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Chapter 8
Su-hyeok quietly slipped toward the enemy’s hideout, following the crimson line cutting through the night air.
The scooter’s engine sounded strangely lonely.
As the dazzling neon lights of downtown Seoul faded into the distance, the scenery gradually took on the color of death.
It was an abandoned district where redevelopment had come to a halt.
After being overrun by monsters during the Gate Break years ago, the area had never been rebuilt, and redevelopment plans had long since been abandoned.
Buildings stripped down to their skeletons stood in rows like enormous gravestones.
Su-hyeok stopped midway.
Any further engine noise would only shatter the silence.
He pushed the scooter into the overgrown weeds of an abandoned house’s yard and took a deep breath.
The stale odor of dust unique to ruins mixed with the damp smell of mold stabbed at his lungs.
He took out the Reaper’s Robe from his delivery bag and put it on.
The moment the robe touched his body, it felt as though the surrounding temperature dropped by a couple of degrees.
Rather than discomfort, the chilling cold sharpened his senses.
The crimson thread flowing across the ground now pulsed through the darkness like a living blood vessel.
He began walking after it.
After cautiously following it for quite some time, its end led to the basement of a four-story building whose outer walls had crumbled away.
“This is it.”
Descending the stairs, he heard muffled voices beyond a thick iron door that was firmly shut.
“Around ten of them.”
Su-hyeok slowed his heartbeat and heightened every one of his senses.
The possibility that an awakened individual might be among them sent tension crawling down his spine.
But there was no fear.
Instead, something resembling a grotesque hunger welled up from deep within his stomach.
“As long as my head doesn’t explode, I won’t die.”
It was the effect of the Reaper Body skill.
A reckless gamble.
But one with certainty.
To Su-hyeok, who had already died once, death was no longer something to fear.
He spread the fingers of his right hand before slowly closing them again.
Somehow, the Reaper’s Scythe had already appeared in his grasp, its razor-sharp blade hidden within the darkness.
“Let’s begin.”
Every muscle in his body tightened as he swung the scythe.
Thunk!
The overwhelming physical strength granted by the Reaper Body and the razor-honed Reaper’s Scythe rendered the heavy steel lock utterly helpless.
The vibration of shattered metal traveling into his fingertips was exhilarating.
Su-hyeok slowly pushed open the iron door and stepped into the darkness.
The scene before him was bizarre.
Eight men wearing gas masks stood beneath fluorescent lights, processing white powder.
He had sensed ten.
There were only eight.
“Still inexperienced.”
A brief irritation flashed through him at the realization that his senses had been off.
But there was no time to dwell on it.
The sound of the opening door made the men turn around with blank expressions.
“Huh? Why’d the door open by itself? Hey, didn’t you shut it properly?”
“I did. I’m sure I did…”
Their muffled, idiotic voices came through the gas masks.
The runner Su-hyeok had been tracking grumbled as he walked toward the door.
The tangled crimson thread around the man’s feet looked like a noose waiting for an execution.
“I told you to shut the damn door properly, asshole.”
Holding his breath, Su-hyeok felt the weight of the scythe in his hand.
The heavy blade trembled ever so slightly.
It wasn’t nervousness.
It was the pleasant vibration of a blade moments before severing the thread of life.
“Damn it, I’m telling you I closed it.”
Still grumbling, the runner reached out for the doorknob.
Su-hyeok fixed his gaze on the back of the man’s neck and swung the scythe horizontally.
Slash!
The first hunt was eerily silent.
The Reaper’s Scythe sliced cleanly through the cervical spine without the slightest resistance.
The man never even realized he had died.
His body collapsed before his severed head even struck the floor.
“…Huh?”
Blood sprayed like a fountain across the visor of the man standing beside him.
Only then did the silence of the basement shatter.
“W-What the hell?!”
“Gah! H-His head! His head’s gone!”
Panicked screams ripped through the damp air.
The remaining seven men stumbled backward in horror.
Su-hyeok adjusted his grip on the scythe.
The first strike had been fortunate.
The next targets wouldn’t stand still.
“Who’s there?! Show yourself!”
One large man grabbed a nearby steel pipe and swung it wildly while shouting.
Hidden beneath the robe’s concealment, Su-hyeok watched him coldly.
A scythe wasn’t like a sword.
Its inward-curving blade wasn’t meant simply to cut.
It required the motion of hooking and pulling.
He slipped into the man’s blind spot and thrust the scythe low.
The blade hooked behind the man’s thigh.
Then Su-hyeok yanked.
Rip!
“AAAAAGH! My leg! My leg!”
Muscle and tendon were ripped away in one brutal motion.
As the man lost his balance and fell, Su-hyeok used the downward momentum to drive the scythe into the back of his neck.
The sharp tip slipped between the vertebrae and instantly severed his life.
“Two.”
His movements were still crude.
He was using too much force.
His swings were larger than necessary.
Looking at the remaining six men, Su-hyeok silently criticized himself.
Faster.
Cleaner.
The Reaper’s Scythe wasn’t a butcher’s tool.
It was a harvesting tool.
A tool meant to harvest the heads of sinners.
“Y-You monster! Die! Just die!”
Three terrified men rushed toward the entrance, wildly swinging kitchen knives and blunt weapons.
Instead of retreating, Su-hyeok stepped directly into them.
Using the long shaft of the scythe, he wrapped its curved blade around one man’s neck.
Crunch!
The inner edge crushed through the man’s neck bones.
Using the recoil, Su-hyeok spun his body.
The scythe carved a wide circle through the air.
Whoosh—Thud!
The chest of the man beside him split open diagonally.
Blood and torn organs splattered across Su-hyeok’s robe.
He never stopped moving.
Where the center of gravity of the scythe lay.
How much angle was needed to break bone with the least effort.
His brain evolved in real time, learning through battle.
“Four.”
Only four remained.
They had already lost all will to fight and huddled together in a corner.
“P-Please… spare us… Please…”
The men ripped off their gas masks and desperately begged, tears and snot streaming down their faces.
But what Su-hyeok saw wasn’t their tears or pleas.
Above their heads floated masses of pitch-black sin.
“Shameless bastards.”
His eyes grew colder than ice.
He casually flicked the scythe.
The tip traced the shape of a crescent through the air before embedding itself squarely between the forehead of the man farthest away.
Thud!
Without even managing a scream, the man collapsed.
Su-hyeok pulled back the shaft, retrieving the scythe as he swept past the remaining two.
Slice.
A single horizontal cut.
It was harvesting.
Like cutting ripe stalks of barley, the scythe gently swept across both men’s necks.
“…Huh?”
The moment thin crimson lines appeared across their throats…
Both heads fell to the floor simultaneously.
The final man simply crouched there, trembling.
Su-hyeok quietly sent him on his way with the Reaper’s Scythe.
After slaughtering all eight men, his breathing remained surprisingly calm.
Only the blood dripping steadily from the blade disturbed the basement’s silence.
“Don’t forget this feeling. Keep improving.”
For the day he would have to fight Abyss Awakeners.
The awkwardness from the beginning had already begun to disappear.
How to grip the scythe.
How to swing it.
Everything had become noticeably more natural.
By cleaning up eight pieces of human trash, he had engraved the handling of the Reaper’s Scythe into his body.
“Judgment Punishment.”
The moment Su-hyeok muttered the words, the basement floor rippled with black darkness.
The eight corpses, the pools of blood, and the scattered chunks of flesh all dissolved into black particles and vanished.
The basement became so spotless that it was hard to believe a massacre had taken place only moments earlier.
– You have judged a sinner.
– Judgment Reward: 80 Hell Points obtained.
“Only ten more.”
He was now just ten Hell Points away from purchasing Reaper’s Step, whose acquisition had been delayed after buying Thread of Sin.
Just then—
The final runner entered through the still-open iron door, humming cheerfully with a delivery container in hand.
“Why’d you leave the door open like th—… huh?”
The basement was empty.
Yet the thick smell of blood lingering in the air instinctively made him freeze.
Su-hyeok silently approached from behind.
Rather than making a wide swing, he lightly rested the tip of the scythe against the back of the man’s neck and gave it a small tug, as though reeling in a fish.
Slice.
“…!!”
There wasn’t even a scream.
Moments later, the man’s body crumbled into dust under Judgment Punishment.
A system message appeared before Su-hyeok.
– You have judged a sinner.
– Judgment Reward: 10 Hell Points obtained.
“Perfect.”
It was almost as if the man had walked in on his own just so Su-hyeok could purchase Reaper’s Step.
He had now gathered more than enough Hell Points.
All that remained was to search for information and clues.
But nowhere in the factory could he find anything useful.
Only dust and powder filled the place.
The knife-wielding assassin who had killed Su-hyeok.
Kim Kyung-soo, the man manipulating Detective Lee Chi-sang from the shadows.
And Iron Mask, the owner of XX Club.
Every trace of the three had vanished.
In the end, Su-hyeok had no choice but to return home empty-handed.
* * *
A short while later…
Someone appeared at the factory Su-hyeok had already left.
“…No way.”
Standing at the entrance to the underground stairs leading into the manufacturing facility, Kim Kyung-soo felt his heart sink the moment he saw the iron door hanging half-open.
Normally, it would have been barred shut from the inside.
The men inside were the type to become alert at the slightest sound.
Without a second thought, Kim Kyung-soo rushed down the dark stairway.
“Where the hell is everyone?!”
His shout echoed throughout the empty underground chamber.
The only reply was an unsettling silence.
Kicking open the iron door, he stepped into the factory.
The inside was utter chaos.
The processed powder that should have been neatly packaged for distribution had been scattered everywhere, as though a bomb had exploded.
Every step he took sent clouds of fine white powder floating into the air like dust.
“W-What… What the hell happened here?”
