The hospital is the closest place to death.
Despite being a place meant to save lives, ironically, it’s also where the most lives are lost.
Naturally, the scent of death dominates that space.
The smell of death varies in each corner.
Sometimes it’s the cold, fishy odor of a body growing colder, and other times, it’s the acrid smell of feces from those slowly awaiting death.
And the clinic center was a hospital filled with the scent of blood—a smell you could only find in places where humans are slaughtered like beasts, a smell that should never exist in a civilized society.
The patients closed their eyes, praying for survival, but never opened them again.
In the surgery room, in the treatment room, in the ward—everywhere reeked of blood.
The only people free from that bloody stench were the high-end package clients.
Even the mid-range package clients were not exempt from this malice.
But that day, the owners of the blood filling the hospital were not patients.
***
“What the hell is that!!”
At the top floor of the hospital, where a large sign read “Authorized Personnel Only,” screams and shouts of panic filled the air.
“Intruder! What were the guys downstairs doing?”
Amon did not answer.
Most of them were already dead—cleanly taken care of before they even had a chance to report upwards.
Amon had used stealth and assassination as much as possible until reaching the top floor.
But now, with only the top remaining, there was no need for such measures.
Besides, there was no need to worry about unintended victims, as the top floor was restricted to personnel only.
“Amon.”
With a bone saw in one hand and a bundle of scalpels in the other, Amon dashed down the corridor.
With every swing of the bone saw, shrouded in a strange aura, it cut through human bones, as it was designed to do.
The scalpels he threw struck the guards’ necks with precision.
The guards didn’t go down quietly.
They fired guns and swung swords, trying to stop Amon’s charge.
But Amon moved in ways unimaginable for a human, swiftly butchering the guards.
He darted straight ahead, then slid sideways, covering several meters in a single step.
“What kind of implant is that?”
It was nothing like a neural accelerator.
Amon’s movements, while barely trackable by the eye, defied inertia and gravity.
The guards couldn’t even guess what kind of ability it was.
‘They wouldn’t have known this was possible.’
Amon thought as he sliced through a guard’s neck, his legs moving tirelessly.
Sky Step allowed for triple jumps, but its utility was limitless.
If his leg strength was sufficient, he could accelerate three times per step and even change direction without touching the ground.
It even enabled near-instantaneous movement, almost like something out of a comic.
In the game, this feature was so effective that unlocking it would grant abilities like double dashes or instant movements.
There was a reason it was ranked Tier 0 in the game.
Top corporations were aware of these uses, which was why (Sky Step) was a must for security personnel above the chief level.
Amon weaved through the corridor, leaving a trail of bodies in his wake.
There wasn’t an ounce of guilt in him.
Remembering the horrors he had seen on his way up here, he felt nothing but a surge of rage.
‘Is that truly something humans would do?’
The reports of the experiments taking place in the ward on the fourth floor alone contained unimaginable content.
Room 401: An experiment on gaslighting conditioning, installing a device in the limbic system that controls human emotions.
The conclusion: failure. The subject fell into a coma and was scheduled for organ extraction and disposal the next day.
Room 403: Administered antibiotics to a pregnant woman. Observing fetal development. Miscarriage of one twin confirmed.
Room 407…
Reports from the fifth, sixth, and seventh floors were similar.
Experiments that made him sick just reading them.
The guards not only allowed these experiments to happen, but actively assisted in them.
They used electric shockers on patients if needed, pointed guns at them to elicit stress responses, and sometimes even shot them in their limbs.
He couldn’t feel any remorse toward these guards if he tried.
“Kill that bastard!!”
The command to kill Amon initially morphed into, “What the hell kind of monster is that!” and then finally into, “Spare me!!”
“Open the door! Open it!!”
As time passed, fear took over.
Only three guards were left.
Amon’s shadow fell over the three guards, who were desperately banging on the door.
As they looked back, Amon stood there, drenched in blood, silhouetted by the flickering lights.
Having lost the will to resist, they pleaded for mercy.
“Please! I don’t know anything!”
“Money? If it’s money, I’ll give you as much as you want!”
“Is it about family? If that’s it, I’ll testify on your behalf! So please…”
Slash.
Amon showed no mercy, even to those paralyzed by fear.
Three more skulls were added to the corridor.
Moving the decapitated bodies aside, Amon turned to the door they had been banging on.
***
[Director’s Office]
Click-click.
The thick iron door wouldn’t budge.
They must have locked it from the inside.
‘If that’s how it is, I have my own way.’
Amon jumped out of a nearby window, then, using the air as a stepping stone, twisted his body toward the adjacent window.
Beyond the window, he saw the anxious face of the director, staring nervously at the iron door.
‘Got you.’
Pushing off the air, he hurled his bone saw.
Crash!
The window shattered, and the director’s head snapped toward Amon.
But by the time he reacted to the noise, the bone saw was already embedded in his shoulder.
“Ugh!!”
The director, who had been sitting in his chair, collapsed to the floor.
Before he could even scream properly in pain, Amon climbed through the broken window into the room.
And before the director could regain his senses, Amon drove a katana, taken from a guard, through the director’s chest.
“Grr…”
The director’s attempt at a scream came out as nothing more than a rasping sound through his punctured lung.
He trembled as he looked at Amon.
“Wh… why…”
Before the director could say more, Amon yanked the bone saw from his shoulder and beheaded him.
The director’s head rolled to the floor.
Pushing the stabbed torso aside, Amon righted the fallen chair.
He immediately began working on the computer.
‘They said they needed evidence.’
Amon was only able to wreak havoc here because the broker promised to cover for him.
However, there was a condition:
He had to secure as much evidence as possible to prove that the medical staff at this hospital were unforgivable monsters.
Only then could they use that material for blackmail or negotiation to back him up.
Thus, Amon needed the director’s files.
One by one, he examined the files and transferred them to a USB.
[Transfer Complete]
With the notification window appearing, he stood up.
“Consider this karma.”
He pulled the sword from the director’s body and sheathed it again.
Stepping over the pool of blood that soaked the floor beneath the director, he walked out of the office.
The corridor of the ward, filled with corpses, unfolded before his eyes.
Unlike when he entered, the way out of the center was quiet.
In the midst of this silence, Amon’s mind began to cool down, and his thoughts started to race.
He had gone on a rampage because he saw that both Sonia and his name were listed among the test subjects.
However, after all his rampaging, he realized something strange.
‘Why was it acquaintances?’
Even if they lacked samples, was there a reason to kidnap acquaintances with the help of the police?
If anything, using family members would have been more convenient.
Just like they used Hump as a test subject through his brother, using guardians would have been far easier.
Acquaintances were too…
‘Awkward. And the range is too broad.’
If they counted acquaintances, that would include neighbors and familiar shop owners.
So why was it specifically ‘party members’?
Just before exiting through the hospital’s back door, Amon’s steps came to a halt.
He stood there, staring blankly as he fell into deep thought.
‘There’s something I’m missing.’
Perhaps his assumptions were wrong from the start.
Amon’s mind raced intensely.
Then, he suddenly remembered the report format he had first seen on the doctor’s computer.
Amon Perfumrose, Sonia Perfumrose, Orc Tanker, Elf Mage…
“Huh?”
Amon’s shoulders shuddered.
There was only one hypothesis that could explain the current situation.
“Could it be…?”
Amon hurriedly grabbed the door handle to the back door to test his hypothesis.
And that’s when it happened.
The moment he grasped the door handle, his instincts screamed at him.
It wasn’t a baseless hunch.
Beyond the door… it was too quiet.
Even if the back door led to an alley, it shouldn’t have been this silent.
Amon removed his hand from the door handle.
Then he went back up to the second floor and cautiously peeked out a window.
Beastmen were aiming their guns at the back door.
And among them was a familiar face.
‘Paul…!’
The useless gunner of a useless party.
The bear Beastman, Paul.
***
In the alley behind the clinic center, the cat Beastman whispered to Paul, who was leading the crowd aiming at the back door.
“Brother, shouldn’t we just go in?”
Paul waved his paw-marked hand to scold the cat Beastman.
“Hold up. That guy’s a close-range fighter. I shot him in the back once, and he reacted to the bullet. His equipment’s good, so if we aim directly at him, I’d be the one lying dead on the spot.”
“Seems like he’s different from the usual junk we used to deal with, huh?”
“Not just different. If we give him any leeway, all our heads will go flying.”
“Brother… isn’t that dangerous? Wouldn’t it have been better to stick to the kind of dumb prey that gets caught naturally, like the ones that got wrecked by that slime last time?”
Next to the anxious cat Beastman, a rabbit Beastman perked up his ears in agreement.
“That’s right, boss. And he even took care of those scavengers, didn’t he? Sure, we’re on a different level than them, but this could be risky.”
With the rabbit Beastman starting to voice his concern, the other Beastmen in the area began to feel uneasy too.
“Looks like the hospital guys called us in for support and then got killed first.”
“No point in honoring the dead, right?”
“Is it worth risking our lives for this?”
Before the fight even started, the group began to lose their resolve.
Their guns, which had been aimed at the back door, gradually lowered.
At that moment, Paul spoke to the group.
“If we sell that bastard’s equipment, we can leave this wretched life behind. I guarantee it.”
“What?”
“Whether we sell his gear or keep it for ourselves, as long as we kill him, we could elevate ourselves to gang level, not just some lowly crew.”
“But it’s too dangerous.”
“Of course it is. But only if he’s in perfect condition.”
“Huh?”
“I never expected those clinic guys to actually kill him. All I hoped was that they’d strip him of his equipment and weaken him as much as possible in the hospital.”
“No way…”
“Think about it logically. After fighting the hospital guards, there’s no way he could be unscathed.”
Hearing Paul’s words, the group’s guns started to rise again.
Hope began to spread among them.
Before they knew it, they each started to justify and rationalize their actions in their own way.
“Yeah, it’s about time we stopped dealing with those hospital guys anyway.”
“They’ve been hinting at cutting ties with us lately too.”
“Honestly, they were probably planning to dump everything on us too. It’s clean this way.”
Listening to the crew’s conversation, a slight grin appeared on Paul’s face.
The cat Beastman, swept up in the atmosphere, praised Paul’s strategy.
“The basics of hunting are to wear down the prey first, right? Isn’t that right, boss?!”
“Yeah.”
The crew regained their energy.
A sense of confidence began to spread that they could take down an injured Amon.
Some of them were already discussing what kind of equipment they’d get and how they’d live after the hunt’s loot was divided.
Paul viewed this atmosphere very positively.
Confidence before a hunt was a good thing.
A confident hunter had much higher success rates than one cowering in fear.
Riding this momentum, Paul shared new information to keep their spirits high.
“The cops looked up the database and found that bastard has a wife. Was it Sonia Rose? They said she’s an orphan too, so she’d be easy to lure in with him.”
“Then shouldn’t we keep Amon alive?”
“Just keep his head. Seems like they’re newlyweds. If we send a photo, he’ll come running.”
“Is she pretty?”
“She’s got a nice chest.”
“Oh, hell yeah.”
The rabbit Beastman puffed up his crotch.
The Beastmen hid their fears beneath their desires and refocused on the back door, where Amon was expected to emerge.
Their gaze was fixed on the bomb attached to the door handle.
“Alright, come on, rabbit.”
The wolf Beastman licked his lips.
“Did you call for me?”
The rabbit Beastman looked at the wolf with a confused expression.
“Not you.”
The wolf grimaced.
The group chuckled at the banter and returned their attention to the door.
Bored from the wait, the tiger Beastman muttered to himself.
“When’s the rabbit going to show up?”
And then…
“Did you call for me?”
“No, I didn’t—”
Slash.
Before the tiger Beastman could respond, his head flew through the air.
The two Beastmen standing on either side of him were also decapitated as an added bonus.
“Huh?”
A dagger lodged itself in the neck of the wolf Beastman who let out a dumbfounded noise.
“When!?”
The rabbit Beastman was split vertically from his groin.
Blood spurted from the five Beastmen.
Covered in the blood raining down with the bodies of his former comrades, Amon spoke.
“Hello. I’m Amon. Right now, I’m behind you.”