Chapter 62

Deep Canyon Spring (1)

A large, five-meter tall Golem was standing between two trees, fully blocking anyone from passing between . Glaring at it, was a goat whose eyes sparkled with a deep red color .

Its appearance was completely different from that of an ordinary goat . It was easily 2 meters in length, was as large as a bull, and its devilish horn was protruding out like a spear . But what was most surprising was its leg power, which easily put ordinary mountain goat to shame .

Devil Goat .

It was just as aggressive as it sounded . It never hesitated to attack others, even when they had done nothing to offend it .

Tudu, tudu!

Racing along like a horse and making a sound more terrifying than a buffalo, the Devil Goat charged towards the Golem with its horn in front . The not-so-long distance was closed in an instant .

The Golem did not dodge its attack, but blocked it with his body .

Boom!

An explosive sound roared out, and the Golem staggered . If it had lost a bit more of its balance, it would have fallen backwards without doubt . Regardless, the Devil Goat’s horn had pierced deeply into its body .

That was the Devil Goat’s fatal mistake .

“Hardening!”

A shout could be heard from a distance, after which the Golem’s body began to grow hard .

Surprised by the feeling from its horn, the Devil Goat struggled to pull out its horn, but in vain .

Crack, crack!

The sound of the Golem’s body breaking could be hard . The goat had immense strength, but it wasn’t able to pull out its horn easily .

Meanwhile…

Whoosh!

Three Black Orc Skeleton Warriors that had been waiting behind the Golem leaped up into the air, slashing down as it landed towards the Devil Goat .

Swish!

With the sound of the wind getting cut, the Skeleton Warriors made several deep cuts onto the goat’s body . The Devil Goat fumed, and its eyes turned even redder . It would burst into rage at any moment .

However, a fourth Skeleton Warrior made from a Blood Goblin poured cold water over the Devil Goat’s rage . When the small Skeleton Warrior landed its sword on the Devil Goat’s body, three curses fell on it . The Devil Goat’s speed and stats decreased, and the Skeleton Warriors didn’t miss the chance to continuously hack away at the Devil Goat . The small Skeleton Warrior didn’t stop either, as it continued to attack the Devil Goat .

Fuuuu!

In the end, unable to even struggle, the Devil Goat let out a strange cry as its eyes began to grow dim . Hyrkan who was watching everything from afar put away the Bone Explosive he was holding, in his pocket .

‘Good . ’

When the Devil Goat finally died…

[You have leveled up . ]

Hyrkan heard a message he was expecting .

‘Finally level 69 . ’

Hyrkan quickly checked his stats .

[Hyrkan]

-Level: 69

-Class: Magician

-Title: 34

– Stats: Strength (559) / Stamina (181) / Intelligence (319) / Magic Power (429)

Hyrkan did not express any joy . He simply put all of his level-up points into strength . , then closed the stat window . If anyone looked, it would seem that Hyrkan was pressed in terms of time .

Dudududu!

In response to Hyrkan’s urgency, the sound of fire roared out, and Hyrkan turned towards the origin of the sound .

Boom, boom!

Hyrkan shut his mouth tightly as he heard the continued explosions .

‘The party I saw a while ago must be here . ’

The thundering sound of magic was quite appropriate for the high-level hunting ground Hyrkan was currently in .

“Ehew . ”

Hyrkan let out a sigh and dismantled the Devil Goat he had just caught . He unskinned the goat with impeccable skill, only taking about 20 or so seconds . Even after that, Hyrkan continued to dismantle its body before the goat’s body fully melted away .

‘No jewels . ’

After checking if a jewel had dropped, Hyrkan converted the bones and skin into crafting coins . He then turned the Golem back into mud and quickly departed . His four Skeleton Warriors quickly followed along, like baby ducks and their mother .

Not too long after that…

“Hm? There’s still an ice-cream here . ”

One player discovered traces of Hyrkan . The player wearing deep green armor waved his hands, and his allies quickly gathered around him .

A total of 7 players .

“Looks like someone was just here . ”

They looked at the melting body of a dead monster and the nearby traces of battle .

“What’s that pile of mud over there?”

They had keen observation skills . Having played Warlord for over a year, they were at a much higher level than other players that had started playing at the same time . In Warlord, you needed skills to survive, and keen observation skill was one of them . Being able to analyze a battlefield from traces of battle was one of the few ways to develop skills to deal with sudden, unforeseen situations .

“It doesn’t look like magic . Golem Summon maybe?”

“Golem?”

It did not take long for them to piece together what had happened .

“Is there a Golem summoning necromancer nearby?”

“Necromancer?”

They went a bit further in their speculations .

“Hahoe Mask Hyrkan?”

Like talking about a Hollywood celebrity, they mentioned his name with casualty .

“Shoot . We would’ve seen him if we had come just a bit earlier . ”

“So Hahoe Mask Hyrkan really is hunting in the Sura Canyon . I’ve only heard the rumors, and never seen him in person . ”

“I wanted to see him fight, what a shame . ”

“I’m a huge fan . I hope we can run into him again . ”

One of them then made a square with his fingers and pointed towards the pile of mud used for Hyrkan’s Golem Summoning .

“Click!”

He even took a picture .

“Hey, take one with me in it!”

Another player then squatted down next to the pile of mud and posed .

At the same time, different place, while picture of Hyrkan’s pile of mud was being uploaded to a SNS, Hyrkan changed his clothes, disguising himself as a typical swordsman class player . He also turned his Skeleton Warriors back into Skeleton Fragments .

‘Tsk tsk . ’

Then, he clicked his tongue .

‘I never thought I’d run into trouble because I got too popular . ’

As he continued to run, the past few dream-like days flashed by Hyrkan’s eyes .

★★★

“Eh . ”

An Jaehyun noticed the signs first when he saw a familiar picture on the front page of a Warlord-related website he frequented .

‘That’s me!’

The one in the picture was none other than Hyrkan . An Jaehyun then clicked on the picture, and what first caught his attention was the headline .

[Bulkas Mountain Range’s New Boss Monster, Bear Warrior Raid Solo Play!]

Under the title was a single video, and below that was an analyses of the battle as long as an entire research paper .

‘Whoa . ’

Of course, An Jaehyun’s mind was spinning . He spent the next three minutes staring blankly at the screen . When he barely snapped out of his daze, he checked the view count of the video he uploaded .

“!”

Seeing the view count skyrocket, An Jaehyun felt a chill rather than happiness .

‘It…’

Furthermore, the countless number of emails that had been sent to his YouTube account turned the chills on his spine into icicles .

‘blew up…’

There was one thing he was certain of .

That his video had blown up .

Of course, he had already expected a high view count when he received the video from Romany . The video this time was amazing even for Hyrkan who had played and watched Warlord for a long time . The quality of the video was high for something that took only a week to make, and more importantly, the content was different than usual .

Everything was unique . The first raid of Warlord’s new boss monster . A soloing necromancer! Everything that made up the video was new . An Jaehyun had originally expected a million views at the very least, and quite possibly more .

But the current success was beyond his prediction .

‘This blew up… but didn’t it blow up too much?’

There was a balance between good and bad in all things . If the result went beyond expectation, there would be an equally great adverse effect . An Jaehyun knew this better than anyone else, and things had worked out just like he expected .

The video he uploaded started receiving an excessive amount of attention . The view count skyrocketed, and his video was on the front page of many well-established Warlord fan sites . It was even discussed in the Top 30 Guilds’ broadcasts .

He received an unbelievable amount of free advertising . The amount of love calls he received increased equally as well . He received scouting offers from over 20 guilds from the Top 30 Guilds, and he was asked to make an appearance on their shows . He received many sponsorship offers as well, many of which came from well-known corporations and came with huge sums of money .

However, An Jaehyun couldn’t just be happy . Although he smiled watching money pile in his bank account, he frowned whenever he turned away from it .

Because it was a result outside of his expectation .

‘It’s good… but it might get a bit dangerous . No, it definitely will . ’

One of his goals was to gain fame, but it was too early .

‘All the crazies are going to come for sure . ’

When one became famous, he became a target . The best way to gain fame was to kill a famous player . People bothered him for no reason, and these encounters ended up online for everyone to see . Even people who came with good intentions were annoying . After all, he couldn’t just curse at them to go away .

‘Ugh, just thinking about it gives me a headache . ’

What An Jaehyun wanted was to become famous once he hit level 100 . Because at that level, most people he would see in his hunting grounds would be players nearing Ranker-class . Even if he were to run into them, he could handle it appropriately . If they wanted to fight, he would fight them . If they wanted to negotiate, he would do so as well . At the very least, Hyrkan would have something to gain from encounters with near Ranker-class players .

Of course, Hyrkan couldn’t do much about the current situation even if he complained .

‘It’s not that easy to blow up like this… why do I have to go through such a trouble . ’

Hyrkan was now too lucky for his own good .

However, An Jaehyun didn’t know at this time, that what was in his mind currently, was nothing as compared to the hardships and suffering he would face .

★★★

‘… it really was a time of hardships and suffering . ’

Thinking about the days he spent hunting in the Sura Canyon, Hyrkan sighed . He was more afraid of players than monsters, and avoided players if he could . Of course, he couldn’t avoid all of them either . At times, it ended nicely, with him just having to take a picture with them . At other times, they PKed each other until only one remained .

PKs were more common of the two . After all, Hyrkan was an easy mark . His level was definitely low for someone who was so famous, his items weren’t full Unique, and most importantly, he didn’t have a guild to back him up . To players thirsty for attention, Hyrkan was more valuable than any monster . Some even came to Sura Canyon to hunt him down .

Hyrkan went through all sorts of hardship in running away or fighting them . He even had to abandon Sura Canyon for a while, hunt elsewhere, then come back .

It was the hardest level-up period he had . It even reminded him of the times he ran away from the Stormhunter Guild in the past .

The fact that Hyrkan was reminiscing now meant his hardships were over .

‘I can finally breathe again . ’

Level 69 .

The reason he set his goal to level 69 and not level 70 was because he already had a place in mind to achieve level 70 .

‘No need to be on the lookout in a dungeon . ’

He was planning on achieving level 70 in the dungeon from Maoong’s map . Moreover, once he hit level 70, he had planned to leave Sura Canyon for another hunting ground .

‘Once I hit level 70…’

Thinking about the hardships and suffering once again, Hyrkan smiled .

“Huhu…”

The level 70 set items he had purchased with the money from his last video . Just thinking about them made him smile .

At the same time…

“All you fuckers trying to hunt me . You’re all dead . ”

A spark of rage burned inside Hyrkan .