The S-Classes That I Raised

Chapter 580: Preparing the Ingredients (2)

The mood turned icy. Everyone’s exact reaction was a little different, but most of the looks I got basically said, What kind of bullshit is that?

“You’re wording that really weird.”

I cut in before Chatterbox could speak again.

“A reward is supposed to work like this.”

Clink–clatter–!

Gold coins I’d taken out of my inventory poured down and piled up in front of my feet. It was a pretty decent heap. A few pieces of gear fell on top of it and rolled. I nudged them lightly with the tip of my shoe. The coins jingled together.

“Rule 1. Whoever takes down Han Yujin gets all the gold coins and Chatterbox–brand items he’s carrying. Here, ‘take down’ means kill. Of course, nobody actually dies for real.”

I pulled out a long cord. It slithered down like a snake, wrapped around the coins and gear, lifted them all up, and dropped them neatly back into my inventory. Eyes followed the disappearing pile of gold up and down.

“Rule 2. If Hunters other than Han Yujin take each other down, they do not get to steal coins.”

Tap, tap. I walked across the stage.

“Rule 3. Han Yujin can take down other Hunters and steal their coins. And the coins he stole will also go to whichever Hunter takes down Han Yujin.”

I stopped by the box sitting on the table.

“To expand on that a bit, it means you’ll profit much more by letting me collect as many coins as possible first, then taking me down later, instead of jumping me right away.”

Played right, somebody could strip all the other Hunters of their coins in one shot.

“Lastly, Rule 4. Han Yujin’s win condition is to take down as many Hunters as the number he’s about to draw. He doesn’t have to reveal that number.”

The chat window, left open, was flying.

└ Pure mind game

└ Feels like a waste to kill him right away, but letting someone else do it is worse

└ If they let him farm coins, H–YJ might just pull off a win

└ Best strat is prob teaming up, agreeing to split, then helping him farm kills on other Hunters

└ He better hide his number well

└ Yujin’s gonna run his mouth like crazy again lololololol

Hunters started sneaking glances at one another. There wouldn’t be many who’d want to kill me instantly. And even if there were, odds were good the other Hunters would stop them.

So technically, the standard play would be to hide the number of kills I needed as cleverly as possible, lie through my teeth, pretend to cooperate with everyone else, then quietly hit my win condition.

“Then let’s draw.”

I stuck my hand into the hole in the box and grabbed one of the slips inside. A few people craned their necks to peek this way. I unfolded the paper. The number 9 was written there. I smiled at the gathered Hunters.

“Nine.”

I held the slip up. A brief silence fell, then murmurs broke out all over.

“What the hell.”

“Why’d he say it?”

└ Yujin!!!!! Your mouth!!!!

└ H–YJ□□□□□???

└ Already gave up? Or is this mind games???

In the air thick with bewilderment, I crumpled the paper and tossed it to the floor.

“Just nine? That’s way too boring. So here’s one exception.”

I grabbed the corner of the box and tipped it. Thunk, the box tumbled off the table and all the slips poured out.

“Han Yujin can choose a number higher than the one he drew.”

The more kills, the worse it is for me.

└ Yeah that’s mind games, this way they’ll at least let him get to 9

└ Still, isn’t that worse for him? They can just stop him at 9 to be safe

└ Not revealing the number at all would’ve been way better

Yeah, true. I squatted down, rummaged through the spilled slips for a bit, then brushed off my hands and stood.

“Maximum.”

Silence fell again. The chat window, which had been scrolling at high speed, suddenly slowed. I lightly spread my arms and repeated myself.

“I’m going to take down every single one of you.”

Clap! I smacked my hands together. I could feel the atmosphere flip.

└ Is he nuts?

└ Is that even possible?????????

└ Wait, isn’t that better for him? There’s no reason for Hunters to attack him anymore

└ Oh crap, you’re right? Might as well help H–YJ till there’s only one person left, he’s F–class anyway

Well, maybe. That would be the easy way. But if I did that, I’d never clear the conditions Chatterbox had set.

“Then, I’ll be in your care.”

I stepped aside and Chatterbox took the front.

“Since this is the final event, all personal streams must be turned on, and mosaic filters are not supported. You may mute and hide skill information, but that only applies to the viewers. Your opponent in battle will hear and see everything normally. If you do not wish to be broadcast, please forfeit now. However, if you forfeit mid–fight, the penalty will be loss of coins.”

On the screen behind him, rows of display cases appeared.

“After the final event, you may exchange your remaining coins for the items you wish. The order will be determined by the combined ranking of your overall performance and the number of coins you hold.”

In other words, even if you held onto your coins, if you didn’t have many, you wouldn’t be able to snag much. Chatterbox smiled that friendly–looking smile of his.

“There are separate party souvenirs and additional prizes prepared, so please enjoy yourselves to the very end.”

Then came that sensation of my body being moved, and the scenery around us changed. A forest, somewhere. Right after, something like a map popped up in front of me.

[Special Perk for Overall Rank 1]

A map that showed the real–time locations of all the Hunters. It covered a pretty wide area, dotted with colored points spread across it—

And one dot was right in front of my nose. The moment I registered it, I threw myself to the side.

Ping!

A small sound cut through the air as a rope whipped past and wrapped around the tree right beside me. I rolled once along the ground and took cover behind a boulder.

“Found you too fast.”

Reeling the rope back in, the Hunter gave me a slightly troubled look. He quickly drew his gun, but by his expression, he wasn’t really worried about me.

“Killing you now would be a waste.”

He acted like, no matter what I tried, he could block it easily. He was more wary of another S–rank Hunter butting in than of me. No matter how well I’d done earlier, I had limits. Plus we were standing several meters apart, making it even easier for him to be relaxed. No matter how fast an F–rank’s attack was, closing that distance on an S–rank was practically impossible.

“Don’t think about running.”

When I shifted to move, the Hunter gave a quiet warning. Then he pulled out his phone and tried to call someone.

“As expected, no signal. It’d be better to move in a team.”

In the meantime, I was loading a small bead into the barrel of the gun. It had a tiny hole through the middle, an item I’d asked Myungwoo to make. The bead locked snugly into place at the muzzle, and I slowly focused my mana.

The White Lynx rifle’s maximum power output was S–rank. But at this distance, it wasn’t that hard for another S–rank to dodge a mana bullet. Even if it hit, as long as they put their defenses up in time, it wouldn’t be a fatal wound.

While the Hunter scanned the area, trying to figure out how to link up with another S–rank, I focused on the sensation spreading from the back of my neck and raised it higher.

“I’ll help you use mana engraving properly,” Chatterbox had said when he came to see me. He’d given me an item that would absorb the overload so my body wouldn’t take the strain. It wasn’t one–time use, but it did have a fixed capacity. …Still, I doubted something like this wouldn’t leave any impact at all.

‘Am I going to get chewed out again?’

Myungwoo would definitely notice. And so would the old man. But the one who taught me this method was Young Chaos. He had said it was too early for me to use it properly, but even so—

‘Even if you don’t have much mana or magic, you can drastically increase efficiency depending on how you use it.’

I compressed the S–rank mana bullet. Compressed it again, and again. To fit that tiny hole in the bead. Then I turned my gaze to the S–rank Hunter, to the mana that made up his entire body.

‘Anything with mana protects itself with that mana. But in a living body where the internal mana is constantly in motion, there will always be weak points.’

You probably can’t find them yet, he’d said, but Young Chaos still explained it in detail. If I learned to handle mana engraving, I’d at least be able to imitate it.

Head. No. Neck. Also no. The typical vital points were actually too well protected, precisely because they were vital. I could faintly sense the rippling flow of magic. A single point where that flow broke drifted slowly along his body. Shoulder, left side, middle. Without going near the usual weak spots, it slid over toward his right shoulder, and the moment it reached there—

Zip!

I pulled the trigger. The mana bullet was so thin you could barely even see it, and it shot out at terrifying speed. The Hunter sensed something and tried to dodge, but I was faster.

“…!”

The mana bullet drilled into his right shoulder. The protective mana around his body shattered all at once, and one of his arms was completely blown off. He staggered violently. I could see all the mana in his body thrashing in chaos. Right now, even I could punch through.

I kicked off the ground. Throwing myself at the Hunter with all I had, I poured mana into the gun again. Maybe E–rank at best. But that weak bullet—

“Kh–!”

—punched straight through the S–rank Hunter’s neck. If their mana–based protection was already shaken to hell and I aimed right for the gap, then even an S–rank body, strong as it was without mana, wasn’t made of steel.

“I mean, an F–class shouldn’t be able to do this at all, but still.”

The Hunter’s figure vanished, leaving a scatter of jangling coins on the ground. I hurriedly dropped the mana engraving effect. For a second, it felt like the noisy world had gone completely quiet.

‘…Is this really something I can use safely?’

At least not with an F–class body, probably. I suddenly realized just how reckless that had been. I wanted to open the chat and see the reactions, but I forced myself to hold back and gathered up the coins instead. Everyone would be going on about how amazing that was, but—

‘It was Chatterbox who helped.’

Most of the engravings and items were mine to begin with, but still, it was thanks to Chatterbox of all people. Reading praise under those circumstances just felt gross.

Checking the Hunters’ positions again, I pulled out my phone. I crossed one name off the list and looked at the Hunters moving nearby.

‘Valerie Roussel. This Hunter should be the one.’

When I tapped the file name, detailed information on Valerie Roussel appeared. It was a combination of the intel from Sesung and the info I got from the people Hwang Rim introduced to me. After reviewing it, I equipped my items. The Lynx set. And—

[White Tail Delroux (A)]

This time, the child form. I’d activated the skill–hiding feature, but I still wondered how it was going to show up. Surely I wasn’t a turtle again.

I turned into a small cat and headed toward Hunter Valerie. I deliberately rustled through the bushes, then hopped out right in front of him.

“Huh?”

– Meow.

Cat. I’m a cat. The very thing you absolutely adore! Valerie Roussel, animal lover. His favorite animal: cats. He stared at me with his eyes round and wide.

“…Is it a monster?”

Visualizing a cat’s movements in my head, I walked right up to Valerie. I circled around his feet once, then flopped onto my back on the ground.

– Mrrrow.

Valerie froze up. Most animals were more sensitive than humans, so by the time someone became a mid–rank Hunter, animals instinctively found them scary. At S–rank, even if you suppressed your presence as hard as you could, it was nearly impossible for an animal meeting you for the first time to cling to you affectionately.

He couldn’t hide his S–rank presence forever, so Valerie had reluctantly sent his five pet cats to live at his younger sibling’s place. He visited often, apparently, but living together was impossible.

“H–hi.”

Valerie carefully crouched down his big frame.

“Cat bro, are you a monster? I’ve never seen a monster that acts this much like a real cat. No, even if you are, S–ranks freak monsters out too…”

Sighing, Valerie grumbled that even low–rank monsters didn’t get cuddly like pets if you tamed them. I felt a little bad. Some high–rank monsters were actually more bold and affectionate. Peace was all growls at first, though. He slowly reached a hand out to me. When I didn’t run even after he touched me, his face lit up in a big smile.

“My angel, good boy. Can I take you out of here? I’ll pay in coins instead of taking an item.”

As soon as Valerie picked me up, I climbed onto his shoulder. He just laughed awkwardly and let me. Okay, fine—if you ever put in a request for a high–rank monster later, I’ll prioritize your order. I bit down on the pill I’d been holding in my mouth. A colorless, odorless SS–rank poison that worked by soaking into the skin. With my tongue coated thickly in venom, I gave Valerie’s nape a long, slow lick.

“…Oh.”

By the time Valerie realized something was wrong, it was already too late. His body seized up in paralysis. It looked like he had some poison–resistance item, so it didn’t kill him, but he couldn’t move at all. I slipped down behind his back, avoiding his regretful, longing gaze, and changed back into a human.

‘I hope you meet a bold, fearless cat, or a cat–type monster, someday.’

Then I fired. Valerie vanished, leaving a handful of coins.

“Two.”

I still had a long way to go. And yet two dots on the map window had already disappeared. They’d try to steer things so I’d be the one to land the finishing blow, but there was no way fights wouldn’t break out between Hunters.

‘Before they all kill each other off, I have to get to them first.’

I pulled out the items Chatterbox had given me.