The asphalt groaned under the car's tires. The silver sedan was sinking into the road as if the ground had turned into magnets.
"Kang-woo, get back in! You can't fight that thing!" Seol-ah screamed, her hands white on the steering wheel.
"If I don't stop him, we both sink," Kang-woo replied.
He stepped fully onto the black-stained pavement. The Reaper drifted toward him, the hem of its gray robe dissolving into smoke. It didn't have a face, only a void beneath a deep hood. It tapped its finger-bone quill against the skin-bound ledger.
[Debt Audit in progress...][Target: Kang-woo.][Current Debt: 24 Years of Borrowed Life.][Interest: Your Soul.]
"I'm not paying today," Kang-woo hissed.
He summoned the Black Guard Centurion. The black-armored skeleton erupted from his shadow, its burning greatsword cutting through the oppressive gravity. The Centurion roared, a soundless vibration that shattered the windows of nearby storefronts.
The Reaper didn't flinch. It merely wrote a single line in its book.
[Sentence: Shackles of Regret.]
Transparent, spectral chains burst from the ledger, coiling around the Centurion's four arms. The skeleton's violet flames flickered. It struggled, but the more it pulled, the tighter the chains became.
"My summons won't work?" Kang-woo's teeth went grit.
He felt the 'Viper's Sense' tingling—not from the Reaper, but from the rooftops. The independent Hunters were watching, waiting for the Reaper to weaken him before they moved in for the 10-billion-won kill.
"You want my soul?" Kang-woo stepped forward, his palm glowing with that unstable, gray-silver mana. "Then come and take it."
He didn't use the 'Blade of the Twilight Grave' this time. He reached out and grabbed the Reaper's spectral quill.
The moment his skin touched the bone, a shock of absolute zero cold surged through him. He saw visions of a billion dead souls, a gray ocean of screaming faces.
[Warning: Direct contact with a Soul-Reaper causes 'Mental Erosion'.][Sanity: 88%... 82%...]
"Harvest!" Kang-woo roared.
He didn't try to drain the Reaper's life. It was already dead. Instead, he used the 'Gray Paradox' to harvest the authority of the ledger itself. The silver mana from Seol-ah, still humming in his veins, acted as a bleach, burning through the Reaper's dark ink.
The Reaper's hood snapped back. For the first time, it looked disturbed.
"That power..." the Reaper rasped, its voice a thousand whispers. "It is not of the Throne."
"It's mine," Kang-woo growled.
He wrenched the quill from the Reaper's hand and stabbed it into the ledger. The 'Gray Mana' exploded. The spectral chains around the Centurion shattered like glass.
The Reaper shrieked as its body began to unravel into gray ash.
[Audit Failed.][You have stolen the 'Auditor's Ink'.][Level Up!][Current Level: 11]
The pressure on the car vanished. Seol-ah slammed the car into gear, the tires screaming as the weight was lifted.
"Kang-woo! Move!"
But as the Reaper vanished, a sniper round whistled through the air.
Crack.
The bullet sparkled with blue mana—a Rank-B anti-tank round. It was aimed straight for Kang-woo's head.
The Centurion moved instantly, throwing its massive body in front of Kang-woo. The round shattered against the Centurion's shoulder plate, blowing off two of its four arms.
[Your Summon has sustained 60% damage.]
"Cowards," Kang-woo spat, looking toward the rooftops.
More Hunters were appearing. They saw the Reaper was gone. Now, the gold was ripe for the taking.
"Centurion, return!" Kang-woo commanded.
He dove into the passenger seat as Seol-ah drifted the car around him. She didn't wait for him to close the door. She floored it, weaving through a hail of small-arms fire and mana bolts.
"We're almost at the border of the Black Zone," Seol-ah said, her face sweat-streaked. "But look."
At the end of the bridge leading out of the city, a wall of armored vehicles blocked the path. Not the Association. These cars bore the emblem of the Iron Fang Guild—one of the top three private guilds in the country.
Standing on top of the center tank was a man in a red leather coat, casually tossing a dagger into the air.
"The 10-billion won brat," the man chuckled, his voice amplified by mana. "I'm 'Red Butcher' Han-sik. And I don't share bounties."
Beyond the blockade lay the 'Black Zone'—a ruined district covered in a permanent purple fog.
"Seol-ah," Kang-woo said, his eyes turning cold. "Don't slow down."
"What? We'll hit them!"
"No," Kang-woo gripped the dashboard, his gray mana flowing into the car's chassis. "We're going through them."