SSS-Class Revival Hunter - Chapter 67

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

◈ SSS-Class Revival Hunter ◈

Chapter 67: The Heavenly Demon (2)

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The Apothecary closed her eyes tightly.

After a moment, her lips parted.

"If it weren't for the King of Death, I'd still be in the slums, stripped of my equipment. I can't even imagine what would have happened to me."

Slowly, the Apothecary opened her eyes.

Through her glasses, her gaze was much clearer than before.

“Yes. I want to repay what you have done for me, King of Death. I will think of nothing else and devote myself entirely to making the cure. But when I become absorbed in my work, I truly cannot see anything around me. I stop observing even basic courtesy. I will probably behave with extraordinary arrogance. Even so...”

"It doesn't matter,"

I nodded.

"Please exert your skills to the fullest."

Now wasn't the time to worry about trivial manners.

What was needed was the future Master Alchemist.

"……Understood."

The Apothecary adjusted her glasses.

She turned to the Medicine King.

"Old man."

"Huh? What?"

"Please support me with all your strength from now on."

The Medicine King furrowed his brows, his wrinkles as deep as his stubbornness.

"Support? Support, eh? What a cheeky request. Kid, there's a hierarchy even in cold water! Where does a greenhorn like you get off telling this Medicine King to merely 'support' you….”

"Skill card open."

"...Huh?"

Skill cards emerged from the Apothecary's hands.

One golden card and three silver cards.

The Apothecary had mastered four skills that an ordinary Hunter would struggle to obtain even one of, all rank B or higher.

The Medicine King's eyes widened.

"What, what is this? Are you showing off your skills to me? These young ones think skills are everything. True power is..."

"You can look if you want."

"What?"

"You can see what my skills are."

The Medicine King was flustered, unable to respond immediately.

Understandably. A Hunter's skills are their secret weapon, never to be revealed to others. Showing one's skills is akin to confessing one's strengths and weaknesses.

In short, a foolish act.

"Or should I just show you myself?"

The Apothecary was bold.

"This skill is 'Moving Hospital'."

She flipped the card herself to show the Medicine King.

"I can perform everything from blood tests to brain scans in real time. I can also use the medicines I've stored in advance. However, there's a 2% chance of misdiagnosis. This one is 'Life Diagnosis'. I can understand a patient's condition down to their genetic makeup. I combine these two skills to minimize the risk of misdiagnosis...."

"Wait, wait! Hold on!"

The Medicine King finally snapped to his senses.

“You little fool! Why are you showing me your skills? What will you do if I reveal them to Alchemy Castle or to our colleagues?”

"It's okay. I've decided not to worry about such things."

The Apothecary spoke.

"You can share them if you want. But please support me thoroughly until we develop the cure."

"But why are you..."

"I need you if we want to advance the development even by a day."

“......”

"Do you find me unbearable?"

The Apothecary looked at the Medicine King with an indifferent gaze. Once always flustered, she now wore a completely expressionless face.

"Do you hate that a young thing like me is out of line and annoying? Does it irk you that I have talent? That I have more days ahead than you, and that I'll be revered longer?"

“......”

The Apothecary's voice was unique, unlike any animal. It reminded one of insects.

A whisper like fire ants sizzling.

"If you help me with all your might this time,"

She adjusted her glasses.

"I'll give you all the medicine recipes I've developed. I won't claim they're mine. Take them. Use them. Tell people you invented them---."

Suddenly, the Apothecary's glasses slid off and fell to the ground.

The Medicine King had slapped her.

“......”

The Apothecary picked up her glasses and silently wiped them with her sleeve. A red mark from the slap was on her left cheek. She put her glasses back on and quietly looked at the Medicine King.

The Medicine King trembled with rage.

"Despicable thing..."

"I'll analyze the zombie virus."

"You'll realize there's a higher level above you."

"Just do what I tell you."

"You'll rot from your wounded pride."

"I'll write down what I need and give it to you."

"Someday, you too,"

“Then, old man,”

The Medicine King and Apothecary spoke simultaneously.

"Will meet someone better than you."

“Find those items and bring them to me.”

Then, both Hunters fell silent.

The Apothecary sat on the left and the Medicine King on the right of the zombie's corpse. The Apothecary muttered something and the Medicine King noted it down. Surrounded by a monochrome atmosphere, the two, more like a still life than a portrait, engaged only in business-like conversations.

"King of Death, I'm sorry but please leave."

The Apothecary muttered as she positioned a scalpel near the zombie's head.

"Your breathing is distracting. Very. Very distracting."

"Bring back six more zombies on your way out."

The Medicine King examined the dark mouth of the zombie. He pinched the purple and black tongue with tweezers.

“We need more samples. Children, young adults, and elderly people, one of each sex in every age group. And if I name a medicinal ingredient I need, obtain it for me.”

I nodded.

"Leave it to me."

From that day on.

We went onto a wartime footing.

Even time spent eating felt wasteful. Washing themselves was a luxury. Although an open-air bath was right beside them, the Apothecary and the Medicine King did not bathe. Day and night, the two Hunters merely nibbled at fasting pills while studying the zombies.

"The atmosphere has certainly changed."

The Heavenly Demon looked perplexedly at our group.

"Seeking enlightenment, young ones?"

“Will you not cook any more of that clam soup or doripal risotto?”

The Head of the Martial Alliance lightly teased the Medicine King.

“Your skill truly could make even an imperial chef weep. If only the world were still intact, I would appoint you head chef of the Great Namgung Clan.”

“I'm busy, so get lost.”

The Medicine King retorted without looking up, throwing a bottle of Bling H20.

"If you're hungry, fill up on water."

Apparently he was deeply disappointed that he could no longer taste the Medicine King's cooking. The Head of the Martial Alliance smacked his lips, yet still caught the bottle of Bling H2O the Medicine King had thrown and drank it readily.

“Old fossil, stop bothering people who are busy and let us go.”

"Alright, alright. My body isn't listening to me these days."

The Head of the Martial Alliance grumbled tiredly.

"How far have the zombies scattered today..."

“Even if they went far, could they have gone a thousand li? Stop grumbling and come out.”

"Fine."

The Head of the Martial Alliance grumbled and left the cave with the Heavenly Demon.

They were probably going to gather the zombies as they did yesterday, for the 991st day of the Great War of Good and Evil.

Another day passed.

The world moved closer to its end.

And another day.

One day.

One more day.

We were counting…

The days we spent waiting for doom.

The world was still like a music box that hadn't stopped yet.

"Hmm."

A week.

It had been exactly one week since we fell into the Apocalypse.

That day, the Heavenly Demon looked up at the cave ceiling.

"...It seems we can't go outside today."

A blizzard was raging outside. The wind whipped the snow around so fiercely that the sky and the ground became indistinguishable.

The world was nothing but a dark snowfield.

It was then that I realized that even white can be dark.

"Well. Such days happen."

The Heavenly Demon shrugged nonchalantly.

"It's rather fortunate that the weather has been clear these past few days. At its worst, the snowstorm lasted over 30 days. We couldn't move a step without sunlight."

"Then the zombies will keep moving, won't they?"

I asked.

"Is that okay? If they go too far, you can't collect them back."

"If that happens, we can't help it. We lose them."

The Heavenly Demon sighed.

"Originally, three years ago, my cult's forces numbered a thousand. The younglings that the old man brought from the Orthodox Faction were about the same. But over time, zombies that went too far to be found started to appear."

Naturally…

They had a lot of missing corpses. No, not missing, but lost. During each snowstorm, the Heavenly Demon and the Head of the Martial Alliance must have lost several corpses.

"That must be the scariest part for you."

"Hm?"

"Waking up and going out to the snowfield, only to find that yesterday's zombies have disappeared."

“......”

The Heavenly Demon looked at me quietly.

"Do you think I, the Heavenly Demon, would feel fear?"

Her pupils were dark as ink.

Her hair. Even the uniform she wore.

Her entirely black appearance seemed like a desperate resistance against this world that had turned into a white snowfield.

"Yes. I think you would."

“The world has indeed been overturned many times over. Ordinarily, anyone who uttered such words would not still have their head. Young one from outside lands, you should count yourself fortunate that the world has ended.”

"The Heavenly Demon and the Head of the Martial Alliance are great masters. I'm embarrassingly far behind in martial arts compared to you."

I quietly shifted my gaze.

The Head of the Martial Alliance was sleeping near the hot spring.

"But even the greatest masters don't have infinite Ki."

"What are you trying to say?"

"When will your Ki run out?"

The Heavenly Demon went still.

"You're blocking the cervical meridian with Ki. Heartbeats, breathing, moving limbs, you're doing it all with Ki."

It was like using the Flying Ki Sword Technique 24/7.

I shook my head.

"No matter how much Ki you have, it's impossible to continue such an extreme act forever."

"Let me ask again. When will your Ki run out, Heavenly Demon?"

She once said,

"People will eventually die."

There was a resonance in those words. The resonance of someone who had realized something.

There is only one way for humans to realize something.

To experience it firsthand.

"...Really."

The Heavenly Demon groaned.

"Really, such a keen young man."

"How many days do you have left?"

"...Let me correct myself. You're annoyingly observant."

This world.

How does [The Veritable Records of the Heavenly Demon] reach its demise?

Upon reflection, it was surprisingly simple.

"When your Ki runs out, you both won't be able to move."

"Yes."

The Heavenly Demon looked up at the sky.

Through the opened ceiling of the cave, a snowstorm raged.

"First, the toes and fingertips will become numb. Then the calves and wrists. Knees. Shoulders. Waist. Gradually, we won't circulate Ki to those parts, and the parts without Ki will eventually rot."

Literally necrosis.

Like a building stopping operation gradually as fuel runs out.

At some point, they would become immobile.

"Heart. Lungs."

The Heavenly Demon pointed to her chest.

“Upper dantian.”

And tapped her head.

"Except for these three parts, all other parts will rot. No. Other parts are left to rot."

"...You already knew."

"Yes. A monk from Shaolin Temple stayed with me for a year."

The Heavenly Demon smirked.

“As though determined to prove they were a bald monk, they entered nirvana while seated cross-legged. In their final moments, hmm, except for their face they were hardly different from a zombie. Every corner of their body had rotted black... They left behind only one final word: Amitabha.”

“......”

“Did you ask whether I am afraid? Yes. I am.”

People often compare a human voice to a bird. But I can say with certainty that no beast could imitate the Heavenly Demon's voice.

It was a murmur like a single flower petal falling.

"I fear running out of Ki. I fear depleting my vital energy. I fear the snowstorm, the absence of sunlight, and the thought of my followers, once my followers, disappearing when day breaks. Every breath makes me worry about how many more I have left. Each heartbeat, how many more times will I feel it, I fear."

The Heavenly Demon sighed.

"I fear failing to kill that old man. I fear that he won't be able to kill me. I fear the day we both lie in bed, unable to move, just waiting for our Ki to dry up."

A meaningless death.

That even their last struggles become meaningless. Dying. Dying and disappearing into a world where only snow keeps falling, leaving nothing but a monochrome landscape.

"Ah."

This was the ending of [The Veritable Records of the Heavenly Demon].

The ending of the world.

"The world is such a fearful place."

Another day passed.

The eighth day since we fell into the Apocalypse.

Only two days left until the world's end.

"Demon."

Lying in bed, the Head of the Martial Alliance muttered.

"I can't move anymore."

The Head of the Martial Alliance was smiling.

And crying.