Chapter 459. There's a Plausible Plan (2)

The Hunter of the Other World Who Is Being Misunderstood

Chapter 459. There's a Plausible Plan (2)

"It's sky blue."

The orb was slightly different in shape from the purple item that had summoned the [Iron Maiden] gate.

"I can roughly tell what that item is for. But that's a magic tool that activates very slowly."

To be honest, Kim Giryeo didn't really welcome the fight they were about to unfold. From the standpoint of a soul well-versed in magical theory, every strange phenomenon happening here was so obvious it felt as if he could grasp it in one hand.

"Besides, among the awakened ones... none of them seem to have any talent for spatial movement. If I just stop the staff from running away, that should be the end of it."

Therefore, there was only one thing the outsider was curious about.

"So then why did Kang Changho tell me not to use a skill in the first place?"

From the perspective of someone from Alphauri, this dungeon-type artificial awakeners' clinic didn't show any particular any remarkable anomalies. The dungeon within a dungeon had been created solely because humans activated an item. Still, he was a wanderer who fell out of place in this world called Earth, so...

The alien displayed a certain patience.

"Maybe there's a device unique to this planet—something that's hard to detect with magic—installed nearby."

Kim Giryeo did not ignore Kang Changho's advice. And now, with no one recklessly interfering anymore...

"Even if there are only a few Koreans involved in artificial awakening research, it's still like a ship with its sails full in a fair wind."

An elderly man with dark skin began to speak.

"But we were genuinely grateful for the labor you provided up to now. Getting an S-rank to work for us without even paying minimum wage... opportunities like that are rare in this world, you know."

"Did you invite me all the way here even though you knew I'd betray you?"

"Right, you b*stard. Why'd you poke around saying you wanted to analyze our organization...?"

"You've got some guts."

Clack. Clatter.

At the same time, something heavy and metallic dropped. The all-black awakened one, wearing a helmet, had just removed two artifacts. It seemed that the elderly technician's main bodyguard had been using those items to conceal his true amount of mana all this time.

"What is this, some kind of sandbag training method?"

The true rank of the core bodyguard, once revealed, was overwhelming. The extraterrestrial—still bearing a faint red mark on his T-shirt—quickly assessed the Earthling.

"That guy... he seemed so insignificant in front of me that I only just noticed him, but his mana reserves are almost on par with Jeong Haseong."

Brooklyn Morgan. Or Korea's Rank 1, and so on. Those Awakened are Earth's top-tier talents, born from odds so impossibly low it's almost miraculous. But now, out of nowhere, a completely nameless, no-title, true powerhouse shows up?

"Why are geniuses—who should only appear when a god descends—this common?"

An Alphauri native sensed something statistically impossible.

"Ah."

But as soon as he focused his mind, the flow that reached the alien felt familiar.

[Dragon's Lung].

The helmeted lightning-type sorcerer was, in fact, a user of such an item. Honestly, when he encountered an artificial sorcerer in Japan, he was still uncertain. But seeing the example before his eyes now, the method by which they extracted high-grade power through procedures had become perfectly clear.

"Japan's fifth S-class wasn't implanted with the item because his organs were weakened from severe illness."

Those high-ranking ability users with suspiciously high dungeon-organ implantation rates... The craze for such items among Middle Eastern tycoons has mostly died down now. So considering the stabilized market price of the [Dragon's Lung], today's outcome is actually quite easy to understand.

"Humans really are a clever species. Dungeon items, regardless of their rank, are fundamentally materials highly compatible with mana particles, and they took advantage of that."

Mana and magical tools. Electricity and electrical wires.

It might not be the perfect example, but still—what would happen if you built a corridor inside a human body that lets a specific substance pass through extremely easily?

Judging by the circumstances, the members of this illegal clinic would first implant a [Dragon's Lung] into an ordinary person. Once the body became sufficiently mana-friendly, they would then put the person under heavy stress. That was how they extracted high-quality superhumans with such a high success rate.

"Of course, if someone has almost no talent, they wouldn't even survive the mutation process in the first place."

Additionally, even if they do succeed in awakening, if you pour too much water into a vessel that can't handle it, something is bound to go wrong.

"It's an evolutionary method that can only result in a vegetative state... or an early death."

The Alphauri evaluated the method of using the [Dragon's Lung] that just came to mind negatively.

"The somewhat fortunate part is that there are still almost no awakened doctors on Earth. You simply can't cleanly remove otherworldly flesh that has fully fused with a body part. In cases like Choi Jin, who has already used an item, fortunately, they won't become a target."

Boom!

But the thought didn't last any longer. To be precise, it was around the moment when the superhuman with physical-enhancement abilities and the awakened one presumed to have an electric attribute clashed with each other.

"Hmm."

The blond youth turned his head at the loud noise. The emergence of a new human with transcendent amounts of mana is usually something to celebrate. However, the new human born here had gone through a seriously problematic process, so there was no need to dwell on it further.

"On top of that, there are circumstances suggesting they even tried to harm one of South Korea's representative hunters, so from this point on, I should treat this as an incident that is clearly connected to someone I know."

The alien decided to completely dismantle those involved in the illicit procedures. Since Kang Changho's warning was still on his mind, he had no intention of using any openly fired offensive magic for now.

"What the heck is that?"

But just before the outsider's clumsy punches could begin, the artificial awakeners in the pocket dimension suddenly revealed their brutal true nature.

"Crack!"

The members in black clothing pressed the healing kits, stained with a dark red liquid, against their own skin.

"They're planning to boost their stamina with no limit on the number of times!"

No matter how beneficial a medicine is, abusing it recklessly always causes side effects. Seeing such a perfectly suicidal behavior, Kim Giryeo inwardly recoiled in disgust.

"Don't worry about Kang Changho. All the other staff, capture that outsider."

"Yes!"

"Target has changed, but since he's speaking Korean, he's no different from Jeong Haseong on the inside anyway! Shoot him and capture him!"

However, once again, there was no room for negotiation. It seemed the members of the illegal enhancement clinic couldn't simply leave the outsider alone, and they quickly changed their target and charged toward him.

"Damn it."

The alien suddenly found itself into unfamiliar hand-to-hand combat.

Kicking. Punching. Blocking.

These sorts of actions are, of course, the kind that even someone without any specialized training can easily perform.

Crack!

Kim Giryeo slightly frowned as he attempted a simple strike, completely unlike the jabs of a skilled fighter.

"W, what... is so hard?"

"An item!"

"He got hit by a bullet earlier, but there's not even a sign of feeling cold!"

Stopping the mammals wasn't a problem in itself, but as the battle dragged on, it increasingly put the alien in a difficult position.

"-Thud!"

A living soul is, by nature, delicate, sensitive, and an inherently vague concept. But what happens if you casually break a bone and the opponent suddenly goes into shock?

Or what if you witness an example of exsanguination because a damaged area accidentally bled excessively?

"It's not easy trying to subdue a compatriot using something that's practically not even part of my own body."

Honestly, the alien wasn't someone who strictly adhered to a non-killing principle. On the other hand, they weren't reckless enough to commit murder blindly without understanding the context either.

"The problem is that nothing is certain yet. And with so many eyes watching, I can't even use a simple knockout spell comfortably. What am I supposed to do?"

Therefore, the alien, who could no longer kill them immediately, maintained a sluggish defensive stance. Still, for a mage, the amount of mana in their body is a status symbol. His power was so great that even responding by blocking everything in a brute-force manner caused no issues.

"Hey, Korean!"

At this point, someone else's voice rang out. The pitch of the words was flat, but the volume was loud and powerful.

"Get out of the gate first!"

"Me?"

"I'll take care of things here myself."

Kang Changho shouted.

"Talk later! Absolutely do not use your skills."

Strangely, he was scolding while smiling. But at these words, the alien still hadn't even spotted a trace of youth, so it wasn't ready to leave.

"If I was just going to leave because someone chased me out, I wouldn't have flown all the way here..."

Elusive movements. Golden hair. A speaker of Korean, among other things.

Based on the information revealed so far, the identity of this body seemed mostly exposed anyway. Yet, when the same suggestion popped up again, Kim Giryeo grew cautious.

"If I reveal my attribute here, could the clinic have some sort of additional measure ready?"

It was just a brief moment of thought.

"Ahhh!"

"What the!"

"Behind!"

"Just shoot that one too!"

Thud.

But just as the blonde man stopped moving, the enhanced-physical-strength individual suddenly changed direction with long strides. Whether it was because he judged that the compatriot would use a skill if left alone or for some other reason, Kang Changho aggressively advanced, even leaving the electric-attribute awakened being he had been subduing right where it was.

"Huh?"

Moreover, the moment he noticed the approach of this S-rank hunter, Kim Giryeo widened his eyes—for a somewhat different reason.

"By the way, I only looked over there for a few seconds, so why is this Korean blinded by his eyes—for a somewhat different reason."

A super artificial awakened being wearing the [Dragon's Lung]. Turning his head, he finally noticed the condition of the short figure. To exaggerate slightly, one could even compare him to an SS-rank, yet he was standing frozen in place, limbs drenched in blood.

"Against a mage whose attributes aren't even compatible..."

The miracle of generating electricity is usually swift, requires little concentration, and can even scatter mana over a wide area, making it a true natural enemy for ordinary enhanced-physical-strength individuals. Yet, Korea's S-rank pushed the central figure of the illegal procedure facility back. Given the innate difference in body mass, Kang Changho's skills wasn't completely unscathed either.

"The skin is scorched and mottled. Well, how could a human body possibly dodge lightning?"

Anyway, even after getting hurt like that, he still rushed to help a fellow Korean—it really makes you see people in a different light...

"This won't work."

Kim Giryeo finally changed his mind.

"I expected as much. Earthlings normally aren't very good at sensing the fluctuations of external mana caused by dungeons."

It seemed that, as a seasoned mage, a situation had arisen where they would have to cast a spell at least once.

The area far behind, out of reach of Kang Chang-ho's [Dragon's Eye].

An old man with wrinkled hands stood there. Moreover, the sky-blue crystal he held in his arms had already begun to manifest its power.

"Bold enough to act like that in front of two S-ranks. To think such powerful items came in a pair."

It was an entirely white artificial pillar, barely visible to mammalian eyes. More precisely, it was an object that often appears in EX-rank gates when a completely wrong answer is given—gates designed to test a creature's emotions or intelligence. Moreover, given the tendency of the gate's creator to have it crawl above humanity's heads, the extreme heat radiated by the pillar's light was naturally...

"If you take a direct hit, you die."

Kim Giryeo no longer hesitated and unleashed his power to destroy the pillar. But he truly hadn't expected that the primitive man named Kang Changho would react so extremely and recklessly, ruining the sorcerer's work.

The enhanced human, who had closed the distance, snapped his jaw forward. He struck Kim Giryeo's lower jaw with all his might. If the alien hadn't been an SS-ranks awakener, his head might have been blown off from the impact.Kang Changho's interference with overwhelming force left the stranger completely defenseless, unable to anticipate the attack. Kim Giryeo's ongoing spell shattered instantly.

"Are you crazy?"

Moreover, the single strike created such a massive impact that even the disrupted concentration was barely an issue.

When the whiteness before his eyes faded, some of the illegal clinic's staff had collapsed like autumn leaves. The attack emitted by the pillar of light had engulfed the humans.

"_ _"

"_ _"

Kim Giryeo was fortunately pushed out of the attack range by the impact of the blow. However, Kang Changho suffered damage according to the illegal clinic's plan.

Left waist. Forearm. Part of the thigh.

Although none of the vital organs necessary for survival were injured, the patient's condition had clearly become unsuitable to broadcast on the news.

Technically, they're human, but from the perspective of the archmage, it was unbearably burdensome that a creature more than a guinea pig had ended up taking the damage instead.

"You didn't need to help."

The alien, utterly dumbfounded, first mentioned Kang Changho's mistake. But upon hearing this, one of the Korean ex-convicts began giving a strange response.

"Yeah. I was just about to say the same thing."

Srrk, srrk, srrk.

Since he was standing with his back turned, the owner of the illegal clinic probably hadn't noticed the change in the 30-something Korean yet.

"Same here. Honestly, I really don't need the help of any other awakened ones."

Kim Giryeo was certain. From the very beginning, the illegal clinic's staff must have had a solid plan. They possessed the amount of mana in their body is a practically a status symbol. His power was so great and an artifact capable of manipulating the mysterious phenomenon known as a dungeon as if it were their personal tool.

If not for this unforeseen disruption, the old man's rosy future would surely have come true.

But everything collapsed the moment Kang Changho revealed the hidden "ace up his sleeve" he'd been keeping secret.

The face of the man whose upper eyelids had been scorched by the artificial awakener's electric attack finally began to change.

A vision of bright red blood rippling beneath the skin, with fresh flesh neatly sprouting over it.

Regeneration.

At this moment, Kang Changho revealed a highly efficient [Regeneration] skill related to self-healing. When debris from the building fell overhead, there was no caster's ritual required to maintain the magic. When he was burned by Jeon G Haseong's attack...he had simply chosen not to waste the most optimal means unnecessarily.

"Originally, anyone who saw this scene would end up dead, but you'll have to start thinking now about what you're going to do."

Let's take a moment to consider the enemies' perspective. A physically enhanced individual is always sturdier and reacts faster than others. But if, after barely injuring such a person, what comes back is perfect and safe [Regeneration], how would that make them feel?