Countless rays of light gathered and gathered until they became a massive pillar.
Attack spells and debuffs descended from overhead. Spears, arrows, and other weapons hurled with all their might rained down around me.
But…
It was already too late to retreat. For me and for them.
Step.
I advanced toward the multicolored flashes.
As I stepped forward, I slashed White Flame diagonally downward. Scorching heat erupted from its spearhead and set everything around me ablaze.
Sssshhhhh!
Space warped. The searing blue-white hellfire forcibly dispelled every spell and devoured the weapons hurtling toward me at tremendous speed, still infused with mana.
Whoooosh!
“……!”
“……!”
Heat billowed upward, and the air shimmered. Beyond the haze, I could see hundreds of pairs of shocked eyes.
Realizing that every attack had come to nothing, the Security Team Leader drew his bowstring again. He fired ten arrows with Multi Shot and shouted, “Formation!”
Screeeeech!
While the arrows flew toward me, he moved like the wind in the opposite direction, retreating behind the tanks.
His quick judgment and precise attack were impressive, as befitted an A-rank Hunter of Ares Guild, but…
This time, you picked the wrong opponent.
I muttered the thought inwardly and thrust out my fist. The single punch driven along my smoothly rotating shoulder and arm smashed through the empty air.
Whoom! Bang!
A short, powerful straight punch.
Compressed air burst outward, whipping up a small typhoon around me. The ten arrows streaking toward me like rays of light struck it and veered off course.
Swish-swish-swish! Boom!
As the deflected arrows slammed into the lobby, I launched myself ahead of them. I crossed the dozen or so meters1 between us and appeared before the Security Team Leader.
“You should’ve shot more gently. Then I would’ve made it hurt less.”
“……!”
I was far too close for him to draw his bowstring again.
Instead of answering, the Security Team Leader swung the bow in his hand. With a faint metallic click, a blade sprang from the tip of the bow and flew toward my chest.
Sssshhh!
He had probably mastered that move through thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of repetitions.
But speed was relative. To my eyes, his attack was so slow and feeble that it made me want to yawn.
Slow enough to catch with one hand.
Clack.
The blade stopped half a handspan from me and trembled.
In a moment too brief to call an instant, I saw unmistakable shock flash across the Security Team Leader’s eyes. I tightened my grip on the middle of his bow.
Crack!
Strength beyond human limits shattered the defensive spell on the weapon, then snapped the bow made from hard monster bone.
Before the archer could cry out over the loss of his cherished weapon, my palm pressed against his chest.
Boom!
The Inner-Family Heavy Hand—striking the outside to damage the inside.
With a small explosive sound, the Security Team Leader shot backward like a cannonball.
He slammed into the lobby wall and spat blood. Screams and shouts erupted from every direction, and countless attacks poured toward me.
Swish-swish-swish! Boom-boom-boom!
Front, back, left, right. Thirty-six directions.
Watching the rays of light shoot toward me from every side, I let out a hollow laugh.
Three jiazi2 of Scorching Yang Qi rose from my dantian, became a fire dragon, and entered my spear.
Fire Dragon Divine Spear, First Form: Fire Dragon’s Single Tail.
Fwoosh! Whoooosh!
I turned smoothly and swung the spear. Flames surged upward in a whirl, blocking and burning everything in their path.
I stepped forward without hesitation. The marble beneath my foot crumbled like sand.
Sssshhh!
A fierce wind brushed past my ears. Someone’s desperate shout mingled with it.
“Stop him—!”
Boom!
The roar swallowed the rest of the shout. Dozens of tanks who had frozen in place to block my path were flung away, their screams filling the gap.
“Guh!”
“Graaaah!”
Bodies as hard as steel. Combat experience gained over hundreds of raids. None of it helped them now.
Overwhelming strength was enough to crush anything in its way.
Yet the Hunters in the lobby, who had turned against me after wavering, kept coming.
Their weapons caught the light of a half-severed chandelier and flashed as they closed in from every direction.
Pap-pap-pap!
Cheek, neck, armpit, waist, calf…
I saw and felt it all.
It wasn’t only my body that had surpassed human limits.
Before my brain could pass along what my sharpened senses told it, I was already moving.
Crack!
I caught a swordsman’s arm beneath my armpit and broke it.
Thud!
I drove my elbow into another Hunter’s solar plexus and knocked him down.
Tap—swish-swish-swish!
I snatched an arrow flying toward my throat and flung it back the way it had come.
As I turned toward the enemies closing in from all sides, short screams pierced my ears.
“Gah!”
“Ugh!”
It wasn’t happening in just one spot. Screams rang out across the lobby.
Every time I dodged a weapon, threw a punch or a kick, or swung the shaft of my spear, someone screamed and collapsed or flew away like a cannonball.
“Don’t hesitate! Fight!”
Boom! Whooooom!
“Hit him all at once!”
Swish-swish-swish!
Two hundred against one.
No—a raid launched against a single human being. But I wasn’t the one being driven back. They were.
Magic? Weapons?
Nothing could touch me. I plunged deep into their formation and tore through it, wrecking it from within—without killing them.
I struck enough fear into them to keep them from charging at me again before today’s battle was over.
Crack-crack-crack!
“Graaaah!”
Boom!
Before one person’s scream had even ended, three people fell. By the time three screams rang out, five had collapsed.
They were sheep, and I was a great tiger.
With one difference: I had the patience to hold back from slaughtering them.
I’m not a monster. I’m not a monster.
I had to repeat it endlessly in my mind to calm the rage swelling inside me to the point of bursting.
Those who crossed to the other side of the river never returned. Jopil hadn’t. Neither had the forces of Dark Heaven, or Go Jun, who had stepped into the realm of monsters for the sake of his goal.
But I was a Hunter. A martial artist of Murim.
I suddenly remembered something a certain person had once told me—a person who had gone from being the greatest assassin of all time to the greatest physician under heaven.
The weak kill, but the truly strong can save lives instead. It means they can prevent innocent deaths, no matter the circumstances.
If I had been less powerful than I was now—if I had been both weak and evil—they would all have died.
But I was human, not a monster. And I had the strength to save them.
“Everyone… move aside.”
Boom!
The palm force I thrust out swept away dozens of people and sent them flying.
Maybe it was the battle that had gone on for hours without a break. Maybe it was the aftermath of One Annihilation. I was exhausted beyond measure.
Yet everything seemed slow and clear. Their movements. Their expressions. I caught every detail.
I could see the mages’ staffs shining between the fragments of shattered Tower Shields.
Vrrrrrrm!
The Magic Gems embedded in the heads of the staffs vibrated faintly and gave off a dazzling glow.
But before their spells could take shape, I was already among the twenty or so mages.
“Ma—Magic Shi—!”
Too late.
Swish—thump!
A mage trying to cast a defensive spell went rigid and fell.
He wasn’t the only one. Ten fingers sent out ten streams of Finger Qi. The instant they brushed the mages’ acupoints, the mages crumpled like a collapsing wall.
But this was Ares Guild headquarters, a place said to recruit only the best. High-ranking Hunters—whom ordinary Hunters rarely even encountered—were as plentiful as grains of sand here.
“Binding!”
Shrrrriiiip!
Between the broken marble, vines burst from the wall where an unknown oil painting had once hung and wrapped around my ankles like whips.
Crack!
A magical rope appeared out of thin air and bound my wrists with tremendous force.
Was he the Team Leader in charge of the mages? An A-rank mage I had once seen on television fixed me with a look full of killing intent.
“Kill him.”
At that moment—
Swish!
The air above my head rippled. A pale shadow, faint as mist, dropped toward the crown of my head.
Realizing that the sound cutting through the air came from a short sword, I let out a hollow laugh inwardly.
Look at these bastards.
I realized two things.
First, Code Red meant it didn’t matter whether the target lived or died. Second, I had no reason to go easy on the ones who were actually trying to kill me.
In that case…
I welcomed it.
Boom!
The instant a short flame erupted, the assassin was flung away with his limbs twisted, unable even to scream amid the explosive roar.
The A-rank mage stared wide-eyed as I burned through every rope and vine, turning the assassin’s short sword over in my hand.
“What are you doing? Why aren’t you using Magic?”
“I-Ice Blo—!”
Crash! Thunk!
The short sword streaked forward like a ray of light, shattered the Magic Gem in his staff, and buried itself deep in his abdomen. The backflow of mana must have made the pain unbearable.
I struck the chest of the mage, who was screaming loudly enough to shake the lobby.
Boom!
The Inner-Family Heavy Hand was fatal to anyone, but it possessed even greater destructive power against those who directly handled mana, such as mages and healers.
Even if this one survived, he was in no shape to call himself a mage again. His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed.
I stared calmly at the mage, unconscious with an irrecoverable injury, and suddenly opened my mouth.
“Anyone else want to retire while we’re at it?”
“……!”
“If not, go to sleep.”
Swish-swish-swish! Thump!
Another volley of Finger Qi flew out. The remaining mages dropped without a fight, and silence fell over the lobby.
The clock straight ahead showed that only three minutes had passed since the battle began. Of the roughly two hundred Hunters, fewer than one in ten were still on their feet.
Wheeeeeeeeeeng!
Beneath the unending wail of the alarm, the scene was horrific.
Tanks were embedded in the walls. Damage dealers gasped in pain. Mages lay stiff, staring at the ceiling.
And there I stood, looking down at them all.
My voice came out through parted lips, hoarse and cracked.
“Don’t stand in my way again. There won’t be a second time.”
“……!”
“……!”
Those still standing and those on the floor alike stared at me with trembling eyes.
They must have understood by now. They weren’t alive because they had been lucky.
Step.
With the alarm blaring over the silent crowd, I walked slowly to the center of the lobby.
Then I channeled three jiazi2 of internal energy, kicked off the floor, and shot upward.
Screeeeech!
The lobby ceiling rushed toward me with the fierce wind. At the same time, blue-white flames flickered over my clenched fist.
The Flame-Extinguishing Divine Fist burst forth, burning through the air.
Kuwaaaaaang!
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