Return of the Sword God-Rank Civil Servant-Chapter 395

Su-ho looked at the clear notification.

The system was telling him he had defeated the sea god Susanoo, but that didn’t actually mean he’d killed Susanoo.

What it really meant was simply that, in the Gate called the Low and Wrathful Sea, Susanoo’s “use” had run its course and he had exited.

That was why Susanoo said, “Let’s meet again.”

‘Gates are, from the start, nothing more than reenactment stages of a given place, anyway.’

As an example, the fact he’d “killed a god” and got only a single level—there’s your proof.

‘If I’d killed a true member of the divine race, it wouldn’t end with a reward like this.’

Just then, the surroundings brightened and turned back into the familiar three-way junction chamber.

Su-ho headed straight for the next portal.

The next Gate portal belonged to “Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto, the Moon God.”

The reason he checked Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto’s first, before the sun goddess Amaterasu Omikami, was because he knew Amaterasu held a far higher rank.

Su-ho approached the Moon God Gate and touched the portal.

[ The conditions have been met. ]

[ Loading Gate information. ]

“Knew it.”

Su-ho smiled as he read the notice.

Thinking in terms of rank, Tsukuyomi would come before Amaterasu.

[ A Still and Bitter-Cold Moonlit Night ]

Entry Conditions: Level 240 or higher; clear ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) the preceding Gate.

Variable Condition: Cap max party at 5; for each member fewer than 5, overall difficulty decreases by 20%.

[ Would you like to enter the Gate? ]

The Gate’s info itself was similar to Susanoo’s.

So he was confident again this time.

If he entered alone, difficulty would drop by up to 80%. Thinking back to Susanoo just now, this looked plenty doable.

With that thought, Su-ho stepped into the Gate.

[ Entering the Gate. ]

A chime announced entry.

At the same time, his view changed.

Fwhoooosh!

A cold wind slammed into his whole body.

But this time, he started on the ground, not in the sky.

A comparatively mild starting point.

Except he couldn’t see what he should be seeing.

Right then, a skill triggered.

[ By the effect of Original Vampire, you do not receive darkness-based vision restrictions. ]

Of course.

The opening environment here was darkness deep enough to restrict sight.

All the better.

It was still calmer than dropping out of the sky.

Once the skill effect secured his vision, Su-ho realized he was standing alone on a broad plain.

Su-ho lifted his head to the sky.

The sky was empty.

‘There are clouds, so it is a sky... but there aren’t any stars or a moon at all.’

Was this really Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto’s Gate?

If it’s Tsukuyomi’s Gate, even if you skip the stars, shouldn’t there at least be a moon?

At that moment, the ground began to tremble.

Kugugugugugu—

The shaking ground split open and began to vomit something up.

What the earth spat out were none other than zombies.

“Gueeugh...”

“Grrr...”

“Kueegh...”

Seeing the zombies, Su-ho knit his brows.

‘Don’t tell me because it’s the Moon God, the welcoming mobs are zombies?’

Moon god, night, undead... a combo like that is way too cliché.

But hey—if it’s cliché, so what.

If that’s how the system set it up.

Su-ho quietly waited for them to finish crawling out.

But watching them, differences from ordinary zombies came into view.

Chuk— chajajak!

Chuk— chajajak!

The ground froze. More precisely, wherever the zombies’ hands and feet touched, it iced over.

“So that’s what ‘a still and bitter-cold moonlit night’ was getting at.”

Normally, with restricted vision, you’d only be hearing zombie groans.

On top of that, they carried an ice attribute, making them a perfectly on-theme opening mob for this Gate’s name.

“In that case, Tsukuyomi might be that kind of type too.”

Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter.

Whoever appears, I’ll cut through and move forward.

Su-ho kicked off the ground and cast his self-buffs.

[ Blessing activates. ]

[ Holy Enchant activates. ]

[ Endurance activates. ]

[ Eye of the Blacksmith activates. ]

By the time he finished buffing, their nameplates popped up.

Resident of the Night Lv.256

Resident of the Night Lv.252

Resident of the Night Lv.253

Resident of the Night Lv.255

......

Residents of the Night.

That was their name.

Their levels were similar to Yamata-no-Orochi’s.

But they didn’t look anywhere near as strong as Yamata-no-Orochi.

Instead, there were a lot of them.

A glance said easily over several hundred.

Looked like this stage’s main theme was human-wave tactics.

All the better.

He’d always found fighting thousands of middling mobs easier than a single huge thing like Yamata-no-Orochi.

‘All the more since their attributes will be Dark and Ice; even easier to counter.’

Ice shows itself, so you can predict it; and given they’re zombies, of course they’ll carry Dark.

Hence, easy.

Because Su-ho was a Rage Crusader.

Before long, the Residents of the Night started toward Su-ho. However—

“Graaaaah!!”

Zombies he’d expected to be sluggish suddenly sprinted like maniacs.

“Oh?”

Running zombies, huh.

Fine. This will be a bit less boring.

Su-ho scattered his blade like belching fire.

[ Cloud Severance activates. ]

Shaaah!

He didn’t use Enhancement.

He didn’t feel he needed to.

Sure enough, even without wrapping on Enhancement, they took stark damage—if not being bisected outright or burning to death—thanks to the overwhelming stat gap and Holy Enchant’s holy-attribute effect.

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

......

They dropped one after another.

Whether they ran or not, whether their level was high or not, none of it mattered much.

What mattered was that their attributes were a poor match into Su-ho.

Of course, sheer numbers tell in the end; some of them, somehow, forced their way into Su-ho’s reach—

Taking advantage of the opening right after he swung.

But Su-ho’s tricks weren’t limited to just swinging a sword.

[ Heatstorm activates. ]

Fwoooom!

The navy-colored mana-laden Heatstorm wasn’t merely hot; the wind pressure was tremendous.

Thanks to it, they couldn’t so much as touch the hem of Su-ho’s coat or a single strand of his hair.

And so, for quite a while, he carved through them as if doing calisthenics.

[ Your level has increased. ]

[ All stats have increased by 1. ]

[ You have obtained 1 bonus stat. ]

He gained a level.

Su-ho smiled at the system alerts.

How reassuring.

If you’re going to be hunted, you should be far higher level than me.

Then it happened.

Freeze!

The Residents of the Night, who had been charging like the crazed zombies out of some zombie flick, suddenly halted their steps.

At the same time, a system alert popped up.

[ The moon rises. ]

The moon?

He lifted his head at the alert. In the sky where there had been nothing but clouds, a moon had indeed drifted up at some point.

Except the moon was black.

‘And what’s that supposed to be?’

A moon hanging there like a sunspot.

Depending on how you looked at it, it evoked a black hole, but strictly speaking, it was like a total solar eclipse—only the rim gleamed faintly, as if it had swallowed the sun.

At that moment, the outer edge of the moon began to brighten bit by bit, shining like a crescent.

[ The Residents of the Night receive a blessing. ]

[ The Residents of the Night’s stats increase slightly. ]

[ The Residents of the Night’s information changes. ]

As moonlight fell, a notice popped that the Residents of the Night’s stats had risen.

The moonlight was an AoE buff.

Resident of the Night Lv.261

Resident of the Night Lv.259

Resident of the Night Lv.260

Resident of the Night Lv.262

......

They’d gone up by about five levels on average.

Their builds also got a bit bigger.

Soon, they started running again.

And they were a little faster now.

Everywhere they touched, the freezing area spread wider.

‘And so what?’

Up to now, all Su-ho had used were Cloud Severance and Heatstorm, plus a few self-buffs for stat boosts.

Even so, they hadn’t laid a finger on the hem of his coat.

Would there be any dramatic change just because their levels went up a bit?

There wouldn’t.

Su-ho kept slicing them down with the same pattern, like calisthenics.

There was no need to add any more skills.

That was the difference between them and Su-ho.

Su-ho swung his sword.

[ Cloud Severance activates. ]

Su-ho cast out the wind.

[ Heatstorm activates. ]

The same alerts repeated.

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

[ You have slain a Resident of the Night. ]

......

Nothing changed.

No named monster or mid-boss so much as showed its nose.

Thinking how Susanoo had only fielded a single Yamata-no-Orochi, this stage likely wouldn’t spawn a named or mid-boss either.

That would be the system’s idea of Gate balance.

‘If it’s going to juice things up, it’ll do it in the next Gate.’

After some time like that, the moon that had been only a crescent by its light had now filled to half and become a first-quarter moon.

[ The moonlight has grown rich. ]

[ The Residents of the Night receive further blessings. ]

[ The Residents of the Night’s stats increase greatly. ]

[ The Residents of the Night’s information changes. ]

Su-ho nodded as if he’d expected it.

“As thought, the buff scales with the moonlight.”

He narrowed his eyes and checked their nameplates.

Resident of the Night Lv.266

Resident of the Night Lv.264

Resident of the Night Lv.265

Resident of the Night Lv.263

......

Again, up by about five levels.

Stingier than he’d thought.

But from an objective point of view, it was quite a bump.

Anyway, that made a total of ten levels up.

Sure enough, the Residents of the Night swelled in bulk and broadened their freezing radius by about five levels’ worth of growth.

If you had to compare it, like a middle-school boy becoming an adult.

But even now, nothing in particular would change.

Same as always, he intended to cut everything down.

Just as he thought that and was about to swing—

[ You receive the moonlight. ]

[ The Rune of the Moon responds. ] 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

[ The Power of the Moon activates. ]

[ You receive the Moon’s Blessing. ]

[ All stats increase by 1%. ]

[ All recovery increases by 1%. ]

[ Ice attribute activates. ]

[ Dark attribute activates. ]

“Hm?”

System alerts poured in all at once.

It was a notice that Su-ho’s trait, the “Power of the Moon,” had activated.

“Why all of a sudden?”

It was puzzling.

It had never triggered until now, and suddenly it does?

‘It’s not like I haven’t been through Gates that had a moon before.’

And the moon had been up since earlier, too.

‘I’ll look into the details later. Anyway, this is amusing.’

A faint smile tugged at his lips.

How could it not.

Moonlight meant to empower the Residents of the Night had ended up empowering me, the enemy, too—if that’s not comedy, what is?

Of course, a mere 1% stat buff wasn’t anything to get excited about.

What Su-ho was looking forward to was something else.

Namely, the Ice attribute and the Dark attribute.

Just how were they going to be granted?

Su-ho gave his blade a light swing.

[ Cloud Severance activates. ]

A sword-light spread wide.

And then, an astonishing sight unfolded.