Ch.11137. To the Stronghold of Yeongdo (4)

The group hurried toward the downtown area.

The screams of monsters could be heard from there. Upon arriving, a horrific scene unfolded before them.

“Aaaagh!! No, please, save me!!!”

A man was sitting on the ground, screaming. In front of him, a woman was having her head devoured by a monster.

“Damn it, hurry! A civilian is…”

Before Seong-hoon Pyo could finish speaking, Soso moved faster. She sliced through the neck of the hideous reptilian monster.

But the woman’s head had already been eaten by the monster.

“Too late.”

Soso said quietly. The woman’s body collapsed to the ground.

“Hiiieek-“

Seeing this, a young man nearby screamed and backed away. None of the hunters present were as shocked as that man. For hunters, this was just an everyday scene.

“What happened here?”

Seong-hoon looked around and tried to approach the panicked man. But Yu-ha Jeong stepped forward first.

“I think it would be better if I talked to him.”

As she said, Seong-hoon’s appearance was quite intimidating. Though the panic didn’t subside quickly, the man stammered something to Yu-ha.

After hearing everything, Yu-ha approached the group. The situation in Yeongdo she described was more serious than expected.

“Apparently, numerous monsters have been appearing in Yeongdo for several days. But the Dead Arms hunters who manage this area haven’t been eliminating them at all…”

Without hunters who specialize in monster hunting, it would naturally be a one-sided massacre.

“What the hell is going on! Even if those Dead Arms guys are crazy, how could they not show their faces when monsters are running rampant like this…”

“It’s really strange. At the very least, they never disliked hunting monsters.”

As Yu-ha said, hunting monsters of moderate difficulty brings in good money. The byproducts and mana stones obtained after killing monsters are highly valuable in modern industry.

Moreover, Dead Arms has the Udilent Group, a major corporation that distributes those byproducts, behind them.

“Like Team Leader Jeong said, those guys would never give up on monsters. What’s happening in Yeongdo?”

Seong-hoon’s voice was full of suspicion. But at that moment, the group was startled.

“W-wait! That corpse is…”

Something was wrong with the headless woman’s body. The torso, which shouldn’t be able to move, was twisting and writhing violently.

“Undead?”

At those words, the hunters all grabbed their swords. But Soso, who was closest to the woman, silently watched the scene.

“No. I don’t think it’s an undead.”

Soso raised her hand to calm the hunters. They were puzzled, but soon seemed to understand the reason as they observed the changes in the corpse.

“The corpse is…?”

Pitch-black smoke began to rise around the writhing corpse. The smoke engulfed the body, and with a final scream, the corpse disappeared.

“W-what just happened?”

As if by magic, all traces of the corpse vanished. More precisely, the black smoke flew into the air.

‘It’s flying away without dispersing…’

Like a specter, the black smoke flew somewhere as if it had a will of its own. At that moment, I was certain.

‘This Yeongdo has definitely become a sacrificial domain.’

The Tragedy of Ains. At that massacre site, the Doubt Demon deliberately opened gates to summon monsters.

And those killed by the monsters—their bodies and souls became offerings that strengthened the Doubt Demon’s sorcery.

Then, Soso spoke.

“Wasn’t this a unique sorcery only the Doubt Demon possessed? If so, the entire Yeongdo area has become a sacrificial domain…”

Soso seemed to have realized the cause of the current phenomenon. She was also from the 19th class who was present during the Tragedy of Ains.

So she couldn’t have forgotten those hellish scenes that unfolded at the Ains massacre—the sight of Ains students killed by monsters evaporating into pitch-black smoke.

“Master Soso, do you know about this phenomenon?”

Seong-hoon asked in surprise. When Soso looked at me, he followed her gaze.

“I’ll explain.”

All eyes turned to me.

***

When all the explanations were finished, Seong-hoon wore an incredulous expression.

No, his clenched fist was trembling with anger.

“Such an absurd… horrific sorcery exists? That Taesuk Seong from Dead Arms was already acting like a villain, but… this is something only a demon would do!”

Soso, with her arms crossed, nodded carefully.

“Indeed, a demon might actually be involved. To turn a certain area into a domain and use those sacrificed within as offerings… Even for an awakened one, this is not an easy feat.”

“Then are you saying this is the work of the Hell Blood Demon?”

I answered Seong-hoon’s question.

“It seems so. Taesuk Seong is far inferior to you as a hunter, Guild Leader Pyo. Such a widespread sorcery would be impossible without him—the villain of the Red Lake.”

At my words, Soso’s expression hardened further.

“Hell Blood Demon Seon-woo Lee. That he would do such a thing in Busan.”

Hell Blood Demon Seon-woo Lee. He was sworn brothers with Soso’s father, Se-hwi Yeon.

Once a promising disciple of the Heavenly Demon Sect, he became a villain swordsman. And now, he is the number one enemy of the Heavenly Demon Sect.

Seon-woo Lee. After killing ten disciples of the Heavenly Demon Sect and stealing sacred artifacts, he fled from the sect’s headquarters. The cause of his atrocity was his inferiority complex toward Heavenly Demon Se-hwi Yeon.

Soso’s father completely conquered the fragmented southern region of the Martial Nation before the dimensional fusion. He is also one of the Five Great Celestial Saints, ruling as one of the five strongest people in the world.

‘So even as sworn brothers, there must have been a huge talent gap from childhood.’

Such complicated grudges within the Heavenly Demon Sect might seem irrelevant to me at first glance, but it’s not something to be taken lightly.

‘Someone like Seon-woo would definitely want to kill Soso.’

In the original story, Seon-woo and Soso were entangled in a bitter relationship. And he was a formidable enemy for the original Si-woo’s guild, Justice.

Soso was the one who eliminated Seon-woo Lee, the right-hand man of Mun-yeom Seo, a member of the Four Demons and an executive of the Red Lake. However, in the original story, Soso was severely injured in the process.

‘In the original story, Min-ah Chae, who had awakened as a saint, was there. So she didn’t lose her life, but…’

Now, there’s no Min-ah, nor Arin who possesses holy power comparable to Min-ah’s.

But I couldn’t forcibly prevent the episode where Seon-woo and Soso would meet.

The plausibility and inevitability of the novel. Due to the connection forged by the bitter enmity between the Heavenly Demon Sect and the Red Lake, the two would eventually cross swords.

And the difference from the original story is that I am by Soso’s side.

‘I absolutely won’t let Soso get hurt.’

That was my honest feeling. Although I still consider her a friend, I needed to strengthen my resolve to maintain that boundary of friendship.

Over the past three months, it wasn’t just Soso’s feelings that had deepened. I too wanted to protect her.

‘So I must eliminate Seon-woo in Yeongdo.’

I had already considered the worst-case scenario. It was somewhat unexpected that Seon-woo had activated the sacrificial domain used by the Doubt Demon, but I could handle it.

No, since I had already experienced it with the Doubt Demon, I knew what needed to be done.

‘From now on, I need to move quickly with the alliance hunters here.’

I gave instructions to the hunters through the earpiece.

***

Whoooosh-

Time had already moved into the late afternoon.

The relentless downpour continued, making the surroundings as dark as night. I was monitoring the reports from the alliance hunters in real-time through the earpiece.

“Fortunately, it seems the alliance hunters are taking care of the monsters.”

Soso nodded at my words. If the sacrificial domain had been activated, we needed to deal with the monsters as quickly as possible.

Monsters controlled by sorcery. The more people killed by these monsters, the wider the domain becomes.

And the bodies and souls of those who die in that domain are absorbed by the sorcery caster.

‘More precisely, they flow to the demon contracted with the caster.’

It’s different from directly summoning a demon. The bodies and souls offered as sacrifices. In return for these offerings, one receives a large amount of mana or demonic energy.

That’s why we needed to deal with the summoned monsters as quickly as possible. Of course, this task wasn’t particularly difficult for the alliance hunters.

‘The alliance hunters I brought are the elites from each guild.’

And fortunately, I had organized them into squads based on their characteristics. Over the past three months, I had personally taken charge of operations while going on missions with them.

“We’ve completed the elimination in the area you designated, Vice President!”

The alliance hunters were very accustomed to receiving my instructions through the earpiece. And they also used drones to measure the surrounding demonic energy, sending me information in real-time.

‘I guess this is some level of pruning.’

And dealing with monsters was just the beginning. Pruning. As the name suggests, after eliminating each monster, we had to examine the demonic energy reaction immediately afterward.

Then, we had to trace back to the source of the demonic energy controlling those monsters.

In Ains, the Doubt Demon thoroughly concealed his position. During those tragic days, it was mistaken for a dungeon collapse rather than a villain’s attack.

The Doubt Demon strictly controlled only monsters, amplifying the rational confusion of the students.

‘That’s why the damage was greater.’

If I didn’t have that experience, I might have been caught without even knowing the identity of the enemy I needed to deal with. But now, I knew their methods.

‘If I know the method, I can actually find where he’s hiding in reverse.’

I reorganized my thoughts. Due to the sudden appearance of monsters, the residents of Yeongdo had evacuated to shelters, I was told.

But not all residents could evacuate. So we quickly identified the shelters and dealt with the monsters furthest from the shelters first.

The result discovered after two hours was shocking.

‘The entire Yeongdo is a sacrificial domain…’

The domain was wider than imagined. The island of Yeongdo itself is an administrative district, Yeongdo-gu.

That entire vast area was included in the sacrificial domain.

‘If the domain is this wide, Seon-woo is…’

The villain grows stronger the more black mist he absorbs. Even though I had considered the worst-case scenario, I couldn’t deny that this was precisely that worst-case scenario.

No, it was natural to risk one’s life when meeting a member of the Red Lake, especially an executive-level member. The main villain group of the original story.

Each of its members is a disaster-level, most heinous villain.

‘But instead of being tense, I need to move my head and body more.’

While dealing with monsters, the movement of the monsters, and the direction in which the black mist from the victims’ bodies was heading.

By combining all this information, I finally found where Seon-woo, the source of the current chaos, was hiding.

‘Taejongdae. Seon-woo and the executives of Dead Arms must be near that cliff.’

The flow of demonic energy and black mist. At first glance, the flow seemed irregular. But through the information sent by hunters scattered throughout Yeongdo, I identified where the flow was heading.

The small arrows on the earpiece ultimately pointed to the southeast of Yeongdo. There’s a small mountain in that area, and at the edge of the forest that meets the coast, there’s a coastal cliff famous for its scenic beauty.

So Soso and I headed to the southeast of the island first. The place the two of us had just entered was the entrance to the forest on the mountain leading to Taejongdae. For now, only the two of us had entered this place first.

Seong-hoon and Yu-ha were dealing with monsters not far away. They were to join us as soon as the monsters were dealt with.

The rest of the hunters were to focus on rescue operations in Yeongdo. After all, if the opponent was Seon-woo, to be honest, other hunters wouldn’t be of much help.

“Let’s move then. There might be ambushes in the forest, so be as careful as…”

Since there were no other alliance hunters, I naturally spoke informally to Soso. But Soso didn’t respond to my words.

On the way here, Soso and I had also dealt with monsters together.

So although she was deflecting rainwater with the Heavenly Demon technique, both of us were inevitably soaked from being in the rain all day.

Soso’s long black hair and traditional Martial Nation attire clung to her body, revealing her figure.

And Soso’s body was trembling slightly.

“What’s wrong? Are you feeling unwell…”

As I was about to say those words, Soso suddenly embraced me.