I Just Subscribed and It’s the Best Hunter of All Time - Chapter 12

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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#Episode 12.
Chen Long stared at me with a bewildered expression.
He clearly hadn’t anticipated anyone being so bluntly direct about their refusal.
But that moment of shock was fleeting.
His face twisted into a scowl as he glared at me.
“What did you just say?”
“I said I’m not interested. Why? Is that a problem?”
As I replied with indifference, Chen Long’s face flushed even deeper.
The others watched the exchange with eyes reflecting anxiety, agitation, and curiosity.
More precisely, only one person among the five—the sole woman in the group—displayed genuine intrigue.
“So you’re saying you’re more suited to be the leader?”
Chen Long took a large step toward me, looking ready to draw his blade if I confirmed his suspicion.
Yet I remained unmoved, my expression calm as I answered.
“No. I have no interest in being a leader or anything like that.”
“What?”
“The objective of this mission is simply to escape this Cave, isn’t it?”
I swept my gaze across Chen Long and the others before continuing.
“I figure moving alone would be faster.”
“Hah, so you really are out of your mind. They say the brave are foolish—do you have no idea how difficult cooperative missions are?”
Chen Long snorted derisively.
Typically, cooperative missions carried significantly higher difficulty than standard ones.
In most cases, passing without cooperation—let alone achieving a good record—was nearly impossible.
If that weren’t the case, Chen Long wouldn’t have bothered gathering these unknowns in the first place.
I let out a soft laugh before responding.
“When the body’s weak, the mind has to work harder.”
“What…?”
Within The Tower, different languages become mutually intelligible, but proverbs and idioms don’t always translate perfectly.
Especially when you’re deliberately reversing a well-known saying.
“I’m saying I’ll handle it myself. Do whatever you want as the leader. I won’t be cooperating.”
“You bastard, who do you think you are!”
As I turned to leave, Chen Long reached out roughly, attempting to grab my shoulder.
But at that moment.
“…!”
Chen Long sensed something and hastily stumbled backward.
Wide eyes. Ashen complexion. His appearance screamed terror.
And right then, a message materialized.
[The mission begins.]
Chen Long’s gaze flickered between the floating message and me, now at a distance, as he muttered in a trembling voice.
“What… what kind of killing intent is that…?”
But noticing the eyes of those behind him, he quickly composed himself and spoke as though nothing had happened.
“Phew. That’s enough. Enough. He’s going to die anyway. Let’s just get moving. Four of us will only slow things down.”
“Ah, I’ll sit this one out too.”
Chen Long turned his head at someone’s declaration.
The one who said she was leaving was the team’s only female member.
“Ah, it’s not that I dislike you or anything, Chen Long.”
The woman said as much, then kicked off the ground. Her speed was remarkably fast.
So fast that she vanished from sight before Chen Long could even open his mouth.
At that, Chen Long stood dumbfounded before suddenly throwing a fit.
The remaining two tried to placate him.
After all, neither of them was particularly exceptional, and they couldn’t afford to lose Chen Long in this situation.
“Sigh. Fine. Understood. So three of us need to clear this. Let’s stay calm and move forward.”
“Yes, let’s do that.”
“Understood.”
And so the three of them began moving to find the exit.
But before they could take more than a few steps, they felt a presence ahead.
“What? Coming back already after leaving like that…?”
Chen Long assumed it was one of those who had left earlier returning, and stepped forward with a smug expression.
But his face quickly hardened.
What appeared before them was not those who had left earlier, but something whose identity was completely unknown.
“A shadow…?”
It looked like a shadow, or perhaps like black smoke compressed into a mass.
What came next was even more startling.
“So that one’s already gone, it seems.”
It muttered regretfully, then swelled its body enormously and engulfed Chen Long and the men.
“Aaah!”
Whoosh—!
Chen Long reflexively swung his sword, but the blade only cut through empty air.
“Gaaaahhh!”
Soon, a harrowing scream echoed out.
* * *
I traversed the Cave alone, my thoughts drifting.
‘I thought he’d come at me, but that’s unexpected.’
My thoughts were about Chen Long.
From what I could see, he looked exactly like the type to throw a punch before speaking.
I hadn’t studied physiognomy or anything like that, but I had accumulated big data from working part-time jobs relentlessly since childhood.
Chen Long was clearly the type who liked to take the lead, show off, and dominate others.
That was precisely why I had decided to act alone so quickly.
If he were more skilled than me, that would be one thing, but since he wasn’t, there was no reason to bend my pride and follow him.
‘When I was working part-time, I usually always bent to that type of person unconditionally.’
I let out a bitter smile.
It was only natural, given that all he possessed was a healthy body.
There was no point in creating friction—losing this job or injuring himself would be far worse.
“Well, what’s good is good.”
Even if it differed from my expectations, things had unfolded exactly as I wanted.
Now all that remained was to find an exit quickly and escape this Cave.
‘Might as well try that now.’
I put some distance between myself and the others, then immediately opened the subscription window.
I needed to subscribe to a new ability.
‘Since the mission is to find an exit… this should work.’
After brief deliberation, I selected and subscribed to an ability.
[You have subscribed to Cassandra’s Obscure Intuition using a Bronze Ticket.]
[This subscription is valid for a total of four days.]
Cassandra’s Obscure Intuition.
The modifiers “intuition” and “obscure” seemed poorly matched, but what mattered was the name attached to it.
‘Cassandra.’
The princess of Troy, the woman who received the gift of prophecy from Apollo, her lover.
In other words, she was among the most legendary names in this field.
“Hah, phew.”
I slowly closed my eyes, then opened them.
The moment I activated the subscription, I felt it.
A sudden flash of intuition revealed the direction I needed to go.
“Perfect.”
I activated the Boots of Swift Movement while drawing upon the power of lightning.
Whoosh—!
My body shot forward at tremendous speed.
The surrounding landscape blurred past me.
The path through the Cave was winding and twisted in many places, but I navigated each turn without hesitation, pressing forward.
I never stopped, pushing straight ahead.
But around thirty seconds into my sprint, I sensed someone approaching from behind.
‘A monster?’
Since I’d been expecting monsters to appear soon, I drew my sword.
The fact that something was “approaching” me meant it was moving faster than I was.
Though not at my absolute maximum speed, it was still a threat not to be dismissed.
‘What kind of monster is it? Are there any monsters on these lower floors that move this fast…?’
As I tried to deduce the creature’s identity, the approaching figure finally became visible, and I froze.
It wasn’t a monster at all—it was human.
Someone I’d already seen before.
“Ah, I finally caught up with you!”
It was one of the people summoned alongside me at the beginning.
Red-tinged hair, eyes with a brownish hue, pale skin—and the only woman among us, which made her stand out immediately.
“Why did you follow me?”
Instead of lowering his sword, Han-seong posed the question.
The woman answered simply.
“I’m interested in you.”
“Pardon?”
“You’re the one drawing the most attention lately in Tower 7—Korea, aren’t you?”
She spoke with a smile.
“I’m Maria from Aegis. And our guild is very interested in you.”
Aegis.
Han-seong had heard the name before.
It was the guild that currently held the top five positions in the global Awakeners rankings.
The world’s greatest guild, based in the United States.
Maria closed the distance with a stride and asked.
“Could we talk for a moment?”
Han-seong answered without hesitation.
“No.”
“What?”
This time, Maria was taken aback.
“I don’t have time right now. Let’s talk after I finish the mission, if I have time left. Then, I’ll be going.”
With that, Han-seong pushed off the ground and began moving again. Maria hastily broke into a run to follow him.
Maria’s speed was no less than Han-seong’s, but once he began running at full power, the distance between them remained constant.
“Wait, let’s talk for a moment!”
Maria tried to engage him in conversation, but Han-seong simply ignored her.
“Roooaaarrr―!”
About a minute into their travel, monsters began appearing.
But Han-seong never stopped. He simply cut down those blocking his path with his sword and continued forward.
There was no need to even draw upon Indra’s power.
Moving at tremendous speed while wielding his blade was enough to overwhelm the monsters.
Meanwhile, Maria, following behind, wore an expression of amazement each time.
“Just as I thought….”
Occasionally, her expression grew more meaningful.
Han-seong paid her no particular attention.
His focus remained solely on escaping this place.
Han-seong cut down another monster blocking his path and thought to himself.
‘This is too easy.’
A strange sense of unease crept over me.
I knew that cooperative missions were generally quite difficult.
Yet every monster I’d encountered so far had been utterly ordinary.
The path was somewhat complicated, but that hadn’t posed any real problem.
Thanks to the intuition ability I’d just acquired, I hadn’t lost my way.
I had never encountered a dead end until now, and that was precisely because of my intuition.
Yet for that very reason, I could not ignore the creeping dread that seized me.
Perhaps my intuition was warning me of something yet to come.
‘I need to move faster.’
I made the decision to quicken my pace.
After all, once I escaped this place, it would be over. And not long after that decision—
“There’s the exit!”
Maria called out in a bright voice.
I had successfully found the exit.
Less than three minutes had passed since we began.
Maria’s expression betrayed her shock—she had never expected to reach the exit so quickly.
But I could not celebrate the discovery with pure joy.
The anxiety that had been growing steadily now reached its peak at this very moment.
‘Is something going to burst out like on the last floor? Or is there something else?’
As I was thinking such thoughts—
“Ah, you arrived faster than I expected.”
A figure emerged from ahead.
It was Chen Long.
This time, not only Maria but I too wore an expression of shock.
I had never imagined that he would be waiting here ahead of us.
But what was even more startling was that the moment Chen Long appeared, my anxiety surged violently.
It felt similar to when I encountered the fragment of Sargon on Floor 10.
However—
‘Something is different.’
I sensed it.
The Chen Long I had seen at the starting point and the one before me now were fundamentally different in some essential way.
As if something had possessed him.
“I was growing bored, actually. Oh, and I suppose I never introduced myself properly.”
Chen Long murmured in a leisurely tone as he approached me.
At that moment, I immediately pushed off the ground.
Chen Long saw me rushing toward him at high speed and smirked.
“Your temperament is more impatient than I—”
But he could not finish his sentence, his expression turning bewildered.
I had passed right through him and rushed toward the exit.
My speed was so great that there was no time for him to react before I burst through the exit.
Both Chen Long and the woman stared blankly at the exit.
It was Chen Long who burst into laughter first.
“Quick judgment indeed. Though I never expected you to abandon your companion so easily.”
“Well… he’s not exactly a companion, after all.”
Maria answered with deliberate composure.
Just then, a figure emerged once more from the exit.
It was Han-seong.
“I didn’t break the record by much this time.”
Han-seong walked over slowly, his expression tinged with disappointment.
Chen Long regarded him with a bewildered look and spoke.
“Weren’t you running away?”
“Why would I? I simply completed the mission. There’s something more important.”
That something important was the challenge quest.
This time as well, there was a challenge to break the records on all floors from Floor 11 to 20.
It was unfortunate that I hadn’t set a sub-minute record as usual, but the gap between me and second place was more than double, so there was no real concern.
“By the way, who are you to be wearing Chen Long’s face?”
Han-seong raised his sword and questioned the one who bore Chen Long’s appearance—or rather, the one wearing his form.
Instead of answering the question, the other smiled and spoke.
“I’ve come to make you a proposal.”
“A proposal?”
“Yes.”
He spoke.
“Become an apostle of the Great One.”
Immediately after, violet energy swirled and flowed outward from him.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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