Chapter 152

The two massive iron balls came down mercilessly on the waists of the two women who were lying prostrate, clutching Jun-sang’s feet.

CRUNCH!

“Ahhhhh!”

“Ugh!”

With a horrifying sound, the iron balls crushed the women’s backs, breaking their bones and tearing their internal organs to shreds. Their bodies writhed in agony and began to mutate, but it was already too late. The iron balls fell once more, crushing their heads.

“Hoo…”

Jun-sang watched their odd, half-mutated bodies twitching, their nerves still alive, and took a deep breath. He had used his mind to easily defeat five Dark Seed users, and while his body had not been exhausted, his mind certainly was.

First, Jun-sang recovered the Dark Seeds from the shattered, crushed bodies of the women and repeated the same process on the man’s corpse outside. Then he took out a bag, put the four grotesque bodies inside, and stored them in his inventory. He then summoned the Dawn Dew and the Elemental Dragon and instructed them to clean up the bloodstains.

As he watched the Elemental Dragon spray water to wash the area, Jun-sang, just in case, summoned Mong-mong. He didn’t expect to find any items, but he wanted to see if they had hidden anything for their fugitive life.

And Mong-mong did not disappoint. He found a bag hidden in the space under the sofa.

“Good job.”

Jun-sang gave Mong-mong a chocolate bar as a reward, put the bag in his cabinet, and left the area while remaining invisible.

As he followed the forest path, he saw fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars gathering near the spot where the self-destruction had occurred. Jun-sang checked the area for any other approaching Dark Seed users but found no sign of them. He walked out of the forest, followed the riverside for a while, and finally reappeared when he reached a deserted area far from the commotion.

He first took off his cloak and boots and stored them. Then he took out the Raptor, got in, and summoned Henes and Lyches.

“Oh!”

“Ah…”

Henes was surprised for a moment when she was summoned back into the car, then she looked at Jun-sang’s face. He was wearing different clothes, and his face looked a bit tired, so she easily guessed that a big fight had taken place while they were reverse-summoned.

“You must have had a tough time.”

Lyches also sensed that something had happened, though not in as much detail as Henes. But she wasn’t happy about being reverse-summoned again and just glared at Jun-sang with a pout.

“Let’s go.”

“Okay.”

Jun-sang slowly drove back to the pension. As he drove, he sent a message to Im Seo-yoon.

‘Done.’

It was a short message, but it contained everything she needed to know. Im Seo-yoon, who was overseeing the police document review and classification with her staff, felt a sense of emptiness when she received Jun-sang’s message on her phone. How long had it been since he left, and he was already done? She couldn’t think of any other word to describe it but ‘incomprehensible.’ At this point, it was more than ‘amazing,’ it was simply ‘incredible.’

“Phew… The situation is over. You can wrap up.”

The group’s secretaries, who had been suddenly called in to read and summarize documents, looked flustered at Im Seo-yoon’s words.

“What do you mean…”

Im Seo-yoon was just as awkward. It was a task she couldn’t handle alone, but it was also a situation where she couldn’t call the guild members who were focused on their training. In a hurry, she had contacted her family and had the group’s secretaries come to do the work, but who would have known that Jun-sang would wrap things up before they even finished summarizing the investigative documents?

The secretaries had been brought in for the chairman’s son’s personal business, put to work summarizing police investigation documents they didn’t understand, and now they were being told to leave just as abruptly as they had arrived. They frowned.

Im Seo-yoon first apologized to her staff. “I’m sorry. Please go out for dinner on your way back. I’ll cover the cost.”

“Understood.”

They were annoyed, but she was showing them goodwill, so they couldn’t keep pouting.

“The detailed results will be announced later, but for now, please don’t speak of the documents you saw today.”

“Don’t worry.”

Im Seo-yoon sent her staff back and sighed again. How should she put it? It felt like the gap between her and Jun-sang was growing, and she felt a sense of futility. It didn’t feel this way at first. Seo-yoon clicked her tongue and headed to the swimming pool to resume her training.

Around that time, Jun-sang arrived near the pension. He put the car back in his inventory and walked the rest of the way to the pension with Henes. After opening the door and entering, he checked the surroundings as Henes and Lyches reappeared inside the room, then he closed the door and drew the curtains. Jun-sang took out the drinks and snacks he had bought earlier and went into the bathroom.

“I’ll take a shower first, so please rest.”

“Okay. Don’t worry.”

After hearing Henes’s reply, Jun-sang disappeared into the bathroom. Only then did Lyches pout and complain. “Tch. I even gave him my earrings, and he still reverse-summoned me at the most critical moment. Isn’t that just too much?”

Henes gave a wry smile at the little Fairy Queen, who couldn’t dare to speak in front of Jun-sang and only asked for her agreement after he was gone.

“There must have been a good reason for it.”

Henes tried to appease Lyches with kind words, but in the slightly annoyed Fairy Queen’s eyes, it just looked like she was defending her man.

“Look at her, a little girl defending her man. Oh my life…”

“…”

In truth, Lyches was the little one, but in the eyes of someone who had lived for over ten thousand years, Henes, who was not even twenty, was indeed a little kid. Henes watched the queen’s cute sulking and then held out the drinks and snacks Jun-sang had taken out.

“Please don’t be mad. Have some of this.”

“What’s this?”

Even in her pouty state, when she smelled the delicious scent of the fruits, Lyches immediately showed interest. ‘Oh, you poor, gluttonous fairy, your name shall be Lyches.’ In the end, it wasn’t long before Lyches completely forgot she had been sulking and was completely won over by the taste of the delicious fruits Henes was peeling for her.

Jun-sang, who had taken a quick shower and was now lying in the tub, feeling the hot water slowly rising, listened to their conversation with his extrasensory perception and unconsciously let out a small laugh at the sight of Lyches.

“Hoo…”

But that was only for a moment. As the fatigue in his mind began to ease a little, Jun-sang simultaneously claimed the rewards from the quests he had not yet received. Was it because his opponents were weaker than him, or because the recovered Dark Seeds weren’t that powerful? Even though he claimed the rewards from five quests at once, Jun-sang did not level up.

His level was already 28. He didn’t know what level the other Returnees were, but he expected that he was at least twice as strong as even strong ones like Im Seo-yoon and her comrades. With such a significant level gap, it was a fact that it wasn’t easy to level up unless it was an epic quest or a quest of a similar difficulty.

In reality, what was truly important was the reward boxes themselves, not the level. Considering that the effects of leveling up were just an increase in cost and a way to exceed level restrictions, the large number of cards and the diverse combinations they allowed were the real measure of his strength.

With those thoughts, Jun-sang checked the five Special Mission Reward Boxes he had received from the quest, one by one.

Congratulations!

You have acquired the Special Card ‘Inventory’ from a Special Mission Reward Box.

: It is possible to unlock sealed special functions by acquiring a special card.

• Since the ‘Inventory’ special function is already unlocked, your inventory capacity has been expanded by 4 slots.
• You can now register and use 21 different types of items in your inventory.

The first box gave him an Inventory card. This time, it expanded by four slots. He didn’t know if the number of expanded slots was random or if it depended on the grade or type of the reward box, but in any case, the more inventory slots, the better.

Jun-sang opened the second box.

Card Information

Name: Tenacity

Level: 1Lv

Experience: 0

Grade: Uncommon

Classification: Skill

Growth: Normal (Medium)

Attribute: Earth

Effect: Reduces critical hit damage by 50%.

Cost: 10

Seed: 2 slots

The skill itself seemed so-so, but as soon as the skill appeared from the box, a new message popped up. This phenomenon meant only one thing.

Congratulations!

: A combo card can now be combined.

• The following combo cards can currently be combined:

1. Guardian of Delodran [View Details]

• If you would like to combine the combo card, press the corresponding number, or press n if you do not wish to combine it. (1/n)

He checked the message and, sure enough, a new combo card had appeared. Jun-sang immediately checked the details.

Guardian of Delodran

• In the Kingdom of Delodran, a legend of a great guardian who steps forward to defeat enemies when the country is in trouble is passed down. When he stands firm, he protects his allies with the strength of a city wall, and when he advances, there is no one who can block his path, and so people call him the Guardian.[Combination Details]
• Weapon Charge, Penetration, Iron Wall, Tenacity
• Effects:

1. Increases the Penetration effect by 100% when Weapon Charge is activated.
2. Increases critical hit ignore chance and armor effect by 50%.
3. Increases all resistances by 10%.

The offensive ability was only an option to increase the Penetration effect by 100% when a critical hit occurred during Weapon Charge, but the defensive ability was much more. It amplified the critical hit ignore chance and armor effect and added an additional 10% increase to all resistances. If Jun-sang were to activate this combo, he would have a whopping 99% physical resistance.

Of course, he thought there might be skills that could bypass or ignore resistance in a similar way to Penetration, but even considering that, it was still an overwhelmingly strong defense. Jun-sang had tended to focus on offense, and he had no other defensive methods or skills other than Iron Wall and Weapon Defense, so he was very pleased with the appearance of the new combo. The only thing he found disappointing was that he didn’t receive a new title for acquiring the combo card. Since he had benefited greatly from his titles so far, he couldn’t help but feel a little regret.

Jun-sang was about to manipulate the interface to open the third box when he felt that the name ‘Delodran’ was quite familiar. Where had he heard that name? The answer was not difficult. The name of the country where Henes’s hometown, the walled city of Yvelia, was located was Delodran.

“Huh…”

He knew that the place names that appeared in the titles were related to the world in which the epic quest to open the Spirit Gate was taking place, but he had no idea he would confirm it in this way.

Guardian of Delodran, huh…

What kind of expression would Henes have if she heard that? Jun-sang thought about it and opened the next box.

Card Information

Name: Mischief

Level: 1Lv

Experience: 0

Grade: Rare

Classification: Skill

Growth: Normal (Large)

Attribute: Darkness

Effect: Causes internal strife in enemies with a fairly high probability during conversation.

Cost: 20

Seed: 3 slots

The success probability was not specified, but considering it was a type of mental attack like verbal abuse or provocation, it was not unusual. Given Jun-sang’s personality, where his body moved before his words, it probably wouldn’t be used often, but it might be a secret weapon if a situation like this happened again.

Card Information

Name: Charm

Level: 1Lv

Experience: 0

Grade: Uncommon

Classification: Skill

Growth: Early (Medium)

Attribute: Light

Effect: Charms an opponent and increases their favorability towards you.

Cost: 20

Seed: 3 slots

“…”

What kind of skill was this, fit for a gigolo? The fourth box gave him a skill called Charm. If used in conjunction with the Radiance effect, it could also be a very powerful mental attack, but Jun-sang didn’t really want an ability like this. Jun-sang clicked his tongue and opened the last box.

Congratulations!

You have acquired a waiting time of ’10 minutes’.

: Since a waiting time is already in effect, ’10 minutes’ has been added to it.

Your current total waiting time is ’20 minutes’.

You can now prepare for your next mission with a little more leeway.

“Twenty minutes…”

Thinking back to how he was teleported just 10 seconds after a message arrived, it was a truly a different world. Twenty minutes was enough time to sleep in, wake up, shower, eat, and then leave at a leisurely pace. Of course, he shouldn’t let his guard down, but he thought he could finally live a little more comfortably.

After he had checked all the boxes, Jun-sang finally got out of the tub. He took another quick shower, put on a bathrobe, and left the bathroom.