Although a Villain, My Wish is World Peace

Among awakeners, I belonged to the upper ranks in terms of physical abilities. In physical evaluations without using my talent, I always ranked in the top ten.

It was thanks to that physical prowess that I could endure gates without a mana filter.

But even so, I couldn’t take the hunter exam.

Why?

Damnably, I lacked any ability to deal effective damage to monsters.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t tried to find a way.

If talent won’t work, then gear!

But ordinary gear was mostly ineffective against the monsters inside gates.

First of all, modern strategic weapons had no effect on monsters at all. At best, the only things that could deal damage were cold weapons fit for the Middle Ages.

And even then, as the monster’s rank increased, their tough hides made the damage negligible.

If not for that, humanity would have simply detonated nukes inside gates to clear them out easily.

Without awakeners manifesting talents, there was no way to hunt monsters.

A truth anyone in South Korea, no, the entire world, would know.

Hence, with my mediocre talent of ‘Lie’, there were no gates I could conquer.

But the gate I was headed to now was special.

Thirty years after the first gate incident, the entire world had poured all their efforts into developing technology to block gates.

One such technology was a detector that could sense gates before they appeared. The performance of these gate detectors improved by the day, achieving an astounding 85% detection rate by the 2040s when I had died.

Meaning an incredible 85% of gates had their locations revealed before they even emerged in this world.

Gates that went uncleared over time would eventually break and spawn monsters, so gates were rarely left buried.

Which is why this gate was special.

Until it was discovered by chance by a hiker, no one knew this gate existed here.

And immediately after this gate was discovered, South Korea, no, the entire world was turned upside down.

Because of the immense artifact found inside this gate.

“Huff, huff.”

Wiping away the sweat pouring down like rain, I inwardly cursed.

“How the hell did they discover this place?”

For South Korean hikers to climb all the way up to such treacherous terrain…

Those people might as well have been true awakeners born with a ‘luck’ talent, given the incredible stroke of fortune to discover this place and overcome all its traps.

But I was out of such luck. If I had no teeth, I’d have to grit my gums.

I narrowed my eyes as I neared my destination.

Having visited this place, which had become a holy ground after the gate conquest, several times before, I was intimately familiar with the surrounding geography.

Unlike back then, there were no ropes or stairs for me to descend, but I came prepared. I drove stakes deep into the crevices between rocks.

Securing a rope there, I lowered myself down. With my full weight on the rope-gripping arms, they trembled like willow branches.

A sheer cliff straight out of a martial arts novel, and the cave below it.

That’s right.

The gate I was headed to was inside this cave.

It was understandable why the gate had remained undiscovered for so long after its emergence.

After descending, I carefully placed my feet at the cave entrance. The inside was pitch-black. I illuminated the path ahead with the flashlight I had prepared.

There it was, the lightless gate, just as I remembered from before.

The rift in space that would normally radiate light, warning ‘I’m dangerous’, was now completely devoid of light and solidified.

Holding the flashlight, I approached the gate. The reason I had come here today was to conquer this gate.

I reached out my hand toward the gate.

“Huh.”

Unlike other gates that would immediately whisk me away to another dimension upon contact, this gate had a distinct sensation to the touch.

Meaning it could be touched.

Certainly peculiar.

The moment I channeled my mana into the solidified gate, it began pulling my body inside.

Like being submerged in viscous mud.

I surrendered my body to the flow. Soon, my body was completely swallowed into the gate.

The world inside the gate was a complex labyrinth reminiscent of the Labyrinth of the Minotaur from Greek mythology.

The completely sealed labyrinth had no proper light entering it. I turned on my flashlight to check ahead.

The walls and ceiling, made of marble, were intricately carved with delicate sculptures. Covered in moss, the exact details were hard to make out at a glance, but they seemed to be lively works by a skilled artist.

I gulped.

The seemingly endless tunnel stretching before me sent chills down my spine. The darkness at the end felt ominous, as if whatever existed there would make it impossible for me to properly escape this place.

But there was no need to cower in fear.

Unlike the menacing atmosphere, there were no monsters here.

If there were monsters, I would never have come to this place.

Although I didn’t have quite enough money to buy Kim Jae-ho, I was able to acquire many useful items from the black market.

The most valuable of them was a necklace imbued with a mage’s power to detect danger in advance.

Though it only had a 2-hour duration as a disposable item, with this alone, I had already half-conquered this labyrinth.

The hiker who first discovered this place was an awakener born with the ‘luck’ talent. Through an unbelievable streak of fortune, he had discovered this place and overcome all its traps, they said.

But I had no such luck. If I had no teeth, I’d have to grit my gums.

Checking the necklace, I moved forward.

The moment the necklace flashed, I stopped in my tracks. Click, a sound of something shifting, and an arrow immediately shot toward where my head had been.

“Huh.”

A cold sweat instantly trickled down my spine.

I had confidence in my reflexes, but that arrow had been completely invisible even to my awakened eyes – fired at a speed beyond my perception.

How many such traps were installed in this dimly lit corridor?

I took a deep breath.

Holding the flashlight in my mouth, I raised the necklace before me and slowly advanced.

The necklace’s performance was assured.

Whenever the necklace flashed, I moved my body.

If the first had been an arrow aimed at my head, the second was a suddenly vanishing floor, and the third was poisoned darts raining toward my body.

All of them would have struck me directly if not for this necklace’s warnings.

And the fourth was…

I cursed as a spear burst forth right before my eyes.

I barely managed to roll aside, but the spear grazed my calf. A searing pain shot through me. Clutching my calf, I retreated to the side of the corridor.

A chunk of flesh had been torn away.

“Damn it.”

Just how lucky had that guy been?

To bypass all these traps!

My body was already drenched in sweat.

Although the necklace had been helpful, by the time I had advanced this far, I was covered in wounds. Especially the calf that had lost a fistful of flesh was the biggest issue.

“Kuk.”

I took out the first aid kit from my backpack. I had brought plenty of potions in preparation for such situations, but I didn’t want to use them if I could help it. As soon as I applied the potion, smoke rose. It felt like cauterizing the wound.

I grit my teeth, but groans still leaked through my pursed lips.

The potion, devouring my flesh like maggots, slowly began regenerating the damaged area. Like worms writhing, my skin twitched and slowly regenerated.

Skin regenerated this way had to be handled carefully for a few days. It was especially vulnerable to impacts and prone to tearing at the slightest provocation.

Clenching my teeth, I rose from the spot.

It had taken a full hour just to move about 30 meters.

The one consolation was that the shortcut, the detour route, would appear soon according to the hiker.

That lucky bastard. Following his word, I looked to the side and spotted a hole in the wall. Hidden in the shadows, how had he discovered it?

I squeezed my body through the hole.

By following the path extending from here, I could completely skip the labyrinth of this gate.

One had to marvel at the stroke of fortune befitting someone born with the ‘luck’ talent.

Emerging from the end of the hole, a corridor came into view. Following that corridor would lead me to the heart of this gate.

In the center of the vast chamber was a box directly receiving the light falling from the ceiling.

“Oh, nice.”

Just as I was about to enter that room, I blinked at the light emanating from the necklace around my neck.

“Ah, not this way?”

If this direction was not viable…

I tried stepping in another direction, but the necklace emitted a blinding light far brighter than any of its previous warnings.

Moreover, unlike the other traps that had faithfully triggered in response to the necklace’s signals, the trap here showed no signs of activating.

No matter which entrance direction I tried, the necklace’s warning did not subside.

Meaning this entire room itself was a massive threat to me.

“They didn’t tell me everything.”

I realized. That hiking bastard, the one who later ranked 8th among South Korean awakeners, had hidden something about this room.

The problem was that the effect of this necklace would soon wear off.

No time.

Clenching my jaw, I took out items I had prepared in advance from my bag. I had brought many things in preparation for such a situation. Taking out a gas mask, I put it on my face.

In the movies from my childhood, noxious gas always came spewing out the moment the box was opened. I even wore heavy-duty protective gear on top. Unbearably heavy, but nothing else could withstand that momentary shock.

Then two deep breaths.

And forward.

The moment I entered, the door slammed shut behind me. The exit was sealed.

Simultaneously, water began rising from the floor.

“Damn it.”

Damn it.

No time to hesitate.

I quickly opened the box. Fortunately, no traps activated when opening the box. Entering this room itself must have been the trigger.

Inside the box was a white egg the size of an ostrich egg. This part remained unchanged.

He had said that by breaking this egg, he had gained his ability.

The talent that had elevated an ordinary hiker with nothing but luck to the 8th ranked awakener in South Korea.

Protean Transformation.

Unlike the talents of others fixed to a single elemental property, his mana constantly shifted without rest.

To stop that bastard’s apocalypse, I needed that ability no matter what.

Clenching my fist, I smashed the egg open.

The shattered eggshell began piercing into my hand.

“Arrrghhh!”

The pain was incomparable to being pricked by glass shards. The agony of molten metal searing my flesh followed. The eggshell that had penetrated my skin melted into my body, devouring my flesh and blood.

Immense pain caused cold sweat to pour from my entire body.

In the meantime, the water had already risen to my knees.

“Huh, ugh, huukk.”

The energy contained within the egg had been fully absorbed into my body. The pain instantly vanished, but it wasn’t over yet.

The water was still rising.