Chapter 71

Chapter 71

The man with tattoos on his face looked dumbfounded.

“You’re laughing? I guess this situation seems funny to you.”

“Am I not allowed to laugh?”

“You’ve got your liver hanging outside your belly, bastard. Then again, I guess that’s why you crawled all the way here without fear.”

The man put away the dagger he had been trimming his nails with and stood.

Once he rose, the man’s build was enormous.

Zeon looked at him with interest.

That was because the man’s body was peculiar.

What drew his eye was the man’s skin.

It was bumpy like a crocodile’s.

At a glance, its texture itself was different from human skin.

The man said,

“What, does my skin look strange? If you live long enough in a dank place where not a single ray of sunlight comes in, you’ll end up like this too.”

“So you weren’t born with it. You changed naturally.”

“That’s right!”

“It’s certainly interesting. This is my first time seeing a case like this.”

At Zeon’s unruffled answer, the man’s expression hardened.

That was because his reaction was different from most people the man knew.

Whenever anyone saw his skin and body, they became frightened and avoided his gaze, but Zeon’s eyes were shining instead, as if he had seen an amusing toy.

This was the first time he had seen such a reaction.

“You’re an interesting bastard.”

“Then will you return the magic power generator?”

“Sorry, but I can’t do that. That thing is quite a rare masterpiece.”

“Masterpiece?”

“Yeah! Even though it’s small, its power output is insane. As long as you supply it with good Mana Stones, it can stably provide a tremendous amount of electricity.”

“Why do you need electricity?”

“Why else? Because there are people who’ll use it. Electricity isn’t supplied down here.”

“Do many people live underground?”

“Far more than you think.”

“I see.”

Zeon nodded.

“So give up. We’ll use it for something much more worthwhile than you will.”

“Sorry, but I can’t do that. I’m rather possessive.”

“So I’ve been spouting bullshit this whole time. Damn, that feels dirty. Kaaak! Ptui!”

The man spat thick phlegm onto Zeon’s shoe.

When Zeon looked down at the phlegm stuck to his shoe, the man laughed.

“What? Does it feel disgusting?”

“It doesn’t feel good.”

“It shouldn’t feel that disgusting yet. This is only the beginning.”

The smile on the man’s lips deepened.

Zeon stared at the man’s face.

His bright yellow eyes and bumpy skin.

“You really look like a crocodile.”

“That’s why my name’s Croker.”

“It suits you.”

Zeon nodded.

At that instant, Croker kicked off the ground.

His fist pierced through the darkness and struck toward Zeon.

CRASH—!

With an explosion, Zeon’s body shook. But Croker’s fist did not touch Zeon’s face.

That was because Zeon had blocked Croker’s fist with his right hand, which wore the gauntlet.

Even though his attack had been blocked, Croker did not erase his smile.

“You’re pretty good.”

“You’re no pushover either. I’d say you’re at least Grade C.”

“Hmph!”

Instead of answering, Croker attacked.

BABABABANG—!

The air exploded violently under his consecutive attacks.

Just as Zeon had guessed, Croker was a Grade C martial-type Awakened.

He drove Zeon back like a storm. But Zeon deflected all his attacks without any great effort.

Croker was certainly strong.

He had perfectly adapted to the environment of the underground waterways.

His two eyes could see through the darkness as clearly as broad daylight, and his skin was extremely tough and strong.

It was durable enough to endure most attacks without using a Skill. But this time, he had chosen the wrong opponent.

Among all the people Zeon had faced, none had been weaker than Croker.

Croker himself thought he was attacking with great brilliance, but in Zeon’s eyes, every one of his movements was clear.

When none of his attacks struck Zeon, panic appeared on Croker’s face.

“You bastard! How long are you going to keep dodging?”

That was when it happened.

As if to deny Croker’s words, Zeon unleashed a powerful punch.

Croker could not dodge the lightning-fast attack.

Left with no choice, Croker crossed his arms and blocked Zeon’s punch.

CRASH—!

“Keheuk!”

Croker groaned along with the explosion.

Croker’s face, as he slid backward, had turned deathly pale.

Both his arms were broken and dangling.

Croker could not believe this.

His bones and muscles were far stronger than those of other Awakened. Yet they had failed to withstand Zeon’s strike and had broken.

Only then did Croker realize it.

The fact that Zeon was an even greater Awakened than he had thought.

‘Martial type, at least Grade C.’

Equal to himself, or slightly stronger.

If he used the Skill he had been hiding, he might be able to win. But his opponent had not revealed a proper skill either.

That meant there was also a chance that he would lose.

His judgment was extremely quick.

To fight an opponent like this, he needed more preparation.

“Damn it!”

His choice was retreat.

The magic power generator was important, but not more important than his life.

Croker and his subordinates hurriedly withdrew through the exit behind them.

Fortunately, Zeon did not pursue them any further.

Before disappearing, Croker said,

“Countless people will end up in trouble because of you. If the people who could have been saved by that magic power generator die, it’s all your fault.”

“That’s not because of me. It’s because of your incompetence. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t shift your responsibility onto me.”

“Ghk!”

Zeon simply denied Croker’s words.

Croker should blame himself for failing to obtain the magic power generator by paying a proper price. It was not right to shift that responsibility onto Zeon.

Zeon’s core was not soft enough to fall for gaslighting like this.

“We’ll definitely meet again.”

With those words, Croker and his subordinates disappeared completely.

Zeon stood still and looked at the place where they had vanished.

A sewer channel where deeper, filthier waste flowed continued into the darkness.

Zeon had no intention of entering that place.

He had rolled through the desert and all kinds of dungeons for no less than eight years.

Now he wanted to live in a slightly cleaner environment.

There were many goods Croker and his subordinates had plundered in the underground space, but Zeon did not even look at them.

He stored only the magic power generator and the alarm device in his subspace and went outside.

“Whew!”

After emerging from the sewer, Zeon took a deep breath for a moment.

Outside air really was better.

Zeon looked around briefly, then returned to his house.

The problem was that he had to walk up to the eighteenth floor, but that was not particularly difficult for Zeon.

Fortunately, it seemed no one had broken in while he had been away from home.

Zeon immediately installed the magic power generator in his house.

After looking at the pyramid-shaped magic power generator for a moment, Zeon took a Mana Stone out of his subspace.

When he put a fist-sized Mana Stone into the magic power generator, a brilliant light burst out for a moment.

The magic power generator had begun drawing electricity from the Mana Stone.

A moment later, the brilliant light slowly died down. It was proof that electricity was being supplied stably.

The Mana Stone Zeon had inserted into the magic power generator had been obtained after hunting a Grade C monster.

It possessed several times greater purity and far more energy than a Mana Stone mined from the mine.

Naturally, electricity could not help being supplied stably.

“Nice!”

A smile appeared on Zeon’s lips.

Now that he had found a stable source of electricity, it was time for the next task.

Zeon took out a black jewel from his subspace.

It was a jewel he had obtained after conquering a dungeon about three years ago.

At a glance, it looked ordinary, but in truth, this black jewel was the dungeon’s core.

The dungeon from which he had obtained this black jewel had been extremely unusual.

The dungeon itself had been a powerful barrier.

It detected and blocked intrusion from the outside in advance.

It also perfectly isolated the inside from the outside, so almost no external shock was transmitted inside.

In a way, the inside of the dungeon was no different from the safest space in the world.

Zeon had stayed there for no less than three months to dismantle that dungeon.

He could have broken through it with force like other dungeons.

But if he had done that, the dungeon would have been completely destroyed.

That was not what Zeon wanted.

He wanted to obtain the barrier of the dungeon intact.

So he investigated the weakness of the barrier and searched for a way to dismantle it completely.

The time he spent thinking that way was three months, and in the end, he was able to obtain this black jewel, the dungeon’s core.

Only then did he learn it.

The identity of the black jewel.

‘The Watching Eye.’

That was the official name of the black jewel.

It was the core of a barrier used by the royal family of Kurayan.

It was mainly used only in key places, such as the royal treasury or the king’s residence.

It was so difficult to make that only a few existed.

One of those had crossed over to Earth without disappearing.

The only disappointing point was that the Watching Eye had crossed over to Earth safely and become dungeonized, but the items inside had been lost and no longer existed.

Zeon placed the Watching Eye on top of the magic power generator. Then the electricity generated by the magic power generator was supplied to the Watching Eye.

Once electricity entered it, red lines extended from the Watching Eye.

The red lines stretched like rose stems and filled the inside of Zeon’s house.

Zeon stood in the middle of the house and watched the sight.

It was the process of the barrier recognizing the space.

The red lines that had filled the house soon disappeared.

They could not be seen, but they definitely existed. And they perfectly protected this house, which they had recognized as their space.

The only person who could enter this house was Zeon.

As long as Mana Stones were supplied to the magic power generator, the Watching Eye would perfectly defend this place.

Next, Zeon installed the alarm device on the door.

The barrier of the Watching Eye was added to the door reinforced with Bloodsucking Tree and Sand Angler hide.

Most Awakened would not be able to put even a scratch on the door, let alone break it down. With the alarm device added to it, Zeon would be able to notice immediately if there was an intruder, even when he was outside the house.

A satisfied smile appeared on Zeon’s lips.

“Now the house is finally complete.”

---

The Black Lion reported to Yu Se-hee.

“He returned home.”

“He went into the sewer at dawn, so did he stay there for three or four hours?”

“Yes!”

“What do you think, oppa? Do you think he found the magic power generator?”

“For now, according to the informant, he was empty-handed.”

“Empty-handed?”

“Yes! It seems he failed to find the magic power generator.”

“He went in with such confidence that I wondered, but it looks like it really was too much.”

Yu Se-hee stroked her chin with her fingertips.

The news that the magic power generator had been stolen by the Crocodiles had reached her as well.

It was an incident in which goods belonging to the Goblin Market had been stolen.

Naturally, she could not help paying attention to it.

If the opponent had not been the Crocodiles, she would already have sent troops to recover the stolen goods.

The problem was that the Crocodiles were lurking in the underground waterways.

The underground of the slums was far more complicated than the surface.

No one knew exactly what facilities existed beneath the ground they stood on, or how intricately the waterways were tangled together.

Even Yu Se-hee, who prided herself on being an information broker of the slums, knew almost nothing about the underground.

No Awakened wanted to enter the foul-smelling underground.

That was also why they could not learn Zeon’s movements after he entered the underground.

Even the watcher old man Clexi had attached to Zeon could not bring himself to enter the sewer because of the revolting smell and air.

In the end, he had no choice but to wait at the sewer entrance until Zeon came out.

When Zeon came back out several hours later, he had been empty-handed, so they judged that he had failed to recover the magic power generator.

The Black Lion said carefully,

“The Crocodiles’ movements have been unusual lately. The number of times they come up to the surface has noticeably increased. They are certainly being protected by someone.”

“They probably are.”

There was no result that occurred without a cause.

Yu Se-hee gave an order.

“First, strengthen the security around the Goblin Market. The place they’ll target is obvious.”

“Understood.”

There was no prey in the slums as tempting as the Goblin Market.

After all, every kind of precious item was traded through the Goblin Market.

Countless people had targeted the Goblin Market until now. But there was a reason no force had ever taken control of it.

“I’ll show them clearly what happens when they touch the Goblin Market.”