SWNOVELXO Chapter 149: The King of the Dead
Of course, planning anything with an F-Class body is meaningless.
‘I have more reasons to buy a lung now.’
I organized my thoughts and hung up the remaining clothes.
.
.
.
And two days later.
Lee Hwa-young hadn’t been acting up since the last warning.
Thanks to that, I no longer needed to find out how to dispose of bodies on Earth. A good thing, indeed.
*
Gimpo International Airport.
Footsteps echoed on the neatly arranged tiles.
Clack. Clack. Clack.
A white woman with short golden hair and pink boot heels stood out.
At first glance, she resembled an American S-Class Hunter, but her name was not Brooklyn.
This petite individual, with a chubby figure, was a freelance hunter named Sofia.
‘Fk! Fk!’
As soon as Sofia arrived in Korea, she began muttering curses.
Do you know why an Awakened from Minnesota traveled all the way to this Eastern country?
Because some lazy high-ranking hunter dumped his job on her.
–Sofia, our boss assigned me a task, but I’m too busy to handle it. Could you run to Korea instead?
Damn it, how did she end up doing Brooklyn’s dirty work?
Debt is truly a curse.
After awakening to A-Class, she paid off her loan shark debts, and thought she’d be free with $700,000 in hand, but here she was—back in the game.
She just couldn’t quit gambling even after awakening, and ended up losing all her rare equipment, which was supposed to be her business capital.
In fact, after awakening, her spending skyrocketed beyond imagination.
Damn card games, damn roulette!
If it weren’t for these debts, she wouldn’t be tied down by Brooklyn.
‘It sucks.’
Sofia scratched a concealed black tattoo under her turtleneck nervously as she walked towards the exit.
She had smoothly passed through immigration.
*
–Investigate whether Korea’s Fourth S-Class is real or fake!
How could she even take such ridiculous orders?
Check if the S-Class Hunter in Korea might be fake by verifying his powers?
‘I have such bad luck.’
Hooo.
Before coming here, Sofia had done a brief background check on an Awakened named Kim Gi-ryeo.
But she sensed she was doomed with just a simple search of his name on a website.
That Eastern man was not just an ordinary S-Class.
He was a colossal figure among the top hunters.
‘He wiped out a dungeon where a Siren appeared? Plus, he volunteered for the S-Class gate expedition?’
Brooklyn must be sending her to humiliate his slave, no doubt.
Even the Japanese hunters who went into the gate together said they wouldn’t have been able to hunt dragons without Gi-ryeo.
‘How could someone like him possibly be anything less than S-Class?’
Before the mission even began, Sofia had already pegged her target’s identity.
There was no other option.
Although it wasn’t intentional, Kim Gi-ryeo’s records got more impressive by the day.
Even the real S-Class Hunter Jeong Ha-seong had been completely fooled by his pretense, so it wouldn’t take long for this flow to spread.
‘Even Korea’s Ranking No. 1 recognized his skills. So it must mean he’s S-Class.’
Well, if someone as incredible as Jeong Ha-seong is involved, surely all of this can’t be fake.
Certainty can be a frightening thing.
Like those who get duped by lies, Sofia hastily concluded from the information surrounding Kim Gi-ryeo.
She had already branded her opponent as an S-Class Hunter.
“Phew.”
Now, the crux of the matter lay ahead.
Regardless of whether Kim Gi-ryeo was real or not, Sofia had to assess his level and return.
That was her promise to Brooklyn.
However, if the opponent truly was an S-Class, honestly, this felt like half a suicide mission.
A hunter from another country coming to test another’s strength? Anyone would naturally blow their top in such a situation.
‘Hmm.’
Glancing again, Sofia took note of Kim Gi-ryeo’s appearance.
Monolid eyes.
A dry face.
Dressed neatly in a black suit that looked slightly tense.
Even though her race differed, she could tell that he didn’t exude a “warm” vibe.
Yeah.
No matter how she looked at it, she didn’t want to mess with a hunter like that.
“Damn.”
But what could she do?
Although it wasn’t as severe as a Knight’s Pact, this collar promised to be hard to break.
“Oh, God……. Please let me return home safely.”
Sofia muttered a small prayer and pulled out her phone.
She needed to prepare for various tasks before starting her work.
*
How to reveal the identity of the Fourth S-Class.
In truth, the method was simple.
If Sofia, an A-Class herself, truly wanted to gauge Kim Gi-ryeo’s rank, she could simply charge at him with all her might.
A being capable of overpowering a diligent A-Class Hunter.
That was the power of the new breeds standing at the pinnacle of Awakening. Even the most formidable A-Class would end up as weaklings before them.
‘The plan is straightforward.’
Though the issue was that if she touched this Korean, there was a chance he might throw her in a kimchi pot.
‘Shit!’
Fortunately, her awakening ability wasn’t a direct confrontational skill against enemies.
People familiar with video games would find this term familiar.
【Summoner】
Sofia was an Awakened with an incredibly rare ability.
She could summon monsters to obey her commands using the magic stones left by the monsters.
As a summoner, this was precisely why Brooklyn had assigned her this task.
Given her abilities, she could always cover everything as an accident due to the gate if needed.
“Whew….”
[Fireball]
[Firewall]
[Light]
She had a few skills to disguise her awakening type, but there was no point in using those against an S-Class,
So this time, she’d rely only on her summoning spell and stealth items.
Besides, bringing up her background would lead to a self-destructing contract. It was akin to a character out of an anime.
Once this job was done, she swore she’d never gamble again.
Clatter. Sofia detached a blue magic stone from the shabby staff she had camouflaged as hunting gear.
Then, driving her previously rented illegal car, she arrived near Kim Gi-ryeo’s residence.
.
.
.
About three days had passed since she started her stakeout.
‘Finally!’
Sofia spotted a blond man emerging from the address her informant had provided. But she didn’t jump into action immediately.
There were still many factors to consider, like his destination and potential witnesses.
‘Especially if the destination is a gate—got to be cautious. That Eastern man is tied to another S-Class named Kang Chang-ho.’
She completed her preparations in the car and trailed Kim Gi-ryeo.
She had covered her head with a stealth item that would briefly blend her with the background.
‘Okay.’
However, it seemed that Kim Gi-ryeo didn’t intend to go hunting today.
He had thrown away some pet bottles he brought from home into a recycling bin and returned to the street.
‘Just tidying up? How ordinary.’
This spot was an open area good for observation.
And since there didn’t seem to be other people around…
Sofia, who had been watching carefully, soon executed her employer’s orders.
Now all she had to do was test that man using her summoned monster. Of course, as a summoner, she would stay far away to hide her identity.
-Right, Sofia.
At this point, let’s verify her employer’s conditions once again.
Her superior, Brooklyn, had added a few requests before this assignment.
-As you know, defensive abilities are really easy to manipulate. If you get the right artifacts, even if someone’s actually C-Class, they can resist higher-tier threats. But, unlike attack power, which cannot be fully masked by their abilities…
Brooklyn wanted to ascertain Kim Gi-ryeo’s rank as accurately as possible.
So she had been told to employ ‘something special’ that was neither a physical nor mental attack for this mission.
No physical attack or mental attack, huh?
What a bizarre order like hot iced americano.
But interestingly, if you observed the monsters that emerged from the gate, there was one that fit the bill.
She knew of a monster that deals a powerful, terrifying attack that couldn’t increase defensive resilience by any method.
‘Alright! Come forth, my expensive servant worth a jackpot the first!’
Rumble.
Sofia poured all her strength into the magic stone she possessed, summoning a monster into the air.
With skin like the bark of a dead tree, and oozing black blood from the holes in its face, this abomination’s name was Demirich.
[Demirich]
[Rank: A]
[Description: King of the Dead. Appears with about a 20% probability in the boss room of the “Fallen Paradise” dungeon…]
It was a special monster that delivered attacks in a ‘fixed damage’ format which couldn’t be reduced no matter what.
[Using the [Soul Strike] skill.]
1 hit for D-Class or lower.
2 hits for C-Class.
And from B-Class onwards, it was a narrow 4 hits.
If struck the determined number of times, it would definitely lead to instant death, providing an opportunity to gauge the opponent’s vessel.
‘Demirich’s attacks can never be blocked. With high resistance to debuffs, the only strategy is to take it down quickly before it kills you.’
Acquiring the magic stone took quite a few troublesome turns.
Sofia’s ability could only handle magic stones she had personally hunted, so she had faced Demirich in its natural state a few times.
And describing that experience? It would be nothing short of ‘horrific.’
‘Ugh.’
The pain felt like her insides were being ripped out. That’s how disturbing Demirich’s attacks were.
[Soul Strike].
Could this monster truly manipulate the concept of a soul?
‘Good, carefully observing the location…’
Clack.
Sofia adjusted the German binoculars in her hands to check her target again.
Blond hair and triple eyelids. That had to be the Fourth S-Class from Korea Brooklyn had mentioned.
And at this distance, even an S-Class should find it hard to detect the presence of the summoner.
‘Confirmed.’
She withdrew to the maximum distance she could control her servant and commanded it.
‘Start!’
The four-legged creature that had been suspended in the air dropped to the ground.
It was making a beeline for the lone Korean hunter.
‘Sorry about this. I have nothing against that guy, but… work is work.’
So, what kind of outcome will unfold from this point?
Will he manage to defeat Demirich?
Or will he be trampled helplessly by the king of the dead?
Sofia adjusted the binoculars with a tense expression as Demirich’s thin legs touched the ground, an event happening simultaneously.