LTTH C74

Chapter 74

“Darling, you’re alright.”

A firm voice cut through the fear saturating the air and pulled Hansol back to himself. James stood squared against the monster, not budging an inch. He was the world’s top-ranked hunter—there was no way he would fail against something of this level. There was simply no way.

Then why am I anxious?

Hansol’s heart was pounding far too rapidly. He forced himself to scan the surroundings. Unlike the blood-soaked scene before them, the rest of the area remained eerily pristine. Nothing had changed—the space looked exactly as it had moments ago when it was just a normal measurement room. There was no gate break. No new gate. Nothing. So where had that thing come from?

While Hansol’s thoughts raced, James met the charging dwarf-sized creature head-on, blocking it easily with his thick arms. Hansol had expected the monster to be flung across the room, but strangely, it held its ground, shockingly managing to withstand James’s strength. Still, that didn’t mean James was at a disadvantage. Not even close.

Hansol could not imagine James losing to a single monster. Even if he couldn’t properly use mana in here. That assumption might have held—if only the first one hadn’t appeared out of thin air.

A cluster of identical monsters materialized. They didn’t immediately close in; instead, their bodies twitched unsettlingly, as if they needed time to determine their target.

“James, watch out!”

When the number of dwarf creatures jumped from one to five in a blink, Hansol grabbed the back of James’s shirt and tugged. Now was the only chance to run. Inside the Association headquarters, they were at a severe disadvantage—the mana-disruption magic circle suppressed both Hansol and James.

“We need to get outside. The mana-blocking formation here is too strong!”

“OK. I’ll break through—stick close!”

James turned sharply, reacting immediately to Hansol’s warning. The dwarf creature he’d been facing froze, momentarily confused by its target’s sudden disappearance.

Taking advantage of that narrow window, James sprinted toward the exit with astonishing speed, Hansol on his heels. Thankfully, the dwarves were slow. They tried to follow, but their movements glitched, halting at odd intervals like lagging video frames. Thanks to that unnatural delay, Hansol and James burst safely out of the Association—

—or so Hansol thought.

“What… what is this?”

“Fu*k!”

Pandemonium.

Safety? The word felt obscene in the face of this carnage. Screams and shouts tore through the air. People ran for their lives; others fought with desperate abandon. Corpses—human and monster alike—were scattered across the ground like discarded mannequins.

Everywhere Hansol looked was devastation. Compared to this, the scene inside the Association had been almost serene. Only two people had died in there.

“Healing Light! Prayer of Restoration!”

No one had asked for help; no one had even seen him yet. But Hansol reacted instinctively, firing off his healing spells.

To his shock, the first thing to react was not a fleeing civilian nor a beleaguered hunter—but a monster.

This one was different from the dwarves inside. It had the height of an adult man, brown skin, pointed ears, and long, slitted eyes. When Hansol’s light touched it, it shrieked and recoiled violently.

…My healing spell hurts it?

“Undead?” Hansol muttered.

“No. It doesn’t have that signature aura,” James answered automatically.

Right. There was none of that sticky, foul, undead energy. But the spell did damage it. What on earth was it?

“I’ll keep using it. It seems to work.”

“…Please do.”

Escape looked nearly impossible through the hellscape ahead. So Hansol and James planted themselves in front of the Association building.

Between Hansol’s waves of radiant light, James raised his arm, a golden shield materializing before him—an amplification of Hansol’s blessing. The brilliance of Hansol’s healing magic and the dazzling flare of James’s skill drew immediate attention. Hunters, quick to assess danger, rushed over to join them.

The two-man frontline swelled to more than ten fighters in moments.

Hansol tended to the most severely wounded while scanning the area. Monsters. Only monsters. The screams of civilians had vanished. Perhaps they’d escaped to safety… but judging from the scene before them, it was far more likely no one had survived this immediate zone.

Hansol bit down hard on his lip. If he’d used his healing quicker… maybe someone could have been saved. A sharp, bitter regret rose to his throat.

“Thank you, Messiah.”

“Can’t believe we’re seeing the Messiah here of all places…”

Just stepping into Hansol’s healing radius allowed minor wounds to mend instantly. Hunters voiced their gratitude one by one. Hansol bowed back, but joy was far from his heart. He had saved some—but far more had died.

Messiah.

He’d known the alias was widespread. But for even ordinary hunters to recognize his face? That was unsettling. His image must have circulated far more widely than he’d thought.

“If you’ve got time to chat, kill one more instead!”

Still blocking monsters at the front, James barked without even glancing back. The reprimand snapped tense attention back into the hunters, who tightened formation.

“I’ll take the right—move to the left.”

“You’re ranged, get to the back!”

Thanks to their coordination, the monsters began to thin. If they held just a bit longer, they would be able to move. They needed to get to the Mage Tower. That had to be the safest place now.

“James, we need to break through toward the Tower.”

“Yeah, it’s the safest place left.”

Step by step, they fought their way forward, maintaining their defensive formation. And then—

Light gathered beside Hansol.

James reacted instantly, yanking Hansol into his arms. The falling dwarf monsters earlier had all been heralded by flashes of light. If another was about to spawn right next to Hansol—

“Hansol?”

“…Kassie!”

But instead of another monster, the small sphere of light dissolved, revealing an all-too-familiar figure. Kassie touched down lightly, tilting his head at the sight of Hansol trapped against James’s chest.

Relief washed through Hansol. A high-level mage appearing at a time like this was nothing short of salvation.

“How did you get here?”

“Hansol wasn’t coming back, so I got worried and checked. I didn’t expect… this.”

Kassie’s blue eyes swept over the war-zone-like streets. It was chaos on par with England at its worst. He circulated mana through his body, expanding his detection field in all directions.

“Let’s move to safety.”

A swirl of blue light enveloped Hansol, James, and the surviving hunters around them. In the next instant, they vanished from the battlefield.

Behind them, the street fell eerily still—save for the distant laughter of monsters, soot rising toward the sky, the acrid smell of burning, and the crunch of inhuman footsteps. Not a single sound belonged to a living person.