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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Vine
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20××.
Seoul, the capital of the Republic of Korea.
A vast field, far from the outskirts, was once a residential area where many people lived.
But now, only a desolate ruin remained.
Ten years ago.
An S-rank gate backlashed, spewing out monsters, and a fierce battle ensued.
It was a battle known as the ‘Great Clash.’
The result was a human victory, but it was a victory written in blood, leaving only scars.
Countless ordinary people and awakened individuals died, and the land where the battle took place was completely contaminated for unknown reasons.
A land where not even a single blade of grass could grow.
A land that even homeless people and criminals avoided.
It used to be called by a different name, but now it was known as the ‘Land of Death.’
No method could restore it to its former state.
All they could do was monitor and clean the gates that appeared in that land.
Moreover, most of the gates that appeared in the Land of Death were high-difficulty B-rank or A-rank gates.
“Team Alpha! Entering Gate A-0128109.”
– Good luck.
The communication from a hunter belonging to the Awakened Association was heard from behind.
As always, the moment of entering a gate was a moment of tension and excitement that made the body tremble.
But the team leader of Alpha Team, a veteran among veterans, calmly raised his hand and gave a hand signal.
“Enter!”
The team members shouted.
“Enter!”
The elite team ‘Alpha’ of the Red Dragon Guild, one of the three major guilds in Korea.
Most of the 12 team members, excluding the porters and hunters from the Awakened Association, were A-rank and B-rank awakened individuals.
The gate that Alpha Team entered was a cave-type A-rank gate that appeared in the Land of Death.
It was a large cave, large enough to fit a large passenger plane.
Alpha Team was tense due to the thick, eerie air flowing from the dark red interior of the cave.
“Um… Team Leader.”
The team leader turned his head at the team member’s voice.
“What is it?”
“It’s been ten minutes since we entered this gate.”
“So?”
“There isn’t a single monster in sight.”
“Did you just sleep through hunter training?”
“Huh?”
“This is an A-rank gate! A-rank monsters have some intelligence. Can’t you consider the possibility that they’re gathered at the end of the gate, waiting to ambush us?”
There was actually such a case five years ago, and the hunters suffered great losses at that time.
The team member realized his mistake, and his face turned red.
“Tsk, be prepared when we get back. I’ll give you a hard time with theory lessons.”
“Gah! I-I’d rather do more physical training!”
“Sigh, it’s because of guys like you that tankers are mocked for having brains made of muscle! Just shut up and take the theory lessons.”
“……”
They walked for another ten minutes, but no monsters appeared, and the expressions of the team leader and team members grew darker.
“Those monster bastards! Using their brains, huh?”
“Damn it! How much are they going to throw at us this time?”
“Right? This is a new armor I bought yesterday, and if it gets even a scratch, my heart will ache…”
How much further did they go?
Before crossing a rocky hill in the middle of the gate, they saw the figure of a monster on top of the hill.
“Gasp! That’s… a Cyclops!”
The team leader of Alpha Team swallowed his breath and gave a hand signal.
The meaning was to prepare for battle!
The close-combat hunters drew their weapons, the magic-type hunters prepared their spells.
And the support-type hunters loosened their bodies, ready to be deployed at any moment.
Soon, the Cyclops discovered Alpha Team, crossed the hill, let out a roar, and charged…
“…It’s not moving?”
Come to think of it, something was strange.
Cyclops are monsters with very sensitive senses, as they only have one eye.
Normally, it should have attacked before Alpha Team even came into view.
But there was no sign of that, and it was just sitting there, leaning against the wall, dazed.
Then, a young hunter from the support team spoke.
“Team Leader! No life signs are detected from that Cyclops.”
“What?”
“The only life signs detected nearby are a few very weak ones.”
“That can’t be! This is an A-rank gate, you know? Are you sure?”
“I’m sure!”
“You, come with me. The rest, stand by!”
The team leader and the team member carefully approached the hill and examined the area where the Cyclops was.
“……”
The team leader was speechless.
The place where the Cyclops was sitting was a dead end.
In other words, this was the boss room.
Below it, hundreds, no, over a thousand monster corpses were piled up like laundry. Because the Cyclops was so huge, the monsters piled up underneath were not visible from afar.
Moreover, all the monsters, including the Cyclops, had expressions as if they didn’t know they were dead.
The team leader muttered.
“…Jackpot.”
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The higher-ups ordered a thorough investigation into this absurd situation.
“In my 20 years as a hunter, I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“Could it be that the monsters fought among themselves?”
“If that were the case, the corpses would be too intact.”
“Then who did this? This gate appeared yesterday.”
Just then, a team member examining the monster corpses shouted.
“Team Leader, no matter how much we examine it, this werewolf only has this one wound.”
“Same here!”
The only common feature among the corpses was a single, deep wound.
“Are you saying that wound was made by a human fist?”
At the team leader’s question, one of the team members answered with a tense voice.
“According to the investigation, yes.”
“That’s hard to believe.”
“But that’s what the forensic results say…”
“Even if it’s a werewolf, an awakened individual who can kill an A-rank monster like a Cyclops with one punch? As far as I know, there’s no one who can do that.”
At that moment, a hunter from the Awakened Association, who had finished a call with the higher-ups, lowered his communicator and spoke.
“Um… We received a response from the S-rank awakened individual, Mr. Shin.”
“What did he say?”
“He said not to joke around.”
“……”
“He said he can’t do that either… That the only one who could do that is a Zero-rank awakened individual…”
For a while, they were at a loss for words.
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A little distance away from the Land of Death, where the A-rank gate appeared.
A young man was walking on the barren land.
“Where the hell is this place?”
The sun was hot.
Only dust swirled on the parched ground.
There were only shattered remnants of what must have been something, to the point where it was impossible to discern its original form.
“How come the only traces of humans are bones?”
He thought it might be hell, but that didn’t seem to be the case.
He wasn’t old enough to die, and he wasn’t unskilled enough to die from an unexpected attack.
The man’s name was Gang-so.
When he, who was called the Martial God and the King of Death, organized his enlightenment and opened his eyes, his house was gone, and he was in a strange cave.
Naked, at that!
He went inside because there seemed to be something there, and it was full of strange-looking monsters.
There were giants with one eye, bipedal wolves, and so on.
They all attacked Gang-so as soon as they saw him.
He had stopped killing people recklessly a long time ago, but that didn’t mean he would let those who attacked him have their way.
Moreover, the opponents were not humans, but monsters.
‘Why are these guys, who fall with one punch, so eager to attack…’
When he came out of the cave after dealing with all the monsters that attacked him, he was once again bewildered.
All he could see before him was… ruins.
He picked up something that looked like clothes from a nearby collapsed building and looked around.
There were traces of humans, but no living humans at all.
There wasn’t a single blade of grass in this unfamiliar place, as if a huge being had trampled everything on the ground.
Gang-so knew the reason well.
‘It’s contaminated with demonic energy.’
The Heavenly Demon Cult.
It was the same energy he felt when those madmen used forbidden spells.
With the martial arts that Gang-so had mastered, he could purify even that demonic energy, but since he didn’t know where he was, he couldn’t act rashly.
He raised his head and looked at the silver tower towering in the distance.
It was the 70-story building of the Awakened Association headquarters, commonly known as the Silver Tower.
Gang-so decided to go near that place.
Because he felt the energy of many people around the Silver Tower.
Whoosh-!
As Gang-so kicked off the ground, there was a sound of air exploding, and his figure disappeared.
It was the day before the Red Dragon Guild’s Alpha Team entered Gate A-0128109.
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