Chapter 81 – Agency Occupation (2)

Alias: Kaldoma.

The Shinhwa Guild has two S-rank hunters.

First, there was the hunter of flames, nicknamed Yeomje.

Second, there was a mercenary hunter recruited from overseas.

His alias was Kaldoma. His real name was Karl Thomas.

“Hey, I feel like I’ve seen that guy somewhere. And he’s totally my type.”

“You’re so damn dense. That’s him. One of the guys we were warned about.”

At her colleague’s words, Kim Yeo-jin nodded, an “Aha” escaping her lips.

“So he’s an S-rank?”

“What’s this? Couldn’t wait? Looks like all my friends have been knocked out.”

The S-rank hunter, Karl, didn’t seem to care that all his colleagues had been taken down.

“Nice timing. Now all that’s left is a nice fight, right?”

At Karl’s words, the five villains snickered.

“That guy is so my type. He’s hot.”

“This is why people say you fall in love too easily.”

“Fall in love easily? Please. I don’t even give ugly people the time of day. That’s why I don’t see you as a man.”

“Damn it.”

“Hehehe.”

Karl let out a disbelieving chuckle.

It was because the five villains were far too relaxed, even with an S-rank hunter standing before them.

“Karl, these guys are tougher than they look… Gaaah!”

“If you’re about to die, just shut your mouth.”

One of the villains stomped on the 6th Team Leader’s head.

Seeing this, Karl’s brown eyebrow twitched.

The Shinhwa Guild was where only the most elite hunters in Korea gathered.

There was no need to compete with other guilds. The Shinhwa Guild itself was the best, so the only competition was internal.

Among them, Karl, being a foreigner, wasn’t viewed very favorably within the guild.

It was probably because he was a rival to Yeomje, the nation’s number one S-rank.

In any case, Karl was in Korea for business. He didn’t feel any particular sense of belonging.

Whether the people of the Shinhwa Guild were killed here or not was no concern of his.

He wasn’t a volunteer, after all.

He was only here now because he was getting paid for an emergency dispatch.

However.

“Get your foot off him.”

“Ooh, so cool.”

“This is the part where I’m supposed to ask what you’ll do if I don’t, right?”

“Probably?”

“Yeah. What are you gonna do if I don’t move?”

They were still messing around.

He felt no camaraderie. But he did have pride as a fellow hunter.

Even if they didn’t get along, they were people who walked the same path as hunters.

“Are we doing the whole cliché thing?”

Karl put a cigarette to his lips.

“Then, I guess I have to say it. ‘I’ll move it for you.’”

*Slice.*

The villain stomping on the 6th Team Leader suddenly felt a sense of emptiness and looked down.

His foot had been blown to pieces.

As their colleague screamed in agony and crawled on the floor, the other villains just cackled.

Kaldoma’s title was Archer.

As his title suggested, he used arrows. But the ability skill he possessed was an invisible arrow.

*Shhhk, shhk!*

Invisible arrows, the Shadowless Arrows, were fired at the other villains.

“Gah!”

“Shit!”

Two of the villains were struck by the invisible arrows and cried out in pain.

An invisible attack is trickier than one might think. If you can’t see the exact trajectory of the attack, it’s not easy to evade.

“It’s over if I just smash you before you can shoot, right?”

A giant wielding a sledgehammer charged forward with an agility that defied his massive frame.

“This guy’s head is mine!”

The giant and Kim Yeo-jin attacked simultaneously from both sides.

Karl held his cigarette with one hand and drew the string of his invisible bow with the other.

*Thwip, shhk!*

The giant used his sledgehammer to shield his face. As expected, he felt something invisible ricochet off it from the front.

“You’re screwed now!”

Having blocked the attack, the giant swung his sledgehammer wide.

It was not just an overwhelmingly powerful attack, but a fast one.

Most of the heavily mutilated corpses in this place were the result of the giant’s attacks.

*Whoosh!*

The mighty sledgehammer tore through the air.

The giant felt no sense of impact in his hands.

Karl had ducked to evade the sledgehammer. At the same time, he placed a hand on the giant’s thigh.

*Thwip!*

In that instant, a Shadowless Arrow embedded itself in the giant’s thigh.

Even as he endured the pain, the giant brought his sledgehammer down.

Karl dodged his attack and placed his palm on his opponent’s chest.

Once again, a spray of blood erupted past Karl’s hand.

“Whoa, seriously!”

Kim Yeo-jin rushed in from the side, a knife in her hand.

Karl pressed his lit cigarette against her forehead.

As Kim Yeo-jin winced from the pain of the burn, Karl placed his palm on her cheek.

“Hey, don’t do that!”

*Thwip!*

Along with Kim Yeo-jin’s ear-splitting scream, a Shadowless Arrow pierced through her mouth.

“You son of a bitch…! Keuk!”

He fired a volley of Shadowless Arrows at the villains who were trying to get back up.

Thanks to that, the villains slipped on the pools of blood they had created and fell back down.

“Is it over?”

Karl took another cigarette from his pocket, placed it between his lips, and lit it.

“Are you okay?”

“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have been.”

“Is that so.”

Karl helped the 6th Team Leader to his feet.

Fortunately, all members of the Shinhwa Guild’s 6th Team were still alive.

“First, let’s clean this up and wait for backup to….”

It was by chance that he saw Kim Yeo-jin aiming a taser.

‘She should have been down…!’

Seeing it, the 6th Team Leader threw his body in front of Kaldoma to protect him.

*Bzzzt!*

The 6th Team Leader gritted his teeth against the pain delivered by the electric current.

Still, being an awakened, he wouldn’t pass out immediately. It just hurt like hell.

Karl fired a Shadowless Arrow at Kim Yeo-jin.

*Shhhk!*

The transparent arrow struck true, embedding itself in Kim Yeo-jin’s shoulder.

Blood from the arrow dripped down, as if suspended in mid-air.

“Hey there.”

Despite what must have been considerable pain, Kim Yeo-jin flashed a grin.

“Being a ‘hero’ is such a pain, isn’t it?”

Kim Yeo-jin stretched out her right hand. On her palm was a thin black line.

It slowly widened, revealing the form of a beast’s maw.

Something completely unexpected happened.

Her arm suddenly stretched out.

Karl instinctively fired a Shadowless Arrow while protecting his head.

The arrow accurately pierced Kim Yeo-jin’s abdomen.

Her red dress was stained an even deeper shade of red. But she just giggled.

“In our world, it’s kill or be killed. Not this half-assed ‘subdue’ nonsense.”

“Aaaargh!”

Karl’s left arm was bitten off by Kim Yeo-jin’s right hand.

The woman’s right hand, having instantly chomped through bone and flesh, began to munch greedily.

“S-rank? So what?”

Kim Yeo-jin smiled like a predator.

Even *He* who had given her the power to take revenge had said it.

If she fought with all her heart, there would be no one who could stop her.

The Smiling Calamity.

That was the title Kim Yeo-jin had been given.

Instead of tending to his severed left arm, Kaldoma fired another Shadowless Arrow.

Heroes.

Hunters were fundamentally beings who hunted monsters.

Player-versus-player combat was uncommon in dungeons.

Even if they were villains, as long as they were human, the top priority in a fight was to subdue rather than kill.

“Damn… it. Run, you idiots.”

At Kaldoma’s words, the 6th Team Leader’s eyes wavered.

An S-rank hunter was falling here.

There was only one option left.

“Retreat! Everyone, get up!”

This was the only window of opportunity Kaldoma had created for them.

The other villains hadn’t yet recovered from Kaldoma’s attacks, and Kim Yeo-jin couldn’t attack while she was finishing him off.

“Oh my, what’s this? You’re running away in this situation?”

Kim Yeo-jin spoke as if she was dumbfounded.

The 6th Team Leader and a few of his colleagues got to their feet. But one teammate with an injured leg couldn’t keep up, trying to stand only to fall again.

*Thwip!*

The hunters of the 6th Team who couldn’t escape died with short screams.

Without so much as a backward glance, the 6th Team Leader and one other hunter retreated from the scene.

Kaldoma could no longer fire his Shadowless Arrows.

“Time for us to part.”

Kim Yeo-jin giggled as she delivered the final blow to the Shinhwa Guild’s S-rank hunter.

The scene of the Shinhwa Guild’s S-rank hunter, Kaldoma, falling was broadcast in real time.

Absolute chaos erupted among those who witnessed it.

Public opinion on the disaster at the agency flooded the news.

“Those crazy bastards! What the hell do they think they’re doing?”

“Tell them to cut the feed immediately!”

“S-Sir, the video won’t come down.”

“What?”

“The streaming company says they’ll look into the cause.”

The video continued to play.

Without any interruption.

-Viewers.

Kei slowly parted his lips.

The comment section, filled with shock over the death of an S-rank hunter, momentarily went silent.

-This is the hunter you all knew.

Kei had planned this.

He had proposed a business venture to the naturally occurring awakened criminals of this world—the villains.

In any world, there was nothing more effective with evil people than money.

It was fair to call them subcontractors.

He had dangled the money they desired most in front of them, and they had magnificently served as bait.

While the subcontractors were getting torn to shreds, Kei and his comrades had formulated a plan to take over the agency.

The result was a success.

He had prepared a live video.

With this video, he announced to the world that they had captured the agency, a symbol of heroes and hunters in the nation.

The reason for broadcasting the live video to the outside world?

-The beings you call heroes are now crawling on the floor. A hero who abandons his comrades and flees.

To destroy the symbolism that hunters held.

-They call us villains. Fine, if that word symbolizes fear.

In America, a war between villains and heroes was raging.

Kei wanted chaos in this country. Chaos would create a world where it was easier for villains to operate.

-Starting today, I guarantee that comrades who share our values will join forces, and the hunters who held a sense of superiority will be divided.

-If you wish to deny it, then by all means, come and take back the agency.

As he spoke, Kei turned his camera.

The camera feed showed the captured hostages.

Drenched in fear, they looked desperately at the camera, their faces pleading for rescue.

Several had already spoken out and been killed like insects, so the fear they felt had reached its peak.

-I doubt you would launch an airstrike on innocent people.

This was why Kei was streaming.

They could ignore the hostages and launch an attack, but they would never choose to show the world a live feed of them dying.

The losses would be greater than the gains.

-I’ll say it again. Come at us honorably, head-on. Hunters.

Kei said this and turned the camera back to its original position.

He had now taken the next step.

Just a little further.

He had bought time. Until ‘it’ arrived.

Every part of the plan was perfect. It had to be.

“…?”

Kei felt a wave of dizziness.

The future had suddenly changed.

Nothing like this had ever happened before.

His original thought was this:

By defeating a powerful S-rank hunter, he would buy time.

Seeing even an S-rank fall, the opposition would halt their attack to devise a more certain method of subduing the villains.

That timing was his objective.

But at this very moment, a being appeared, shattering the future.

-‘Lee Hyunbin’ has donated 5,000 won.

-Coming to kick your ass now.

Kei’s lips tightened. On the streaming video, a man was being shown.

A man in a power suit, pulling on open-hand gloves, spoke again.

“When you get a donation, you’re supposed to react.”