When I was inevitably forced to leave the battlefield, what I regretted most wasn’t a stable future, a position admired by others, or even public recognition.


    Ever since I lost my family to monsters, my life had only one purpose.


    To erase monsters from this world.


    Nothing else mattered.


    The world changed.


    Those of us who had risked our lives on the frontlines were now relegated to the back, reduced to nothing more than old relics biding our time in irrelevance. Government support dwindled.


    My comrades, both seniors and juniors alike, exchanged their tattered combat gear for crisp business suits, trading battlefields reeking of gunpowder and corpses for luxurious offices cooled by air conditioning.


    No matter how much I stubbornly clung to war, there was nothing left for me to do.


    I tried to return to the battlefield by any means necessary, but all that awaited me were positions as an instructor or some bureaucratic post—paths I had no desire to walk. If I couldn’t stand on the battlefield, I would rather disappear into seclusion.


    And if I couldn''t kill monsters, then being killed by one in the end wouldn’t be so bad either.


    With that thought, I entertained the path of a doomsday nihilist and began preparing for retirement.


    “I don’t make mistakes.”


    “I’ll trust you.”


    Click—


    I loaded my domestic 12-gauge automatic shotgun and advanced into the abandoned factory.


    The remnants of battle were everywhere.


    Before we arrived, the Legion-affiliated hunters had already carried out a cleansing operation.


    A smear of fresh blood, not yet blackened, was splattered across the floor—evidence that someone hadn’t made it.


    Cleansing operations involved eliminating the minions guarding a monster’s lair and reshaping the terrain to favor human fighters before the executioner moved in to finish the main target.


    These operations were usually assigned to rookies or inexperienced hunters, but in the absence of hunters, soldiers sometimes took on the role.


    Just because they didn’t engage the main monster didn’t mean it was any less dangerous.


    There were times when clearing minions was even riskier than fighting the monster itself—just like when King and I entered the ruins near Sejong City.


    Thud— Thud— Thud—


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