Judul: "DEATH MORTGAGE: The Hunter's Liquidation"

Chapter 4: Four Minutes and Fifty-Nine Seconds of Godhood

[04:59]

The neon red number ticked down in the right corner of Jihan's vision.

Jihan stood tall. The sensation in his body was completely beyond reason. His right leg, which had been broken so badly his shin bone was sticking out, was now perfectly straight. The gaping hole in his chest from the spider's leg was sealed shut. But it wasn't healing. Jihan could feel threads of light forcibly stitching his mangled flesh together, acting like hot superglue injected directly into his nervous system. The pain was immense, but it was masked by an even crazier surge of adrenaline.

In his right hand, the six-foot Sword of Light crackled with static electricity. The hilt felt warm, as if the sword were alive and breathing, demanding a blood sacrifice.

At the end of the corridor, the S-Class Shadow Weaver rose from the pile of rubble. Its eight blood-red eyes blinked with fury. The apex predator felt humiliated. A piece of prey that should have been a corpse was now radiating an aura that made its animal instincts scream in alarm.

The monster let out a shrill cry, opened its maw, and spat a web of venomous silk at Jihan. The web, as thick as ship rope, shot forward with the speed of a bullet, ready to melt anything it touched.

[04:55]

Jihan didn't dodge. He didn't even blink.

His leg muscles tensed. He pressed the sole of his right foot against the stone floor.

BOOM!

The stone beneath his foot exploded into dust. Jihan's speed broke the sound barrier, creating a shockwave that sent the remains of the Hobgoblin corpses flying. The monster's venomous web only hit Jihan's after-image.

In a millisecond, Jihan was in the air, directly above the Shadow Weaver's head.

This is the power of an S-Class Hunter? Jihan thought, his eyes widening as he felt the wind tear at his face. No wonder a rat like Bagas can be so damn arrogant. With power like this, you feel like a god.

Jihan swung the Sword of Light downward. There was no secret sword technique. No elegant hero's stance. It was just the brutal swing of a porter used to chopping firewood.

SRAAAKKK!

A golden light split the dungeon's darkness. The Shadow Weaver's two front legs, as thick as concrete pillars, were severed as easily as a hot knife through butter.

Thick green blood gushed out like a burst pipe, spraying the cave walls. The monster shrieked, its high-frequency cry cracking the rocks on the cave ceiling and causing them to fall. The giant spider scrambled back in panic, dragging its unbalanced body.

Jihan landed smoothly. He looked at his sword, then at his own hand, which was trembling not from fear, but from absolute euphoria. This feeling of power was intoxicating. It tickled the darkest corner of his brain. He wanted to cut off the rest of the monster's legs one by one. He wanted to hear this monster beg.

But the flashing red number in his vision slapped him back to his senses.

[04:12]

"Focus, you idiot. I have less than five minutes."

The Shadow Weaver realized a direct physical fight was suicide. The monster climbed the cave wall with its remaining six legs, scurrying quickly toward the ceiling dozens of feet above. From up there, its massive abdomen, patterned with black and green stripes, glowed brightly, pulsing disgustingly like a living tumor.

The bottom of the monster's abdomen tore open.

It wasn't a web that came out. It was hundreds of eggs the size of basketballs, raining down on the stone floor like a meteor shower of slime. As soon as they hit the ground, the eggs burst. From inside crawled baby Shadow Weavers, spiders the size of pit bulls with serrated carapaces and acid-dripping jaws.

One. Ten. Fifty. Two hundred.

In seconds, the floor of the narrow corridor transformed into a surging sea of black carapaces. Hundreds of pairs of small red eyes stared at Jihan with a uniform hunger. The S-Class boss had no intention of fighting Jihan alone. It planned to stall until Jihan ran out of energy.

"So you want to gang up on me, huh?" Jihan hissed. He spat on the floor. The mix of saliva and blood sizzled on contact with the hot aura radiating from his body. "Who's afraid? Come on, all of you! Bring your mom, your dad, and your grandparents too!"

Jihan realized a bitter truth. If he only killed the mother and left these babies alive, the moment his loan duration ended, hundreds of these spiders would chew on his paralyzed body. He had to level this entire room. Leave nothing behind.

[03:45]

The hundreds of spiderlings charged at once like a black tsunami.

Jihan didn't retreat. He charged forward, plunging himself directly into the center of the monster wave.

The slaughter began.

The two-meter sword in Jihan's hand became a whirlwind of death. Each slash cleaved through three or four spiders at once. Green blood, guts, and pieces of carapace flew through the air. Jihan spun, kicking one spider so hard it exploded against the wall, then leaped to behead five others that were trying to bite his neck from behind.

The acid spat by the smaller monsters hit Jihan's clothes, melting his cargo fabric. But when the acid touched his skin, the golden aura from the System blocked it, creating a smoke that smelled of ozone and stung his lungs.

One minute passed. Blood rained down on Jihan. He moved like a meat grinder. Piles of spider corpses began to form around him.

In the middle of the storm of carnage, a neon blue panel suddenly blocked Jihan's view, appearing right in front of his face as he was slashing at a monster.

[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Borrower's kinetic energy expenditure exceeds the normal limits of human cells. Estimated post-loan muscle damage has increased by 400%. We advise you to minimize movement to prevent vital organ failure when the loan matures.]

"Shut your mouth, you damn loan shark!" Jihan yelled, waving his hand as if to swat the virtual screen away.

He reversed his grip on the sword, stabbed a spider that leaped at his face, then slammed its corpse into another group. Jihan laughed. A broken, crazed, and hoarse laugh.

He didn't care about the system's warning. He didn't care if his muscles would be torn apart later. For the first time in his life, he wasn't the one being stomped on. He was the one doing the stomping. The satisfaction from every piece of monster flesh he tore felt like a deadly drug.

But behind his crazed laughter, a speck of pure fear resided in the bottom of his heart. "I'm enjoying this. I'm killing them like I'm some executioner from hell. If I keep using this system… I'm going to lose what's left of my humanity."

[01:15]

The sea of small spiders was finally gone. The corridor floor was now covered in a thick layer of green blood and slime as far as the eye could see. Jihan's breathing became heavy. His golden aura had dimmed slightly. His shoulder muscles started to spasm, refusing to be forced to move any faster. This five-minute loan apparently didn't grant infinite stamina. It only forced his mortal body beyond its limits.

On the ceiling, the Shadow Weaver growled in desperation. Its army of children was annihilated. The monster released its grip from the ceiling, letting its massive body fall like a black meteor, aiming directly for Jihan with its giant maw wide open.

It was a suicide attack. If its jaws failed to lock onto Jihan, the monster would be crushed to death on the floor.

[00:45]

Jihan looked up, staring at the vortex of death descending from above. Instead of dodging, Jihan gripped the hilt of his sword with both hands. He lowered his stance, channeling all the remaining golden energy he had directly into the blade.

The sword's light intensified, burning the oxygen around it and creating a high-frequency hum that hurt his ears.

"Get down here, you bastard!" Jihan roared.

The S-Class boss slammed into Jihan's position. Its giant mouth locked onto his body. Dust and rock fragments exploded in all directions, creating a thirty-foot-wide crater at the point of impact. A local tremor shook the entire Crying Cave Dungeon.

[00:15]

In the middle of the thick dust cloud, there was no victorious roar from the monster.

Slowly, a beam of golden light pierced through the Shadow Weaver's black carapace from its back. The light grew larger, tearing the monster's flesh from the inside out.

Jihan stood tall inside the monster's mouth. His Sword of Light had pierced through the roof of the monster's jaw, continuing upward until it split its brain and the deep purple Magic Core nestled in its head.

CRAAAATT!

Jihan yanked his sword sideways. The S-Class monster's head was split in two. Brain fluid and crystal fragments of the Core spilled out, drenching Jihan. The giant spider convulsed once before its body finally collapsed, completely dead.

[00:08]

Another rumbling sound followed immediately. The death of the main boss triggered a spatial destabilization in Sector B. The cave walls began to collapse. Large rocks fell from the ceiling.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

The sound of magic explosions came from the direction of the iron gate that Bagas had locked. Someone from the outside was forcibly destroying the gate.

In seconds, the two-ton gate was blown to pieces. White smoke billowed out.

From behind the smoke, dozens of Hunters in elite armor with the Association's emblem burst in. Behind them floated several high-resolution camera drones from national news stations. It seemed the seismic anomaly from the slaughter had triggered an emergency alarm at the Hunter Association's headquarters, attracting a rescue team and journalists who happened to be covering a story outside the dungeon.

The searchlights on the rescue Hunters' shoulders cut through the dust, illuminating the center of the room.

Everyone who had just entered froze. They held their breath. The camera drones immediately zoomed in automatically.

In the center of the crater of destruction stood a young man in the tattered clothes of a porter, half of them destroyed. His body was bathed in both green and red blood. Beneath his feet lay the carcass of an S-Class Shadow Weaver, a catastrophic monster that should have been impossible to defeat alone.

Jihan stood there, holding a sword of light that radiated absolute dominance. His glowing golden eyes stared coldly at the crowd of rescue Hunters. He looked like a god of war who had just descended from the heavens to punish sinners. A hero's story that was about to explode across every news broadcast in the world.

Jihan enjoyed the camera's spotlight. He smirked. He imagined Bagas's pale face seeing him alive.

[00:03]

One more second, and I'll pretend to faint for dramatic effect, Jihan thought with satisfaction.

[00:01]

However, Jihan forgot. He was doing business with a loan shark from hell.

[00:00]

The exact moment the number hit absolute zero, a giant blue panel appeared, blocking Jihan's entire field of vision, cutting off the searchlights and cameras.

[Your Free Trial Loan Period Has Ended.]

[Loan Status: Completed.]

[Withdrawing power facility…]

WUSSH!

The sword in Jihan's hand evaporated into golden smoke that flowed back into the virtual screen. The light in his eyes went out. The protective aura that had been surrounding him vanished without a trace.

And as the power was withdrawn, the magic glue holding Jihan's body together was forcibly removed.

The shin bone in his right leg, which had been broken and held together by the system, immediately snapped again with a disgusting KRAK. The flesh on his right chest exploded open, restoring the fist-sized puncture wound to its original state. The muscles in his arms, which had been forced to work beyond their normal limits, now tore simultaneously, spraying a mist of blood from the pores of his skin.

[Calculating bookkeeping penalty for first day's interest. Please pay your bill by tomorrow. Thank You.]

"Bastard…" Jihan whispered. His voice was no longer echoing, but hoarse and weak like a dying man's.

In front of dozens of cameras broadcasting live to the entire nation, the unrivaled hero vomited half a liter of thick, black blood. His eyes rolled back in his head, and his body collapsed backward like a wooden puppet whose strings had been cut.

Jihan fell into the pool of monster blood, losing consciousness before his face even hit the ground.