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[Translator - Hestia]
[Proofreader - Kaya]
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Chapter 13: New Face (4)
As the door cracked open, Baek Ho’s face twisted into a scowl.
“You son of a bitch…”
A sickening stench rushed through the gap in the iron door.
At first, it was just a mix of generic foul odors.
But soon, distinct notes separated themselves.
The smell of blood—and not fresh blood, but the thick stench of rot.
Like slicing into fish guts, cutting your finger in the process, and the blood pooling on a steel counter, rotting as it mingled with other animals’ entrails.
A nauseating, putrid reek of blood and decay.
What followed was a stench every UnderHeaven citizen would recognize without fail.
The rancid grease of a mechanical body way past its replacement cycle.
The bitter tang of rusted metal.
The acrid smoke of burning carbon fiber, tangled into every corner.
Rotting blood and oxidized machines.
Together, they didn’t just stink—they were ‘violent’.
The smell tore through Baek Ho’s nose like blades and dragged a memory, long buried in the depths of his mind, up to the surface.
The bodies of Reapers whose vessels had melted in the venom of a demonic beast.
And Baek Ho, a child then, the only survivor standing among them.
The air then had smelled just like this.
‘No… no, no… not again…’
It was one of the many traumas etched into him.
“Haa…”
Baek Ho exhaled sharply and gave the command to his retainer.
“Break it.”
Frank raised his right leg high.
He drove his foot — charged with mana — straight into the steel door.
KA-WHAM!
With a deafening crash, the door tore loose from its hinges, blasting inward.
It bowled over the group lying in ambush just behind it.
A heavy scream rang out as Frank charged inside.
“Wahaha!”
Surgeon’s severed head, still in Baek Ho’s hand, suddenly burst into laughter.
As if boasting that this chaos had been his plan all along.
“Ku-kukukuk!”
Baek Ho swung the head against the wall.
There was a sound like a watermelon splitting—and the laughter stopped.
“Crazy bastard.”
He tossed the crushed head aside.
Just as he reached into his pocket to draw his revolver and step in, Mujin blocked his way.
“You stay here, sir. It's dangerous in there.”
Mujin tied his hair back tightly and followed after Frank into the building.
It was the beginning of a massacre.
Crash! Snap—
Smashing, shattering, pulverizing.
In the pitch-black darkness, Mujin’s mana-infused poleblade and axe blades slashed and spun in every direction.
Like a bear and a wolf let loose into a pigpen at night, they tore through the enemy, chewing through flesh and skull.
“Aaaargh!”
“Rush them all at once!”
Beyond the dim, bluish glow, the enemies came into view—
White skull markings painted like masks across their faces.
Bright red lenses jammed where their eyes should be.
Their bodies partially exposed mechanical bones—augmented, half-machine frames.
“Tsk.”
Baek Ho recalled necromancy from his school days.
Specifically, the old-school minions known as ‘skeletons’, long abandoned due to inefficiency.
{Familiar “Friend” is rapidly consuming mana.}
{Would you like to reduce output?}
No.
The place was large, and there were too many enemies.
Around forty human skeleton-types, firing guns and swinging blades.
But against a Reaper, they were no match.
Heads burst. Necks were severed—most didn’t even manage a proper scream.
“Hmm…”
Baek Ho furrowed his brow, focusing into the darkness.
Something felt off.
The White Skull Syndicate wasn’t just some scrappy gang of vagrants.
They were a gang with a reputation—there’s no way their defenses would be this sloppy.
“There you are.”
In a corner, Baek Ho spotted a hunched black-aqua aura.
A White Skull Reaper, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.
He immediately signaled Mujin.
[Reaper at 3 o’clock near the exit.]
Mujin’s axe froze mid-swing.
He pulled a second hand axe from his waist and hurled it toward the direction Baek Ho had given.
Thunk!
It landed perfectly—straight into the Reaper’s heart.
“…Oh.”
The interior was quickly cleared.
Baek Ho pulled out a purification mask from inside his coat and strapped it on.
Just as he was about to head in—
A new guest arrived outside the building.
＊ ＊ ＊
Mujin’s hand axe sliced clean through the neck of the charging undead.
Its vessel hadn’t been completely destroyed, so it wouldn’t be truly dead—but that didn’t matter.
Unless a necromancer came along, there was no chance of it getting back up.
Ratatatat—
Suddenly, a hail of bullets came flying in. Mujin threw himself sideways.
With their intended target gone, the bullets tore through the backs of several enemies that happened to be in their path.
“Whew.”
Mujin wasn’t wearing a necroshell.
There was a time when his entire body was covered in them, but he’d turned them all in when he left the military.
Now he only had the most basic cybernetic parts—so for bullets, dodging was the best policy.
“Let’s go!”
Frank entered his view.
He’d turned his ChangeArm into a massive shield and was charging across the warehouse from one end to the other.
Bullets rained down on him, but he didn’t flinch.
It was like a runaway bulldozer with no steering.
More brute force than finesse.
“…We’re totally out of sync.”
Their coordination was a mess.
In just this short fight, their paths had overlapped several times, almost causing serious trouble.
Honestly, Mujin figured he was better off fighting alone.
Shaking off the thought, Mujin went back to dealing with the enemies.
His axe, charged with mana, split the skull of a White Skull Syndicate member clean in half—when suddenly—
Bang!
A gunshot rang out, close to his ear.
It didn’t come from inside the warehouse. It came from outside. Where Baek Ho was.
“Goddamn it!”
Mujin’s head snapped toward the sound.
He pushed off the ground and sprinted.
He cut down a White Skull thug blocking his way, cleaving the man’s neck in two as he ran.
In his head, Sophia’s strict warning echoed.
“Your job is to protect the necromancer.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Don’t forget it. If you want your pay, make sure nothing happens to him. Got it?”
He ran as fast as he could.
‘Money! My money!’
Panting hard, Mujin finally reached Baek Ho.
He was aiming his revolver up the stairs, scowling.
“What’s going on?”
“A necromancer.”
“Huh?”
“There’s a necromancer outside.”
Mujin followed Baek Ho’s gaze up the staircase.
The building’s entrance above the basement.
A corpse with a bullet hole in its forehead was slumped over the railing.
Next to it stood three figures.
Two men wore the signature makeup of the White Skull Syndicate.
A woman with a skull mask covered her face.
"That woman is the necromancer. The two on either side are Reapers."
"Goddamn it…"
Mujin, a veteran of countless battlefields, understood all too well the game-changing impact of a necromancer’s presence.
What had been a hassle was now outright dangerous.
And as expected—
The corpse of a White Skull member lying nearby began to creak as it stood back up.
Its twisted neck snapped back into place, and the red lens in its eyes came into focus.
Resurrection—the core of necromancy.
"Fall back for now."
Baek Ho and Mujin slowly retreated.
They didn’t get far before one of the undead lying on the ground suddenly sprang up and lunged at Baek Ho.
Crunch!
Mujin’s axe split its forehead precisely.
Earlier, he’d aimed to quickly disable them. Now, he was focused on destroying their vessels.
"Let’s go!"
Inside, Frank’s massacre continued.
Resurrected or not, he crushed them all.
Every one of them, flattened like mashed potatoes.
He hadn’t been specifically targeting the vessels, but since they were so large, they got pulverized anyway.
"Watch out!"
Mujin swung his axe over Baek Ho’s shoulder.
It clashed against a dagger.
It was the Reaper who had previously taken Mujin’s thrown axe to the heart—now back on his feet.
"This just got real messy."
Frank joined them, moving to stand next to Baek Ho.
"What is it? A necromancer showed up?"
"Yeah."
The once-dead undead now rose again in grotesque forms, surrounding the three of them.
The battlefield had flipped completely with the necromancer’s arrival.
The woman in the skull mask descended the steps toward the warehouse entrance.
She waved her hand dramatically, her voice sharp and irritated—clearly displeased with the stench.
"And just who the hell are you people to be causing chaos in someone else’s place of business?"
"We’re looking for someone."
Baek Ho’s flat response earned a snort from the necromancer.
She hadn’t realized yet that Baek Ho was one of her own.
"A Reaper with that tone? Maybe I should rip out your tongue and replace it with your balls?"
"...This is exactly why I hate talking to necromancers. All of them are psychos."
"Why you little—!"
With the necromancer’s shout, the undead moved in.
They charged with blades, likely ordered not to use firearms.
Frank stepped forward to shield the group.
With sweeping limbs, he knocked them back like bowling pins.
Mujin was about to start swinging again when Baek Ho stopped him.
"Take it. I’ll break it later."
Baek Ho extended his hand toward Mujin.
Dark mana flowed from him and touched Mujin’s vessel.
Immediately, a system prompt appeared before Mujin’s eyes.
{You have received a call from a Necromancer.}
{Do you accept the contract and become a familiar of ‘Baek Ho’?}
“…Baek?”
Mujin’s pupils trembled.
There was only one group of necromancers with the surname ‘Baek.’
The bloodline of the first great hero who left a mark on human history.
One of the Seven High Necromancer Clans, and the family that owned the megacorp Yomra.
The infamous Baek Family.
‘I did hear that Commander Baek had a son…’
Whatever the case, Mujin understood one thing.
If they were going to make it through this, he had to accept.
The difference between a Reaper under a necromancer’s command and one acting alone was massive.
{You have accepted.}
{You are now a familiar of ‘Baek Ho.’}
{From this moment on, you are bound by the duty of obedience typical of all Reapers. Compensation for services shall be determined per mutual agreement…}
Baek Ho’s dark mana poured into Mujin’s vessel.
What had been a half-empty shell was now brimming with necrotic energy.
The link between them—mental and magical—was complete.
At the same time, the necromancer’s trauma—the source of the dark mana—seeped into Mujin.
Creak—
A horrific, unidentifiable sound echoed in his ears and Baek Ho, who was usually unfazed, let out a blood-curdling scream.
‘Stop! Just kill me! Kill me!’
A vivid image flashed through Mujin’s mind.
Baek Ho, holding a dagger, crying tears of blood.
"Ha!"
Mujin gulped hard.
A sharp pain pierced through his chest.
He had experienced many binding moments with various commanders, but this level of traumatic shock was unprecedented.
‘What kind of training has this necromancer undergone to become like this...?’
The entire experience was a mere flash in time.
The negative emotions Baek Ho had projected onto Mujin quickly faded, leaving only the deepest emotions behind.
A single tear slipped from Mujin’s eye.
‘Huh… what is… this?’
"What are you doing?!"
Frank shouted as he crushed the undead’s skull charging at him.
As Mujin’s senses snapped back to attention, Baek Ho’s voice reached his ears.
"Handle it."
It was a brief command, but the intent behind it was conveyed with precision.
⋮
The target is the Reaper coming around Frank’s right.
Use the gap between Frank’s arm and torso.
The exact vessel location is 4 centimeters below the crown of the head.
Take advantage of their moment of carelessness and deal with it quickly.
⋮
Mujin moved without hesitation.
He hid behind Frank’s large frame.
Gripping the axe’s handle tightly, he saw the Reaper sprinting around Frank’s shoulder.
As the Reaper extended their sword toward Frank’s side, Mujin swung his axe through the gap under Frank’s arm.
Crunch!
The axe buried itself exactly into the Reaper’s skull.
"Ha."
Mujin was stunned.
He had just thought it would be nice if Frank’s arm moved like that, and Frank did exactly that.
It was all thanks to the bond with Baek Ho.
Considering how they had been stumbling over each other inside the warehouse earlier, it felt like an impossible turn of events.
That wasn’t all.
Baek Ho was not only adept with bonds, but also had a keen awareness—one of the most important qualities for a necromancer.
In the chaos, he had seen the Reaper move and acted accordingly.
At that moment, Mujin remembered Frank from when they had visited the undead factory.
Even with his clumsy size, Frank hadn’t missed a single "Mad Eater" then.
He probably received similar guidance from Baek Ho, watching from a distance and issuing commands.
Swoosh—
The sword the Reaper swung grazed Mujin’s shoulder.
He had let his guard down for just a moment.
The pain seared sharply, and the wound bubbled with a fiery heat, but soon, new flesh covered the wound.
‘Even the regeneration is this fast…’
Baek Ho’s necromancy was impressive.
The bond, the command ability, the regenerative power—it was so impressive that Mujin could hardly believe it was happening in UnderHeaven, and not in "the outside."
And all of this from such a young age.
‘Is he really... Commander Baek’s son?’
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[Translator - Hestia]
[Proofreader - Kaya]
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