NOVEL ONLINE FREE Chapter 9 - Fire
Chapter 9 – Fire
Sitting across the long table, Kalifa wasted no time getting to the point.
“I need you to retrieve something.”
She slid a file folder across the table.
As Jin focused on the neatly organized documents and the clipped photographs inside, Kalifa continued speaking.
“A data chip. As written there, it contains the Solard family’s secret magic.”
Jin happened to be reading that exact section at that moment.
A crest resembling a flame caught his eye.
Beneath it, the word “Solard” was inscribed.
“If it’s secret magic, that must mean it’s something incredible, right?”
Even with Jin’s limited knowledge, he understood that in this world, the status of a “family” was immense.
A powerful organization composed of purists.
Heirs of swordsmanship and magic who rejected the age of advanced technology.
Jin had regretted not joining a family almost every other day—though, on the remaining days, he regretted not choosing a corporation instead.
Unaware of Jin’s internal musings, Kalifa answered,
“It is. But the leaked content is just a few basic spells. Of course, even that is a disgrace to Solard.”
“Hmm.”
Jin’s eyes naturally drifted back to the documents, and Kalifa continued.
“While investigating the leak, Solard discovered that the data chip had been duplicated. One of the copies ended up here in Downtown. And someone got their hands on it.”
“That would be this guy?”
Jin muttered as he looked at a mugshot.
A man with tattoos covering half of his face.
A nose piercing that resembled a bull ring.
He glared at the camera with a murderous expression.
“Edmund Nilsson. He’s illegally engraved mana circuits onto his body. He was already known in the Blacknet for installing cheap, mass-produced magic spells. As a result, his personality twisted, and he became a maniac who kills on a whim.”
Mana circuits?
The term sounded straight out of a fantasy novel, but the fact that they could be surgically implanted gave Jin a strange feeling.
He kept reading.
“He even cut ties with his gang? And he was the third-in-command.”
“Because this involves a family. It’s not something they can cover up with talk of loyalty or brotherhood. Thanks to that, we don’t have to hold back.”
“All we need to do is get the data chip out of his head, one way or another,” Kalifa added while casually twirling the liquor glass in her hand.
“The success fee is 2 million credits. The broker’s commission is capped. What do you say?”
Two million.
The same amount Jackie had once offered to save his sister.
Enough to eat meatball spaghetti three times a day for 333 days and still have enough left over for waffles.
It was more than enticing.
On top of that, taking out Nilsson, a fake mage, would earn him plenty of experience points.
Jin had been short on XP to unlock his next perk, so the answer was obvious.
“Alright. I’m in.”
Edmund Nilsson.
According to Kalifa, he had implanted the data chip into his head and had been holed up in his hideout for days.
That hideout was an old apartment complex with outdoor hallways—a wretched structure covered in chaotic graffiti.
Up close, it reeked from piles of uncollected trash.
Jin climbed the roughly welded steel staircase.
Apartment 402.
Standing in front of Nilsson’s door, Jin scratched his head.
Should he just break in?
With his current strength, smashing a door lock was trivial.
At first, he considered pretending to be a deliveryman who had the wrong address, but if Nilsson got suspicious, things would get messy.
So, he opted for a swift approach. Just as he grabbed the door lock—
“…Who the hell are you?”
A wary voice made Jin turn his head.
A man stood there, carrying two full black plastic bags, staring at him with an uncertain posture.
A bald guy with tattoos covering half of his right face.
For a brief moment, their eyes met in the air.
A short silence.
Then, both moved at the same time.
“Shit!”
Nilsson threw the plastic bags straight at Jin and reached out his hand.
“Boom Light—!”
A flash exploded with an oppressive force.
Instinctively, Jin shut his eyes.
“Urgh!”
Would this be what it feels like to have a flashbang go off right in front of your face?
In games, it only makes your screen go white, but experiencing it in reality meant tears and drool streaming uncontrollably.
His body staggered, struggling to maintain balance.
But even this was only a fleeting moment.
His abnormal recovery rate quickly stabilized his disoriented autonomic nervous system, and Jin snapped his bloodshot eyes open.
Scattered across the floor were various necessities—canned goods, tissues, razors—all tumbling out of a bag.
Beyond them, Nilsson could be seen sprinting down the stairs.
Jin immediately stepped onto the hallway railing and leaped.
His jumping power easily surpassed that of an Olympic medalist.
It was a moment of pure flight.
Even as he soared, his eyes never lost sight of his target.
Nilsson, frantically descending the stairs, widened his eyes in shock.
Boom!
A cloud of dust burst forth from the stair landing between the second and third floors.
A landing so crude it was almost barbaric.
“What the hell?!”
Nilsson, now trapped with no way down, was momentarily paralyzed in fear.
Jin closed the distance.
His fist cut through the air.
A frantic cry echoed—
“Shield!”
A force field, resembling enlarged, tightly interlocked fish scales, blocked the punch.
But that alone caused it to tremble violently.
A barrage of follow-up strikes shattered it completely.
However, in that brief window, Nilsson had already slipped away.
Now he was dashing back upstairs.
“You crazy bastard! Stop chasing me!”
Realizing he would be caught at this rate, Nilsson suddenly pulled a gun from his coat and fired blindly behind him.
Ping! Ping! Ping!
Bullets ricocheted off the steel framework, sending sparks flying.
Jin scowled.
This guy calls himself a mage?
But Nilsson wasn’t some purist.
He had learned magic through illegal procedures, and for him, firearms were just another weapon.
After emptying the entire magazine—
One stray bullet, deflected by the steel, struck Jin’s shoulder.
Its trajectory had shifted unexpectedly, making it difficult to react in time.
If he hadn’t twisted his torso at the last moment, it would have hit his heart instead.
Nilsson had gotten lucky, as if he had just played a perfect game of billiards with bullets.
But he had no time to celebrate—Jin, who had only hesitated for a moment, was already accelerating again.
“Shit. Shit. Shit!! What the hell are you?!”
Swearing furiously, Nilsson gritted his teeth.
By then, he had already reached the rooftop.
With nowhere left to run, he turned around in desperation.
He began chanting.
This was not some cheap, mass-produced spell floating around the Blacknet.
It was real magic.
When he first realized this was only beginner-level magic, he had been crushed.
With his ability, even casting it once was grueling—his body would suffer just from using it.
The moment he activated it, he would be out of the fight.
But he had no other choice.
“I’ll roast you alive, you little shit.”
As Nilsson muttered through a bloody nose, Jin felt a shift.
Something indescribable was converging in one place.
The formless energy gathered into a blazing sphere of fire, spinning rapidly in Nilsson’s palm.
Even from a distance, the heat was intense.
The entire process took less than two seconds.
“Die—!!”
Nilsson hurled the fireball like a baseball.
At the same time, Jin tensed his thighs.
His hyperdeveloped fast-twitch muscles contracted with explosive force, generating an immense burst of speed.
In an instant, he closed the distance, crossing his arms in an X to shield himself as he lowered his head.
The fireball struck.
BOOM!
The explosion sent Nilsson tumbling backward, slamming onto his rear.
He gasped for air, his body battered by the overwhelming heat.
But inside, he was celebrating—there was no way anyone could survive a direct hit like that.
“…Did I get him?”
The words had barely left his mouth when a cracked voice answered from within the smoke.
“Fools who say that always regret it.”
“…?!?!”
The next moment, a leg emerged from the smoke and smashed into Nilsson’s ribs.
His body flew like he had been hit by a dump truck, rolling across the rooftop before crashing into a water tank.
Then, Jin stepped out of the smoke.
He slapped at the flames on his shoulder with his palm, his face flushed red from the heat.
“Magic is so fucking broken.”
The searing pain made Jin grimace.
Burn injuries are most painful at the second-degree level, right before the nerves are completely destroyed.
Right now, he was at exactly that stage.
Soon, blisters and pus would follow—a real mess.
“Mages are so damn broken.”
Jin frowned as searing heat surged through him.
But, as always, Jin simply endured it.
He had more pressing matters to deal with.
“Ku… Kehuk. D-Don’t… don’t come near me.”
Even while gasping for air, Nilsson desperately pushed himself backward, dragging his heels across the floor as if he could foresee what was coming.
“This… this is mine. It’s mine.”
Jin let out a sigh as he looked down at Nilsson, who was curled up like a pill bug, clutching his temples.
“You still don’t get it, do you?”
He forcibly pried away the resisting arms and examined the access port of the cybernetic socket.
Among the densely embedded chips, one emitted a faint red glow.
“The Fire Emblem… This is it.”
“Hey, hey! You f***ing bastard! Don’t pull it out, please! I haven’t finished downloading it yet! If you yank it now, I’m screwed! You son of a—”
“Damn, you’re noisy.”
Thud!
Jin’s fist slammed into Nilsson’s ranting face.
Finally, with his target silenced, Jin struggled to extract the chip from Nilsson’s temple—until he accidentally pressed the tip and the whole thing popped out on its own.
“…It’s like a floppy disk. Not that I’ve ever used one.”
Jin scratched the back of his head, then finally retrieved the chip and stood up.
That was when it happened.
Nilsson, who had been limp like a corpse, suddenly shot out a hand and clamped onto Jin’s ankle.
“…?”
Jin’s brow twitched.
More than the fact that Nilsson had regained consciousness so quickly, it was the inhuman strength crushing his ankle that put him on high alert.
His body moved on instinct.
Jin stomped down hard on Nilsson’s wrist with his other foot, loosening the grip just enough to slip free.
Then, as Nilsson lurched halfway to his feet, Jin’s kick smashed into his face.
The sensation that traveled up Jin’s foot told him everything.
His opponent’s face had been completely shattered.
No doubt about it.
Yet—
“A’hhh!!!!!”
Nilsson’s head, which had snapped backward from the blow, snapped right back into place with a chilling shriek.
His ink-blackened eyes locked onto Jin.
“A’hhhhhh!!!!!”
With another unearthly scream, Nilsson lunged.
Gone was the desperate man trying to flee—he was now a beast, charging straight at Jin.
Even amid his surprise, Jin remained calm.
He widened the gap, evaded Nilsson’s attack, and smoothly hooked his opponent’s ankle.
Using the momentum, Nilsson’s head slammed into the floor.
Jin then drove his foot down onto the back of his skull, hammering it over and over.
At some point, a familiar, electrifying sensation surged through his body.
The satisfying rush of gained XP.
Jin, wiping the sweat from his chin, slumped to the floor, exhausted.
He pulled out the red data chip from his pocket, glancing between it and the unconscious Nilsson before slowly speaking.
“What the hell is this?”