Chapter 420

What did people feel when they first encountered a monster?

Surprise, terror, fear, confusion?

I had no idea. It happened before I was born—or, technically speaking, back when I was still on my father’s side rather than inside my mother’s womb.

But those who witnessed that historic moment must have thought of the countless legends and myths handed down since ancient times.

Just as I did now.

Demon.

That was the word that flashed through my mind the instant I saw it. A massive body reaching three meters¹ tall. Bones covered in a black sheen. A shape resembling a human’s, yet fundamentally something else.

Fwoooosh.

Like the wings of a demon from myth, the robe draped over its body billowed as though it were alive.

The demon’s mere presence darkened the world—or rather, the Arch Lich’s red eyes cast an eerie glow.

“Human.”

Just one word.

The air around me trembled. From inside my Inventory, the Skeleton Warlord muttered with a groan.

“The lord of the undead…”

His voice was steeped in fear. The law of power applied to monsters, too.

Yes. Just as the Skeleton Warlord had said, the Arch Lich was likely the lord of every undead monster in this land.

“Human. It is not too late. Even now…”

Instead of answering, I gave a small nod.

The Skeleton Warlord was right. It was not too late, and I still had more than enough opportunity left.

A chance to stop that bastard.

If this sprawling metropolis transformed into a single Gate, there would truly be no turning back.

Countless undead monsters would spread like a plague, and the Arch Lich’s power would grow even stronger.

It has to be now.

I drew a deep breath and extended my hand. White Flame flew toward me through Seizing an Object Through Empty Space, its shaft landing in my grasp.

I stepped over the piles of collapsed concrete and trudged outside. Nothing awaited me but ruins blanketed in thick fog.

Above and below. Left and right.

No matter where I looked, there wasn’t a monster in sight.

Ah, scratch that. There was one.

“Nice to meet you, you fucking bastard.”

Some twenty meters² overhead, the Arch Lich stood upon empty air and gazed down at me. Its red eyes gleamed.

“So it is true. You know the language of the Demon Realm. I did not mishear you.”

“I studied hard. But you know me, don’t you?”

“I am a being with hundreds of eyes and ears. I have been watching you all along, human.”

I frowned.

“All along?”

“Yes. Your performance on the battlefield was remarkable.”

A Familiar spell.

I kept the thought to myself and clicked my tongue.

“So you’re a hidden-camera creep. You didn’t install one in my bathroom, did you?”

“A hidden-camera creep? You speak nonsense, human.”

“True. If you’d seen me through a hidden camera in my bathroom, you would’ve vanished from shock already. No one has ever survived looking my enormous Black Anaconda in the eye.”

“Do you mean a Basilisk?”

A Basilisk was a monster from mythology whose gaze inflicted a curse of petrification.

It was also a Named Monster that had appeared exactly once during the Great Cataclysm.

“Something like that.”

At least the part about being so startled that you froze was the same, right?

But the Arch Lich’s response was not what I expected.

“So that is why. Why you feel strangely familiar to me.”

“What?”

“Human. I sense the energy of death upon you. Dense and dark—an energy like my own.”

“…!”

A jolt of surprise ran through me. I thought I knew what the Arch Lich meant by the energy of death.

There was someone who had been unable to hide his agitation at every word the creature spoke.

The Skeleton Warlord.

Even as a Named Monster, the Skeleton Warlord was still undead.

Had the Arch Lich caught a scent that had seeped into me after all the time I had spent with him? Or had it seen through even that other unknown space called the Inventory?

If it was the latter…

Just how far do that bastard’s abilities reach?

I activated Qi Sense. A blue line shot into the sky along with a System notification.

At the same time, the Arch Lich’s red eyes, flickering between its bones, curved like crescent moons.

“How interesting.”

The next instant, black mana erupted from the Arch Lich’s entire body and lashed against the blue line.

Beep!

System

• ??? protects itself with a powerful, incomprehensible force!
• Qi Sense failed! Unable to determine the designated target!

I’d suspected as much, and sure enough.

The Arch Lich looked down at my stiffened face and let out a low laugh.

“What an interesting human. Truly. Perhaps… my guess was correct after all.”

“What guess? That you’re about to die?”

“That will not happen. I am the lord of all undead. I am nothing like those weak and foolish humans.”

The Arch Lich raised a hand made of black, glossy bone and pointed toward Wu Heixing, whose breath had stopped, and Lee Jungryong, who had been reduced to black ash.

“It was a most entertaining sight. Watching you humans kill one another brought me immense joy for the first time in a very long while. I thank you for helping me understand just how insignificant your kind truly is.”

“Get lost.”

“Anger makes humans stronger. Is that true of you as well?”

Fwoooosh.

The fog filling the area began to move like a living creature. As though an unseen hand were painting upon empty air, it formed a scene before me.

A city in ruins.

At the center of a horrific battlefield, where blood flowed in rivers and corpses lay piled like mountains, a man used his sword as a cane to pull himself upright.

I had seen that face only once, but I could never forget it.

The Arch Lich’s low voice echoed through the air.

“Lei Fei. That was certainly his name.”

“…!”

“He possessed a great and radiant soul. So dazzling that I coveted him merely from watching afar.”

With another small gesture, the fog shifted and painted a new scene.

Lei Fei staggering toward the Arch Lich.

Lei Fei dropping to his knees before he could reach it.

Lei Fei glaring at the sky with a face filled with rage and resentment as he breathed his last.

And then…

Lei Fei reborn as a corrupted being through the Arch Lich’s power, kneeling before his new master.

No.

The Death Knight Lord.

Fwoooosh.

A wind blew from somewhere, scattering the fog. The Arch Lich continued slowly.

“Did you know? Humans with noble souls wield even greater power once they fall. He truly was the finest material… The outcome was regrettable, but he did not turn out too badly.”

I slowly nodded.

“Keep talking.”

“I have found new material. You, human—with an even stronger and more massive soul!”

Its chilling voice thundered through the air.

Mana poured from the Arch Lich’s entire body, covering the sky like dark storm clouds and casting the city into darkness.

At the center of it all, its red eyes burned like an ominous sun.

I stood silently and watched the scene. Then I suddenly opened my mouth.

“Right, so… are you finally done running your mouth?”

My stomach was burning.

The rage I had stored up and suppressed until I met the Arch Lich reared its head.

It surged like lava from a volcanic field.

“If you’ve said everything you wanted to say…”

Something snapped inside my head.

For that moment, I forgot even the mental exhaustion from hours of fighting at the head of the suicide squad and my battles against Lee Jungryong and Wu Heixing.

“Then get down here, you fucking bastard.”

If the Arch Lich’s voice was thunder, my shout was lava.

The fire dragon raced through hundreds of acupoints boiling like an active volcano. Blue flames engulfed White Flame’s transparent spearhead, radiating tremendous heat.

And then—

Shweeeeeek! Boom!

The spear of flame I launched with all my strength blew apart the dark clouds of mana and tore through the darkness.

Rumble-rumble-rumble! Fwoom!

The earth shook as dazzling blue flames painted the sky.

Several kilometers³ away, the humans and monsters locked in fierce battle forgot their own circumstances for a moment and stared blankly at the spectacle.

“Grrrrr…”

“What is that…?”

The light bursting from the enormous city shrouded in thick fog was warmer and more dazzling than anything else.

At least, that was how it seemed to one man standing tall and gazing at the city.

Choi Minwoo.

Mr. Jin Taekyung.

It was him. It had to be.

No one but Jin Taekyung came to mind. He was alive, and he was fighting the Arch Lich.

No. Perhaps he was fighting someone else, too.

Lee Jungryong. Wu Heixing.

Others might dismiss his concern as premature and his suspicions as baseless accusations, but Choi Minwoo knew how evil a person could become.

At least, that was what the Lee Jungryong he had known had been like.

And at the same time…

He knew Jin Taekyung well, too.

You’re strong. Stronger than anyone I know.

Choi Minwoo had said those words to Jin Taekyung once.

Some people might have laughed at him, but Choi Minwoo had meant them.

He believed no S-rank Hunter—not even Cheon Taemin, his maternal grandfather and the man who had defeated the Demon King Asmodeus—could be stronger than Jin Taekyung.

It wasn’t a matter of skill, much less a question of whose aura was greater or stronger.

It was something only those who had come to know Jin Taekyung possessed.

Faith.

Jin Taekyung had given Choi Minwoo faith.

Cheon Taemin, the hero who had saved humanity, had pushed his young grandson out of his thoughts after the boy lost his parents.

Jin Taekyung had not.

He had rejected every temptation around him that whispered of wealth and honor, remained with the Peace Guild, and protected his people through every danger.

No matter who stood against him.

“Our opponent is the Ares Guild. It’ll be a dangerous road.”

“Thorny roads are kind of my specialty.”

“More dangerous than anything we’ve faced so far.”

“Team Leader.”

“Yes?”

“Sometimes it’s okay to be honest.”

“…!”

It was the first time anyone had ever said that to him.

Butler Kim, who had been by his side since childhood, was thoughtful and warm, but he had never given Choi Minwoo that same certainty.

Jin Taekyung had, and that gave Choi Minwoo the courage to speak.

“Will you… continue staying with the Peace Guild?”

“Yeah. That’s more like it.”

Choi Minwoo could never forget Jin Taekyung’s crooked grin.

That was the day he gained people he could call us, rather than Guild members bound together by a few sheets of paper called a contract.

So this is what it feels like.

He had always been alone.

Isolated and lonely.

For as long as he could remember, he had been cut off from everything around him.

The children he met in his youth were wary of him, and the adults whispered among themselves.

It hurt, but he never let it show. Only the aging Butler Kim had ever been someone he could truly confide in.

But not anymore.

A smile appeared on Choi Minwoo’s lips.

Far in the distance, he watched the flames rising through the thick fog and darkness, then gripped his sword once more.

Shhk!

A monster’s body split apart beneath a flash of dazzling aura.

As the brief silence and stillness that had settled over the battlefield shattered, a tremendous cry burst from Choi Minwoo’s lips.

“Attack—!”

He raised his sword and charged toward the monsters, looking much like someone Lee Jungryong had seen several decades ago.