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Chapter 59: The Expedition Team Without Hopes And Dreams (1)

—What part of that is supposed to be okay?

[Shiny does not understand your statement.]

The Guardian blinked, and the holy sword flickered.

“I’m talking about Lefanta Aegim. The first emperor of the Aegim Empire, and the guy who turned the Goddess of Protection into Shiny.”

[Shiny points out that the one who named her Shiny is you...]

“I don’t know who he is, but he can travel across worlds.”

I donned my suit jacket. The Black Witch had this tailor-made for me. My reflection in the mirror looked like a brand-new employee who had just finished getting ready to head to work. It was somehow reassuring.

“Think about it. Shiny was in the Aegim Empire, but one of the sister swords is in murim, which is a different world. That means Lefanta Aegim has the ability to travel from world to world.”

—Oh.

“He’s probably like an overpowered protagonist.” I felt the grip of the holy sword hung from my waist. “He’s capable of building an empire, sealing a Constellation after splitting her apart, and traveling to a different world. It would be stupid to blindly jump into murim looking for another sword.”

I needed to be more cautious.

“I’m not invincible,” I muttered.

Yes, recently I was... feeling wary of myself. I was worried that my confidence would mutate into arrogance if I let my guard down just a little bit.

“I’m now the Rank 3 Hunter, I beat up the Demon King mostly on my own, and everyone in the city talks about me. On top of that, I’m even ordering around Hunters who have titles.”

—So what? the Guardian asked.

“I feel like I’m going to let my guard down at some point.”

The Tower had one hundred floors, and I was only on the twenty-first floor. It was too early to feel secure about my success.

That was how I hunted the Fire Emperor, I thought.

The reason why the Fire Emperor, Yoo Soo-Ha, had let his guard down was his Returner\'s Clockwork. With that Skill, he wasn’t going to stay dead even if he was killed. It was the ultimate cheat Skill that seemed to have no way of countering—but how was he now?

He’s dead. After his death, he even had to go for a round of hopak in front of the army of an entire world. He’s the perfect example of why a Hunter should never let their guard down, regardless of their strength.

—I think it’s just an example of how evil you are, Zombie... the Guardian grumbled.

“Anyhow, I’m not going to jump into the Heavenly Demon Chronicle before coming up with a solution. I should at least find out what Lefanta Aegim is like since I know nothing about him.”

It was said that an ounce of prevention was better than a pound of cure. I wanted to get as much information as I could before entering the next stage. Why was another holy sword in murim, not the Aegim Empire? Why had an overpowered figure named Lefanta Aegim split up and scattered the pieces of the Goddess of Protection?

—Well, it’s better to be safe than sorry. The Guardian tilted his head. But how exactly are you going to prepare? Like you said, you know nothing about this Lefanta guy and have no way to find out.

“It’s true that I know nothing, but...” I tapped on my holy sword. “...you’re wrong that I don’t have a way.”

—What?

“This sword is technically the Goddess of Protection. There are five of them in total, but this holy sword is still a Constellation.” I grinned. “Now here’s the question: if I stab myself with this sword, is that suicide or a murder committed by a Constellation?”

—Huh? Huhhhh? The Guardian’s eyes widened in surprise.

“It’s either one of them. I’m not sure which one it’ll be... Let’s say it’s fifty-fifty—it’s worth testing out.”

As I unsheathed the holy sword, I heard a voice urgently call out to me.

[Shiny sincerely asks you to reconsider your choice.]

“Why?” I asked.

[Shiny says it’s embarrassing to show her past to someone else.]

[Shiny strongly requests you protect her privacy.]

I smirked. “Come on. What do you mean by privacy? I show you everything about my life twenty-four seven. Let’s be fair.”

[Shiny pleads you to not—]

The holy sword pierced me. The next moment, I realized that I’d won my gamble..

[You have died.]

[It has been determined that your death met the requirement for the Skill’s activation.]

[Unable to duplicate the Skills of Constellation: Goddess of Protection because they are sealed.]

It was a little sad that I couldn’t copy her Skill, but that wasn’t what I was after right now.

[Your Hunter Class is D.]

[Initiating your Skill penalty.]

[Recreating your killer’s trauma.]

[The penalty’s intensity level is intermediate.]

[The penalty’s theme is Preta Realm.]

The moment I had wished to see started playing in front of me.

“Your long journey is finally over,” I heard a beautiful voice say. “I knew you would be able to do it, hero.”

I had never seen the woman before, but for some reason, I immediately realized who she was: the Goddess of Protection. This was before she got sealed in the five swords. Right now, she was a Constellation with her full power.

“Yeah,” The man she called a hero answered.

Is he Lefanta Aegim?

Lefanta Aegim, an elegant-looking man with silver hair and the first emperor of the Aegim Empire, was sitting on an undecorated throne, looking deeply fatigued.

“I feel like it was only yesterday that I was panicking after getting summoned to this world out of the blue. You truly never know how life is going to turn out.”

“Haha. I feel the same. You really were a civilian who knew nothing, but you’re now stronger than me. Most divine spirits won’t par—”

—Huh? I’ve seen that bastard before, the Guardian interjected. He peered at the reconstructed trauma with me.

What?

—I’m talking about that silver-haired guy. He’s the Constellation Murderer. I’m sure of it, the Guardian said, obviously perplexed.

I was completely blindsided by the fact that the Guardian and Lefanta Aegim had met before.

What’s the Constellation Murderer?

—It’s his title. He got it because he’s a crazy motherfucker who did nothing but hunt down Constellations and beat them up.

Beat up Constellations?

—You’ve seen that the Tower is connected to different worlds. Once you reach the fiftieth floor, you have to compete with Hunters from different worlds.

Huh? Is that so?

—Yeah, and that Constellation Murderer never leaves the fiftieth floor, the Guardian said. The Tower is there so Hunter can climb, but he’s always on the fiftieth floor. When Constellations occasionally drop by, he immediately beats the life out of them. He probably killed hundreds of Constellations.

...Then Lefanta Aegim is also a Hunter?

—Yeah. I wondered where that psycho was born. Wow, I didn’t know he was from Aegim, the Guardian mumbled. I didn’t think I would meet someone from my past here.

Uhh... How do you two know each other...?

—What do you mean, how? We went at it. He’s strong, but he can’t compete with me.

Even as we talked, the trauma continued to play.

“What are you planning to do from now on, hero? There are no divine or demonic spirits. Your long journey is now—”

“Constellations.”

“Excuse me?”

“They aren’t divine or demonic spirits. They’re Constellations.” Lefanta Aegim stood up from the throne. “And the worlds belong to humans, not Constellations.”

He turned back to the goddess, his dark red aura firing up.

“...Hero? Why are you suddenly using your aura...?”

The first emperor of the Aegim Empire stopped to ponder something, but despite his profound weariness, it didn’t take very long.

“I won’t kill you since you’ve been helping me until now.”

A wave of his red aura struck the goddess.

“I’m going to split your existence and seal you; then you’ll never be able to regain your power. When Constellations are gone...”

The last bit of his words was muffled by the goddess’s piercing scream. Her very existence was being torn apart.

“I’m sorry,” Lefanta Aegim said, “but this is the right way.”

The goddess’s scream was the last thing I heard before the world of trauma cut away.

[The trauma recreation has been completed.]

[It has been confirmed that the ego of the subject under the Skill penalty is intact.]

[Ending the Skill penalty.]

After returning a day, I cooped myself up in the bathroom again.

“...Who is this guy?” I mumbled. “I thought I would get an idea of who he is if I saw the past using the trauma penalty...but I still have no idea. Hey, Shiny, why did your old master seal you?”

[Shiny answers that she doesn’t know why either.]

Shiny shone with a wan light. Maybe that was just me, but the light looked unusually weak today.

[Shiny weakly says that she remembers Lefanta Aegim to be a righteous hero, although he was very quiet.]

[Shiny has no idea why he sealed her and left the empire he built with his own hands.]

The mystery only deepened.

—I told you. The higher level Hunters are, the crazier they are. The Guardian shrugged. Don’t try to understand the Constellation Murderer and those nutheads. If you look into the abyss, the abyss looks into you. Just become strong like me and beat up all of the guys you don’t like. Then it’s all over!

I sighed. “Well, at least I learned what he looks like.”

And one more fact became certain: Lefanta Aegim, the Constellation Murderer, would antagonize me as soon as he laid an eye on me because I had a piece of the Goddess of Protection, whom he had sealed.

I looked into the mirror, frowning. “If I’m going to meet him on the fiftieth floor one way or another, I want to be prepared...”

—Wake up. You’re nowhere close to his level! He may be weaker than me, but he’s still one of the strongest Hunters in the Tower. And if you have time to worry about the fiftieth floor, get to the fiftieth floor, you weakling!

He wasn’t wrong, so I spent today like I had done before. The next day, the Hunters finished reading the apocalyptic books and chose a book to be their twenty-second floor. Since it was the recommendation of none other than the Sword Star, the Heavenly Demon Chronicle was chosen with minimal opposition.

“You chose a murim novel as your first novel, huh?” When he saw our choice, the Indoor Librarian smiled mysteriously. “That’s not a bad choice! It won’t be completely the same as the murim you know, but it has its own martial arts and gangho. Depending on how you all lead the storyline, you may receive a hidden gem that’s worth a ton of gold, such as an ability of murim that’s similar to a Skill, to use your terminology.”

The Hunters got excited.

The Indoor Librarian immediately threw a wet blanket on the mood.

“But everything is a high risk high return! The enemy characters are also strong. I’m sure this is obvious, but if you perish in an apocalyptic book, you die in real life. Of course, you can’t escape from an apocalyptic book until you see a proper ending!”

The Hunters went quiet, unsurprisingly. Unless one had an unusual Skill like mine, death had the power to shut people up.

“The number of required challengers is two to four people. Now! Who wants to be the characters of this apocalyptic book?” the Indoor Librarian inquired.

The Hunters’ eyes fell naturally on the High rankers, especially me. The reason was simple: I had been ordering them for the past few days as if I were their leader. Well, with great power comes great responsibility, and I had no intention of running away from them.

“I’ll do it.”

My quick answer brought proud smiles to the guild leaders’ faces, as if they knew I was going to say it. However, most of the Hunters looked at me with surprise.

“I’ll come too,” the Sword Star said after me. “I’m the one who recommended the apocalyptic book, so I can’t sit it out.”

He looked serious, but the corners of his mouth were slightly curled. I could see that he was itching to fight. He was probably happy that he, an avid murim reader, got to enter the real murim.

“Good. The minimum number has been met!” The Indoor Librarian laughed gently. “Two more people can become characters of this apocalyptic book... What is your choice?”

“Speaking of which, there is one more reason I recommended this book,” the Sword Star announced. “I would like everyone to take a look at the reason why serialization was discontinued.”

Heavenly Demon Chronicle

Genres: Murim, fusion fantasy

Difficulty level: B

Required challengers: 2~4 people

※Serialization is currently discontinued.

Description: This is the world where people admire, practice, and master martial arts! The Heavenly Demon shows up and tries to unify murim, leading the Heavenly Demon Cult. The other factions rise against him and fight for the world’s future. ...Well, they would have done that if that hadn’t been for a super plague.

Reason for discontinuation of serialization: A mysterious plague breaks out, killing the Heavenly Demon and wiping out the Heavenly Demon Cult and the other factions. The end.

Even looking at it again, the reason was still outrageous. It didn’t specifically state what kind of plague that was either, it was just “It wipes out the Heavenly Demon Cult and the other factions”. No one knew what exactly happened.

I’ll find out when I enter this world.

In any case, it was clear that murim was going to meet its doom because of this mysterious plague.

“As you all saw, a plague brought the world to extinction. We need not only strong Hunters but also those who are knowledgeable about diseases. And I know the best.” The Sword Star nodded and then called a person from the murim group with a smile. “Would you step forward, Medicine King?”

An absolute geezer of a man walked out, his hands clasped behind his back.

—Oh, I know him! The Guardian shouted.

Why? Who is it?

—You remember the shop I tried to bring you to at first? the Guardian reminded me. That guy owns the shop that Gramps Marcus frequents.

Aha, I see.

—He’s good at making medicine, yeah, but... The Guardian trailed off.

No one would know the reason better than I did.

“Don’t worry. I’ll do most of the fighting. If I’m not enough, the Death King will help, and the Medicine King can focus on solving the plague. The three of us can... Death King, is there something you want to say?” The Sword Star looked at me with a confused look.

“Ah, yes. There is one person I would like to join me.” I put my hand down and then pointed at the Chemist.

The Chemist opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, unsure as to why she was being called out out of the blue before she managed to say, “Y-yes? Are you talking about me...?”

I nodded. “Yes, I’m talking about you.”

The Chemist trembled as if she’d been struck by a bolt of lightning. “M-Mr. Death King...it’s been less than a week since I received a title. I’m r-really weak! I’ll be no use! So why...?”

“You’re the most proficient pharmacist and doctor I know, Miss Chemist.”

“Pardon? What...?”

“And you told me earlier, didn’t you, Miss Chemist?”

“Please tell me if you need anything, Mr. Death King! I’ll help you in any way I can!”

I gently smiled. “Unless you didn’t mean it, I’m sure you’re going to help me. “

The Chemist gave me a look of utter despair as if she was looking at a demon, but I wasn’t sure why. I was the reason she had her title. If she received a boost, she had to pay the price.