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Solo Leveling Novel Chapter 18 Average 5 / 5 out of 1
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33rd, it has 5 monthly views
Summary
A short while later.
“Euph, euph, euph!!”
Jin-Woo discovered a lone convict struggling on the ground not too far from him. His arms and legs were all tied up with a rope, and there was a gag placed in his mouth.
It was as Kahng Tae-Sik said, just before his final breath.
[“I’ve tied up the rapist not too far from here. I was thinking of disposing of him last, after the victim’s father asked me to make him suffer for a bit.”]
Kahng Tae-Sik stopped breathing after those words.
The convict began to struggle even harder after seeing Jin-Woo. It was as if he was asking to be freed as soon as possible.
“Euph! Euph! Euph!”
Now that Jin-Woo took a closer look, it was none other than the same guy who threw a dirty wink at Ju-Hui earlier on.
As soon as Jin-Woo pulled the gag off the convict’s mouth, he breathed in and out heavily and widened his eyes.
“Pant, pant, pant!! That, that crazy b*stard, Kahng Tae-Sik killed everyone! He killed everyone!! What the f*ck happened?? Did he leave? There’s blood on your clothes?! Did you get done in by him, too??”
Jin-Woo didn’t reply and simply raised his head to stare straight ahead.
….Towards where the boss was.
The convict’s words poured out in great urgency.
“Untie me first. Hurry! We gotta escape before Kahng Tae-Sik shows up! God d*mn it!! There’s some sort of magic energy flowing in the ropes and I can’t tear them apart! You have some sort of a weapon with you, right? Why aren’t you saying anything? Can’t you hear me??”
When a bottom-feeder Hunter from the Association continued to ignore him, the convict forgot about the position he was in and began frowning in dissatisfaction.
Remaining expressionless until then, Jin-Woo finally opened his mouth.
“The boss should be just up ahead.”
“What?”
A confused, questioning expression floated up on the face of the convict.
“Feels like it’s a bit stronger than a regular rank D dungeon boss, too. I’m getting really curious about its attack patterns, you see.”
The convict listened to those words and lost his cool, roaring out at the top of his voice.
“What the f*ck are you even talking about?!”
Jin-Woo calmly continued on with what he wanted to say.
“Before all that, though, I gotta ask you about something. You remember the girl you raped before?”
“What? Which one are you talking about? You a family member of the victim?”
Jin-Woo’s brows quivered.
Just now, this man asked ‘which one’, rather than answering with yes or no. Meaning, he had hurt well more than one or two girls.
Hunters possessed extraordinary strength, so if they wanted to, they could become a horrifying monster at any time. And this b*stard used that strength to violate women until now.
With that, Jin-Woo’s mind was made up.
He coldly stared down at the convict and spoke.
“Now I know, so there’s that.”
“What?! Euph? Euph!!”
Before the convict uttered out more rubbish, Jin-Woo swiftly gagged the b*stard again. Then, he began slowly dragging the convict by the ankles towards the boss room.
“Euph! Euph!! Eeuuuph!!!”
The convict struggled even more desperately as he got dragged along. Both of his wide-open eyes were now completely bloodshot.
Not even slightly fazed by the criminal’s desperate struggle, Jin-Woo successfully dragged him into the boss room.
“Euph! Euphhh!!”
And inside the boss room, there was a large group of Hobgoblins waiting for their arrival. These monsters reputedly enjoyed snacking on human entrails. Apparently.
“Euph! Euph!! Euphhh!!”
The convict finally realised what Jin-Woo was planning to do here.
He cried out and shook his head around wildly after seeing the group of Hobgoblins. The blue convict’s pants began dyeing in a yellow colour, as well.
“Fuu-woo.”
Jin-Woo took a deep breath, and he chucked the convict among the waiting Hobgoblins.
“Eeuuuph-!!”
“Kiiiigiik.”
“Kiihit.”
“Kiiieekk!”
Picking up on the smell of a fresh, living prey, Hobgoblins pounced on the convict all at once and began tearing into his stomach.
“Eeeuupph!! Euph! Euphhh!!”
As the convict desperately struggled on and thrashed about, the vessels in his eyes burst open one by one, dyeing his eyes utterly crimson red.
“Eeeupphhh….. Euh, euh…..”
Even though the convict gradually lost his consciousness, Hobgoblins greedily and restlessly tore into him.
Just what would it feel like to be devoured alive by the disgusting monsters?
Jin-Woo frowned deeply as he quickly scanned the interior of the room, searching for the boss.
‘There it is.’
A huge Hobgoblin, definitely the boss of this dungeon, sat arrogantly over yonder on the other side of the boss room.
With its subordinates all too preoccupied with the fresh prey, there was not one guard around the boss itself, which meant that this was the perfect opportunity.
‘Dash!’
Jin-Woo immediately dashed past the Hobgoblins in the blink of an eye and arrived before the boss.
“Kkieehk?!”
The surprised Hobgoblin boss quickly stood up, but before it could complete the action, its head fell and rolled on the ground.
Plop.
Tumble, tumble.
Tti-ring!
[You’ve killed the owner of this dungeon.]
[Level up!]
‘Ah, hang on a sec.’
Only after he had sliced the boss’s head off did Jin-Woo remember the existence of the Rune Stone.
‘There was no need to lure them out with a bait, was there? I could’ve just learned the Stealth skill and sneaked closer, couldn’t I?’
Jin-Woo shifted his gaze over to what little remained of the convict and clicked his tongue.
Of course, he wasn’t feeling any sympathy for the b*stard there.
‘Well, whatever…..’
In any case, his plan was a success.
Part 5. Cogwheel
It wasn’t difficult to deal with the group of confused and leaderless Hobgoblins.
“Kiiieek!!”
“kiiieaahhk!!!”
“Kyahk!!”
The Hobgoblins ran around trying to escape from Jin-Woo, but were all hunted down soon afterwards.
“Kkyaaahkk!”
When he killed the very last one, another feel-good message popped into his view.
[Level up!]
‘It rose up again?’
His expression brightened up after this rather unexpected reward of the day’s labour fell into his lap.
Jin-Woo cleaned all the blood off the Poison Fang of Kasaka, and along with all the magic crystals extracted from the Hobgoblins, stored them inside his Inventory, before summoning his Status Window.
Tti-ring!
Name: Seong Jin-Woo
Level: 27
Class: None
Title: Slaughterer of Wolves
HP: 5,114
MP: 548
Tiredness: 0
[Stats]
Strength: 72
Stamina: 43
Agility: 82
Intelligence: 39
Perception: 69
(Available points to distribute: 5)
Physical damage reduction: 20%
[Skills]
Passive skills:
– (Unknown) Lv. Max
– Tenacity Lv. 1
Active skills:
– Dash Lv. 1
– Intimidation Lv. 1
[Equipped items]
Gatekeeper’s Necklace (A)
Before he knew it, his level was almost near the ’30’ mark.
Jin-Woo wasn’t expecting much from this dungeon at the time of hunting down the weak Goblins by the entrance. But, well, he got a level up by killing the Hobgoblin boss, and then another one from hunting down every single one of the Hobgoblin underlings, as well. His level rose up by two in such a short time.
What a lucky day it was for him, every single strong monster being in the boss room and all.
‘No, hang on a bit here. It’s a bit too much to call this good luck, huh.’
Three diverging pathways, and the difficulty of the boss room….
If the low-ranked Hunters got too conceited after hunting down weak Goblins and arrogantly stepped into the boss room, then they might have met with a serious accident from the appearance of all these Hobgoblins.
Unlike the Goblins, Hobgoblins were pretty tough monsters to contend with.
‘There are some instances of Hobgoblins appearing in dungeons full of Goblins, but….’
Well, it was still very rare to see such a big group of Hobgoblins in a single location as it was in the case of this dungeon.
Really now, it was utterly impossible to predict what might happen inside a dungeon. Someone’s lucky day might turn into someone else’s worst nightmare.
The only protection one had in this place was the one’s own power.
That was why Jin-Woo wanted to get stronger. Surviving inside a dungeon was one thing, but what if there was a dungeon break near the hospital where his mother was staying?
What if, he got sneak-attacked by a monster while out walking on the street?
No, the monsters wouldn’t be the only problems to worry about, either.
Hunters were also dangerous existences, just as much as the monsters themselves. Even if various organisations were trying to manage them, there would always be a limit.
Indeed, he needed to possess the necessary strength to protect himself.
‘There are limits to how powerful a Hunter could become.’
However, there was no such thing for himself.
Theoretically, he could grow stronger indefinitely as long as his Stats increased and he found the right type of equipment to wear.
And today, one more method of getting stronger had been added to his arsenal. It was none other than the Rune Stones!
Jin-Woo pulled out the Rune Stone from his pocket.
Just like with other items, the information on the stone floated up like a hologram projection.
[Rune Stone: Stealth]
You can absorb the skill by breaking this Rune Stone.
To those who didn’t know, this thing would’ve come across as a small pebble with weird letters carved on the surface, but if you were a Hunter, you’d be salivating like crazy regardless of what your rank was.
High-ranked Hunters would’ve used it for themselves, while the lower-ranked ones would’ve sold it to the higher ranked Hunters.
And a Rune Stone containing rare skills, such as this one with the ‘Stealth’ skill, would’ve especially fetched a large amount of money. When placed in an auction, this particular stone should fetch at least a few billion Won, and when sold through the black market, several times more than that.
There was only one reason why it would be more expensive in the black market. Because, there would be no official record of who bought what with how much money, that was why.
Having a hidden skill was the same thing as possessing one more powerful weapon.
‘….Just like how Kahng Tae-Sik had been hiding his Stealth skill.’
If it weren’t for his high Perception Stat, Jin-Woo would’ve been killed for sure. Thinking about that sent chills down his spine.
‘Let’s forget about selling this. I can always make money later on.’
He’d not fall for the monetary temptation right now. His current priority was to become stronger than ever before, after all.
There was no need to even mention just how useful this rare ‘Stealth’ skill would prove to be in the future.
“And to think, this little stone is worth several houses, no, several buildings, even.”
Still, Jin-Woo quickly did something he’d never have dreamed of doing in the past.
When he squeezed his hand tightly, the Rune Stone shattered into pieces without much resistance.
Crack.
A reddish aura seeped out from the cracks of the Rune Stone and slowly wrapped around his body.
It was almost the same as when receiving the effects of the healing magic. Only the colour was wrong, being red and not blue.
In any case, it wasn’t a bad sensation.
The reddish aura circling around him smoothly entered through his nose and was absorbed into his lungs. Right away, he could sense an unknown power well up inside of him.
A familiar mechanical beep went off shortly afterwards, too.
Tti-ring!
[You’ve learned ‘Skill: Stealth’.]
[You can now use ‘Skill: Stealth’.]
‘Nice!’
He managed to successfully absorb the skill.
He was feeling rather nervous since this would be his first time using a Rune Stone to learn a skill, but the whole process turned out to be unexpectedly quick and simple.
‘So, does this mean that I can use Stealth now?’
His heart began pounding harder from the sense of accomplishment after learning a rare skill.
Well, the wise elders, they said that seeing was believing, so….
Jin-Woo activated his new skill right away.
‘Stealth.’
Just as he finished thinking about activating it, his body vanished from his own view. From the tips of his fingers right down to his toes, every part of him became transparent.
What a strange feeling it was, unable to see his own hands right in front of his eyes.
‘What would happen if I do this?’
Since he thought about it, Jin-Woo quickly summoned his dagger from the Inventory to confirm.
Then, he sensed gripping something in his hand. Rather mystifyingly, though, he could sense it but couldn’t see it.
‘As expected….’
Just like the knife that Kahng Tae-Sik had been carrying around, the ‘Stealth’ skill was also applied to his Poison Fang of Kasaka.
As he thought, it wasn’t that Kahng Tae-Sik’s weapon was strange, it was simply the power of this skill, instead.
‘I wonder, just how far does this skill cover?’
Jin-Woo picked a pebble up from the ground, and it too disappeared from the sight.
‘Can I do that with this, too?’
He got even more curious, so he reached out and touched the shoulder of the dead Hobgoblin, but nothing happened next. It seemed that there definitely was a limit to this skill.
At least, he was now sure of the clothes he wore and the objects held in his hand being affected by the skill.
It happened right then.
[You’ve exhausted all of your Mana and ‘Skill: Stealth’ will be deactivated.]
“Eh?”
Suddenly, ‘Stealth’ came undone.
‘But, it has been only a few seconds, though??’
Jin-Woo had been moving his body this way and that, trying to familiarise himself with the state of being cloaked, but after the skill came undone all by itself, he hurriedly summoned the skill list and confirmed the details with a flustered look on his face.
[Skills]
Passive skills:
– (Unknown) Lv. Max
– Tenacity Lv. 1
Active skills:
– Dash Lv. 1
– Intimidation Lv. 1
– Stealth Lv. 1
What he sought was the information on the Stealth skill.
The relevant words quickly floated up before his eyes.
Tti-ring!
[Skill: Stealth Lv. 1]
Active skill.
Mana required to activate: 200
Simultaneously cloaks the body and hides all traces of the skill holder. During its activation, 10 Mana will be spent every second.
He needed 200 Mana to activate, and further 10 would be spent every bloody second?!
“Hah….”
No wonder his MP couldn’t hold up.
[MP: 7/548]
His remaining Mana of 7 looked rather pitiful to his eyes.
‘It’s really all spent up, huh.’
Currently, the maximum amount of Mana he could store was around 550. If he were to activate the Stealth skill once, he’d be able to maintain the cloaked state for around 35 seconds.
But, if he were to use other skills, then he’d not even get the full 35 seconds, either.
‘Now that I think about it, even Kahng Tae-Sik cancelled his Stealth pretty quickly, didn’t he?’
He didn’t do that accidentally, as it turned out.
If a high-ranking Hunter like Kahng Tae-Sik couldn’t keep the skill going for long, then it meant that lower-ranked Hunters wouldn’t even be able to use it.
“….My Mana is the issue here, huh.”
Until now, he had invested all his Stat points on every Stat other than Intelligence, and not even once did his MP value rise up from doing that.
In other words, he now needed to raise the Intelligence Stat as well….
‘I guess it’s about time I did that.’
Still, it kind of felt like a waste investing his hard-earned Stat points on a non-combat related Stat just so he could use a skill for a few seconds longer.
‘Compared to other Stats, Intelligence just has too low of an efficiency.’
Strength, Stamina, Agility, and Perception.
He had personally felt the effects of those four Stats increasing. As they increased in value, he became physically stronger and stronger.
The only Stat that he couldn’t sense any tangible change taking place inside him was this Intelligence, although it had climbed up a bit now.
‘I mean, it’s now almost four times the value compared to when I was a level 1.’
If he were to really dig around and find the difference, then it’d be his increased MP value. That was all, really.
So, to invest his points on this Stat based only on a single result like that…..
‘It’s just too wasteful.’
Those points would become his flesh and blood if he were to invest them elsewhere. The only conclusion he could draw here was to continue on with his levelling up until he no longer had to worry about his MP.
Meanwhile, he’d spend his precious Stat points on other, better Stats….
‘My Stat points….’
He abruptly recalled that he still had five extra points he got as the reward from the emergency quest.
He pondered for a second or two on whether he should invest that on ‘Intelligence’, but in the end, he spent 3 points on Strength and the other 2 on Stamina.
[Stats]
Strength: 75
Stamina: 45
Agility: 82
Intelligence: 39
Perception: 69
(Available points to distribute: 0)
Reduction in physical damage: 20%
‘As I thought, numbers ending in 5s are the best.’
As a satisfied smile formed on Jin-Woo’s face…
RUMBLE….
The earthquake inside the interior of the dungeon became too severe for him to ignore.
‘Is it the one hour mark already?’
There was no more time to waste here.
Jin-Woo closed his Status Window. He had been deliberately wasting time, waiting for the Gate to nearly close, but if he stayed here for a second longer, he might get trapped inside, unable to leave forever.
Before leaving, Jin-Woo turned around and swept his gaze around the boss room one more time.
‘I extracted all the magic crystals, and….’
Well, it looked like he hadn’t missed a thing.
After confirming this fact, he rapidly disappeared down the exit.
RUMBLE…
As if to warn those still inside that the Gate was about to close, the dungeon began shaking even harder than before.
***
With excellent timing, agents from the Association’s Investigation Department arrived in front of the Gate. Their eyes grew real round after spotting Jin-Woo leisurely exiting from the Gate as it gradually closed behind him.
“H-Hunter-nim!! Are there any other survivors besides you?”
“No. No one else.”
“Euh!!”
The expressions of the agents hardened in an instant.
Nine people entered it, yet only three walked out alive. This undoubtedly qualified as a huge incident.
What with several similarly bad incidents occurring within a single district, it was little wonder why these Association agents felt like they had stepped on an almighty pile of dog poo at this very moment.
They wanted to make sure there were no other survivors, but the Gate closed on them so that was no longer possible, too.
This was precisely the reason why Jin-Woo waited around until the time limit was almost up, however.
‘Well, I can’t let them know that there indeed was a survivor, now can I?’
With this, the testimonies of the three survivors would have to suffice. One of the agents spoke with a complicated tone of voice.
“Just now, the Investigation Department has received a telephone call from the chairman of the Geumgang Industries, wishing to hand himself over.”
It was here that Song Chi-Yeol entered into the conversation.
“The chairman of the Geumgang Industries, you say?”
“He’s the father of the victim, and he allegedly has paid off the Hunter Kahng Tae-Sik from the Monitoring Division to murder the convicts.”
“Oh….”
The chairman had confessed to everything after he heard that Kahng Tae-Sik was indeed successful in killing the rapist.
‘Although, it wasn’t Kahng Tae-Sik but me….’
Cops headed there, and the Association came here, it seemed.
Jin-Woo listened quietly before asking a question.
“If that’s the case, there is no problem on this side, isn’t that right?”
At Jin-Woo’s question, the agents formed troubled expressions.
“Yes, basically.”
There was a clear evidence of Kahng Tae-Sik’s crimes, and these three people fought Kahng Tae-Sik in order to survive. Just as Jin-Woo asked, there was nothing here that could be seen as problematic.
….Except for one thing.
One of the agents asked the part that felt the most suspicious to him.
“Just who delivered the final killing blow to Mister Kahng Tae-Sik, who was a rank B Hunter?”
The agents had only arrived at the scene not too long ago, and they were not briefed on the minute details of the situation yet.
‘Oh, well. The distance from here to the Association headquarters is really far, so it can’t be helped, huh. It’s already quite commendable that they had arrived here before the Gate actually closed.’
They surely had to leave the HQ and drive super fast to get here in time as soon as receiving the call.
Hints of fatigue were clearly visible on the faces of the agents.
Just before Jin-Woo was about to speak the truth, he recalled the face of Yu Jin-Ho.
‘What a missed opportunity this is, but looks like I won’t be helping that kid out with his raid quota after all.’
By making an excuse of him being a Re-Awakened Hunter, and going ahead with the re-assignment test, he’d not be able to humour Yu Jin-Ho’s plan anymore.
What Yu Jin-Ho looked for was a low-ranked Hunter that possessed incredible skills. As soon as Jin-Woo’s ranking was re-assigned and it dramatically rose up, everything would’ve been for nothing.
However, what was up here?
When Jin-Woo imagined the dejected, depressed face of Yu Jin-Ho, he found that sight rather humorous, instead of feeling apologetic.
Sure, Jin-Woo was kind of bummed out about the promised building, but, oh well.
‘Well, naught I can do here now.’
Jin-Woo thought as such and was about to open his mouth, but then….
“It was me.”
….His head naturally swivelled towards the source of that voice. And he saw Yi Ju-Hui, her wide-open eyes full of surprise, staring at Song Chi-Yeol.
“But, ahjussi….?”
Before Jin-Woo could ask what his intentions were, Song Chi-Yeol took the initiative and walked closer to the agents.
“I’m the one who killed Kahng Tae-Sik.”
The questioning agent still didn’t look convinced, however.
“Song Chi-Yeol Hunter-nim, are you saying that you brought down Kahng Tae-Sik Hunter-nim?”
His suspicions had merit; not only was Song Chi-Yeol a rank C Hunter, but he also had lost his left arm as well. On the other hand, wasn’t Kahng Tae-Sik often referred to as a high-ranked Hunter, someone who was ranked B?
The power of high ranked Hunters easily exceeded one’s imaginations. The accepted norm was that the difference in strength between a rank B and a rank C was far, far wider than that between a rank C and a rank D.
It was here that Song Chi-Yeol began chuckling amiably.
“Have you all forgotten just who is behind me?”
“….Ah!”
Just as the gazes of everyone focused on her, Yi Ju-Hui’s face reddened and she quickly lowered her head.
Yi Ju-Hui was a B-ranked Hunter. She hadn’t been mentioned until now because her class was not combat-related, but when looking only at her rank, then she was a high-ranked Hunter, just like Kahng Tae-Sik had been.
Why wouldn’t a rank C Hunter be able to defeat a rank B Hunter, when a rank B Healer was lending her aid from the side?
The agents finally formed expressions of understanding.
Taking the opportunity born from the momentary confusion, Jin-Woo stood real close to Song Chi-Yeol and whispered to the older man.
“Why are you lying to them, ahjussi?”
Song Chi-Yeol replied back in a whisper as well.
“I thought that there must be a good reason why you were trying to conceal your abilities. Did I overstep my boundaries?”
Of course, he didn’t. Thanks to him, Jin-Woo would get to avoid dealing with many inconvenient matters. This was the reason why one could never discount wisdom formed from years of experience.
“No, you didn’t.”
“I’ve received a lot of your help until now, so I’m glad to hear that I was able to help out you now, even if it’s just a small thing,”
Meanwhile, one of the agents walked closer to the two men.
“Mister Song Chi-Yeol, why don’t you come with us? Help us for a minute or two with writing up the report.”
“Alright. Let’s get going, then.”
Song Chi-Yeol left for the Association along with the agents, and before anyone knew it, only Jin-Woo and Yi Ju-Hui remained on the scene.
The sun had set a long time ago.
Ju-Hui must’ve found Jin-Woo and the somewhat altered aura he emitted a bit foreign, because she hesitated greatly before cautiously approaching him.
“Would you like to walk with me for a little while?”
‘Is she talking about that dinner date?’
He was starving after moving around for a bit today, so he found her suggestion to his liking.
Jin-Woo agreed with a welcoming expression.
“Okay, let’s.”
As if they had made a promise earlier, the two young people began quietly walking side by side under the soft lights of the street lamps.
“….”
Ju-Hui’s eyes remained fixed to her toes.
Because, if she tried to raise her head, her gaze automatically drifted towards to her side. She tried very hard not to think about it, but it was of no use.
In the past, she found him comfortable to talk to, but now, the current Jin-Woo was overflowing with this certain sense of power. She found it much harder to talk to him now as a result.
‘Just what happened….?’
He was strong enough to subdue a rank B Hunter without too much trouble. He had changed so drastically.
Since he requested her to keep it a secret, she wasn’t planning to pry, but his amazing transformation kept tugging at the corner of her mind.
< Chapter 18 > Fin.
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