Chapter 165

Kim Jin-Woo’s residence wasn’t located too far from the Paju Gate. With creatures streaming out of the gate as of late, the price of the land around it had dropped drastically.

With the negotiation skills he had gained from dealing with Mr. Baek and the Black Merchant, he reduced the price to rock bottom, and the landlord gladly handed over all the land deeds surrounding the gate that he had difficulty selling off.

Having bought all the land around his house, Kim Jin-Woo immediately started on the construction work. The first order of business was to set up fences around the perimeter to mark his property, followed by surrounding it with mud and sand.

“Wow, the Terrans sure work quickly!” Dominique exclaimed as she watched the construction go on into the night. The sun had set and night had arrived, and it was the best time for her to replicate the look of a human perfectly.

“These guys are relatively highly skilled as Terrans go,” Kim Jin-Woo said. When he paid extra for overtime work at night, the construction progressed astonishingly quickly, even for someone like him who was used to the surface.

“There’s no competition when compared to the Naga Workers.” Dominique expressed her admiration once more. The surface was full of surprises in her eyes, as she had spent her whole life in the Underworld.

The huge monster made a loud roar as it spewed up a mountain of dirt and sand each time it rose up from the ground, and the monster with a wretched arm crushed the pile of dirt in an instant.

“If only we could use such powers in the Underworld, we wouldn’t have to worry about the Moai, the Counts, and whatnot…” Dominique remarked.

“At best, these are only useful for digging up dirt. The true power of the Counts can’t be compared with something like these,” Kim Jin-Woo corrected her. Even though he’d never seen the true powers of the Counts for himself, he knew that their powers were incomparable to that of the 9th Floor. These mere machines would do nothing to narrow that gap in power.

But Dominique seemed to have a different opinion. She fell into her own thoughts without answering him. The expression on her face was so serious that he didn’t know what else to say, and he simply walked away.

“Mm?”

But the construction site that had been busy until just moments ago suddenly fell silent.

The excavator that was busily compacting the soil had stopped moving as it held the huge bucket in the air, and the truck that had been busy carrying the soil also stopped in its tracks.

“What the…” Kim Jin-Woo looked at the situation unfolding, wondering if something wrong was going on, before belatedly realizing what was happening and scoffed.

The eyes of the workers had fallen on Dominique, and their expressions were quite a spectacle. Looking at all the workers with their mouths wide open and a dreamy look on their faces, they must have been taken aback quite a bit by Dominique’s beauty.

After all, even compared to the Under-Elves and vampires, who were already known to be beautiful in the Underworld in their own right, Dominique was even more exceptionally beautiful than them.

The sight of her brooding under the moonlight as she was immersed in her thoughts was a dreamy sight to see. In fact, many of the workers’ faces were hazy as though they were in a dream themselves.

“Dominique,” Kim Jin-Woo called out.

“Yes?” Kim Jin-Woo’s voice woke Dominique from her thoughts.

“I don’t mean to interfere, but if I leave this situation as is, I fear it will get in the way of the construction work,” Kim Jin-Woo said.

“Ah, did I get in the way?” Dominique asked. As she blinked innocently, gasps of admiration could be heard all across the site.

“I know it wasn’t intentional, but you actually are getting in the way,” Kim Jin-Woo explained.

In the Underworld, beauty meant nothing more than a pretty looking shell. In a bleak world where survival was a virtue, Dominique’s thin arms and waist were in fact a negative factor in terms of pure survival. With such a level of beauty, it couldn’t be helped that the workers on the surface were mesmerized by her.

But Dominique was smart enough to read the atmosphere and quickly grasp the situation. “Hmph. How dare they,” she remarked, blatantly showing a look of discomfort in front of the workers. The innocent-eyed maiden had instantly turned into a deathly cold woman. It appeared she didn’t appreciate the gaze of anyone other than her Master.

“Alright, alright. Head back in,” Kim Jin-Woo said.

“I understand.” Dominique, who had been staring coldly at the workers, quickly let go of her tension at his urging, a look of regret showing on her face. But she quickly turned her back and disappeared into the house.

Kim Jin-Woo felt sorry for forcing Dominique back indoors when she was merely excited by the sights of the outside world, but without his intervention, he knew that the work would never carry on.

“Ah, why are you forcing her inside when she’s obviously unwilling…”

“He obviously wants to keep her all to himself. Sheesh, he has so much money yet he’s so stingy about one girl. Man, I don’t feel like working anymore.”

When Dominique disappeared, it was as though the flow of time had resumed once more across the construction site. Lamentations and complaints flowed for from all over the site. The workers must have deemed it a pity that Dominique had disappeared.

“For real, we’re here shoveling like dogs, but someone out here is lucky enough to have real good parents to fool around with girls like that.”

Among them, a few started to gossip about Kim Jin-Woo with unlikely speculations.

“This country is fucked, I’m telling you. This greenhorn isn’t even thinking about working hard and is already fooling around at such a young age.”

“Man, I’m so fucking jealous. Life’s already fucking tough as it is. Urgh! Aarrgh!”

“Fucking hell, when will we ever live a comfortable life?”

As the creatures continued to flow from the Underworld, they had affected the sentiment of the entire country, and that in turn had caused the economy to enter a depression.

Surviving in the world was already tough as it was, and yet, in front of the workers was someone who was rubbing salt in their wounds, and all they could feel was envy and anger against the world.

“Mm.”

With nowhere to vent their anger, all their hatred was directed toward an innocent Kim Jin-Woo. To someone like him who had transcended the level of a mere criminal, those words were a rather new experience. But he didn’t even bat an eyelid. He simply stared down at the man who had introduced himself as a supervisor without saying a word.

“You bastards, you’re too full of yourselves, aren’t you!? In times like these, it’s so rare to get paid extra for working, so what the fuck are you all blabbing on about!?” the supervisor exclaimed.

“Isn’t it a given that the rich should pay more for working for them?” a worker shot back.

“Did you earn that money? Stop talking bullshit and continue working!” the supervisor shouted back at the workers as he warily looked back at Kim Jin-Woo.

“I’ll be heading back in.” Feeling that nothing good would come out of staying outside any further, Kim Jin-Woo lightly bowed his head and turned around.

But then, something happened. A truck began sloppily heading toward a pile of materials.

“Uh? Huh? What’s up with that guy!?”

The workers screamed as they ran frantically out of the path of the truck.

“Hey! Stop! Stop!”

The truck that had rushed forward out of control collided with the pile of materials. Unfortunately, one of the workers nearby was caught in the mess and ended up getting crushed and screamed, “Aaaaaaah! My leg! My leg!”

In an instant, his screams caused the site to be engulfed in chaos.

“Hey, you asshole! Back up! Quickly back up!”

“W-What the fuck are you guys standing around for!? Pull back the truck and carry these first!”

The workers cursed at each other as they shouted, while the worker buried under the pile of materials kept on screaming.

“Aaaaah! Why isn’t this bastard backing up the truck!?”

The injured worker was screaming his lungs off in pain, but the truck driver seemed to have no intention of backing up his truck. The situation looked dangerous and a second accident seemed imminent. The workers panicked even more.

“Oi! I’m backing up the truck! Get out of the way if you don’t wanna die!”

The truck driver belatedly started to back up the truck, and the precariously balanced pile of materials started to rattle once more.

“Back off! Fuckers!”

“How about Kim!?”

“I have to reverse the truck for us to do something about Kim, don’t I!? You stupid bitches!”

As a couple of the workers held on to the unstable pile of materials, refusing to get out of the way, the supervisor started shouting once more. “You crazy bastards! All you have to do is pull one person out; what the hell are you all doing!?”

“AAAARGH! Save me! It hurts! It hurts so much!” the injured worker shouted as the workers holding on to the dangerous pile of materials quickly pulled out of the area. He continued to scream in pain.

Rumble.

“Oh god!”

It appeared that everything that could go wrong was going wrong. The truck frantically moved back and forth, and it disturbed the pile of materials once more. With a rumble, the iron pillars and other assorted materials came crashing down.

“Mr. Kim!”

Even the rugged men with steady temperaments screamed as the site turned chaotic.

“Urgh…” Mr. Kim had gotten so afraid that he couldn’t even let out a scream anymore, uttering groans of pain.

The workers stared at what was happening in front of them, before closing their eyes as they braced for the worst to happen.

Thud.

But what followed was a strange sound. If a person were to be crushed by a solid iron pipe, a distinct, dull, crushing sound should have followed. However, the sound they heard was so small and insignificant that they could barely hear it.

Even in the midst of all the chaos, the workers forced themselves to open their eyes at this strange occurrence.

“Huh?”

Before their eyes, what the workers saw wasn’t the corpse of their colleague who had been terribly crushed by the materials, but a man—their client—supporting the pile of solid iron pillars with both his hands.

“Oopsie-daisy,” the client said. The workers’ jaws were dropped at the incredible scene unfolding before them, as he casually pushed the pillars aside.

Crash!

The pillars collided with each other with a bang, and piles of dirt and dust scattered in all directions.

“Please call 119.” The client’s soft voice carried a powerful aura. Even the workers, who had been flustered and embarrassed, were jolted awake by his words as their eyes widened.

Some of the workers took out their mobile phones as they called for an ambulance, while some dragged out the truck driver responsible for the accident.

“What the!? This motherfucker is drunk!”

“No, that’s not it…”

“You son of a bitch!”

It seemed that the truck driver’s accident wasn’t simply due to negligence. The driver’s face was completely flushed, which explained the odd situation in which the truck had crashed into the pile of materials stacked up in the corner. Judging from his frantic, discombobulated fumbling after the accident, it was clear that he was extremely drunk.

“You crazy son of a bitch! Who drinks like that before getting behind the wheel!? Are you trying to kill someone!?”

“No, it was just one glass! I only drank one glass! I did drink but it wasn’t drunk driving!”

“What kind of bullshit is this fucker talking about? You almost sent an innocent man straight to hell, so cut your crap!”

“That’s not it! Oh, for fuck’s sake! Listen to me! I did drink, but it’s the same amount that I always drink! Just that much!”

“Stop fucking around, Mr. Park. We can’t overlook it this time. The police are coming; sort it out yourself.”

“There was definitely something else! This place is strange! The perfectly fine truck suddenly started driving around on its own! Fuck, I’m about to go mad!”

While the truck driver and the workers quarreled, Kim Jin-Woo stepped forward to rescue the injured worker from the pile. He said, “I’ll save you, so don’t you speak a word. One wrong move and you’ll lose your tongue.”

Before Mr. Kim could even answer, Kim Jin-Woo had already moved on, but not before tossing yet another heavy iron column aside.

***

The man named Mr. Kim was eventually taken away by an ambulance. The truck driver was also taken away by the police for questioning, and after their investigations, the case was closed.

However, according to the police investigations that day, the truck driver’s alcohol level wasn’t high at all, and it wasn’t enough to cause a serious accident. It was an absurd point, but Kim Jin-Woo paid no attention to it at all.

But as time passed, the situation seemed to repeat itself, as accident after accident continued to occur at the construction site.

A perfectly fine worker who was carrying a heavy load would suddenly fall over as if he were drunk, and heavy equipment that had no abnormalities repeatedly malfunctioned. The work was considerably slowed down, and of course, Kim Jin-Woo called the supervisor over for an explanation several times.

Nevertheless, the accidents continued, and not long after, stories about the cursed site began to spread.

At that point, Kim Jin-Woo couldn’t help but pay closer attention. It was abnormal for the workers to repeatedly say that they saw nothing, and yet, accidents kept happening. And if something truly was affecting them, then the answer was plain to see.

Labyrinths. Two Underworld labyrinths now existed on the surface.