Everything depended on Jin-Woo's judgment. Sung Jin-Woo fiddled with the E-rank mana crystal in his hand and looked to the side. Joo-Hee shook her head at him. She seemed worried. In truth, Jin-Woo was just as anxious. Under normal circumstances, he would never have taken such a risk. He didn't have the skill for it, nor the nerve. But Jin-Woo had a younger sister who would be starting college soon.
'I don't have any savings...'
Jin-Woo was twenty-four. At an age when he should have been studying, he'd given up on college because he had no money. He didn't want to pass that kind of pain on to his sister. Right now, every penny counted. It wasn't just Mr. Baek who needed a lump sum. Jin-Woo thrust his hand into the air.
"I'll go too."
A quiet sigh escaped from beside him.
2. Double Dungeon
The tunnel stretched on endlessly. Up front, strong Hunters led the way, with Mr. Song at the head. Walking at the very front, Mr. Song lit the path with a small flame conjured on his palm. Beside him, Mr. Kim asked:
"Aren't we going too deep? We should consider the time needed to get out." "How long have we been walking?"
Mr. Kim checked the watch on his wrist.
"Roughly... about forty minutes." "After we kill the boss, the Gate closes completely in an hour, so there's still about twenty minutes of leeway." "If we don't spot the boss within those twenty minutes, we pull out." "That's the way of it."
Mr. Song silently nodded and pointed his thumb over his shoulder.
"Mr. Kim, it's dark ahead, so come stand behind me."
Mr. Kim stared at Mr. Song's flame for a moment, then pulled his phone from his pocket and turned on the flashlight. The area ahead lit up brightly.
"..."
Mr. Song looked back and forth between his flame and the phone flashlight, then silently began rummaging through his pockets.
***
At the rear of the group stood the badly wounded Jin-Woo and Joo-Hee, who had no combat skills. Jin-Woo scratched the back of his head.
"Hey... I'm sorry." "For what?" "For dragging you here against your will." "I'm fine, so don't worry about it."
Jin-Woo sneaked a glance at Joo-Hee's expression. She looked anything but fine. Frowning, Jin-Woo carefully asked again, gauging her mood.
"Are you really okay?"
Joo-Hee whipped her head toward him.
"Of course I'm not okay! Are you out of your mind? If the spot where you got stabbed had been even a little higher, there would've been a hole in your heart. And what about the wounds on your wrist and thigh? I barely managed to heal those, and now you're going into another dungeon? Without even knowing what kind of place it is?"
She spoke so fast that listening to it all made his head spin. But she wasn't wrong. It was a good thing Joo-Hee was a rare B-rank healing Hunter at the Association. Otherwise, Jin-Woo might not have been able to continue hunting, let alone live a normal life for a while.
Come to think of it, I keep relying on Joo-Hee.
Joo-Hee was a precious healing Hunter. A B-rank talent at that. The Association naturally asked her to treat Hunters every time a Gate appeared, and Jin-Woo ended up sitting in front of her almost without exception every time he went on a raid.
"Does it hurt? Just hold on a little." "You look familiar... Are you the one from last time?" "You got hurt again?" "Seems like we see each other pretty often." "Your name is Jin-Woo, right? Um... Are you okay?" "Maybe this job isn't really for you..." "...You're here again." "Stick out your arm — no, you can just put a band-aid on that at home. The fractured one."
By now, his gratitude had turned into guilt.
"..."
As Jin-Woo looked downcast, Joo-Hee seemed to regret her harsh words, and her attitude softened slightly.
"Do you really feel bad?" "Yes."
Joo-Hee pondered for a moment, then glanced at him sideways and raised the corners of her lips.
"If you feel that bad... How about buying me a meal sometime?"
It was an invitation he never expected. Startled, he looked at her, and Joo-Hee was grinning playfully like a teenage girl.
A girl...
Well, Joo-Hee had only just turned twenty. Had she said she'd be twenty-one next year? If you replaced her long hair with a short bob and her current outfit with a school uniform, she'd look exactly like a high schooler. The thought of Joo-Hee in a school uniform made his face flush for no reason. When Jin-Woo took too long to respond, Joo-Hee puffed out both cheeks like balloons.
"What... You don't want to eat with me?"
Just then, commotion suddenly erupted up ahead.
"It appeared!" "The boss room!"
Jin-Woo's and Joo-Hee's gazes shifted forward. A massive door blocked the path. The Hunters surrounded it.
"A door at the end of a cave?" "Were there any rooms with doors before?" "I've never seen anything like this..." "Isn't this... dangerous?"
Whispers of unease. The Hunters expressed their anxiety. When their lives were on the line, caution was inevitable. But excessive caution could sometimes prevent one from doing what needed to be done. Mr. Song decided this was one of those cases.
"You came all this way just to turn back empty-handed?"
Mr. Song placed his hand on the door.
"If you want to, go ahead. I'm going on, even if I have to go alone."
Mr. Song was a C-rank Hunter with ten years of experience. If not for his age well past sixty, he had the skill to operate in a major guild. When such a Hunter spoke with confidence, everyone's anxiety gradually subsided.
"Come to think of it..."
A few of the Hunters remembered the rumors about Double Dungeons.
"They say Double Dungeons hold incredible treasure." "I heard a mid-sized guild discovered a Double Dungeon and grew into a major guild in one shot." "The monsters inside are all roughly the same level regardless of where they are, so hunting shouldn't be too hard..."
If the rumors were true — if Double Dungeons really did hide incredible treasure, and the monsters inside were only D-rank or E-rank like the ones they'd just faced?
'I can't let that old fogey hog all the treasure.' 'Of course.' 'Postpartum care center, oldest kid's tuition fees, rent's going up soon too...'
The Hunters' interests aligned. Jin-Woo steeled his resolve as well.
'I can't go back with just one E-rank mana crystal. I need to take down at least one more D-rank — no, even an E-rank monster.'
It didn't even have to be a monster.
'If treasure comes out...'
Treasure or rare items from dungeons were customarily split evenly among all members. This was different from hunting, where you only kept the mana crystals from the monsters you killed.
'If I can score here, things could get a lot easier down the road.'
Jin-Woo swallowed hard. Seeing his grim expression, Joo-Hee asked:
"Is that the face of someone who hunts as a hobby?"
Jin-Woo shrugged.
"Who puts their life on the line for their job these days? If it's a hobby, maybe that's different." "...Excuse me?"
While Joo-Hee looked at him with exasperation, the dungeon door that Mr. Song had begun to push slid open. Greeeeak! The heavy door, whatever mechanism it had, yielded easily to the brute force of a man in his sixties. Boom! When the door swung wide open, a spacious interior was revealed. The Hunters rushed inside.
"Let's go too."
Afraid of falling behind, Jin-Woo grabbed Joo-Hee's wrist and led the way.
"Ah..."
Joo-Hee followed him in, her cheeks slightly flushed.
***
The moment the Hunters stepped inside, flames erupted simultaneously from the torches lining the walls. Fwoosh! The interior was bathed in light.
"What's this? The fire lit up?" "Never seen a dungeon like this." "Something's... different."
The Hunters looked around. Inside had the atmosphere of an ancient temple — an old, somber temple that might be hidden underground. Moss clung in patches to the floor, walls, and ceiling. Several Hunters shrank back and shivered.
"This gives me the creeps." "Don't you feel like someone's watching us?"
Leaving the frightened Hunters behind, three or four strong ones ventured deeper inside.
"Tch! Cut the superstitious crap." "Let's finish this quickly and get out."
The interior was excessively vast. A wide, dome-shaped chamber. It looked as big as several of Seoul's Olympic stadiums combined — no, even bigger than that. And yet, somehow, it felt cramped. The reason was obvious.
"That... that thing..." "No way that's the boss, is it?"
At the very back, something incomprehensibly massive sat on a throne as enormous as itself. A colossal statue of a god!
"Oh my God." "Whoa."
Exclamations escaped involuntarily. The first image that flashed through Jin-Woo's mind was the Statue of Liberty. If the Statue of Liberty sat in a chair, it would be about that size — though the Statue of Liberty was female and the statue on the throne was male.
'Maybe even bigger than that...'
The Hunters swallowed hard standing at the foot of the giant statue. Everyone was clearly tense, afraid that this thing might be the boss.
"..."
But the statue didn't move. A relief.
"Phew-"
Mr. Song let out a sigh of relief as well.
"All right, spread out."
The now-relaxed Hunters scattered and began searching the surroundings.
"There's nothing here that looks like a monster." "Right?" "Never mind monsters — not a single bug in sight."
The room containing the statue, despite its vast expanse, had a simple interior structure. Countless torches used as lighting hung on the walls, and in front of them stood stone figures slightly taller than a person, arranged in tight rows.
"Beautiful." "They look like works of art."
Each stone figure held something different. Some held weapons, some held books, and others held musical instruments or torches.
"It's almost like..." "The sculptures of a temple."
Mr. Kim was about to speak, but Mr. Song said it for him.
"Hm?"
Mr. Song spotted something at his feet.
"Is this... a magic circle?"
In the center of the temple was drawn a magic circle of a shape never before seen. Just then.
"Hey, Uncle Song, there's something written over here! Could you take a look?"
A Hunter in a corner had spotted an unusual stone statue and called over to Mr. Song. Mr. Song, who had been examining the magic circle, stood up. The other Hunters all crowded toward the statue Mr. Song was heading to. And no wonder — this was the only statue with wings, holding a stone tablet. What drew the Hunters' attention was the text inscribed on the tablet. Scanning it, Mr. Song murmured:
"Runic script."
Runic script — writing found nowhere on Earth except inside dungeons, decipherable only by Hunters who had awakened magical abilities.
"The Ordinance of the Kartennon Temple."
Mr. Song read the first line. Jin-Woo listened intently to the contents of the tablet as Mr. Song read aloud, his face taut with tension. But then someone tugged his arm. He turned around and found Joo-Hee standing there, her face pale as a ghost.