Doing Good Deeds Will Bring Blessings¿

Choi Miyeon thought, Is this what it meant when Lee Manbok boasted of his omnipotence while standing before the congregation?

“Run! Get away!”

“P-protect the Father—aaagh!”

Crunch! The trees of the oasis shattered with cracking sounds, threatening the guards as they fled. Against a monster with an overwhelmingly massive body, the desert whale, the flimsy defensive lines the guards had prepared were utterly useless.

Jeong Suyeon’s wailing voice brushed past her ears, “Please… please save me!”

“H-huff… huff!”

More than anything, seeing Lee Manbok desperately fleeing, gasping for breath…

This feels…so good.

That was right. What was overwhelming Choi Miyeon right now was pure exhilaration. Smashing and trampling the enemies before her while controlling the desert whale, like dealing with shoddy toy soldiers, felt genuinely good. The chest that had been filled with anger and resentment felt completely cleared out.

All because of trash like this.

Lee Arin, her dad, her!

Crunch! The whale swung its massive tail once more, battering the fleeing humans. She deliberately avoided striking them dead-on. That way, she could make them suffer longer. Only then could it truly be called revenge for everything they had done to her so far!

And then, at that moment— Flash!

Choi Miyeon couldn’t understand what had just happened. All she could register was that a straight beam of light suddenly burst out, centered on Lee Manbok. And that beam attacked the desert whale. Fortunately, sensing something amiss, the desert whale twisted its body in midair and avoided being pierced straight through. But either way, the result was the worst possible outcome for Choi Miyeon.

Boom! Struck by the unidentified attack, the desert whale sprayed white blood and collapsed heavily onto the sandy ground. As a result, Choi Miyeon, who had been riding on its back, was flung down with it.

“Aah!”

She used a landing technique, but being thrown onto the scorching sand made her skin scream in pain. But she didn’t even have time to focus on that pain.

Booooo!

“N-no!”

The sudden agony snapped the desert whale, once tamed by Choi Miyeon, back to its senses. Already a creature that disliked fighting, the desert whale wailed from the abrupt pain and burrowed deep into the sand.

Just as Choi Miyeon tried to regain control once more— Bang! An explosion-like roar, as if tearing heaven and earth apart, spread through the area. This time, even Choi Miyeon recognized what it was.

“You bastard! How dare you—!” Lee Manbok shouted and fired laser-like beams of light from both hands! The green beams shot out like a single blade, slicing the desert whale cleanly in two.

Choi Miyeon stared blankly at the scene, which looked like cheap CGI. That desert whale, which had seemed as immovable as a mountain, died in a single instant.

The dimensional rift is being repaired after defeating the boss monster.

The dungeon has been restored to an accessible state.

Time until dungeon escape becomes available: 00:10:00

The system will protect the user until dungeon escape.

A dungeon clear message even appeared. She couldn’t believe it. Wasn’t this exactly like the miracles Lee Manbok displayed at every New Year’s event? How was this possible?

And Choi Miyeon wasn’t the only one witnessing this unbelievable sight.

“It’s… it’s a miracle.”

"Father!"

“As expected of our Father!”

“To take down a monster like that in one blow!”

The guards, who had been too busy fleeing to care about their leader, now rushed back to Lee Manbok, cheering. Jeong Suyeon, who had been collapsed on the ground, tears and snot streaming down her face, did the same.

Watching the believers who had just witnessed an impossible miracle, Choi Miyeon grew confused. How could Lee Manbok possibly possess the power to kill an A-rank monster in a single strike?

Did he use something like a soul core, like Lee Arin said…? No, even so, that level of power is…

But there was no time left to sink any deeper into thought. After defeating the desert whale, Lee Manbok, now swollen with pride, spotted Choi Miyeon and issued orders to his guards, “There you are. Bring me that insolent apostate!”

Choi Miyeon immediately tried to get up and run, but there was nowhere to hide in the desert. On top of that, she had already exhausted nearly all her strength controlling the desert whale.

“Aaaagh!”

In the end, one of the guards grabbed her by the hair, dragged her along, and threw her down in front of Lee Manbok.

“You insolent bitch!”

“You little brat, I knew you’d cause trouble someday!”

“How dare you betray the Truelight Church that showed you mercy? Know your shame!”

Having spent so long within the Truelight Church, most of the guards were people Choi Miyeon recognized. Yet every single one of them treated her with open hostility. Well, considering she had just been playing with them like toys using the desert whale, it was hardly surprising.

“Damn woman. Not knowing her place and daring to rise up.” Lee Manbok spat.

Choi Miyeon stared blankly up at him, the Father she had believed in and followed her entire life. The man who always embraced the faithful with benevolence, a living incarnation of god. She remembered how thinking of Lee Manbok used to make her heart swell with devotion.

But now…

“…If you had power like this, then why…”

"What?"

“Why didn’t you save my dad?!”

All she felt now was resentment and betrayal. If he had possessed this kind of power, power great enough to instantly kill an A-rank monster, he surely could have saved her father.

“My dad devoted his entire life to the Truelight Church!”

If that had been the case, she wouldn’t have cared at all whether the source of that power was a soul core made by grinding down other people’s lives or anything else.

“With power like this, you could have saved my dad!”

Choi Miyeon screamed, but her cries never reached her supposed savior.

“What nonsense are you spouting?” Looking down at the traitor kneeling before him, Lee Manbok merely snorted. “Someone who raised a heretic like you isn’t worth saving!”

“If you’d just saved my dad, I wouldn’t have ever—!”

Crunch! Before she could protest any further, Lee Manbok stomped down on Choi Miyeon’s head. “Fool.” Crack, crack. As if venting his anger, he ground his foot into her head again and again. “I am a god. And you dare resent me after betraying and humiliating me? I will personally tear you to pieces and kill you!”

Seemingly wounded in his pride at having been toyed with by Choi Miyeon, Lee Manbok clenched his teeth and repeatedly stomped on her head.

“Die! Die already! I said die!”

Thud, thud, thud. Lee Manbok kicked Choi Miyeon’s body relentlessly. It was brutal enough that even the guards, who had been cheering his miracle, hesitated.

And as Choi Miyeon was kicked over and over, her face pressed into the sun-scorched sand, she laughed. “Ha… haha.”

Hearing that laughter, Lee Manbok frowned. “What? Have you finally lost your mind—”

“As expected, someone like you couldn’t have caused a miracle.”

For a brief moment, after witnessing him kill such a monster in an instant, she had wondered if Lee Manbok’s power might truly be real. But now, after taking his blows, she understood.

Choi Miyeon spat out the words, “You weak, scam-artist old man.”

“Wh-what?!”

Whether out of uncontrollable rage or intoxication with violence against someone weaker, he kicked her however he pleased; but it didn’t hurt that much. At heart, he was someone who didn’t even know how to use his own body. A man who could barely hold himself upright, how could he possibly handle power properly? Lee Arin had been right. This was nothing more than a fraud.

“…There’s no way someone like you could ever save my dad. Or me.”

“What? You’re still not in your right mind—!”

"Hahahaha!" Choi Miyeon laughed. Her vision blurred with tears, but she laughed anyway. It was all over, after all. She had failed to kill even this pathetic man, and her revenge had ended in failure.

Why am I so stupid?

In novels, when the protagonist suffers a major setback, they usually awaken right away. But reality wasn’t like fiction. She had gained power she’d never held in her life, got drunk on the thrill of tormenting Lee Manbok, and in the end, couldn’t even carry out her revenge properly. The shame of it was unbearable. She had thrown away the chance Lee Arin had created for her at the cost of his own life.

I guess I really can’t be a decent human being after all.

Once again, all she’d done was turn away from reality and ruin everything. It wasn’t surprising. She should’ve just died. If she had died and Lee Arin were standing here instead, that ferocious kid would have definitely succeeded in getting revenge.

Yeah… maybe it would be better if she just died like this.

“Aah!”

Suddenly, the pain of being kicked vanished along with a short scream.

What?

Choi Miyeon lifted her head, and what she saw was—

“M-monster! It’s a monster!”

“Wait, isn’t the system supposed to protect us until the clear?”

“Forget that, save the Father first! Father! Aaaagh!”

A massive leopard, easily over three meters tall, stood proudly with its head raised, its short black fur gleaming.

“Th-this is insane! What the hell is that?!”

And in its mouth, Lee Manbok dangled helplessly.

Having suddenly been snatched up and left flailing in midair by a ferocious beast, Lee Manbok screamed, “Y-you crazy monster! What are you all doing?! Hurry up and kill it—aaagh!”

Lee Manbok’s situation was dire, but the guards had problems of their own.

“B-but…!”

“If we attack the monster, the Father will get caught up in it too!”

With the leopard shaking its head from side to side while holding Lee Manbok in its jaws, they couldn’t attack recklessly.

As Choi Miyeon stared at the monster that had appeared so abruptly, she rubbed her eyes. Strangely enough, that gigantic black leopard, something she had never seen before, felt oddly familiar. The glossy texture of its fur, those green eyes.

“Don’t tell me… Nabi?”

“Grrrrr!” The black leopard growled with Lee Manbok still in its mouth. It was nothing like a cat’s gentle purr; this was a growl on an entirely different level.

The moment Choi Miyeon flinched and instinctively turned her gaze away, like a shadow, like a ghost with no presence at all, a young girl walked into the chaos.

“Why are you scaring those who have nothing to do with this?”

“Grrr!”

Her steps were so natural, like an actor stepping onto a stage, that those watching this farce were momentarily stunned, unable to react.

One of the guards, now reduced to a mere spectator, spoke her name. In truth, it was only natural that everyone knew it. For the past few weeks, it had been the most famous name in South Korea.

“Th-that’s… Hunter Jeong Daon?”

But Jeong Daon didn’t answer the call. Instead, she tilted her head slightly toward the black leopard. At that, the leopard spat out Lee Manbok, who it had been violently shaking, onto the ground.

“H-hurk!” Thrown hard onto the sand, Lee Manbok jerked his head up.

Or rather, he tried to.

Thud!

“Aaaagh!”

Jeong Daon kicked the white-haired old man’s head, literally like a soccer ball. The old man went flying, rolling across the desert sand. There was no trace of respect for elders in the scene; it was an outright act of defiance.

At the same time, gasps escaped the mouths of those watching. The guards, who had lowered their guard because she looked like someone who had never even held a weapon before, hastily raised their own weapons and aimed them at Jeong Daon.

“Wh-what do you think you’re doing to the Father, Hunter Jeong Daon?!”

"How dare you!"

“That’s my line.”

“You crazy bitch! What is this supposed to be?!”

After rolling for quite some distance, Lee Manbok clutched his kicked head and shouted, “Where did a brat like you crawl out from? Don’t you even have parents?!”

“Yeah, that’s right. You’re sharp. Are you a shaman or something?”

“Wh-what?”

“Shut up and answer my question.” Jeong Daon’s gaze, her pitch-black eyes were fixed on a single point. “Where did you get that?” Everyone instinctively followed her line of sight. “That bracelet.”