Chapter 252 – The Reason We Fight (2)

Not far from the battlefield, I could see a village of demonkin.

It was a village reminiscent of the Middle Ages.

Seeing me covered in blood, they were on high alert.

A hurried shout, something being announced. The outskirts of the village were in an uproar.

A wooden gate like this would shatter with a single kick.

Still, I waited a moment out of courtesy.

“If you open it, I’ll just pass through. If I have to open it…”

I left the thought unfinished and took off my shirt.

It was soaked in demonkin blood and felt disgusting to wear.

Contrary to my intention, the gate swung wide open at the sight of my living, breathing muscles.

That wasn’t meant as a threat. I really just took it off because it felt gross.

First, I washed up in the village and received the tribute they offered… wait, why were they offering things like this?

For their part, they had offered clothes and food. To the demonkin, being weak is a sin.

Thus, in their world, it’s common sense to bow unconditionally to the strong.

I understood that, but this was excessively subservient.

I decided to rest at the village chief’s house.

I had just meant to take a short break when someone knocked on the door.

“He-Sir Hero. May I come in…?”

“Yes.”

After receiving my permission, the chief’s daughter entered, carrying a meal while wearing nothing but a thin piece of cloth.

“Will you have your meal first, or will you have me…?”

Where did these people learn this kind of culture? Or is it just a universal thing?

“The meal.”

Trying to tempt me with a body so prone to muscle loss. Not a chance.

I took the meal from the disappointed young demonkin.

She stared at my luscious muscles as if she wanted to lick them.

Ignoring the woman who was there to attend to me, I had my first proper meal in a long time.

I put a piece of bacon in some bread and took a bite. The bread was quite hard. Perhaps I had grown too accustomed to modern food.

Seeing my strange way of eating, the young demonkin gently covered her mouth and spoke with a smile.

“The soup is for dipping the bread and bacon. It tastes better that way. The bread is too hard to chew otherwise.”

“Oh, I know. I’m not eating it because the soup is poisoned.”

“……!”

Ah, was that a secret?

At my words, the young woman’s eyes went cold.

Perhaps angry that I had carelessly revealed her secret, the woman pulled a poisoned knife from her robes and lunged at me.

I easily blocked her attack and snatched her wrist.

At the same time, I took the poisoned dagger and planted it in her thigh.

“Keuk…! Everyone, attack…!”

As she opened her mouth, I poured the poisoned soup into it.

She immediately clamped her mouth shut and tried to vomit, a pitiful sight, so I decided to kill her a bit later.

The door burst open, and a javelin came flying.

I grabbed a shovel from my inventory and parried it.

The one who threw the javelin ended up with his own weapon piercing his head.

A shovel, huh? This is pretty useful.

I battered the charging demonkin with the shovel.

*Clang!*

The Weapon Master skill really is invaluable.

Who would have thought a shovel could produce such an extraordinary sound?

By the time I had smashed the fifth demonkin’s head, the shovel put in for its discharge.

I granted its request and tossed it to the floor.

I kicked a fallen javelin off the ground and into my hand. Then, I finished off the charging demonkin one by one.

*Shhlick, thunk!*

In a flash, a dozen or so assassins were dead.

Only then did the woman, who had finally succeeded in vomiting up the poisoned soup, stare with a devastated face at the annihilation of her allies.

I made things easier for her so she wouldn’t have to worry about the poison.

After all, once you’re dead, you don’t have to worry about such things.

Wiping my hands, I stepped outside to find a small demonkin child trembling against a wall.

The child, trembling while clutching a teddy bear’s arm, seemed to be in deep shock after witnessing the death of their family.

The child was so frightened they had wet themselves.

I walked past the child.

In that instant, the child lunged at me with a poisoned dagger they had hidden behind the teddy bear.

I threw a low kick. Ah, for this kid, it would be a high kick.

You poor, short creature.

The child, struck by the low kick—no, the high kick—rolled across the ground several times, coughing up blood.

Pretending to be an innocent child, even wetting themselves for a perfect deception.

They would have become a fine assassin.

If they had lived, that is.

I left the house.

The terrified villagers were no longer anywhere to be seen.

Instead, everyone was charging at me, ready to take me down with them.

-If I kill the Hero, I can make a name for myself.

-Kill him and advance to the central territories!

Their honest thoughts flowed into me.

I don’t know if I’ve gone mad from trampling on so many lives, or if my inventory has skilled up.

But the space I considered my domain had become much wider than before. And I could read the thoughts of anyone within this radius.

I found it strange myself, so I let myself be deceived and entered the village as a test, and it all turned out to be true.

It seems I’m still growing, even in a situation like this.

I held a shovel in one hand and a pickaxe in the other.

“You guys should carry some decent weapons.”

With that, I crushed the charging assassins.

Seeing the bits of flesh and blood floating in the air with every swing of my shovel, I figured I’d need another bath.

* * *

-Another returnee has come home today.

-Once again, people rescued by the Delivery Man, Hunter Lee Hyunbin, have returned to their families.

Returnee. The word had now become familiar to the public.

Every survivor who had been dragged to the Demon World spoke of Lee Hyunbin.

“If it weren’t for him, I would have never seen my family again… My family and I are waiting, praying for his safe return. Hunter Lee Hyunbin, I will definitely repay you.”

The news was running a special feature on Lee Hyunbin.

Of course, there were those who couldn’t return. They had either not yet been rescued, or were already dead.

-But seriously, isn’t the Delivery Man perfect for a rescue team?

A porter who could even carry people in his inventory.

Lee Hyunbin was the only person in the world with such an ability.

With a power like that, it went without saying that he was the perfect man for rescuing people dragged to another dimension.

It wasn’t just Koreans being rescued.

People from overseas had also been taken by the Demon King’s army, and thanks to Hyunbin’s rescue, they too were able to return to their own world.

Coincidentally, this very incident was being discussed at a meeting of European hunters.

“I know hunters are often called glorified miners, but shouldn’t we repay our debts, regardless of money?”

Many hunters from overseas, especially Europe, owed their lives to Lee Hyunbin.

They had fallen into a trap set by Ian Kruger, the head of the Union, and were on the verge of annihilation.

If Lee Hyunbin hadn’t shown up when he did, the formation of the International Hunter Federation would have been impossible.

That was why they were now talking about going to support him.

Of course, they weren’t talking about blindly heading into an unknown location.

A considerable amount of information about the other dimension had already been gathered from the survivors.

With witness statements from not one or two, but thousands of people, they could roughly deduce the enemy’s movements and scale.

“Isn’t the Demon King’s army’s sudden withdrawal also thanks to him?”

Emily, the UK’s Rank 1 hunter, pointed out.

It was a plausible theory.

It didn’t make sense for an army to retreat so hastily when victory was within its grasp.

According to the returnees’ accounts, the Korea Monster was waging a reckless war to settle things with the Demon Kings.

“Honestly, if humanity loses the Korea Monster now, who knows what kind of crisis we’ll face. Don’t you think?”

Emily, the British ranker, was a hunter with high self-esteem. It was rare for her to humble herself and praise another.

That was how unparalleled the Korea Monster was.

“He must be doing it to stop the crisis facing the entire world.”

The Demon King’s army’s dimensional gate hadn’t closed yet.

It would either disappear naturally over time, or it could be destroyed if hunters conquered it.

“There are still too many uncertainties.”

“I didn’t expect to hear that from you. You, of all people, should know how necessary he is.”

France’s Rank 1, Yan, and the UK’s Rank 1, Emily, shared the same thought and voiced the same opinion.

But Danny McGuire, who was listening, had a very passive reaction.

It was uncharacteristic of him.

“Don’t tell me you’re scared? That’s not like you.”

Emily provoked Danny McGuire with a smile.

For the head of the International Federation that had replaced the Union, and the world’s Rank 2 hunter, it was a humiliating remark.

“Maybe I am.”

“Huh? Hey, I was joking. What am I supposed to do if you react like that?”

Danny’s calm admission left Emily looking even more bewildered.

“No, it’s just… for the first time, I had that thought.”

“That thought?”

“Yeah. After that battle, my perspective changed a lot.”

Danny’s words made Yan’s and Emily’s faces stiffen.

“What help could we possibly be in a fight like that?”

He had always been proud to be a hunter. He had felt a sense of accomplishment climbing the ranks, reaching for ever greater heights.

But then he witnessed the overwhelming power of the 6-star boss monster and Ian Kruger.

In that battle, the Federation’s hunters, especially the famous rankers, had been of little help.

But the Korea Monster was different.

With his power, he had stopped a disaster of historic proportions.

Alone.

On that battlefield, the other hunters were nothing more than background characters.

“The Rank 2 hunter shouldn’t be talking like he’s weak.”

“It’s not like I haven’t had similar thoughts.”

Yan took Emily’s criticism upon himself, though he wasn’t necessarily agreeing with Danny.

“A soldier has a soldier’s duty, and a general has a general’s duty. You can’t do everything by yourself, Danny. He might need our help.”

Yan’s words brought a bitter smile to Danny’s face.

It was true that he had been downcast since that fight.

He had thought he was one of the strongest people in the world, but when faced with an invasion from another dimension, he realized he was just a frog in a well.

“Isn’t that why your bald friend went to Korea?”

Danny McGuire’s best friend, David Henri, had heard about the Korea Monster and gone to Korea alone, insisting they had to provide support.

“He’s always been a sentimental one, that bald friend of yours. Yes, you’re right. I was being foolish.”

He wasn’t weak.

Against an enemy on a different level, he just had to fight as a soldier.

He had to distinguish between what he could and couldn’t do.

-Please, help the Korea Monster. He was all alone, covered in blood, fighting against death itself.

An American woman, recalling the hero who had saved her, was sobbing as she pleaded with the camera.