Chapter 175: The Head That Exploded

Until a gap appeared in the Dokkaebi King’s defenses.

I clenched my fists tightly from behind, focusing on the Hunters’ battle.

I felt a pang of guilt for standing here in safety and merely giving orders, but at the same time, an overwhelming sense of responsibility weighed on me.

All the more reason to focus on the battlefield—if only to ensure I didn’t miss the opening the Hunters were creating for me and finally.

“Thud.”

The Dokkaebi King collapsed.

Combat 2, who had been waiting for the firing command, glanced at me.

“Not yet.”

I still hadn’t given the order to fire.

I had to trust the Hunters.

Even now, if we fired, the Dokkaebi King might block it with both arms.

Even if not, with just the force of repulsion, the shell I launched could simply bounce off, futilely.

At that moment, the Sword Saint charged at the Dokkaebi King.

“Thwack!”

The Sword Saint’s attack was blocked, almost effortlessly but in that instant.

My eyes gleamed, and I immediately signaled to prepare to fire.

In attacking the Sword Saint, the Dokkaebi King’s arms had moved away from his ‘real head.’

Moreover, after using repulsion, he was now using attraction to finish off the Sword Saint.

Judging by all the previous fights, the Dokkaebi King couldn’t use both repulsion and attraction at the same time.

Therefore.

“Fire!”

Now was the chance.

“Boom!”

The Orichalcum shell was launched.

“Whoosh!”

The Orichalcum shell cut through the wind, flying with force.

Faster than any other shell.

As the Dokkaebi King was about to finish the Sword Saint, he instinctively sensed the presence of Orichalcum.

“Damn…!”

The Dokkaebi King immediately canceled the attraction but it was too late to defend against the shell.

The shell was swift, and the Dokkaebi King’s hands were still pointed toward the Sword Saint, the interval between using attraction and switching to repulsion was too great.

As a result, the Dokkaebi King couldn’t put up any resistance.

“KABOOM—!!”

He took a direct hit from the Orichalcum shell.

Not on any of the so-called weak-point heads sprouting across his body, but right on the Dokkaebi King’s true head.

The staggering shock shattered the Dokkaebi King’s rationality.

Even then, he strained his neck, trying to endure the shell’s force.

“Flaaash!”

A rainbow-colored light burst from the Orichalcum shell.

With my crafting, the holy power within had been maximized, and with Fireball’s help, holy runes had been engraved onto the Orichalcum shell.

That shell was holy power incarnate.

Besides, the Dokkaebi King, though a demigod, had an overwhelmingly evil nature as a ‘demon,’ not a deity.

“Kraaaaagh!”

He couldn’t resist the holy attribute pouring out from the shell.

Even if he tried to summon repulsion, the holy power scrambled his strength.

Still, he could endure.

The Dokkaebi King clenched his teeth, resisting the shell’s power.

He was a Rank 10 monster.

No matter how much holy power was infused, and even if the shell was rated L-grade, it was ultimately forged from SS-grade materials.

It wasn’t enough to fell the Dokkaebi King in one blow.

While the Dokkaebi King was thinking that and resisting the shell—

“Slash!”

“Urgh!”

A sharp pain stabbed from a head growing on his forearm.

The Sword Saint, who had been dragged in by the attraction, struck right at the Dokkaebi King’s weak point at full speed.

That alone shook the concentration that had been resisting the Orichalcum shell, but it was only the beginning.

“Thud!”

“Kraaaagh!”

The swiftly approaching Shadow King unleashed a barrage of skills.

“Thudthudthudthud!”

Cheon Seung-heon wrung out his remaining strength, firing arrow after arrow at the Dokkaebi King’s weak spot.

And more—Team Leader 1, Park Sang-hyun, climbed onto the weak spot and slashed with his claws, the Spirit Emperor poured spirit magic as he wrung out his powers, and my assistants scrambled up the Dokkaebi King’s body.

Everyone on the battlefield relentlessly targeted the Dokkaebi King’s weakness.

Eventually, not only did the Dokkaebi King’s concentration break, but his rank quickly dropped as his weak point was assaulted.

With his rank diminished, he could no longer withstand the holy power in the Orichalcum shell.

At last.

“Kraaaaaaaagh!”

The Dokkaebi King reaped the karmic consequences of his oft-shouted threat—’I’ll crush your head!’

“BOOM!!”

His head exploded from the Orichalcum shell.

Not one of the fake heads that had sprouted all over to increase his rank, but the Dokkaebi King’s true head.

And no matter how great the rank of a monster, none could survive with their head blown off.

“Boom.”

At last, the Dokkaebi King’s massive corpse crashed to the ground, lifeless.

[You have successfully repelled the Tower’s first Monster Wave.]

[Massive experience will be awarded to the Awakened Ones who repelled the Wave.]

[Awakened Ones who repelled the Wave are now eligible to climb.]

[Until the Tower’s ascent is completed, Monster Waves will repeat.]

A string of system messages signaling the end of the Monster Wave appeared before the Hunters.

***

Meanwhile.

Other countries, like Korea, were also suffering from Rank 10 Monsters that appeared alongside the Tower.

Korea had somehow managed to stand against the Rank 10 Monster, but the situation was not as good elsewhere.

Even in the United States, the country with the best prospects—

“Douglas, that thing…”

“I said I can’t! How are we supposed to beat that?!”

“But if this goes on, Washington will be destroyed!”

“It’s not that I don’t want to stop it—I can’t take it down! I’m barely holding it off as it is, and I don’t see any way to defeat it!”

“ROOOOOOAAAAR~!!”

The Rank 10 Monster that appeared alongside the Tower.

They were barely managing to hold off the Elder Dragon.

The Elder Dragon attacked the American Hunters with more powerful magic and breath than any Monster they’d faced before.

They were barely holding on for now, but as time passed, the situation deteriorated.

At this rate, the Hunters would collapse from exhaustion, and the Elder Dragon would destroy Washington—

No, the entire United States and yet, this was still considered fortunate.

Meanwhile, in Japan—

“R-Run away!”

“The Hunters! What are they doing?!”

“KYAAAAA!”

They had already given up on defeating the Rank 10 Monster.

The Hunters had fallen or fled, and the citizens, left unprotected, were escaping Tokyo, the capital.

It was the same in other countries.

Just surviving the Monster Wave was a blessing; in most places, the moment a Rank 10 Monster appeared, defense was abandoned and people ran.

Since most Towers appeared in each country’s capital, fleeing meant abandoning their very hearts, but they had no choice.

Thus, the world slid rapidly toward ruin.

At this rate, it was the end.

Everyone had that thought in their mind.

“Damn it!” Douglas cursed, the United States’ number one Hunter.

No, unofficially, the world’s number one Hunter—unable to protect Washington, let alone the United States.

His confidence and pride as number one were trampled completely but he couldn’t give up.

Douglas soared skyward, desperate to bring down the Elder Dragon.

Struck by the Elder Dragon’s magic and sent crashing down, he rose and flew again.

Even after colliding with the dragon’s tail and crashing once more, he rose to fly again.

Then—

The Elder Dragon bowed its head toward Douglas.

Then opened its massive jaws wide.

He tried to flee, but the wings of the dragon he was riding had broken from the last impact.

“Haha…”

A hollow laugh slipped out.

As the man once hailed as America’s hero was about to fall—

In front of Douglas’ eyes—

No, in front of everyone’s eyes, Hunters and civilians alike, a system message appeared.

[Korea has repelled the first Monster Wave.]

[Monster Wave will be halted.]

[Massive experience will be awarded to Awakened Ones who repelled the Wave.]

[Awakened Ones who repelled the Wave are now eligible to climb.]

[Until the Tower’s ascent is completed, Monster Waves will repeat.]

“What?”

‘They had stopped the Monster Wave? Did that mean they’d defeated a Rank 10 Monster?’

‘No way. Impossible.’

It was a system message too unbelievable to trust, but proof appeared immediately.

The Elder Dragon, which had been about to crush Douglas, suddenly stopped moving.

More than that, its body began to dissipate and it wasn’t just the Elder Dragon.

All the Monsters that had been roaring as if to destroy the world vanished as if it had all been a lie.

In that moment.

“Oh my God…!”

“Dear Lord…”

People across the world thought of Korea and offered prayers of gratitude.

***

[Vulcanus defeats the Dokkaebi King]

[The blacksmith who brought down the Dokkaebi King—Vulcanus]

[Separate from the Hunter rankings, Vulcanus hailed as Korea’s hero]

[Vulcanus, he is…]

After the Monster Wave ended.

Not just Korea, but the entire world was shouting my name.

Sure, all the other Hunters had worked hard, but in the end, it was the shell I fired that blew off the Dokkaebi King’s head.

Though it stung to have used up all that Orichalcum, it didn’t matter.

Because by using SS-grade Orichalcum I got:

[Dokkaebi King’s Soul Fragment]

Type: Material

Grade: SSS

Description: A soul fragment of the demigod known as the Dokkaebi King, revered as the king of goblins.

“Heh heh heh. A triple-S grade material.”

After all, I’d obtained an SSS-grade material, the Dokkaebi King’s Soul Fragment.

That was more than a fair exchange.

Honestly, I wasn’t sure what I could make with it yet, but as long as it was SSS-grade, anything crafted from it would surely outclass any item made from S-grade materials.

As I admired the soul fragment from the comfort of my room, a familiar announcer’s voice came from the Hunter news on the TV I’d left on.

— The sudden appearance of the Tower and the Monster Wave in the heart of Seoul has caused tremendous damage.

— However, thanks to the efforts of Hunters including Vulcanus and Sword Saint Han Yu-ra, we were able to protect Seoul with only this much loss.

— Meanwhile, in countries other than Korea, even the Hunter superpower United States was unable to repel the Tower’s Monster Wave.

— While everyone else had given up, Korea’s successful defense against the Monster Wave brought a halt to Monster Waves worldwide.

— As a result, countless countries are expressing gratitude to Korea and searching for the way forward.

A Tower had appeared.

Monsters capable of destroying the world poured out in a Monster Wave.

It was only natural that people were shocked.

Truthfully, except for a handful of Hunter superpowers, most countries had their capitals destroyed and had no direction for the future.

In this situation—

– “Vulcanus-nim. All related personnel have assembled in the Vulcanus Guild conference room.”

I summoned all the key figures of Korea to the Guild.

Maybe it was because I had seemed to know about the Tower’s arrival in advance and prepared cannons to take down the Monsters, and then played a key role in defeating the Dokkaebi King?

Even though those summoned were all important figures, they gathered at the Vulcanus Guild at my call.

“I’ll head over right now.”

And before them, I was about to tell them everything I knew about the Tower and the age of ruin.