I Woke Up as the Villain

"Oh, dammit!" Helen cursed as she ran towards the blackened Philosopher's Stone.

Rachel chased after Helen, swinging her hand axes recklessly. However, Helen paid no attention to Rachel after seeing the blackened Philosopher's Stone.

"Huh?" Confused, Rachel stopped swinging her hand axes. Her steady hands stopped effortlessly wielding the axes and came to a sudden halt.

Helen reached out her finger and left some blood on the blackened Philosopher's Stone. Hugging it with both arms, she cried out earnestly, "Please, please…!"

"Can someone explain what’s going on?" asked Rachel, tilting her head in confusion.

"The idiot that you didn’t kill has caused the worst disaster!" Helen broke into a cold sweat. Her Homunculus armor began to fall apart.

‘Does this mean her mana is being drained just from cradling the Philosopher’s Stone?’

In other words, Rachel could kill Helen right away if she wanted to. Her reason for not doing so was simple.

'There's no way this grandma wouldn't know about it, and she's risking her life to stop something...' 

Rachel had shivers running down her spine, feeling a great sense of peril. She forced a cold grin and said, “Do you think you can stop it if you try hard?”

"Please shut up...! The situation is already tough enough," said Helen.

"Grandma, isn't this a situation where you should be begging me to stay patient?" Rachel asked, then sliced Helen’s wrist with her hand ax.

"...?!” Helen widened her eyes in shock as her hand fell from the Philosopher's Stone and blood spurted. She screamed at Rachel, "You crazy...!"

"Did you just find out that I'm crazy?"

Just then, a black hand burst forth from the Philosopher's Stone. It grabbed Rachel's sinisterly smiling face.

'Huh?' 

Before she could even react, Rachel lost consciousness, spilled blood, and flew into several walls. Then, she completely disappeared from sight.

"Oh, my, damn it!" yelled Helen.

Looking at the trail of Rachel, who had vanished from the basement to go above ground, Helen expressed great despair in her eyes. She wasn’t too concerned about her missing hand, since she could roughly mold a replacement hand by using Homunculus. It wouldn't be as comfortable as her original hand, but she could bear the inconvenience. The real problem was that there was no way to prevent the immediate situation.

The Philosopher's Stone, after absorbing a bunch of black aura, now had two black arms covered in fur emerging from it. Soon, two legs would appear. Then, a creature complete with a head and horns would come into existence.

Only one being on this earth had such an appearance.

‘Demon!’

Of course, not all demons were equally powerful. A relatively weak one might be able to be hunted by an S-rank hunter. Unfortunately, this demon could easily fling Rachel with a single arm, so it was not a weak entity at all.

‘Given that the Philosopher's Stone was used to summon it, and such a large amount of blood and flesh has been sacrificed, then…’

The only glimmer of hope was that Helen had managed to slightly interrupt the flow of energy. Without her intervention, it was possible that the Demon King might have been summoned with the sacrifices that Pyongyang had made.

The second problem was retrieving and collecting the Philosopher's stone.

‘At least a Catastrophe-grade demon will be unleashed.’

According to the World Player Association (WPA), a Catastrophe-grade demon could only be stopped if a nation within the top ten hunter powers deployed all of its resources. In other words, everyone here couldn't stop the summoned demon even if they were to use all of their strength.

‘Pyongyang is over.’ 

Maintaining even a semblance of a city-state was now over for Pyongyang.

‘I’ll have to tell the kids about this!’ 

If they could manage to escape with a little bit of luck and quick thinking, that would be a great outcome. However, if they were even slightly careless and tardy, they would be swept away by the demon's invasion and ultimately die.

‘Maybe... If there's still a chance…’

Helen looked at the Philosopher's Stone, which was now the heart of the emerging demon. She shook her head.

‘I'll have to give up the Philosopher's Stone that is right in front of me!’

Although it would be challenging, the situation had already come to this point. The only way for Helen to retrieve the Philosopher's Stone that was used in the summoning ceremony was to defeat the demon and remove its heart.

It can be hard to make great work when its stolen from bit.ly/3iBfjkV.

‘I'll save the two kids, then escape.’

Helen urgently headed above ground.

***

Lance Charging, with precision and power, undoubtedly penetrated Emilia's entire physical form.

Emilia's small body was torn apart and scattered in all directions. If she was a normal person, she would surely die. However, neither Choi Yu-Seong nor Kim Do-Jin considered Emilia to have died.

‘I should’ve broken her head!’

A vampire’s only weakness was their head. Although Lance Charging had been aimed at Emilia’s head, it had missed its intended target due to one simple reason.

‘The barrier twisted its direction.’

The attack had been weakened by the sudden appearance of Emilia’s blood-red barrier, so it ended up being a failed strike.

"What was that just now? That was really dangerous! Great, I admit it. You two aren't ordinary. From now on, I'll attack with all my might. Haha!" Emilia laughed out loud.

She floated in mid-air with her head spinning around. Then, another body emerged from below her neck. This time, it was not the same small body of a girl as before.

‘That's...a spider?"’

Yu-Seong had heard that, among the vampires in this world, there were those who absorbed the blood of powerful monsters and used it on their own body.

That was exactly what Emilia was doing. Her head was human in appearance, but her body was that of a strange monster. It resembled a spider as she now clung to the wall.

Emilia opened her mouth and a giant spider web wrapped around the heads of Yu-Seong and Kim Do-Jin.

‘Even Kim Do-Jin won’t be able to cut through this.’

Yu-Seong instinctively felt danger, so he transformed Wind Control into Wind Flow. He threw himself backward.

When the red spider web fell to the ground, Do-Jin looked at it with a frown. He said, "This is dangerous.”

Do-Jin had also sensed great danger earlier on and had escaped that one attack.

Yu-Seong nodded in agreement.

Unlike in normal cases, Emilia’s red spider web continued to maintain its form and viscosity even after falling to the floor. It could now prevent their mobility when fighting against Emilia on the ground.

‘Black Gauze King, Emilia.’

In the original novel, Emilia should have already been dead due to some kind of event. Therefore, there was no description of the battle, but seeing it firsthand, it was easy to understand why she had earned the nickname ‘Black Gauze King.’

Emilia spewed her webs several times. Soon, a gigantic spider web was made, forming between the floor and the walls.

"We can't win in such a narrow space. Let's run away," said Do-Jin unexpectedly.

When Do-Jin started darting toward the outside, Yu-Seong widened his eyes and looked around. He followed Do-Jin using Wind Flow and chased after him.

"Where are you running off to?!" Emilia screamed.

Emilia’s spider webs flew toward Yu-Seong's ankles, trying to ensnare him. Fortunately, he had more agility and speed with each step.

'If it wasn’t for Wind Flow, I would be dead.’

As Yu-Seong gradually disappeared from view, Emilia snorted and shot her spider webs toward the outside building. She pursued the two men through the darkness of the night.

Yu-Seong and Do-Jin turned to look at her massive form in surprise, but Emilia only laughed mockingly and shouted from a wall of the outside building. "Did you think I would be slow in this form?"

Emilia was going to attack again. She generated blood-red energy from her back and emitted spider webs from her mouth, relentlessly striking the two men.

Thump-!

With a loud explosion, screams and chaos filled the entire Pyongyang.

"What the...!"

At that moment, Yu-Seong stopped in surprise. A dark-red energy flew and hit his right cheek.

To be honest, Yu-Seong’s entire face would have been penetrated by the attack if Kim Do-Jin hadn’t come close to slashing the energy strike with his sword.

"Stupid! Get your senses together!" Do-Jin shouted at Yu-Seong.

'The city... The people...!' 

Yu-Seong swallowed the words that he wanted to say. He avoided the next attack, then stared at Emilia. He clenched his jaw. He had already experienced such emotional turmoil during his battle against Vincent. He was also aware that his insufficient power kept him from preventing such a disaster.

'Don't get arrogant. I am too busy trying to survive now.’

As the screams of innocent people echoed in the background, Yu-Seong forced himself to ignore the pain-filled cries. He could see Kim Do-Jin approaching Emilia with his sword.

The flow of Emilia’s bloody energy was so intense that Do-Jin could not make a proper approach.

‘Kim Do-Jin is right.’

To minimize the damage here as much as possible, they had no choice but to stop Emilia together.

Yu-Seong’s gaze became even more serious. He was no longer intent on just capturing Emilia's attention and restraining her.

‘How can we kill her?’

The safest way was for them to survive until Helen arrived.

Having experienced Emilia’s attacks, Yu-Seong thought that he could distract Emilia for a longer time than before with Do-Jin’s help. This was assuming that they only had to survive. Also, he had no clue just how many innocent lives would be sacrificed along the way. Even now, Yu-Seong could hear the cries of help all around him.

Yu-Seong was aware that this was not his fault. Even if it wasn’t the immediate battle, the citizens of Pyongyang would eventually face a terrible death from being used by Emilia and Kim Un-Jeong. However, Yu-Seong could not help but be angry at being too weak and having to ignore their deaths.

Ever since his battle against Vincent, Yu-Seong’s hatred for the villains grew increasingly. The reason why he wasn’t overwhelmed by his emotions was the skill Cool-headed, which was transmitted to him through his grip on the spear.

‘Let's think of a possible hunting method before Helen arrives.’

Of course, it wasn't going to be easy. The opponent was one of the Twelve Dark Kings of the Demon King Worshiper. Under regular circumstances, Yu-Seong and Do-Jin had no way of beating Emilia even if they fought with all of their might.

In a way, the answer was simple: they had to exploit their opponent’s weakness and strike the head, a vampire’s true weak spot, with a single blow.

‘The problem is that the head is not even accessible.’

Emilia's spider web was certainly dangerous. If Yu-Seong got caught up in it, he would surely die.

That was why Do-Jin and Yu-Seong tried very hard to maintain a safe distance. However, even that was different. When he tried to run away to widen the distance, Emilia would chase him fiercely and not let him get away so easily.

‘And even if I reach a safe distance, there's still a problem.’ 

Emilia had a strange blood barrier surrounding her that easily defended against mediocre skills. Even if Yu-Seong could penetrate it, Emilia’s head was much smaller compared to her body. That would make it almost impossible for him to strike it with precision.

The more he thought about it, the more Yu-Seong realized the immense strength of his opponent.

‘She is so much stronger than Vincent.’

Emilia couldn’t be defeated through a regular strategy or luck. Nevertheless, Yu-Seong still desired her death. He didn't want the battle to end with him trying to buy some time.

‘But how? There's no way…’

Yu-Seong, filled with anger, suddenly looked toward Kim Do-Jin.

‘Maybe there is a way.’

His eyes suddenly flashed with light.