Level Up Machine

Chapter 62 Armor of the Demon God (7)

After handling the three corpses, Yeong-sik summoned the guild members using the communication orb. Upon receiving the call, the guild members quickly gathered where Yeong-sik and Tiria were.

“This, this is…”

Upon seeing the three corpses sprawled on the ground, the guild members’ expressions hardened. They weren’t so oblivious as to not understand what these bodies signified.

“You bastards!”

The one who reacted most violently to the sight of the corpses was Yu-na. She, who had always thought of Tiria as an older sister, was struck with shock as if her own family had been killed.

“I will burn everything to the ground. I will burn this trash-like nation to ashes!”

She trembled all over as she drew the twin swords from her waist. Flames rose along the blades of her red twin swords.

Tiria reached out her hand towards her.

“Calm down, Yu-na.”

“Calm down?! They were the family you longed for so much! How can I calm down when all of them are dead!”

Yu-na shouted in a voice full of passion. Looking at her, Tiria spoke in a cold voice.

“Getting worked up won’t change anything.”

“Grrr…! Then what do we do?! Are you thinking of just letting this go?!”

Yu-na asked, her face contorted with rage.

“No.”

Tiria’s voice was firm as if she was cutting through with a knife.

“We can’t just let this pass.”

“…Are you planning to take revenge?”

Han-seong, who had been listening, asked with a hardened expression. Revenge. What that meant was clear.

To kill Hendrick von Elnote, the culprit behind all this.

However, it wasn’t a decision to be made in a moment of emotion. Killing a king was too enormous an undertaking for the current Salvator Guild to handle.

“Yes. That is my plan.”

Tiria, who knew this better than anyone, spoke with a voice filled with resolute determination.

Her voice exuded a murderous intent that was hard to believe, considering it was Tiria. The members of the Salvator Guild hardened their expressions at her unfamiliar demeanor. This was not the Tiria who always smiled gently no matter the situation.

“…I will follow the Guild Master’s decision.”

Han-seong said quietly, deeply bowing his head, his voice filled with firm resolve. Yoo Jin, who stood behind him, also bowed to her.

“What exactly are you planning to do?”

Yoo Jin asked in his characteristic sharp voice as he raised his head.

At his question, Tiria fell into contemplation. Killing the king itself was not difficult. The Elnote royal castle was now in a state akin to an empty shell, with all its forces dispatched elsewhere.

The problem lay in what would come after killing the king. Killing the king without any plan, considering the extreme chaos that would follow, was foolish.

“I do have one temporary measure in mind.”

Yeong-sik’s voice broke the silence, and everyone’s attention focused on him.

Yeong-sik began to speak.

* * *

“Huff! Huff! Damn it!”

A middle-aged man was running through a dark passageway. It was an artificially constructed passage, resembling the inside of a dungeon.

The middle-aged man, dressed in gaudy clothes that seemed almost rustic, was panting heavily as he looked back.

“Why, why did an attacker have to come now…!”

With a face filled with terror, he stared down the passage he had just come through. He couldn’t hear anyone following him.

The middle-aged man, trembling in the passage, was Hendrick von Elnote. His pitiful appearance, glancing around frantically, was far from what one would expect of a king.

“Those, those incompetent fools! They should have left forces behind to protect me!”

Hendrick cursed vehemently, recalling his ministers. If they had heard his words, they would have collapsed in shock.

It was Hendrick himself who had ordered all available forces to participate in the Dragonian subjugation, leaving not even the minimum guard for the royal castle.

But Hendrick, not one to care about such details, only vented his frustrations at the ministers.

“Shouldn’t you reconsider who the truly incompetent one is?”

A cold voice echoed in his ears, startling him.

“Wh-who’s there?!”

Hendrick fell to the ground, his voice trembling with fear.

From beyond the passage, a figure approached him. It was a young man with a sharp expression.

“As expected, you ran this way.”

The young man with the sharp expression, Yeong-sik, let out a smirk as he looked down at Hendrick, who was now sitting on the ground.

The place where they were now was a secret passage connected to the Silensium Mountains, used to infiltrate the royal castle. Yeong-sik had predicted that Hendrick would come here upon hearing about the attack on the castle, and his prediction had been perfect.

“How, how do you know about this passage’s location…”

Hendrick looked up at Yeong-sik with an expression of disbelief.

This was a secret passage, even within the royal castle, known only to a few. It was unimaginable that anyone else would know about it.

“Hm. It’s a pity. If the guards had been here, they could have alerted you to where we were attacking from.”

Yeong-sik spoke with a sly smile. If the guards had known about their infiltration through this passage, Hendrick would never have fled this way.

But with all the forces dispatched, leaving the royal castle an empty shell, there was no one left to inform him of their point of entry.

“What, what is your objective?!”

Hendrick shouted at Yeong-sik, his face pale with fear. Yeong-sik approached him with leisurely steps.

“I have a few questions.”

As Yeong-sik approached Hendrick, he nudged him with his foot, speaking in a leisurely tone. Hendrick’s expression twisted as Yeong-sik playfully poked him.

“You wretch! Do you even know who I am…”

Crunch!

Yeong-sik stomped on Hendrick’s right ankle, producing a chilling sound of bones breaking.

“Aaaaaaaah!”

Hendrick clutched his ankle, screaming in agony.

“Are you ready to answer my questions sincerely now?”

“How dare you…!”

Crunch!

Tears streaming down his face, Hendrick glared at Yeong-sik, only to have his left ankle crushed as well. With both ankles shattered, Hendrick trembled uncontrollably, foaming at the mouth from the excruciating pain.

Pop.

Yeong-sik opened a potion he had taken out from his inventory. It was a potion that cleared the mind and enhanced focus.

Holding the potion in one hand, Yeong-sik grabbed Hendrick’s hair and forcefully poured the potion into his mouth.

“Gack, cough! St-stop!”

With his mind now painfully clear, Hendrick’s agony intensified, and he clutched at Yeong-sik’s pant leg with a desperate expression.

“How are you feeling now? Do you feel like answering?”

“I’ll answer anything!”

Hendrick nodded frantically, shouting. A faint smile appeared on Yeong-sik’s lips.

“As long as you answer sincerely, your life will not be in danger.”

Yeong-sik’s voice was calm, belying the fact that he had just shattered both of Hendrick’s ankles.

“I confirmed that Duke Erman was dead in the underground prison. Why did you leave the hostages meant to threaten the Salvator Guild to die?”

“Y-you, are you doing this on Salvator Guild’s orders… Crunch.”

Yeong-sik reached out and twisted Hendrick’s left thumb. His finger bent at an unnatural angle.

“Aaaaaaaaah!”

Hendrick writhed in agony from the excruciating pain radiating through his hand. Yeong-sik spoke in a calm tone.

“Just answer the question. Why did you let the hostages die?”

“Cough, cough…! They were no longer needed! They were no longer needed, so I let them die!”

“Oh? Why were they no longer needed?”

“T-that’s because…”

Crunch.

With a chilling sound, Yeong-sik twisted Hendrick’s index finger. Another scream erupted from Hendrick.

“The Ingrium! We found an artifact from the Ingrium Empire! With that, we can subdue all the summoners!”

“An artifact from the Ingrium Empire…?”

Yeong-sik narrowed his eyes as he looked at Hendrick.

“What is this artifact?”

When asked about the artifact, Hendrick’s expression wavered with hesitation. Yeong-sik’s hand grabbed another one of his fingers.

“W-wait a moment! I’ll tell you!”

Hendrick shouted in a desperate voice.

“The Armor of the Demon God! That is the artifact from the Ingrium Empire!”

“The Armor of the Demon God…?”

“Well, technically, it’s not an artifact from the Ingrium Empire! It was found at the site of a massive battle between the Ingrium Empire and the northern monsters!”

“Is this ‘Armor of the Demon God’ you’re talking about this?”

Yeong-sik pulled out the black armor he had obtained from the royal report from his inventory and asked.

Seeing the jet-black armor, Hendrick’s face filled with astonishment.

“H-how do you have that…!”

Judging by Hendrick’s reaction, Yeong-sik confirmed that this armor was indeed the “Armor of the Demon God.”

Yeong-sik’s eyes darkened deeply.

“This is the Armor of the Demon God?”

Yeong-sik looked at the jet-black armor from his inventory with a puzzled expression. This was a purely mechanical suit, containing no magic whatsoever, and it possessed specs that far surpassed modern Earth’s science—something one might only see in movies.

He couldn’t understand at all why it was found at the site of a battle between the Ingrium Empire and the northern monsters.

“Hmm…”

After pondering for a while, Yeong-sik swallowed his frustration.

There was far too little information to uncover the identity of the black suit.

“You’ve got all the information you wanted now, right? Let me go!”

Hendrick cried out to Yeong-sik in a desperate voice.

Yeong-sik squatted next to him and casually grabbed Hendrick’s middle finger, twisting it.

Crunch!

“Aaaaagh!”

Hendrick writhed in agony as the pain radiated through his hand again.

“Why the rush, Mr. Hendrick?”

Yeong-sik placed his arm on Hendrick’s shoulder, speaking in a tone one might use with a neighborhood friend. He grasped Hendrick’s ring finger with one hand and began to speak.

“This is just the beginning.”

With Yeong-sik’s continuing words, Hendrick’s expression was filled with profound despair.