Chapter 166 – Pursuit (1)

Northern Mexico.

On a mountainside overlooking a tropical city, a palace-like luxury villa stood alone.

Built on a large site carved from one side of the mountain, the villa had a clean two-lane road extending from the city to the front of the house, as if boasting the owner’s power.

And the villa had a massive garden that required a long walk from the main gate to the building entrance.

It was a beautiful and luxurious-looking house, but right now the place was suffering from smoke and gunfire.

Tatatatang!

The gunfire pierced through the morning sunlight and came from the well-maintained garden in the inner courtyard of the house.

From the gunfire and simultaneous sound of breaking glass, the guns seemed to be fired from the garden toward the villa building.

Tudududududung!

And as if answering that gunfire, a machine gun emerged from the broken window and poured bullets toward the garden.

Under the pouring bullets, the people crossing the garden scattered in all directions like grasshoppers.

“I told you not to shoot recklessly!”

Michael hid his body behind a statue and shouted toward the summoner who fired the gun.

At Michael’s angry voice, the summoner bowed his head with a reddened face.

“Don’t act rashly! This mission won’t be broadcast anyway!”

Michael also cautioned the other team members who scattered in all directions.

Shortly after, when the team members’ excitement seemed to have finally calmed down, Michael let out a sigh.

For himself, the ultimate outsider, to be a team leader felt like wearing clothes that really didn’t fit.

Things like team leader should be taken on by Sun-woo who had good skills or Daniel who had good leadership, not a troublemaker like himself.

However, even such a troublemaker had to become a team leader because the association’s situation wasn’t good.

More than half of the existing summoners had died, and new summoners were in a state of not being adapted yet.

Moreover, because contamination was disclosed, sometimes their missions were broadcast.

Fortunately, the team members followed his words well so he continued as team leader, otherwise he would have certainly quit long ago.

This mission was one that broadcast reporters couldn’t follow, unlike before.

This mission wasn’t a summoner’s mission to resolve naturally occurring contamination sources or the association’s work to clean up conflict zones. It was a mission to handle the secret base of Revivers, those who contaminated themselves with contamination injections.

Moreover, because the previous summon team failed the mission, they absolutely couldn’t call reporters.

That was when it happened.

“David, move to the next statue!”

Michael suddenly shouted toward the summoner he had been scolding.

The summoner, at Michael’s shout, threw his body toward the next statue without any doubt.

Kwagwagwang!

The next moment, the machine gun directly hit the statue. The medium machine gun pouring out tremendous firepower made the statue disappear without a trace.

At that sight, all the team members let out sighs of relief.

The reason the team members followed Michael’s words all this time was precisely for this.

His ability specialized in crisis detection had an excellent effect on the team members’ survival.

That’s why his team members followed Michael’s words no matter what he said from the moment they entered a mission.

Michael, confirming that the other team members safely positioned themselves, aimed his anti-materiel sniper rifle at the window where the medium machine gun was installed and immediately pulled the trigger.

Tung!

A heavy gunshot was heard.

Kwang!

The window where the machine gun was mounted was completely destroyed along with the machine gun by the magic bullet ‘Explosion’.

At that sight, the team members clenched their fists and tried to run toward the building, but Michael stopped them.

His 〈Survival Ability〉 and 〈Sixth Sense〉 were still telling him the crisis wasn’t over.

Michael, scanning the building again, saw sparkling light and an explosive sound from the building rooftop, followed by a large blast wave.

“A recoilless rifle! Where did they get that from!”

While he shouted in surprise, the shell flew toward where he and the party were.

The team members’ expressions turned white. They expected up to machine guns, but they didn’t anticipate such heavy weapons appearing.

Kwang!

Fortunately, the shell exploded in the sky just before reaching the party.

The team members were puzzled by the unexpected situation, but Michael, who saw the sword that pierced the shell, realized Sun-woo was somewhere here.

The enemy on the rooftop was no longer visible. When he no longer felt the crisis, Michael shouted toward the team members.

“Run! I’ll kick the butt of anyone who’s late.”

At Michael’s words, the summoners ran toward the building with all their might.

“Phew, that was almost too late.”

On the building rooftop, at the spot where the recoilless rifle was fired, Sun-woo let out a sigh of relief while watching the approaching summoners and Michael.

He almost missed the shell. Fortunately, he could hit the shell with his sword, otherwise many people would have almost gotten hurt.

Michael and his team came here to re-attack the secret base of contaminated summoners, but Sun-woo received a mission from Summoner.

[Find the missing Chairman Douglas.]

Chairman Douglas went missing along with the previous summoners who were annihilated while attacking this drug cartel boss’s villa.

What he said about being busy with personal matters seemed to be related to contaminated summoners.

Thanks to that, Sun-woo, who returned from the Empire, was summoned here to Mexico without much rest.

And he happened to see Michael’s summon team attacking this villa and lent a hand.

Michael and his team jumped into the building, and then gunfire began to be heard from inside the building.

“Michael as team leader. Really unexpected.”

Sun-woo, catching the sword that returned after circling the sky, glanced at the contaminated human collapsed on the ground, then chased Michael and the team members and jumped through the villa’s broken window.

From what he confirmed on the rooftop, there were no more people armed with heavy weapons inside the building.

There was nothing more that could threaten Michael.

Sun-woo didn’t help Michael more and ran faster than them to the center of the building, to the office of this villa’s owner.

***

Inside the building, in the gang boss’s office, there were the gang boss and a summoner.

The boss was currently holding a radio and spewing curses, while the other man was clicking his tongue at that sight.

“Damn it! What are you doing! Block them quickly!”

The gang boss shouting into the radio had red eyes and murky-colored skin, and the other man was similarly contaminated.

In the past, Carlos, who was the head of the largest gang among Mexican drug organizations and now the chief responsible for contamination spreading agents in America, was very displeased with the current situation.

This villa, kept secret for a long time, had already been attacked twice in just two days.

Moreover, both times he couldn’t block with his own power and enemies pushed in all the way inside the building.

During the first attack, the man before his eyes helped and they even caught a big fish called the association chairman, but Carlos’s pride didn’t allow him to receive help every time.

Though contamination made him different from before, his stubbornness and pride increased even more than before, so Carlos was now spewing curses into the radio.

However, it seemed he would have to ask the man for help this time too.

All the external defense facilities were already breached and gunfire was heard from inside the building.

Though the subordinates became contaminated and their bodies didn’t budge from a few gunshots, blocking the enemy without heavy weapons was impossible.

However, Carlos, who asked the man for help, was ignored unlike yesterday.

The man walked to the center of the room, ignoring Carlos’s words.

The room was splendid and massive, befitting a giant organization boss’s office. And in the center of the room was a magic formation that didn’t match the room.

“I went to the trouble of helping you avoid the Summoner bastards’ eyes, but it became useless.”

The man stood in the center of the magic formation, pulled out the contaminated amplification stone, and put it in his pocket. When he removed the amplification stone, the magic formation that had been hiding contaminated humans stopped operating.

Now this villa could no longer avoid Summoner’s surveillance.

“What are you doing?”

Carlos distorted his face seeing what the man did.

“Well, your utility value disappeared. Simply put, you became useless.”

Since their location was discovered by the Summoner Association, this place was no longer safe.

He had extracted all the drugs and contamination spreading agents here during the day, so it was time for him to leave too.

“What are you saying! Are you bastards really going to abandon me, Carlos! Do you think I’ll just let that happen?”

Carlos, pulling out a pistol from his pocket, gritted his teeth while aiming at the man.

He didn’t volunteer to be contaminated to be abandoned like this.

After being contaminated, a strange obedience toward those contaminated summoners arose, making him similar to their subordinate, but being thrown away like this brought out his original personality.

However, even seeing the pistol, the summoner didn’t care at all.

Guns weren’t a problem even before contamination, so now they weren’t worth worrying about.

“Still, your personality is really remarkable. Pride that ignores obedience.”

Rather, he seemed to find Carlos, who was angry at them more than the gun, more impressive.

However, leaving behind someone who rebelled also didn’t fit his personality.

He raised his hand toward Carlos.

That was when it happened.

Knock knock knock!

Someone urgently knocked on the door then opened it with a bang.

“Boss! You must evacuate! We can’t stop them!”

The one who entered was Carlos’s contaminated subordinate.

After spitting out those words, he saw the situation inside the room and made a bewildered expression.

It was because his superiors were trying to attack each other.

Perhaps not wanting to show internal strife to outsiders, the subordinate hurriedly closed the door.

“It’s an order. Shoot that bastard!”

Carlos, annoyed at the sight of stupidly closing the door, shouted toward his subordinate.

Carlos knew from the beginning there was no chance of winning. However, he wanted to show a man’s pride.

But the subordinate didn’t follow his words. The subordinate just looked at the two people with a troubled expression.

“Resisting the obedience embedded in the mind isn’t something anyone can do.”

Seeing the subordinate refuse the order, the man mocked Carlos.

And this time the man gave instructions to the subordinate.

“Carlos, kill your boss. It’s an order.”

Naturally, it seemed the order would be carried out, but this time too the subordinate didn’t move.

The man, who was frowning at the subordinate not moving, soon had a puzzled expression.

“Your magic energy is strange? How does it look so thick?”

The subordinate’s contaminated appearance showed murky energy as thick as a membrane.

At the man’s question, the subordinate clicked his tongue with a regretful expression.

“Still insufficient. I thought I could control it a bit weaker, but do I need more practice?”

The face and body of the subordinate muttering quietly gradually changed.

Shortly after, where the subordinate stood was a man he was actually seeing for the first time but had heard much about.

It was Sun-woo.

“Now, from whom would be better to hear the story.”

While retracting the magic energy spread throughout his body, Sun-woo became thoughtful again.