63. Today, At Least, He's No Backwater Goblin Spirit

“So you really did wipe out every last organization in a single day.”

Seven organizations had once stood on this ground. Now it lay razed flat, a procession of the dead drifting over the ruins. Hardly a soul in Ground Zero hadn’t heard of the slaughter Yujin had carried out.

The Madam’s astonishment drew a click of the tongue from him.

“It’s a pain if they run.”

Nothing to be gained by leaving loose ends behind. It already galled him that the Red Spider’s boss, Kim Jaewoo, had slipped off to China. Since he’d resolved to throw his weight around anyway, he had to make sure no one would talk behind his back.

“The black market sent word that they’ll manage the Red Spider’s businesses on your behalf.”
“Those bastards, for nothing?”
“They couldn’t keep what they promised at the last meeting. They called it a courtesy.”

The Galaxy Pub and the black market, two of Ground Zero’s Three Powers, had both acknowledged the standing Yujin earned by breaking the Red Spider, and pledged to protect his turf within Ground Zero.

“I knew there were plenty of mayflies, but… they really don’t know how precious their own lives are.”
“Quite the thing to say, coming from someone who does business off those mayflies.”
“Hoho. That’s true enough too.”
“So what can you do for me, Madam?”

The Madam mulled it over a moment, then slowly crossed her legs and put on an alluring expression.

“Might I answer you later?”
“That won’t work on me.”
“You really are no fun. A man like you.”
“Well, let’s just say I’ve got you down for one debt. There’s nothing I need at the moment.”

There was still the chance to wring something heart-stone-worthy out of Jang Miseon, too. Given the Madam’s capabilities and connections, binding her with a debt was far more profitable than demanding payment up front.

“Will you manage the Black Herb and the northern routes yourself?”
“Yeah. Just send me the workers.”
“The income from the rest of the businesses, after labor costs, should come to about… two billion won.”

— Hk.

Kang Minho, seated at the table behind them, let out a low groan.

“Less than I expected.”
“You blew away their blood-stone supply, didn’t you. And the real moneymaker’s set apart.”

The Madam was alluding, obliquely, to the Black Herb farm.

Two billion won was a fortune to any individual, but to the Red Spider and its hundreds of members it was pocket change. Which was exactly why, when the Black Herb farm came under threat, they’d pulled in half the organization’s Hunters.

‘And for the time being, no one’s going to be greedy for the businesses.’

This suited him even better. He’d waded through plenty of blood, true, but he’d come away with businesses he’d once written off for fear of choking if he tried to swallow them all. The black market’s people would run the day-to-day, leaving him nothing to do but pay their wages on schedule. He’d shattered seven organizations and flaunted his strength in the doing, so there’d be peace for a while.

“In Ground Zero, they’re putting Master Yujin’s level at the 6th Rank.”
“That’s awfully generous. I’m honored.”
“And to think you were only 1st Rank back when you took on the crimson camouflage.”
“That one just needs you to keep quiet, Madam.”

It never crossed his mind that the Madam might sell the information. He’d saved her from the Red Spider’s attack, and by the time he’d cleared the crimson camouflage the two of them were in the same boat. The spider hunt had reshuffled even the Three Powers of Ground Zero, and she’d colluded with the black market to prop Yujin up as the spider’s replacement.

‘It’s obvious which side stands to lose.’

The Madam read his mind, let out a soft “Hmph,” and whipped her head aside.

“Is that all we are to each other?”
“A splendid business relationship.”
“How very precise. And so cold-blooded, too.”

Don’t act so wounded. For all your talk, there’s not a trace of warmth in your eyes. Either way, she wasn’t an opponent he could let his guard down around.

“If anything out of the ordinary comes up, let me know anytime.”
“I’ll just have to hope no occasion arises to summon you, Master Yujin.”

Leaving the Madam’s theatrics behind, he crossed to the table where the Scraps sat. All three of them looked hollow-eyed.

“You all right?”
“Uh, mm. Yeah.”
“No need to force it. The heart isn’t something that gets pressed down just because you try to press it down.”
“…You’re amazing, Boss. Strong in body and in heart both.”

Kang Minho muttered it, his face gone dark.

Seven organizations, wiped out. It wasn’t hard to imagine how many had died in the process. Hunters lived a trade pressed up against death; every moment put their own lives on the line, and often enough survival meant taking someone else’s.

“It’s not that I don’t know that. But seeing it firsthand shakes me.”
“It’s not weakness. Only by accepting it honestly can you move on to the next step.”

Yujin answered earnestly.

The rest of the group, gathered around the table, let out long, heavy sighs.

‘Well, the Hunters from our country can be forgiven that much.’

The whole world had been remade along with the Great Cataclysm. Korea, at least, had reached a measure of stability without its social order collapsing. Across the border, though, North Korea alone had watched the state itself fall apart, and in countries like China and India warlords ran wild over vast regions that no government institution’s reach ever touched.

‘In places that were already civil-war zones, it’s an everyday thing for Hunters to kill more people than monsters.’

Agonize over it all you like. And then overcome it. The way Yujin saw it, the Scraps could weather this well enough.

‘Found your tongue at last, have you? Backwater goblin spirit.’

Kronos had answered calmly, instead of thrashing about wildly the way he usually did. Something was off.

‘Constellation. Did you go and stack up some great deed while I wasn’t looking?’

‘Stacking deeds because someone killed a lot of people feels a little off.’

Where had he picked up a saying like that? Yujin heaved a deep sigh.

‘Cut the nonsense and get to the point.’

‘Pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?’

Oho. Kronos’s confident declaration set Yujin’s brow twitching. What kind of magnificent holy spell had he conjured to be this sure of himself?

‘I’ll look forward to it. Backwater goblin spirit.’

Kronos’s hearty laughter rang through Yujin’s mind again and again.

With his business in Ground Zero wrapped up, Yujin returned to Seoul. He gave the Scraps a few more days off.

‘And what’s “like me,” exactly?’

‘Hammering away blindly when you forge doesn’t make for hardened steel.’

Chuckling, Yujin started up the mountain of stairs spread out before him. One hundred and eight of them. On his first visit after the regression, he’d struggled up them gasping for breath.

‘Now it isn’t even tiring.’

That was thanks to the stats he’d built up with Life Drain. A 2nd-Rank Martial-line Hunter’s physique outstripped a pro athlete’s, and he cleared all one hundred and eight steps at a light, strolling pace.

The moment he slid his right foot in between the pillars, everything around him stained black, sealing him off from the outside.

‘Same as ever.’

A wave of negativity poured down over the crown of his head. The countless constellations carved into the dome bared their hostility toward him. It wasn’t as though these lofty beings had only started this yesterday.

This time, though, was different from before. Not every constellation regarded him with dismissal or contempt.

…

‘Odin?’

The Contemplator of Wisdom was Odin’s constellation name: the guardian spirit of House Romanov, the god-king-class constellation who’d granted Dmitri his blessing. And “The One Who Calls Forth the End” would be Surtr.

‘Have they caught on to Kronos’s existence?’

Odin was a mage said to have grasped all the wisdom and principle of creation. Surtr was one of the few constellations left among the giant race. However different the bent of their interest, both had reason to watch Kronos closely.

‘And if your identity gets exposed because of it, Zeus would just love that.’

Kronos was a half-baked constellation, his very presence faint for want of accumulated deeds. If the god-king of the Olympus stellar field caught wind of him, snuffing him out would be no trouble at all.

The constellations’ light gradually dimmed. Odin and Surtr, along with the few others who’d shown interest, soon withdrew.

‘You said it.’

‘It’d better.’

‘You getting stronger is what gets me the benefits.’

So put his back into it, then. At Yujin’s curt thought, Kronos roared with laughter.

‘Enough. Just hand over what you mentioned earlier.’

Not bad?

‘Negation Shock Shield, huh. Perfect for combo plays.’

It reflected damage from close-range attacks and, as a defensive holy spell, blocked the force of ranged ones. On top of that it linked with the Wedge of Retribution, the buff that grew stronger the more impact piled up. Defensive spells were scarce in necromancy too, which made it better still.

This Kronos fellow had actually handed over something useful?

‘So there’s more to it?’

Memento. Latin for “memory,” wasn’t it. True to the name, it was a psychometry-class holy spell that read the memory of an object.

‘It’s useful, sure. But it doesn’t seem worth all that talk of pouring your heart into it.’

‘And I’m the one who flipped that concept around and had you preside over the power of defying the heavens, aren’t I.’

It was also the reason Kronos had come to preside over the domain of defying death. Why bring that up now, of all times?

’…I don’t get it.’

‘Yeah. I did.’

— Vvvvrrrm—!

The pocket watch tucked in his pocket let out a humming vibration.

‘It’s something the parents I never knew left behind.’

It couldn’t be. Yujin gripped the pocket watch, still humming in his hand.

‘It remembers… an event?’

That had been when he’d taken up Arahan Guild’s proposal and entered a gate jointly with them. Back then he hadn’t known that Song Myeongseok, one of the Guryongbang’s Nine Heads, had once been called Arahan’s Supernova.

‘Which is to say…’

‘You’re telling me to use the pocket watch to find the fortuitous encounters I missed?’

Wow. Yujin couldn’t find the words to answer. He just stood there, blinking over and over.

“Total jackpot.”

The feeling boiling up in his chest was far more intense than that, far more overwhelming. But he couldn’t find an expression to match it, so he kept it plain.

‘I have to hand it to you this time. Great king of the Titans.’

Yujin granted Kronos his due without complaint. To think he’d pieced together a holy spell that used the pocket watch as an axis to hunt down the fortuitous encounters of the pre-regression era!

A constellation who had once governed time: only Kronos could have conceived of such an ability, let alone wielded it.

‘With this spell and the pocket watch, I can claim even the fortuitous encounters I don’t know about.’

When he’d prepared for the regression, he’d catalogued the fortuitous encounters worth seizing as thoroughly as he could. Even so, he didn’t remember everything; some of it had never been made public, and some had simply slipped past him.

But that changed now. If he used Memento?

‘I can get all the information on the fortuitous encounters I might’ve missed, too.’

His heart hammered. This was no different from sitting an exam with the answer sheet laid out beside him. Memento alone had been useful enough, but once Kronos got his hands on the Relic, it became a cheat-tier ability bordering on a true authority.

‘All right. Let’s do it for the commemoration.’

— Tick, tick—.

The minute and second hands, frozen until now, began to turn, much as they had when he’d absorbed the divine power Dmitri loosed and rewound time. A single scene flashed through Yujin’s mind.

“Huh?”

Hold on. This place… that was where it was, wasn’t it?