Chapter 785

It was a reverberation.

More than a roar—a sound that left their ears muffled.

Gooooong.

Darkness and flames collided, then mingled.

Everyone watched as the two immense forces drew in wind, air, and debris, slowly swelling. A red warning light flashed through their minds, along with a single word.

Annihilation.

Before power unlike anything they had ever felt, everything else seemed meaningless.

If it burst, everything within a few hundred meters¹ would turn to ash.

No—the blast might reach beyond the National Assembly and sweep across the entire city.

At this rate… even the civilians will get hurt.

But not everyone was thinking of the civilians.

They might all have sensed the same danger, but they stood on opposite sides of it. Some fought to protect the world of the people outside. Others had turned their weapons on them to protect only their own.

That difference soon showed in what each side did.

“Get them!”

Shhk-shhk-shhk!

With their backs to the cliff’s edge, the traitors had nowhere left to retreat.

Already outnumbered, those who had chosen Michael Silbert seized on the sudden upheaval and made one last desperate attack.

Their numbers had been cut in half, but their auras flashed with more vicious intent than ever.

Krrrraack!

A massive Tower Shield split apart. The ground opened like a block of tofu under a knife.

Lethal strikes rushed in from every direction. A moment’s carelessness would cost someone their life, yet no one stepped back.

They were Hunters.

Even if the word meant nothing more to those traitors than a faded slogan, they had upheld what it meant to be a Hunter—and they would continue to do so.

That was their duty. The responsibility that came with their strength.

“Mr. Johnson!”

Choi Minwoo shouted as if giving a battle cry and swung his sword with all his might.

Its wielder was drenched in blood, but a dazzling crescent of aura swept through the air, grazed past the towering Black man standing there, and cleaved the dozens of arrows flying toward him.

Shhk!

The severed arrows scattered before Johnson’s eyes.

Even amid the battle raging on every side, Magic Johnson drew a deep breath and gathered his mana, muttering to himself.

I keep telling him to call me Johnson.

When this battle was over—when the blood finally stopped flowing—he would tell Choi Minwoo again that there was no need to be so formal with him.

He wanted to clap Faye Chen on the shoulder as she drew her bowstring with bloodied fingers. Prince Felix, too, fighting drenched in blood despite his noble station. And Chuck Hagel, who had just ripped off the Kronos Guild Master’s arm.

No. He wanted to get drunk, laugh, and talk with every Hunter who survived.

And Jin would surely be there.

Yeah, Jin. You’ll be there.

His unheard words dissolved into the reverberation.

Through the blinding light now filling the National Assembly, Johnson caught a hazy glimpse of a young man.

He saw someone else running toward him without hesitation—toward the heart of the disaster.

Chrrrrrrk!

Something white as snow surged forward like a wave.

It sealed every gap around Jin Taekyung and Michael Silbert, the two figures who stood opposed with neither able to give way.

As it took shape, Magic Johnson smiled faintly and roused every bit of mana in his body. He spread it throughout the National Assembly as if to wrap the whole world in it, then spoke.

“Absolute Shield.”

The spell consumed the Grand Mage’s vast reserves of mana and spread across a radius of several hundred meters¹.

Whooosh.

Then the light finally burst forth, filling everyone’s vision.

In a sliver of time divided into moments finer still—

Boom! Rumble-rumble-rumble!

The world shook with a roar so vast it hurt. Pitch-black darkness and flashes of light flickered before my eyes. Sensations flooded through my body.

Pain. Heat. Cold. Wetness.

And… weight.

It pressed down on my whole body, almost more than I could bear.

Huff. Huff.

My breathing was ragged. I struggled to clear my blurred vision, then drove the shaft of my spear into the ground to support myself.

Thump.

At times like this, I was glad I’d chosen a spear.

It reminded me of what the red-capped Instructor had said when I first arrived at the Hunter Training Center and he handed out our weapons.

“Just use a spear. Spears are the best.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry, but may I ask why?”

“What’s your Awakening Grade?”

“F-rank, sir.”

“Right. There’s your answer. In a fight between weaklings like you, reach is everything. I’ve used one, so I know. And another important thing…”

“What’s that, sir?”

“It looks cool.”

“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that…?”

“I said it looks cool. Look. Say you meet an enemy. You fight like hell, one-on-one. You both use every last bit of strength until neither of you can lift a finger. Who falls over first—the guy with the sword or the guy with the spear?”

“The guy with weaker legs, I’d think.”

“Wrong. The guy with the sword. Every time.”

“Could you tell me why, sir…?”

I still remembered the Instructor’s answer, delivered with a solemn expression.

“The guy with the spear can use it as a cane.”

“Sir?”

“Jam it into the ground or a wall and you’ve got something to lean on. The guy with the sword has to fall. Why? His sword’s too short. That’s what decides it: one man down, one man standing. What do you think? Like a scene from a movie, right?”

“Ah.”

“Good. Decided what weapon you want?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What is it?”

“A bow.”

“Get down.”

It was a stupid, dusty old memory.

He’d promptly whacked me on the ass about twenty times with a spear shaft from the armory, then practically forced me to take that spear as my first weapon.

The next day, he turned up for our first training session with a sword at his side. I learned one of life’s great truths.

This line of work was crawling with some truly spectacular assholes.

But even that Instructor, who must have stayed at the training center for the pleasure of messing with recruits like me, couldn’t have imagined where his stupid joke would lead.

That because of his stupid little joke, I’d be standing here now.

That the F-rank Hunter he’d seen back then would make Michael Silbert kneel just a little over ten years later.

Thump.

I raised my head at the heavy sound that pierced my ears.

Through my blurred vision, I saw him trembling on one knee.

Michael Silbert’s wings of magical power were gone. So were his gleaming black scales. He stared at me, panting.

“Y-you bastard…”

Cough.

With a cough, a torrent of bloody fluid mixed with bits of his organs poured out.

He’d exhausted all his magical power, and his body refused to heal as it had before, no matter how badly he wanted it to.

No. It would never heal like that again.

Michael Silbert was going to…

Die today. By my hand.

I had no strength to say it aloud. I spoke the words in my head, gritted my teeth, and used White Flame to push myself upright.

Then I walked toward him.

Thud.

Pain tore through my body with every step, as though I might break apart.

Or perhaps I already had.

Beep. Beep. Beep-beep!

Strange.

My eardrums had burst, and my ears had been ringing for a while, but the System’s warning beeps were still loud and annoying.

My body must be pretty thoroughly wrecked.

A hollow laugh escaped me. It didn’t matter.

Since when had I ever worried about my condition in a fight?

I was happier that I’d finally brought Michael Silbert down—and that, despite the immense aftermath, all those familiar faces had made it through alive.

Of course, not everyone felt the same joy I did.

“Jin Taekyung!”

The middle-aged giant charging at me—the Kronos Guild Master—certainly didn’t.

As proof of how fierce the fighting had been, he’d lost an arm to some powerful fighter I couldn’t identify. Unable to accept that his life was over, he charged at me.

Then a fierce rush of air sounded behind me, and he had no choice but to accept it.

Boom!

An absurdly huge War Hammer swept past. The Kronos Guild Master’s face vanished.

Behind his corpse, which crumpled like a rotten log, Chuck Hagel stood posed like a shot-putter.

He stared at me for a moment, let out a short laugh, and turned to charge the remaining traitors.

He had a warm little line to thaw their frozen hearts.

“Let’s keep playing to the end, you sons of bitches.”

Cheers and screams mingled in my muffled ears. Some fell, spraying blood. Others stepped over their bodies and pressed on.

The tide had turned.

Even if the goddess of fate showed up to tip the scales back, all we had to do was take her down, too.

Just as I would take down the monster struggling to rise now that I was right in front of him.

Thud.

When had I gotten this close?

I stopped. Like an old man who had leaned on his cane through a long journey to see a lifelong friend, I greeted him, weary but glad to have arrived.

“Hey. I’m here.”

Clang!

His answer was the still-brilliant blue blade of his sword.

But even an edge forged from Dragon Bone, a material beyond compare, couldn’t cut through Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Iron. There was nowhere near enough strength or speed behind the strike.

Even I, barely able to stand, could block it with ease.

And return his rude greeting.

Thud. Crunch.

Michael Silbert’s eyes flew wide. Both arms crumpled. Blood and a scream he couldn’t force out bubbled in his open mouth.

Grrk. Grrrk.

Blood spurted intermittently, splattering my face.

But why?

If I thought about what he’d done up until now, the scent of blood seeping into my nose should have been sweet. But all I could smell was something revolting.

Maybe that was why I stopped.

Why the face reflected in his eyes, dark with blood and tears, looked twisted into a monster’s.

“…So this is the world you wanted so badly?”

I knew he couldn’t give me the answer I wanted, no matter what I asked.

No answer could calm this heart and these emotions threatening to burst out of me.

But I still wanted to hear him speak. I had to.

For all the people who had died because of his pathetic ambition.

“Answer me.”

Grab.

I seized Michael Silbert’s one remaining horn and hauled him upright. Fighting the pain that surged through me, I whispered to him as he slipped closer to death.

“Say something. Anything. Come on.”

And then I understood.

I knew where his other horn had gone. Why I hadn’t seen it anywhere nearby.

Thud.

The horn shot up from somewhere and pierced a palm with a dull, wet sound.

But there was no blood. No groan from someone enduring the pain.

Only Michael Silbert’s trembling gaze, fixed over my shoulder, and his voice.

“How dare… How dare a monster like you…”

“Wrong. I’ll tell you once, and only once, so remember it.”

I knew that voice. I realized who stood behind me and laughed aloud.

“My name is Stone-King, you hideous monster.”