Nicknamed “Divine Discerner,” Appraiser Jinmyung was an SS rank disciple. He was the man who had claimed to be Lee Gun’s student at the Integrated Exchange. Lee Gun had given him the task of finding information about a dagger, the dagger that had dropped him into the trap twenty years ago.
Jinmyung carefully handed over a box to Lee Gun. It contained the short sword Lee Gun had given to him after beating up Sophie.
[Short Sword Infused with Death Energy]
Rank: ???
- Cannot bring up info.
Hugo was surprised to see it, his reaction understandable. “Didn’t you show this to Heiji a couple of days ago??”
He was sure that Lee Gun had shown this blade to Heiji and asked about the culprit. In response, Lee Gun grinned and took out something from his bosom.
Hugo exclaimed. “That’s the one!” It was the same short sword.
“The one I have is a replica,” Lee Gun explained.
“What? Replica? I never saw you make that thing.”
Lee Gun snorted as he tossed the blade between his hands. “I can make this small blade during a bathroom break.”
“…!” Hugo was shocked. As a Saint, he had been forcefully granted the Eye for Beauty(S) skill. Yet, he hadn’t noticed at all that this item was a replica.
Moreover, every item Lee Gun made was always two points better than everything else. This made the copy much more valuable. So, Hugo wondered if the copy held any extra abilities.
‘This looks like the original!’ Hugo’s admiration of Lee Gun’s abilities lasted only a moment. “That’s fine! However, I can’t believe you entrusted that item to a Virgo disciple! If I’m being blunt, he could’ve sold you out to the Virgo Saint!”
“What?!” The one to get surprised was Jinmyung.
Hugo continued, “You should be a bit more suspicious of others, Gun!”
“What did you just say, you foppish Saint! You’re nothing without your face, you gangly bastard!”
“…?!”
Jinmyung was ruthless even toward a Saint. Hugo had never been treated this way in his life. However, it seemed Jinmyung was furious. “Why would I sell out my teacher of twenty years? You will be in last place as a Saint forever!”
“…!” This unexpected blow took Hugo by surprise. It made him wonder if this was the appraiser’s normal personality. “He has been your teacher for twenty years? When the hell did you meet Gun?”
“Ah! That’s right. You two are brothers.” Lee Gun chimed in.
“?!”
When Lee Gun double tapped his kill, Hugo took damage for the second time. It meant Lee Gun had raised a student in secret from him. However, the damage didn’t end there.
Lee Gun continued, “If we are strictly going by order, the appraiser is your older brother.”
“?!!”
Hugo took damage for the third time.
“Moreover, he’s a thousand times more useful when it comes to investigating. That’s why I left it with him.”
The fourth time…
“Anyway, you guys should be friendly with each other. You do know he is a friend of Sungjae, right, Taeksoo?”
Hugo, who felt like dying, angrily replied, “I don’t know! My son doesn’t have a friend like him!”
Jinmyung looked at Hugo with pity. “Now that I’ve met you, I can see what your son was talking about. He has a good reason to not like you. You’re stubborn and inflexible, a boomer.”
“Kuh-huhk!!” Hugo crumpled to the ground. This was a kill shot.
Lee Gun didn’t care what he did. When it came to a task he issued, Jinmyung had used any means possible to complete the task. Why?
[Short Sword Infused with Death Energy]
Rank: ???
- Cannot bring up info.
[An evil power has destroyed the information within the sword]
[There is no info left within the sword]
[Gaze of a God is too low in level to check the ingredient information]
[No tracking skill can track the remaining owner of the sword]
Hugo, a tracking specialist, couldn’t glean any clues from the sword. However, Jinmyung could do it. Why?
Jinmyung (SS rank) Virgo
Awakened Name(Baptized Name): [One Who Determines Authenticity of All Items]
- One who can tell the history of antiquities
Effect: Can extract memories from all items.
- Possess a skill that determines the authenticity of items.
[Read Memory! SS rank (Virgo)]
[Memory Transfer! S rank (Virgo)]
[Lee Gun-nim’s Student (Personal)! B rank (Virgo)]
[Memory Transplant! S rank (Virgo)]
…
Personal Attributes
[Unknown Confidence] Luck Buff: 30%
[Artisan’s Sharp Eyes] Observation Buff
[Diligence] Stamina Increase: 20%
[Obsession] Works with items above A rank
[Fanatic] Brainwashing & Hypnosis type skill. Incapacitation! A skill he wants to hide.
[Sensitive Mind] Stamina Discharge: 50%
[Voice] Takes the energy of the opponent
Jinmyung’s main skill was the <Read Memory> skill. Whether it was humans, objects, rooms, or monsters, he could extract the object’s memories.
He was also born with sharp eyes, but he had become an SS-rank appraiser for a reason. Jinmyung could sift through the memories to check if an item was real or fake. That was full proof.
When Lee Gun had peeped at the ability, he had known Jinmyung was the only one up for this task. ‘Well, the only troublesome part was that he couldn’t read my memory.’ The reason for this was simple too.
[A human cannot dare invade the body of the Serpent Bearer.]
Therefore, Lee Gun wanted Jinmyung to read the memory of the short sword. ‘He did say it would take a long time since it wasn’t a normal item.’
Lee Gun asked, “So who's the culprit?”
Jinmyung quickly studied his surroundings. “Please excuse me, Lee Gun-nim.” His sword-shaped badge thrummed.
Ting!
A curtain of light surrounded the trio.
[A rental skill from the Pisces has been activated.]
[For the next 30 minutes, <Silence Barrier (S)> will remain activated.]
[Rental fee of $500k has been deducted.]
[Thank you for using it.]
[The water’s energy prevents sound from leaking outside.]
When the curtain of light seeped into their bodies, Jinmyung became tense. “You said a sword similar to this was auctioned five years ago?”
“Yes. I heard an SS rank appraiser appraised it.” This was another reason Lee Gun had sought out Jinmyung. He wanted to see who had sold the sword.
Jinmyung gulped. “In truth, the person who appraised that sword was my senior.”
“!”
“I came in after him. His ability was different, but he was also one of Ten Stars, one under the Virgo Saint.”
“Oh! Your senior must know more about the culprit. Can you contact him?” Lee Gun asked.
“He passed away.”
“!”
“He met a premature death. One week after he appraised the sword, he was assassinated.”
The expressions on Lee Gun's and Hugo’s faces changed.
“Also, I extracted the memories from the sword. Some of them have been deleted. Basically, someone covered their tracks perfectly. This shouldn’t have been possible unless some being with enormous power meddled in it.”
“…!”
In other words, Lee Gun’s opponent wasn’t someone normal.
Hugo accepted the reasoning. Even if Lee Gun was tired from killing Red Eye, there was no way a stab in the back by a mere sword would send him into a trap. The Archer Saint was soon proven right.
“There is a powerful curse skill placed on it. The curse is powerful enough to kill a god.”
“…!”
Curse skills were the domain of the Cancer, but even the Crab Saint wasn’t skilled enough to kill a god.
This implied that a single Zodiac Saint couldn’t pull this off. In fact, Lee Gun already knew the power used on him didn’t fit with any of the twelve Zodiac Saints.
“I believe the culprit received power from someone and stabbed Lee Gun-nim.”
Lee Gun smirked. ‘As expected, is the unknown civilization involved?’
After a moment of hesitation, Jinmyung continued, “Anyway, I was able to scrape together snippets of memories…”
“What did you see?”
Jinmyung shut his eyes. His next words were shocking. “It was the Virgo Saint. He stabbed Lee Gun-nim!”
“…!”
Jinmyung’s hands shook from the betrayal. The sword’s memories were scrubbed, so the memory he had recovered was fuzzy and fragmented. However, he was sure of it. The memory that came out from the short sword was from his Saint.
“I wanted to make sure, so I secretly searched the Virgo Saint’s weapon storage. I found identical items….” Jinmyung opened the bag.
Lee Gun laughed when he saw the contents of the bag, while Hugo almost fainted. Weapons identical to the sword that had stabbed Lee Gun were inside it.
Jinmyung was an SS-rank disciple, yet his faith toward the Virgo Saint had been dropping. This was the reason. However, he was fine with this development. Suddenly, he thought about the commission from the European Alliance. Hugo’s son had brought it. It was a commission from the Virgo Saint.
“Does that mean the Virgo Saint called you here to— Huhk!”
Hugo was cut off.
Lee Gun, who had taken the sword back, suddenly unsheathed it.
Ssguhng!
Twenty years— No, he had been trapped inside the tower for several hundred years. Despite the passage of all those years, he looked undamaged.
Lee Gun’s gaze was fixed on the blade. The blade was so beyond being odd that it gave one goosebump.
“Gun?”
“I want to know about the curse skill within this blade.”
“What?” Jinmyung asked.
“You said the skill could kill even a god. Can you reactivate the skill?”
“…!”
Hugo and Jinmyung were both scared out of their minds.
“No way you are thinking about doing that!”
Lee Gun’s snake eyes flashed in a scary manner. “It can kill a god. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”
Jinmyung shivered when he saw the killing intent from Lee Gun. It was something he hadn’t witnessed before. However, he still replied, “I know a Regenerator who can bring back the power of a spent skill. I will contact him.”
Lee Gun laughed. Then, he held something out to Jinmyung. It was a necklace.
“This is a protection-type holy item I made. You should keep it just in case.”
“Lee Gun-nim!”
Of course, the necklace was imbued with surveillance and tracking abilities too. It was unknown whether Jinmyung was aware of this or not, but he felt just touched by the fact that Lee Gun-nim had given him an item.
Lee Gun had a more urgent business he had to take care of right now. “First, I have to catch the monster that showed up here.”
“!”
‘I’ll take care of the Virgo Saint after I finish the Trial of Strength.’ The trial was on a time limit. Lee Gun looked at Hugo. “You sent your subordinates ahead as an advance party, right?”
“Yes. They should be…”
Suddenly…
“Lee Gun-nim!”
“!”
Hugo’s subordinates, the ones in the advance party, appeared in the distance. When they reached Lee Gun, one of them brought out a cloth bag.
“Lee Gun-nim! This is it! We found some fur from the monster you two mentioned!”
“We were lucky! We ran across someone who had been attacked by the monster…!”
Hugo, who was pushed to the back, found their behavior ridiculous. “Hey! I’m the one who ordered you to find it…”
However, his underlings didn’t pay any attention to him.
“If it’s Lee Gun-nim, this should be enough to know what kind of foe you’re going to fight, right?”
“Unlike our Saint-nim, your analytical ability is outstanding.”
Hugo felt a surge of anger, but no one cared about that.
“Lee Gun-nim. Is this the monster you’re looking for?”
Lee Gun let out a sharp laugh. “Bingo.”
[Fur of the Monster that eats gods(SS)]
[It is the target for your Trial of Strength.]
His intuition had been correct. The monster that had appeared in this place was considered unkillable. There was a chance that the Virgo Saint had called it forth to harm him.
‘This might be an unexpected gain.’ Lee Gun had been able to find his opponent quickly thanks to all of this. “Where was it last seen?”
“It will be too much for you. You should give up on it.”
An unfamiliar voice replied to him. It was the voice of a robust young man. The young man looked to be in his late twenties. As expected of an Archer disciple, his appearance was top tier. However, he didn’t even have an ounce of humor, and his manner was brusque. All in all, he looked like an old-fashioned man.
The young man had weight to throw around, and he was very tall, taller than both Hugo and Lee Gun.
[Caution! This man’s loyalty to the Sagittarius is very high.]
[His faith toward the Serpent Bearer is very low.]
The information caused Lee Gun’s eyes to widen. As for Hugo, he was shocked.
“Ben!”
This man was someone Hugo knew very well.
[Benjamin Goat]
- Archer! SS rank
“It’s nice to meet you. My name is Goat. I serve the Archer Saint.”
Lee Gun jeered. “Good ol’ Poverty Saint. So you do have other disciples. I thought you had only two.”
Hugo reacted in anger. “The number isn’t that small!”
It didn’t really matter. ‘It’s my first time seeing an SS-rank.’ Lee Gun wondered. Most of the Ten Stars hadn’t shown up in the raid on Thousand Legs, thinking the monster was too low in rank.
The Ten Stars were a new breed of awakened beings. Numbered only ten, they were considered the strongest amongst humanity after Saints.
‘He’s one of the Ten Stars.’ This man was like Yooha. Of course, Yooha was still an S-rank disciple, so the SS-ranks looked down on her.
In any case, SS-ranks were candidates to become the next Saints. They were like commanders-in-chief who kept the generals of the directly-managed temples in line.
As if to prove this, Goat’s faith toward the Sagittarius was sky-high. However, for some odd reason, he looked guarded toward Lee Gun.
“It seems you’re here to kill the monster. Please go back before you get hurt.”
The other Archer disciples screamed when Goat made fun of Lee Gun.
“Goat! Do you realize who he is?”
“He is the legendary Lee Gun!”
“He had an archery match with our Saint-nim."
“Our Saint-nim got folded! He was lousy…”
Goat roughly pressed down on their heads. “Did you forget you guys are disciples of the Archer Saint?”
“Ahhhhhhk!”
“I’m sorry!”
“Anyway, I’ve heard a lot about Lee Gun-nim from Saint-nim. Still, I’m sure our Saint-nim is better. From what I’ve heard, Lee Gun-nim succeeded in most fights thanks to our Sant-nim’s help.”
Lee Gun discreetly glanced at Hugo. The Archer Saint was shaking. Hugo did remember saying that to boost his standing amongst his subordinates.
Oblivious to this, Goat continued, “Anyway, Lee Gun-nim can’t do anything without Hugo-nim. Please stay put when our Saint-nim isn’t present. You’ll get in the way.”
‘No! Stop it!’ Hugo’s expression was a sight to behold.
Lee Gun let out a big smile. “Is that so? Taeksoo said that? I’ll get in the way?”
Hugo turned pale as if he wanted to deny it. However, Goat was sincere. “Yes. He said you were so bad that he couldn’t send you alone into the battlefield.”
Hugo gripped his face as if he knew he was ruined. Goat didn’t pay any attention to his reaction as he said, “This isn’t for you. You should head back.”
“What?”
“The advanced party scouted the monster. It isn’t something a human can kill. Lee Gun-nim will fall short.” Goat took out something. “Only I can kill it with this weapon.”
For some reason, when Lee Gun saw the weapon, his eyes turned round. Then, he burst out laughing. ‘Really? Is that how it is?’
