SSS-Class Revival Hunter

Chapter 121: The Hero (3)

After hearing my request, my fellow Hunters remained silent for a long time. Maybe they were looking back on their past, stained from their purges.

“You’re asking us to walk on a really difficult path,” the Black Witch said slowly. She almost sounded as if she was lamenting. “People can become competent leaders if they work hard. If they try really hard, they can make the best decisions for their people without abandoning their moral compass. However, it’s almost impossible to have someone who is both competent and moral in power. It’s just too difficult... Too difficult.”

“Someone told me that the road to hell is paved with goodwill.” I held out my right hand toward the guild leaders. “Then the road to heaven has to be covered in malice.”

Countless people would be jealous of us. Many would probably cause trouble just for fun. Those who were greedy for power would fight among themselves or even instigate residents in their favor. There were countless people who would do something like that.

Malice was poisonous because it was common.

“But that doesn’t mean we should give up. Let’s show a better world to the people who gave up on the outside world and ran away here.”

I didn’t want them to shake my hand; I wanted them to hold it just like a sports team huddle.

“...”

Although the Black Witch hesitated, the Inquisitor was the first to gently place his hand on mine. “Sure, why not? A government’s moral justification has a powerful appeal, and the Death King is the only one who can plate us with that golden morality of his. It would be a shame to miss this kind of opportunity!”

The Viper laid his hand on the pile. “Now that I’m the successor to the Righteous Faction, the old man always nags and asks me to remember its principles or something. Well, I might as well use this chance to do what he says, at least once. I’m in.”

“Hmm.” The Paladin also placed her hand above everyone else’s. “I’ve been using my Skill even before we began the conversation.”

She was talking about her Lie Detector.

“None of the people gathered here uttered a word with a foul intention. Above all, I know that your upright heart was your sole driving force in the Heavenly Demon Chronicle and the Story of Sormwin Academy, Death King.”

“...”

“I believe in your sincerity and your true love. Most of all, I believe in who you are. All revolutions fail. I’ll at least offer my life and soul so that our revolution will be remembered as the most beautiful failure.”

The Countess put her hand on the huddle. “I can’t keep up with you romanticists. I’ll just follow the trend and hope my investment won’t end up in the gutter. Please do your best, people.”

Finally, the Black Witch hesitantly placed her hand over. “I can’t promise much. I won’t be able to guarantee that I can make this work or stop using the means I usually resort to, but... fine.” Her black gaze briefly stayed on every one of us. “If we fail and one of us has to die... I’ll be the first to lay down my life. That much I can promise you.”

“Then I’ll make one more promise.” I smiled. “I won’t let any of you die. Not now, not ever.”

The Black Witch smiled bitterly, but she didn’t withdraw her hand. “That’s an outrageously empty promise...”

All six of us put our hands together.

“Well, good!” The Indoor Librarian smiled, spinning in the air. “Death King, Black Witch, Inquisitor, Countess, Viper, Paladin, I designate the six of you as the characters in Our Victim! When you open your eyes, you’ll find yourselves in a world where the apocalyptic book is in the process of serialization discontinuation. Please be careful. This will be very different from all the other apocalyptic books you’ve experienced so far!”

When the Indoor Librarian opened the book, light streamed out from it and landed on our hands, soon enveloping us.

“The difficulty level of this apocalyptic book is A! Unlike last time, I can’t bestow many blessings on you. The Constellation of this world is alive in this apocalyptic book, reigning it. You’ll become the invaders when you enter. The Constellation will naturally be hostile toward you.” The Indoor Librarian smiled softly. “Death King, the Constellation will view you as their mortal enemy!”

Enemy?

Before I could even understand what that meant, a light blinded me. I didn’t really have to try to understand what the Indoor Librarian had said, though.

The world turned white, and before we even opened our eyes and met the new world.., I heard a sharp voice in my head. It sounded like an emergency message.

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher has detected an invasion.]

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher warns you all.]

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher wants to exterminate the invaders.]

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher declares war on you all!]

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher hates you in particular.]

Our Victim was the fairy tale where the Constellation that had invaded Raviel’s world was ruling.

***

In stories about a hero and a demon king, the demon king always let their guard down, never revealing their full power from the beginning and sending their fodder subordinates to deal with the warriors first. The hero, who was weak at the beginning of the story, became stronger by defeating those enemies until they finally confronted the demon king.

—I’ve been waiting for you. You dare to oppose my master!

The Constellation of this fairy tale was different, showing us their fangs from the beginning.

Among our group, the first to sense the crisis was my holy sword.

[Shiny has detected the presence of her sister sword!]

The holy sword on my waist trembled, seemingly trying to warn me about an incoming crisis. Although my vision had yet to clear, Shiny quickly gave me more information.

[Shiny has confirmed that the characteristics of the Immortal Happiness Preacher and Sacrifice match!]

[The Immortal Happiness Preacher is Sacrifice, the fourth sister sword left by Lefanta Aegim!]

Right after Shiny’s warning, the world around me cleared up, revealing a blue sky. The Hunters and I were falling, plummeting toward the ground. I only realized it now since, immediately after being summoned to this world, we floated in the air for a moment. However, gravity quickly pulled us back to the ground.

Whooooshhhhh!

As the wind brushed past my forehead, I could feel my blood rushing to my head. We were falling head first toward our deaths.

Just before the wind could scatter our group in all directions, the Inquisitor grabbed my arm, deftly wrapped his legs tightly around my waist, and made a hand seal.

“Mr. Death King, grab my right foot and never let go! Divine Formula: Teleportation! ”

As instructed, I clung to his right foot.

In the next second, the Inquisitor appeared right next to the Black Witch. “Black Dragon Master.”

“Yeah, give me your leg!” The Black Witch grabbed the Inquisitor’s left foot as if it was her own.

“Haha.” The Inquisitor’s light laughter blended with the wind.

I felt like the gravity that had been weighing us all down suddenly became light for a moment.

“Divine Formula: Teleportation!”

The Inquisitor gathered the Countess, the Paladin, and the Viper one by one. We clung to the Inquisitor like little pigs clinging to their mother.

Embarrassed by this situation, the Viper squawked. “Hey! Why am I last!”

“It’s because you’re the most useless of us all, Sect Master! Even if we lose you, it won’t be a significant loss!”

“You fucking preacher!”

With all five of us clinging to him, the Inquisitor no longer had the room to move his hands to make seals. To make matters worse, there was not much time left either. Even at this moment, the ground was getting closer by the second.

While waiting for all of us to gather, the Black Witch yelled, “Good job, kid! Everyone, say you agree to become the subject of my Skill! Hurry! Hurry!”

“Yes!”

“I agree!”

“Alright!”

“You have my consent.”

“Fuck yes!”

“Teleportation!”

Our group was immediately teleported. Unlike the Inquisitor, who had to make a hand seal to use his ability, the Black Witch’s Skill was activated simply by physical contact. This was the very Skill that I had relied on when dealing with the Demon King of Autumn Rain.

We landed safely on the ground.

—I’m not letting you go! Sing, my apostles!

But it wasn’t safe down here at all either.

Beyond the horizon, hundreds of thousands—maybe even millions—of child-like entities stood. Every one of them was identical to the apostles who had invaded Raviel’s world. They were now surrounding us in rows.

—La.

And they sang.

—La, la.

—La, lala.

—La.

An acapella of a million alto and soprano melodies harmonized, their whistling forming the instrumental.

The children happily danced in a circle. With each step they took, the ground shook slightly.

Thump, thump, thummmpppp.

—La.

The difficulty level of this apocalyptic book was A. The entire world was hostile to Hunters, and its ruler didn’t let her guard down. From the moment we entered, the world already began trying to destroy us with all its might.

“Ugh!”

The fellow Hunters hurriedly drew their aura up, but it wasn't enough. Less than a minute after arriving in the apocalyptic book, we were already under an all-out attack. A vehement wave of joyful drowsiness hit us fiercely, proving to be difficult to handle with our aura alone.

“Miss Countess!” the Inquisitor shouted. “Give me money, please!”

“Damn it. My bank account is going to close down...!”

“Yes, but that’s better than having your head crack open!”

“Fifteen percent compound interest!”

“I won’t take it unless it’s free!”

“Well, that’s nonsense.”

“Nisha!” the Paladin screamed.

At first, I didn’t know what Nisha meant. However, when I saw that Paladin’s eyes were on the Countess, I realized that Nisha was the Countess’ real name.

“Shut up and take out your wallet before I kill you!”

“Ugh. Damn it! Withdrawal: Infinite!”

The Countess took out a pouch with a golden snail pattern from her chest and untied it.

Chinnnng!

Countless gold coins spilled onto the ground.

“User Change: Inquisitor!”

“Hahaha, thank you!” The Inquisitor quickly made a hand seal. “Divine Formula: Devotion!” @@novelbin@@

White light burst out of his hands and enveloped the pile of gold coins, which turned into dust and disappeared. In return, our aura was strengthened to an absurd degree.

“Divinity Transfer: Psychological Attack Immunity and Aura Enhancement! Targets: the Countess, the Inquisitor, the Black Dragon Master, the Paladin, and the Viper. The duration is undecided for all targets. The gold will never let you go. The Divine Formula Incantation is completed!”

“Kyaaaaaaaah! My money!” the Countess screamed.

Gold coins continued to pour out of her pouch, but as soon as they came out in the open, they turned into light and evaporated without a trace.

She was in so much panic that her cat ears popped out from her hair. “My money! Nya! No! My money! My money is more precious than my blood! I feel as if I’m bleeding!”

“Haha, would you like some of my blood?” the Inquisitor offered.

“Forget it! Just remember that the Tower goes bankrupt the same day I become broke! Do you understand? Unless you want to eat scrap porridge tomorrow morning, get moving already!”

The fall from the sky, and the acapella of a million children—these crises had come one after another without a moment of rest, but we successfully overcame them. Only then were we able to take a good look at the main culprit behind this mayhem.

—Tsk. I guess you’re skilled enough to take control of Idol, Sympathy, and Prayer. After all the trouble I went through to hide my presence and launch a surprise attack...!

The Constellation—a girl covered in dark red blood—was trembling in the air. Like Prayer, her entire body was red. However, her shade was a little darker.

—But it’s no use! Leader of the traitors, my loyalty to Lefanta Aegim will never fade. I’ll kill you and destroy you so that you won’t be a hindrance to the grand path that my master walks!

I see. I took out the holy sword.

Raviel had stabbed her heart with the Goddess of Protection’s fragment to turn herself into a Constellation. This meant that even if Sacrifice used to be a mere Constellation’s fragment, she still had the potential to become a new Constellation herself. After all, she had evolved from a fragment of the Goddess of Protection into the Immortal Happiness Preacher.

—My apostles! Get rid of them!

And Sacrifice was still loyal to Lefanta Aegim. Unlike her other sister swords who had been powerlessly absorbed into my holy sword, Sacrifice gathered all her strength and attacked me as if she had anticipated my arrival.

That was the whole story behind the full-scale attack just now.

I looked straight ahead, holding the holy sword. An army of hundreds of thousands were coming from all directions. Instead of shouting or thrusting their weapons, the apostles sang and danced. However, this was more threatening than any other shout and more lethal than any weapon.

We were six people against countless enemies.

“Miss Countess.”

“What?”

“You still have coins to spare, right?”

This was the best moment for me to shine.

The Countess blinked. “What?”

“Please let those coins fly on this stage. Monster Legion Reincarnation,” I muttered.