Chapter 29
‘Why did I do that?’
As soon as the hunt ended and the rewards came in, Lee Do-jae snapped back to his senses.
He then looked at the dead Hwain lying a little distance away.
Its body was mangled, with only one ragged leg left intact. Its arms and chest were crushed, and Do-jae’s blue sword was lodged between its wide-open, lifeless eyes.
‘How brutal.’
Seeing the result of his work, Do-jae covered his mouth with one hand.
Efficiency had always been his priority in monster hunting.
His usual style was to decapitate his enemies or strike their vital points for a quick kill.
It was a habit born from his weakness.
But this time was completely different.
Not just with this monster, but with all the ones he had hunted recently—none of them had died cleanly.
He hadn’t even taken a single trophy, something he usually enjoyed.
‘What’s wrong with my mind?’
Do-jae shook his head vigorously.
His heart was still racing.
Only then did he focus on the voice in his mind.
—More. Kill more.
It was her voice.
The voice of the goddess who had promised to become his god.
“What did you do to me?”
Do-jae asked, speaking into the empty air.
The voice responded to his question.
—I planted a small spark in your heart. A spark that allows you to resonate with my emotions.
She sounded agitated.
Her tone was completely different from the dignified one she had used in the temple.
“Why?”
—Why? They are filthy followers. Only a painful death awaits them.
“Filthy followers? Wait… Who are you, really?”
—I am Ellatra. The witch of the Sight, who will become your god and deliver despair to these vile followers!
Suddenly, her emotions flooded into him.
His heart began to pound even faster, and blood surged through his veins like a torrent.
His skin flushed red, and the blood vessels in his eyes burst, turning them crimson.
A splitting headache exploded in his skull.
Shhhhh—
As his mind wavered, his Golem Armor deactivated.
Thankfully, as if by some miracle, his blood pressure and heart rate returned to normal.
“Ha, Hah, phew.”
Do-jae sat down, panting heavily, trying to regain his composure.
He wondered if this was what it felt like to be hit by a berserk spell cast by a Red Orc shaman.
It was a state of pure frenzy, where all you could think about was slaughtering your enemy.
Experiencing it firsthand, it wasn’t a pleasant feeling.
‘Am I turning into a complete psycho?’
The being he had thought was a god turned out to be a self-proclaimed witch.
A witch talking about becoming a god?
It sent chills down his spine.
‘I should seal the Golem Armor for now.’
The “Golem’s Eye,” given to him by the witch, was incredibly useful. But after hearing her voice, he felt uneasy.
Luckily, the voice only spoke to him while he was wearing the Golem Armor, so he decided to seal it away until he found a solution.
‘More importantly, what about Kim Joon-su?’
The connection to his golems had been severed since earlier.
While he was fighting the Hwain, the link had broken.
At the time, he had been too consumed with killing the Hwain to think about it, but now that he was calm, he worried about Kim Joon-su.
As soon as his breathing returned to normal, Do-jae began sprinting toward the last place where he had sensed the presence of his golems.
—
Kim Joon-su’s sword grazed the troll’s leg.
His well-honed standard sword left a deep gash in the troll’s thigh.
“Rooaaar!”
Unfortunately, by the time Kim Joon-su looked back at the troll, the wound was already starting to heal.
Indeed, a troll’s regeneration ability was second to none.
Without the power to sever the troll’s neck in one strike, there could be no more difficult foe.
“Damn it, where are Jang Pil-ho and Lee Ji-ung? Jang Pil-ho! Lee Ji-ung!”
Kim Joon-su shouted again, dodging the troll’s attack.
While it was one thing to not care about what they did during downtime, leaving the battlefield was something else entirely.
“Sorry!”
“Lee Ji-ung! Where did you go?!”
Lee Ji-ung ran over, looking extremely apologetic.
But having one more person didn’t change the tide of battle in any dramatic way.
thud-!
The troll didn’t even seem to acknowledge Lee Ji-ung’s attack and swung its blunt club down.
“Ugh.”
Their swords clashed with the club, but instead of the club being cut, the impact forced the sword down into the ground.
If Lee Ji-ung had taken better care of his sword like Kim Joon-su, he might’ve been able to at least damage the club. But expecting such discipline from the lazy Lee Ji-ung was unreasonable.
On second thought, perhaps it was for the better.
Had his sword gotten stuck in the club, it would’ve led to an even worse situation.
Lee Ji-ung’s carelessness had saved him, in a way.
Swish—! Slash—!
Both their swords cut into the troll’s waist and legs.
Kim Joon-su’s blade made a decent wound again, but Lee Ji-ung’s sword merely glanced off the troll’s tough skin.
It wasn’t just the sword’s fault—Lee Ji-ung’s lack of skill was painfully obvious.
“Draw its attention!”
“Huh? How?”
As the youngest member of Class 3, Lee Ji-ung still hadn’t spent enough time with the team to be fully in sync.
This mismatch of coordination was a matter of life and death.
“Argh!”
The troll’s club grazed Lee Ji-ung’s leg as it swung by.
Even a graze was enough to leave a massive bruise from the sheer strength of the blow.
“Hyung, my leg…”
“Idiot, move!”
Lee Ji-ung tried to stand up, his leg trembling uncontrollably.
The troll, seeing an opportunity, swung its club down once more.
Thud—!
“Ugh!”
Kim Joon-su threw himself in the way, taking the hit for him.
With a heavy thud, like a baseball bat hitting a soccer ball, Kim Joon-su was sent flying and crashed to the ground.
“Ugh… This is all the leader’s fault…”
The troll advanced.
Lee Ji-ung, standing over Kim Joon-su’s fallen body, muttered in frustration.
Facing a troll alone, when they barely stood a chance as a group?
Lee Ji-ung began to resent his situation.
“We’re going to end up like Class 2… If only our leader hadn’t abandoned us…”
The troll raised its arm once more, looming over them.
For Lee Ji-ung, everything seemed to slow down as he struggled with his decision.
“Should I dodge? Or block?”
He could dodge.
The troll, despite its strength and regeneration, was slow.
As a D-rank~E-rank Awakener, Lee Ji-ung might not be able to land an effective hit, but dodging was well within his capabilities.
But if he dodged, the club would strike Kim Joon-su instead.
At the very least, he would suffer broken bones; at worst, internal injuries that could lead to death.
Should he sacrifice himself for his comrade, or let his comrade suffer to save his own life?
While these thoughts raced through Lee Ji-ung’s mind, his body had already moved—out of the troll’s attack range.
Boom—!
Dust rose thickly, obscuring the scene.
A few seconds passed.
When the dust cleared, a troll’s club was revealed to be stuck on something.
“A golem?”
A golem stood in front of Kim Joon-su, blocking the troll.
The golem had grabbed the troll’s club with both hands, preventing it from moving.
Pah-!
Meanwhile, Lee Ji-ung quickly picked up Kim Joon-su and, limping, fled the scene. The troll let out a roar and struck the golem with its other arm.
Thud, thud, thud-.
The golem’s head flew off, and the mana stone embedded in its chest became fully exposed.
The light of the mana stone was faint, barely glowing like the last flicker of a dying flame.
Boom-!
And finally.
The troll slammed its fist down on the golem.
The golem, along with its mana stone, shattered into pieces, losing its form and crumbling into a pile of dirt.
“Roarrr!”
The troll, frustrated after being interrupted twice from getting its prey, was growing angrier.
Lee Ji-ung, after laying Kim Joon-su down some distance away, gripped his sword harder to stop his trembling hands.
“Shit….”
Lee Ji-ung took one last look around.
The others were too busy fighting their own battles with trolls and couldn’t help him.
‘Fuck, I have to survive.’
Tap, tap, tap-.
Lee Ji-ung started running, dragging his injured leg.
However, his decision was a poor one.
If he had run towards Son Jeong-gyu, Yuk Hyun-jae, or Jang Pil-ho, they might have been able to assist him.
But instead, he ran in the opposite direction, causing the troll to chase after him.
And to make things worse, he stumbled on a rock and fell after only a short distance.
‘Damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it!’
The troll approached him with a grotesque grin.
Lee Ji-ung, unable to even think of standing, crawled across the ground.
It was the first time since joining the subjugation force that he had experienced the fear of death.
“Kreuk, kreuk.”
Lee Ji-ung turned his head to look back.
The troll was right behind him, raising its club, ready to strike.
‘This time, I’m really done for.’
At the moment Lee Ji-ung fully gave up.
Swish-.
A thin line appeared on the troll’s neck.
Blood droplets started to form along that line.
Thud-.
The troll’s head, unable to defy gravity, dropped to the ground.
Then, the troll’s massive body fell over in a pathetic heap.
“Sorry, I’m late.”
Behind the fallen troll stood a familiar face.
Do-jae was there.
***
Drip, drip-.
“Don’t spill a single drop.”
Son Jeong-gyu scolded Jang Pil-ho and Lee Ji-ung.
“Hey, be careful when you’re collecting it.”
“You do it properly, then…”
The two were carefully collecting troll blood into the glass bottles Do-jae had given them.
“Team Leader, I’m sorry.”
Kim Joon-su bowed his head in apology to Do-jae.
Do-jae reassured him and then turned his gaze to Jang Pil-ho and Lee Ji-ung.
“You two, drain all the blood from the troll and strip the flesh off the bones. That’ll be your punishment.”
“Yes…”
“Got it…”
The two responded weakly.
Once Do-jae had joined the fight, the battle against the trolls had quickly ended.
Although other teams arrived later to help, by that time, the trolls were already dead at Do-jae’s hands, so there was nothing left for them to do.
Aside from Lee Ji-ung’s broken leg, which had been splinted, and Kim Joon-su’s unconsciousness from simple bruising, the team had avoided major injuries.
“Team Leader, the golem…”
Kim Joon-su trailed off, not finishing his sentence.
However, Do-jae didn’t show much reaction.
Jang Pil-ho and Lee Ji-ung had already confessed, and regardless, the responsibility fell on him anyway.
“Don’t worry about it. It’s already over.”
Though he couldn’t help but feel a bit of regret, he was relieved that none of his team members had been seriously injured.
Determined to take on more responsibility in the future, Do-jae checked his subspace.
Out of the three golems, only one remained.
‘Subspace. Mana stone classification.’
—Mana Stone (E) x9
—Mana Stone (D) x2
—Mana Stone (C) x5
—Mana Stone (B) x3
—Mana Stone (A) x1
After upgrading the Golem’s Eye, Do-jae could now categorize his subspace more efficiently.
He could separate out the mana stones like this.
‘Should I make another golem?’
Do-jae hesitated.
Creating a new, useful golem would require more leveling up.
While using higher-grade mana stones would result in stronger golems, they wouldn’t be very useful immediately.
Bzz, bzz-.
As the team gathered and prepared to return, Do-jae’s smartphone buzzed with a notification.
[Team 3, return immediately. Upon return, the team leader is to report to the commander’s office.]
—
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