Chapter 91
Crash!
A bolt from a clear sky struck like judgment.
The moment they heard the thunder, the members of Dazol Guild made a single choice.
Run as far as they could, in any direction at all.
Scatter and flee.
But then... they realized something.
The building they were trapped in had become a prison with no way out.
One of their comrades had grabbed the doorknob to open the door and been knocked flat by an electric shock.
They couldn't get out through the door.
No, they couldn't get out of the building.
Even after they understood that, they still refused to give up.
Everyone inside the building rushed to the top floor.
They did it even though they knew they were being herded.
There wasn't an escape route prepared up there, like a teleportation circle or a warp gate.
They were simply being used as bait.
They knew Gong Woo-jae, the leader of Dazol Guild, had gone down to the basement, so they went upward to buy even a little more time.
"C-can the boss escape?"
"......"
One man asked the question.
No answer came back.
The answer was too obvious to need saying.
He couldn't escape.
What they were doing was nothing more than buying one or two minutes.
Thud, thud.
Footsteps climbed the stairs.
Every gaze on the top floor turned toward the sound.
A man with tousled hair.
"Han Jin-hwan...!"
The man whose name was called, Jin-hwan, smiled faintly.
Then he looked over the people huddled together in little groups.
He lifted his right hand.
Spreading his index and middle fingers.
"You all have two choices."
"T-that... what are they?"
"Be caught quietly. Or be caught painfully."
As he spoke, Jin-hwan walked between the members of Dazol Guild.
The guild members stood still and watched him stride through their midst.
The choice between the two options he offered was obvious.
One after another, they raised their hands.
"Quietly! I'll be caught quietly!"
"Me too! I'll just let myself be taken!"
"Please, just catch us and take us away!"
They knew all too well that they couldn't escape Han Jin-hwan.
If they were going to be caught anyway, being caught without pain was the smartest choice.
Han Jin-hwan looked back at them and laughed.
"Good thinking."
With a voice that sounded almost like he was scolding children,
Crash!
Another bolt of lightning came down.
The sound was so thunderous it shook the building.
At the crack of it, the members of Dazol Guild felt their ears ringing.
As the high, shrill whine gradually faded, they realized their arms had been bound.
Han Jin-hwan had tied them up.
Not one or two, but nearly twenty people at once.
At that moment, they felt one emotion all together.
Relief.
If Han Jin-hwan had meant to kill them rather than restrain them?
They would have lost their breath and died without ever even realizing they were dead.
Thunk, thunk...
Watching the people sag and sit down with long breaths, Han Jin-hwan scratched his head.
"Not here...."
After muttering to himself, he closed his eyes.
Mana crackled out from his feet.
It was a skill that sent electricity flowing out to search the surrounding area.
Soon he confirmed that two beings were facing each other in the basement.
Only, the size of the detected presence was a little strange.
It was so enormous it didn't seem human at all.
It felt as though he'd detected a monster inside a gate.
No way....
Han Jin-hwan opened his eyes and called to the man who had sat down.
"Hey."
"Y-yes? Did you call me?"
"Do you happen to know Gong Woo-jae can monsterize?"
"Y-yes! That's right! How did you know?"
"Perfect...."
"Huh?"
Waving his right hand, Jin-hwan closed his eyes again.
Then he sent his mana toward the basement.
The mana flowing out from his feet reached the basement in an instant.
It showed him the scene below.
Baek Do-woon and Gong Woo-jae, transformed into a troll, were staring at each other.
"Baek Do-woon can restore a monsterized human to normal."
Choi Hee-seok's words surfaced in Jin-hwan's mind.
When Choi Hee-seok had told him that, he had handed over a related report.
Unfortunately, the report was completely useless.
It described the process of Do-woon restoring Lee Jeong-geun to normal, but only the process itself. That was all.
It never explained how the effect actually worked.
A half-finished report.
That was what Jin-hwan had thought after reading it.
He had also assumed the person who wrote it wasn't especially good with paperwork.
"Holy...?"
Then Do-woon started doing exactly what the report described.
He changed his right hand into something like tree roots.
The root-like hand grabbed the troll and began sucking out all its energy.
When the troll's body shrank, Do-woon transformed his left hand into tree roots as well and shoved it into Gong Woo-jae's forehead.
From what Jin-hwan could tell, Do-woon was forcing his mana into Gong Woo-jae.
If you did something like that, wouldn't he die?
That thought flashed through Jin-hwan's mind.
But for some reason, no matter how much time passed, Gong Woo-jae didn't die.
He only cried out in pain.
Then, little by little, Gong Woo-jae's body began to collapse.
Instead of the troll-like body, a human body appeared in its place.
"......?"
How on earth?
Jin-hwan couldn't tell.
All he could see was Gong Woo-jae returned to his original human form.
"Hah, so now that I think about it.... that report was a perfectly accurate report after all?"
Jin-hwan let out a dry laugh.
＊＊＊
"A thick branch...?"
The absurd thought slipped straight out of my mouth.
The log that had become the body of Arca wasn't a thick branch at all....
I had never once considered that the log might be a thin branch or an ordinary branch.
"Haa, huck! Ha...."
I stared at the quest notification window, then shook my head.
I was curious what a thick branch would look like.
I was curious, sure, but now that it had come to this, I felt like it would be a waste to finish the quest immediately.
[I have defeated and won against the followers of the demon race. (7/10)]
Three more were left until the quest was complete.
Just three more and I'd meet every condition.
If the completion reward improved with every enemy I took down, then once I met all the requirements, I'd probably get something that made thick branches look like a joke.
If I had to guess, maybe something like the Fruit of the Previous World Tree.
"Haa, ha...."
"...You've been making a racket for a while now."
The owner of the breathing I'd been hearing all this time was Gong Woo-jae.
Even though he must have been in tremendous pain, unlike Ji Sang-wook, he hadn't passed out.
He hadn't lost consciousness, and he was still looking at me with his wits intact.
That said, his whole body was drenched in cold sweat as if he'd been caught in the rain.
He kept gasping for breath, and his arms and legs trembled uncontrollably.
Even so, his gaze stayed fixed on me.
His eyes were bright the way they had been when I was draining his strength.
What on earth was he thinking, staring at me like that?
It wasn't quite the look of a hunter stalking prey.
Was it because he was the leader of a guild that manufactured illegal drugs?
"Hah, hoo...."
"...You're impressive. I thought you'd pass out."
"Pain is, I'm used to it...!"
He cut himself off and clenched his teeth.
It seemed the sensation of pain was still clinging to his body.
Still, I could tell what he had been trying to say.
He probably wanted to say, "I'm used to pain."
Was his pain tolerance really that high?
Before long, the ragged breathing spilling out of Gong Woo-jae's mouth began to calm.
"Just now... what did you...?"
"Just now? What?"
I asked back, pretending not to know.
It was obvious what he was asking about.
He had heard me mutter "thick branch."
I had no intention of telling him, so I just stared at him.
"......"
"......"
He snorted a laugh.
A weak, helpless sound.
Then he turned his eyes away from me and started examining his own body.
The same unruffled expression he had worn before fighting me.
He was a remarkable bastard.
A few seconds later, Gong Woo-jae closed his eyes.
"You hit my heart...?"
"That's right."
"......"
"You won't ever be able to transform into a troll again."
And that wasn't all.
Gong Woo-jae wouldn't be able to use the power he had originally possessed either.
He had lost everything, just like Lee Jeong-geun.
His heart had broken down, the same as someone who used Heart Break.
Once Gong Woo-jae realized that, he only gave a small hum.
He lay there quietly and stared up at the ceiling.
Hmm.... That was strange.
How could he be so calm after losing everything?
Lee Jeong-geun had thrown a fit the instant he learned he'd lost his power.
No, it wasn't just Lee Jeong-geun.
Anyone who loses their power tends to lose their damn mind.
I was the same.
When I used Heart Break two years ago and lost everything....
I hadn't been any better than Lee Jeong-geun. Maybe worse.
If I had to choose the single biggest embarrassment of my life, I'd pick that time without hesitation.
And yet... Gong Woo-jae looked as if he'd already accepted this would happen.
"Looks like this isn't what you expected."
"Hm?"
"You seem to have thought I'd be desperate, or screaming in despair."
"...If I'm being honest, yeah. Why are you so calm?"
The answer was a smile.
He was smiling?
At the guy who had taken his strength away?
"Because I already gave up on everything."
"......?"
"The name Han Jin-hwan carries that kind of weight...."
"Ah."
"When I heard that name yesterday, I was prepared to die. If it ended with just losing my power... then that was a cheap price to pay."
"......"
"And more than anything else...."
"More than anything else?"
"...No. Never mind."
Then he shut his mouth.
And stared back up at the ceiling.
What was this guy, who seemed as though he'd risen above all of it?
Even saying he'd given up on everything,
even saying he'd been prepared to die,
how could he be this calm?
"Hey. Let me ask you one thing."
Gong Woo-jae, still looking up at the ceiling, turned his gaze toward me.
There was no hostility in his eyes.
Even Lee Jeong-geun had looked at me with a cringing sort of malice, but...
Gong Woo-jae's face held only a languid expression.
Was it because he'd truly accepted what he had said?
"Do you have anyone else in the guild who can monsterize like you?"
"There were. About four of them."
"Oh, really? Where are they now?"
That was a huge score.
About four of them.
If I drained the energy from those guys....
I'd be able to reach the first fruition, and the quest would be complete too.
But,
"They're all... gone a long time ago."
The words coming out of Gong Woo-jae's mouth left a bitter taste in my mouth.
There were, and about them, yes.
Come to think of it, everything he had said was in the past tense.
"All of them? Not one left?"
"I couldn't help it."
He added it like an excuse.
"They were no longer people I could call 'human'...."
"Damn it...."
Well, that made sense.
Ji Sang-wook had been the same.
When he transformed into a manticore, he couldn't keep his wits.
He only treated other hunters like prey and attacked them like a monster.
But there was a way to bring them back to their senses.
Two ways, in fact.
Feed them Saessak's morning dew.
Or drain their power through the World Tree Root.
I'd brought Ji Sang-wook and Lee Jeong-geun back to their senses with those two methods, respectively.
......
But I decided not to tell him that.
There was something lonely in Gong Woo-jae's voice.
I had a feeling the "they" he mentioned were probably his subordinates, or maybe his comrades.
I could understand what it must have cost him to deal with them.
"Just what the hell did you believe about Yoo Hye-joo that made you swallow those things?"
"Hm? No, I didn't swallow Baba or VP."
"......?"
"I'm a pro at manufacturing drugs too. Why would I ever take something like narcotics?"
"Then how did you transform into a troll?"
Gong Woo-jae wasn't Crowd.
When the followers of the demon race transformed, they still kept a human shape.
Bat-men, centipede-men, bee-men, that kind of thing.
Then how had Gong Woo-jae been exposed to V-substance?
"I took only the substance that turns a body into a monster.... I extracted that part and injected it directly into myself."
"Y-you insane bastard?"
The pity I'd felt a second ago vanished in an instant.
He injected it into himself directly?
So Gong Woo-jae had done that knowing he would become a monster.
Into his own body, and into the bodies of his comrades.
All for the sake of power.
No, that was just wrong....
Saessak: I can't even with the stupidity of this human.
Saessak: Waving its leaves at the human's foolishness right in front of us.