The dragon was feisty, and it turned toward the ground when it was ready to unleash its breath. Although I was being tilted forward, I could withstand the imbalance as the wind supported my back. The breeze hitting my eyeballs was tolerable, but I found it hard to endure the black energy that concentrated in the dragon’s head. The energy was malicious. It went beyond the destructive power it held as it contained a negative aura.

The black energy swirling in the dragon’s head reminded me of the memories I never wanted to think about: my father’s lonely funeral, a street full of starving people, a group of monsters who took control of the world, and the Awakened who went frantic and killed each other. After recalling the faces of those I had killed, I suddenly came to my senses as I was getting closer to the ground.

Arrows and spells were flying in from all directions. They even flew diagonally up from the ground and spattered against the dragon.

Pang! Pang!

Each time they hit the dragon, its protective shield flickered. The Kciphos must have sensed that their deaths were coming. All of their eyes were filled with dread even though they continued to fire attacks at us.

Kuaaaaaaah-

The dragon finally vomited black energy from its gigantic jaw. If I hadn’t held out with all my might, I would have collapsed as well. Wild energy was jolting around all at once. When the dragon flew while blasting out the corps with its breath, I heard the sounds of choking and screaming. The entire ground became filled with black waves, and the floundering limbs quickly disappeared into the fog.

The skeleton dragon flew from the north to the south and took a huge turn near the end. Then, it went back into the street. The road we had flown past became clean as a considerable number of monsters vanished without even leaving mana stones.

Meanwhile, the notification messages indicating the completion of the quests popped up constantly. The dragon flew toward the remaining Kciphos on the street.

Sheeeeek-

The escort, winged soldiers, and the commander-in-chief were near the north street, but the commander-in-chief was the only one left standing. The others were dying on the ground while barely holding their swords in their hands. The dragon landed on the ground at a reasonable distance away from the commander-in-chief.

Thud!

It began to stomp with me on its neck. Seeing that the black energy was still swirling in its skull, it had enough power to do one last shot. Then, at last…

Kuaaaak-

It blasted its pitch-black energy at the commander-in-chief that was rushing in. The enraged monster was no longer visible as it had been buried by the dragon’s attack. A few seconds later, it surged into the air without any equipment including weapons. The hair that had covered its whole body was completely gone, and only its skin was exposed. The only thing it had left was its tensed-up muscles and eyes full of fury.

The skeleton dragon moved its head after the monster. Following that, the black energy flickered in and out multiple times. The commander-in-chief had somehow managed to resist for a while, but it could never truly compete against the dragon by struggling like that. Before long, it completely gave up. It was a bit surprising as it should have made multiple efforts to fight back. Well, all of its efforts were useless as it had already been exposed to the dragon breath…

I was confident things would end even if I didn’t intervene. After all, it had taken even me years to catch the dragon, so this monster could never defeat it without using anything unexpected.

[The dark breath of the Skeletal Dragon that even the Living Worship has been exhausted.]

[Cooldown time: 1 day]

The monster finally got an opportunity to attack when the dragon’s breath disappeared, but it wasn’t in a state to seize the chance. Instead, it was lying and scratching the ground as it had lost all its senses. It was extremely slow and couldn’t even move an inch.

The dragon’s skull tilted, and it delicately grabbed the monster, whose skin and muscles had melted, and lifted it up as if it wanted to show me. It was either bragging about its achievement or asking me if I actually thought this weak monster would be its enemy. Then…

Quak!

The bones of the dragon’s jaw closed. No blood came out, and only the pieces of shattered bones fell to the ground.

[Congratulations! You are the first one to complete the quest ‘The Death of the Commander-in-chief.’]

[The death of the commander-in-chief has been announced to its corps.]

[The corps has become significantly dispirited and has lost a considerable degree of power.]

[You have obtained a ‘challenger box’ for being the first one to complete the quest.]

[Please select the box.]

***

Perfect!

I gained one challenger box, one master box, and nine diamond boxes after monopolizing the quest related to the commander-in-chief and its corps. This was an amazing reward similar to the compensation that I could get from an A-class dungeon. I was delighted to get a challenger box as I hadn’t received one for a while.

I opened the boxes from the highest to the lowest class. I upgraded Agility to S-class with the challenger and master box, and it was my first S-class stat I obtained since I entered the Second Round. In a situation where I already possessed enough items, developing basic stats was my priority. All nine remaining diamond boxes had insignias, so I embedded them in my chest.

I headed for Seong-Il, and he was waiting for me while sitting in a pile of monsters. Puddles of blood were everywhere, so my steps splashed as I walked forward. The flat areas were also drenched with blood and mud.

“Ugh.”

Seong-Il barely managed to raise his head toward me, but he couldn’t stand up.

“I got a… diamond… box…” His face was contorted in pain, and he was forcing himself to talk.

“What about the gate?” I questioned.

He responded, “It’s closed.”

Exterminating the corps all at once was only possible when all of them entered the village. If we missed the timing, we had to rummage through the town and look for soldiers that had spread out on all sides. That was why I dealt with the village and sent Seong-Il to the sides where it was easy to obtain hidden rewards.

“You must have earned something when you touched the gate.”

I was nervous when I spoke because I wasn’t certain if I had gotten fake information or not. Seong-Il slowly put his hand inside the jacket and took something out. There was a mana stone on his hand, and it fell to the ground. His head also drooped down weakly, accompanied by panting. I patted his shoulder and picked up the mana stone. The chill immediately spread around my palm, and this coldness was the reason why Seong-Il could maintain his consciousness for so long.

[Kciphos’ Ice Halidom (Item)

The powerful force of the Kciphos Corps is concentrated in the item.

Effect: You can set return points.

Class: S

Return point: Ice Castle (Kciphos)

Cooldown time: 7 days]

As soon as I used the item…

[Would you like to return to the Ice Castle (Kciphos)?]

The description sounded alarming. The saved return point was surprising, but no Awakened would agree to go there. There were two kinds of actions the user could take while using the return stone. One was to teleport to a saved return point, and the other was to set up a return point.

[Would you like to set the current spot as a return point?]

[Subject: District 152]

I obviously made a new return point.

[Kciphos’ Ice Halidom has been added to your storage box.]

Last but not least, it was Seong-Il’s turn.

“Seong-Il. Kwon Seong-Il.”

Even though I was calling his name, he didn’t respond as he was on the verge of losing his mind. But luckily, something for Seong-Il had come out of a diamond box.

***

It was a B-class Healing insignia. With this, Seong-Il no longer had to live with only one arm.

Srrrrr-

A brilliant light penetrated into Seong-Il, and his pale face slowly regained its original color. He gazed stiffly after turning toward his arm, which was quickly regenerating. The bone grew. Following that, a bundle of new nerves spread through the limb like a spider’s web, and blood vessels were created at a fast pace, similar to how the black energy had quickly swirled inside the dragon’s skull. Muscles and fat filled up the new arm ending with newly formed skin quickly covering all of it.

Seong-Il tightly clenched and unfolded his fist before swinging his shoulders with a twinkle in his eyes. He was no longer dying. Instead, he smiled at me while showing off his thick biceps. In the end, he stretched out and tensed his arm. His forearm between the wrist and the elbow looked like a blunt weapon. Then, Seong-Il began to pretend to wield something after concentrating his strength on both arms.

Whoosh- 

He pretended to have one weapon in each hand. His nickname was Human Calibur, and Seong-Il enjoyed using his skill more than any item. It was inevitable as he used to have one arm, but it seemed he would continue doing it even after growing a new arm. It wasn’t a skill the System gave him, but he had mastered using it. Kwon Seong-Il was a funny guy. He was also giggling to himself as if he had an interesting idea.

He asked, “Soo-Ah and Kyung-Ah. Don’t you think I can beat those two at once now?”

This was what made him trustworthy. Although he knew I now had an S-class item that allowed me to teleport to other regions, he didn’t ask for anything from me. Instead, he simply secured the mana stone and gave it to me as I had ordered him. He was loyal.

“Let’s go back.”

***

The village was still full of life even when the main squad had left to confront the enemies that had appeared in the nearby area. I felt a sense of disharmony. Seong-Il had witnessed the bloody battles that each district’s squads were having against monster corps on this way here. That was why.

“Fuck.”

He threw an unpleasant look at the remaining people in the village.

“If the people battling lose the fights outside the town, everyone will die together. But how can they be so at ease here!”

Well, I had caused a part of this problem. After my interference, many Awakened were growing at a much faster rate than they had in the past, so the number of survivors had increased due to the impact. However, the rich-get-richer and the poor-get-poorer cycle remained in this world. Those who entered a regular squad at least had a chance to become rich, but those who failed to adapt only struggled to live in the economic system I had created.

However, these losers often refused to join the battle. What had made them like that? Their mentality was a problem, but the one thing they all had in common was that the majority hadn’t experienced any growth. An increased number of survivors in the Stage of Advent didn’t help mankind. What we needed were strong and enthusiastic Awakened.

Those who had become complacent were no different from civilians. The regular Awakened had to fight against the monster corps while I was battling the Seven Demon Kings. Looking at them, I realized that I had to fix something else before getting rid of the assassination quests! I needed to be more intuitive than the System. Instead of accumulating points to open a box, people needed immediate compensation whenever they killed a monster. There had to be a clearer distinction of people’s growth with levels, and it would be more effective to engage everyone than lumping them based on class from F to S. The first attempt would be weak, but if they experienced it at least once…

“Where are you going?” Seong-Il asked as he walked briskly to catch up with my pace.

“To the front.”

I decided to bring Lee Soo-Ah and Shin Kyung-Ah along this time. I didn’t know what kind of diabolically difficult quest I would have to overcome in order to modify the System in the way I wanted, but I couldn’t delay it anymore.

A third of the Stage of Advent had already finished. It would only cause confusion if I postponed this modification. I wanted to make this world as close as possible to a game. A System that encouraged Awakened to become passionate about growing was the only way for humanity to win this war. In fact, the System should have been like that in the first place. We needed to change classes into levels, and points into XP[1].

1. A game term that refers to ‘experience point.’ ☜