Resurrection Chapter 98 - There’s a Strange Scent

‘Ooh huh huh… huh huh huhng…’

I wailed, trying desperately to dig through the rubble of my collapsed house.

I had just been on my way home from school. Hearing the news that a monster break had occurred, I had hurried home. My dad, who had come to get me, had just stepped inside the house, shouting for my mom, and I, too, was in the entryway, about to take off my shoes.

KABOOM!

A strong impact hit the house, and the entire structure came crashing down. I was also pinned when the entryway ceiling collapsed, but thanks to the front door falling over me and acting as a shield, I was able to avoid serious injury. However, I couldn’t be happy about being safe. Because when I crawled out from under the front door, I saw that the house had completely caved in.

Witnessing the scene of my house turned into a pile of concrete rubble, I thought of my parents trapped underneath. My face turned pale as I moved broken roof tiles with my bare hands, but that alone wasn’t enough to save my parents.

At some point, I was crying out loud. It was with the hope that someone, anyone, would hear my cries and respond.

As if to answer that expectation, someone appeared.

At the sight of a group of hunters running over, I threw down the piece of tile I was holding and raised both hands high.

‘H-help me! Please save us! My parents are trapped, over here!’

When I shouted with all my might, the hunters closed the distance in an instant with their amazing leaping ability. They stood on the wreckage of the collapsed house and looked around. I was overjoyed, thinking they had come to help me, but that was merely my delusion.

‘Seeing how the house collapsed, it looks like it came this way.’

‘Right? If it landed with that much weight, it’s no surprise the building ended up like this.’

‘Did you see the mithril embedded all over its body? A golem made of mithril ore! I’ve never seen anything like that in my life!’

They were so excited chattering that they didn’t even look at someone like me. Feeling like an invisible person, I flailed my arms and scrambled up the wreckage. I was about to grab any one of them and ask for help, but they turned their bodies in a completely different direction.

‘Looks like it went that way.’

‘Let’s go catch it quick before some other guys snatch it up.’

‘Let’s go!’

They moved away as quickly as they had come. My fingertips couldn’t even graze the hem of their clothes.

Left alone, I stared blankly at them as they disappeared from sight, feeling dazed. The stories I had heard about hunters until now raced through my mind.

Superhumans who received the power of the gods. Hunters who beat down monsters.

I had heard that as long as they existed, there was hope for humanity, that they were real-life heroes.

I had been enthusiastic about their stories, but the reality I encountered was so different from what I had thought. To them, someone like me, crying for help, seemed to have less presence than a tree swaying in the wind.

They were completely captivated only by the golem that was said to be made of mithril ore. Rather than being angry at the monster that had destroyed my house and crushed my parents, they discussed how much it was worth.

Anger and betrayal swirled inside me. Unable to overcome the indignation and sorrow that erupted like an active volcano, I screamed.

‘Aaargh! Aaaaaaaah!’

As if in response to my scream, a strange sound came from somewhere. When I turned my head, monsters were crawling up onto the wreckage I was standing on.

At the time, I didn’t know what they were, but I know now. They were the species named ‘goblin’ in the Awakened system.

People tend to think of goblins as small and insignificant monsters, but that’s not the case. Experienced hunters dislike goblins more than orcs.

First of all, goblins travel in packs, are fast, and have small bodies, making them difficult to hit. When about six or seven of them surround you and stab with their bamboo spears, they are extremely hard to deal with.

The creatures were cunning and knew how to accurately attack human organs, avoiding the bones, so it was a common occurrence for novice hunters to be stabbed in their organs and die in agony.

The creatures that had crawled out of the dungeon due to the monster break were armed with things like pipes they had scavenged while roaming the ruined city streets.

There were quite a lot of them, too. There were about a dozen, so as a child, I was completely terrified. So much so that I even thought it would have been better to have been crushed to death in the house.

‘Kirrrruk!’

‘Kkeerruk!’

The goblins let out cries that sounded like cackles and leaped towards me. Terrified, I stumbled backward and fell down from the wreckage.

Just then, behind the goblins, someone jumped up onto the ruins of the collapsed house.

‘Over here!’

The person, who drew their attention by shouting loudly, ambushed the goblins from behind and cut the necks of two of them. The goblins’ black blood splattered into the air, and the enraged goblins changed their target to him.

‘Kik-kik-kik!’

‘Kkeegagagak!’

The creatures swarmed him, repeating a chaotic pattern of attacking and retreating as they thrust their spears. He calmly blocked their attacks, but it was clear to anyone that he was surrounded.

Seeing the person who had come to help me in a crisis, I didn’t know what to do. It would have been better if I had acted like a child and hidden or run away, but I, who had admired hunters and knew a lot about them, recognized at a glance that he was a low-ranking one.

His shabby equipment, dull-looking sword, and youthful face were clear giveaways.

Was he, at most, three or four years older than me?

I have to help him somehow!

Straining, I lifted a large piece of roof tile. I threw it at the goblins surrounding the young hunter.

‘Kkeerrrrrrr!’

With a single piece of brick, all the goblins’ hostility turned towards me. The goblins let out terrible screams and leaped at me.

Having unintentionally drawn their aggro, I thought I was surely dead this time. In the face of my fear of death, I couldn’t even think to scream or resist; I was completely frozen.

I was just staring blankly at the goblins closing in in an instant when, surprisingly, the young hunter caught up with them.

What was truly strange was the fact that I could see his movements with stark clarity.

There aren’t many people who can maintain their composure while ferocious and noisy monsters are flitting about right in front of them. Most people, in their excitement and nervousness, forget what they know and tend to make repeated mistakes.

But he was astonishingly calm. He moved his feet to precise locations, rotating his body to swing his sword.

The sword, which looked heavy and at first glance slow, accurately struck the goblins’ vital points as it passed. Because of that, three of the goblins that had been leaping towards me were instantly killed and fell to the ground.

Between the falling goblins, he kicked off with his long legs. Using his superior height to his advantage, he closed the distance ahead of the creatures and pulled me into his arms with one arm.

I felt his body flinch. I realized that he had been injured while shielding me. But instead of showing it, he held me tucked against his side and slaughtered the goblins without wavering.

At the time, I was just a clueless kid, but seeing his swordsmanship, I couldn’t help but be amazed. I could feel with my whole body how great his skill was, and a thrill even ran through me.

Gripped by a sense of awe I had never felt before or since, I watched him kill every last goblin.

Finally, when all the goblins were dead, he, despite bleeding from his body, looked me over first rather than tending to his own wounds.

‘Are you okay?’

His face, as he looked at me intently, was filled with nothing but pure concern. His youthful, handsome face was splattered with the goblins’ black blood, but in my eyes, he looked like an angel descended to earth. Feeling as if I were facing a being so noble that nothing could defile him, I had by then even forgotten my tears and opened my mouth.

‘I’m, I’m okay……’

‘That’s a relief.’

Clinging to him as he muttered softly, I rambled on about the fact I had almost forgotten.

‘In the house, in the house…! My parents were there! Please save my parents, please, help me!’

He didn’t say anything like, ‘I saved your life, what more could you want?’ Even while bleeding profusely from his stabbed back, he exerted superhuman strength to push away the collapsed wreckage.

Beneath it, he found my parents, collapsed in each other’s arms.

My parents’ lower bodies were already completely crushed. He took a potion from his pocket and poured it into my unconscious parents’ mouths.

I didn’t know for sure at the time, but for a low-ranking hunter, that potion must have been an incredibly precious item. He was probably saving it for when his own life was in danger later, but he didn’t show the slightest hint of regret. My parents’ injuries were so severe that one bottle of potion couldn’t handle them, so in a way, he was wasting it uselessly, but he used it to comfort me as I cried.

After drinking the potion, my parents regained consciousness for a brief moment. They spoke to me, who could neither grasp nor accept the fact that we had to say goodbye like this.

‘You have to survive, no matter what, Yitae.’

‘You must live on steadfastly for our sakes, too.’

‘Let’s meet again someday……’

‘I love you, my son……’

With their last words of love, my parents passed away. On behalf of me, who was too stunned to do anything, he took care of my parents’ bodies. He cleared the remaining debris, laid them down neatly, and then found a blanket trapped under the rubble and covered them with it.

Around that time, I began to hear the presence of people nearby. It seemed they had suppressed the monsters in the area, as police officers, firefighters, and medical personnel began to move around, searching for survivors.

I realized I had been gripping his hand tightly since some point and looked up at him. I had a premonition that it was time to part with him, who had silently held my hand, and I opened my mouth to express my gratitude.

‘……Thank you.’

He clearly didn’t want to hear words of thanks from me, who had just lost my parents. Seemingly unable to find any words of comfort, he clouded his face and shook his head. Looking into those eyes that were expressionless yet kind, and somehow sad, I asked.

‘What’s your name?’

He said softly.

‘Seo Heesoo.’