To Gyeom-shin, the Demonic Sword Ades felt as though his mind were resonating with the blade without him even realizing it.
"There's no fun in only cutting down scarecrows, right? Isn't that so?"
Surging fury and fighting spirit. And he could not control the power boiling over within him.
Therefore, he could not stop the slaughter.
Not until he had spewed out all the madness and resentment lingering in his eyes.
"A-attack all at once...!"
"Everyone who's still breathing, charge at that bastard together...!"
<Waaaah-!>
"...Yeah, come at me like that if you have to."
In the end, the assassins charged in a pack.
They had judged that they stood no chance whatsoever against the strongest Hunter in a one-on-one fight.
However, to Gyeom-shin, that was actually what he had hoped for.
He wanted to kill them.
He wanted to kill every last one of them without leaving a single man alive.
"Just like cowardly assassins!"
ZZZT—!
Through his resonance with the Demonic Sword, that single-minded obsession alone dominated Gyeom-shin's mind.
Whenever humans had been his enemies, he had always killed his opponents only out of necessity.
However, from this moment on, murderous intent boiled up within him for some reason.
He felt pleasure in the slaughter.
Every time he mercilessly butchered an opponent, he felt that he was alive.
"I'll annihilate every last one of you."
Grinning like a crazy bastard, Gyeom-shin bared his intense killing intent toward the enemies.
SWISH—!
SLASH—!
"Kuaagh...!"
He had completely changed.
To Gyeom-shin, whose senses were activated several times more acutely than usual, the enemy's attack coming down above his shoulder felt as if it were moving in slow motion.
Thus, he dodged it with anticlimactic ease and lightly swung his sword, sending the man's head flying.
"H-he's a crazy bastard...!"
"That's not a human...!"
"This monster bastard...!"
However, dozens more still remained.
Since these bastards had shown up determined to bury the entire 1st-ranked guild, there was also a possibility that even more reinforcements would swarm in.
He had to quickly dispose of at least these bastards right in front of his eyes.
"Baek Min-jun! Wang Jun-gi!"
"Yes, sir!"
Therefore, Gyeom-shin hurriedly called out the names of the executives who were still alive.
"And Yoon Chan-ho! Choi Ji-ho!"
"Okay, Master! Let's have some fun...!"
Trudge, trudge.
At that, a total of ten prominent executive Hunters—the very faces of the guild—gathered as if surrounding Lee Gyeom-shin.
"Eliminate the enemies!"
"...Yes, understood, Master."
SWISH—!
STAB—!
However.
"......!"
The one whose body their swords plunged into was not the enemy, but rather Gyeom-shin himself.
"You bastards..."
The swords of his executives had pierced right through his body.
Gyeom-shin could not understand it.
"Why...?"
For years, they had entrusted their backs to one another and risked their lives fighting as comrades.
They were not people who would betray him so easily.
At least, that was what Gyeom-shin had believed.
"Just as you commanded..."
However, reality was different.
He had been thoroughly betrayed.
STAB—!
SQUELCH—!
PIERCE—!
"Kuaagh...!"
By the executives he had trusted so deeply.
Before long, three more swords plunged straight into Gyeom-shin's internal organs.
Had he been an ordinary person, he would have died on the spot.
"We merely eliminated the enemy, Master."
However, Gyeom-shin's lifeline was still clinging on, even if only by a thread.
For Hunters, who transcended the biological limits of humans, such a thing was possible.
"Were you... the ringleader, you bastard?"
To Gyeom-shin, it was nothing short of a shock.
"Baek Min-jun."
To think that the clever Vice Master he had trusted and relied upon until now was the ringleader of this betrayal.
Baek Min-jun.
To Gyeom-shin, he was a man like a brother, and also a benefactor who had already saved his life several times.
"Ptui. That's why they say... you should never take in black-haired beasts. Cough."
SWOOSH—!
SWISH—!
However, his instinct to survive by any means necessary was far stronger than the shock.
Holding tightly onto his fraying consciousness, he lightly swung his sword and leaped back from the executives.
SLIDE—!
"You traitorous bastards...!"
Where the information had leaked from was as clear as seeing fire.
The ambush by the assassins just moments ago had clearly been a diversionary tactic orchestrated by these bastards as well.
Gyeom-shin etched the faces of every single executive bastard who had betrayed him into his memory.
Right up to this very moment on the brink of death.
Then, he readjusted his grip on his sword.
"Wow? As expected of the Master."
"We definitely stabbed through all his internal organs, yet he still won't die. He really is a monster in the flesh."
"Be careful, he's currently the number one Hunter in the world. To think he's still like this after all his strength has been drained..."
The ten executives who had been the pride of the guild.
All of them had betrayed him.
Now, they were pointing their swords at Gyeom-shin, their Guild Master.
"Don't get cocky, you crazy bastards."
Because of these bastards, his guild members had died.
The reason was obvious without even needing to ask.
After all, Gyeom-shin had seen far more than just one or two Hunters die unjustly because of that damned money.
"...I'm not dead yet."
Trudge, trudge.
Pain flared every time he moved.
The Demonic Sword Ades was still resonating with his mind as well.
The fury of being betrayed surged up within him.
"I'll kill more than half of you bastards and take you with me as companions to the grave. Come at me, all of you."
The intense resentment harbored within his soul did not easily subside.
He wanted to rip apart the snouts of those bastards who were smiling with wicked grins.
Even in death, he was ready to become a vengeful spirit.
"However..."
SWISH—!
Yet no matter how much he was the strongest Hunter in the world, he was still only a single human being.
"You will not be able to stand against the ten of us, Master."
Moreover, he had already suffered fatal wounds.
Gyeom-shin himself knew best of all that it would be difficult to take on these ten skilled experts.
Tap-tap-tap—!
Tap-tap—!
The bastards charged in all at once.
Without anyone holding back, each of them intended to snatch the credit first.
Ugly, ungrateful traitors were rushing in to send Gyeom-shin's head flying.
SWISH—!
CLANG—!
Even so, to Gyeom-shin, they were the bastards he had believed were his allies, crying and laughing together with them as he grew this guild until now.
At this laughable, absurd end, Gyeom-shin squeezed his eyes shut.
And when he snapped his eyes open again, their weapons were already right before his face.
SWOOSH—!
SMASH—!
"Keuk...!"
Gyeom-shin deflected their swords all at once, barely managing to block them.
However, because of that, his body was flung backward, and his already fatal wounds tore open even wider.
Death was slowly approaching.
SHAAAH—!
They were Hunters who wielded mana.
Therefore, simple sword strikes were not the only things flying at him.
Blazing flames, arrows made of ice, and spears of lightning flew toward him.
SHAAAAH—!
CRACKLE—!
Gyeom-shin used his specialty, a Counter skill, to completely neutralize all of the bastards' skills.
"......!"
SWISH—!
CLAAAANG—!
However, that was only possible when there were just one or two attacks.
There was no way for him to withstand the bastards' coordinated attacks that raged endlessly like a typhoon.
'...In this condition, I'm at a disadvantage.'
Everything had been a planned trap.
'Then the only remaining possibility is...'
Even so, the mere fact that he could still hold a sword and fight was a miracle in itself.
Now, there was only one hope left.
'Only this Demonic Sword...!'
SWISH—!
This very Demonic Sword held in his hand, whose power he did not even properly know.
CLAANG—!
However, he had come here because he had heard it would be the strongest Demonic Sword in history.
Because according to the industry's evaluation, it was the first and only Mythic-Grade Demonic Sword.
Gyeom-shin quietly closed his eyes to focus on this last remaining possibility.
Then, letting go of everything in his mind, he cast the swords he had originally been using onto the floor.
He focused solely on this Demonic Sword.
"Have you lost your reason...?"
Watching the Master throw away his own weapons with his own hands, Baek Min-jun asked with a hollow expression.
"Giving up in despair is so unlike you, Master, when you used to fight by biting off the enemy's nose right up until the moment you passed out."
He looked disappointed as he watched the anticlimactic end of his boss.
"...Are the eyes on you bastards just for decoration?"
However, Lee Gyeom-shin was a Hunter who was very far from ever giving up.
He had simply found a new possibility with the highest probability of survival right now.
Instead of the swords he had originally used, Gyeom-shin aimed the Demonic Sword he had just obtained at the bastards.
"If you've lived as Hunters under me for years, learn a thing or two, you stupid bastards."
SWISH—!
At that, the executives snorted.
"...You're saying you're going to use something that only worked on mere low-grade assassin bastards against us too...?"
"And with this timing, no less?"
"A Demonic Sword you just got without even knowing what effect it has? Wow, he's really lost his mind."
Indeed, brandishing a sword without even knowing its use was an act of suicide in this industry.
Nothing more, and nothing less.
Especially among Demonic Swords, there were plenty of cases where a single misstep would cause the blade to drain its owner's energy instead.
"Haa... Haaa... Huuu."
Just as they said, the Demonic Sword had worked earlier only because the skills of the assassins who had ambushed Gyeom-shin were terrible.
Against the pros among pros—Hunters who had walked through countless bloodbaths—it was a sword that would not work right away.
"I'll show you."
However, Gyeom-shin faintly sensed it.
"What ultimately happens when you betray me."
That this Demonic Sword wanted him.
He had felt it from the very moment he grasped it in his hand.
However, the world was not so kind as to let things go smoothly for Gyeom-shin.
SWISH—!
SLIDE—!
"......?!"
All of a sudden, Gyeom-shin felt dizzy, and his vision turned pitch-black, leaving him unable to see properly in front of him.
"Knowing you would do that, I prepared something in advance, Master."
As if mocking the staggering Gyeom-shin, Baek Min-jun spoke in a low voice.
"A special gift just for you."
"Keuk...!"
THUD.
He could not breathe.
In the end, following Baek Min-jun's words, Gyeom-shin collapsed limply to the ground.
"Haa... Haaa..."
Gasping for breath, he retraced what had happened in his mind.
Everything was because of the potion Baek Min-jun had handed him right before entering this dungeon.
Inside it was the only poison capable of killing even Hunters who possessed superhuman bodies.
It had contained the Deadly Poison of Arachne.
SWISH—!
"Even for the strongest Hunter, it is a miserable end after all."
Baek Min-jun aimed his sword at the fallen Gyeom-shin's neck.
'I can't... I can't breathe.'
However, he no longer even had the strength to resist.
His vision grew blurry.
His consciousness faded.
"Please, fare well."
Through his fading consciousness, he felt Baek Min-jun driving his sword down with a cunning smile.
SMIRK.
"...My respected Master."
STAB—!
At that moment, Gyeom-shin's heart was pierced through.
"......!"
SLUMP.
'I-is this...'
His tightly clenched fist came undone.
Now, no strength would enter his entire body.
'Something as mere as this...'
His life flashed before his eyes.
A past where he had pursued nothing but power.
'Was this the life I wanted...?'
Because he had pursued only strong power, he had failed to look at the other things around him.
As long as someone was strong, he had accepted them without question.
'Not yet... I can't...'
All just to grow this single guild.
He regretted every single bit of it.
The faces of the precious executives who had sacrificed their lives for the guild until now rose in his mind.
Their strength might have been weaker compared to the current executives, but they had been his true, loyal retainers.
Gyeom-shin regretted everything about the way he had lived.
'Just once more...'
There were still many people he had to protect.
He could never die like this.
'Just give me one more chance...!'
Nor could he give up his grand ambition to use his great power to save not only his own life, but this entire goddamn world.
DING—!
[The Status Window has blossomed.]
And it was at that moment.
'......!'
Something rose up as if responding to Gyeom-shin's unextinguished soul.
Entering his darkened vision like a bright light was a Status Window message.
[Contract conditions have been met.]
'T-this is...?'
The energy of the Demonic Sword Ades lingered within that bright message.
[Contract Requirement: Death]
'Is this a message sent by the Demonic Sword...?'
At that moment, Gyeom-shin was certain.
[Proceed with the contract with the Demonic Sword, Ades? Y/N]
That the Demonic Sword wanted a contract.