Chapter 61: The Demon Guild

-Thanks for telling me.

“Hey, I was joking! You’re overreacting! Facing against an entire guild alone? Even if you use guerrilla tactics, it’ll be impossible!”

-You said that the guys I killed were on the strong side, right? Then I can kill the others easily as well.

“No, they have too many people.”

-I have magic. And I’m not going to charge recklessly at their base. I have a plan in mind.

“You just said you didn’t have a plan!”

-I just thought of it.

Yeon Jung couldn’t say anything to that.

-Then I’m going.

His phone went silent.

“That crazy person…”

Yeon Jung muttered as he slowly put away his phone.

“Even if the Demon guild’s filled with dogs, they can’t be taken lightly.”

They weren’t particularly strong, but still couldn’t be underestimated.

“Soo Hyuk sounds like he’s really angry this time.”

Since he hadn’t been present on the scene, he had no way of knowing the exact story. However, Yeon Jung had noticed from his tone, atmosphere and the current situation, that Soo Hyuk was enraged.

“If he’s angry like then…”

Over the years that they’d known each other, Yeon Jung had only seen Soo Hyuk get angry a few times. But the few times he did still sent shivers down his spine.

“Should I worry about the Demon guild instead?”

* * *

The Demon guild’s guild house.

“The username was Soo Hyuk, and he wore a robe from the Tower of Poison…”

Haggis lifted his head while frowning heavily.

“Then those three got done in by a magician?”

He asked the master of the Demon guild, Baal, who was sitting opposite of him.

“That’s correct.”

Baal answered Haggis’ question and went back to his book.

“Okay, but shouldn’t they be able to beat a magician if they teamed up together? What did Mandara do? He’s supposed to be the wizard killer.”

Haggis continued, ignoring the fact that Baal was still reading a book in front of him.

“He died first after being caught by surprise.”

Baal answered while turning a page in his book.

“That magician isn’t normal, since Mandara died in two hits.”

“Two hits? Mandara?”

“Right.”

“Wow.”

Haggis exclaimed silently in surprise at Baal’s words.

“Ask Rhino about it.”

Haggis suggested. Rhino was a magician who used poison. Of course, he wasn’t a normal magician, as he was the vice head of the Tower of Poison in Hadrac.

“Since we fed him a lot of gifts, he’ll cooperate nicely.”

The Demon guild had a unique relationship with Rhino, built upon numerous bribes.

“About who he is, and where he is”

Magaician Soo Hyuk, who wears the Poison Tower’s robe. That was equivalent to him belonging to the Tower of Poison. Rhino was sure to provide them with information.

“Okay! Then should we send them to Hedlin?”

“Do it.”

* * *

After ending his call with Yeon Jung, Soo Hyuk reviewed what he had just heard.

“Hadrac…”

The city founded by the Mercenary King Hadrac. The Demon guild’s base was in Hadrac. Soo Hyuk set down his phone and went to his computer. It was to research more into the Demon guild. Soo Hyuk went into the official Pangea website and searched ‘Demon guild.’ It turned out to be fairly a well-known guild like Yeon Jung said.

‘…It’s a group of crazy people.’

He thought as he read through the posts about the Demon guild. The Demon guild was weirder than how Yeon Jung had described them.

“You can only join when you’re not wanted?”

The information that caught his eye was the conditions for joining. You could only join when your infamy score was low enough that you weren’t wanted by authorities.

“They also have a lot of enemies.”

Being a criminal guild, they obviously had a lot of enemies. And it wasn’t just one or two. They had enemies all over the land.

“Then how are they surviving?”

He couldn’t understand how the Demon guild was still intact. After more research, he found out the reason. There were many reasons why, but there were two notable ones.

First, the guild members didn’t operate in an area where an arrest order had been given. Second, those who killed the guild members were hunted and killed at least 5 times. They were the main reason why people didn’t go after the Demon guild.

“This is why he called them dirty.”

He realised why Yeon Jung had called them ‘dirty bastards’. He hadn’t paid much attention when Yeon Jung mentioned them, but he realised the nature of these ‘hunts’ from the users who hunted by them.

“Hmm.”

Soo Hyuk got up from his seat, then started walking to his capsule.

‘How would they try to find me?’

The Demon guild would try to hunt him down from now on. But all they knew about him was his name and appearance. The problem was that there could be multiple users of the same name, and people could change their appearance by swapping around their gear.

‘Will they just go around killing people conspicuously?’

They could perform another tragic act like Hedlin’s incident.

‘Anyway,’

What method the Demon guild used didn’t matter. The only important part was that they would try to hunt him down.

‘Those bastards. When apologising isn’t enough, they go around hunting more people instead?’

If he didn’t have enough strength in this situation, he would have experienced a heart-tearing pain. But Soo Hyuk had strength. Didn’t he easily kill the three men in Hedlin?

Soo Hyuk looked around his surroundings once he connected to Pangea in his capsule. The corpses had disappeared, and the people around him were going about their day like nothing had happened. The atmosphere was too different from 1 hour ago.

Soo Hyuk observed the heads of people going past him. He was checking their guild marks.

‘They’re not here.’

He couldn’t see any Demon guild marks in the end.

‘Well, only an hour has passed.’

Only an hour had passed since he had killed Loken, Haiden and Mandara. It would be unusual if the Demon guild reacted so quickly. After confirming that there were no Demon guild members around him, Soo Hyuk teleported to his subspace.

[Warping to the Archmage’s Subspace.]

When he arrived at the familiar chamber, Soo Hyuk walked through the tunnel on the right and headed for the magic circle. Then using the magic circle, he teleported again to Matab.

‘I came back.’

Arriving at the Matab Library, Soo Hyuk handed in his token and headed towards the bookshelves. He should’ve been enjoying his time with his family by now, but things had gone astray.

“Hoo…”

He boiled with anger every time he thought of it. While frowning heavily, Soo Hyuk pulled the books out of the shelves and returned to the reading desk.

‘I will show them…’

He thought as he opened the book.

‘What a real demon looks like.’

* * *

“Soo Hyuk?”

Rhino asked.

“Yes. Do you who he is?”

Haggis answered with his own question. Perhaps Rhino knew who he was?

“No, I’ve never heard of him.”

“I see.”

“Hmm, can you tell me why you’re looking for him?”

Rhino asked again. A magician of the Tower of Poison, Soo Hyuk. He was curious why Haggis was looking for him.

“Ah, that…”

Haggis paused briefly at Rhino’s question.

‘Is it okay to tell him?’

The Demon guild’s relationship with Rhino was strong. But they didn’t know who Soo Hyuk was, and Rhino also didn’t know who he was.

‘What if he turns out to be Rhino’s friend’s friend?’

He could turn out to be important to Rhino through said friend. If that turned out to be the case, the Demon guild could have a difficult situation on their hands.

‘No, that’s not likely, considering Rhino’s personality.’

As he was considering whether to tell Rhino or not, he was reminded of Rhino’s temperament. He would value money above a friend’s friend.

‘Plus, we have a reasonable justification.’

Rhino was sure to help them upon hearing their justification.

“Our guild members were attacked by him. Three of them.”

“…!”

Rhino was surprised by Haggis’ sudden answer.

“Then…is it for revenge?”

He asked Haggis carefully.

“We want an apology, but we will have our revenge if he refuses.”

Honestly, they didn’t want an apology. They were still planning on killing him even if he did give one, but he didn’t need to say that to Rhino.

“Hmm.”

Rhino fell silent at Haggis’ answer, while Haggis stared expectantly at Rhino. After a few seconds, Rhino opened his mouth.

“Alright. I will help you this once. But it’s going to take some time”

“Thank you.”

Haggis smiled at Rhino’s answer. Then he opened his inventory and took out a pouch filled with different kinds of rare jewels.

“This is from our leader, Baal.”

Haggis said as he handed the pouch over to Rhino. Rhino was silent during the whole process, but he couldn’t hide his eyes shining with greed. Intoxicated with greed, Rhino grabbed the pouch from Haggis and checked its contents. A few moments later, Rhino looked up from the pouch with a huge grin on his face.

“Come tomorrow. I’ll find out by then.”

The wait was shortened.

“Yes, I understand. Then I’ll come again tomorrow.”

Haggis stood up from his seat with a grin of his own.

* * *

“What do we do if those freaks are still there?”

“Yeah, what should we do…”

Soo Hyuk, who was listening to their worries, stood and said confidently,

“Please wait for a bit. I’ll check first.”

If those three bastards were still in Hedlin, another PK incident might happen. To prevent this, Soo Hyuk stood up, went to his capsule and connected to Pangea first.

“Archmage’s Subspace.”

Soo Hyuk cast Archmage’s Subspace as soon as he appeared in the library.

[Warping to the Archmage’s Subspace.]

The moment Soo Hyuk appeared in the subspace, he turned right and walked through the tunnel to the magic circle. After taking a warp gate to Hedlin, he became able to teleport to Hedlin with the magic circle in the Archmage’s Subspace. He stood on the magic circle and warped to Hedlin.

“Help me!”

“Ahh!”

Screams filled his ears the moment he arrived at Hedlin. Soo Hyuk frowned as the sudden noise assaulted his ears.

‘These bastards.’

He had tried to check just in case, but it was really happening again. Soo Hyuk shoved past the panicked people and found them again. Loken, Haiden and Mandara.

‘Doing this again as soon as the penalty’s over?’

Upon death, there was a 24-hour access penalty. But they were causing chaos the moment their penalty was over?

‘They must be genuinely crazy.’

“W-why! You freaks!”

“What kind of…ack!”

The ongoing slaughter.

‘Should I kill them?’

Soo Hyuk was conflicted as he stared the black light of death erupting one after another.

‘Their guildmates will appear if I do though.’

He had the ability to end this atrocity right now, but there was still one thing nagging at his mind. It was the Demon guild.

‘Damn it. If only I wasn’t on a holiday with my family.’

If he had no commitments on his schedule, he would’ve slaughtered them like lambs. But today was his replanned family trip. If he killed them now, the Demon guild members would come, and they would have to delay their holiday again.

‘But…’

His reason was faltering in front of dying users and NPCs around him.

“But why are only those three moving? Why aren’t the rest of the Demon guild moving?”

“It looks like they’re searching for somebody?”

At that moment.

“…Mmm?”

The conflicted Soo Hyuk caught onto a conversation between the users around him.

“Ain’t they looking for the user from yesterday?”

“Ah, that Soo Hyuk user?”

Soo Hyuk looked around after listening to the conversation between the spectating users. He saw eight people with the three-horned demon mark on their heads.