Without any further delay, the first red orc lunged at Raith with a roar, swinging its crude club. Raith ducked, narrowly avoiding the heavy blow, and retaliated with a quick jab to the orc's gut.
The orc grunted, but his thick muscles absorbed the impact, and he swung his club again, aiming for Raith's head– simultaneously the other one charged in, cornering Raith, it quickly became a situation where Raith either had to step back to avoid the one coming and in that sense falling into the range of the club that was coming over his head or, step out of the range and therefore fall into the wide grasp of the red irc charging him.
It was a tough spot to be in, which was why his instantaneous decision was amazing! His reaction was as though all these were within his calculation.
Thwack!
He smacked a blow into the chest of the orc whose club was coming at him, his hands were so fast that it was impossible that the naked eye caught them move, even their blurs were not caught. The after the impact of the punch was even more amazing, it wasn't just packed with speed, the power behind that simple punch was enormous– his fist print was carved into the chest of the orc and all his body squeezed around that particular point, with an air burst from its back, the orc was thrown away splattering to pieces midway– all these in a split second, the way even before the first orc was sent away by the impact of his attack, Raith had slipped into the space of the charging orc and quickly crushed his jaw with his bare fist, delving his knee to its abdomen before it could grapple him.
While the other scattered to pieces, with his intestines making a mess of themselves, the other one tumbled back in pain, holding its belly together.
Their mouth fell open, and from their vantage point, everything happened so fast that it would only make sense to deduce that Raith was a superseded kinda hunter. But that was not the case– he could also summon soldiers from the darkness.
The existence of such a person like Raith was a defiance of common sense according to their definition.
"Oh my God... did he just use his hand to punch an S rank Orc to pieces." Sung Min stuttered, his eyes shaking as he made sense of what he saw.
'He has become unreachable even to me. Just how much has he grown since the last time we fought' Mok Jae-Hwa's eyes stayed on Raith as he walked closer to the second Orc who was now scrambling on the floor. That must have been one hell of a pain.
"'...he's strong... and terrifying," Shin-Hye stated.
All of them watched in awe as Raith stomped the second Orc to death.
After finishing, he walked back to where they were all standing.
"Wow, amazing..." Ga-Yun exclaimed but the next second her expression scowled at Raith, "But now that you have killed both Orcs how do we channel our way through this place without any information? You just killed our only source of information."
"Like you can communicate with an orc." Shin opposed her.
"Well, at least Yeon-Woo can." She responded, flipping her hand over to Yeon-Woo who was already immersed in the book he was reading.
Yeon-Woo belatedly looked up, dumbfounded as to why her hand was pointing toward him, he cocked his head.
"What?"
"You know... that thing you do where you can communicate with the monsters using sensing something."
"It's a speech signal, how many times do I have to repeat that?" Yeon-Woo's voice resounded with a bit of frustration, although his face betrayed that tone. ⁰
"Whatever, just do it..." Shin replied to him maliciously. Both their eyes stayed locked with a spiteful streak before another person broke the silence.
"I know where they are," Raith said.
All their attentions naturally came to him.
"Wawwuuu, as expected of a catastrophe rank, they really are built differently," Chong-Yol spoke folding his hands, his spiteful intents brimming more gloriously than ever. The guy was just angry at Raith for the sake of jealousy.
"Hunter Raven, when you say you know them... does that mean you know their hideout?" Mok Jae-Hwa wanted to be sure.
"To be exact, Fenrir is there right now, and since he is my summon, I can tell where he is now."
"Fenrir?"
All of them were lost trying to figure out what Raith meant by Fenrir.
'...ah, right they don't know them by name.'
Nice of you to belatedly realize that.
"The big black wolf I summoned moments ago..." Raith said, demonstrating the big part with his hand raised above his head.
"Ah ah!! Right! That wolf!" Sung Min acclaimed, slapping his hands in the delight of his revelation.
They didn't even realize that Fenrir was gone until it was this obvious, such a big creature like that.
"Hunter Raven, you are very amazing." Mok Jae-Hwa complimented him with a warm smile.
"Say, hunter Raven, do you have a name for every of your summons like that," Ga-Yun asked, clinging to him.
Raith's ear became very red– red beyond saving and all of them just stared.
"He's a sucker for girls," Shin murmured to the others.
Hunter Mok Jae-Hwa giggled, "Let's head to the hideout, as much as I would like to keep this lively atmosphere, there is a danger ahead of us that requires us to be alert, so do away with all that... Ga-Yun." He stayed on her at the end, with the tone of his voice stressing out her name.
"Yea sure, whatever party pooper." She replied and released her grip on Raith's hand, permitting the catastrophe rank hunter who has been holding his breath due to his uncontrollable nervousness to finally breathe.
'...it, it... was touching me...' Raith's mind was running amok all the while because Ga-Yun's little breast was rubbing on his arms when she clung to him.
They all started to press forward, according to Raith's leading. Shin-Hye after finally gathering a lot of confidence walked up to Raith.
"Hey, I have a question?"
"We are not the same," Raith stated to her. It was rude of him to answer without hearing her question no doubt but he had a rough guess of what she wanted to go on about and Raith was very rude when it came to things he wasn't interested in at all.
"You don't even know what I wanted to ask." Shin-Hye frowned.
"You have the power of death."
"To be exact, I'm already dead. I awakened when I died, that is why my body is like this. I can feel a sense of likeness from you but yours is more frightening. In all my life, you are the first. Plus, because of my abilities, all humans smell to me, high ranking hunters like S ranks, disaster, and catastrophe ranks are still bearable though. But you don't reek, at all."
"It's quite ironic how humans smell to you when you should be the one smelling since you are already dead," Raith replied, ignorant of the effect of his nonchalant reply.
Mok Jae-Hwa could be seen glancing at the two as they talked.
"I just want to know what you are. Why are you so different yet like me."
Raith paused and lowered his head, his bangs.
'I don't want to make a big deal but she keeps going on and on about how we are alike and it's fucking annoying.'
"Do you feel it too?" Shin-Hye seeing that Raith suddenly stopped, optimistically asked.
Whish!
Raith swung his hand in her direction, and she immediately flinched and curled away from his sudden gesture, the group was immediately ready to attack Raith and all their glares were on him, Chong-Yol's was the fiercest.
"There..." Raith pointed to the red orc that fell from the black rock cliff, face flat on the floor, his head splattering as he fell.
"There are three more," Raith stated.
"Roger that!" Sung Min exclaimed and catapulted out of them, Chong-Yol followed, and Yujin also.
Clang Clang Clang Clang
Cheeeugggghhhkkk
Following the reverberating clashing of metal was a large screech, Yujin soon jumped back down from the road to the narrow road.
Raith looked towards the direction Sung Min flew to, '...is he weaker than her.'
"Hunter Sung Min is an S rank and he is the strongest here, except you and I of course." Hunter Jae-Hwa said, looking at the expression on Raith.
Just as he finished speaking to Raith, something landed on the narrow way from the cliff causing a massive dust screen. Sung Min walked forward to them as the dust screen slowly cleared.
"Ah ah, it took a little while because this guy was kinda strong." Sung Min sheepishly said with his hand behind his head, the second hand holding tightly the red Orc's dreaded. The face of the Orc was battered in the worst possible form yet Sung Min was looking like he had gone for a jog.
"What the hell did he do to that orc...?" Raith was gobsmacked.