#20
The overwhelming roar and heat that could shake the entire jungle made Ha-seong squeeze his eyes shut. Because that thing exploded unexpectedly fast, he couldn’t buy time to deploy his skills. Damn, he always said he’d make roast pig out of the pig, but Ha-seong himself was about to become roasted.
No, maybe he already had.
But something was strange. If he had become roasted, his status window should have been going crazy by now, but it was quiet. Ha-seong slowly opened his closed eyes.
“Hyung really has no luck.”
At that moment, a familiar voice was heard from ahead. A low, sunken voice. When Ha-seong opened his eyes, he could see Cha Do-hyeok’s back. He was standing with his back to Ha-seong.
“Getting caught up in a dungeon on your way to work.”
Do-hyeok slowly lowered the hand he had stretched forward. Ha-seong just slightly raised his head to assess the situation. For such a huge explosion having occurred, the surroundings were intact. There were no traces of burning either. Looking closely, the monster that had been lying on the ground earlier was burned without a trace, and only the floor nearby was charred black. Presumably, he had definitely deployed a barrier around that thing to surround it. And the person who accomplished that in such a short time was…
“You came really fast.”
None other than Cha Do-hyeok.
Ha-seong muttered a complaint to that Do-hyeok, but it was still fortunate. Without him, he might have really become roasted.
“It’s because it’s me that I came now.”
Do-hyeok slowly approached. Looking closely, Cha Do-hyeok seemed to be quite fond of bragging about himself.
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
Still, it was a slightly more human question than when he grabbed his clothes and dragged him out last time.
“I’m fine… no, actually it’s a bit tough.”
Ha-seong was about to respond with something like ‘what do you mean am I hurt from something like this,’ but then realized his current situation, or more precisely his situation that ‘should appear that way,’ and corrected his words. For now, to Cha Do-hyeok, Ha-seong was a purifier close to being an ordinary person.
“By the way.”
Do-hyeok looked at the pig that was sneakily walking toward Ha-seong’s side and finally opened his mouth.
“Did hyung do this?”
“What.”
Instead of words, Do-hyeok pointed to the ground with his hand. Ha-seong’s gaze slowly followed his gesture downward. And on the damp ground lay something startling.
“Ah.”
The crocodile tail he had cut off. Since the monster had died and disappeared, the tail, being part of it, was already losing its form, but if it was Cha Do-hyeok, if it was a hunter, there was no way he wouldn’t know what it was.
“This?”
“Yes.”
“No, this guy did it.”
Ha-seong pointed to the pig trying to hide behind his legs without batting an eye. He had assigned the flashy role to the pig knowing this would happen.
At this point, he thought it was heaven-sent luck that he hadn’t used a shield skill when the monster exploded. If he had used a skill the moment Do-hyeok appeared, he definitely wouldn’t have been able to pretend to be a ‘purifier close to an ordinary person.’
“You said that’s just a pig.”
Do-hyeok hid the fact he heard from Shin-woo and tilted his head pretending not to know. Do-hyeok was asking Ha-seong how an ordinary pig could make this possible. Ha-seong caught his breath for a moment. Of course, this wasn’t a scenario he hadn’t thought of either.
But he thought the probability of this situation happening would be low. Why did Cha Do-hyeok of all people come? Isn’t that guy the guild leader of the 1st-ranked guild? Is such a person this free? Ha-seong, who had no way of knowing Do-hyeok’s hidden intentions, was thinking of South Korea’s 1st-ranked person as someone with free time.
“I thought it was just a pig too. Guess it wasn’t.”
Ha-seong chose to muddle through for now. Of course, even he thought this answer was terrible. It was an excuse that anyone who heard it, even an elementary school student, would scold him saying ‘do you think that makes sense?’ But he couldn’t think of any other way to get through this situation right now. His mood was as bad as the damp mud scattered on the ground.
That was because there was no response from Cha Do-hyeok who heard those words. He just stared intently at Ha-seong with an unreadable expression.
The wind blowing through the jungle was humid and stuffy. It was air that seemed to strangle Ha-seong’s throat, which was full of lies.
“Well, yes.”
And after the silence, the answer Cha Do-hyeok gave was exactly those two words. It was Ha-seong who felt strange at the somewhat unexpected words. This got brushed off just like that? This felt like when you go with an absurd reason to leave class early, but the teacher allows it without saying much. He was so dumbfounded that he almost asked ‘aren’t you going to ask more?’
Do-hyeok seemed to really intend to end it there and turned around saying “then let’s head out now.” If this was the case, there were two possibilities. Either Cha Do-hyeok had no more than necessary interest in Ha-seong, or he was an idiot.
When Do-hyeok moved his steps, Ha-seong finally remembered Min-chan.
“Hey, but what about the people on the bus?”
“Hunters were dispatched from other guilds and the Management Bureau too. They’re probably rescuing them by now. I originally came to kill the owner anyway.”
Ha-seong nodded saying that was good then and followed Do-hyeok’s steps. Leaving behind the dungeon that was starting to collapse, Ha-seong crossed the entrance.
When they came out of the gate, the vast road where the bus had been running welcomed Ha-seong. Whether it was controlled because the gate opened, there wasn’t a single car on the road that usually had traffic jams every day. However…
“There’s an injured person here!”
“We requested additional ambulances. They’ll arrive within 5 minutes!”
Around the gate was nothing short of chaos. Injured people and civilians who still hadn’t come to their senses. And the treatment teams and hunters dispatched to treat them. The road was literally completely out of its mind. As Ha-seong’s eyes grew a bit dim at the familiar but quite nostalgic scene…
“Hyung!”
When a bright voice was heard from somewhere, interest appeared in Ha-seong’s eyes.
“Oh, Min-chan.”
Min-chan ran over in perfect health and hugged Ha-seong.
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
“No! Mom just woke up too and the uncles are treating her.”
“That’s good. I’m glad.”
Ha-seong smiled softly and patted Min-chan’s head.
“But did hyung really save us? You did all this, right?!”
Ha-seong glanced at Do-hyeok’s reaction to Min-chan’s excited voice, but he couldn’t find any change of expression on his stone-like face.
“No. This was… solved by the pig.”
“That pig?! Wow.”
Ha-seong resolved to feed the pig cabbage to its heart’s content today. Who knew he could use the guy he only thought of as an annoying burden so usefully.
“And this hyung did the rest.”
Ha-seong pointed at Do-hyeok with his finger. Anyway, it was Cha Do-hyeok who prevented the huge disaster from the monster’s final self-destruction.
“Wow! Hyung is also super cool!”
Min-chan grinned and gave Do-hyeok a thumbs up. Of course, Do-hyeok’s reaction was lukewarm, so Min-chan’s thumb went down weakly.
“Then I’ll see you later, hyung!”
“Yeah. Go to mom quickly.”
Ha-seong waved to Min-chan who was running away excitedly.
“You’re not popular with kids, are you?”
Ha-seong said that while crossing his arms and glancing at Do-hyeok who was standing guard looking annoyed.
“I’m not interested in that stuff.”
Yes, yes. Of course you would be. If Cha Do-hyeok had been interested in such things, he would have done advertisements and photo shoots like other hunters from the beginning.
Ha-seong felt like he knew a tiny bit about what kind of personality Cha Do-hyeok had.
“Then we should work now.”
He was already tired to death from entering the dungeon again, squeezing out strategies, lying and even acting, when he heard unbelievable words. More work for his pitiful self who got caught up in an unavoidable situation on his way to work?
“Now?”
“Yes.”
Cha Do-hyeok was a devil. A devil like a department head who throws work at you 30 minutes before leaving when you want to finish everything for the day and leave on time feeling good.
“Fine. Let’s work.”
But what could he do? It’s natural that a low-level employee has no power to stand against a department head.
“Then first when we go to the guild…”
“No.”
Do-hyeok suddenly cut off Ha-seong’s words and pointed behind himself.
“We need to solve this first before going.”
Ah, that’s right. Ha-seong looked at the gate whose energy was gradually becoming fainter. The gate would close soon, so he needed to do purification work before it completely closed. Ha-seong passed by Do-hyeok who was standing tall and approached the dark entrance.
Now he was about to do purification work as usual when he felt a strange gaze from behind. When he slightly turned his head, wasn’t Do-hyeok staring intently this way, that is, at Ha-seong who was about to purify? What’s this, it’s not like he’s monitoring whether he works well or not.
Ha-seong thought he was a strange guy anyway and stretched out his hand without noticing that Do-hyeok’s eyes were starting to ripple with blue light.
[Energy absorption and extinction skill is activated.]
After a few seconds passed and he confirmed the gate was completely closed, Ha-seong turned around again. He was about to tell Cha Do-hyeok, who was still staring intently at him, to go now, but something was strange. The guy who had been expressionless the whole time, the guy who didn’t even blink when a child purely said he was cool, was smiling with his lips slightly raised.
What’s this? Ha-seong suddenly felt a strange uneasiness. A different uneasiness from before. The feeling Ha-seong had when he faced life-or-death crises while fighting in the previous world.
“As expected, it’s strange.”
“…”
Ha-seong met Do-hyeok’s gaze rippling with deep blue light.
“There couldn’t be another S-rank in this South Korea besides me.”
“…”
“And there’s no way my eyes are wrong…”
Do-hyeok’s lips rose higher and higher.
“Who are you, hyung?”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
