The All-Time Best Talent was F-Class Purification - Chapter 59

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

59
Chapter 59 – An Elite Talent Awakened as an F-Rank Purifier
“Where’s the next point?”
Lee Ji-young manipulated the terminal device.
“From here… 600 meters in the one o’clock direction. We’re detecting a strong gas reaction beneath the Collapsed Elevated Highway.”
“Let’s go. If we rest, our bodies will stiffen up.”
We resumed our march. The mist remained thick, visibility barely exceeding five meters. Something rustled continuously in the darkness, yet the mana detector registered nothing.
‘This feels wrong.’
A predator’s unseen gaze from the shadows was far more unnerving than a beast charging openly.
“Eun-ha, do you sense anything unusual?”
At my question, Seo Eun-ha yawned as if annoyed.
“Who knows. There are so many small insect signatures I can’t distinguish them. Why can’t I just burn them all?”
“You can’t. The gas concentration here is too high—it could explode. Please minimize fire usage.”
“Ugh, so tedious. I’m S-Rank. Why should I bother controlling my power in a dump like this?”
Despite her grumbling, she reduced the flame at her fingertips to barely a flicker. Her words were rough, but her situational awareness surpassed everyone else’s.
After about twenty minutes of walking, a massive silhouette emerged from the mist—the upper section of a Collapsed Elevated Highway, split in half and driven into the ground. Beneath it, a dark tunnel-like space echoed with the hissing sound of gas venting.
The second Fissure.
But something was wrong. The area surrounding the Fissure was covered in white. It couldn’t be snow….
“Wait. Everyone stop.”
I raised my hand to halt the group. Upon closer inspection, it was webbing—thick, sticky white strands as sturdy as steel, coiling around the highway’s pillars and debris.
“…A Nest.”
Park Jae-jung swallowed hard, his gas shield held forward.
“The gas vents are warm, so they must have laid their eggs here.”
I slowly drew out my purification stone. To seal the Fissure, I’d have to push through that forest of webbing.
Click, click, tap.
That’s when it happened. Above us, in the darkness of the highway’s upper section, the sound of hard legs colliding began pouring down like rain.
“Above!”
As Lee Ji-young’s cry rang out, something cascaded from the ceiling—black masses. Monsters with torsos the size of humans, covered in bristling fur, each bearing eight legs.
[Mutant: Toxic Spider – B-Rank]
Not just one or two. Dozens descended along the webbing like ropes, falling toward us.
Shrieeeek!
“Hold formation! Su-jin, move to center!”
I shouted, pressing my palm against the ground.
[Skill: Purification – Area Deployment]
White light radiated outward from the ground, incinerating the toxic moss around us. At minimum, I needed to secure solid footing.
“Disgusting! Won’t you disappear?!”
Seo Eun-ha snapped in irritation, sweeping her palm through the air. Flames whipped like a lash, engulfing the falling spiders.
Shrieeeek!
The burning spiders became blazing torches, plummeting to the ground.
But they were cunning. They avoided direct confrontation, instead firing sticky, toxic webbing from their mouths.
Thwack! Thwack!
“Ugh!”
Park Jae-jung blocked with his shield, but the webbing’s adhesive was so potent that the shield stuck fast to the ground. His mobility was completely compromised. Seizing the opening, two spiders lunged at his legs—his blind spot—and burrowed in.
“Jae-jung! Your legs!”
Before I could even finish the warning, their venomous fangs gnawed through his shin guard.
Clang! Fortunately, they didn’t pierce through to the skin, but the impact sent Park Jae-jung staggering.
“These… damn vermin!”
Park Jae-jung abandoned his shield and drew the mace from his waist.
Crack! He caved in the spider’s skull. Green ichor sprayed in all directions.
“Boss! The Fissure is getting dangerous!”
Lee Ji-young cried out again. While we fought, the spiders were inhaling the gas pouring from the Fissure, swelling their bodies. They were using the gas as an energy source to go berserk.
“We have to seal it or this battle won’t end. I’m going in!”
“It’s too dangerous alone! Hey, Lee Tae-hyun!”
Seo Eun-ha shouted, but I was already moving.
While Park Jae-jung and Seo Eun-ha drew aggro, I tore through the webbing and drove toward the heart of the Fissure. Sticky strands clawed at my clothes. Webbing clung to my gas mask’s visor, obscuring my vision.
‘Damn it, I can’t see!’
I concentrated mana in my hands, purifying the webbing as I burned through it. Finally, the Fissure loomed before me. I shoved the pre-prepared purified mud mass directly into the gap.
[Skill: Purification]
Crack!
Light streamed from my fingertips, hardening the mud like steel. As the gas vent sealed shut, the spiders’ movements suddenly sluggish, starved of their energy supply.
“Now! Eun-ha!”
“Don’t need to tell me!”
Seo Eun-ha’s eyes blazed crimson. She brought her hands together, then spread them in a fan shape.
[Flame Wave]
A colossal wave of fire unfurled like a fan’s ribs, sweeping across the space beneath the Elevated Highway. The webbing hanging from the ceiling became a fuse, transmitting the inferno in an instant.
Whoooosh!
The entire spider nest transformed into a sea of flame in moments. Shrieeek! Dozens of spiders shrieked and fell as charred husks.
I pressed myself flat against the ground to avoid the heat. The purification barrier I’d erected around myself barely held back the flames.
“Huff… huff…”
The fire subsided, and the space beneath the Elevated Highway filled with acrid smoke and the stench of burnt spider. The second Fissure was sealed.
“Is anyone hurt?”
I brushed myself off and checked my companions. Park Jae-jung’s shin guard was dented, but thankfully he was uninjured. Han Su-jin looked pale with shock, though Lee Ji-young stayed close by her side.
“Ugh… this is absolutely the worst. Sticky and foul-smelling.”
Seo Eun-ha grimaced, brushing webbing from her clothes.
“Still, we handled it well without causing a major fire. Thank you.”
“Quiet. Let’s just get back up.”
We’d sealed two Fissures. This should reduce the gas flowing up into the Lower District by at least thirty percent. We’d extinguished the immediate crisis. Push any harder and we risked complete exhaustion—we might not make it back.
“Should we head back? Regroup and come down again.”
We retraced our steps toward the Emergency Stairwell Passage. The climb up felt far heavier than the descent. Yet hope flickered in a corner of my heart—the anticipation of breathing clean air again.
Thirty minutes later, we stumbled gasping to the iron door at the top of the stairs, the entrance to Zone 99.
“We’ve arrived….”
Park Jae-jung exhaled in relief and grasped the iron door’s handle.
Creak.
The door swung open, and we returned to the familiar landscape of the Lower District. The air was noticeably different. I could feel the toxic miasma that had constricted my breathing growing thinner against my skin.
“It worked. The air is definitely better.”
Lee Ji-young beamed while checking the measuring device.
“Ha, all our hard work paid off.”
A smile bloomed unbidden on my face. I wanted to rush back to the hideout and share this joyous news. Lee Seung-ryong and his companions would be waiting. We walked toward the hideout with light steps.
But the moment we entered the alley where the hideout stood, my feet froze.
Something was wrong. The shutter of the hideout, which should have been firmly closed, hung half-crumpled and grotesquely ajar.
And before it lay Lee Chung-hyung’s crossbow, its bowstring snapped, rolling across the floor like an abandoned thing.
“What… is this.”
Park Jae-jung’s voice trembled. No signs of life emanated from inside the hideout. It was eerily, chillingly silent.
Our sanctuary had been ransacked. While we were gone.
I picked up the weapon from the ground. A crossbow with its bowstring snapped clean in half. The weapon Lee Chung-hyung treasured like his own life.
Fresh bloodstains still clung to the grip. This wasn’t simply left behind. It bore the marks of desperate resistance, of being forcibly subdued.
“I’m going inside. Stay alert.”
I spoke in a measured voice. Park Jae-jung wordlessly raised his shield, and small flames flickered at the tips of Seo Eun-ha’s fingers.
We crouched and squeezed beneath the half-crumpled shutter that hung open.
Crunch. Glass shattered beneath our feet. The hideout’s interior was absolute chaos. The mattresses where we slept had been slashed open, their stuffing spilling out, and the storage door where we kept our provisions had been torn off its hinges, leaving it empty.
The precious meat we’d roasted and left over yesterday, the purified water, and even the spare batteries Han Su-jin had charged—everything of value had vanished.
“No one… is here.”
Lee Ji-young spoke in a trembling voice.
“Lee Seung-ryong, Ju Mi-sung, Lee Chung-hyung, Min-ji, and Aeri… all five of their mana signatures have disappeared. But there are no bodies….”
“They’ve been kidnapped.”
I clenched my fists. They hadn’t been killed. That was a mercy. But there could be only one reason they were kept alive. In the Lower District, labor was a resource. Whether to sell them into slavery or work them as pack animals, that was their intent.
“What kind of bastards.”
Seo Eun-ha ground her teeth.
“While we risked our lives sealing that hole, they rob an empty house? These people are animals?”
“Ji-young.”
I called to Lee Ji-young, suppressing my emotions.
“Can you tell who did this? Are there any clues?”
“Give me a moment.”
Lee Ji-young adjusted her glasses and activated her Eye of Truth. Her gaze swept across the chaotic mess—drag marks on the floor, impact traces on the walls, and the lingering residue of unfamiliar mana in the air.
“…It’s organized. These weren’t just random looters passing through.”
She pointed to one section of the wall.
“Roughly twenty people. They primarily used blunt weapons like steel pipes and hammers, and the leader’s mana signature is… high-tier C-rank, nearly B-rank. And there.”
Lee Ji-young indicated the wall near the entrance. A crude symbol sprayed in red paint—a steel fist gripping a gear.
“…It’s Iron Fist.”
Park Jae-jung groaned in dismay.
“Do you know them?”
“Yes. They’re the ones occupying the Eastern Lower District. They call themselves a civic patrol, but they’re thugs, plain and simple. They extort protection money from the shops, and if anyone refuses, they beat them senseless and drive them out. I never thought they’d reach this far.”
Iron Fist. I’d heard the name before. A guild with a notorious reputation among the Lower District residents. They’d carved out their own kingdom in the gaps where Dominion’s surveillance was lax, ruling over their territory with an iron grip.
“They caught the scent.”
I kicked an empty canned food tin rolling across the floor.
“We grilled meat, burned through electricity, purified the air… To them, we must have looked like a walking treasure chest.”
My carelessness. I’d been too complacent about the base’s security. The Lee Seung-ryong Party wasn’t weak, but twenty organized and armed attackers would have been too much to handle.
“So what now?”
Seo Eun-ha glared at me. Her eyes were blazing.
“Burn their place to the ground? Or go beg them to give it back?”
“Eun-ha.”
I met her gaze directly.
“We don’t beg.”
I pulled a map from my waistband and asked Park Jae-jung.
“Do you know where their headquarters is?”
“I do. They’re using an abandoned shopping mall building about 2 kilometers from here.”
“Then that’s all we need. Let’s go.”
I kicked open the dented shutter and stepped outside. A killing intent far more potent than the venom I’d brought from the surface rose from my body.
The 2-kilometer path to the abandoned shopping mall. We didn’t speak, but the air was heavier than it had ever been.
Park Jae-jung’s footsteps at the front were far rougher than usual. His shield was already scarred from the surface battle, but he didn’t even think to polish it.
“…I was supposed to protect them.”
Park Jae-jung muttered quietly. He and Lee Seung-ryong had gotten along quite well. As fellow vanguards, they’d toasted together and called each other brother and younger brother.
The mace handle gripped in his fist trembled. It wasn’t just the sorrow of losing a comrade—it was the self-reproach of a tank who’d failed to protect, and a weighty murderous intent toward those responsible.
Han Su-jin, walking beside him, was different from her usual self. Normally, she would have been timid and followed behind me, but now she walked with her head held high.
“They were all people I treated…”
She spoke through gritted teeth. She was the one who’d stitched up Ju Mi-sung’s torn shoulder, who’d healed Lee Chung-hyung’s bruised eye. To a doctor, patients are like children. Those who’d touched my patients. The mana battery ring on her finger glowed blue and hummed—a sign she was ready to pour out her power at any moment.
“Damn, this is infuriating.”
Seo Eun-ha kicked at stones along the way as we walked. The rocks struck by her feet glowed red and melted away.
“Hey, Lee Tae-hyun. Don’t waste time talking. I’ve held back as much as I can.”
The stress she’d accumulated from the surface was on the verge of exploding. She’d had to hide her power because of the gas, endured the humiliation of an S-rank having to control her strength against mere insects. But now we were topside. The air was clear. To her, Iron Fist wasn’t an enemy—they were kindling to burn away her accumulated rage.
“Don’t worry, Eun-ha. I wasn’t planning to talk anyway.”
And Lee Ji-young. She appeared the most composed, but she was the coldest. She’d been analyzing traces on the ground as we walked.
“There’s a trail of blood continuing along the floor. They didn’t even stop the bleeding properly while dragging him. At this rate, Lee Chung-hyung is in danger from blood loss.”
With each of her analyses, our party’s pace quickened.
I walked at the very front of the group. My mind wasn’t filled with complex calculations—just one single sentence. They touched my people. That was enough.

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