Leon's declaration spread like wildfire and the Academy's seniors were initially unhappy.
Hunters are a valuable resource in their own right. Every year, small and medium-sized guilds, as well as large guilds, adjusted their contracts upward to meet the demand for talent.
However, they've never seen a guild, even one of the Ten Guilds, be so arrogant.
-I heard he's a survivor, but isn't that too barbaric?
-What kind of attitude is that in today's world?
-Isn't there a down payment or a salary? Aren't they following the rules of the industry?
There were reviews on the Korean Hunter Academy, and it was posted as a real-time best article in various places.
While the interest in Leon grew in Korea, there were also those who encouraged it. This is the case of Park Yeonrae, a Hunter Academy alumnus and member of the Korean wizard community.
-Honestly, the man. Saying that magic is inferior is ridiculous, and what's with the horsemanship?
-He's from the Middle Ages, so he's barbaric.
"Huh~ That's refreshing."
Park Yeonrae looked satisfied as she watched the number of likes on her comment increase.
[Magic is inferior to holy law.]
Park was outraged by this misguided statement but she couldn't refute it on the spot.
She had seen the existence of holy laws that enforced concepts but she could not admit the inferiority of magic. She had lived her entire life with a sense of mage superiority.
Mages are the most powerful Hunters and the non-magical Hunters are merely stalling tactics until they are bombarded by mages.
But the Holy Law? The power to make magic inferior? A lifetime of training would not allow it.
"Alright, just a few more comments and then──"
Park Yeonrae was about to check for replies to her comments when she realized that she hadn't seen any.
"Huh? Why don't I see them?"
No comments. Her comment had disappeared.
"What? That's not possible.
What's wrong with my comment?
She checks her comment, but she doesn't see her comment anywhere. She even checked her comment history and found that all the bad comments she had made were gone.
"Zee, did you really comment on that? On YouTube?!"
Why?
But YouTube's response didn't end there.
[We would like to inform you that your account has been permanently suspended for serious violations of the YouTube Community Guidelines]
"Huh?"
Suspended? Why?
All I did was post a few abusive comments. Not a YouTube warning, nor a suspension, but a permanent ban?
"Why, why, why?!"
Yeonrae logged in to her account, but the suspension status didn't change.
At the same time, Yappy's brain sensors, which were floating around the Internet with a computational rate of 3%, posted a report.
-Account suspension completed. Hacked into YouTube's centralized processing system. Traces incinerated.
When he wasn't at the gate, Yappy was putting all his computing power into promoting and expanding the Ten Thousand Gods Guild.
Naturally, his detractors would hack into the community site, delete posts with administrator privileges, and threaten permanent bans.
Many of the banned accounts were removed in less than 0.3 seconds, even when the owners complained. It's like an auto-delete at this point.
The internet dictatorship had already begun.
Yappy immediately uploaded the edited video under the Ten Thousand Gods Guild YouTube official account, and simultaneously spread the video through his fake YouTube accounts.
[Shock! Japan watched in horror, the U.S. watched in horror. Why did the demons kneel down to King K?]
[Why the demons converted in tears after seeing K Kimchi. Black, please let me naturalize in Korea]
[8K 60fps. official battle report video of Ten Thousand Gods Guild]
This fully edited 8K video, translated into over 100 languages, was the battle at the Fluctuation Gate.
He added background music and sound effects, edited out camerawork and poor angles with in-house CG, and interspersed Leon's booming voice with spectacular charges.
The reaction of those who saw it was overwhelming.
-Holy shit… is that a person?
-Look at the dozens he's taking down with each charge. Are demons supposed to be that weak?
-What are those bulls and Death Knights? How did they manage to pull that off?
That's not all. While the fluctuation gate may have shifted the issue, the original purpose of the gate exploit was to showcase the effectiveness of the training of the first batch of trainees enlisted in the Ten Thousand Gods Guild.
Indeed, the sight of the Ten Thousand Year D-rank Hunters forming a shield, silently repelling the demonic charge, and even fighting back was just as impressive as that of the Death Knights.
-What's with the anti-vibration, they're all tanks?
-Their ratios are shit, why are they so good at blocking?
-Aren't they B- ranks tanks? Doesn't that look like Kim Jin-soo, head of the Hunter Association? He's a B-rank.
Yappy commented with additional information.
-That's Kim Do-han, head of the mining team. I worked with him. He's D-rank.
-D-rank is that good? Don't be ridiculous.
Yappy thought about suspending the account for replying and added another comment.
-Wasn't this gate capture the one that the Lionheart King trained D-rank hunters had to capture? They were all promoted to C-rank.
-Why do you know the details? Do you have any idea──
Yappy immediately deleted the account. It further traced the IP, used a VPN, hacked into the consolidated database in 1.5 seconds, and caused a blackout at and around the actual IP address.
The power would have been restored in a minute, but his computer would have been overloaded and short circuited.
-Ahhhh! Fuck my computer!
Confirmed by the house's pet surveillance cameras, Yappy repeated the same action 687 times. The entire world was the target.
Even as this was happening, the videos of the Ten Thousand Gods Guild were spreading far and wide, and the students of the Hunter Academy were beginning to develop an interest in the Guild based on the biased information they were being fed.
* * * *
Academy cadet Han Soo-ho, a native of Hanwon Orphanage, boards the bus to the Naju terminal.
Next to him are classmates Kim Jae-hyuk and Chen So-yeon.
"There are more guys than I thought."
Jae-hyuk scoffs, then looks at the bus full of cadets and sneers.
"Well, we've all seen it."
Leon's holy laws were definitely a culture shock.
Traditionally, the maximizing power of a gate raid is undoubtedly the rear support of the mages.
With tanks and dealers blocking the front lines and mages firing from the rear, their firepower was useful enough to change the difficulty of the gate.
However, mages are few and far between, and even when they are, they tend to end up in the mage tower.
The monopoly of magic is not new, and it is common for most gate raiding teams to not include mages.
Even the Ten Guilds are heavily reliant on mage towers aside from their own recruited mages but what Leon showed was a new possibility.
He broke the monopoly of magic and made it possible for dealers and even tankers to use magic.
"Soo-ho, did you see that?"
"What?"
"On the Ten Thousand Gods Guild channel on YouTube there's an amazing video, and it goes into great detail about the use of the Holy Law."
"Really?"
Jae-hyuk hands him his earphones to watch and Soo-ho plugged the wireless earphones into his old Hunter phone and connected to the bus's Wi-Fi.
"It's probably 6G, right? Intercity bus Wi-Fi is slow."
"I… use LTE."
"Ew. You're using your grandpa's phone? What, it's fucking old?"
Jae-hyuk knew Han Soo-ho was from an orphanage, but he didn't expect him to live on a shoestring.
"You make a lot of money, don't you? You must have gotten quite a bit of money from the last practice."
"I sent it to an orphanage."
"You and Ms. Ha-ri are so eager."
Han Ha-ri and Han Soo-ho were both Hunters from the same orphanage, and they donated every penny they earned to their home orphanage.
"Sister Ha-ri?"
Han Ha-ri was also in the video posted by the Ten Thousand Gods Guild and her performance in the Orc Gate was shown.
"By the way, this guy is a real killer. Have you seen the Fluctuation Gate?"
"Uhm…I'm watching it now, it's a bit brutal."
The video showed burning demons at the stake and brutally murdering them.
It wasn't quite as grotesque as it could have been, thanks to the colorful video editing, but you could guess what was going on.
"By the way, didn't you say that your sister is also in the Ten Thousand Gods Guild?"
"Yep. She has been there since the Lunar New Year."
Han Soo-ho and Han Ha-ri are from the same orphanage. In the orphanage, they had no choice but to rely on each other, and Soo-ho was a good follower of Ha-ri. Or rather, he looked up to her for her genius at such a young age.
She hadn't hesitated to join the Associations when the Ten Guilds offered her a hefty contract.
She chose the Association because she admired the Association employee who protected her from the monsters in Dungeon Break.
He died attacking the gate just before Dungeon Break, but he left behind a Rank A Hunter named Ha-ri.
Ha-ri is a righteous and passionate Hunter. She genuinely wants to help and protect people, and Soo-ho, who grew up under her like a brother, admires her.
"By the way, I read that your sister was sent to the Ten Thousand Gods Guild, but what is she doing these days?"
"Hmm~ I only talked to her on the phone, so I didn't hear much… but I'm sure she's doing great things."
Soo-ho didn't doubt that his sister, the one he admired, would save people everywhere.
They arrived at the Naju Plains Ten Thousand Gods Guild base when a familiar voice was heard from beyond the large gates.
"Hey, Lord Yappy, is this you? Is it really you?"
-See Big Data. Numbers don't lie.
"I think it's too short though...."
-Self-information confidence rate 99.999%. Doubting big data?
It's my sister's voice.
Soo-ho's face lit up at the sound of Ha-ri's voice, which he hadn't heard since the Lunar New Year.
'I have to surprise her!'
With his back to his classmates, Soo-ho swallowed his voice and knocked on the door.
"What, what is it?! That's right! I heard the juniors are coming from the academy today, hehe!"
The classmates were excited as they realized that the voice on the other side of the door was Ha-ri.
Han Ha-ri was the youngest A-rank Hunter and she received a legendary contract offer in last year's draft.
Even though she only worked as a civil servant for the Association, isn't she one of the top geniuses since the Hunter Academy was founded?
For the current third-year students, who have seen her play time and time again in mock games, Ha-ri is still the same cheerful, cool senior.
But from the other side of the door comes the sound of frantic running.
"Okay, wait, wait, wait!"
-Guests. Should respond in a hurry.
"No, wait! Lord Yappy, wait!"
Ha-ri's desperate cry causes the gate to fling open as she hastily pulls down her skirt and greets the students with a reddened face.
"Ah, hello, everyone, you've come a long way…uh."
She wore a sleeveless maid's outfit that exposed her sternum and shoulders. The skirt was so short it was borderline skimpy.
The spandex stockings are transparent, showing off her flesh-colored thighs.
No. 1 in YAPI's big data survey.
A full set of 5 sexy spanx maid clothes.
For: Boyfriend.
Satisfaction: 9.98 stars.
Numbers don't lie.
-His Majesty, Lionheart King. A culture similar to that of medieval European kingdoms. Maid's dress = maid's dress Reasoning.
-The results of the calculations and the ordered goods are the most complete conclusions.
It was a blessing in disguise.
"Nu, sister… what is that?"=
"Oh, no, I didn't buy this because I wanted to wear it...."
-Big Data Ignored?
A tiny mechanical spider raises the hem of her skirt with a mechanical arm to enforce the 'recommended maid wear' posted on the sales site.
"Lord Yappy, please, skirt, skirt, don't raise the skirt!"
Ha-ri makes desperate excuses to the cadets, who look on in bewilderment.
"No, no, no…! I didn't buy this! I, uh, yes, His Majesty, the Guildmaster, is a medieval kind of guy, and we've had a queen recently, and that's why Lord Yappy ordered the appropriate attire, and I didn't want to wear it!"
-Distrusting the big data?
Yappy's red eyes were fixed on Ha-ri.
"That…what are you wearing?"
A familiar voice was heard from behind Ha-ri's cut-out maid suit as Leon's eyes widened at the sight of Ha-ri's outfit.
He wonders if he's ever been so shocked since he arrived on Earth.
"Your Majesty, this."
Leon's voice quavered, and then he burst into a rant.
"You disgusting bitch, change out of those clothes right now!"
"Hic…?!"
Ha-ri, whose legs were weak after Leon's tirade, hesitated on the spot and her pouty gaze turned to Yappy.
"Lord Yappy?"
You said it was me, and even when I told you it wasn't, you scowled at me for doubting the big data.
-Huh?
Yappy spun on his heel and began to head nonchalantly toward the kitchen.
-Two o'clock trainee meal. Brine distribution commenced.
"......."
"......."
Reuniting with his beloved sister was the worst.
* * * *
Jeju Island Gate, this "red" gate appeared in the center of downtown Jeju City and made headlines across the country as soon as it appeared.
The red gate attracted a lot of attention, even as the recent high-profile Fluctuation Gate incident faded into the background.
The gates, which are categorized as black, red, orange, yellow, green, and blue, are not uniform, but there is a general strategy.
Red gates are the hardest, with the exception of black gates, which are the worst disasters in history. Generally speaking, two S-rank hunters are the minimum number of S-ranks needed in a raid of about 100 hunters.
This is the minimum number of S-ranks, but it is generally believed that three S-rank hunters are needed to reliably defeat it.
The guild leader of the Firebird Guild, an S-rank hunter and one of the Ten Guilds, bought the Jeju Island Red Gate but was worried that they wouldn't be able to capture the gate on their own.
The Firebird Guild has two S- rank Hunters, including Lee Yong-wan himself but at the very least, he wanted to attract one or two more S- rank hunters.
However S-rank hunters are not that common.
There are 20 S-class Hunters in Korea, but all of them belong to the top 10 guilds.
Usually, the top 10 guilds cooperate on hunter bills and profit projects, but only when they have a common goal.
The larger, more competitive guilds were ready to rip each other apart at every opportunity.
Would any guild be willing to give up their S-rank hunters for a Firebird guild that had outbid them on the red gate?
Negotiating time is short and if a dungeon break happens in the red gate all would be over.
Rather than invite the ten guilds to a negotiation table that could end at any moment, Lee Yong-wan chose the most obvious option.
"I'm here."
"I paid you to come, but you took an early morning flight, you ghost of money."
"Our guild is in a bad spot."
Huang Yeonha and Golden Chul brought up to forty Golden Lion raiders under their command.
It would be no exaggeration to say that the Golden Lion, who had been heavily damaged by the Yakt Spinner at the Cheongju Gate, had brought virtually all of their strength with them.
"It's been a while, Mr. Golden Chul."
"Senior Lee Yong-wan, you've been saving yourself since the government blackmail incident at the Hunan Gate, and you managed to get a Red Gate?"
"Thanks to my self-sacrifice, I didn't end up chopping up all the other guild members."
"Hahaha~"
"Hahaha~"
The two S-rank hunters stabbed at each other with smiling faces. This was the usual atmosphere when the Ten Guilds met.
"Wow, the one who didn't even give us a bone to eat in this small land has provided us with a true sacrament."
"You've been on a bit of a hiatus lately, so I'll take care of you."
The Firebird Guild wanted S-rank power and veteran raiders who could come quickly while the Golden Lion Guild needed funds to repair its tarnished reputation and restore its power.
The two Ten Guilds were able to come to a quick compromise in the face of such an alignment.
"The settlement is five-for-five, right?"
"What are you talking about? It's obvious that our guild is the one that's going to get the short end of the stick."
"A~ Who else but us would come to help you, Yong-wan of the Firebird Guild, if you don't want to, you can call someone else now~"
"I'm Lee Yong-wan. Junior, don't you fucking cross the line."
The name was a complication for Yong-wan. No wonder his parents gave him this shitty name.
"Sixty-forty. No less than that.
"Okay, but you'll pay for the food."
"You can eat with your own money."
The two made a harsh but quick settlement since they both wanted to get things done as quickly as possible.
"Why do ... men have such stupid fights."
"I know."
"Oh, my God!"
Huang Yeonha glanced at the short-haired beauty who had suddenly appeared behind her.
It was Han Yuri, another S-class Hunter from the Firebird Guild. She's an assassin who specializes in using daggers and has mastered the art of plunging them into the backs of monsters without warning.
"Sis, you need to wake the fuck up."
"Talk nice."
Three S-class hunters and one semi-S-class, in addition to more than 150 elite raiders entered the Jeju Island Gate, expecting a steady victory, and──
[Quest: Save the Slaughtered].
Conditions: Defeat the 'Majestic Georgic'.
There, they see a knight.
"How dare you try to save those wretches in front of me, in front of this Georgic! You have crossed the line!"
A hulking knight in heavy armor equipped with a massive one-handed hammer and shield overwhelmed everyone with his fierce gaze and voice.
"It is I, the glorious Holy Knight of Lionheart, Georgic, who will bring you the Divine Punishment!"
The 'Majestic Georgic' Holy Knight of Life and Abundance was the boss of the gate.