Episode 96
By the time Seo Sang-ho received the call and arrived at the scene with Lee Jun-cheol, the situation had already been resolved.
The masked hunters were lying on the ground with severe injuries that had their clothes torn to shreds.
Although the victim lost consciousness, he was not in danger of dying as he avoided vital areas such as arteries.
“This is completely made of rags.”
The people who finished their work left a long time ago.
All that was left at the scene were masked men in a miserable state and D-class hunters gaping like carp.
Seo Sang-ho explained the situation to them before any false rumors spread.
“You don’t have to be too surprised, since it was just members of our guild who were active.”
“Joe, the people who showed up a little while ago are hunters belonging to the Pantheon?”
“Yes. This is confidential information, so please do not let rumors spread.”
As Seo Sang-ho spoke politely, the D-class hunters nodded.
But Seo Sang-ho had no faith that any of them would keep their promise.
Just because someone is socially disadvantaged doesn’t mean they are all good people.
Among these people, there must be someone who sells information for money.
‘That was the plan from the beginning.’
The Pantheon hides an unidentified group of exceptional talents.
The real purpose was to spread the rumor and create a suspicious atmosphere so that other guilds would not attack without permission.
Seo Sang-ho thoroughly controlled his facial expressions so as not to reveal his true feelings.
“I don’t know where they come from, but they are definitely talented.”
He had been desperately trying to see them in action, so he had chased them even when it meant forcing himself to do so, but all he saw was traces of them after the work was done.
Lee Jun-cheol was somewhat disappointed, but he was satisfied because he got to know the strength of the people.
“Looking at them, they seem like pretty skilled hunters… … .”
Lee Jun-cheol took off the masks of the fallen masked people one by one and checked their faces.
Then I found a familiar face and smiled.
“Choi Junseo. He is the author who moved from Titan to the Cadenza Guild.”
Seo Sang-ho heard Lee Jun-cheol’s words and checked his face.
As expected from someone who was a member of Titan, his face was definitely familiar.
“Then this raid must have been carried out by the Cadenza Guild.”
“It seems like they were quite sincere, considering they even mobilized a former Titan.”
You could tell just by looking at the fact that they had deployed over 20 hunters to an area where there were hardly any patrol personnel.
The Cadenza Guild had intended to drive a wedge in with their first raid, but their opponents were not good.
“Shall we contact the association?”
“I think that would be a good idea. Now that we have an excuse, we should use it thoroughly.”
Lee Jun-cheol looked surprised when he heard Seo Sang-ho’s answer.
“Iyong… … . I think your personality has changed a bit.”
Lee Jun-cheol didn’t expect to hear those words from Seo Sang-ho.
If Seo Sang-ho had been his old self, he would have said that they should just let him go since there were no casualties even though he was attacked.
The reason Lee Jun-cheol came to the scene was also to prevent such a decision.
“Because I learned that the world is not as easy as I thought.”
“Hehehe, is that so?”
After being severely beaten once, Seo Sang-ho also learned how to compromise with reality.
Lee Jun-cheol thought it was a good change.
It is much better to pursue practicality and reap the benefits than to live an ideal life only to get hit in the back of the head.
“I will go back first and report this matter to the guild leader.”
“No, you can do that later.”
“Yes? Why?”
“When you’re busy all the way to the Middle East, how can you possibly have the time to worry about this? It won’t be too late to let me know when you get back after work is over.”
Seo Sang-ho also knew the hardships well, as he had often traveled abroad for commissions.
In his experience, it wasn’t possible to get here from overseas in one go, so worrying about it didn’t help.
Lee Jun-cheol thought about it for a while and then agreed with Seo Sang-ho’s opinion.
“We’ll do that. It’s not that urgent, so we can take care of it.”
Anyway, the plan was to spread rumors and buy time to prevent other guilds from attacking recklessly.
Since I wasn’t going to attempt a counterattack right away, it wasn’t that difficult to just wait until Kang Jin-hyeok’s request was finished.
“Let’s see… … In Qatar, it must be lunchtime now.”
“It’s so hot out there, I’m sure he’s just really annoyed.”
Seo Sang-ho’s prediction was highly credible as it was based on experience.
In fact, Kang Jin-hyeok felt like he was going to die because of the sunlight shining down from above his head.
If it had just been hot, it would have been better, but as expected from a country next to the ocean, the humidity was no joke.
Kang Jin-hyeok grumbled as he walked, asking why he had to come all the way overseas to get a taste of Korean summer.
“Where’s that damn monster? Let’s catch it quickly and leave!”
One secretary pointed to the place in front of him for an answer to the complaint.
“It’s over there, beyond that wall.”
“A wall? Where on earth is the wall?”
Kang Jin-hyeok’s eyes only saw the appearance of an ordinary city.
Kang Jin-hyeok, who was looking around to find the wall that a secretary had mentioned, witnessed a bird crashing into an invisible wall and falling.
“uh?”
For Kang Jin-hyeok, the invisible wall was a very familiar phenomenon.
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‘Could it be that there are side effects of dimensional magic here too?’
Kang Jin-hyeok, who approached the wall closer, soon realized that his thoughts were mistaken.
The invisible wall erected in Qatar was not the result of dimensional magic, but was a barrier created by the combined efforts of hunters.
Dozens of hunters took turns holding the barrier every hour, continuously infusing MP into it.
“There’s a new type of monster beyond that barrier, right?”
“Yes, that’s right. Please wait a moment, as they are making a gap for you to enter soon.”
When Kang Jin-hyeok and his party arrived here, the person who had come out to greet them walked to the scene and said something to the hunters.
The hunters who heard the story glanced at Kang Jin-hyeok and Cheon Sang-ho.
Then, the hunters frowned and created a gap in the barrier for a person to pass through.
“I guess those hunters don’t trust us that much.”
“You figured it out, didn’t you?”
“It’s strange that you don’t know when you’re so open about it.”
The hunters in Qatar were hurt by the fact that hunters from other countries were offering to take on the tasks they could not solve.
When Kang Jin-hyeok and Cheon Sang-ho passed through the gap in the barrier, the words they spoke were clearly curses in Arabic.
“Why is this necklace so good at translating other languages, but so bad at interpreting Arabic?”
Kang Jin-hyeok is constantly venting his anger on the necklace the dwarf gave him.
It seemed that this necklace could only interpret languages from other dimensions.
I thought I could put studying foreign languages aside from now on, but things in life don’t always go as planned.
He was left with regret, thinking that if he had been able to communicate properly, he would have given those hunters a proper swearing-out.
“Kukuk.”
As Kang Jin-hyeok and Cheon Sang-ho entered the barrier completely, the hunters of Qatar let out an unpleasant laugh.
Although it wasn’t visible, I could vaguely sense that the gap had closed, perhaps because I used the aura so often.
“It looks like a mess when it opens, but it’s like a festival when it closes.”
“Please understand that I am acting like this because my pride is hurt.”
Cheon Sang-ho advised that it would be detrimental to react to such trivial things one by one.
“Rather than worrying about those people, it’s time to track down the new monsters.”
“Is there a need to chase after something like that? They’ll come to you anyway.”
Kang Jin-hyeok expected that the monster would definitely reveal itself since two humans had volunteered to be its prey.
“Knowing that an attack is coming is useless if you don’t know where it will come from.”
Even though he knew it, Cheon Sang-ho concentrated his mind and tried to read the monster’s movements so that he wouldn’t be harmed.
While Cheon Sang-ho was concentrating, Kang Jin-hyeok took out the radar from his inventory and searched for the enemy’s location.
“What is it? Is something broken?”
Kang Jin-hyeok looked at the countless dots on the screen and had doubts.
The number of visible points was estimated to be in the hundreds.
Moreover, the location is only within 5m.
With so many of them close together, even the dullest of people could not have missed it.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing much. I was just checking because the radar didn’t seem to be working properly.”
“This new type of monster is said to have the ability to disable all detection items. That’s probably why.”
There was a reason why Cheon Sang-ho put aside his tracking items and relied on his intuition.
“Why are you telling me that important fact now?”
Kang Jin-hyeok grumbled and put the radar back into his road inventory.
Instead, Kang Jin-hyeok took out a baseball bat and hit the floor with all his might.
The baseball bat made a loud noise as it easily pierced the concrete floor.
“Ugh.”
Kang Jin-hyeok raised his aura with a short shout and sent it flowing with the tip of the baseball bat.
The aura that spread from the tip of the baseball bat to the floor gradually expanded its range and turned the surroundings upside down.
Kang Jin-hyeok’s aura and Cheon Sang-ho’s intuition almost simultaneously detected the monster’s location.
When the two people’s gazes were focused on one place, a new monster also appeared as if it had been waiting for it.
Boom!
The new monster that appeared by digging the ground like a mole had a very similar appearance to a scorpion.
The difference was that, unlike regular scorpions, it had a huge body, reaching over 15 meters in height.
Including the tail, the body length must have been at least 50 meters.
“They say there is poison in the tail.”
“I know that without you having to say it.”
It looked exactly like a scorpion, so you could tell just by looking at it that the sharp stinger on its tail was poisonous.
The giant scorpion immediately used its stinger as a preemptive strike.
The tail, swung like a whip, approached the two people at incredible speed.
Cheon Sang-ho swung his sword horizontally to block the tail’s movements.
When the sword and tail met, a loud noise rang out and a strong shock wave occurred.
“… … It’s pretty solid.”
Cheon Sang-ho was extremely surprised that the giant scorpion’s tail wasn’t cut off by his sword.
This was my first time facing a monster, as my only previous experience was when I faced Kang Jin-hyeok.
“Even so, it would be at the level of a scorpion.”
Kang Jin-hyeok confidently stepped forward and aimed for the scorpion’s head with a baseball bat filled with aura.
The scorpion moved quickly and struck Kang Jin-hyeok’s bat with its pincers.
It was clearly a blow with an aura, but the giant scorpion was able to parry the attack without any damage.
“Huh?”
It was the first time that Aura’s blow, which was no different from a drop of water, was blocked so pointlessly, so Kang Jin-hyeok also made a surprised expression like Cheon Sang-ho.
