Chapter 49
Seong-Hwi first bought items from the item market. He did not open item cubes using Karma because he had earned tons of Coins. He purchased four items: a leather brigandine, leather boots, a knife, and a ten-meter red string. They all possessed D-rank potential and would have cost forty thousand Karma if he opened item cubes, but paid fifty thousand Coins because he bought them from the item market.
Considering the opportunity cost, it’s a plus. After all, I have to use Karma to raise my stats later.
Seong-Hwi examined his purchased items.
[Barbed Snake Brigandine (Item)
Rank: F(0)
Description: A brigandine made with the leather of a Barbed Snake with high magical resistance. Its three layers allow for moderate physical defense.]
Seong-Hwi bought a brigandine that did not restrict his movements and one he could wear under his clothes. Metal armor did not suit his fighting style.
[Tom’s Leather Boots (Item)
Rank: F(0)
Description: Leather boots made by the leather artisan Tom Payne of the race Human. Ten brilliantly buffed pieces of different leather were blended using his special technique to fit its wearer’s foot size.]
Seong-Hwi preferred boots since they kept his ankle stable. It was also the only handmade item of the four he purchased because there weren’t many boots among the cube items.
Tom Payne will become a famous leather artisan in the future.
These boots were likely one of his early creations.
[Ackher Ring Dagger (Item)
Rank: F(0)
Description: A dagger made with the small horn of an Ackher Rhino. Its pommel has a ring on it.]
Seong-Hwi purchased a dagger, the perfect sub-weapon since his D Weapon was his main weapon. He also bought an item that would complement the dagger.
[Longus String (Item)
Rank: F(0)
Description: A ten-meter string made by coiling the tendons of a Longus Lizard. It is extraordinarily tough and does not tear easily.]
Seong-Hwi tightly tied the red Longus String to the Ackher Ring Dagger. He could use it like a whip or easily retrieve the dagger after throwing it.
He looked out the window after examining his gear. The streets were empty in the dead of night.
Roughly two hours left.
The attack on Edu unfolded around three in the morning in his past life.
I should get ready, Seong-Hwi thought as he stood up.
***
Miroslav, a man from the Czech Republic, walked along the hallway of the Lodi Hotel.
Dammit! How was I reduced to this?! he cursed inwardly.
He had been Lost in the Mirror World for two years and felt pathetic for barely holding on to life; he was only making enough to pay the survival tax each month.
It’s becoming more difficult to pay the tax. At this rate, I’ll become an escaper.
Miroslav also had dreams at first; even if he wasn’t an elite member, he at least wanted to join a decent clan where he could consistently go on hunts and earn enough Coins to own a small store. It would earn him a stable Coin income and free him from a life of risks.
However, he had mediocre talent. His D Weapon was ordinary, and his skills were the general ones that everyone else used. He was just another average Double-E human one could find anywhere.
At this rate, I’ll become weaker as the survival tax takes all my items and skills. I have to make it big before that! Miroslav thought as his eyes filled with determination.
Just then, his shoulder bumped someone.
“Be careful, dammit!” Miroslav shouted, not blaming himself for spacing out while he was walking.
“Oh, my apologies,” the Asian man replied.
As Miroslav was about to keep walking, he heard an Akasha Message.
[Hundred-Man Mark stamped.]
He did not understand what happened.
Hundred-Man Mark? What the hell is—huh?
He remembered his friend’s warning that he should run without looking back if he encountered a Black Human who knew how to use the Hundred-Man Mark. That short thought became his last.
A dagger beheaded him, and a blue cup appeared out of nowhere to pour water on where his head used to be. The dead Miroslav collapsed, but his neck wound instantly closed, so no blood was spilled.
[750 Karma obtained.]
[558 additional Karma obtained as per the effect of the Hundred-Man Mark.]
Seong-Hwi looked down to scan Miroslav’s corpse and thought, Yeah, he’s perfect.
Through his research in the past two days, he discovered that twenty-one people resided on the fifth floor of the Lodi Hotel, and the man named Miroslav was the closest to him in body type.
Seong-Hwi exchanged clothes with the corpse. The jeans and black shirt made in the Mirror World were large enough to fit the Barbed Snake Brigandine under them. It was odd to see a man exchanging clothes with a beheaded corpse in the dead of night.
He also fastened his newly purchased Ackher Ring Dagger under his shirt and called, “Chaya.”
“Yes, hyung-nim.”
Chaya appeared in the empty hallway. He also looked different than one month ago—he was wearing leather armor and wristbands he had purchased in the item market.
“Hide him in my room for now,” Seong-Hwi said.
“Okay.”
“After that, do as I’ve instructed.”
Chaya nodded hesitantly and placed his hand on Miroslav’s corpse, which then disappeared.
Seong-Hwi stared at Chaya, about to move the invisible corpse, and asked, “Don’t you want to ask me anything?”
He had asked the same question one month ago. Chaya turned to Seong-Hwi and stared at him silently. The moonlight through the hotel window illuminated one side of Seong-Hwi’s face and darkened the other side.
I... don’t understand him, Chaya thought.
To Chaya, Cheon Seong-Hwi was his savior and employer. The list of questions he wanted to ask kept getting longer throughout the month they spent together. Seong-Hwi was a brave warrior, an extraordinary hunter, as well as a cruel murderer. It was as if he possessed several egos that he switched between whenever necessary.
One would normally be wary of a person with so many faces, but Chaya felt otherwise. He prioritized repaying his debt to Seong-Hwi, who had saved the lives of both his little sister and him. He also helped him grow stronger in the past month. Those facts were far more important than anything else. Hence, Chaya could only answer the same way he did one month ago.
“I do, but I will wait until you are willing to tell me.”
Seong-Hwi smirked as Chaya gave the same answer and said, “What are you most curious about? I’ll at least answer one question truthfully.”
“Then... what am I to you? A brother or a mercenary?”
“A mercenary,” Seong-Hwi answered without hesitation.
Chaya lowered his head, taking a momentary silence, and replied, “That’s all I need to know for now. I will accomplish the mission you bestowed upon me without fail.”
Chaya went down the stairs with Miroslav’s corpse to the second floor, where their rooms were.
Seong-Hwi stared at Chaya from behind and thought, I’m sorry, but... as promised, I told the truth.
They had spent the past month together, but Seong-Hwi had never once felt Chaya was like a little brother to him—no, to be more exact, he did his best not to feel that way. It was just how Seong-Hwi treated everyone; he always doubted them and rarely opened up to anyone in the truest sense.
He suspected it was because of his memory of being abandoned by his mother on that fateful day of the first snow. One could only experience farewell by making bonds, and the pain of the farewell was proportional to how deep the bond was. However, the key members of Clan Calasanz in his past life managed to break through the walls of his heart and made him wonder if this was what it felt like to have a family.
But even the time I spent with them is now gone.
Seong-Hwi met Jurie and Lina, but his bond with them was different than what he had made with them in his past life. He felt like he was left alone in the world. He turned to look out the window. The stars illuminating the night sky reminded him of his conversation with Mother Maria, who named him.
“Why don’t you play with the others, Seong-Hwi?”
“I like reading books alone more.”
“Is reading biographies that fun?”
“Yes, it’s fascinating. They show just how amazing the figures written about are. They shine brightly, just like the name you gave me.”
“Do you want to shine brightly, Seong-Hwi?”
“Of course.”
“Then all the more reason you should play with the others.”
“Pardon?”
“What use is it to be the only one who shines brightly? You have to illuminate others with your bright light. Come this way. And your eyes will go bad if you read in the dark.”
Seong-Hwi smiled as he remembered Mother Maria’s warm and gentle voice.
Your wish for me to become someone who shines brightly has become my life’s goal, Mother Maria. I wonder if this feeling of solitude will disappear if I become the brightest star that illuminates the whole world, Seong-Hwi thought as he wore the Myriad Cheoyong Mask.
[Activating Artifact Skill: Myriad Faces.]
[Target: Miroslav]
The Myriad Cheoyong Mask contorted like clay and turned into the face of a blond man with green eyes—the same as Miroslav, whom he had just killed. Not only did the face look the same, but it exuded the aura of a man filled with complaints and desperation for opportunity.
Seong-Hwi mumbled in Miroslav’s voice, “I don’t know the answer, so I’ll just try to become the brightest star for now.”
***
Thou great star! What would be thy happiness if thou hadst not those for whom thou shinest!
Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
***
Hundreds of shadows gathered in Edu at three in the morning when the students of the 2031-1-1 season were sound asleep for the coming graduation ceremony. Seong-Hwi was running toward Edu’s east gate with twenty other people from the Lodi Hotel, each with a red mark on their left hand.
“Kerek! All of you know your mission, correct? Your targets are weak newbies! Capture them all and bring them to me!” said a midget in a black robe, leading the group at the front.
He was only as tall as an average human’s waist, and his voice was as crackly as nails on a chalkboard.
I can smell the putrid stench of goblins from here, Seong-Hwi thought, his eyes sinking deeply.
“Is it true you will accept us as members of Clan Trophy if we do as you ask?” asked one of the men in the group.
“Krrrk! I will keep my promise. It’s time for Trophy to be reborn as a multi-racial clan. Underhanded humans are a good addition!”
Trophy was a famous goblin black clan. Goblins were also an inferior race like humans, but were rated slightly higher because of their secondary force, Sorcery Force.
“Hell yeah! We’re finally free from our shitty lives!”
“We won’t ever have to worry about Coins if we’re in a clan like Trophy!”
“Traitors to our kind? Hah! I couldn’t give less of a shit! Since when has our kind ever cared for us?!”
“Screw the Union! Screw humanity! I’ll make it big, no matter what!”
Everyone in the group held animosity for their fellow humans and was overjoyed that they could become members of the notorious Clan Trophy.
“Kererek! I will let the boss know and have him reward the human who captures the most newbies!” the goblin shouted as he ran toward the east gate, with no doubt their plan would succeed.
There were no guards around the east gate, a giant wooden door. Members of the Bronze Cross Knights usually stood guard, but they were nowhere in sight for some reason.
The humans kept their promise! the goblin shouted inwardly with a smile.
He pulled out a wooden tile and infused mana and Sorcery Force into it, shouting, “Wood is wood! The wooden tile is the wooden door!”
[Activating Race Skill: Imitative Sorcery - Equation.]
The small wooden tile resonated with the giant east gate. The goblin destroyed the wooden tile in his hand, and the east gate was destroyed just like it.
“Krrrk! Commence the operation!” the goblin shouted.
“Let’s go!”
“Ahhh!”
The humans ran into Edu through the broken east gate. Just then, the sound of gunfire echoed, and a bullet pierced the heart of one of the people at the vanguard.
“Kurgh!” the man who was shot grunted and died on the spot.
“Kerek!”
The goblin turned to where the bullet flew from. A Middle Eastern man wearing white and a keffiyeh was on the roof of a building in the perfect position to monitor the east gate.
He took his eyes off the sight of his AK-47 and mumbled, “I can’t believe the information was true. Crazy bastards!”
A bell rang throughout Edu to alert everyone of the attack.