Apocalypse Hunter

After completely thwarting the one-night coup, Zin sat in front of the City Administrator, who was pulling bullets out of his body.

“Thank you for everything. If it wasn’t for you, we and our entire headquarters would’ve been blown.”

Zin had not left Shane. He wasn’t the type to miss such an event, so he had gone to the Central Office to warn the Reavers about the danger.

If the gangs were organized, they would have secured an emergency route in case of a disaster, and the fact that the Central Office had been used by the Sheriff Gang in the past was a big clue. To overcome being outnumbered, the children might resort to bombing, so Zin succeeded in getting a gig from the Reaver Administrator.

There would be no payment if nothing happened, but if something were to actually happen, he would get paid.

“We’ll pay an additional two hundred chips for the arrests of the remaining guerilla members on top of the five hundred chips that was promised to you.”

“You’re quite generous, Administrator.”

The City Administrator took the chips out of the safe, and Zin scooped them up. All the insurgents were either killed or arrested. Ramphil and Zin were the ones actually involved in the operation. Zin took control of the underground, while Ramphil was in charge of tracking down the enemies who escaped.

For Ramphil, who even had night vision, tracking down the fleeing children was no big deal.

“As the Administrator of the Group, I express my gratitude to you, hunter.”

The third basement level was a place the Reavers had had no knowledge of, so without Zin, the Administrator could’ve been the only surviving Reaver in Shane.

Even though Zin knew that the Administrator was a corpse, he could feel that the free will given to him was quite substantial. The insurgents were taken care of, and the Reavers would be busy collecting corpses off the streets of Shane.

“What will happen to the captured ones?”

“The king will make decisions on everything.”

“Is that so?”

Whether it was because of his loyalty or simply that he was being mentally controlled by Asura was difficult to determine, but in any case, the Administrator didn’t seem to have any anger toward the insurgents. His attitude was more like that of it being just another day at the office, and he was only doing what needed to be done.

Zin got up to leave since their relationship didn’t make for long conversations.

“The king could use a hunter of your caliber. Why don’t you stay here? The king will be here soon.”

The king would be here to decide what to do about the ones involved in the coup, and the Administrator would report Zin’s contribution to the king. He seemed to think that the king, then, might assign the talented hunter to an important position in the Group. He was a corpse, but his thinking was alive, and he could think and make judgements on his own.

Zin suddenly had a strange feeling. The Emperor had always treated the corpses like corpses, but SoSeoLan was different. Of course, Zin laughed off his suggestion.

“I don’t want to complicate my family tree.”

The Administrator didn’t understand what that meant, but Zin left without saying anything more.

Zin was watching the Reavers moving quickly about as he walked out of the Central Office Building. In reality, the Reavers had tried to protect the citizens, and it was the guerillas who had killed the residents. But on the inside, they were repressing cruelty and violence.

There was no way to tell whether it was due to the intoxication of their lives as guards or their fear and obedience to Asura, but when the guerilla war started, the Reavers tried to protect the citizens.

Zin felt strange as he watched the citizens and the Reavers working together to remove the dead bodies and move the injured.

All Reavers were human.

The Reavers were originally humans, but Zin thought that the process of humans becoming Reavers was irreversible. As he watched the scene, he couldn’t help but be reminded of the age-old question:

‘Can Reavers be human again?’

Without an answer, Zin had no choice but to leave Shane as he watched the scene play out in front of him.

———–

Outside of Shane, his three teammates were waiting for him, and all headed to the place where the armored vehicle was hidden. It was the middle of the night.

“SoSeoLan will be here in a few days to take care of things. It would be best for us to leave as soon as possible.

It wasn’t a hostile relationship, but it wasn’t a good relationship either, so it was best to avoid bumping into each other.

Although he could have escaped from Shane, Zin lent a hand in the suppression and got paid in chips. Even though his goal was to get chips, he ended up helping the Group.

He had helped the Group while agonizing over whether to kill SoSeoLan. Everyone knew what that meant. Zin took a quick look around Shane and just added a brief comment, “Many things started with good intentions.”

Various thoughts passing through Zin’s mind revealed how well he was aware of where good intentions ended up. Wargrave created the devil. Some demon hunters became monsters.

All good intentions eventually degenerated. But after saying that, Zin added, “However, if we were to judge everything just based on results, only meaningless things would exist in the world.”

If results were everything, all lives, events, and struggles would be meaningless. Why live when you would die, and why would you have to live at all?

Humans have no choice but to live even though they know that everything will end in the tragedy called death.

Just as Zin’s wandering around the world without belonging to any group was his struggle, what SoSeoLan had chosen might be her struggle.

“We’re going to leave the Group as is and head to B.H.”

They couldn’t support the cause, but they no longer wanted to stand in the way. Everyone was sympathetic to what Zin was saying and nodded. When they arrived at the armored vehicle, they decided to sleep.

Driving an armored vehicle in the middle of the night was not a good idea, so they were going to leave at dawn the next day. They set up camp and, since they were hungry, they ate a simple meal.

“I’m afraid,” Cho-yul said nervously after the meal.

“What are you afraid of?” Leona asked him.

“I can’t estimate the amount of damage that the Death Command will bring…” Cho-yul looked at Zin and continued, “You said that the devil hunters were also devils, so don’t you think there could be devils like the one we’ve seen or something worse?”

Devil hunters were devils. Then, there would be little difference between the calamities that would result from SoSeoLan or the White Witch.

Both had the potential to change the world as they knew it.

“Yes,” Zin agreed.

Nevertheless, Zin decided to leave SoSeoLan alone even though she was holding a ticking time bomb. Killing SoSeoLan would release all the mad dogs from their leashes and cause them to run wild in the world.

Cho-yul stood at a crossroads, where he needed to decide whether or not to leave SoSeoLan alone.

Zin repeated what he had said before, “As I said the other day, the choice is yours.”

“…”

“What’s your decision?”

At Leona’s question, Zin spoke slowly, standing in front of the bonfire with a stiff expression, “There is something called black magic in sorcery… a ritual.”

“What is that?” This time, it was Ramphil who asked.

“The curse of death.”

His answer made everyone freeze.

There were endless ways to kill people with sorcery. It could make people sick, cause accidents, set taboos, strike people with lightning or even hurricanes.

But black magic was on a different orbit.

That curse killed people. It just killed without any reason, prelude or need.

“Well, then. We can kill the devil with it.””

Leona tilted her head as if she didn’t understand why they were wasting time when there was such a spell. Zin sighed and added, “… First of all, the White Witch is an immortal, so we can’t use the curse. Even if we decided to, we would need to trap her inside the seal first.”

“Oh… yeah.”

“But if there is a spell that could kill anyone, that would make sorcerers the most powerful, wouldn’t it?” Ramphil asked with curiosity.

Instead of Zin, Cho-yul answered, “The sorcerer who uses that curse will also die.”

“…”

“…”

Zin explained further. Using magic wasn’t always convenient. For great results, there was a sacrifice and a price to pay.

“Even sorcerers not as advanced as this guy here could use the curse, but that person would need to dig a hundred graves and kill ninety-nine people, and then get in the last grave.”

But, since Cho-yul was a high-level sorcerer, he could simply use the curse in exchange for his life.

All sorcery attacks could be defended against by sorcery. It wouldn’t be long before Asura neutralized a curse after it went into effect.

But, if the sorcerer performed the ritual in exchange for his life, even Asura would not be able to neutralize it. The Black Magic Curse, therefore, was very powerful.

Cho-yul was agonizing over whether or not he should kill SoSeoLan at the cost of his life. He couldn’t just wait and see as she ran toward planned destruction, especially when it involved the lives of countless people.

Zin said as he watched Cho-yul, “Think about using the curse as the last resort. This is not the time to kill the SoSeoLan.”

There might come a time for that, but for now, everyone agreed that this wasn’t the time.

However, since they needed to travel to somewhere far from there, they worried that news of SoSeoLan losing her mind would not reach them in time if that were to happen.

“Now, you have two options.”

“What are those?”

“First, getting power equal to SoSeoLan’s.”

Cho-yul could go where the Book of the Dead was and learn the same Death Command she used. When the group became a giant organization, the high-level sorcerer, Cho-yul, could use the Death Command and fight against them. Guns for guns, sorcery for sorcery.

If the Group’s leader were to go crazy, Cho-yul, the new Death Commander, could face SoSeoLan.

Of course, Cho-yul expressed his reluctance, “Well, that power…”

“The devil hunters were a tribe that fought evil with evil. If you’re trained by a devil hunter, then you should be willing to do that much.”

In the end, regardless of whoever won, both would die. Even if Cho-yul won, he would eventually go crazy for using the spell. Cho-yul lowered his head without saying anything.

“What’s the second option?”

“It’s simple.”

The second option was simple.

“Go work for Azura. And when she goes crazy, you can kill her and take control of the Group.”

After hearing this, Cho-yul became even paler.

“Th-That’s ridiculous! You already know how much she hates me!”

Cho-yul shook his head vigorously, and Zin frowned.

“Are you pretending or do you really not know?”

“What?”

“How can you be that stupid and call yourself a high-level sorcerer?”

Leona gave Cho-yul a subtle look, as if to say even she knew.

“Now that I think about it, Cho-yul is really stupid.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Cho-yul asked as he couldn’t understand.

The one who answered was not Zin or Leona, but Ramphil, “Do you think that she would let the only person who could kill her stay alive if she really hated you?”

Shocked, Cho-yul’s face hardened.