Dungeon Hunter - Chapter 62
Chapter 62: Episode 17. The 15-Day War (2)
Cries of despair and groans of pain spread throughout the city like a wave.
Shades were driving people mad. The maddened people went to the streets with knives and murdered each other.
“Hahaha!”
“Kill! Kill them all!”
Everyone, adult or child, had gone mad.
One child stabbed an old man’s leg with a small kitchen knife, then a man behind the child hit him with a steel pipe. A woman next to the man then bit his neck.
It was complete chaos.
If there was a hell, it must have looked like this.
Shades were parasitic on shadows and specialized in driving humans mad. This was the sole reason that they were classified as intermediate-level monsters. Such characteristics made them one of the scariest predators of humans.
“Wha-what’s wrong? What is wrong with everyone all of a sudden?”
Some could stand the Shades’ attacks, so the shades’ effect was halved to those who had strong mentalities or awakened heroes who were intelligent enough.
Then the Shadow Sinners stepped up.
With a clanging sound, they held up iron balls. Shadow Sinners evolved from Shades, but no one knew why they were called sinners and wielded iron balls.
Besides mental attacks, Shadow Sinners were also capable of powerful physical attacks.
Swinging their iron balls, Shadow Sinners destroyed everything in their paths. A Shadow Sinner threw its iron ball at a man nearby who was puzzled and looking around.
Despite a distance of around half a mile, the Shadow Sinner’s aim was accurate.
The iron chain that connected the iron ball and the Shadow Sinner stretched widely… Soon, with a booming sound, the man was crushed into a shapeless blob.
Boom! Boom, boom!
As though the attack was a sign to fire, tens of fighter jets appeared across the sky and shot missiles. However, Shadow Sinners were half-spiritual beings. A non-magic attack would do them no harm.
Swoosh!
Shadow Sinners had another ability; they could foresee what would happen in the next second with very high probability.
Their iron balls soared high, moving as though they were alive and hitting the fighter jets. No human eyes could easily track the speed of the fighter jets. However, Shadow Sinners were high-level monsters. They were beyond normal human beings.
“You monstrous sons of b*tches!”
This was the last message from one of the fighter jets.
In spite of being able to predict the next second, there was no guarantee that the iron balls would hit every time. Furthermore, the iron balls could reach about 1,600 feet. If fighter jets launched attacks from beyond that distance, even Shadow Sinners couldn’t respond effectively.
After several fighter jets fell, the remaining pilots realized what a safe distance was and adjusted their heights.
Shadow Sinners had another option for a longer range.
Shadow Sinners and Shades were a perfect combination when it came to resisting fire weapons invented by humans.
While all the pilots were distracted by the Shadow Sinners, the Shades quickly closed the distance between them and the fighter jets by hiding in the iron balls’ shadows.
Then they started to control the pilots’ minds. A few pilots who lost their minds started to attack their allies, and the sky quickly turned into a battlefield.
Once the humans lost the lead, they could never take it back.
As the pilots soared through the sky in confusion, flying iron balls smashed into the fighter jets.
The situation quickly grew worse as time passed. The desperate attacks from fighter jets, which people had placed their hopes in, were intense but didn’t do much harm to the monsters. Ground forces, as well as one unit of awakened heroes, were deployed, but they could only eliminate dozens of Shades.
“Ahhhhh… God!”
Those who hadn’t lost their minds knelt on the ground and prayed to their gods.
Closing their eyes, they hoped that it was all a dream.
However, it didn’t take too long for them to accept reality, in which monsters were destroying everything. A sharp pain was the best tool to bring humans back to reality. Everyone was forced to face the truth and cry out for help.
Suddenly, a group of people wearing black skull masks appeared.
The place was filled with madness, anger, and despair.
I was amazed at the sight.
Sugoof Valhula, a duke working for Ufa, had accurate insight on human weaknesses.
He had dared to think of using Shades.
No monster was on par with Shades when it came to fighting against humans. They were relatively weak compared to other intermediate monsters, and they couldn’t even reproduce. Therefore, many had abandoned them. However, Sugoof had purchased as many as he could.
‘The Shadow Sinners…’
Furthermore, he had sent out two high-level monsters that would deal with the awakened heroes.
Shadow Sinners were expensive high-level monsters at Level 3, and they cost 150,000 points each.
Sugoof had easily spent at least 500,000 points on this specific Monster Wave.
He must have spent a large amount of money on monsters in the long run in order to use them to fight awakened heroes.
If I hadn’t shown up here at this moment, Sugoof could have earned an extreme number of points for the next few years through Shades and Shadow Sinners.
However, if the plan didn’t work in the first place, Sugoof would lose so many points. In that sense, Sugoof had no luck, since I was here.
“Shades feed on human shadows. Form a team of members with intelligence higher than thirty and attack the shadows of those who are creating confusion. Those with intelligence under thirty should only support from a distance.”
“Should we give up on the monster that’s spinning that iron ball?”
I shook my head. “I’ll take care of them.”
“Are you all right?”
The two monsters definitely looked very strong.
They were at least high-level monsters at first glance.
“Are you saying that you can’t trust our attack unit leader? Phew! New recruits don’t know anything.” Yoo Eunhye clicked her tongue.
After the electrical current that was flowing through her body vanished, Yoo Eunhye became more direct than she had been before.
After staring at the disastrous site for a while, I spoke. “Let’s get rid of them before the damage increases. Move now!”
Edward, who had turned ten years old that year, was trapped under a pile of ruins.
His parents suddenly became confused. Edward, while attempting to save his baby brother’s life, locked the door and hid in his room. However, the building had collapsed.
The situation hadn’t settled. However, Edward woke up, feeling intense pain.
“Rooney? Rooney, where are you?”
Edward cried out the name of his little brother, who was barely three months old, but he couldn’t hear him crying. Biting his lips, Edward tried to move his body.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t move as he wished, since his legs were stuck. It didn’t hurt, although he was scared. Fear seeped in. Shaking his head, Edward searched for his brother Rooney.
“Please, Rooney… Are you hiding because you’re scared of Mom and Dad? They’re nice people. They were just frustrated for a moment because of work, so please…”
Edward had raised Rooney nearly from birth.
Their parents were always busy, so Edward had to take on the role of a parent. He fed Rooney, changed his diapers, and calmed him down when Rooney cried.
Rooney was the best present that Edward would ever receive, because he always felt lonely while staying home alone. Had it been any other person, taking care of Rooney could have been seen as annoying. However, Edward wasn’t annoyed at all. In fact, he felt rewarded while taking care of Rooney.
Then, he found a tiny hand that looked like a doll’s in the midst of the debris.
“Oh… Rooney!”
However, Edward couldn’t move his body. Not letting go of hope, Edward cried out, “Wait a minute. People will come to save us.”
Edward turned his head quickly, then saw people fighting with each other and bleeding. He also saw a monster that was swinging an iron ball. Buildings had collapsed, and dead bodies were everywhere.
Edward didn’t understand the concept of death yet, so he just thought that these people were sick and laying down for a while.
‘All of them are completely out of their minds.’ Edward could tell one thing for sure: people were not normal.
A soldier wearing a uniform approached him. Waving his hands, Edward cried, “Hey! Help us!”
However, the soldier’s eyes were out of focus. He looked at Edward hazily and quickly pointed the gun at him.
“Huh huh huh…”
“Why, why? Come on, help me! Please get Rooney out before me. Please, I’m too young and weak to get out by myself.”
Ignoring the strange laughing, Edward continued to beg for help, but the soldier didn’t move his gun away. Rather, he attempted to pull the trigger.
Boom!
Something flew at them and hit the soldier.
The soldier’s body was flattened like a hamburger, and blood splattered everywhere.
Edward checked what had flown in and opened his eyes wide.
It was the monster with the iron ball!
He had no idea why the monster had flown down from the sky.
Pushing off the ground, the monster tried to get up from the floor.
“What a tough guy.” A man wearing a black skull mask suddenly appeared as though he had teleported.
The man wielded a sword that looked quite strange.
Slash!
He split the iron ball in half, avoiding the monster.
When the ball was split in two, the monster screeched and slowly evaporated.
About ten seconds later, the monster disappeared without a trace.
Edward, who stared blankly at the scene, suddenly exclaimed, “Oh! Mister, please help me. No, please help my brother. His name is Rooney. He’s too young to get out by himself.”
The man turned around, looked at Edward, and said indifferently, “Don’t you feel pain?”
“Huh? Ah. The doctor says I can’t feel pain, but that’s not the point right now. Come on, my brother Rooney…”
“Your brother is dead.”
“Huh?” Edward only had a vague idea of what death was. He didn’t clearly understand the meaning of it.
The man realized that Edward wasn’t fully understanding his words. He cruelly explained to Edward in different words, “It means that your brother cannot move. Forever.”
It took about half an hour to get rid of two Shadow Sinners.
Of course, ten minutes would have been enough, had I used my full power. The total sum of my statistics was above 410. The Shadow Sinners had something around 340, so they were no match for me. I had to delay though, because I had to pretend that I was also an awakened hero.
After eliminating the two sinners, I looked at the boy who spoke to me.
The lower half of his body had been completely crushed by the debris of a building. At first, I thought his senses were simply numbed, but the boy didn’t seem to feel any pain. Out of curiosity, I opened my Mind’s Eye.
Name: Edward Windsor
Vocational: Warrior (Soldier)
Title: None
Capabilities:
Strength 14, Intelligence 34
Agility 15, Stamina 17, Mana 32
Potential (112/441)
Unique: None
Skill: Painless (Ex R)
He had such great potential.
The boy’s potential was twenty points higher than that of Yoo Eunhye. I had never seen a human with such impressive potential.
What was more surprising was the boy’s name.
‘Edward Windsor? As in Edward Winsor, one of the ten strong warriors?’
His name was Edward Windsor. He was the Duke Killer!
Edward Winsor had ruthlessly murdered Archduke Pandemonium’s subordinate duke, which made him one of the ten strong warriors. All of his fellow attack unit members died, but he alone survived. Later, Edward destroyed the dungeon core and became one of the ten strong warriors.
However, I had never heard that his lower body was paralyzed.
Perhaps he overcame his difficulties with his skills… The boy’s face certainly resembled the old Edward’s face.
I hadn’t expected to encounter him like this.
Was this meeting a coincidence or fate?
Edward, who was about to cry, wailed, “It-it’s not fair. Rooney was just born…”
I thought for a moment.
The boy seemed to care a lot for his younger brother. If I really wanted, I could fake bringing the younger brother back to life.
I could revive him as an undead being through Krithli or trick Edward using the doppelganger’s mutation skill. If these tricks worked, then I would be able to control the boy, who would eventually become one of the ten strong warriors.
However, once the boy realized the truth, the aftermath would be terrible.
This boy was Edward Windsor, so I couldn’t miss out on this opportunity.
Therefore, I decided to switch things up a little bit.
“Death comes to everyone, regardless of age. However, monsters killed your brother. Monsters, like the one I killed just now, twisted people’s minds and caused your brother’s death.”
“Ah…” Edward’s eyes were filled with tears. “Then Rooney can’t move anymore?”
“Yes.”
“Forever?”
“Forever.”
“Ah…!” Edward grabbed his cheeks and screamed.
Soon, it started to rain as though the sky empathized with Edward.
The dark clouds in the sky seemed to represent Edward’s sadness.
I let him cry for a while.
Then, the cries started to die out. I started talking to him right before he fell limp, short of breath.
“Do you want revenge? Don’t you want to crush the monsters that killed your brother and your parents? If you want to, nod your head. I’ll grant you the power.”
“Power…”
“The power to kill all monsters. The power for revenge! Don’t you want it?”
“The monsters, the monsters… I want to kill them.” Edward nodded his head, then he passed out.
He was unconscious.
I grinned at the sight.
“Welcome to the Devil Hunter attack unit, Edward Windsor.”
The chains of fate, intertwined with serendipity, were indeed nasty.
Edward couldn’t learn the truth behind the monsters that killed his brother and his family—that I was in charge of them.
I was the one and only exceptional being!
