Chapter 4

“……Ah.”

Drip.

A red drop of blood trickled from Seong-ha’s nose and fell to the ground. The crimson traces that splattered across the vivid green blades of grass blurred painfully in her vision.

Seong-ha instinctively covered her nose with one hand and read the window floating in midair.

[See? I told you to stop.]

[If you enhance too many weapons at your current level, your body won’t be able to withstand it and will collapse.]

“Really? Then once my skill level goes up, I’ll be able to enhance more weapons at once, right?”

[Ha, yes. You’re right.]

So it wasn’t just the grade of the weapons she could enhance that would increase.

Seong-ha, who had enhanced seven weapons over the course of a single day, committed this newly discovered information to memory.

At that moment, a dizzying pain struck her as though someone were violently shaking her brain. Her breathing grew ragged.

[So you can stop now.]

“I have to be thoroughly prepared. If I make even one mistake, I’ll die.”

[What you’ve made already is more than enough.]

“That’s something we’ll only know after I try.”

As if even the blood that had unintentionally flowed from her nose were too precious to waste, Seong-ha gathered the blood smeared across both hands into her palms. Then she wiped it over the arrows she had placed on the ground.

‘This time, not enhancement. Weapon crafting.’

When she activated the Weapon Crafting skill on an arrow with a broken tip, it began glowing brightly and gradually transformed into a body that was longer than its original form.

[Weapon Crafting (S-Rank)

Level: Lv. 1

Description: Uses the caster’s blood to transform an existing weapon into a weapon desired by the caster.]

Why her ability, unlike everyone else’s, used blood as its medium, and why that blood could transform weapons and even enhance them—everything about it was a mystery.

But Seong-ha firmly suppressed the questions welling up inside her.

‘They said they’d tell me everything once I get out of the dungeon. Everything I needed to know and everything I didn’t.’

There was no need to dig into it right now. Seong-ha glanced at the window telling her it was time to go defeat the boss.

[Let’s go.]

“Yeah.”

Whether it ended in success or failure, she would try everything she could.

Muttering to herself, Seong-ha endured the throbbing pain stabbing through her head and gathered up all the weapons she had made, clutching them in her arms.

Then, when she finally reached the lake she had seen from afar, Seong-ha reconsidered her judgment.

‘That was supposed to be the size of a school field?’

She must have been seeing things wrong earlier. If the scenery she had seen after entering the dungeon hadn’t consisted of dense tropical rainforest, she would have thought the lake was an ocean rather than a lake.

“So the boss is in there.”

[That’s right. It’s at the bottom of that lake.]

[The foul-tempered bastard hiding beneath that lake is called Capricorn.]

“Capricorn? That’s the first time I’ve heard of it.”

[Of course it is. Those creatures are powerful beings that came from another dimension. It has the head of a goat and the body of a fish, and it occasionally fires water cannons. It becomes weaker outside the water, so you can use that to make things a little easier.]

“That works out. I was just starting to feel like going fishing.”

She had never gone fishing even once in her life, yet she was about to catch something terrifying for her very first attempt.

She had abandoned the absurd plan of catching the boss with a fishing rod long ago. But with her painfully weak body, throwing a net or fishing net and dragging the boss out of the water was also impossible.

‘Then there’s only one answer. Lure the boss out of the water and shoot it to death.’

Seong-ha carefully prepared the weapons she had brought while keeping an eye on the surface of the lake. The gentle ripples were so still that there wasn’t even a hint of wind disturbing them.

That silence became a suffocating tension pressing down on her shoulders.

Her mouth was parched, but there was no hesitation in the fingertips carrying out the plan she had devised in her head.

Having died and come back to life, she had no shortage of blood to spend on enhancing and transforming weapons. Sunlight gleamed like poison along the tips of the weapons born from her blood-soaked hands.

After finishing all her preparations, Seong-ha spun the dagger in her hand.

“……All right. Let’s catch ourselves a big one.”

Taking aim at the center of the lake, Seong-ha hurled the Hellfire Dagger with all her strength.

Bang-!

Boom!!

The Hellfire Dagger possessed an A-Rank Fire Explosion skill. If the Fire Explosion activated just as the dagger collided with the surface of the lake, it would be more than enough to draw out the boss monster resting at the bottom.

A column of water shot high into the air, ruthlessly shattering the silence that had settled over the lake. Droplets exploded in every direction, scattering wildly.

And the shockwave that rocked the vast lake reached the predator that had presumably been resting on the bottom.

The predator, having discovered the outsider who had disturbed its rest, hauled its massive body along and personally emerged from the lake to kill Seong-ha.

—Meeeeeeeh!

It was the moment Seong-ha had been waiting for.

[It’s out!]

“Good. Next!”

Capricorn’s glossy, bright-yellow eyes fixed upon Seong-ha.

As the goat’s head with its pair of horns emerged from the lake, the overflowing water surged with a deep rumble, reaching Seong-ha and soaking the hem of her pants.

But Seong-ha calmly took her position behind the spear gun she had set up beforehand.

The spear gun, now resembling a crossbow large enough to accommodate harpoons the size of spears, was much taller than she was. It had been made from a broken sword.

Ha Seong-ha knew her own shortcomings better than anyone.

Her physical abilities couldn’t even compare to those of other S-Rank Hunters.

No matter how many A-Rank weapons she created, she knew better than anyone that she couldn’t throw one accurately enough to hit an enemy standing in the middle of the lake.

[Fire!]

That was precisely why she was also someone capable of creating weapons that could compensate for her abilities better than anyone else.

She now had both the knowledge and the ability to create a weapon capable of piercing an enemy’s heart.

Whoosh-!

Thunk!

The harpoon tore fiercely through the air before embedding itself in Capricorn’s torso.

To Capricorn, the harpoon was barely larger than a toothpick.

But perhaps irritated by the stinging pain, Capricorn slammed the surface of the water with its enormous fish tail, large enough to cover Seong-ha entirely.

Even as she was drenched by the heavy rain of water pouring down on her, Seong-ha grabbed another harpoon and loaded it into the spear gun.

What she held in her hands was no longer an arrow with a broken tip.

It was an A-Rank harpoon.

[Keep firing!]

“I know!”

And it was a harpoon forged from her own blood.

—Meeeeeeeh!!

With three more harpoons embedded in its torso, Capricorn twisted its body, then opened its mouth wide and inhaled deeply.

Sensing danger instinctively, Seong-ha hurriedly grabbed only the spear gun and a harpoon nearly as large as her own body, then ran for her life.

[Run to the right! Behind the big tree on the right!]

KRAAAASH!

Following the notification window’s instructions, she threw herself behind the tree. The moment she did, the place where she had been standing was completely obliterated by the powerful water cannon Capricorn fired.

Even so, Seong-ha loaded the final harpoon into the spear gun and aimed it at Capricorn.

But her arms were trembling so badly that she kept missing her aim. Seong-ha cursed harshly.

“Damn it, damn it! Get a grip! Are you going to fucking die like this?!”

She firmly clamped the spear gun between her thighs and took aim at Capricorn’s head.

Whoosh!

Thunk!

The final spear embedded itself in Capricorn’s body.

Furious, Capricorn roared and slammed its tail against the surface of the water.

BOOM! BOOM!

The repeated impacts shook the ground.

Bosses of at least A-Rank dungeons like Capricorn were naturally resistant to the attributes they were vulnerable to.

That thing lived in the water, so it should be weak against the electric attribute. Of course, considering how powerful it was, it would have some resistance to ordinary electricity……

[Special Harpoon (A-Rank)

Attribute: Lightning

Crafter: Ha Seong-ha

Durability: 100/100

Lightning Discharge Activation Condition: Clap]

If Capricorn had even a shred of common sense, there was no way it could withstand the electricity released simultaneously by the five A-Rank weapons embedded in its body.

Seong-ha grinned fiercely despite the water droplets running down her cheeks and brought her hands together.

“Die.”

Clap!

With the crisp sound of flesh striking flesh, the entire world flashed pure white.

“Senior, shouldn’t we be leaving soon?”

Seo Woong let out a deep sigh as he looked at his senior, who had set up camp in front of the dungeon and still showed no intention of returning to the company.

It had already been a week since they had been staying in front of the dungeon that the A-Rank team led by Ha Seong-dan of the Zodiac Guild had abandoned.

Since they were one of the top teams in Korea, the fact that they had given up on conquering a mere A-Rank dungeon had become quite a major issue.

And then there was the fact that a dragon, something that normally appeared only in S-Rank dungeons, had emerged.

There was no way journalists constantly hunting for the next big story would let such fresh bait slip away.

But that had already happened a week ago.

Now, in front of the A-Rank dungeon where they stood, there was no one left except Seo Woong, his senior, and Hee-jin.

“No. That person still hasn’t come out of the dungeon.”

“Ha Seong-ha? Well…… they said Ha Seong-dan had unofficially entered the dungeon with her, but Zodiac ultimately gave no comment. They said there was no reason to go into details.”

Seo Woong spoke as he searched his memory.

All attention had been focused on Ha Seong-dan’s team after they abandoned the A-Rank dungeon and came out.

A week after exiting the dungeon, Ha Seong-dan held a press conference to reveal what had happened inside.

It was there that they disclosed the identity of the monster they had encountered in the dungeon.

But amid all those revelations, there had been no mention of Ha Seong-ha, the S-Rank Hunter who had entered the dungeon but never come out.

Hearing Seo Woong’s words, Hee-jin gave a sharp, mocking laugh and opened her bloodshot eyes wide.

“Hey. You actually believe that?”

“Huh?”

“Zodiac Guild may have only recently started using Ha Seong-ha as a bridge to form an alliance with Cheongwol Guild, but even a passing dog knows that the relationship between the Ha siblings has completely fallen apart.”

“That…… is true.”

“Let’s be honest as journalists. What’s more likely? A dragon, something you can hardly even see in an S-Rank dungeon, suddenly appearing in an A-Rank dungeon? Or Ha Seong-dan killing Ha Seong-ha, whom he considered a thorn in his side, inside the dungeon? Especially when she isn’t even his biological sister?”

“…….”

Seo Woong swallowed dryly and stared silently at his senior.

In her eyes, the strange light emanating from the dungeon gate seemed to flicker like madness.

“Sure, Ha Seong-dan gave up on that A-Rank dungeon, so maybe a dragon really did appear. But just suppose. What if Ha Seong-ha, who everyone thought was dead, comes out of that dungeon alive?”

“What?”

“Don’t you remember what Ha Seong-dan said at the press conference?”

“‘We will not be accepting questions regarding Hunter Ha Seong-ha’?”

“Exactly. We don’t know why they said that, but who knows? Maybe Ha Seong-ha didn’t die in the dungeon. And what if we’re the first journalists to reveal that fact?”

Seo Woong looked at his senior with exasperation.

In short, she had seen the slightest possibility left in Ha Seong-dan’s statement and was now wasting her time here, suffering through every possible hardship because of it.

Damn it. My poor life.

How did I end up with someone this crazy as my senior?

Just as Seo Woong lamented his fate and covered his eyes with both hands, Hee-jin’s low, rapid voice came from beside him.

“We’re the only ones who might get to see Hunter Ha Seong-ha return alive right now. If we break the exclusive story first, the incentive is practically guaranteed…… Huh……? Uh……?!”

“What is it?”

“Hey! Over there! Look over there! Isn’t someone coming out of the gate right now?!”

“What? Are you sure you’re not seeing thi—Gasp!”

Seo Woong glanced toward the dungeon gate Hee-jin was pointing at and his mouth fell open.

Someone was walking out of the dungeon that no one had approached for nearly a week.

It was unmistakably a person.

A woman covered from head to toe in blood was walking out while clutching several harpoons that looked like spears.

Her waistband bulged as though something had been stuffed inside her pants, but with her entire body covered in blood, it didn’t attract much attention.

The woman frowned as though she hadn’t expected to find anyone standing in front of her, then relaxed her expression.

“……People? Ah, are you journalists?”

“Yes? Yes! C-Could you possibly be Hunter Ha Seong-ha?”

“Yes.”

“Whoa, this is insane…….”

Seo Woong hurriedly covered his mouth, which had involuntarily let out an exclamation of astonishment at the exchange between Hee-jin and Seong-ha.

Seong-ha glanced briefly at him, then noticed the camera in Hee-jin’s hand. As though she had just thought of something, she twisted up one corner of her mouth into a sly smile.

“Reporter.”

“Yes, yes?”

“Could you publish an article for me?”

“Of course!”

“Then, as for the headline……”

Seong-ha adjusted her grip on the numerous weapons in her arms once more.

The weapons clattered against one another, their metallic sound echoing through the silence in front of the dungeon gate.

“……‘The Birth of an Advanced Weapon Crafter’ sounds good.”