Lee Kanghyun grabbed the charging monster’s muzzle with his bare hands and tore it apart. He vividly felt its sharp teeth digging into his palms, but he did not so much as scream. The torn flesh of his palms writhed as it regenerated. Burning pain surged through him.
But he did not stop.
Rather than drag this out, it was better to finish it quickly.
One of his slippers flew off. His bare foot was exposed, but Lee Kanghyun did not care.
He leaped onto a monster’s back and stomped down, crushing its spine beneath his foot.
Crack.
With the sound of bones breaking, the monster collapsed. Lee Kanghyun used its fallen head as a stepping stone and launched himself toward the next one.
Corpses piled up like mountains.
Lee Kanghyun stepped over those mountains of bodies and crossed pools of blood as he forced his way forward.
He looked like a complete wreck. He was drenched in red from head to toe, to the point that he could no longer tell which blood was his and which belonged to the monsters.
His clothes hung from him in shredded rags, and he never did find the slipper that had flown off. Every time his bare foot touched the cold stone floor, sticky blood clung to it with a wet smack.
His body itself was fine.
Torn flesh had grown back. Broken bones had fused together again.
But his brain was screaming.
The lingering agony of being injured and regenerated dozens of times was gnawing away at his mind.
He was so irritated he felt like he could die from it.
The pain was bad enough, but more than anything, he hated the sensation of his own body being drenched in blood.
His reason was one step away from snapping completely.
The boss.
The owner of this goddamn gate.
Once he killed that bastard, it would be over.
Once he killed it, he could go home and sleep.
Clinging to that thought, Lee Kanghyun trudged onward.
This is such a fucking pain. I just want to sleep.
When I get home, I’m eating whatever Kang Yujun makes me and sleeping for twenty-four hours straight.
I’ve suffered this much, so I should put Kang Yujun to work a little.
He planned to make him clean, do the laundry, and cook.
Lee Kanghyun was keeping Kang Yujun’s home from collapsing, so he figured he deserved at least that much.
When he reached the boss room, Lee Kanghyun rubbed his blurry eyes and lifted his head.
But there was nothing there.
No enormous boss monster the size of a house.
No grotesque creature.
Only a single small silhouette stood ahead.
Lee Kanghyun narrowed his eyes at it.
It did not look like a monster.
A person? How is there a person in here?
Before Lee Kanghyun could even make sense of the situation—
“Kanghyun!”
A bright, cheerful voice rang out.
The man standing far in the distance crossed the space between them in an instant.
What the hell? A humanoid monster?
Either way, Lee Kanghyun instinctively clenched his fist in preparation for an attack.
At that exact moment, something warm and solid crashed into him.
Whump.
The man who had approached threw his arms around Lee Kanghyun.
He hugged him so fiercely that it was almost difficult to breathe.
He seemed completely unconcerned about Lee Kanghyun’s blood-soaked body. If anything, he buried his face against Lee Kanghyun’s shoulder and rubbed against him like a puppy, as though he enjoyed the smell of blood.
“I missed you. Why did you take so long? Do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting for you?”
Lee Kanghyun’s thought process stopped dead.
What the hell is happening?
He stared blankly down at the man wrapped around him.
He looked around Lee Kanghyun’s age, an Asian man with hair dyed a vivid yellow and clothes that made him look exactly like some street punk.
And yet his face looked gentle.
Gentle enough to make someone instinctively want to lower their guard.
“What the hell….”
Lee Kanghyun asked in utter disbelief.
He should have shoved the man away immediately, but the sheer absurdity of the situation drained the strength from him and left his body frozen.
Whenever something caught Lee Kanghyun completely off guard, his brain tended to shut down and his body would lock up.
It was why Kang Yujun had gotten away with doing ridiculous things to him more than once, and yet Lee Kanghyun still had not managed to fix the habit.
His belief that he would not die no matter what had rooted itself too deeply inside him, making it difficult for him to feel any real sense of danger.
The man lifted his head.
His smiling eyes curved into crescents.
“Me? I’m your fan. Ah, this is seriously moving. You’re even more handsome in person. Even after taking a shower in blood, our Kanghyun is still sexy.”
Is this guy insane?
Definitely.
This was not just some ordinary lunatic.
Every instinct he had was telling him not to get involved with this man.
Ignoring Lee Kanghyun’s stiff expression entirely, the man reached up and stroked his cheek as he pleased.
“By the way, how did you like the present?”
“Present?”
“Yeah! The one I prepared for you! I had it delivered right to your doorstep.”
The man pointed toward the path Lee Kanghyun had come from.
“My puppies. I packed the place full of A-ranks for you. I arranged them especially because I thought Kanghyun might get bored.”
The moment Lee Kanghyun heard that innocent, cheerful voice, his dazed mind snapped awake as though someone had dumped ice water over his head.
A present?
Those hellish swarms of monsters?
Those things that tore into my arms and legs were just a fucking present?
“You did this?”
“I told you I did. So? Did you like it? Praise me, okay?”
The man’s eyes sparkled like a puppy waiting to be praised as he tightened his arms around Lee Kanghyun’s waist.
Goosebumps spread across Lee Kanghyun’s entire body.
The man’s body heat disgusted him so much he could barely stand it.
He wanted to tear those arms off himself immediately, but he endured it for now.
He needed to hold back long enough to extract even a little information.
Lee Kanghyun suppressed his disgust as much as he could.
He could not, however, keep his voice from coming out rough.
“How?”
He had never heard of an Ability capable of creating gates and controlling monsters.
That was what he wanted to learn.
But unlike the serious Lee Kanghyun, the man answered with endless casualness.
“That’s a secret. Ah! If Kanghyun comes with me, though, I can tell you.”
“Cut the bullshit.”
“What a shame.”
The man drooped his eyebrows.
But he quickly brightened again and resumed chattering.
“Oh, right! The first present wasn’t that great, was it?”
“What are you talking about now?”
“The guy in the black mask. The delivery guy I sent to your house earlier. He went out way too easily, didn’t he?”
The man giggled.
His tone was as innocent as a child’s.
Lee Kanghyun’s pupils shook violently.
This bastard sent that intruder?
So he broke into my home, then killed himself when he was caught… and all of that was this bastard’s doing?
“…Why the hell?”
Lee Kanghyun muttered almost to himself.
He had never seen this man before.
He could not understand why a complete stranger would go this far to torment him.
“It was a surprise. Our Kanghyun looked bored. But that guy was too weak, so he wasn’t any fun, right? He died way too easily. So I set this whole thing up myself right away. I wanted to see what Kanghyun could really do.”
The man’s eyes shone as he rambled excitedly.
“Were my presents good? Want more?”
Lee Kanghyun’s patience snapped.
There was no longer any reason to endure this.
Nothing this man said was worth listening to anymore.
“You fucking bastard.”
Lee Kanghyun’s fist shot toward the man’s face.
Thud.
But the man raised one hand and caught it.
The impact was powerful enough that an ordinary person—or even most Hunters—would have had their arm blown apart.
Yet the man did not budge.
“Wow, you’re strong! That’s our Kanghyun. So forceful—”
He was just about to keep talking smugly.
Bam!
The man’s head snapped violently to the side.
Getting his fist caught had been deliberate.
The moment the man grabbed it, Lee Kanghyun twisted his body around the captured hand as a pivot and drove his other fist into the man’s temple at blinding speed.
“Ghk!”
The man staggered and released Lee Kanghyun’s hand.
Lee Kanghyun did not waste the opening.
Don’t get cocky with me.
He kicked off the ground and shot upward, driving his knee into the now-exposed pit of the man’s stomach.
“Ugh…!”
The man’s body lifted off the ground and was thrown backward.
He barely managed to land before staggering as he regained his balance.
Blood trickled from his mouth.
But instead of getting angry, the man wiped the blood from the corner of his lips with his thumb and broke into a wide grin.
His eyes gleamed with a bizarre kind of ecstasy.
“Haha. Ahahahaha!”
The man clapped.
“You really are the best, Lee Kanghyun! I knew I had good taste!”
Those hits had landed hard.
Lee Kanghyun was certain of it.
They were blows that would have made an A-rank monster’s body burst apart in a single hit.
Yet this bastard was still standing there laughing.
This went far beyond simply being tough.
Is his Ability defensive?
Lee Kanghyun started to take up an attacking stance again, but the man raised one palm and winked.
“Calm down. I don’t want to fight you, Kanghyun.”
“Shut up.”
“More importantly, Kanghyun. You look like you’re in a lot of pain right now.”
The man abruptly changed the subject.
“You didn’t take your medicine, did you? I can smell it. The smell of someone enduring pain. Want me to help? Hmm? I can make it stop hurting.”
Lee Kanghyun clenched his fists.
His fingernails dug into his palms.
Who the fuck is this bastard?
Why is he tormenting me? And how does he even know I take medicine?
How the hell does he know?
It did not matter.
He could just kill him.
Murderous intent sharpened Lee Kanghyun’s gaze.
Just as he was about to charge again, the man suddenly closed the distance between them.
Before Lee Kanghyun could even react, the man pressed his lips against Lee Kanghyun’s bloodstained cheek.
Smack.
The embarrassingly loud sound echoed through the gate.
“That’s enough for today. See you again, sweetheart. Don’t forget me.”
Poof!
The man’s body vanished in a burst of white smoke.
Lee Kanghyun reflexively swung his fist through the smoke, but it only cut through empty air.
When the smoke cleared, nothing remained.
Anger, disbelief, and disgust churned together until his stomach turned.
“You fucking piece of shit….”
He scrubbed his cheek viciously with his hand and made himself a promise.
Next time I see you, I’m really going to kill you.