Chapter 21

Chapter 21

Haejin’s Skill, Safe Property.

Its effect was to allow only those he permitted to enter his property.

An invisible wall formed around the entrance, blocking everything.

But what if the property itself moved?

What if that invincible wall charged forward with the force of a five-ton camper van behind it?

‘That’s basically a tank.’

This was on a completely different level from an ordinary traffic accident.

The phrase ‘strategic traffic accident’ might actually suit it perfectly.

Of course, he wasn’t certain this plan would really work.

After all, Safe Property only activated once the camper van came to a stop.

So he planned to floor the accelerator, then slam on the brakes right before impact.

The ability might not activate, and the Red Goblin Lord might survive even after getting hit.

But that was fine. He had a Plan B.

‘If things go wrong, I can just lock the doors and hole up inside.’

As long as Haejin remained inside the camper van, he was practically invincible.

At the very least, there was no chance of him dying or getting hurt, so it was a gamble worth taking.

“Everyone got your seatbelts on?”

“Yes! Tight and secure!”

“Then grab onto anything you can see. This ride’s going to shake a little!”

“S-shake? What do you mean?!”

Clunk- VROOOOM--!

He shifted gears and stomped the accelerator like he wanted to break it.

His target was the Red Goblin Lord straight ahead.

The distance between them was roughly three hundred meters.

The engine overheated almost instantly as the camper van began accelerating at tremendous speed.

‘If not now, I won’t get another chance. Let’s bet everything on this one shot.’

A completely insane strategy no one could have imagined.

Sangjin and the other government Hunters turned deathly pale and gritted their teeth.

-Keruk?

-Keruruk?!

“Get out of the damn way, you bastards!”

The Hunters weren’t the only ones shocked.

The Red Goblins stared blankly at the camper van as it started moving.

Then they panicked and scrambled out of its path.

Even they understood that getting run over by this thing would be a pointless death.

The speedometer had already reached 120.

‘Not enough. Faster!’

Past 130 and then 140 kilometers per hour.

And the instant the trembling needle crossed 150.

“LET’S GOOOO!!”

As he charged right up to the Red Goblin Lord.

For a split second, he saw it.

The creature’s trembling eyes, faced with a sight it had never imagined.

Haejin threw his entire weight onto the brake pedal.

SCREEEEEECH--!

BOOM-!

A tremendous impact shook everything.

Sudden deceleration.

The metal and springs connected to the brakes ground viciously, spraying sparks everywhere.

For a moment, the camper van’s rear wheels lifted off the ground like a Viking ride, and the inside shook violently.

But that was all.

Thanks to Fully Operational Property, every worn component repaired itself the instant it was damaged.

The same was true of the camper van’s interior.

And so, the full force of that impact was transferred into the defensive barrier that formed the instant he braked.

Then passed directly into the Red Goblin Lord, perfectly trapped between the camper van and the barrier.

KABOOOOOM--!

Like a cannon had been fired.

The Red Goblin Lord, which had been standing roughly five meters away, was launched backward.

No, ‘fired’ might have been more accurate than ‘launched.’

“Holy shit...?!”

Kim Sangjin’s jaw dropped as he watched through the windshield.

The Goblin Lord slammed into the cavern wall and blasted straight through it.

Its body was mangled and covered in blood.

Half its face had been crushed, and green blood poured from wounds all over its body.

“Wow. That actually worked?”

“Hunter, what did you just say?”

“I said the plan worked. Mm. Nice and clean.”

“A-ah...”

Of course, the most shocked person there was Haejin himself.

He had basically said screw it and rammed straight in, only for it to actually work.

But panicking along with everyone else wouldn’t benefit him.

So he forced himself to keep a straight face and act as though everything had gone exactly as planned.

Naturally, the Hunters who already believed Haejin was A-rank or higher immediately accepted it.

“Is that thing... really dead?”

Mage Lee Sua asked in a trembling voice.

Haejin narrowed his eyes and stared at the Red Goblin Lord for a moment.

Its skull was half shattered, and the body that took the direct hit had been smashed apart.

Its hide was so tough that it still looked relatively intact at first glance.

But its bones and internal organs must have taken the full impact and been pulverized.

Most importantly, it hung limply embedded in the cave wall.

Almost like a piece in some avant-garde modern-art exhibition.

“It’s probably dead.”

The moment he answered with a faint smile.

-Ding!

-Level Up!

-Level Up!

A fanfare burst in his ears.

The system confirmed its death for him.

‘Kyaa! As expected of a boss monster. Two levels at once?!’

The reward was far greater than expected.

A full two-level power boost.

Including the Red Goblins he had hunted earlier, he had already gained five levels inside this Dungeon alone.

And now that he had reached Level 11, he could draw another Skill and Trait as well.

‘See? People really should gamble once in a while.’

The corners of Haejin’s mouth rose almost to his ears after hitting the jackpot.

-Ding!

[Boss Monster defeated.]

[Dungeon cleared! Congratulations!!]

The Dungeon was cleared the instant the boss died.

The Break had been prevented without issue, and he could now collect the promised raid reward.

All that remained was escaping.

Not long afterward, the Dungeon began gently trembling.

A draining sensation swept over him, as though his body and soul were being pulled apart, and his vision went black.

Then, when he opened his eyes again.

“Sunlight.”

Haejin and the Hunters were standing outside the Dungeon, in the forest of the Demonic Realm.

“Heh.”

When he looked behind him, a massive pile of monster corpses had appeared.

Which meant there was only one thing left to do.

‘Time to settle up properly.’

Time to get paid.

* * *

“Bleeegh...”

“Bleeaaagh! Ugh, this is killing me. Urk.”

Unlike Haejin, who was relatively fine, the government Hunters seemed to have had their stomachs completely turned inside out.

They kept retching from the shock of being expelled from the Dungeon.

“Go outside. Outside. Unless you’re paying for the cleaning.”

“Yes, sorry... Bleeegh.”

He hurriedly kicked them out before they could dirty his precious luxury camper van.

Afterward, Haejin slowly stepped outside as well.

“There it is! The camper van the Director told us about!!”

“Secure our Hunters first. I’ll make contact with the Masked Man.”

“Well, well?”

The surroundings suddenly became noisy as men in suits poured out from everywhere.

They wore Hunter Association badges. Anyone could tell they were government officials who had come to clean up the situation.

‘Wait. Did he just say Masked Man?’

Haejin quickly processed the situation.

‘Looks like they don’t know who I really am. They probably just watched the stream.’

For a moment, he considered simply revealing his identity.

But before long, he shook his head.

‘If they find out I’m just some nobody F-rank and decide to screw me over, that’d be a problem.’

The Association owed him far too much.

Right now, they believed he was some mysterious top-class Hunter.

In other words, Haejin held the leverage.

‘Okay. Better to hide it.’

He made the decision immediately.

“You Hunters over there. Come inside for a moment.”

“Pardon? But.”

“Come inside.”

“I’m sorry. Understood!”

He grabbed Kim Sangjin, who had been about to rejoin his colleagues, and dragged him back inside.

It couldn’t be helped. These people had already seen Haejin’s face.

Even if he ordered them to keep quiet, there was no guarantee they wouldn’t talk.

Of course, Haejin already had a plan.

“Sua, you’re a Mage, right? B-rank?”

“That’s right!”

“Then you know memory-erasure magic?”

“That... I do.”

Haejin quietly pulled out the mask hidden inside the box beneath the driver’s seat and put it on.

Now transformed into the Masked Man, he looked at Lee Sua and said quietly.

“I don’t want my identity revealed yet.”

“We absolutely won’t say anything. Please don’t worry!”

Team Leader Sangjin suddenly cut in.

But.

“How am I supposed to trust you?”

“But, Masked Man.”

“What?”

Haejin stared at him from behind the mask.

A line of cold sweat ran down the team leader’s forehead.

“N-nothing.”

“Use it now. I’ll be watching.”

People couldn’t be trusted.

This was the most reliable method.

Sangjin nodded, and Sua hesitantly began chanting the spell.

It was only a low-level erasure spell, around 2nd Circle, but that was more than enough.

At least six hours of memory would be wiped clean.

“I’ve cast it on everyone. Then...”

“You need to use it on yourself too, Sua.”

Not a chance she was getting away with that.

Gulp.

She swallowed dryly and pressed the staff against her own head.

Thud-

The Hunters all collapsed after losing their memories.

Haejin hoisted them over his shoulders one by one, then walked proudly out in front of the camper van.

A man who clearly looked like a superior officer approached and bowed politely.

“Greetings, Masked Man. I’m Yeom Myoil, Director of the National Intelligence Service’s Special Hunter Management Team.”

“The NIS has a Hunter Management Team?”

“It is a highly classified department, but yes. We do.”

The man named Yeom Myoil was exceedingly courteous.

He had even openly admitted the existence of a classified department.

‘They really do rate me extremely highly.’

That meant even the higher-ups considered him A-rank or above.

Good.

That meant he could act even more confidently.

“We received confirmation that the Dungeon was cleared. This was an urgent request, so thank you sincerely!”

“It’s fine. It wasn’t particularly difficult.”

First, he handed over all the government Hunters who had fainted from the memory-erasure spell.

Yeom Myoil’s mouth opened slightly when he saw how unharmed they were.

But it was still too early to be surprised.

“Wait. Those... are all monster corpses?”

A small hill had formed behind the camper van.

A pile of tangled red bodies.

They were all Red Goblin corpses.

“As you can see.”

The Dungeon had expelled them alongside everyone else when it collapsed.

Yeom Myoil’s eyes began trembling as he examined the corpses one by one.

‘What the hell did this monster awaken as?!’

Some had been fried crisp by lightning.

Some had been burned by fire.

Some had bullet holes through their heads.

Even the boss, the Goblin Lord, looked flattened by some enormous impact.

Mage, Ranger, Guardian? Or Warrior?

The corpses were far too varied to believe they had all been killed by one person.

The more he tried to guess the Masked Man’s class, the deeper the mystery became.