Chapter 1

A monster like a giant warship took over the sky.

It was the flying monster, Nuckelavee. Resembling a whale, it swam through the sky as if it were an ocean and trampled the ground below.

With a single movement of its hundreds-of-meters-long body, armored in pitch-black scales, towering skyscrapers collapsed helplessly, and the asphalt cracked wide open.

A brutal war had raged for six months since it first appeared. The civilians who fled into underground bunkers were crushed to death beneath falling concrete, and the Hunters who fought with their lives fell alongside the street trees.

“Cough…”

Nam Shin-hoo dragged his body with great effort, spitting out a mouthful of clotted blood.

Before him lay the once-hopeless Nuckelavee, collapsed on the ground. Humanity’s last surviving strength had barely managed to deliver the final blow.

‘Abandon all defense and focus all power on Hunter Nam Shin-hoo.’

It was a victory achieved only through that extreme strategy. The creature that had looked down from the sky and crushed humanity had finally crashed down. Countless lives had died gruesome deaths just to bring this beast to the ground. Shin-hoo raised his weapon toward the dying Nuckelavee.

He channeled strength into both hands. Bright blue electricity crackled along his spear. A massive bolt of lightning, connecting heaven and earth, tore through the world. It was the final energy he had gathered for this very moment.

“You damn bastard.”

The spear struck.

Tracing a long arc, the spear plunged straight through the Nuckelavee’s eye and dug deep into its brain. With the terrible stench of burning flesh and boiling blood, the Nuckelavee shrieked. An ultrasonic scream shook the world from deep within its brain.

Struck by the thrashing Nuckelavee’s fin, Shin-hoo was sent flying into a ruined concrete wall.

The raging Nuckelavee slowed down. Burnt scales dropped to the ground, and its overwhelming pressure gradually vanished.

“Haha, hahahaha.”

Despite the pain of his dislocated spine, laughter burst out. Looking at the slowly dying monster, Shin-hoo’s eyes gleamed.

It had been a desperate fight.

It had only been six months. In that time, humanity had lost everything it had built over thousands of years.

The dazzling city had turned into ruins. Neon signs were smashed, broken glass covered the ground, and the green park grass was burnt pitch-black.

Nothing was left. Every living thing was dead. The office workers who used to fill the streets, the students who ran around with energy, and the Hunters who threw themselves into battle.

The culprit behind all this despair was finally dead.

“Ha, haha…”

His laughter died down. Pain, sorrow, and months of despair weighed down on him like a boulder. All that was left was an exhaustion so deep he could barely move a single finger.

Shin-hoo rubbed his blurry eyes. Hunter corpses lay everywhere around him. Every single one of them had sacrificed themselves to secure that final opening for him—Hunters who gave their lives to create an opportunity for Shin-hoo to strike and to support him.

—Gurgle, grrrr…

In the distance, the Nuckelavee drew its final breath. The sickening sound echoed sweetly for a moment before stopping entirely.

Shin-hoo pressed the communicator on his wrist with his right hand.

“Command. What’s the situation?”

—…

There was no answer. He pressed the next button.

“How are the shelters? Civilian casualties?”

Silence there, too.

“…”

His hands shook with anxiety. He tried to calm down, but his grip slipped, crushing the communicator. He couldn’t sense anything around him. No sound of breathing, no beating hearts. Not a single trace of life remained.

Shin-hoo placed his hopes on one last option.

“Say. Scan the area for any remaining life signs.”

[Please specify the scan range.]

“As far as you can. Scan as far as possible.”

[Processing request. This may take some time due to data volume. Please wait.]

Contrary to the warning, the answer came back almost instantly.

[Master. A scan within a 300 km radius detected 1 life sign.]

“…So only I am left.”

He had braced himself for it when the radio went silent, but hearing the result shattered his heart.

The Nuckelavee’s minions had attacked the entire globe at once. Every nation built by humanity had fallen—the United States, once called a Hunter superpower, the European Union, and countless nations across Asia. Amid the destruction of continents, Korea was the last nation to fight on until the end. And now, the only living creature left in Korea was Nam Shin-hoo.

Shin-hoo’s hands dropped. Lost, turbulent emotions surged in his chest.

They had to pour everything they had into attacking the Nuckelavee. They couldn’t even spare a single shield generator for the shelters. At the cost of countless sacrifices, they concentrated all their power into Shin-hoo, and he managed to kill the beast.

The victory cry he had desperately sought was finally won, but there was no one left to hear it. After this hopeless battle, Shin-hoo was the only person remaining on Earth.

He staggered to his feet. Clutching his screaming lower back, he approached the nearest body. He knelt and placed a hand on the corpse’s shoulder, but there was no movement.

‘I will cover you to the very end. I am the strongest shield of the Saint Guild, and its last. I will die for you, so please become the sun for those who remain.’

It was his loyal right-hand man who had protected Shin-hoo for twenty years, an old friend who had shared laughs and lamented his growing gray hairs. Shin-hoo gently closed his friend’s eyes with his palm.

He then laid a young girl’s body beside him to rest peacefully.

‘As long as Master lives, that’s enough. Even if our buffs wear off, never look back. Just keep moving forward. Master, you are our last hope.’

She was a support-type Hunter who had channeled her power to Shin-hoo until her final breath. She was the reason Shin-hoo was able to breathe while all the other Hunters fell to the Nuckelavee’s toxic gas.

Shin-hoo went from body to body, laying them out properly and closing their eyes. Though covered in dust and stained with blood, their faces were all peaceful.

‘I don’t care what happens to me. Hunter Nam Shin-hoo will save humanity from this darkness.’

‘I’ll go ahead first, so please grant our wish.’

‘If you don’t smash that damn Nuckelavee’s head, I’ll resent you even in hell. So don’t worry about us, just keep moving forward.’

Their faces were free of regret and longing. Those who had given everything for Shin-hoo wore faint smiles.

“Idiots… What ‘last hope’? What ‘sun’? In the end…”

Tears and sweat dripped onto the ground. Staring at the round marks they left on the dirt, Shin-hoo muttered.

“I couldn’t save a single thing.”

Shin-hoo tightly gripped the hand of the corpse he was tending.

He didn’t even know this Hunter’s name or face. Yet they had trusted him and bet their life on him.

Countless lives had died like this. The sight of so many people who died just to protect him—the supposed “last hope”—made it impossible to lift his head.

Shin-hoo bit his lip until dark blood dripped down his chin.

‘If I had known it would turn out like this…’

He clenched his fists, his jaw trembling.

‘This is all my fault.’

Belated regret washed over him. It sank deep into his bones, making every joint ache with a cold, hollow pain.

The Hunter Association knew there would be casualties from the moment they planned the operation. Knowing that civilians and countless Hunters would die, they still pushed forward. And the final decision-maker had been Nam Shin-hoo. It was a plan carried out under the belief that sacrificing the few was inevitable.

The operation had failed. It had reached the worst possible conclusion.

A plan meant to sacrifice only a few had resulted in the sacrifice of everyone, and the only person left breathing atop that mountain of corpses was Shin-hoo alone.

“…”

Blood dripped from his clenched fists.

He had been wrong. Even if it meant humanity’s total extinction, he shouldn’t have done it this way. Shin-hoo should have been the one to sacrifice himself most. Even if his arms were torn off and his heart burst, he should have stood on the front lines from the start. He should have died before them, prepared to take down the Nuckelavee in a self-destructive strike.

“…Ugh.”

The survivor’s lonely sobs echoed across the plaza. Water stains marked the dry, dusty ground.

Staring blankly at the ground through hollow eyes, Shin-hoo’s overwhelming grief kept him from noticing the shadow creeping up behind him.

A pitch-black shape slowly drew near and stopped right behind his back.

“…!”

By the time Shin-hoo realized it and turned around, standing before him was a dark silhouette shaped like a human. A creature covered in the same pitch-black scales as the Nuckelavee he had just killed.

‘Could there have been a Phase 2?’

Some dungeon boss monsters were known to change forms after dying, entering a second phase with a new body and entirely new attack patterns.

Shin-hoo scrambled to grab his spear. He reached for the handle, which still sparked with leftover electricity, but it was already too late.

Without hesitation, the monster thrust its hand forward. Just as Shin-hoo had done to the beast before, the creature pierced straight through his body.