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Clang!

As the sound of the hammer rang clear through the air, it felt as though a soundless, white sheen was cascading over his head. All of the noise that complicated his mind was disappearing.

‘It’s not bad, is it?’

The light in Park Jae-Hyun’s eyes as the smith looked at him seemed to be asking him that question.

Clang!

Lee Jun-Kyeong nodded in return.

The sound of Park Jae-Hyun’s hammer continued to ring, slamming down on an anvil. However, it was the first time Lee Jun-Kyeong had experienced something like this, as he was the one swinging it at this time.

“You’re doing good.”

Under Park Jae-Hyun’s instructions and his purview, Lee Jun-Kyeong was smithing something with his own hands. In front of him lay Muspel’s Spear and Mistilteinn.

Normally, the reason why a blacksmith would forge something, hammering it into being, was to shape it and strengthen it. However, this was different.

Clang!

Sssss.

As he swung his hammer, something flowed forth from Lee Jun-Kyeong and entered into the materials. Park Jae-Hyun had a name for what was happening at this very moment.

‘This is called the sharing of the souls.’

It was a process in which one would share their soul with the weapons they were forging with their own two hands.

What they had before them was the purest essence that the two siblings, the greatest blacksmiths, Park Jae-Hyun and Park Yu-Jin, had wanted to create. Moreover, the only person who could act as their tool to do so currently was Lee Jun-Kyeong himself.

Clang!

The sound of the hammer rang once more as the worries that bothered Lee Jun-Kyeong disappeared. However, before he knew it, they began to come back to him once again.

Sssss.

But this time, things were different from before. If his various thoughts and worries could have been said to be as disorderly as a chaotic road before he had started hammering, now, they were all rising one by one in an orderly manner.

‘We’ve reached the end.’

What flickered through his mind were the trials he had gone through so far, the days of suffering in the previous timeline, and how he had found himself returned to the past.

‘A lot really has happened, hasn\'t it?’

He had also moved according to the history that had been written by the Demon King. However, though he may have walked along the same path, his actions were different.

Finally, most importantly, the Demon King was all that remained. Although he had been the Hero that Lee Jun-Kyeong had loved and admired the most, now, just like a prince from within a fairy tale, all that awaited him was the final battle against the Demon King.

Clang!

Goosebumps appeared all over his forearms alongside the sound of the hammer. He was scared just thinking about it. However, just as much as he felt fear…

‘I’m looking forward to it.’

It was a feeling impossible to describe. The Demon King was the main culprit that had caused all of these disasters, damage, and carnage. Even though he had been a Hero that Lee Jun-Kyeong had looked up to and wanted to emulate in the past, all Lee Jun-Kyeong could think about now was anticipating meeting him as a villain.

Still, there was one thing he hadn’t done. Lee Jun-Kyeong hadn’t seen him yet with his own two eyes.

‘I’ve still never met him, not even once.’

Zeus, Merlin, and Odin had all met him, but Lee Jun-Kyeong hadn’t. Still, he would meet him soon.

Clang!

With the next swing of his hammer, another thought arose in his mind.

‘The Sponsors…’

They had a horrifying purpose, and their actions and behavior betrayed their view of humanity as livestock. On top of it all, humanity had no choice in the matter as they were forced to allow themselves to be taken advantage of by the Sponsors.

All of his worries and countless thoughts came and went through his mind as he continued to hammer away to try to find the answer.

Clang!

However, the last one that came to his mind was the most difficult for him to reconcile.

Clang!

He was quite confused about this.

‘The Sky of the Apocalypse…’

He couldn’t quite figure out the identity of that bastard. Hearing the story from Saeynkaed, Lee Jun-Kyeong was convinced that all that the dragon had said was true from what he had noticed from the behavior of the Sponsors.

However, even so, the Sky of the Apocalypse couldn’t be easily judged.

‘It’s different from the other Sponsors. After all, the abilities of this bastard, who was the one who sent me into the past, are unique compared to the others.’

It was to the point that it was overwhelming. Moreover, that was the exact reason why he was so scared.

The Sky of the Apocalypse was different. It had sent him to the past and watched over every single thing that he had accomplished.

‘This bastard, unlike the other Sponsors, it…’

It even seemed as though it didn’t even covet his body.

Clang!

When the sound of the hammer rang again, suddenly, Park Jae-Hyun and Park Yu-Jin froze.

Ding!

“...?”

Lee Jun-Kyeong turned, thinking that the work had finished, and so he looked at them, hammer in hand. However, the stiff faces of the two blacksmiths were enough to show him that something was wrong.

“...”

Park Jae-Hyun’s mouth opened slowly as Park Yu-Jin was already beginning to speak.

“Right now…”

“We just received a mission.”

They opened their mouths and spoke at the same time. It was a mission that Lee Jun-Kyeong hadn’t received.

“The Sponsors…”

“They want us to kill you.”

As they finished speaking, Lee Jun-Kyeong put down the hammer he was holding.

***

There was a system available to the Sponsors called Missions.

Missions generally didn’t appear very often. Even though most people didn’t care about them, there wasn’t a single Hunter who didn’t at least know what they were.

The reason was simple. A mission was like a lottery, so to speak.

The missions were rare beyond belief, but if one completed one successfully, a disgusting amount of sponsorship would be given. However, what the Hunters most wanted through sponsorship wasn’t an increase in skill or ability.

No, what they really wanted were items. There were only very few cases where Sponsors would sponsor Hunters with items. In most of those rare cases, they were only given in the name of missions.

A sponsored item had an incredible performance that was incomparable to that of any ordinary item. They were items that could raise their user’s abilities by two or more tiers, making it nearly impossible to quantify the value of these sponsored items. That was the reason why they were so impossible to find.

Lee Jun-Kyeong now finally understood the purpose of these missions.

‘The missions are directives.’

Now that he had fully understood the purpose of the Sponsors, there was no way that he wouldn’t have figured out the meaning behind the mission before him and the missions as a whole. This was a system for the Sponsors to move their Incarnations in their desired directions.

‘Instead of the sponsorship, which can’t be done carelessly…’

This was a way for them to strengthen the bodies of their Incarnations, even if it meant that the Sponsors would have to push themselves a little more.

The Sponsors wanted their Incarnations to become strong. However, according to Saeynkaed, the Sponsors couldn’t just relentlessly provide their Incarnations with endless sponsorship. The bodies wouldn’t be able to handle it.

Since sponsored items didn’t directly affect the bodies of the Incarnations, they were an attractive alternative that could also stably strengthen the Incarnations without destroying them. Notably, with such incredible power, they also had the side effects to match.

‘If they obtain items, the growth of the Incarnations will slow down.’

In essence, sponsored items were still objects that weren’t directly related to the body’s ability. In particular, it was already a widely known fact that a Hunter\'s growth would stagnate if they became dependent on items.

Swayed by the powerful force within their grasp, they were apt to die even more easily compared to when they hadn’t received the item, as they would be more prone to overexertion due to overconfidence in their abilities. Moreover, there was another thing as well.

‘There’s a chance, most likely, that a sponsorship item also taps into the potential of the Incarnation itself.’

Thus, a sponsored item would slow the growth of the body of the Incarnation, too. All things considered, sponsored items weren’t a perfect system.

“It’s guaranteed to be a sponsored item?!”

“Has there ever been a mission like this?”

Nevertheless, at this very moment, one of those imperfect missions that could provide such incredible sponsored items had come before all of the Hunters.

The Hunters were in an uproar as the mission that had appeared before almost every single Hunter in the world was something they had never seen before.

[Bring Justice Against Those Who Would Disturb Order.]

The person who disturbed the order was specified clearly.

[Kill Lee Jun-Kyeong.]

His name was clear for all to see, even changed to depict ‘The Underdog’ for those who hadn’t yet learned Lee Jun-Kyeong’s name.

A buzz rose around the world.

They were in the midst of a period of cataclysm, and now that everything around them was dangerous, sponsored items were a massive source of temptation for the Hunters.

Thud.

So much so that many eyes were suddenly cast toward Lee Jun-Kyeong’s footsteps.

"This… .”

“Whew...”

Everyone was looking at Lee Jun-Kyeong, each with gazes filled with their own thoughts and desires. However, not a single one of them moved carelessly, as everyone gathered here could tell how strong Lee Jun-Kyeong was.

All of them knew that not a single one of them had the skills to take him down. Moreover, there were also those who had followed and admired him.

“You crazy bastards! Watch what happens if a single one of you takes a step out of line.”

“Protect the Underdog!”

They came forward, wanting to protect Lee Jun-Kyeong.

“...”

Lee Jun-Kyeong bit his lip, sensing the manner in which everyone had their own reactions from every direction. The Mission pushed forward by the Sponsors wasn’t good for them in any way.

It wasn’t that he thought that anyone would suddenly attack him without any thought—if any of them were that stupid, then they would have already died by this point in the cataclysm. Still, that didn’t mean that there wasn’t a problem.

‘We’re going to be divided.’

In order to act against the Demon King, they were planning on advancing on Seoul now. However, the sudden mission created a chaotic atmosphere among the Hunters.

Moreover, only those in command actually knew the purpose of the Sponsors; the Hunters, who weren’t part of the upper echelon, had no idea of anything regarding the details.

“But still, considering that this type of mission has come up…”

“Something is definitely wrong, right?”

“I mean, think about it. How could a human become that strong?”

The Hunters began to have doubts, fear spreading among them. Although it was just a small crack in their alliance, it was only just a smidge of curiosity at this moment.

‘One can never know what would happen on the battlefield.’

Right now, when they had to deal with the Demon King, none of them knew what would happen next, and having even the smallest tinge of doubt was never a good thing.

That was why Lee Jun-Kyeong walked forward.

He even ignored the gazes of Jeong In-Chang and his colleagues that were directed at him.

On top of it all, there was even that as well.

‘Horus…’

The pharaoh of Egypt that had been brought by Merlin to join their forces, Horus, just couldn’t accept the secrets of the Sponsors that Lee Jun-Kyeong had unveiled to the Apex-Level Hunters.

The fact that the Sponsor he had worshipped, the object of his faith, had the sole purpose of stealing his body was inconceivable. The Leader of the Nile was displeased at the idea, unable to accept it. Moreover, it was not just him. The other Apex Hunters had similar thoughts.

‘They are the problem.’

The mission should have already appeared before them by now.

Lee Jun-Kyeong wondered. ‘Wouldn’t it be considered an order from their god…?’

One thing that those who worshipped their Sponsors as deities had in common with one another was that they all thought of the missions as an oracle, the Word of God spoken down unto them.

‘They really might think that I’m disrupting the order.’

Inciting people with lies, Lee Jun-Kyeong could see how he could be twisted into a person who blasphemed their God with lies.

‘There could become an even greater split among us.’

Lee Jun-Kyeong was exasperated. Of course, it really had to be right at this moment.

Thump.

Lee Jun-Kyeong suddenly sat where he stood with his legs crossed in the middle of the street. Every Hunter’s eyes were focused on him. Since Gyeonggi-Do was on the path to Seoul, all of the citizens in the area had been evacuated to Japan.

All who remained here were Hunters, and most of them, if not all, should have received the mission.

“Mr. Lee…”

Jeong In-Chang, who had been following behind him, began to speak when Lee Jun-Kyeong stopped.

“What do you plan to do?” he asked.

Lee Jun-Kyeong looked up at him.

‘Could he have gotten the mission, too?’

There were only a few Sponsors to whom The Sky of the Apocalypse hadn’t expressed hostility, one of which was Jeong In-Chang’s The Prince on a White Horse.

‘If what I think is right…’

The mission wouldn’t have appeared before Jeong In-Chang. Moreover, even if it did, he refused to doubt him.

“Whew…”

Seeing the fire in Lee Jun-Kyeong’s eyes, Jeong In-Chang just sighed and stood next to where he had taken his seat.

“Well, even if I don’t know what you plan on next, I’ll just do it with you.”

Moreover, as Jeong In-Chang finished speaking, Won-Hwa, Liu Bei and his two brothers, and the giants all came to Lee Jun-Kyeong’s side.

Lee Jun-Kyeong just sat quietly, sitting in silence as if waiting for something. Without saying anything, he was tranquil, as if nothing had happened.

Thud.

Then, finally, footsteps began to echo through the air.

One.

Two.

The sound of the footsteps gradually increased.