Min-hyuk oppa paused for a moment at the woman’s claim that she was his acquaintance.
“……?”
But seeing the woman showing no intention of taking action,
“You’re not going to do anything?”
“No, I’m not going to do anything.”
“…Then don’t stop me.”
“I warned you.”
Not wanting to just leave Min-hyuk oppa like that, I tried to approach him right away.
Squeeze—
I could feel that Pyro Bomber was still gripping me tightly.
“…What are you doing right now?”
“…Don’t go.”
“Are you kidding me? If we leave him like that—”
“Min-hyuk has a physical regeneration ability… No matter what happens, he won’t die.”
“…Huh?”
Just because he had a regeneration ability, we should leave him alone like that?
“……”
If that kind of statement could convince me, I would’ve stopped when that strange woman told me to.
Ignoring Pyro Bomber’s words as well, I was just about to head to Min-hyuk oppa when—
“You… don’t feel that?”
“Feel what?”
I heard Pyro Bomber say something I could barely understand.
“That… that enormous energy… don’t you feel it?”
“What energy?”
At that moment…
“What’s this? Among Min-hyuk’s friends, there’s another one who came close to death.”
The woman who claimed to be Min-hyuk oppa’s friend suddenly said something bizarre about one of us approaching death. And then she began to draw a weapon.
What is even going on…!
Unable to comprehend the situation at all, I considered the possibility that the woman might be attacking us and instinctively got ready to defend myself.
Whoosh—
The woman threw a dagger she had pulled out from somewhere.
Thud—
With perfect precision, she cut the rope, and Min-hyuk oppa dropped straight to the floor.
At that moment…
“Haa… haa… haaa…”
As soon as he hit the ground, Min-hyuk oppa began gasping for breath as if he were struggling.
Seeing this, Pyro Bomber who had been blocking me from getting close rushed to him first.
And when I saw that the woman no longer tried to stop us, I too approached Min-hyuk oppa.
“Babe—”
Bang!!
“!!!”
“Haa… haa… Pyro Bomber…?”
Oppa struck the ground violently with a look more terrified than I had ever seen.
“…Are you okay?”
“…If Pyro Bomber is standing in front of me… does that mean…?”
“It means you’re back in reality. Congratulations. How does it feel to have defeated a god of another world?”
The woman, still speaking in incomprehensible words, threw a question at oppa.
What on earth is she even saying?
She didn’t seem like a normal person at all.
When I tried to protect Min-hyuk oppa who looked terrified, thinking she might be someone who’d lost her mind…
Oppa, upon hearing the incomprehensible question…
“…Is this really… really a fight I can win?”
…began showing a side of himself completely unlike the man who had never been afraid of any hardship.
“…What happened to you?”
“I went into the Domain.”
“…What is this Domain you’re talking about?”
“It’s a subspace created by the god of death from our world. A place one can enter when they come close to dying. Min-hyuk fought a god from another world there and returned. Of course, it wasn’t the real god, just a remnant.”
***
Crunch—
The moment the unidentified monstrous creature devoured me instead of Pyro Bomber…
…What the…?
I felt a bizarre phenomenon where my body wouldn’t move according to my will.
What is this…?
Even trying to open my mouth didn’t work, and moving my body on command was completely impossible.
Even a trivial action like blinking fell out of my control, and I was no longer able to use my abilities.
On top of that…
That lunatic… ate me… what?
Even though the thing controlling my body had hanged itself, I didn’t feel any pain, which meant…
I could tell that everything that made up “me” had been stolen by that mysterious monstrous creature…
But there was nothing I could do about it.
…Am I really going to die this meaninglessly?
Just as I was beginning to wonder if this was what death felt like,
Before I knew it…
…Where am I?
I found myself entering a space completely shrouded in black.
And…
“Ah, I can finally move again.”
I had regained control over my body.
Krrk?
The moment I entered the domain, I locked eyes with the monstrous creature that was looking down at me in surprise.
“So, even after swallowing me, you were controlling my body from within this domain.”
I could tell at a glance.
That thing…. that was the one that had been controlling my body from inside this domain.
So I immediately charged at it, throwing a punch to reclaim control over my body…
Whoosh—
But it swiftly dodged my attack… and countered by swinging its massive tail straight at me.
I quickly raised one hand to activate my reflection ability—
Boom!
“!!!”
Even though my reflection ability had clearly activated…
The creature somehow broke through it and landed a clean hit.
“Whoa… what the hell.”
Even though I had managed to reflect part of the impact…
Judging from the force that still hit my body, it was clear this monster was on a completely different level than anyone I had fought before.
“Hoo…”
In that situation, the only thing I could do was…
Kroaaaaagh!!!
“Please, let me live!!”
…to run away without even looking back.
…
I kept running.
One of humanity’s strengths was endurance.
I continued to flee, trying to wear down its stamina, using my teleportation ability to escape from critical moments…. but…
“Huff… huff…”
Grrrk!
The creature showed no sign of exhaustion and relentlessly continued its attacks on me.
“Summon, summon.”
First, I began summoning bombs and hurling them at the thing chasing after me.
Boom! Boom!
The bombs kept exploding one after another.
Kroaaaaagh!!!
The creature chasing me seemed like the type with high attack power but not much in the way of defense.
Seeing it take damage from the bombs, I briefly thought that maybe a punch with all my strength might be enough to smash it.
“You can regenerate too, huh.”
But upon seeing it regenerate even faster than I could, I resumed my escape once again.
Of course—
“Summon, summon, summon, summon.”
—I kept summoning bombs without stopping.
…
I kept throwing explosives at the creature without pause.
Thankfully, the bombs I used within the domain didn’t seem to affect the ones in reality.
Even after using the same bomb tens, hundreds of times, I never reached a point where I couldn’t summon them anymore.
“Yeah… you’re getting tired now, aren’t you?”
As I watched the monster’s regeneration begin to noticeably slow down, I kept throwing bombs without letting up.
This was probably… around the moment when about 24 hours had passed since I first entered this domain.
…
Grrrk… grrrrk!
The monster’s regeneration had significantly slowed down.
What once took less than a second to heal from an explosion now left its melted flesh unable to regenerate. It was on the verge of death.
“Haa… haa… haa…”
Dragging my exhausted body, which had been running nonstop for two days, I approached the monster to finally put an end to it…
“Let’s finish this… now… haa…”
Thud! Crunch—
Thud! Crunch—
I began slamming my fists into it with all my strength.
But then…
Whoosh—
Even in its dying state, it managed to attack me with its tail…
Thud—
“Gghhhhhk!!”
A massive hole was torn through my abdomen.
Krrrk!!!
Blink. Blink. Blink.
I immediately teleported away to escape the attack…
But the human body wasn’t built to withstand such devastating trauma.
“Hold on… Don’t lose consciousness.”
Using incantations, I forcibly awakened my mind.
“Stop. Sleep. Halt. Stop breathing. Cease all movement. Die. Sleep.”
Chanting every word that came to mind, I resumed my assault on its body.
“Die! Die!!! Stop! I said die!! Sleep!! Die!! Die, you fucking bastard!!!!”
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! …
…
It felt like hours had passed since I started pounding its torso with my fists.
As the saying goes, it’s not the strong who survive; it’s the survivors who are strong.
“Haa… haa… haaa…!”
In the end, I succeeded in taking down this monstrous being…
“I… I won, you son of a bitch… haa…”
As the light in the fallen monster’s eyes began to fade completely—
“Haa… haa… haa…”
At last, color began to seep into the world that had been nothing but black.
…
—
[Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck]
This can’t be happening.
It doesn’t make any sense.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
This has to be a dream, right?
Please tell me it’s a dream.
Tell me it’s a fucking dream.
[Comments]
-: Welcome to the timeline where the Villain Hunter is dead… South Korea is finished…
ㄴ (OP) : Tell me this is a dream… please tell me this is just a dream…
-: I was one of the people who saw the livestream before it got taken down. I just… just… I have no words…
-: What were the heroes doing instead of protecting the Villain Hunter? They’re fucking useless.
ㄴ : Why would a hero protect a villain?
ㄴ (OP) : I said to protect the Villain Hunter, not the fucking villain. Are you illiterate, you dumb fuck?
ㄴ : Damn, why are you so mad? I’m just saying, the Villain Hunter’s still a villain. Do we really have to protect him?
-: I really hope this turns out to be a prank. Like always, the Villain Hunter is actually still alive. He’s just not saying anything to surprise us later.
ㄴ : But too many people saw the body on the livestream for that to be true…
ㄴ (OP) : That’s it. That has to be it. That has to be the answer.
—
After scrolling through SNS posts flooded with news of my death, I shut off my phone.
The information the Hero Association president had given me was so overwhelming that I just wanted to clear my head for a moment… so I looked at my phone.
…It’s like they’re all collectively insane.
Reading those posts only made my thoughts even more chaotic.
I lifted my head and began staring at the empty ceiling.
So the way to enter the Domain… was by approaching death.
According to the Association president, those who overcame death were granted the qualification to enter the Domain.
In my case, I had overcome death when I acquired my eleventh ability…
And apparently, the way to enter that Domain was… at the moment someone who had conquered death once again approached it.
I was basically attempting suicide.
The reason I entered the Domain every time I absorbed a new ability was because…
Under normal circumstances, I should have died. But my body’s regenerative ability kept saving me.
On top of that…
“So I can’t undo this uncomfortable thing…”
Even though I had taken the Elixir, it didn’t mean I had surpassed human limits.
If I kept the ability suppressor on, it was said that I could prevent my body from collapsing like last time, even with more than ten abilities.
However… the moment I took off the suppressor, that disaster would begin again.
“Well, she did say an ability treatment shot would fix it.”
Still, fortunately within misfortune—
As long as my body didn’t collapse due to the elixir’s power, if I received the treatment shot and reduced the number of abilities I had,
Then I was told I could move around normally even without the ability regulator.
So once I was done dealing with those guys from Heavenly Will Cult or whatever they’re called, I planned to reduce my abilities a bit.
“So then…”
I looked at the two women who had entered my room with no intention of leaving.
“…When are you going back to your rooms?”
“I told you, I’m sleeping here tonight.”
“I’m sleeping next to you too, oppa.”
“…Just go sleep in your own rooms.”
“I’ll sleep on the left side.”
“I’ll take the right side.”
“No… come on. I just want to sleep comfortably??”
Look at these two unreasonable women.
They weren’t even pretending to listen to a word I said…
Wait, hold on a second?
A brilliant idea suddenly flashed in my mind.
“Oppa?”
I immediately placed my hand on Seo-yoon’s head and transformed her to look just like me.
“…Babe?”
“As you saw today, I also have the Mimicker’s ability. Now, with Seo-yoon disguised as me—”
“Good night, babe!”
Without hesitation, I let out a sigh of relief as Pyro Bomber grabbed Seo-yoon’s hand and left the room.
Should’ve just done this from the start.
How peaceful this is…
“Hngh!..”
“?”
A strange moan coming from the room right next door made me start to regret things a little.
“Babe… not there… you can’t… ahaha…”
Looks like I’ll need to get some soundproofing done tomorrow—
“…So if I cooperate today, Pyro Bomber will do it tomorrow, right?”
“Hey! Don’t break my immersion!”
This won’t do.
I’ll just use my ability to put those two to sleep.
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