The Archmage’s Swordsmanship Is Too Strong - Chapter 68

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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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68
Chapter 68. Decima and the Car Seat
***
“You want me to find an Incubation-type Gate?”
Kim Dae-han stared at me with genuine bewilderment, his firmly pressed lips barely containing his confusion.
The flicker in his pupils was clearly asking whether I’d just said something utterly absurd.
For all his experience as head of the Ability Management Team, the request I’d just made lay far beyond the bounds of common sense. An Incubation-type Gate was a harbinger of catastrophe.
Any hunter worth their salt would avoid it; the Management Bureau would have to pursue its closure with desperation. Yet I was proposing to hunt for one myself.
Instead of answering, I drew a weighty black terminal from my coat and placed it before him. The cool texture of metal transmitted against my palm.
I set it down carelessly on his desk with a soft thud, letting it fall atop a stack of documents.
“Ah, this is Decima.”
Kim Dae-han picked up the terminal and let out a short exclamation. His fingertips traced the device’s edges with a mixture of familiarity and curiosity.
“Decima?”
“Yes, sir. It’s a wavelength detector specifically for Incubation-type Gates. Se-hui gave it that name.”
Decima.
One of the three goddesses who govern fate in mythology—the one who measures the thread that determines human lifespans.
I hadn’t expected Se-hui, who usually scattered idle talk and procrastinated, to have drawn upon such a heavy mythological metaphor for a name.
Perhaps her instincts had grasped that this small heap of machinery would become the thread that severed life from death for someone.
“The name doesn’t matter. I made quite extensive modifications to the internals last night.”
“Is that so?”
Kim Dae-han’s expression turned skeptical as he pressed the power button on the terminal’s side.
After a moment of silence, blue light bloomed across the black display, and white text began cascading down like a waterfall. The boot sequence.
Thousands of lines of code screamed across the screen, awakening the system’s heart.
“What is this.”line>
Kim Dae-han’s eyes widened as he watched the screen.

The computation speed of the updating data and the fluidity of the interface unfolding were in an entirely different class from before.
If the old Decima had been like a rattling antiquated diesel locomotive, this one was more akin to a high-speed train that cut through the air without sound.
“It’s gotten incredibly faster. No, the response time is at the level of a completely different machine.”
“I stripped out a lot of unnecessary garbage code.”
“This changed this much overnight? Even with Se-hui and Jae-hee working on it, we never achieved this level of optimization.”
Kim Dae-han continued marveling as his fingers worked the touch panel in all directions.
Beneath his thumbs, the data map reconstructed itself in real time, charting the surrounding Mana density.
The Maintenance Room had been cold and dry last night. The interior of Decima, laid bare beneath the lights, was a horrible mess.
The algorithm itself, which read subtle Mana fluctuations in the air, was the epitome of inefficiency.
Dozens of low-grade detection magic circles, wasteful in their routing, had been crudely stitched together like a ragged patchwork.
The maker’s anguish was palpable, but it was merely flailing within the bounds of modern thaumaturgy’s limitations.
I set down the tweezers and the Mana driver, then injected my own power directly, tracing the grain of the circuitry.
I severed the Mana conductors that lay unnecessarily tangled, and in their place substituted the High-level Spatial Perception Calculation Formula etched into my mind.
I rebuilt the core algorithm itself from the ground up in a structure that maximized magical efficiency. The fine trickle of Mana flowing from my fingertips embroidered new pathways across the circuit board.
“Chu Jae-hee had already calibrated the artifact hardware to perfect zero-point. With the hardware in place, swapping out the software was trivial. It will catch wavelengths at least forty percent wider and faster than the existing radar.”
“That’s what it looks like. There’s no scan delay at all. With this—the map comes up in real time. This is incredible.”
“I also inputted preemptive waveform data for Gate Breaks. If the resonance of a specific frequency exceeds a certain threshold, the alarm will sound immediately. The concept isn’t bad, so it might be worth seriously considering a commercial model based on this.”
“That’s truly a good idea. If ordinary people could use it, everyone would be much safer. When Se-hui and I were working through the prototype all night, we didn’t think that far ahead. Impressive. Really.”
Kim Dae-han, who had been staring intently at the screen, set the terminal down on his desk with a sharp tap. The look of admiration that had been on his face moments before evaporated instantly.
His eyes narrowed, and the cool, calculating face of a practical administrator returned.
“I understand the performance and the method. But I’m curious about your reason.”
Kim Dae-han rested his chin on his interlaced fingers. His gaze tried to bore into the depths of my pupils.
“I’d like to know why Hunter Kim Do-jin is so obsessive about finding a new Incubation-type Gate. It can’t be mere duty as a hunter, surely.”
“The Red Blood Alliance and the Gate Cult.”
I didn’t hide it. Lies demand elaborate architecture, but truth is simple.
“I’ve thought of a sure way to draw them both out at once and crush them.
It’s faster to dangle bait they can never refuse than to smoke them out of their holes.”
“Is that so. You’re confident they’ll come crawling out?”
“Yes. I’ve understood their survival structure.”
Kim Dae-han picked up Decima again. His thumb swept across the cool surface of the terminal, and a thin smile crossed his lips.
It was closer to bloodlust than pleasure.
“I see. To lure those sordid bastards, you need the most lethal stage imaginable—an Incubation-type Gate. A poisoned chalice they’d drink from even knowing what it is.”
Without needing me to explain the context in tedious detail, Kim Dae-han had grasped the essential point. He understood how to read the board.
Mana-crystal Essence, the primary ingredient of Booster Original. An Incubation-type Gate supplying that vast revenue stream was a lifeline the cartel could never abandon.
We’d already destroyed one in our hands.
They’d be desperate for an alternative source, and the discovery of a new incubation-type Gate would be an opportunity they couldn’t afford to miss—and a trap they’d walk straight into.
If their remaining production line was exposed and they faced imminent collapse, even the most deeply hidden leadership would have no choice but to show their hand and risk everything to break out.
A perfect lure. Kim Dae-han had grasped its strategic value immediately, and he was already running simulations in his mind of the bloodshed it would trigger.
“Excellent. This should prove interesting. I’ll scout the hunting ground myself.”
Utterly calculated, relentlessly purposeful. That ruthless efficiency of his—I had to respect it.
***
Kim Dae-han’s provincial assignment was approved quickly. He handled all the administrative procedures himself.
He invoked his authority as head of the Ability Management Team, framing it as a “Comprehensive Survey of Wide-area Mana Instability Zone.”
He set the duration for one week.
After running Decima, no trace of the characteristic murky signature of incubation-type Gates registered anywhere within G City’s radius.
He was going to expand his search perimeter to other regions like sweeping a radio telescope across the sky, conducting the survey on foot himself.
He intended to maximize his expertise in intelligence gathering and leverage the administrative apparatus to its fullest.
Just before departure. The outdoor parking lot in front of the Ability Management Team Office. The noon sun beat down mercilessly onto the asphalt.
The vehicle Kim Dae-han was loading was no longer that battered domestic sedan. It was a gleaming black luxury full-size SUV.
The heft of its massive frame and enormous wheels dominated the parking lot’s atmosphere. The engine growled low, exuding predatory power.
He gave the hood of his new car two sharp pats with his palm. The sound rang out, clean and metallic.
“Thanks to you, Hunter, I got a solid promotion out of that Club Arabian cleanup operation. I indulged myself a bit. I sent the old clunker I used to drive overseas as a used car yesterday—it’ll find a good owner somewhere. At my age, my back’s been acting up, so I figured I deserved it.”
Kim Dae-han laughed heartily, his voice booming. But his laughter merely brushed past my ears.
My gaze had come to rest elsewhere—beyond the deeply tinted rear window, fixed on a single point deep within the darkened interior of the vehicle.
Premium leather seats still exhaling new-car smell. Yet something utterly incongruous lay atop them.
A faded, threadbare fabric car seat.
Its edges were frayed, cotton stuffing protruding in tufts, and the character pattern stitched onto the backrest had faded so thoroughly by weathering that its original form was barely recognizable.
It was the only worn thing in this car, and simultaneously the thing most securely fastened to it.
The car seat of his young daughter—the one he’d lost his grip on during the Gate Break incident, swept away in the chaos.
The car changed, his identity changed, his life’s trajectory veered in a new direction, yet he could never remove that obsessive attachment.
No—it wasn’t obsession. It was the sole anchor that kept his soul afloat.
On the surface, he played the role of an efficient, easygoing civil servant, but that weathered car seat was the true essence of the man named Kim Dae-han.
Since that day when his daughter’s time stopped, he’d never known a moment of peace. A fathomless madness fueled by uncompromising resolve.
He stood on this battlefield not in the name of justice, but with the heart of a father who had never completed his revenge.
It was a feeling I knew far too well. Which is why I could no longer bear to look at it.
During those ten years of my previous life, I’d chewed and swallowed the sickening taste of loss every night—my mother, my sister, both gone.
I’d clawed my way up to the peak of the 9th Circle, using the hell of deprivation as fuel. Those who know the weight of loss don’t carelessly meddle in another’s scars.
Because they understand that the scar is the only force that moves him.
Kim Dae-han closed the trunk and held out a clipboard with documents wedged into it.
“I’d appreciate your help with this. It’s something that needs to be handled while I’m away.”
“What is this?”
On the clipboard was a crudely printed table with hastily drawn lines—an attendance record for the Ability Management Team’s special management subjects.
The rigid bureaucratic format made my eyes ache.
“Ah, the paperwork for Se-hui—hand that back to me. I’ve already verified that myself.”
He smoothly slipped the sheet with Se-hui’s name from my hands and pocketed it. I caught a glimpse of the check column: it was already packed with perfect circles for the full week.
He’d flawlessly falsified the attendance record for her—crediting her return to Taeseong Energy, her parent company, in the administrative file.
It seemed to be a continuation of the promise Se-hui had mentioned making with Kim Dae-han a few days ago. Classic Kim Dae-han: convenience over law, pragmatism over principle.
“Instead, I need you to handle this.”
The clipboard that remained in my hands. The moment I saw the name at the very top, my brow tightened unpleasantly. Three characters in ink stabbed at my retina.
“Hong Tae-hwa.”
“Yes. He’s someone I normally manage directly and conduct interviews with. I’d like to ask you to take this on. Today happens to be the scheduled home visit according to the department manual.
Since I’ll be away, there’s no way around it.”
“Sigh.”
A dry breath escaped me.
The request had a solid justification—I couldn’t simply tear up the paperwork and refuse.
Kim Dae-han’s week-long provincial assignment was, after all, sanctioned at my direction as part of the bait-search operation. A form of quid pro quo.
This was the price I paid for setting him free in the field.
“What am I supposed to do when I get there? Conduct an interview?”
“Tae-hwa’s been absent without authorization for a full week now. He’s skipped school and ignored the Management Team’s summons. I’ve checked the PC Bangs and back-alley billiards halls he usually frequents, but he’s nowhere to be found. When a special management subject loses contact for more than three days, the case officer is required to conduct a home visit to their residence. It’s tedious, but it’s administrative procedure. The records have to be documented.”
“Why make it so complicated? If he doesn’t show and vanishes, just strike him from the management roster. If he causes trouble later, we arrest him then. Simple.”
“The law mandates it. Tae-hwa is still a legal minor. If he were neglected and caused a major incident or became involved in crime, the liability would fall entirely on our Management Team. To clear the negligence label, we need to maintain records in the file.”
“You really do worry about everything, don’t you.”
Having to do home visits to confirm the attendance of some rebellious truant kid. It was infuriating.
“Go to the address listed. It’s a grandparent-grandchild household—that’s his grandfather’s place. The old man’s probably home alone. Just check on things lightly and come back. If Tae-hwa’s there, fine. If not, just ask his grandfather to have him make contact.”
……
I slotted the clipboard beneath my arm without a word, offering only a slight lift of my chin.
When I thought about it, I was the only field operative the Ability Management Team could spare right now.
Se-hui was drowning in the corporate succession struggle, and I couldn’t hand delicate administrative work to Charles, who’d been soaked in alcohol since noon.
As for Chu Jae-hee, polished as he was—he’d never survive Hong Tae-hwa’s rough defiance or the vicious atmosphere of that neighborhood.
That left me. It was a pain, but I decided to think of it as the price of setting the board.
“Understood. Safe travels.”
“I’ll bring back someone really solid within a week. Someone who’ll suit your tastes perfectly.”
Kim Dae-han gave a casual salute and climbed into the driver’s seat. The luxury SUV rumbled out of the lot with a heavy engine growl.
I watched the dispersing exhaust hang in the air for a moment, then turned and walked away myself.
“Time to go sightseeing in hell.”
***
An utterly abandoned backstreet corner on the outskirts of G City.
I’d arrived at Hong Tae-hwa’s address from the clipboard, and the sight before me was grim.
The neighborhood where I’d once lived was also a neglected area pushed aside by redevelopment, but this place’s poverty ran deeper.
It wasn’t that time had stopped here—it was that time had rotted and caved in.
Shabby corridor-style apartment complexes built during the 1970s economic boom loomed like monsters in a row.
Paint peeled grotesquely from the outer walls, exposing the crumbling cement beneath, while corroded rebar jutted out nakedly here and there, weeping rust like tears.
The buildings were so decrepit that they couldn’t even accept Mana-crystal Cartridges—the modern standard power source—because the port specifications didn’t match.
A blind spot untouched by twenty-first-century civilization.
The residents here either clung to expensive antiquated grids or had lost them entirely, spending their nights in pitch-black darkness once the sun fell—a warped existence.
The stench of unmanaged garbage heaps mingled with sewage backing up from broken pipes, hanging thick in the alleys. The air itself was heavy, windless.
The residences, lined up grim as a vast tomb in the heart of the city, were slowly eating away at the living.
Damp alleyways with more than half their streetlights shattered. Broken glass fragments crunched softly beneath each step.
Was Hong Tae-hwa hiding in this abandoned dead zone? I was starting to glimpse what lay at the bottom of his defiance.
Buzz—
My smartphone vibrated briefly in my pocket.
Unknown number. I opened the message. It was from Lee Min-yeong, an inspector from the Gate Management Bureau. She must have gotten my number from Ryu Gang-jin, the Power Division Chief.
Her persistence hadn’t changed.
The message was characteristically terse.
[Hunter Kim Do-jin, Jung Chan-hyun has been detained and arrested.]
[I’ll keep sharing the investigation results. He’s started talking.]
[Hunter Lee Do-hyun’s remains are being handled quietly—direct family only, under media blackout, funeral rites proceeding in secret.]
[And… I’m really grateful. If it weren’t for you, the truth would have stayed buried forever.]
The Gate Management Bureau’s decision was as I’d expected.
Exposing a first-generation hero’s death to the press too hastily would unnecessarily provoke the coiled Red Blood Alliance and Gate Cult, causing them to cut and run.
Before unleashing public fury, the plan was to bury it beneath the surface until they had perfect physical evidence.
Probably Ryu Gang-jin’s call.
As a result, my picture didn’t quite match. I’d been planning to use a loud spectacle to flush out the Gate Cult.
The Gate Management Bureau, by contrast, had made a pragmatic, cold calculation—a shrewd political operator’s move, worthy of Ryu Gang-jin.
My dull eyes reflected in the black screen.
“Shit. His place is here?”
“Yeah. Building 4 over there. He lives with his grandfather, they said.”
“We’re done for. Hong Tae-hwa, you bastard. I’m breaking at least one of your legs today.”
A sharp voice tore through the still air.
I lifted my head, staring toward the source. The entrance of the old apartment complex.
Five or six figures—some throwing on school uniforms carelessly, others in garish, nondescript clothing—stood gathered, shifting their weight on one leg.
Steel pipes and splintered wooden clubs gripped tight in their hands, snickering with sadistic excitement in their eyes.
At a glance, they were low-quality thugs. But they had a different grain than ordinary delinquents.
One of them, the one in the center, was wreathed in a faint shimmer of Mana fluctuation like heat haze.
An amateur early-stage Awakened One whose core hadn’t opened properly, power leaking everywhere—a would-be monster who’d tasted strength without proper education.
I checked where their gaze was fixed. Precisely at the address on my clipboard—Hong Tae-hwa’s location.
Our destination was the same.

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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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