Damn Hunter Life Chapter 35
Hiss! At that moment, a snake that wasn’t completely dead raised its head again and tried to pounce on me.
Won Ha-ri screamed.
“Get away—!”
As my body followed Won Ha-ri and I turned around, something burst through the head from behind the boss monster with a thud!
Monster bodily fluids dripped from the triangular-shaped blade with a curved tip.
Myo Cho-hui, who had flown up into the air and pierced the magic stone in the forehead with her spear in one strike, fell down along with the monster’s head with a thump.
When the dust settled, Myo Cho-hui had landed lightly on top with her small body. She smoothly pulled the spear out of the head.
“Phew…”
A genuinely relieved sigh escaped me.
Myo Cho-hui asked me from afar.
“Gang-hyeon. You’re not badly hurt, are you?”
“Probably not.”
“Then wait just a bit? Hyeong-woo will come running up soon.”
The hoodie I was wearing had become a rag, but fortunately I hadn’t sustained any particular injuries. I only had a few scratches from flying stone fragments.
Won Ha-ri quickly came to her senses. As if feeling ashamed, she vigorously rubbed away her tears and turned away from me.
How heartless, when I just happened to see it by chance.
“Why go that far? What’s wrong with a fifteen-year-old kid getting scared seeing a big monster for the first time?”
As if she didn’t want to hear it, Won Ha-ri quickly ran off to Myo Cho-hui, who was extracting magic stones from the corpse.
Since Myo Cho-hui has a rabbit familiar, she probably came flying on her familiar, but Ja Hyeong-woo, who doesn’t have a familiar, had no choice but to run up on his own feet. The rabbit familiar is too small to carry someone as large as Ja Hyeong-woo.
So Ja Hyeong-woo, who had just now come running up hurriedly, stopped when he saw me.
My completely exposed bare back was fully visible to him.
“Come here. …No, you wouldn’t come if I told you to.”
What am I supposed to do about that? After talking nonsense, Ja Hyeong-woo walked over himself.
Even though he had a staff, he deliberately placed his palm on my back. I could see blue light emanating from beside my ribs.
==
<Status>
Receiving ‘Willow’s Water Light (Water Attribute)’ skill.
==
What’s this? This is an intermediate skill that can save even people on the verge of death.
“Why waste a skill? Did you use up all your low-grade skills? Or was it a mistake?”
Ja Hyeong-woo silently healed my back completely with his healing skill and draped his jacket over me as I crouched there.
I glared at Ja Hyeong-woo. Then Ja Hyeong-woo also sent me an unfriendly look.
* * *
The leader of the Twelve Zodiac, Woo Sae-geon, was already pressing his brow in anger from the moment the four people entered the meeting room doorway.
In order, Ja Hyeong-woo, Gyeon Gang-hyeon, Won Ha-ri, and Myo Cho-hui stood in a line of four before him.
In a space not exposed to the outside, Woo Sae-geon’s fury mercilessly berated them.
“A D-grade regular gate, and one that other students had already cleared more than half of. Even if it was newcomer training, Ja Hyeong-woo, Myo Cho-hui. You two were there.”
I don’t understand how you could mess up a conquest so badly that a boss grade elevation message appears and citizen evacuation orders are issued near the gate.
Woo Sae-geon’s anger was considerable, having had to handle the aftermath after receiving contacts from three places: the Association, government committee, and broadcasting station.
However, he soon stopped the rebuke. He interrogated those before him to learn what happened inside the gate.
“Speak. What caused the boss’s grade elevation?”
Won Ha-ri’s face, who had been the only one trembling nervously, turned pale.
Determined not to cry, Won Ha-ri hung her head low.
‘I wanted to do well. I only caused trouble for Cho-hui eonni, Ja Hyeong-woo-nim, and…’
There was exactly one cause. Herself, who had been holding the boss monster’s egg.
The other three people had done nothing wrong.
Won Ha-ri pressed down her desire not to be scolded by the leader and steeled herself before honestly confessing.
But then.
“The snake egg was the boss’s reverse scale, and it got broken, you see?”
A light-toned voice beat her to it.
Gyeon Gang-hyeon rambled while ruffling his hair with his hand. Won Ha-ri and Ja Hyeong-woo, who were standing on either side, looked at him.
Woo Sae-geon’s cold gaze swept over Gyeon Gang-hyeon, not Won Ha-ri.
“Why did it break?”
“Well, she was holding it fine, but I was fooling around beside her and broke it. Gyeon Gang-hyeon did what Gyeon Gang-hyeon does.”
More than the mistake itself, Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s irreverent attitude of speaking about it as if it were nothing further provoked Woo Sae-geon’s mood.
“Don’t you have any attitude of reflecting on what you’ve done?”
“I’m sorry.”
Though Gyeon Gang-hyeon responded readily, there was no way it would satisfy Woo Sae-geon. Woo Sae-geon closed his eyes tightly as if suppressing his anger, then opened them.
“You and Won Ha-ri, get out.”
Even while receiving the order to leave, Won Ha-ri absolutely couldn’t believe what Gyeon Gang-hyeon had done for her.
Gyeon Gang-hyeon, who had come outside, didn’t particularly care about Won Ha-ri. As if it were natural for him to show loyalty before Woo Sae-geon, as if he didn’t care at all that his charges had increased by one more, he walked away without regret.
That retreating figure was especially deeply etched in Won Ha-ri’s eyes.
The harsh words she had said until now came to mind.
“If you can’t even run two laps, just stay quiet instead of making noise.”
“Try having some sense of shame.”
“When would I train separately with you? I’m getting annoyed just listening to your panting sounds now.”
Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s expression didn’t change even when receiving such treatment from a middle schooler 7 years younger than him.
Rather, he would properly respond and sit there.
“Just wait and see. I’ll run three laps in a week.”
“I don’t know what shame is.”
“Once you master the curriculum and escape beginner level, you’ll say bye to me too. Do well until that day. I’m probably hopeless anyway.”
Even though the gap in abilities was so clear, when the boss monster struck, it wasn’t Won Ha-ri who picked up the bow and shot.
Won Ha-ri’s stopped legs soon began moving.
Won Ha-ri hurried her feet to catch up with Gyeon Gang-hyeon. When she grabbed his sleeve, Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s body stopped abruptly and he turned around.
“…Look at me.”
She whispered quietly.
At that moment, back in the meeting room.
Woo Sae-geon focused on the two remaining founding successors.
Actually, these two were the ones who should be scolded.
No matter what, Gyeon Gang-hyeon and Won Ha-ri were just newcomers who had recently awakened.
Between those two… Woo Sae-geon didn’t even give Ja Hyeong-woo a glance.
While Gyeon Gang-hyeon said earlier that he had broken the egg without a word, Woo Sae-geon knew the truth. He could clearly see the hidden circumstances.
The snake egg with a hard shell that doesn’t break easily.
It was Myo Cho-hui who entrusted it to Won Ha-ri.
“…You deliberately tested them. Their abilities.”
Myo Cho-hui didn’t deny it.
With clear, round pupils without a trace of light, she faced Woo Sae-geon with a calm and composed expression.
Myo Cho-hui had deliberately made the boss monster head in that direction. And in a way that made Won Ha-ri think she had made a mistake herself. She escaped the situation with clever methods that prevented her from even thinking it was a senior’s doing.
Finally, Woo Sae-geon regretted it. From the beginning, he should have entered the gate as Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s training supervisor himself, not accepting Ja Hyeong-woo’s volunteer offer.
If he had, he would have restrained Myo Cho-hui.
“To make you come to your senses, Myo Cho-hui, you must run through 3 stages without missing any from now on. Even if external gate support requests come in, I’ll give them all to you.”
“Yes.”
Myo Cho-hui responded obediently with a face showing she wasn’t particularly affected.
Making up for her arbitrary actions with labor was ridiculous. She was somewhat different from others.
She felt no burden about saving people in external gates, and even if someone died because she couldn’t reach everyone… she felt no particular emotion.
However, she also possessed the acting skills to put on a bright and gentle image inside the stages.
Myo Cho-hui’s hair swayed as she was the first to leave the meeting room. When Myo Cho-hui left, Ja Hyeong-woo followed behind her.
A blood vessel bulged prominently on the left temple of Woo Sae-geon, who was left alone.
He and Myo Cho-hui were in a kind of truce relationship.
The two, who had recognized early in the gate outbreak that they couldn’t control each other according to their will, had been drawing appropriate lines and maintaining each other’s territories since then.
An implicit deal where occasionally the awl called Myo Cho-hui would pop out of Woo Sae-geon’s pocket, but in stage conquests, Myo Cho-hui would unconditionally follow Woo Sae-geon’s opinions.
Myo Cho-hui roughly untied her hair tie as she walked down the corridor. Light brown hair cascaded down.
She was mulling over the results she had obtained by luring the boss monster this time.
‘Won Ha-ri is ordinary. At best, a talent above average. Gyeon Gang-hyeon is unexpected.’
It wasn’t about Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s tendency to suddenly be filled with heroic spirit the moment he recognized a truly dangerous situation. That was content she had already confirmed at the Busan Gate.
At that time, Gyeon Gang-hyeon had definitely picked up Won Ha-ri’s bow and shot.
‘The bow itself was earth attribute made by Woo Sae-geon.’
But the arrow was Won Ha-ri’s.
That is, it was metal attribute. Completely unconnected to Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s attribute.
And Gyeon Gang-hyeon had used it.
‘Attacks of other attributes have been impossible until now. There has never been such a case.’
The attack that went out from Gyeon Gang-hyeon’s hand wasn’t his earth attribute, but the original metal attribute. When the arrowhead lodged in the magic stone, it was certain because it wasn’t the bronze glow of earth but the silver glow of metal that leaked out.
That’s how he could produce such power even with that terrible durability.
‘The one and only successor who exhibits affinity for other attributes too…’
What a shame that only I saw this major discovery and Woo Sae-geon doesn’t know. Myo Cho-hui muttered monotonously.
The more interesting fact is that Ja Hyeong-woo, who was in the gate together, also doesn’t know this fact like Woo Sae-geon.
When the two left the meeting room earlier, I thought Ja Hyeong-woo would talk about this when he called me to stop, but… what did he say again?
“Successor Myo Cho-hui. Overlooking you doing such things to newcomers is only this once. Don’t think you can continue receiving my healing after doing such things twice. I’m not as upright a person as people think.”
Getting distracted by Gyeon Gang-hyeon. Losing the eye to see what’s actually needed.
‘Gyeon Gang-hyeon saved one healer and ruined another.’
Gyeon Gang-hyeon. For you to make a proper contribution to the Twelve Zodiac, you’ll need to produce even more outstanding results, taking into account that you’ve clouded Ja Hyeong-woo’s reason.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
