Retire 257
by Cristae257 Jirisan Fairy (3)
Clang!
No matter how many golems there were, each one by itself wasn’t much to worry about. Their massive size might have been threatening on open ground or inside a building, but in this densely wooded forest, they couldn’t perform to their full potential.
On top of that, their numbers worked against them; they kept bumping into each other and getting in their own way.
The golems’ hard, unyielding material also played a part in this situation. Other hunters might have struggled against this many, but who were we? We had Hong Seok-yeong with us.
Hong Seok-yeong was, quite literally, smashing the golems’ heads.
No, just breaking their heads wasn’t enough to stop them, so he was pulverizing them from head to toe, reducing them to fragments.
“……”
Of course, I wasn’t just standing idly by, either.
“Are there still some left?”
“Their numbers have dropped a lot, but…”
At this point, the noise of battle had rung out so loudly that all our efforts to keep our voices down were pointless. Even with all this commotion, I couldn’t sense any other presence.
Hong Seok-yeong narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing the golems. He looked dissatisfied.
I understood why Hong Seok-yeong was making that face. I was looking at the golems with a similar expression.
“This is just…”
With a sour look, I finished off the few golems that remained. Meanwhile, Hong Seok-yeong’s expression grew more and more grave.
“When did the level of our country’s hunters drop this low?”
Why did his thoughts always jump to that?
It wasn’t just Park Seo-hyun and the others who deserved blame. This man was the same. Like teacher, like student.
But, fortunately, Hong Seok-yeong didn’t just spout nonsense. Unlike the kids who would burst into tears at the drop of a hat, Hong Seok-yeong at least had his own logic.
“How many hunters have come through here, and none of them noticed this?”
Ah. That kind of problem.
I nodded in agreement.
“That’s definitely an issue.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
Hong Seok-yeong smashed the last of the golems. Anyone could see he was taking out his frustration.
He wasn’t slashing or stabbing with the spear, but beating them with the shaft.
Only after making sure the shattered golems didn’t rise again did Hong Seok-yeong let out a deep sigh.
“There’s someone controlling them, and yet all they did was list golems as the monsters appearing here? Honestly…”
“This dungeon wasn’t rated that low, either.”
“Was it an A?”
“Yes. The dungeon’s interior is large, so it’s rated that high, but the difficulty was evaluated as B.”
“So that means at least an A-rank hunter came through here. Disappointing. We need to rethink the licensing evaluation system.”
Until the golems attacked, Hong Seok-yeong had somehow held back, but now he grumbled incessantly.
I half-listened to his complaints while sifting through the golem debris. There was no mana left in them. They were just like broken pottery. To be sure, I pressed my blade against a shard and applied force.
Crack.
The fragment broke into even smaller pieces, but I still felt nothing. Saw nothing. If someone was controlling the golems, there should have been a mana link, but I hadn’t seen anything like that during the fight.
“Any good ideas?”
“…About what?”
“About the evaluation method.”
“That’s for the Association to figure out, not us.”
“Hm…”
Hong Seok-yeong tilted his head, then accepted it.
“That’s true.”
Licensing was the Association’s jurisdiction, not the Administration Bureau’s.
“Try saying something to this hunter when you get out.”
“I’ll have to.”
“You didn’t notice anything while fighting these things, did you?”
Hong Seok-yeong came closer. I heard the crunch of shards breaking under his feet.
Earlier, he’d walked so lightly not even a blade of grass was harmed. Now he was deliberately stomping. Even I could sense he was trying to provoke whoever might be watching, the possible controller.
“It felt wrong.”
Hong Seok-yeong rubbed the ground with his sole as he spoke.
“No satisfaction. It felt like smashing a child’s toy. I didn’t like it.”
“Well…”
I understood what he meant.
I straightened up. The golem fragments were scattered everywhere. Some still clattered as if the connection hadn’t completely severed, even though they were shattered. Still no visible mana…
Even after destroying so many golems, as Hong Seok-yeong said, it didn’t feel like we’d defeated monsters. I didn’t agree with the “child’s toy” part—after all, toys don’t attack me and try to break my skull—but I did agree that there was no sense of having cut down or slain a monster.
Monsters have mana. Awakened bodies are imbued with mana too, but it’s different from monsters. Monsters are pure concentrations of mana. That’s why you can make mana stones from monster blood, but not from an awakened person’s blood.
Awakened ones sensitive to mana can keenly sense the change in mana flow when a monster dies.
Not all hunters can do this, but for someone of my or Hong Seok-yeong’s level, if we couldn’t notice it, we might as well have bought our licenses with cash.
What Hong Seok-yeong called “satisfaction” was precisely this change in mana. For hunters, it’s one of the ways to tell whether what they’ve killed is a monster or not.
After a moment’s thought, I spoke.
“Should I burn them?”
Hong Seok-yeong stared at me.
“…Just to check, did you use that sword before, too?”
“No.”
“Then…”
“Well, dungeons in Korea tend to have a lot of trees. If something seems suspicious, I figured it might not be a bad idea to just burn it all.”
“Hmmm.”
“…Why are you looking at me like that?”
Hong Seok-yeong’s gaze was unsettling. When I frowned, he flinched and waved his hands.
“No, no, it’s nothing. Still, I’d rather you didn’t burn everything.”
“I still think it’s the simplest solution.”
“But then nothing would be left behind…”
“Isn’t that even better?”
I gave the sword a slight swing. A tiny flame, no bigger than a fingernail, flickered to life. If it were ordinary fire, it would be impossible to burn golems made of baked earth.
But… well. No need to waste words at this point.
The blue flame swallowed a shard of golem. I was careful not to let it spread to the forest as I burned the small fragment.
“……”
I infused the flame with mana.
“……”
Added a bit more mana.
“……”
Mana…
“Hee—Hee-jae? If you put any more in, you’ll start a fire.”
“This is just so damn annoying!”
“They’ve already been fired once, so they won’t burn easily, right?”
“That’s only true for ordinary fire! My sister used to burn all sorts of things with this!!”
At least its performance was undeniable.
But it was also picky about its wielder. I glared at the sword. If this really… if it was connected to my brother, if there was some trace of him left in this dungeon, and if the sword recognized it—
…If an item had that kind of function, it would have caused trouble long ago.
Don’t get worked up, don’t get worked up.
Maybe it was the heightened senses from being inside the dungeon, but my emotions were easily stirred.
I took a deep breath and focused on the fragment I’d targeted.
How did my sister use this sword?
‘What? What am I thinking when I set things on fire? Hey, Woo Hee-jae, listen to yourself. Anyone would think I’m some kind of arsonist… I’m not, okay?! It’s not like I never set fires, but only in dungeons! And only when there’s really no other choice!’
‘You say that, but you do it pretty often.’
‘Well, there’s always something to burn nearby, so why not… No, I’m kidding. Hey, aren’t you coming? Why are you getting farther away?’
‘Arsonist…’
‘I told you I’m not! And anyway, even if you burn trees, monsters don’t burn that easily. Especially the higher-ranked ones. It depends on their composition, too.’
‘You can’t burn them? After all that bragging, it’s nothing special.’
‘You—seriously… I didn’t say it’s impossible, just that it’s hard. If you use runes or magic to boost the firepower, it can get ridiculously strong. Or you can just pour in a ton of mana.’
…Only unhelpful memories come to mind.
Anyway, as far as I remember, if it doesn’t work, just pour in more mana and see what happens. That’s not just about this sword—most hunters’ solutions are simple and brute-force.
“I’m telling you, you don’t have to burn everything.”
“I’m going to burn it.”
“No…”
Hong Seok-yeong tried to stop me, but soon gave up.
“Fine, fine. Do whatever you want. It’s the perfect age to enjoy playing with fire, after all…”
“What are you talking about?”
I considered drawing a rune as my sister had advised, but then remembered we didn’t know what might be lurking in this dungeon and decided against it.
Better to be cautious than to just assume it’ll be fine.
I focused my mana. It didn’t matter if the surroundings burned; I could put it out before it got out of control.
We’d smashed a ton of golems, but who knew what else might crawl out. If it came to it, I’d really have to set a fire and run. I wasn’t as good as Hong Seok-yeong at tracking illegal awakened ones in dungeons, but when it came to dungeon raiding, I had confidence.
Inside a dungeon, you always had to consider every tool at your disposal, and the conditions for using them. That was my job. For example, if you had to start a fire, you needed to know what temperature would affect even the dungeon’s monsters.
The yellowish shards, like dry earth, started to blacken. I could see them thinning out. They became as thin as paper, then crumbled into ash and scattered.
And then—
BEEEEEEEEEP!!!!
<@!*%$#%>
“Ugh!”
“Guh!”
A piercing shriek filled the dungeon, crushing my eardrums.
I hastily shielded my ears with mana. But the sound still rang as if it were striking my brain directly.
I’d never seen a pattern like this. What was it? The one controlling the golems?
Hong Seok-yeong, his face twisted in pain from the noise, quickly moved his hands. The noise made it hard to read, so it took me a moment to understand.
My eyes widened.
Hong Seok-yeong’s hands repeated a single word.
‘Fairy.’
BOOOOM!!!!
<#%^$(@&>
Instead of hair, it had branches. With small leaves densely packed, it looked like a hedgehog bristling with spines.
Aside from the leafy hair and pale earth-colored skin, it was almost indistinguishable from a human. Ah, except for the small white flowers hanging where fingernails should be on its long, piano-player fingers.
<$*^@%@&>
“What the hell are you saying?!”
<!$%^#*>
Every time it opened its mouth, my ears stung. My eyes throbbed as if they would pop out, and my head ached. Blocking my hearing didn’t stop the pain, so I just gave up. It was better to finish this quickly.
“Damn it, seriously!”
Beneath the green leaves, its features were those of a soft-faced woman. The body, clad in bark, was also feminine. So, was this a female? Do monsters even have sexes?
Gritting my teeth, I swung my sword and sliced through the vine that lashed out.
<%(@#@^>
“Shit, does that hurt? Good, I wanted it to hurt!”
Seeing its face, clutching its wounded arm and welling up with tears… Yeah. Now I understood why some people fell for monsters.
And now, I could finally believe that these things had emotions and intelligence enough to seek revenge. Monsters with intelligence? Ridiculous.
“Shit, I don’t have time for this!!!”
Blue flames roared up.