a proper hunter."
"Haha, don't worry. We'll give it top priority and have it done in no time!"
When the boss said that, the dismantlers exchanged quick looks.
Then, moving with perfect coordination, they began taking the Watchers away one by one and starting the dismantling work.
Just like Park Il-seok and the boss had done earlier, they were grinning as they worked.
Hoo... What am I supposed to do? These people are kind of scary.