The Return of the Genius Ranker of All Times - Chapter 44

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 44

Chapter 44.

But soon after confirming that Dohyun was gone, Jihad’s attitude changed 180 degrees.

-Damn it… got caught up with the wrong guy… In all my life, I’ve never seen such a heinous human. That’s not human, that’s Satan, Satan.

How could he beat me up like this without listening to a single word?

Of course, he couldn’t deny that he had bad intentions, but still, going too far was going too far.

-…He’s really gone, right?

Jihad looked around once more and then collapsed flat on his back.

His whole body throbbed and screamed in pain. Jihad frowned from the agony and grumbled complainingly.

-If only my original power was intact…

For some reason, when he was reborn, almost all his power had been sealed away.

Even the undead he had painstakingly raised were gone without a trace.

He was already frustrated from dying like a punching bag without being able to fight properly, and thanks to that, he had just gotten beaten up the same way again this time.

If he fought again in perfect condition, he would definitely give him hell…

Shudder.

At that moment, Jihad trembled as he recalled Dohyun’s fists and that chilling blade.

-…Can I even win?

Maybe it was because he had been helplessly beaten twice.

For some reason, when he thought about confronting that human, his confidence dropped. Jihad, who didn’t want to admit that fact, kicked an innocent stone out of spite.

-Someday I’ll definitely punch that human’s bulging back of the head.

It was while he was making such a half-hearted vow.

[You will be moved to the Guardian Room.]

-Huh? What room?

Before he could question the suddenly appearing message, his vision flashed and Jihad’s body was transported somewhere.

When the blinding light faded, what was revealed was a new world.

-Wh-where is this…?

The gloomy and dark cave was nowhere to be seen, replaced by a landscape where countless worlds seemed to coexist.

Clouds and earth were connected together, with a glacial region on the left and a volcanic region on the right.

It should have felt jarring, but instead it looked quite natural.

Beyond a certain distance, it was cut off abruptly, revealing only parts of the world, but that actually created even more mystique.

-Ah…

Jihad’s pupils trembled as he gazed upon that world.

This was definitely his first time seeing this place.

But why?

-So this is what it feels like to step on the surface.

He felt his heart becoming peaceful somehow.

How long had it been since he last stepped on solid ground? How long since he felt such fresh air?

Jihad fully felt the wind tickling his face. It was a peculiar wind where cold and heat coexisted.

-…This might not be so bad.

Jihad had been practically trapped in his hideout anyway.

The thought suddenly occurred to him that this might be better than being confined in an underground cave.

And so Jihad fell asleep on different soil for the first time in hundreds of years.

* * *

Whoosh-.

Dohyun emerged from the opening capsule and stretched thoroughly.

Feeling his body loosen with cracking sounds, he finished some simple stretching and turned on his phone.

[20:12]

“It’s already evening.”

He had logged in at 10 AM, but it was already past evening and into night.

Still, thanks to logging in earlier than yesterday, even after playing the full 10 hours, he still had time left in the day, so it wasn’t bad.

‘This is why you need to be diligent.’

…Though whether turning on a game first thing in the morning could be called diligent was questionable, but times had changed.

Now was an era where diligently playing Godose was recognized as living earnestly.

Normally he would have shown extreme diligence by heading straight to the gym, but unfortunately he had things to do.

Click.

Dohyun immediately turned on his computer and naturally accessed the Godose homepage.

It was to gather information.

The name “ocean of information” wasn’t just empty words – as soon as he accessed the homepage, countless posts welcomed Dohyun.

Among them were strategy guides for the next city, but that wasn’t what Dohyun wanted right now.

[What is a Guardian! Essential reading for newbies unfamiliar with Guardians]

[Perfect Guardian Strategy!]

[Guardian Grade Chart]

[Not all Guardians are the same? What are Divine Beasts!]

‘No matter how I think about it, I can’t accept that such a Guardian exists…’

The strange Guardian he had obtained this time, Jihad Black.

It was to gather information about that guy.

He had already taken preventive measures to stop any backstabbing, but still, having some information was better than having nothing at all.

[Title: Guardian Grade Chart]

[Author: Godddong]

-Godose is a game obsessed with grades. It’s just a terribly discriminatory game where everything has grades attached.

Naturally, Guardians also have grades.

Commonly used ones like Salamander and Golem are Rare grade… you can basically think of this as the maximum.

From Hero grade and above, you generally can’t obtain them.

From here on, it’s not the realm of Guardians, but generally the domain of what are called Divine Beasts… (continued below).

“This is fine…”

Dohyun, who already knew this, skipped over it and rummaged through a few more posts, but most were either knowledge he already had or obvious statements.

Things like raising Guardians being inefficient, or recommendations for decent Guardians…

It was when he had passed over three or four meaningless posts.

Click.

[Title: Want to get a Divine Beast?]

[Author: Godddong]

-Divine Beasts are the best partners and strongest beings that players can obtain as Guardians.

They have no flaws except being damn hard to obtain and costing a lot of money.

The Guardians we’re familiar with, like Cheonoechen’s Pegasus, the Empress’s Void, and the Rogue Monk’s Haetae, are these Divine Beasts.

Each Divine Beast has a grade attached, but since they’re all at least Hero grade or above, they all have powerful abilities… (continued)…

Most people ask: So where do you get Divine Beasts?

For this, you need one of three abilities.

1. Strong luck that calls forth fateful encounters.

2. Massive cash spending that can create luck.

3. Guardian-related Achievements.

Luck means luckily obtaining Divine Beast-related Hidden Quests, and cash spending means buying all those processes, which is basically beyond the realm of ordinary people, so if we pass on those, what remains is number 3.

Dohyun stopped hitting the back button for the first time after reading this far.

‘Achievements…’

That element called Achievement had caught his attention.

That was because it was an element that didn’t exist in Demroc.

Maybe it existed, but at least it was something he hadn’t heard about even from Uncle Bora, who was quite knowledgeable about Guardians.

It might be nonsense, but anyway, since it was new information, it drew his interest.

‘The author is that person again.’

Honestly, the author played a role too.

This author called Godddong seemed very interested in Guardians, posting many related articles, and most of those posts seemed to be written by someone with considerable knowledge.

The seriousness that made you wonder if he really wasn’t a doctor was one thing.

Someone like that probably wouldn’t lie, at least.

-Everyone knows about Achievements. When someone accomplishes something difficult that anyone would find hard to do, they achieve an Achievement and receive rewards.

This could be a title, stats, or even a hidden quest.

Guardians are the same.

If you accomplish an Achievement that no one else can easily achieve, and it’s related to guardians, you might get a chance to obtain a guardian.

…(omitted below).

“Hmm.”

There was more lengthy content after that, but the essential information was up to this point.

There were no drop routes or quest details.

Well, no matter how passionate someone was about Guardian, would they really post such valuable information in a public post that everyone could see?

“Anyway, this was a huge help.”

First of all, obtaining a guardian by killing monsters was impossible in both Demroc and Godseeker.

There were no such cases anywhere.

Instead, in Godseeker, there was a new route called Achievement when obtaining guardians.

‘From the circumstances, it seems related to that Achievement… but it just seems like I found a secret dungeon and killed the boss. Could there be something like that?’

As Dohyun thought for a moment, a memory suddenly flashed through his mind.

Come to think of it, there was something.

Among the flood of messages that appeared when he killed Jihad, there was a phrase written in one line of messages.

-You have achieved a hidden Achievement.

‘Right, it definitely said that.’

Now the puzzle pieces fit together.

Obtaining Jihad Black as a guardian wasn’t some simple coincidence or strange bug, but a reward for achieving a hidden piece.

It seemed unlikely that just clearing one dungeon would be enough for a hidden piece, but thinking about it, it made perfect sense.

‘It was an insane dungeon though.’

From the location hidden in a 4-person party dungeon’s boss room, to the condition that required being alone to open it, to the difficulty that a level 24 could never handle.

Looking at each aspect, everything was extraordinary.

It was even a hellish dungeon that would disappear if you failed to clear it.

‘Thinking about it this way, clearing it was the strange part.’

It was like stubbornly clearing a dungeon that developers made specifically not to be cleared.

If the development team had been watching that scene, their mentals probably would have exploded like fireworks.

Anyway, achieving such an Achievement must have been the hidden condition for monster taming.

If that’s the case, couldn’t there be other boss monsters that could be made into guardians this way?

‘If I could make a legendary dragon into a guardian…’

I’d gain coolness that surpasses that purple old man’s epic confrontation.

Dohyun, who had been thrilled imagining that moment, shook off his thoughts.

Just because he got one this time didn’t guarantee he could get other bosses the same way, and the current reality was that he had a mere goblin, not a dragon, as his guardian.

‘Well… it’ll probably become useful if I raise it.’

Well, at least it wasn’t just any goblin.

Despite being a goblin, it was Hero-grade, and though he couldn’t use it now, it also had a unique trait called bloodline factor.

It acted like it contained a black flame dragon or something, so it had to amount to something.

Though he hadn’t yet seen whether that was a black flame dragon or a loach.

Click.

Dohyun turned off the computer and came out to the living room.

After resolving his curiosity, his starving stomach finally started rumbling.

Well, he had been starving for 10 hours, so it was natural.

Originally he had planned to buy beef… but looking at his empty bank balance, that seemed to have fallen through.

“Mom, is there anything to eat at home?”

“Nope~ There isn’t.”

At the frivolous female voice instead of an elegant one, Dohyun furrowed his brows sharply.

Hyuna was leaning against the living room sofa watching TV and giggling.

With her knees hugged to her chest, dropping snack crumbs onto her stomach – why was that sight so annoying?

Was sibling hatred a human passive skill?

“Where’s Mom?”

“Appointment.”

“Did you eat? Let me go grocery shopping.”

“I ate, what time do you think it is? Oh, there’s stew in the fridge. Mom made it yesterday for you to eat, but you didn’t eat it and just slept, right?”

“Ah…”

Come to think of it, she did tell me to eat it yesterday.

I was just so absorbed in enjoying Godseeker that I forgot about it.

‘I was discharged from the military yesterday, right?’

It felt like a week had passed, but it had only been two days…

He was amazed at his own monstrous adaptability, having already adapted to civilian level.

It was probably also because so many incidents had happened in those two days.

‘But why hasn’t anyone contacted me?’

My fellow soldiers said they were worried because their schedules were fully booked for a month after discharge…

Feeling inexplicably hurt, he checked KakaoTalk, but there wasn’t a single unread personal chat room.

At most there was a group chat with five people…

-Kwak Jaeyeol: Ah, I want to have sex.

-Kim Duhyeong: Bastard.

-Yu Jonghyeon: Hey, anyone in Pratel right now come in. Field boss appeared.

-Kim Hyeonsu: Yeah, the guild’s already occupying it~ It’s not your turn~.

-Kim Duhyeong: But when is Dohyun getting discharged? Haven’t heard from him lately, did this guy die?

-Kim Hyeonsu: This bastard finally seems dead. Planning to celebrate today.

-Kwak Jaeyeol: Huh? The 1 disappeared. Seems he’s not dead. Damn.

-Kim Duhyeong: Damn.

-Yu Jonghyeon: Damn.

-Kim Hyeonsu: Damn.

“…”

…Hmm. I think I looked at that for no reason.

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