chapter_0206

“I am very pleased to meet you again.”

A woman in a neat suit bowed to them. Behind her stood heavily armed women who looked like bodyguards. From their weapons, they were all hunters.

They tried to maintain their posture, but their curiosity was evident as they kept glancing at him.

“I heard you had a hard time with an unidentified monster. How is your body feeling?”

Nika, dressed in a thick coat from head to toe, took the question. Underneath the coat, she was, of course, wearing the Succubus Queen’s outfit. It was fortunate that she hadn’t revealed what was underneath the coat outside.

“Thirteen minutes ago, seventeen A-3-grade monsters appeared outside the gate and were just defeated. According to the dungeon break prediction formula, the dungeon boss or an S-grade monster is expected to appear in ten minutes.”

“I thought the initial dungeon break prediction time was still far off. Did you miscalculate, or did something unexpected happen?”

Nika, who was usually gentle and caring towards him, had a cold and stern expression on her face. She knew how to draw a clear line between public and private matters, as she had done when she appeared as the Succubus Queen in the Imperial Palace.

“It’s the latter. After the incident of the dormant gate activation, all gate dungeon break times have been jumbled up. Didn’t you receive the report?”

He wouldn’t have received it. He was the culprit behind the dormant gate activation incident. After that, he had been busy sticking with the guild members in the guild building, so there was no time to receive reports.

“I was busy.”

“Yes, I expected as much.”

The woman in the suit might have a different reason, but it wasn’t wrong.

“So, the voices calling for a revision of the dungeon break prediction formula are getting louder, and it will be corrected soon.”

Additionally, what happened inside the gate remained a mystery. The gate had collapsed, leaving no clues, and the Cha Mountain Group’s eldest son and his secretary, who were found unconscious in front of it, both refused to testify.

‘It can’t be helped.’

He had to hide his identity, so he had messed with their memories a little. It was an attack, but he had only messed with their memories, not their minds.

In fact, he hadn’t touched their brains at all. He had only messed with their memories and sent them on their way, but the man had developed a trauma and was trembling with fear.

He had only touched their brains a little, and the man had developed a trauma. What a weakling.

“But who is that…… person?”

The woman in the suit, who had called him “that person” quickly added an honorific when Nika glared at her.

“It’s my summon. Don’t dare call it by a disrespectful name.”

“A summon…… Yes, I understand. I apologize for any inconvenience.”

The woman bowed her head slightly. It was understandable that she would be nervous about offending a human’s summon, but the woman remained calm.

Of course, if she had shown any sign of weakness, she wouldn’t have been sent here.

“Is that a summon? Is he deliberately making it wear that outfit? What a fashion sense.”

“Shh. They’ll hear you.”

“They can’t hear us from this distance.”

Some reporters whispered among themselves. Nika couldn’t hear them from this distance, but he could.

It wasn’t surprising that they were whispering. With a mask on his face, his whole body wrapped in a thick coat, and his eyes covered by the coat’s hat, only his right hand was visible. Even that was covered up to the elbow with a thick glove.

‘It can’t be helped.’

At first, he had planned to hide his identity and act as a mysterious hunter. However, the Eternal guild had gone too far in excluding male hunters, so this was a last-ditch effort.

There was no harm in keeping his identity a secret for now, and he could take his time figuring out the next steps.

The person who would accompany him outside as his “master” had been chosen by rock-paper-scissors. At first, Leona was supposed to go with him, but the other six stopped her.

‘The gate is facing 7 o’clock, and the distance is about 80 meters.’

Of course, understanding and remembering faces were two different things. This was the first time, so it would have been fine, but the guy had been grumbling about something since earlier, so he was a little annoyed.

“Gurgle……”

As the hunters nearby glanced at him, a sound like water draining from a sewer could be heard, and the gate began to shake. The area immediately became busy.

“Dungeon break signal! Everyone, be on guard!”

However, despite the commotion, the atmosphere didn’t feel as tense or desperate as it should have been.

From the whispers, it seemed that they were more curious about Nika. Everyone knew how much fame she had accumulated, and they were probably also aware of how hard she had worked in his absence.

“Master, are you going to do it?”

Nika stared at him, and a voice rang in his head. He nodded and approached the gate, drawing the Dragon Tooth Sword.

“Are you not going to take action yourself?”

The woman in the suit asked worriedly. Nika scoffed.

“He’s more than enough on his own. Just keep your eyes open and watch carefully. This is his first field test, but I guarantee his skills.”

“Oh, I see. Alright.”

The hunters nearby looked anxious when they heard that she wouldn’t be taking action herself and that this was his first field test. What did it matter if they were anxious? He would show them soon enough.

“I’m coming out! It’s the boss!”

A yellow beak poked out of the gate, followed by a large bird head. It had no feathers, and its half-open eyes looked drowsy, as if it had just hatched from an egg.

However, its size was definitely not that of a newly hatched bird.

Its half-open eyes turned towards him. The eyeballs, visible under the eyelids, rolled around as the bird head ignored him and tried to pull its body out. It seemed to have no instinct to assess how strong its opponent was.

The Dragon Tooth Sword’s blade glowed with mana. As the sword shone blue, someone behind him exclaimed, “Sword Aura!”

This wasn’t an aura. He was just preparing to use a sword technique by surrounding the sword with mana. In the first world, magic tended to be more prominent, so there were no aura techniques, only magic sword techniques.

He used physical enhancement and acceleration to dash forward. The bird’s eye slowly followed him but couldn’t keep up. He approached the bird’s side and raised the Dragon Tooth Sword as if he were beheading it.

“Polar Distortion.”

The mana in the sword’s blade rotated in opposite directions and aimed for the bird’s neck, slicing it off. “Kwajijijik!” The neck was torn off, and the bird’s head fell to the ground.

“Ugh?!”

He was surprised at how easily it was cut and twisted his arm. The Dragon Tooth Sword stopped just short of cutting into the asphalt. If he had twisted it a little more, he would have gouged a hole in the asphalt.

The severed head rolled on the ground. Blood gushed from the neck, still stuck in the gate, and soaked the severed head. Both the cut surfaces were ragged.

“……”

The murmurs around him stopped.

‘It’s not that impressive.’

This was far from the first world. In the second world, he had dreamed of becoming the Demon King but was killed by another demon for being too weak and mediocre.

This S-grade monster was pathetically weak. The gap between worlds was enormous, even taking into account that Earth had changed due to the fragments of other worlds mixing in.

He grabbed the body that was blocking the gate and pulled it out, then had a good idea when he saw the overflowing blood.

He checked the direction and was about to pull the body out when he tore off a piece of flesh and threw it. The flesh flew in a nearly straight line and accurately hit the face of the guy who had been grumbling earlier, splattering blood on him.

“Kwaaaaaaak!”

This time, even Nika, who was standing at the 7 o’clock direction, could hear the scream. As the commotion at 7 o’clock drew attention, he pulled out the rest of the body.

The tail end of the body was about the size of two buses combined. It was definitely huge. He threw the corpse aside and peeked inside the gate. Nothing else seemed to be coming out.

“Is this it? Is it over?”

“I think the boss monster is hesitating to come out because of you, Master. This time, it’s not a monster that blindly tries to kill humans, but one with a survival instinct.”

“So, are there monsters that blindly try to kill humans, regardless of their survival instinct?”

He had a good idea. It was a little uncomfortable to go inside the gate, but then he thought of something.

“Nika. If I say it’s your summon, will people accept that it’s strong enough?”

“Hmm…… It should be fine for an S-grade gate. We’ve soloed hundreds of S-grade gates, so it should be fine. Even if it’s not, it’s fine. I’ll make sure they understand.”

“……You don’t have to go that far.”

He stopped Nika, who was about to say something sinister. He stuck his left arm into the gate and drew a wide-area annihilation magic circle on his palm. An enormous amount of mana was sucked into the magic circle.

The magic circle heated up, and the wide-area annihilation magic activated. An immense heat wave erupted, and a firestorm swept through the inside of the gate.

He used the same magic again to intensify the flames. The flames multiplied and unleashed an overwhelming power, consuming the gate entirely. Surprisingly, not a single spark escaped outside.

“The gate……!”

Soon, the gate began to crack, starting from the inside. He pulled out his arm. The gate, which had begun to collapse from the inside, disappeared without a trace.

The chicks inside had burned to a crisp, becoming well-done bird roast. The faces of the people on the other side of the gate were stunned.

“Are your doubts gone now?”

No one could answer.

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“Three years after her official appearance, Eternal guild’s S-class hunter, Nika, reveals a new summon. Who is the summon next to her? Nika maintains a ‘no comment’ policy. A human-shaped summon, but not quite human-like strength. The summon’s personality, is the owner at fault……? What’s this?”

A few hours later, the news articles were flooded with headlines about him.

Normally, it would have taken at least the next day. No journalist in their right mind would have tried to cover an S-grade dungeon break, risking their lives.

However, thanks to Nika’s return, there were more journalists present than usual, so the articles were published faster.

“How was it, Master?”

“It was nothing.”

He wasn’t trying to downplay it. If they hadn’t been there, even a single Demon King’s Army Corps Commander would have been difficult to handle, let alone the Demon King himself.

“I was surprised, too. At first, we were.”

“Because it was too weak?”

“Yes. Our standard of strength has always been you, Master.”

“……”

He turned off his smartphone with a bitter expression.

If humans and monsters were both weak, there was no way a Demon King’s Army Corps Commander would suddenly appear.

“Wooooong……”

His turned-off smartphone vibrated. It was Laura.

“Why?”

“The investigation into your family is complete. Your parents are both safe and sound, and they haven’t had any major difficulties, so you can rest assured. But your sister……”

“What about my sister?”

As Laura hesitated for a moment, all sorts of thoughts flashed through his mind. Had she died during the gate crisis, or had she become a hunter and died, or had something unmentionable happened to her?

“……She’s a member of our guild.”