Chapter 82: End Cave

“Yeah, I wanted to meet you too, you bitch.”

I was briefly surprised by her decent looks, but the moment I recalled what this woman had done, the curse slipped out of my mouth on its own.

“Hahaha, with a face like that, you’ve got quite a foul mouth.”

I spoke aggressively, but Karelin just laughed and parried it. Well, considering this face, even swearing probably didn’t come off as threatening. Besides, she wasn’t the type to be intimidated anyway.

“Where’s Claire?”

But I didn’t want to be brushed off, so I kept my eyes wide and spoke in a low voice.

“Want to know? If you want it that badly, I could tell you.”

“Try any tricks and you’re dead.”

“It really doesn’t suit you. I never imagined the mage we were looking for would be a little kid like this.”

Not a little kid, but turned into one.

…It was infuriating, but I didn’t say that out loud.

‘Does this bitch not know I was Verdiol?’

That guess came to mind.

“And…”

Karelin’s gaze shifted toward the charred corpse.

“I had a hunch, but I didn’t expect Paolo to end up like this.”

“…Paolo?”

“That’s the name I gave him. For all it’s worth, he was a masterpiece.”

“A masterpiece? This thing was a Demon Beast—”

“I know. It’s the Demon Beast from an S-Rank Gate, right?”

Demon Beasts vanish the moment they die, leaving behind a Magic Stone. But Apollo’s corpse—

The corpse Karelin called Paolo still remained, not having disappeared.

“How did you do that…”

“Who knows?”

Karelin shot back with a sly smile.

‘…This isn’t the time.’

Maybe Karelin’s intention was to stall for time like this, calling in her allies.

No, maybe she didn’t even need to.

This woman’s ability was teleportation. And she could even lend it out to others like a consumable item. Back when I went to the C-Rank Gate with Deneb, Vasquez opened a Gate on his own and disappeared, so that was probably Karelin’s ability too.

‘Mr. Luca’s condition isn’t good either.’

The bleeding had stopped, but his appearance was terrible, showing how deep his wounds had been before that. If I didn’t get him treated soon, it might be dangerous.

I needed to find Claire quickly and move Mr. Luca to a safe place. This wasn’t the time to exchange pointless jokes in a place like this.

‘If she won’t tell me.’

I’d just find out myself. I never expected her to tell me in the first place.

“By the way, how was it? My masterpiece. I didn’t expect him to get taken down like this, though.”

Ignoring Karelin’s question, I pressed my hand to the ground.

I immediately activated Navigator Magic. If Claire had stayed at Mr. Luca’s lodging, her coordinates would come up.

‘It’s drawing a line.’

As expected, I saw a green line being drawn on the cave floor. Following that line would lead me to Claire. The fact that it went deeper inside bothered me, but…

“What are you—”

Before Karelin could even finish her sentence.

[ Vacuum Element — Sandstorm Lv.3 ]

I reached out my hand, and a green Magic Circle formed in front of me.

*FWOOSH!*

Wind and sand dust rose in the cave, which had no sand at all, and soon a sandstorm kicked up, blocking Karelin’s view. Taking that chance, I ran along the line.

…I tried to run.

“You should listen to people until they’re done talking, you know?”

For a moment, Karelin’s voice came from far away within the sandstorm.

‘…!’

I saw a shadow moving inside the sandstorm. I could tell instantly that it wasn’t Karelin. Her voice came from far away, so there was no way she was right in front of me.

What soon revealed itself was—

‘Another robe?!’

Just as I’d guessed, it wasn’t Karelin. Not the fallen Paolo from before, but a white robe. The bastard who appeared out of nowhere drew a sword from his waist and swung it straight at me.

I’d already activated my Mana Shield. But I had a bad feeling, so I quickly deployed additional defensive magic. The moment the white robe’s slash touched the barrier—

‘?!’

What the hell was this? He’d just swung his sword with no technique at all, but I felt like space itself was being cut away. No, it wasn’t a feeling.

‘Did the space that blocked the slash just disappear entirely?’

The spot where the sword path passed was truly empty.

‘No, it’s not empty!’

A black empty space. At first glance, it looked like it had just blended into the cave’s darkness and was empty, but looking again, it wasn’t empty at all. That was… sword aura. Pitch-black sword aura.

KWAANG!

I hadn’t expected sword aura to come out of the spot where the sword path had passed, so I was caught directly in the sword aura the robe had created.

“Kugh!”

I went flying and slammed straight into the wall.

‘Fuck…’

Thanks to the Mana Shield, there was no impact. I felt relieved for a moment that I hadn’t taken a direct hit, but then I saw the white robe moving.

‘Fast.’

High-Speed Movement, the basic footwork of High-Rank Hunters. But the speed was practically teleportation.

The moment the bastard got right in front of me, I reflexively threw myself aside. Right after that. His slash came down.

KWAANG!

The spot where I’d been standing was cleanly severed, not even a speck of dust scattering, as if the space itself had vanished.

‘This bastard is on a whole different level from the black one!’

The moment I saw the white robe’s skill with my own eyes, I understood why Mr. Luca and Claire had been subdued. This bastard’s slash was just not something you could block. Maybe even my Mana Shield…

The moment I thought that, a chill ran down my spine. That slash was erasing everything it touched. If so, it would erase my Mana Shield, then wound my body, or maybe… even erase the body part it touched.

‘A natural enemy.’

I got to my feet. Even as I did, the robe approached and swung another slash.

FWOOSH!

The time it took for the space where the sword path passed to be erased was roughly three seconds. During those three seconds, that spot was completely empty, as if even air didn’t exist, then it reconstructed itself.

Memorizing that timing, I dodged while calculating the bastard’s slashes as best I could.

‘Whoa!’

Of course, dodging perfectly was hard. While avoiding the slashes and calculating the timing, my posture got thrown off, and part of my clothes touched the spot where the sword path had passed. And at that moment.

‘Just as I expected…!’

The part of my clothes that touched the sword path was cleanly erased, leaving my bare skin exposed.

…I had my Mana Shield up. Just as I’d expected, that bastard’s slash was my natural enemy. My Mana Shield sustained itself with near-infinite power. But that slash could pierce through the Mana Shield itself and inflict fatal wounds on the mage inside it. In fact, if it had been just a little deeper, not just my clothes but my skin would have been erased.

The thought of what would have happened if it touched my skin sent a chill down my spine, but—

[ Ice Element — Frost Wall Lv.7 ]

I suppressed that feeling and reached my hand out toward him. Right before the robe moved with near-teleportation speed and appeared in front of me. KWAH! An ice barrier shot up from the ground, blocking the bastard’s path. Of course, I didn’t have high expectations. It was just to buy a little time.

SHRING—!

And just as I expected, the moment the sword path passed through the ice barrier, the supporting lower section collapsed, and the barrier began to crumble.

‘Looks like it has no intelligence.’

The robe was buried under the ice barrier as it fell. In the meantime, I cast another spell.

[ Superheat Element — Hell Fire ]

Multiple red magic circles formed in front of my palm. The hellfire that would burn the black robe to ashes in an instant.

SHRING!

The white robe ‘erased’ the collapsed barriers and emerged from the cold mist. I immediately unleashed Hell Fire toward it.

FWHAAA!

The blazing flames engulfed the white robe. But that was only for a moment.

‘Shit.’

The bastard lightly swung its sword, and even high-level magic was erased from the world.

“How is it?”

A voice laced with mockery rang in my ear. I saw Karelin looking this way and shrugging her shoulders.

“That one from before was a masterpiece too, but compared to this one, it’s nothing.”

“What kind of Demon Beast is this?”

“Want to guess? I’ll give you a hint. Hmm… for starters, that thing isn’t a Demon Beast.”

Not a Demon Beast?

I only had a moment to feel puzzled by Karelin’s words.

“Kugh!”

The white robe had already leaped in front of me and swung a slash. If I hadn’t reached my hand back in time to crush the space with vacuum-element magic and dropped down, I would have been caught in the sword path.

But.

‘The headache…!’

Whether my Mana Shield had been caught in the sword path, the mana flowing through my body vanished in an instant. As a result, a recoil began to reverberate through my body.

Drip.

Blood started trickling from my nose — proof of that.

‘…That’s never happened to me before.’

When a mage-type Hunter exhausts all their mana, recoil symptoms appear accordingly. But I have nearly infinite mana that regenerates at high speed. So I’d never felt those symptoms before.

‘I think I get the principle now.’

My Mana Shield touched that bastard’s sword path, and during the three seconds when space was being erased, my continuously regenerating mana evaporated — a massive amount of mana got wiped out in that gap. So even I couldn’t help but feel the recoil.

‘…This is seriously dangerous.’

My body swayed heavily. I collapsed to the ground as I was.

‘Still… I’m still okay.’

I turned my head to first check if Mr. Luca was safe. Even though my mana had been erased for an instant, Mr. Luca’s body, protected by gravity magic, was fine.

My relief at that sight was brief.

‘…It’s coming.’

I saw the white robe move. That bastard swung the sword in its hand once more.

‘This is ridiculous.’

That posture wasn’t that of a skilled fighter — it was just a novice swinging a sword without any thought.

But.

The problem was that I had no way to counter it.

‘I can’t defend against it, and I can’t respond to it.’

That thing is completely my natural enemy. A slashing attack that erases everything it touches. It wipes out my magic and Mana Shield without any backlash.

‘Is there any way…’

As I was thinking that, the bastard approached me, and then came the moment it launched its slash. In the end, unable to think of a next move, I squeezed my eyes shut.

Death approaching.

But the emotion I felt wasn’t fear.

Guilt.

Only guilt — that I hadn’t managed to save Mr. Luca, who had shown me so much kindness I could never repay.

‘Am I… going to die?’

No.

Yoschuko Verdiol had already died long ago. This living thing wasn’t really alive.

I’d just been acting as if I’d somehow been reborn in a different body.

And so the existence called Yoschuko Verdiol was erased, and the one who had been Verdiol became Verdi.

Verdiol.

Verdi had gradually come to think that even if she couldn’t return to being a man, it was fine.

She was satisfied with her current life.

This life, where she wasn’t hated by people.

…Thinking that, for some reason, I didn’t want to die anymore.

Was that why?

“Kim Jihyeok!!!”

The name of the person I thought could help me now — I shouted it without realizing it.

And.

“…Where have you been, showing up only now?”

At my ear.

“Senior.”

Right after that, I heard a damn welcome form of address.