Chapter 325

Beast No. 1 noticed it and was about to spit out the clichéd question, “What are you?” But the moment he saw what happened next, his mouth snapped shut in disbelief.

“-_-”

Bones.

The ligaments connecting those bones.

The tendons binding them together.

And finally, the skin and hair covering everything.

Before their very eyes, the man’s injuries regenerated layer by layer, as though someone were reconstructing a human body from the pages of an anatomical textbook.

His skull had been shattered badly enough for the inside to be clearly visible.

Could something like that really heal so quickly?

The witnesses could barely find words to describe the sight.

It was nothing short of ‘magic’.

Even those who controlled information from across the entire world had never once heard of such a form of physical restoration.

“-_-”

But the blond man paid no attention to their confusion.

He continued staring blankly at the floor.

Then, without changing expression, he slowly raised a hand.

As though checking whether everything had reattached properly, he began feeling around his own head.

A few seconds later, amid the oppressive silence, the blond man spoke.

“-_-”

At first, it was barely more than a whisper.

“-_-”

But by the time he raised his head slightly, his voice had grown loud enough for everyone to hear.

“I wasn’t wrong...”

Thud.

At the same moment, the Beasts’ hearts pounded violently once again.

Aside from Enzo, the other two Beasts wondered whether this inexplicable phenomenon was one of Kim Gilyeo’s skills.

Whatever it was, they decided they needed to take him down again before anything worse could happen.

But just as the two awakened beings charged forward and approached the far end of the cave—

they stopped dead in their tracks.

“Ugh!”

“Keugh!”

It was only natural.

For the first time in their lives, the S-rank hunters were experiencing a fear normally reserved for low-rank hunters and ordinary people.

The terror of standing before something overwhelmingly superior to themselves.

“-_-”

Drip.

Now fully restored, down to the tear glistening across his cornea, the man turned his head.

His expression remained calm, almost indifferent, as he looked toward the pack of Beasts.

And yet, behind his wide-open pupils, something unmistakably dangerous seemed to be swelling.

***

Let me explain this again.

Kim Gilyeo was a 24-year-old man from South Korea.

His bank account balance was 3,320 won.

The emergency cash he carried amounted to 11,800 won.

And if I were to list his other possessions, the entirety of that poor man’s wealth consisted of the deposit on a shabby one-room apartment barely 5 pyeong in size.

That was the identity of the body I had possessed.

But as I stubbornly struggled to survive, I discovered that even a body like this had its advantages.

[[PILY 000 0701]] ******

Level: F

Aw: 15.57

Apparent hardness: 07

####################

At first, it was 12.

Then 14.

And when I finally noticed something strange and measured it again, the number had risen to 15.57.

As you can see, Kim Gilyeo possessed one peculiar characteristic.

His magic power kept increasing.

Perhaps he was the only human on Earth with a growth-type superpower.

But looking back now, maybe I should have paid closer attention to the fact that Kim Gilyeo’s magic power fluctuated at all.

After all, following several experiments, I eventually arrived at a plausible hypothesis.

[15.57Aw]

Shortly after obtaining that result of 15.57, I suffered one of the rare serious injuries of my life in the [Six Legged Corridor].

Between then and the next measurement, I also faced genuine threats to my life during my clashes with Kang Changho in Incheon and Seoul.

Then, after all that chaos, I measured my awakening level again using the sample I had purchased at the Tokyo Artifact Expo.

[38.15Aw]

The number had changed dramatically in a remarkably short period of time.

Could that really be dismissed as mere coincidence?

Any reasonable scholar would have been forced to reconsider the previous hypothesis that Kim Gilyeo’s growth was simply a function of time.

[Breaking News: [Full Coverage] Strange Phenomena Continue to Emerge in Major Cities Including Texas and Washington]

Besides, how did superpowered individuals come to exist on this planet called Earth in the first place?

Was it simply because they had been exposed to vast amounts of mana?

No.

If awakening were merely a process of adapting to a substance, primitive humans would never have coined the term ‘awakening’ to collectively describe sorcerers.

[Test Result: F-Rank Awakened]

In truth, the entire answer was contained in that single phrase describing Kim Gilyeo’s condition.

What does humanity need in order to break beyond its limits?

What force once kept the ancient beasts alive, allowing them to endure and triumph over impossible adversity?

Stress.

Just as I had privately suspected even before conducting any experiments to restore my mana, one of the greatest causes of mutation on Earth had always been extreme stimulation and pain.

“I wasn’t wrong...”

Strictly speaking, the spell I cast must have gone wrong somewhere.

The formula itself wasn’t the problem.

Rather, those mana entities granted this soul’s empty wish...

in a slightly troublesome way.

[To be reincarnated as the creature with the highest mana on this planet.]

Yeah.

I really wasn’t wrong.

More than anything else, this very situation proved it.

“-_-”

Looking back, though, what happened was incredibly dangerous.

I had been injured so severely that even my brain fluid had nearly dried up.

And yet it was precisely that impact that finally awakened the full potential of this body...

Hmm.

At this point, let me make one thing clear.

The reason Kim Gilyeo awakened so weakly in the beginning was actually because the cells of this body had been protecting him.

As demonstrated by the compression phenomenon, mana was still dangerous to less-evolved Earthlings.

“If I had awakened to my full capacity back then, my life might have been in danger. I could have fallen into a coma like other victims of magic addiction... or simply shattered apart.”

Kim Gilyeo’s body had instinctively suppressed everything in order to prevent its own destruction.

Until this flesh could fully adapt to the changes of the new era, every cell had simply waited.

Patiently.

Deliberately.

And once it finally became safe to release its full potential without bursting apart—

once the vessel named Kim Gilyeo became capable of accepting mana in its purest form—

all that remained was one final shock.

One final trigger...

to awaken it again.

Hmm.

Anyway.

If only you hadn’t died so quietly.

So insignificantly.

If only you had managed to hold on a little longer.

If you had dragged yourself to a healer and clung to life until the very end.

If you had crossed the threshold of death with defiance rather than despair...

S-rank awakened beings were usually surrounded by immense mana.

If this body, so thoroughly blessed by the favor of a miracle, had remained yours, perhaps even that illness might eventually have been cured.

But I suppose...

for someone starving to death alone inside a cramped room, a future like that was never something you had the luxury of imagining.

“Maybe... every survivor in the world is tragic in exactly the same way.”

With my brain restored, I sank briefly into thought before returning to the matter at hand.

Anyway, the situation could be summarized in just a few words.

“Ugh!”

“Keugh!”

The one and only case of [Second Awakening] on modern Earth.

If one insisted on assigning it a rank, this could even be described as the emergence of a 5S-rank.

Driven repeatedly into life-threatening situations, I had finally pierced through the boundaries that once confined me—

and come face-to-face with the true mana capacity of this vessel.

“-_-”

Sweeph.

Haaa.

How long had it been since I last felt exhilaration like this?

“This planet almost suffered a truly terrible loss. Who would’ve imagined that someone blessed with such extraordinary and rare talent would end their life through something as pitiful as dying alone!”

Meanwhile, two of the Beasts wearing bone masks charged toward me.

But with a single glance in their direction, I brought both of them to an immediate halt.

“Keugh!”

Since I had already gone as far as openly using the ridiculous phrase 5S-rank Hunter, perhaps I might as well drive the point home.

Give it one final, unmistakable blow.

[3.0.2 Patch Notes]

• Second Awakening

• The magic power of the possessed body has been restored to near its original limit

• Medium to Large-scale spells unlocked

Anyway, that was the situation.

A body capable of fully enduring the soul of a great mage—

one that even surpassed the mana capacity of former top-tier hunters—

had finally become mine.

What more needed to be said?

Sook.

“Ugh!”

I raised the head of this newly perfected body and looked down at the egoists before me.

“One meal.”

And then,

I gave them a small taste of the price they would pay for their sins.

“Three meals a day, every 24 hours, averaging 8,400 won. And that’s for roughly a year and a few months.”

“W-what...?”

“It took so much effort to maintain this physique all this time... And yet, you bugs.”

At the same time, I absentmindedly brushed a hand across my cheek, checking whether this apricot-colored skin had been restored to its proper texture.

Of course, the fingertips of a mammal felt quite different from those of an Alphaurin, so it wasn’t exactly the most reliable way to verify it.

“Keeeeek!”

“Heuk!”

That was the last exchange I had with the grunts.

In the next instant, the chest of one of the immobilized Beasts tore open.

Blood erupted outward.

The tissue bursting through his back scattered through the air like spilled wine, painting an intricate pattern behind him.

S-rank awakened beings were normally wrapped in powerful magic even without consciously concentrating on defense.

But this time, someone’s psychokinesis had simply pierced through that protection by targeting its weakest point with overwhelming force.

“As expected, controlling my strength is difficult.”

Perhaps because I had only just undergone my second awakening, I hadn’t fully adapted to this new power yet.

As a result, what I had intended as a minor attack turned into an instant killing blow.

The Beast couldn’t even scream before collapsing.

“-_-”

Naturally, the nearby figure in the bone mask, horrified by the sight, fared no better.

Taking the opportunity to practice controlling my output, I immediately cast another spell at the remaining one.

“E, euph! Euph!”

The surviving Beast began suffocating as the flesh inside his throat swelled and blocked his airway.

And then—

Paang!

As though sensing that something had gone terribly wrong, Enzo Hunter hurriedly joined the fight.

A sonic boom thundered from afar.

Without warning, Enzo hurled a [Defense-Piercing] spear.

“If I wanted to, I could stop it with telekinesis... but I don’t really see the need.”

For someone whose awakened talent now far exceeded even the conventional S-rank range, could an attack like that possibly work?

Even when the spear came within mere picometers of my eyeball, it failed to penetrate anything.

It simply stopped in midair.

I pinched the motionless spear between my index finger and thumb.

“Come to think of it, I vaguely remember hearing something while I was drifting in and out of consciousness. Enzo Chano, was it? Did you say you wouldn’t mind shaving a few years off your lifespan if it was for work?”

There was no answer.

Not that it mattered.

I dropped the so-called “epic-grade” cheap Earth-made spear onto the ground and turned to face Enzo.

By then, he had completely lost his composure and was unleashing torrents of lightning.

Bzzzt—

Even while standing in the middle of the relentless bombardment, not a single strand of my dyed hair moved.

It was a sight that seemed to defy the laws governing the human world itself.

Because I’m different from them.

Originally,

this abnormality is my natural state.

“Hoho!”

Could it be that Enzo Chano, despite his seemingly simple appearance, had finally decided to try escaping?

Of course, I moved before the hollow laugh that escaped him could even fully leave his lips.

“---?!”

From the outside, it looked like nothing more than a simple flick of the fingers of my left hand.

Yet with that tiny movement, first the air—

then reality itself—

seemed to freeze in place.

Cold sweat rolled down Enzo’s face as he stared at me in disbelief.

“From what I’ve gathered, this entire incident seems to have been planned collectively—and apparently directed from above by whoever is in charge...”

Now that I had a feel for my output,

it was time to finish this.

“I’ll investigate your circumstances and everything else later. Under normal conditions, I could simply subdue you. But in my current state, I’m not confident I can prevent you from repeating your crimes, so that won’t do.”

Now that I could easily search through all the memories using [Golem Technique],

there was no need to waste time asking unnecessary questions.

I walked toward Enzo.

Then, with my index finger, I slowly traced the shape of a cross over his chest.

More precisely,

I used mana to split his lungs open in the shape of that cross.

“Hetal Hih... Cough, cough.”

Enzo let out another hollow laugh.

After all, who could ever have imagined being defeated this helplessly by an E-rank hunter—

the very man who had spent so long doing nothing but running away?

The last Beast struggled for a while to move his rigid body, but eventually succumbed to his injuries and lost consciousness.

In that brief span of time,

I had brought down three of the modern era’s highest-ranking awakened hunters.

“As expected, life really is something no one can predict, huh...”

This was the true power of an archmage.

But defeating the enemies in front of me didn’t mean the job was finished.

Immediately after taking Enzo down, I turned around.

“H, Hunter Kim Gilyeo...?”

“Huh...?”

The Koreans were standing there with dazed expressions.

For reference, every one of them was inside the barrier I had created.

I had put it up just in case, since Enzo had been attacking indiscriminately earlier.

“Is everyone okay?”

Swish, swish.

I swept a hand through the air and dispelled the transparent barrier.

Then I approached my still-dazed comrades and began administering first aid.

“Thanks to you, I survived... ugh!”

“Wait, just a moment! I can drink it myself... keugh.”

I pulled mana potions from their pockets and poured them into their mouths as though bottle-feeding infants.

It should at least help ease the lingering effects of the [Mana Burn].

“-_-”

At that moment, Seonwoo Yeon, slumped in a corner, looked at me with a deathly pale face and trembling body.

So I approached her and administered the final treatment.

“H, Hunter?”

The reason she looked like that despite never being touched by the golden arms was probably because the mana flowing from my body had overwhelmed her own energy.

“Ugh...”

Heugh.

I placed my palm against the association agent’s forehead and cast a calming spell to settle her mind.

“Ugh, ugh.”

The output must have been a little stronger than intended, because Seonwoo Yeon suddenly looked far too peaceful...

But oh well.

She should be fine!

“I accidentally experimented on someone just now. For a while, I should probably refrain from using magic directly on Earthlings.”

Anyway,

the spell would wear off on its own with time.

After receiving proper medicine and resting for a while, Garon, the Magic Tower representatives, and the other guild leaders gradually regained consciousness.

They clearly had countless questions for me.

But true to their instincts as professional hunters, they answered mine first.

“Oh, right. What happened to the others? The A-rank hunters! It looks like the room shifted again and moved them somewhere else...?”