Click, click!
A barrage of camera flashes blinded me. You’d think I would have gotten used to it by now, but apparently I really was a caterpillar that had to eat pine needles.
“Mr. Jin Taekyung! Did you clear the Gate?”
“If not, why did you come out so quickly?”
Questions rained down from the reporters. If the Gate security guards hadn’t been there, they looked ready to jam their microphones into my mouth already.
But that lasted only a moment. Before long, the initial frenzy gradually died down, replaced by confused voices.
“But… why is Jin Taekyung covered in blood like that?”
“The numbers don’t add up, either. The people behind him are Star Guild members.”
“They’re even tied up.”
“Where’s Won Myunghoon? I don’t see him, either!”
I could roughly imagine what we must have looked like on camera.
Me, drenched in the blood of monsters and Won Myunghoon. A dozen or so Star Guild members tied together in a line. And Butler Kim holding the rope in his hand as though he were walking a dog.
I suppose that reaction makes sense.
I licked my dry lips, then shook my head at Butler Kim as he tried to step forward on my behalf.
He had clearly tried to stop me, and I had refused. Since this had happened because of my choice, I was the one who had to deal with the aftermath.
“Mr. Jin Taekyung! What happened?”
“Please, just give us one comment!”
The commotion lasted only a moment. The reporters, who had caught the scent of a scoop, went wild.
I calmly watched the frenzied press corps before asking the young reporter at the front a question. He wore thick, horn-rimmed glasses.
“Who do you work for?”
The young man in horn-rimmed glasses flinched.
“Pardon? M-Me?”
“Yes. You.”
“Uh, well, that is…”
He had been shouting the loudest from the front, but apparently hadn’t expected anything like this to happen.
After panicking for a moment, the young man finally managed to speak.
“H-HunterTV.”
“Oh. Them.”
HunterTV was a channel that focused on Hunter-related issues and information.
It was a cable channel, but it was also a major broadcaster that drew higher ratings than terrestrial networks.
Since it was connected to what I was about to say, both the reporter and I were lucky.
“I’ll take questions.”
“Pardon?”
“There are too many microphones. I’ll focus on one.”
“So… an exclusive?”
“Whatever you want to call it. Shall we begin?”
He still looked like a greenhorn, but he was a reporter all the same.
The bewilderment vanished from his face, and his eyes shone brightly behind his glasses.
“How about a live broadcast?”
“A live broadcast?”
“Yes. Like at the Association last time. Real-time streaming.”
A real-time stream.
After a moment’s thought, I nodded.
“Let’s do that.”
iTube was the number-one video-sharing website.
Millions of channels, from individuals to organizations, were registered on the platform. Among them, HunterTV was a massive channel with several million subscribers in Korea alone.
At the same moment, the phones of HunterTV subscribers going about their daily lives all rang with the same notification.
Bzzzzt.
[HunterTV has started a live stream.]
[“Jin Taekyung Exclusive Live Broadcast.”]
The view count reached 100,000 almost immediately.
The screen was still black from the sudden influx of viewers. The chat window blazed like a furnace packed with firewood.
What is this? Why is there suddenly a Jin Taekyung exclusive live broadcast?
No idea. Feels like it hasn’t even been a day since Lord Fuck entered the Gate.
It’s an A-Rank Gate. He’s already out?
The buffering is absolute garbage.
Now I want some Butter Rings.
Oh, the screen’s up.
Everyone shut up and welcome Lord Fuck with the proper reverence.
Pop.
After the short but seemingly endless buffering ended, the video began to play.
The viewers saw a huge Gate and a young man standing tall in front of it. Their fingers flew across their screens.
It’s Lord Fuck!
Oh my god, fuck.
Please insult me!
Smack my ass, too!
Cut it out, you lunatics.
Jin Taekyung’s popularity was through the roof.
He had saved countless lives by suppressing a B-Rank Gate. His approachable, down-to-earth personality—unlike what people expected from an A-Rank Hunter—and even his bizarre stunt of accidentally swearing during an official press conference had kept him at the center of attention day after day.
But the frenzy lasted only a moment. The viewers soon noticed something strange and began voicing their doubts.
Why does he look like that?
Did Lord Fuck get hurt? He’s covered in blood.
The numbers are cut in half, too. And they’re tied up;;
What the hell is this? Something happened.
What’s HunterTV doing? If you’re going to start a broadcast, at least ask some questions.
Perhaps feeling the chaos in the chat, the HunterTV reporter finally opened his mouth.
“I’ll ask you directly. What happened inside the Gate?”
“It would take too long to explain everything from beginning to end… May I give you a summary?”
“Please do.”
Vrrrrr.
The camera zoomed in, capturing Jin Taekyung’s face in full.
His face was smeared with blood and dust, but his eyes shone calmly. Then a composed voice flowed between his parted lips.
“There was a Named Monster.”
“……!”
“It was a Mutated Gate.”
The noise from the scene suddenly fell silent, as though someone had pressed a mute button.
After pausing for a moment, the chat began scrolling upward like mad.
??
???
Wait, why is there a Named Monster here;;;
They must all be dead. No wonder so many people were missing;;
Is Won Myunghoon dead, too? I haven’t seen him since earlier;
Holy shit…
A major incident.
That was the phrase that flashed through everyone’s minds.
Even the reporter in horn-rimmed glasses, who had been holding the microphone toward Jin Taekyung, forgot his duty and stood there with his mouth hanging open.
A Named Monster.
Everyone knew how destructive they could be.
Five years earlier, a Named Monster that appeared in Central and South America had possessed enough power to destroy a small city on its own.
Although it was eventually defeated after several days of fighting, the damage had been enormous.
Hundreds of Hunters had died, along with ten times as many civilians.
It had been an incident that drew the attention of the entire world. Neither the reporters nor the viewers could have been unaware of it.
If that was really a Named Monster, surviving was a miracle;
No. Wait a second.
Then that means there’s still a Named Monster inside the Gate;;;
So what? It’s inside the Gate, isn’t it? Doesn’t that make it fine?
Did this bastard just get here from Mars? You idiot, don’t you know what happens when the mana level exceeds a Gate’s capacity? The monsters come pouring out.
The catastrophe in Central and South America a few years ago happened because the mana level exceeded the limit and the Gate opened;;
The Black Wyvern’s Nest? Does anyone know where it is?
Holy shit;; Get the reporters out of there first.
The reporters who had been staring back and forth between Jin Taekyung and the chat as if hypnotized suddenly came to their senses.
“A Named Monster!”
“Hey, get out of here right now! Grab the cameras!”
No scoop was worth more than their lives.
Just as the reporters, sensing the threat of death, began wading into chaos, someone who had been watching the entire situation finally spoke.
“Ah, the raid monster has already been taken down, so you don’t have to worry too much.”
The clear voice pierced everyone’s ears.
The reporters who had been trying to flee in a panic and the viewers staring at their phone screens while swallowing nervously both wondered if they had heard correctly.
“Pardon?”
“……What did you say?”
????
I think I heard that wrong.
What did Lord Fuck just say?
He says he killed a Named Monster…?
Who did?
Lord Fuck.
What did he kill?
A Named Monster.
Can he even do that?
I don’t know…
The camera, shaking as though caught in an earthquake, regained its focus. Dozens of cameras turned toward the young man’s calm face.
The reporter in horn-rimmed glasses asked Jin Taekyung in a trembling voice.
“C-Could you say that one more time?”
“It’s just as I said.”
“Then you really killed a Named Monster…”
“Yes. I killed it.”
He killed it? A Named Monster?
Everyone’s jaws dropped at the unbelievable words that had come from Jin Taekyung’s mouth. One reporter finally recovered enough to blurt out a question.
“T-Then did the others die in the process?”
“Seven dead. The rest are safe…”
He let his voice trail off, thought for a moment, then continued in an unwavering voice.
“Oh, I need to add Won Myunghoon to the death toll. Eight in total.”
“W-Won Myunghoon? Why did he…”
“Uh, well…”
Jin Taekyung hesitated briefly before adding another word.
“I got him.”
“……Pardon?”
“Ah, not caught. I killed—no, that sounds strange, too. Give me a moment.”
Before the aftershock of the Named Monster bomb had even faded, a second bomb went off.
The dozens of reporters at the scene and the 100,000 viewers watching the screen were left half dazed.
What the hell is he talking about?
At the exact moment everyone had the same thought, Jin Taekyung finally found what he considered the most appropriate expression.
“This is probably the best way to put it. I ‘disposed of him.’”
“…….”
“…….”
At the end of the heavy silence, a single line appeared in the frozen chat.
Did that guy just come back from sorting recyclables at home?
Everything proceeded quickly and smoothly. The investigation team dispatched in an emergency dug into the truth of the incident with speed and thoroughness.
It was a case drawing attention from countless people. If they missed even one detail, they might be cursed out for the rest of their lives.
“Handle this properly. Miss even one thing and you’re finished—finished!”
“This has already been reported all the way to the Blue House. If we slip up, we’re all going over a cliff together.”
The government and the Hunter Association’s leadership were both on edge.
Contrary to their concerns, however, it did not take long for every detail to be revealed beyond a doubt.
“Holy shit… He killed this thing by himself?”
“He actually killed it.”
The investigators were stunned when they confirmed that the enormous Named Monster lay gruesomely dead.
By then, every Star Guild member who had participated in the raid was tied to a cold metal chair in an interrogation room.
“I don’t know anything.”
“Look, Hunter. It’s going to come out in no time anyway. Why make things difficult?”
“I’m telling you. I don’t know anything.”
“Ha, you bastard… You’d spill everything with one mental spell, but you still have to be annoying.”
“Did you just swear at me? Just because you’re a prosecutor, you think you can do whatever you want? And don’t you know mental magic is illegal?”
Their lives were on the line. They couldn’t give up the comfortable lives they had enjoyed as B-Rank Hunters and rot in prison for the rest of their lives.
The prosecutors were racking their brains over the Star Guild members’ stubborn denials when an unexpected savior appeared.
“I-I’ll tell you everything.”
Kim Jonghun, the Star Guild’s Team 1 Leader, confessed to everything that had happened before he had fully recovered from his shaken state.
It was a perfect testimony. On top of that, an anonymous informant had sent a USB drive and a note.
The Hapsburphon family, a long-established German family of equipment makers, has produced rare and highly practical items. One of their representative products is the PSV-96K camera, which cannot be detected by any detection magic and functions normally even in Gates with unstable mana…
The prosecutor in charge looked at the note with an incredulous expression and asked the investigator,
“What is this supposed to mean?”
“They filmed the whole raid. There’s footage on the USB. Open it and you’ll see. That bastard Won Myunghoon was a real piece of shit.”
“Filming is illegal, isn’t it?”
“It is.”
“It was the Peace Guild, right?”
“Wouldn’t you say so?”
“…….”
“Let that much slide. Every Guild with enough clout does it. They didn’t leak it to civilians, and thanks to them, we secured conclusive physical evidence. We both benefit from this…”
Bang!
An employee burst through the door and held out his phone.
“H-Have you seen this?”
The number-one real-time search term was boldly displayed across the screen:
“Won Myunghoon Raid Footage Leaked.”
As the ugly side of a former star people remembered fondly was revealed, the internet boiled like a cauldron over hot coals.
What a fucking bastard.
My head is ringing. Is this really true? It’s not staged, is it?
Good riddance. Killing him was the right call.
Still, it’s clearly murder. Killing Won Myunghoon was a bit much…
└ Are you Myunghoon?
└ Can Wi-Fi reach hell?
└ Did King Yama set up a hotspot for you?
└ You’re calling this murder? Don’t you know what self-defense means?
Only two days had passed since the incident. Yet the backlash was fiercer than anything people could remember.
Every time the suspicions surrounding Won Myunghoon that had been buried in secret came to light, people boiled over with anger.
And when that heat of fury had swept through, they always ended with the same question.
So what is Jin Taekyung doing?
└ At this hour? Probably sleeping.
└ Probably sorting recyclables.
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