Chapter 27 – Debt

Quest

Promote to a Green-mark Raider.

Quest Reward: 150P

Se-min’s current quest was to promote to a Green-mark Raider.

There were two methods to advance to a higher mark.

One was to formally pass the promotion exam, and the other was to hunt a magic beast that only those of that mark or higher could face alone.

Ahn Seong-jun, a popular Raider, had risen to the Platinum-mark in the past by slaying a Kesia alone.

However, this was not a normal situation; the Raider Bureau regulated lower-mark Raiders from facing higher-grade magic beasts for their safety.

Therefore, such promotions occurred due to unexpected errors, such as being swept up in a Missing Gate.

Ahn Seong-jun was also a case of encountering a Kesia due to a Missing Gate. Of course, it was a show; anyone who had any sense knew that the Raider Bureau and his agency had made a deal to leave an impact on the people.

“I wish a Missing Gate would drop…”

In Se-min’s case, he did not have enough experience to take the qualification exam. Since a minimum of six months was required, he had to wait a few more months.

“I’ll be punished if I think like this. No, let’s wait patiently. Just the Three Talents Swordplay alone is too profound.”

Se-min closed the Transcendent Network and looked up.

Hyeon Jae-yeong was training and sweating in front of him.

After reaching the Green-mark, he had become Se-min’s faithful servant. If Se-min said so, he would believe it even if a Zorg caught a Drake.

His goals were now Gold and Platinum.

Even though his master had not even gotten out of the Blue-mark.

“Let’s spar.”

“Suddenly?”

“Yeah.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong made an ambiguous expression, showing that although he could not bring himself to refuse, he was reluctant deep down.

“N-now? Right away?”

“Yeah.”

It was the moment when Se-min was about to attack Hyeon Jae-yeong without warning.

“Wait!”

“Is it time for your last words?”

“Really, just a moment.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong pulled a cell phone out of his chest pocket. The phone was ringing. Hyeon Jae-yeong turned around and answered the call.

Seeing the tone of his voice change, it was Kim Ye-na.

Having lost his target, Se-min stretched his stiff body and swung the claymore in the air.

The call dragged on. As Se-min was making a plan to tattle to Kim Ye-na about the woman named Min Ji-hyun to torment Hyeon Jae-yeong even more, Hyeon Jae-yeong’s voice sounded unusual.

It seemed he had brought trouble again.

But Hyeon Jae-yeong was looking at Se-min.

His eyes were pleading for help.

Se-min shook his head.

“All right, wait. I’ll go right now.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong hung up the phone, approached Se-min, and pulled his arm.

“Hey, why?”

“Brother, help me.”

“With what?”

“Something big happened.”

“Why do you need me?”

“Ah, I don’t know.”

Se-min was dragged all the way to the office by Hyeon Jae-yeong.

“Boss! I’ll be out for a bit.”

“You’re not working more?”

“Yes, something urgent came up. I’ll leave work now.”

“Sure.”

Yoo Sang-heun was still looking at overseas football articles beyond the monitor. Just before leaving the office, Se-min shouted at Yoo Sang-heun.

“That’s not a big club!”

“Do you want to die?”

Yoo Sang-heun jumped up, but the office door was already closed.

Se-min was practically pushed into the Ferrari by Hyeon Jae-yeong. Hyeon Jae-yeong immediately started the engine. His driving was rough.

“What is it?”

“Ye-na got into a fight just now.”

“Then you should call the police.”

“They say the opponent is a Raider.”

“What?”

Kim Ye-na was an ordinary person who did not even know how to properly clench a fist, let alone use aura.

“I don’t know whether your girlfriend, who gets into arguments with a Raider, is amazing, or the opponent, who causes trouble against an ordinary person, is amazing.”

“Tell me about it.”

Raiders were those who fought magic beasts. That meant if a Raider set their mind to it, they could cause a disaster on the same level as a magic beast. Therefore, if a Raider or an aura-compatible individual committed a crime against an ordinary person, the weight of the punishment was different from the start.

The notorious Raider prison in Ansan was no different from a modern-day Alcatraz.

“Still, she’s an ordinary person, so nothing major should happen.”

Se-min muttered.

His prediction was wrong.

Something major was happening.

“What do you want me to do, fuck!”

A man shouted in the street, and Kim Ye-na was arguing with him about something.

Behind Kim Ye-na, a woman hung her head; seeing how the man kept trying to push Kim Ye-na aside and speak, it seemed the subjects of the dispute were not Kim Ye-na but those two.

“Hey, you, come out and talk. Huh? Don’t hide!”

“Look here, stop yelling!”

“Who are you to step in and act up like this!”

“I’m stepping in because I’m Jin-hee’s friend!”

“Do you want to get hit? I won’t go easy on you just because you’re a woman.”

“Try hitting me.”

“Has this crazy bitch lost her mind?”

“Yeah, you crazy bastard!”

“Wow, I can’t believe this.”

Se-min shook his head and leaned back in the passenger seat.

The Ferrari stopped beside them, roaring its exhaust.

People’s gazes gathered.

“Oppa!”

Kim Ye-na brightened when Hyeon Jae-yeong got out of the car. Hyeon Jae-yeong approached her and placed his hand on her head.

“Are you okay? Did nothing happen?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s going on?”

Hyeon Jae-yeong turned to look.

The man let out a hollow laugh.

“Look at you acting all high and mighty after calling some dog-bone bastard.”

“Watch your mouth.”

“If you don’t like it, you can swear at me too.”

He glanced over Hyeon Jae-yeong’s Ferrari and grinned.

“You seem like a guy with some money, but you’re going to end up crippled like that.”

A white current rose from his hand. It was aura. Hyeon Jae-yeong’s expression remained unchanged.

“Since you’re a Raider, you should restrain yourself more.”

“Who are you to care?”

He tried to poke Hyeon Jae-yeong’s chest with his finger but flinched. The presence of aura was wavering from Hyeon Jae-yeong’s body.

Only then did the man realize that Hyeon Jae-yeong was also a Raider and smirked.

“So you were acting all high and mighty because you have a Raider boyfriend?”

Kim Ye-na raised her middle finger from behind Hyeon Jae-yeong. The man flared up, but he could not do anything to harm her since Hyeon Jae-yeong was blocking him.

“I don’t know what this is about, but let’s talk.”

“If you want to end this with words, get that woman behind you out of here first.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong’s eyebrows twitched.

“Why, you want to hit her?”

He was not alone. Two men who had been watching the situation from behind stood up. They were all Raiders.

They had green marks on their jackets, and underneath, the name of the company they belonged to was also embroidered.

Nine Dragons Association.

It was a place with a rather bad reputation.

Hyeon Jae-yeong and the man had a staring contest. The man was larger in build, but Hyeon Jae-yeong did not back down in momentum. Their faces gradually drew closer. It was a touch-and-go situation where a fight could break out at any moment.

At that moment, there was a calm voice.

“The highest good is like water; it is *Sangseonyaksu*.”

It was a low voice that nevertheless made people feel at ease. People’s gazes gathered. The man continued to speak.

“It is best to live like water. Water does not strive with its surroundings, and the reason it does not strive is because it benefits all things yet stays in places people dislike. Therefore, water is close to the Tao.”

It was Se-min. He got out of the Ferrari and approached them.

“Now, everyone. Let us all calm down and act like water.”

However, the attire of the person who uttered those words did not look peaceful at all.

As a punk-looking guy wearing a souvenir jacket approached, the Raiders of the Nine Dragons Association blocked him.

“Let’s first hear what the situation is for each of you and resolve it through conversation…”

“Don’t interfere.”

“Lowering your voice like a gangster.”

Se-min ignored them and tried to approach Hyeon Jae-yeong and the man.

They held Se-min back. Their arms touched Se-min. Se-min brightened.

“This counts as hitting, right?”

“What?”

“Under self-defense…”

Se-min was about to make a forced argument and subdue them, but a fight broke out over there first.

It was a fistfight where it was impossible to tell who had started it. When having a staring contest, such a moment comes. That brief instant when each other’s hostility meets at a point like supply and demand curves, forcing them to throw punches.

Se-min and the two men facing off were also dumbfounded.

“They are really fighting?”

“Uh, yeah…”

Perhaps because a fistfight had actually broken out, the two also stood still in embarrassment.

A brawl between Hyeon Jae-yeong and the man ensued. As the two Raiders exchanged punches and kicks, nearby property began to be damaged.

Even as people were evacuating, they could not miss out on watching the fight, so they took cover somewhere and continued to watch.

Se-min went to Kim Ye-na.

“Hey.”

“Se-min oppa! Shouldn’t we stop that?”

“Leave it alone, Jae-yeong will win. What’s the matter?”

“Well…”

The story went like this.

That man and Kim Ye-na’s friend, Kim Jin-hee, were lovers. However, Kim Jin-hee had suddenly ended up pregnant.

The woman decided on marriage, and the man chose to escape.

Eventually, when the man was reached, what he said was to abort the child. Shivering with a sense of betrayal, the woman rejected his proposal.

Their voices rose, and as Kim Ye-na, who was with her, stepped in instead and argued with the man point by point, the man got angry and ran amok.

It was a sad story.

“Oppa!”

Kim Ye-na screamed. Hyeon Jae-yeong took a hit and staggered. Just as the man was about to follow up with consecutive strikes, Hyeon Jae-yeong countered the opponent’s attack with a mysterious movement and struck the flank with his knee.

The man staggered.

“Oh no.”

Kim Jin-hee, who was standing quietly next to them, covered her mouth. Even after causing all this trouble, she seemed to be worried about that man. The human heart was indeed a mystery.

Whenever Hyeon Jae-yeong got hit, Kim Ye-na flinched; and whenever the man got hit, Kim Jin-hee flinched. Feeling it was pitiful to watch, Se-min stepped forward.

“Let’s stop fighting.”

Se-min intervened and blocked the man’s fist.

At his mediation, Hyeon Jae-yeong stepped back and caught his breath. He had also been hit a few times, so his lip was cut and bleeding.

“Hey, stop…”

The excited man threw a punch at Se-min.

Se-min kicked his shin and knocked him down. The man did not give up, got up again, and rushed at Se-min.

He had quite a bit of grit.

Se-min shouted.

“Since you have that much grit, why can’t you take responsibility for your woman!”

He was kicked by Se-min and flew back again.

The man, face down on the ground, staggered up.

“What do you know to talk like that!”

“Perhaps is there some circumstance that I am unaware of?”

“Kim Jin-hee!”

The man called out to Kim Jin-hee, who was standing far behind.

“That’s not my child!”

At his shocking remark, the atmosphere suddenly turned cold.

“Did you think I wouldn’t know you cheated? Fuck!”

The man’s voice choked up. When the large man shouted with his face in a total mess, it evoked a strange sense of pity.

Flustered, Kim Jin-hee shook her head.

“W-what are you talking about!”

“You!”

Just as they were about to start arguing again.

The sound of a siren wailed.

At the same time, men dressed in black uniforms began to run over. Without a word, they brandished their batons.

The men in black uniforms, otherwise known as the Raider Mobile Unit.

They were special police officers who subdued Raiders who committed crimes or caused trouble. They were all former Raiders or aura-compatible individuals, and they were famous for ruthlessly handling Raiders who committed crimes.

“Why me?”

Se-min dodged the attack of the Raider Mobile Unit. A gleam of interest appeared in the opponent’s eyes. He pressed Se-min harder.

“It’s a misunderstanding, a misunderstanding.”

“Fighting in front of civilians is a crime.”

“I’m telling you, I stopped it.”

“Silence!”

His attacks grew more persistent. Annoyed, Se-min deflected the opponent’s attack and snatched the baton using the principle of leverage.

“What?”

His expression changed at what had occurred in an instant. Flustered, he tried to draw another weapon from his waist.

“Stop.”

When the man standing behind spoke, everyone stopped. It was an orderly response.

He stepped forward.

Se-min’s eyes widened.

It was a familiar face.

“It’s unexpected to see you here.”

He was short, had a large scar on his face, and.

One of his eyes had faded white.

***

“Did you discharge from the military?”

“Yes. You still use that weapon.”

“It’s practically my comrade-in-arms.”

Se-min answered, tapping the claymore’s handle.

It was Kim Gyu-jin, who had always given the impression that he would wear a military uniform and drink from a canteen, so sitting face-to-face in a cafe like this felt strange. Perhaps because they were in society, he was somehow easier to deal with.

Se-min said, taking a sip of coffee.

“Did you know that I was alive?”

“I heard later. That you were held in prison and then fell beyond the Gate.”

“Yes.”

“It’s a hard story to believe.”

Se-min smiled silently, shook his Americano glass, and asked gently.

“What about the other people?”

He wanted to ask Kim Gyu-jin once.

“Did they all die because of that dark Gate?”

Instead of answering, he smiled bitterly and cast his eyes down. Even the white pupil, which moved as if it were a different life form altogether, did not make eye contact with Se-min.

After a silence, Se-min changed the subject.

“Why did you discharge?”

“I got sick of the military uniform.”

“So did you change into a police uniform?”

“Since I don’t have any particular talent.”

Kim Gyu-jin was not someone with whom conversation came naturally.

After replying briefly, he stared out the window. People were walking below the cafe, and cars were busily passing by.

Kim Gyu-jin suddenly spoke.

“They said you lived beyond the Gate, eating magic beasts alone.”

“Yes.”

“As I said, it is a hard story to believe.”

Kim Gyu-jin’s white pupil occasionally lost focus and shook uneasily.

“If even I think this way, they would be even worse.”

“Who are ‘they’?”

“To deceive the enemy, you must first grasp how much the enemy knows. That is the basic of information warfare.”

“I’m just a former regular soldier, so I don’t know about such things.”

“It means you should be careful.”

Kim Gyu-jin pulled something from his chest and gave it to Se-min. It was his business card. Even in the military, he had been a major at a young age, and this time, his rank seemed to be quite high as well.

“How did you become a police officer?”

“We are attached here and there, but in the end, we belong to the Raider Bureau. There is no exception for anyone who possesses aura.”

“So you mean you used connections?”

Kim Gyu-jin smiled faintly.

“Contact me if you are interested.”

“Yes?”

“There aren’t many Raiders who deliberately want to work as police officers. We are always short-handed. That’s why we maintain contract relations with trustworthy Raiders. The pay varies depending on the target.”

It meant they entrusted the disposal of criminals to Raiders and paid them. It was a concept like bounty hunters.

Se-min smiled.

“You mean I am trustworthy?”

“Yes.”

“Since none other than Gyu-jin hyeongnim is praising me, I’m embarrassed.”

Although Kim Gyu-jin raised his eyebrows at the title of “brother,” he did not make any particular rejection. Instead, he said something else.

“At that time, you returned to save your comrade-in-arms.”

Se-min’s face stiffened.

It was the story of Yoon Woo-jae.

“A person’s true colors appear in such moments. Just as that guy was different from you.”

Se-min smiled bitterly. He had saved Yoon Woo-jae, and Yoon Woo-jae had abandoned him. He did not hold a grudge now.

“Thank you for thinking highly of me, Brother.”

“Let’s get up.”

“What will happen to those guys?”

“It will end with a fine.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong and the Nine Dragons Association Raider who had fought were writing statements at the police station.

The two left the cafe and headed toward the police station.

Se-min looked at Kim Gyu-jin anew. The black uniform looked dignified on him. In the past, he had been a taciturn principled man, and once he entered battle, he was a terrifying beast. The criminals who had to deal with such a person seemed rather pitiful instead.

Hyeon Jae-yeong and Kim Ye-na were coming out of the entrance of the police station.

“Lee Se-min.”

Kim Gyu-jin grabbed Se-min’s shoulder.

He whispered quietly into Se-min’s ear.

“Be careful of the Raider Bureau.”

Ending with those words, he walked forward with steady steps. Se-min wanted to ask more, but his back was refusing any questions.

What did it mean to be careful of the Raider Bureau?

Se-min stroked the outline of the necklace hanging near his chest, pondering Kim Gyu-jin’s words.

“Brother.”

Hyeon Jae-yeong approached, glanced at Kim Gyu-jin’s retreating back, and said.

“Thanks to him, it ended quickly. That guy was writing his statement for a long time.”

“Right. What did they say about the punishment?”

“We got off with a warning. They told us not to fight in the future.”

“That’s a relief.”

It was not common to end a fight between Raiders with just a warning. Since Kim Gyu-jin was not the type to personally pull strings, it seemed they had let it slide on their own.

Se-min scolded Kim Ye-na.

“Why do you get into fights with a Raider?”

“Did I do it on purpose?”

“Jae-yeong ended up like this because of you.”

Se-min pointed to Hyeon Jae-yeong’s face. His face was slightly swollen. Kim Ye-na became sullen and cupped his face.

“Oppa, let’s go to the hospital.”

“It’s fine. I can just apply some ointment.”

“What should I do now that my handsome oppa’s face is hurt?”

“Why are you like this? My Ye-na, don’t frown.”

“Hing.”

Se-min turned around without a word.

After their relationship got better, a side effect occurred. Looking at the two together made his blood pressure rise.

Thinking of it as the karma of having promoted Hyeon Jae-yeong to the Green-mark, Se-min raised his hand to hail a taxi.

“Brother, you’re taking a taxi?”

“I’m going home alone, so whether you two go to the hospital or not is up to you.”

“Goodbye, oppa!”

Kim Ye-na waved her hand excitedly. Se-min pointed at Kim Ye-na, stuck out his lips, and shook his head.

She’s hopeless.

As if the meaning had been conveyed, Kim Ye-na kept waving her hand while making a sour face.

Se-min glared at her once in return and climbed into the taxi that stopped in front of him.

By the time he was done being caught up in the love drama, it was already dusk.

Come to think of it, how would the story of the two people who were the source of the problem progress? He was very curious.

Whose words were correct? Did she really cheat? Who was the biological father? Hasty assumptions generate doubts and suspicions.

“I should ask Ye-na later.”

Se-min opened his cell phone.

There was news that a Missing Gate had opened in Gangwon Province.

Civilian casualties numbered in the dozens. The magic beasts that appeared were Zorgs, Kargs, and a small number of Mallaks. They were not high-difficulty magic beasts, but that was by the standards of Raiders.

Magic beasts slaughtered numerous humans in a short period of time.

Even the lowest-grade magic beast was a disaster to civilians.

Raiders were deployed belatedly and annihilated the magic beasts as quickly as possible. The time it took to do so was about an hour.

That one hour.

Numerous people lost their lives.

The names of the deceased were displayed in order, and citizens mourned them. In the photo within the article, the bereaved families were wailing. A donation number for the victims popped up.

Se-min let out a sigh.

Something he could never get used to.

It was something he did not want to get used to.

Se-min turned off the internet and opened his contacts. He connected to Yoo Sang-heun. He answered as if he had been waiting.

He suddenly said.

[Evaluating in light of history, it is definitely a big club.]

“Yes…”

He still held a grudge.

“Brother, is there work today?”

[I thought you were leaving work. You want to do it?]

“If there is one, I’ll do it.”

[A night raid. Let’s see. One is opening in Jamsil, you want to go?]

“I’ll go.”

[Right. Se-min is wonderful. A Raider should raid. You shouldn’t fall in love like someone else.]

A certain percentage of Se-min’s raid reward goes to him. A capitalist’s smile must be hanging on his lips right now.

[I’ll send the files, so check them.]

“Got it.”

Se-min hung up the phone and spoke to the taxi driver.

“Driver, please go toward Jamsil.”

He was a Raider.

A Raider’s job was to annihilate magic beasts.

It was a karma that would not end as long as the Gate did not disappear.

***

“If you are a Raider, you must make a lot of money, right?”

There were people who asked this.

Then Se-min usually replied by shrugging his shoulders and saying it was not bad.

“You must be happy?”

When the conversation continued like this, Se-min shook his head and made a bitter expression toward the person.

“You don’t seem very happy?”

“Because the prosperity of the raid business means that the magic beasts are running rampant that much.”

“Ah, you’re right. As expected, an active worker thinks differently.”

The other party smirked at Se-min while sipping coffee.

“Still, maybe because I don’t have practical experience yet, when someone says Raider, I only think it’s cool and makes good money.”

“I was like that too.”

“But, Raider-nim.”

He glanced at Se-min’s old scooter parked at the entrance of the cafe.

“You seem to be a frugal style.”

Se-min leaned back and nodded.

“I always prepare for crisis. You could say I’m a prepper of the raid industry.”

“A prepper?”

“Raid ends if the Gate doesn’t open. The apocalypse will come. And we don’t know when that will come.”

“Will it really be like that?”

“Of course.”

Se-min pointed to himself with his thumb.

“Since the super rookie of the raid world, the magic beast slayer, the magic beast cleaner Lee Se-min has appeared, the magic beasts will soon get scared and stop coming. You should save up too.”

“Wow, you are cool.”

“Don’t make up things you don’t mean.”

“It’s true.”

“It wasn’t just on the level of cool. I hate cutting words short and simplifying. Weren’t you so impressed that you wanted to kneel and kiss my feet?”

“Wow. You must also read minds.”

“It’s essential to survive in the jungle-like SH Company.”

“Just thinking about it makes my heart race.”

The person Se-min was talking to was a prospective Raider who had just turned twenty, named Bang Jin-young.

Thanks to Se-min’s beast-of-burden-like raid performance, Yoo Sang-heun’s SH Company was able to gain the favor of the Raider Bureau and be allocated high-yield Gates. They also scouted new Raiders.

The scale of the company gradually grew.

Yoo Sang-heun, an overseas football enthusiast, declared the recruitment of trainees, saying that SH Company must also establish a youth system.

In the list of aura-compatible individuals compiled in this way, the one Yoo Sang-heun anticipated the most was Bang Jin-young, who was in front of him. Her aptitude was not bad, and her personality was amiable.

However, Se-min was somehow not satisfied. Looking at Bang Jin-young reminded him of Park In-jae, who originally should have been preparing to become a Raider like her around this time.

If it were the current Se-min, he would have had many things to teach Park In-jae.

He felt regretful once again.

***

“Since you’ve probably received several contracts, you should roughly know. The terms are as follows.”

Se-min handed over a contract he had prepared. It was not a formal contract, but a summary of the clauses she needed to pay attention to.

Contract terms in the raid industry were standardized to some extent. For Bang Jin-young, it was a time to contemplate the scale and future of the company rather than the contract itself.

Bang Jin-young looked at the contract terms and lifted her head.

“Raider-nim.”

“Why?”

“If I join SH Company, what do you think is the biggest advantage?”

Se-min looked at Bang Jin-young.

“Honestly.”

Bang Jin-young added with a laugh. Se-min glanced at his cell phone. A message had arrived. Checking the content, Se-min replied.

“You can guess by looking at me, but it would be that there are many handsome oppas in the company.”

“Really?”

Bang Jin-young smiled brightly. Se-min slightly twitched his eyebrows.

“Of course. Look at me.”

Se-min winked at her and stood up from his seat.

“Then think about it carefully. I’m leaving now.”

“It was nice meeting you.”

“Bye-bye.”

Se-min turned around.

He put the cell phone to his ear as he left the cafe. A booming voice greeted him.

[Customer. It is just as I texted you.]

“Really?”

[Yes. It’s information from a reliable source, and I’ll let you know the details in person.]

“I’ll go now.”

Se-min hung up the phone and pondered the message.

In it, this was written.

[Gate forecast. Einkel appearance expected. Reliability A.]

***

“I beg of you,”

Se-min said.

The support team leader of the Raider Bureau looked troubled.

“Seeing Se-min speak to this extent, it seems to be an important matter.”

“Yes.”

Se-min had obtained information about the Einkel forecast through an errand center. He did not reveal where or how he obtained the information, but hinted at internal information, saying in passing that human tongues become infinitely light when money is involved.

Even so, it did not mean Se-min could hunt Einkel right away. The Raider Bureau would have already allocated the raid to a large corporation.

Se-min met the support team leader with whom he had a friendly relationship and pleaded.

“An Einkel…”

“I want to at least spin the roulette.”

“Hmm.”

The corpses of magic beasts are automatically put up for auction. In cases where multiple Raiders required the corpse, the right to purchase was granted randomly by spinning a roulette.

Joo Won-ho, the support team leader of the Raider Bureau, stared at Se-min’s face.

His face, which had always possessed a playful look, was serious. The jokes, which he could not tell if they were sincere or just a concept, had vanished without a trace now.

“Einkel.”

Joo Won-ho sighed, muttering the name of the magic beast.

A bizarre magic beast capable of regenerating a human’s body.

Demand for high-value species was always overflowing. That was the power of the Raider Bureau, which monopolized Gate forecasts.

“Although it is not a matter I can decide.”

Joo Won-ho glanced up. Perhaps curiosity had been piqued by the news that the rumored nutcase, Factory, had arrived, as office staff were unnecessarily walking back and forth in the support team’s office.

They avoided Joo Won-ho’s gaze with awkward smiles.

“Since there are things Se-min has done for us so far, I will speak to the higher-ups seriously.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m sorry I can’t give you a firm answer.”

“What you have said is already enough.”

Se-min had taken on and processed ultra-small Gates and low-value raids, which had been headaches for the Raider Bureau. Furthermore, he executed multiple raids in a single day. It was an amazing digestion capacity.

Most Raiders conduct raids once every few days due to tension and physical pressure.

Se-min was like a welcome rain to the front-line employees of the Raider Bureau.

“I saw you did several raids all day yesterday as well.”

“If there is a Gate, I just get rid of it.”

“Don’t push yourself too hard. You should be a Raider for a long time.”

“You don’t have to worry about that.”

Se-min grinned.

“Because I am the magic beast cleaner, the magic beast slayer, the natural-born magic beast killer Lee Se-min.”

He returned to his usual self again.

Joo Won-ho laughed out loud.

“It was a needless worry. Since you are here anyway, would you like to receive a Raider checkup before you go?”

“It’s fine. I have to go to a raid soon.”

“Oh dear. Be careful.”

Se-min stood up.

“Thank you for listening. I will head out now.”

“Yes. See you again.”

Se-min bowed his head in farewell and left the office.

Once the door closed, the computer room and human resources staff who had been lingering around the office tossed out words one by one.

“He’s normal?”

“I thought they said he was a crazy person?”

“Wasn’t it just exaggerated for no reason?”

The support team staff who had experienced Se-min so far merely shook their heads.

Joo Won-ho said.

“Support Team 25 has a raid soon. Let’s get ready.”

“Yes!”

Joo Won-ho refreshed the messy atmosphere and then turned on the company messenger.

The recipient was the head of the forecasting office, who oversaw Gate forecasting and Raider allocation.

He was not someone met often. The forecasting office was a core department of the Raider Bureau, and the head tended to associate with paper-pushers rather than field workers like Joo Won-ho.

“What should I say?”

Joo Won-ho carefully chose his words.

He had worked at the Raider Bureau for over ten years. In his youth, he had wanted to become a Raider, but possessing no talent, he devoted himself to the Raider Bureau.

The breed known as Raiders that he experienced was not a very pleasant opponent.

In the field, he saw the bare faces of the privileged class, bound by greed and selfishness.

Their top priority was money.

The next was about honor.

Raiders fighting to protect citizens was a thing of the past.

Then, what about the man named Lee Se-min?

Externally, he was not someone like a hero of justice. However, his true nature hidden behind a rowdy appearance was rather suitable for an embarrassing fairy tale.

How did he know?

His colleague was in the social contribution department of the Raider Bureau.

Factory’s name was mentioned there as well.

“Will this much do?”

Joo Won-ho sent a long message to the head of the forecasting office.

He did not expect much. He just wanted to show the minimum sincerity.

“Huh?”

However, a reply came immediately.

***

The hour hand pointing to midnight had already tilted toward the next slot.

Se-min dropped by the company after finishing the raid.

He opened the locked door of the training ground and turned on the lights.

The darkness receded, and the rough texture of the concrete floor unfolded. Se-min walked to the center. The lighting divided his shadow into several paths. As Se-min lifted the claymore, his shadows also soared in all directions.

He swung the sword.

It was a restrained aura.

When one reaches a high level, one realizes that the technique of generating sword qi is nothing but a waste.

Aura lurks beneath the blade. A momentary contact is sufficient for the projection of power. However, since there was no enemy here, the Tai Chi Wisdom pressed him with unquenched thirst and rang the sword cry.

Se-min closed his eyes.

He set up an imaginary enemy.

His enemies were magic beasts. At one time it was a Zorg, and later it was a Brucus. Even listing only the names of the guys he had met in the north and beyond the Gate would make a single blank sheet of paper insufficient.

But sometimes there were other things.

After stroking the outline of the necklace situated beneath his T-shirt once, Se-min thrust out the claymore.

The sword pierced the empty air like an arrow leaving a bowstring. Se-min’s aura exploded as if bursting, causing an impact. The aura, which had not yet faded, discharged with a fizz and rang a lingering echo.

Once a single strike ended, he suppressed his aura again.

Rash actions were forbidden. He controlled himself and waited until the enemy showed a gap. Since a fight was for the sake of killing once weapons were held, and a brief instant was sufficient for a life to fall, he had to hide his teeth and stare at the enemy until he caught that brief instant.

And that brief instant.

Se-min turned around and swung widely.

The attack range drawing a semicircle expanded two-fold with aura on its back. Two-fold became four-fold, and four-fold became eight-fold. When squared once again, the entire training ground was filled with his sword qi.

A whirlwind swept through the training ground.

Around the time the training ground grew quiet as the aura completely subsided, Se-min raised the claymore above his head.

Slowly, the tip of the sword descended.

It was a slow, slow stroke.

However, everything within that slow trajectory was decimated.

The dust floating in the air was fragmented into smaller pieces. The currents of the wind were cut into pieces to become afterimages, and the sound of breathing was eliminated. The aura floating around the training ground was split and returned to the world.

With this sword, he would return the arm to him.

Se-min killed the enemy in his mind.

Harmful magic beast system number 77, Einkel.

Se-min had never faced it directly either. It was a bizarre species with excellent regenerative powers, which hid itself by assimilating into the surrounding environment, and sometimes parasitized the body of a stronger magic beast.

Its combat power was also not to be underestimated, so solo raids were not allowed for those below the Gold-mark, and even in group raids, it was rare for an opportunity to come to a Blue-mark.

However, he obtained permission.

The message from the Raider Bureau was that it was a reward for what he had done so far, and they requested his active performance like this in the future as well.

“It’s hard to believe.”

Se-min muttered.

Although he had personally gone and requested it, he had naturally thought it would not be granted.

He was still only a Blue-mark. Going to the Raider Bureau was a kind of gesture. The purpose was to continuously make them recognize that he needed Einkel, and thereby get allocated to the Einkel raid as quickly as possible when it eventually came.

Yet it happened immediately.

Se-min opened his cell phone. He pondered the message from the Raider Bureau. Along with praise for him, a request to dedicate himself to society in the future was written. There were only good words.

Se-min smirked as he turned off the cell phone screen.

He did not believe in words. What represented existence was action, not words. And the path the Raider Bureau had shown was never this kind.

Kim Gyu-jin’s words telling him to be careful of the Raider Bureau came to mind.

It was an unknown matter.

Perhaps they were trying to place a burden on him using this as an excuse.

Anyway, the opportunity had come. He had promised to return the arm to Park In-jae. Se-min would participate in the Einkel raid and would spin the roulette. If it did not work, he would do it until it did.

He opened Park In-jae’s profile in the cell phone messenger. A photo of Park In-jae making a V-sign against the backdrop of a foreign landscape appeared.

He said he had become a college student now and was studying in the department of social welfare. He was a consistent fellow. Se-min smirked.

If Dokgo Cheonma had raised Se-min up, Park In-jae had shown him the way.

Se-min did not abandon his debts.

“I am Lee Se-min, a true man.”

Se-min accessed the Transcendent Network.

Today, the transcendents were chatterting about the cuisine of their own dimensions. They even used points to post photos of food to preach how wonderful the delicacies of their worlds tasted.

Dokgo Cheonma, who was subtly boasting about the cuisine of her world, was also there.

Title: It is food like livestock feed.

Author: The Greatest Demon of All Time Dokgo Cheonma

I am the Greatest Demon of All Time, and at the same time, the greatest gourmet of all time. Do not discuss food before me.

(Photo)

On a bowl made of gold, ingredients of unidentified identity were gorgeously decorated. Perhaps because it was a Murim world, the food was also Chinese-style.

Se-min nodded.

“As expected, there is nothing my Brother cannot do.”

However, he captured something.

It was a single strand of hair.

It was a long strand of hair.

Was it his wife’s hair? Or was the cook a woman?

Perhaps Brother Dokgo Cheonma had long hair. Since it was the Murim world, that would rather be correct.

Se-min posted a comment.

Raider Lee Se-min: As expected of you, Brother. It looks so delicious. Loyalty, loyalty ^^7

He had more people to repay his debts to.

Dokgo Cheonma.

How could he repay that debt? In the future, if he became a strong person who could stand shoulder to shoulder with the transcendents here, he might be able to do something then.

When that day came, Se-min would willingly spend points to go to Dokgo Cheonma.

And after that, to sister Iana as well…

“Ahem, daily training until that day.”

Se-min swung the sword again.