【Five-Colored Blessing】
【You alternately obtain absolute immunity, rotating at random, against physical, magical, elemental, mental-abnormality, and bodily status-abnormality effects.
Duration is 1 minute, and once you obtain an immunity type, you cannot obtain it again until you have experienced the other four types first.】
【At maximum mastery, the ‘Expansion’ option is added.
The immunity duration remains 1 minute, but it resets into a type that does not conflict only with the most recently experienced immunity form.
In other words, for example, the sequence Physical Immunity → Magic Immunity → Physical Immunity is also possible.】
“Belated as it may be, thank you.”
It was gratitude offered to the Dimension Plunderer. And for good reason—raising mastery for hidden skills was truly difficult.
Mastery, by nature, rose through frequent use, but hidden skills were hard to utilize.
Even the version of the hidden skills Vincent had used was broken enough, but maximum mastery was even more absurd.
Forced Fusion.
A Saint’s Wish.
Five-Colored Blessing.
Not one of them was a throwaway hidden skill. And since he could handle magic reasonably well, the synergy was excellent.
【So you do know how to be grateful. These days, you don’t thank me much, so I thought you took it for granted.】
“No way. If I said it too often, I felt the meaning of gratitude would fade, so I only swallowed it in my heart.”
【At least wipe the saliva off your lips before you say that.】
“I did.”
【Enough. It’s embarrassing.】
At Kang-hoo’s joking, the Dimension Plunderer deliberately cut the conversation short to ease her own awkwardness.
Paradoxically, Kang-hoo always felt warmth from her in moments like this.
He even thought she was the kind of constellation that fit the word “tsundere.”
For all her talk, the Dimension Plunderer took more pride than anyone in him as her contractor.
“Now is it time to check the stolen constellation contract and the items I took from Vincent? Winner Takes All is scary for this reason. It’s not just ‘a lot’—it’s on another level.”
There were still many spoils to verify.
With a pleased grumble, Kang-hoo began pulling items out of subspace.
They were Vincent Meyer’s effects, carefully collected on site.
Around then.
A masked figure stared with interest at a message displayed before him.
Quite some time had passed since he read it, but he kept it on screen, continuing to study it rather than dismissing it.
【The following information is transmitted to all hidden-skill holders.】
【The hidden skills ‘Forced Fusion,’ ‘A Saint’s Wish,’ and ‘Five-Colored Blessing’ have been inherited by a hunter who possesses ‘Wall of Integrity’ and ‘Black Moon Slash/White Sun Slash.’】
It was a notice related to hidden-skill theft.
Normally, when a hunter obtained a hidden skill—such as from a dungeon—the system did not reveal who the recipient was.
It would announce the emergence and type of a new hidden skill, but not who acquired it.
For that reason, Vincent and Jang Si-hwan had not known at first that Kang-hoo had obtained hidden skills.
But theft was different.
Hidden-skill theft was only possible between hunters who possessed hidden skills.
If a hunter without hidden skills killed a hunter with hidden skills? Then inheritance did not occur.
The hidden skill vanished, and to maintain the total count of 77, a new hidden skill would emerge instead.
After time passed, some lucky hunter would obtain the newly emerged hidden skill.
Thanks to the notice, hidden-skill holders all learned one fact clearly.
The hunter who had stolen three hidden skills had already possessed two hidden skills.
Which meant that hunter now owned as many as five hidden skills.
That was precisely why fierce hidden-skill “hunting” happened.
The system’s notification—seemingly an intentional provocation of conflict—was also what had driven Vincent toward his death.
“Incredible. Truly, incredible.”
The masked figure muttered, a distinctive red aura seeping through the eyeholes of his mask.
From that notice alone, he was certain who had died and who had gained—certainty, not guesswork.
Considering his information-gathering ability, it was nothing surprising. If anything, not knowing would have been strange.
The “mask” tied his long hair into a tight ponytail.
Only then, as if he felt cooler, he exhaled and continued speaking.
In front of him, a man was forcibly seated on a chair, shackled and handcuffed.
“Wi Jung-yang-nim. Your disciple is truly impressive. How about it—why not give your disciple a chance to enter Sinwol as well?”
Wi Jung-yang.
The real name of the Celestial Assassin. Not a pseudonym that looked like a real name—his true name.
The reason it was not well known was simple: almost everyone who knew it had died.
But the mask in front of him knew Wi Jung-yang’s true name and still lived. He was that powerful.
“Sinwol. If I made one mistake, it was believing you had fidelity.”
Celestial Assassin ground his teeth.
It was phrased to restrain his rage as much as possible, yet even so, red blood soon ran down from his tightly bitten lip.
Celestial Assassin called the masked figure Sinwol. Yes—this was that Sinwol. The head of Sinwol, “Sinwol.”
Sinwol did not answer with yes or no. Perhaps he did not want such a wasteful argument.
Instead, he turned his gaze to the rain-streaked window outside.
For days, torrential rain had been pouring here. Some villages had flooded and been completely submerged.
Sinwol traced the cold glass with his fingertips, then lowered his head.
Seeing Sinwol’s unusually sorrowful reaction, Celestial Assassin tilted his head slightly. Was he acting?
Even if blunt honesty was his flaw, he was not the type to stir up false sympathy with pointless theatrics.
Sinwol said nothing for a while, hands clasped behind his back as he paced along the window.
His repeated glances outside seemed to carry regret and grief that could not quite be put into words.
Then, as if he had sorted out his thoughts.
Sinwol slowly walked back to Celestial Assassin, folded his knees, and lowered himself to meet his eye level.
And he broke the silence.
“Early this morning, Sinwol’s entire South America branch was wiped out. By a single Byeokan.”
“……By a Blue Eye?”
“Yes. By just one person.”
Celestial Assassin’s expression changed.
Even he, who rarely showed surprise, could not hide it this time.
It was true the South America branch was the weakest among Sinwol’s branches, but.
It was not a place where rabble gathered—something that could be cleaned up by a single hunter.
Simply belonging to Sinwol proved you were an elite hunter. This was no ordinary incident.
Tremble.
Celestial Assassin saw, if only briefly, that Sinwol’s fingertips were shaking unlike usual.
Depending on interpretation, it could have been sorrow or fear—or restraint of fury.
What was certain was this: it was shocking enough to draw a reaction from Sinwol, who seldom showed emotion.
“We desperately need every capable person. To the point that we must even forcibly call back old comrades we once let go willingly.”
Sinwol’s next words sounded different to Celestial Assassin than before.
It was as if he were making a desperate request while still trying to preserve his pride as leader.
Emotions the leader had never shown before were surging repeatedly in front of Celestial Assassin today.
And Sinwol…… had also taken great interest in Kang-hoo, his disciple. Far earlier than he had expected.
She strongly wanted not only him, but Kang-hoo as well, to enter Sinwol.
“For now, it’s better to sell everything except one first-grade talisman and two first-grade rings.”
Kang-hoo first finished sorting the items he had obtained from Vincent.
He decided to keep the one first-grade talisman and the two rings of the same grade, and planned to sell all the rest on the market.
【Talisman of Great Recovery】
【Grade: First Grade】
【Instantly restores HP to 100%. Ignores bleeding and all recovery-interference effects.
When the talisman’s effect is consumed, it enters a ‘Deactivated’ state and you cannot benefit from its effect.
To reactivate it, 1 Hematite is required, which restores its original function.】
The very talisman Vincent had tried to use as a game-changer—only to have it turned back on him.
Since he died without using it, Kang-hoo gained a reliable life-insurance policy.
“Ignores all recovery-interference effects” meant it functioned fully even with related debuffs present.
In other words, the Great Recovery effect took system priority, so there was no need to consider other variables.
He only had to avoid foolishly relying on guts alone, like Vincent did, when the opponent had something like an instant-kill move.
The reason Kang-hoo chose to keep only the two rings and sell the rest was simple.
Since Vincent was a mage, every item was heavily coated in mana-related options.
From Kang-hoo’s standpoint, he had to suppress mana-stat increases as much as possible to benefit from the Barbaric Era effect.
So mana-related items were useless to him. He did not desperately need mana as a stat either.
The two rings he kept had no mana-related options, and since they were the same grade, he had a specific use in mind.
【Aesthetics of Healing】
This one.
It was a shoe option that let him synthesize two first-grade items of the same slot into one zero-grade item.
And regardless of reason, a zero-grade item, by its very existence, could equip multiple destructive options……
So even if each first-grade ring’s option felt slightly lacking, he judged it a synthesis worth attempting.
Either way, it was guaranteed to become zero-grade—the question was what options would branch inside.
Since part of it fell into the realm of luck, he was considering it once more rather than proceeding on impulse.
“The world they live in.”
He murmured the phrase that suddenly came to mind.
It was a common expression.
It was used when talking about the world of top-tier and apex hunters—meaning they lived in a completely different world.
It was mentioned often in the original story, but it felt different to experience it as life rather than as fiction.
In the world of hunters—“superhumans”—he now clearly understood why those at the top of the pyramid had no choice but to be strong.
Because they grew by devouring strong hunters.
The scale of Winner Takes All was on another dimension.
With a single victory, you could seize items worth more than dozens of low-level hunters combined.
And if, like Kang-hoo, you could even steal the opponent’s constellation and hidden skills, the breadth of profit exceeded imagination.
Conversely, if Vincent had devoured him? He would have become a monster with five hidden skills as well.
On top of that, he would have stolen and worn Kang-hoo’s zero-grade shoes, and all kinds of options would have piled on.
Maybe that was why.
Kang-hoo instinctively thought of the one person he would soon collide with.
A rival with an older bad blood than Vincent—and now someone he felt was worth testing himself against.
“Kang Dong-hyun.”
The former captain of Eclipse.
