Chapter 150

The first to speak was the small man with the gloomy face. “I… I didn’t mean to… go that far. I’m truly sorry… for causing you to worry.”

As he apologized in a somewhat awkward manner and bowed his head deeply, the other three men and women followed suit, apologizing in unison as if on cue.

“We’re sorry. We’re so sorry.”

“Please forgive us just this once.”

“We’ll never break a taboo again. We promise.”

Jun-sang didn’t reply, too busy extracting and analyzing information from their attitudes and words. He wasn’t sure what it was, but it was clear they had some kind of organization. He hadn’t been able to figure out such details from the two dark seed users he had hunted before. But these five had been working together from the very beginning, unlike the other two. Like Returnees forming a party.

The entity they referred to as “he” seemed to be the one who directly controlled them. Then what were the Seven Stars? He couldn’t get a definitive answer to that either, but seeing them prostrate themselves and apologize in front of a potential attacker suggested that the Seven Stars were not just a group’s leaders or powerful beings, but rather entities with the power of life and death over them. Of course, it was a bit questionable that they didn’t even know what such a being looked like, but if their organization was a secretive one, it might be natural for low-level members to not have proper information about the person at the very top.

Having organized his thoughts up to this point, Jun-sang felt the need to test if his hypothesis was correct. And just as he thought this, the small man who had spoken first slowly raised his head with a servile expression, hoping to say something, and his eyes met Jun-sang’s.

In that moment, Jun-sang decided. The first sacrifice would be this one. He wasn’t sure what this small man’s ability was, but it was a fact that he could at least detect Jun-sang’s invisible state through smell. In case things went wrong and his identity was revealed, this man was the one who needed to be dealt with first.

The man quickly lowered his head when he made eye contact with Jun-sang, but in the next instant, he felt his body being pulled toward Jun-sang and desperately begged for forgiveness.

“S-sorry! I… I don’t know my place… Gulp!”

The man begged for forgiveness in a panic, but he was pulled in by Jun-sang’s psychokinesis and had his collar grabbed in an instant. Once he was grabbed, the power of ‘Binding’ took hold, and the strength in his limbs drained away.

“Ugh, ugh…”

The man was terrified. The dark seed was doing its best to block the three status effects Jun-sang was emitting, but with his collar grabbed and death looming before his eyes, there was no way to endure the fear that rose from his bones, no matter what helped him.

And finally, as his survival instinct overwhelmed his reason, the man’s body began to mutate on its own in order to survive. His snout grew long and his nose became shiny. His incisors grew long and sharp claws extended from his hands. Fur instantly grew all over his body, and the shabby clothes he was wearing were ripped apart by his swelling muscles.

And when the mutation was complete, Jun-sang was reminded of the giant rat he had killed in the tutorial. What was it called? Rat-man? Or a were-rat?

Of course, it was different from the creatures usually called monsters. A dark seed materializes the user’s desires. He had no way of knowing why his desire had taken the form of this rat-man, but for Jun-sang, it was a good thing. At least he wouldn’t feel guilty about killing a fellow human being.

“…”

The rat-man writhed, trying to shake off the emotion of fear that had invaded his bones and regain control of his body, but Jun-sang’s fist moved first.

Thud!

Crunch!

Jun-sang held the rat-man’s massive body in the air and punched its face repeatedly with a blank expression. He had already abandoned his human form, so there was no reason for him to hesitate any longer.

• Gack! Gack!

The rat-man, whose oral structure had changed so that he couldn’t even make a human scream, let out a monstrous cry as he was hit by Jun-sang’s relentless fists. Finally, at some point, he moved his arm and drove his claws into Jun-sang’s arm, which was holding his neck.

But in the next instant.

Splat!

Just like a watermelon dropping onto asphalt and scattering its ripe red flesh everywhere, the rat-man’s head was completely shattered with a horrible sound that made the fine hairs on his body stand on end.

The three men and women no longer dared to raise their heads and only trembled. How could they not be afraid when one of their comrades had just been beaten to death right in front of them just because their eyes had met?

Jun-sang pulled out a large dark seed from the vividly pink brain matter of the rat-man. One of the four quests in his left-hand view showed a completion message.

Now there were three left. Jun-sang threw the rat-man’s corpse aside and looked at the three men and women who were trembling, prostrate on the ground.

He had already seen the two women’s arms transform into wings like harpies. The sharp cuts left at the crime scene were likely the work of the slick-looking man.

Jun-sang watched as the wound on his arm from the rat-man’s claws healed rapidly and fell into thought for a moment. If the man’s ability was like that, it would be difficult to deal with him in the same way he had just dealt with the rat-man. The rat-man, when faced with death, had broken free from the grip of fear and managed to wound Jun-sang’s arm. If a person with that cutting ability were to use it right in his face, it might be difficult to survive without any damage, even with ‘Iron Wall.’

What should he do, then?

Jun-sang looked at the three prostrate figures and said in a small voice, “There are three left.”

“…”

His voice cracked, perhaps because he had swallowed a lot of dust enduring the self-destruction of the one they called the cricket. But Jun-sang’s already heavy voice, cracking and turning into a metallic sound, was a terrifying whisper to the three men and women, like that of the grim reaper.

Jun-sang ignored the three immobilized figures, walked into the house, sat down on a fancy sofa that he didn’t know where it came from, and spoke again.

“What a hassle.”

A hassle? Did he mean it was too much of a hassle to even kill them? The three men and women breathed a sigh of relief without realizing it.

But Jun-sang hadn’t finished speaking.

“One more of you, go and die on your own.”

“…”

Die on their own? The three men and women were momentarily flustered. But only for a moment. When they realized the other meaning hidden in his words, they scrambled to their feet and looked at each other. Jun-sang had clearly said, “one more.”

Didn’t that mean he would spare two of them?

The three men and women began to glare at each other, radiating killing intent. The first to speak was the short-haired woman.

“This all started because you brought in and ate the female police officers.”

The man did not back down. “Bullshit. Who was the one who ignored me when I told you to stop eating so much?”

The short-haired woman’s face flushed with anger, but then she exchanged glances with the long-haired woman. The simplest way would be for one of the women to team up with the man and eliminate the other. But the two women did not get along well with the slick-looking man. It was a problem that he always tried to act as their boss just because he was the strongest, and it was also a problem that he would always try to get them into bed whenever he had a chance. Up until now, the two women had teamed up to stop his advances.

But if one of them died here, the survivor would become a toy for the slick man the moment the “Seven Stars” member, who was sitting on the sofa with a bored expression, disappeared. If she was going to become someone’s toy on her own accord, it would be a hundred times better to defeat this slick bastard and then seduce the Seven Stars member who was showing such obvious signs of annoyance.

With that thought, the two women felt their bodies heat up.

The man had thought that at least one of them would side with him because he was the strongest, but when he saw the two women exchange glances, he realized he had become the target.

“You… damn b**ches.”

As the man muttered this, the two women immediately turned their arms into wings, took to the air, and cautiously looked at Jun-sang. They were afraid he would pursue them if he thought they were trying to escape, so they looked, but Jun-sang was just yawning with his mouth wide open. Did it mean that no matter where they ran, they would still be in the palm of his hand?

At first glance, it might have been a very insulting thing to think, but the two women were rather captivated by Jun-sang’s confidence. This was something Jun-sang didn’t even expect, but it was a psychological change that had occurred because the unspoken effect of the fairy kiss’s ‘radiance’ was influencing the women’s psyche.

In any case, with the allies and enemies clearly defined, the three men and women no longer hesitated and immediately began to fight.

• KAAAAAAH!

Perhaps because it was truly based on the form of a harpy, the women opened their mouths wide and began to let out monstrous screams. Jun-sang, hearing the scream, felt a tingling sensation through his skin and easily understood that it was a form of mental attack. To compare, he thought it was probably a level below the “Scolding Grandma” combo Henes had used before.

“Ugh! You damn b**ches!”

The man’s cutting attack definitely had the power to sweep a large area at once, but the long, extended arm had a drawback similar to a frog’s tongue: its power and speed were halved when it attacked at a long distance. The women quickly flew through the air, launching mental attacks, and when they saw an opening, they would swoop down like a goshawk, aiming for the man’s head, but they couldn’t easily land a successful attack. The man’s cutting attack had the power to slice their bodies in half.

As they fought back and forth, the battle between the three became more and more intense, and one by one, wounds began to appear on their bodies. Of course, the healing power of the dark seeds quickly healed those wounds, but as time went on and the number of injuries increased, they reached a point where healing power alone was not enough to keep up.

In this situation, the one who was at a disadvantage was the man who had to endure the attacks of the two women alone. As time went on and his stamina dropped, the power of his formidable cutting attack began to wane, and with the women’s mental attacks, his body felt heavier and heavier.

Sure enough.

The long-haired woman, who had been waiting for an opportunity, swooped down like lightning and crushed the man’s shoulder with her steel-like claws.

“Aaargh!”

The attack was originally aimed at his head, but even that was a fatal blow that would have instantly incapacitated a human. Of course, for a man with the power of a dark seed, such a wound was something that could be restored on his own with a little time. Unfortunately, the man did not have that luxury. With one of his shoulders crushed and one of his arms useless, the women, despite being exhausted, did not miss the opportunity and launched a fierce attack.

The man gradually realized the shadow of death that was beginning to loom over him.

“D-don’t do this. We’re comrades.”

The women, as well as the man who had just said those words, knew full well that it was useless to say such a thing now, but the only thing he could do was stall for time with such words. Of course, the women were not swayed by such words. In fact, seeing him psychologically weakened, they unleashed even more powerful mental attacks and continued their assault.

In the end, the man died, torn to shreds by the women’s claws, under their hateful gaze.

“Huff… huff…”

“W-we won.”

The women reveled in their victory, looking at the man’s torn corpse, which was no longer recognizable.

Jun-sang had watched the scene quietly until the end. When the fight was over, he slowly rose from the sofa. In his hands, a massive iron ball, known as the ‘Rage of Langdajal,’ was now held in each hand.