Chapter 30 - The End (2)

Chapter 30: The End (2)TL: SHW

The numbers in the bankbook do not change no matter how much time passes.

What? The four major insurances? The ones I know?

What’s the point of giving me a Hunter license? If you won’t even let me raid dungeons.

So, this… the minimum wage of 2021, reduced even further for the training period, and on top of that, the four major insurances?

I’m not ignoring the importance of insurance, but even fleas wouldn’t be this meticulous about sucking blood dry.

…Wait, what about the money I paid for pension while working at the Agency? Every time I saw the deductions from my salary, it made me sick, but I endured it thinking of my retirement. Is that all gone? My pension? My retirement?

“I know it’s thrilling to receive the reward for your rightful labor…. but you can check it again later.”

Hong Seok-young completely misunderstood my silence.

He thinks this is touching? The best Hunter in Korea doesn’t have much insight. This amount is almost the same as the allowance the old man used to give me every month.

“Anyway… Boss! More beer here, please!”

Setting aside the amount issue, it was significant that Hong Seok-young handed me the resident registration card and other documents.

It meant that this man finally stopped playing around and fully accepted me as the unfortunate victim of the Ark.

By the time we had quenched our thirst with the new beer and finished the ordered chicken,

we returned to talking about work.

I resumed checking the photos that I had paused to verify earlier. The first photo only had corpses, but in the next set of photos, there were small centipede larvae as well. Seeing those crawling on the corpses made my stomach churn.

Centipedes.

Were there centipedes in the Bangi-dong Dungeon? Being a D-rank dungeon, it surely had monsters, but I didn’t recall seeing any mention of monsters in the Bangi-dong Dungeon reports over the past few years.

According to what I saw from the Mana Watch, when dungeons first appeared, it was noted that there was no relationship between the mana stones found inside and the monsters, so they were disregarded. The dungeon was so old that some reports were missing, making it unclear what kind of monsters were present.

I looked at the centipedes in the photo.

I had heard reports of discovering monster eggs while extracting mana stones occasionally…

“It’s not unusual for insect-type monsters to like rotten meat, but this is too suspicious.”

Kim Chae-min said, waving the photo.

Most of Earth’s common knowledge applies to dungeon monsters too. Unless it’s a rare exception, you can usually guess right by their appearance.

“Anyone can see that they seem to have been fed.”

Kim Chae-min said thoughtfully.

“You said the dungeon gate was constantly guarded, right?”

“Hmm.”

“When did the dungeon appear? I remember it was April.”

“April 6th.”

“Oh my. That’s after the Myeong-dong outbreak…. Daseon took over the dungeon not long ago, so… the dungeon was pretty much abandoned in the meantime, wasn’t it?”

“Probably?”

Hong Seok-young frowned.

“I was busy at that time, so I couldn’t pay attention…. It’s a densely populated area, so the government checked it once. It was rated as D-rank back then too.”

“And no one cared about it afterward?”

“Seems like… that’s right.”

This isn’t Hong Seok-young’s fault. It’s not the government’s fault either.

It’s just the way this era is. With the urgent aftermath of the Myeong-dong Dungeon to deal with, a non-dangerous dungeon could be left unattended for a while.

If I had thought about it….

No. At that time, I was constantly tied up with the Awakened Crimes Investigation Department and thepilot high school. Even for me, it was impossible to move around unnoticed by Hong Seok-young.

If there’s nothing that can be done, then it’s better not to think about it. It’s not my fault.

“So, if Ark could enter the dungeon, they could have done so at any time.”

“I guess… so?”

“They said the dungeon was unusually large for its rank…. If this is Ark’s doing, and if there’s someone else doing such things other than Ark, that would be an even bigger problem. So, let’s assume it’s Ark. Maybe Ark went into the dungeon and just didn’t come out?”

“…Huh?”

“No, isn’t it possible? With just one fairly competent earth-attribute mage, digging and crawling in would be easy. It’s a method we used when raiding a dungeon with Vietnamese Hunters in the past. Did you thoroughly check the inside?”

After a moment of hesitation, Hong Seok-young shook his head.

“We only checked around the entrance and the dungeon core. We didn’t check to the end.”

“If they were really hiding inside, they might not have come out yet.”

“I’ll have to tell the Hunters to check.”

After fiddling with his phone for a moment, Hong Seok-young moved on to the next topic.

“And about this rune.”

The rune he mentioned he wanted to ask me about earlier.

It was roughly drawn with a marker on a dirty shirt. The lines and everything making up the rune were all crooked.

I squinted my eyes. It was an unfamiliar rune.

Or was it? I don’t memorize all the runes.

After pondering for a moment, I opened my mouth.

“To fix mana in a rune, it’s important to draw it accurately. That way, it lasts longer.”

The support runes were developed by a French Archmage. It’s unknown to Ark. The rune roughly drawn on the shirt was ruined as centipedes crawled over it.

“You can use it even if it’s roughly drawn like that, but… it’s unstable and won’t last long. I don’t know when it was drawn, but by the time you found it, the effect would have already ended.”

“Really? Then…”

“It means the situation was urgent enough to draw the rune hastily or there was no need to put effort into drawing it.”

I have no idea what they are doing in the dungeon. Even if they didn’t expect Daseon to take over the dungeon, displaying the corpses so blatantly?

What is Ark plotting?

I’ve seen and heard things happening in the research lab, but the dungeon is a different story.

In the first place, Ark got caught by Hong Seok-young because they were in a hurry to kidnap the kids. It doesn’t make sense. Ark’s basic action guideline is secrecy.

Maybe there was an internal conflict.

“But despite that, the fact they did this means it was something they had to do?”

“I suppose so… What did you do with the corpses?”

“Daseon decided to handle it due to security issues. They’ll start with an autopsy.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“There’s no telling where the information might leak from, so we had no choice.”

Kim Chae-min didn’t care about that. She was more focused on the roughly drawn rune.

“Teacher Woo.”

“Yes?”

“Do you know what this rune is?”

“Hmm…”

The Mana Watch contains not only the Agency’s data but also information necessary for dungeon raids.

One of those pieces of information is the Encyclopedia of Runes.

As the name suggests, it lists all the runes registered with the International Rune Research Association.

If I can check the watch, I can quickly find out what this rune is.

Should I say I need to go to the bathroom and check?

No, there’s no need to take unnecessary risks.

Besides, what if it’s a rune not stored in the Mana Watch? There are many runes not registered with the Rune Association, and Ark also used their own runes, so it’s possible.

Yes.

I’ll just say I don’t know.

Saying you know it but then finding no information on the Mana Watch would be disastrous. It’s much easier to say you don’t know and gradually reveal information later.

“What do you think, do you know?”

Hong Seok-young looked at me with hopeful eyes. It was a shame to disappoint him, but I willingly answered.

“No, I don’t know this rune either.”

“You don’t know a rune?”

“How could I know every single rune that I can’t even use?”

“But you know a lot of runes, Teacher Woo. You draw new runes every time I see you.”

Runes are essential knowledge for modern Hunters….

But I can’t say that easily.

“…I’ll find out what rune it is.”

“Find out?”

“How?”

“Just draw it and see what happens.”

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If not me, then who?

“No, I’m not a mage.”

“Then?”

“Why are you asking me? Isn’t Hunter Lee Mi-seon curious about what this rune is? Daseon must have mages too.”

“It’s hard to find reliable mages.”

I tilted my head.

“Does Daseon not have mages?”

“They do, but they’re not as trustworthy as the ones we usually keep around.”

Mages are picky. Since they’re so rare, they tend to turn their backs if not treated well. I nodded.

So, I looked at a trusted Archmage.

“Then Teacher Kim should do it.”

“Huh?”

“Of course, it has to be Teacher Kim.”

“Who else but Teacher Kim?”

“But I don’t know anything about runes!”

“You’re learning now.”

Kim Chae-min’s eyes widened.

“You just have to draw it, so why are you surprised?”

“This feels unfair!”

“It’s because Teacher Kim is so capable.”

“I don’t think so. This feels weird.”

No matter what she says, Kim Chae-min can’t escape her fate.

Kim Chae-min drank her beer with a displeased face.

Well, I don’t plan to leave everything to her. If the Mana Watch has information about this rune, it will reduce the chance of a misstep. If not, I can reverse-engineer it.

I followed Kim Chae-min’s lead and took a sip of beer before speaking.

“May I tell my story now?”

Since we had roughly wrapped up the rune discussion, it was time to move on to the next item.

“Hmm? Oh, right. What was it you wanted me to see?”

“This.”

I handed over the tacky flyer again.

Kim Chae-min recognized it immediately.

“Didn’t Eun-young show this to you?”

“Eun-young? What were you doing while I was away that the kids are carrying around things like this?”

“She got it on her way to school, apparently.”

Even under the dim light, the tacky writing was clearly visible.

‘Mana! Will you leave it only to the Awakened?’

Just reading it made me cringe.

Hong Seok-young’s face twisted with a similar expression.

“What is this? Why put so much effort into this nonsense?”

I pointed to the text at the bottom of the flyer.

Taegukgi Training Center.

I got straight to the point.

“This is Ark.”

“…What?”

Did I say it too briefly?

“This is a front set up by Ark to recruit new members.”

“…”

There was a particularly long silence.

Hong Seok-young, who had been staring at the flyer intently for a while, finally spoke.

“This?”

Well, any sensible Hunter would react like that.

That was my reaction when young Yoo Ji-eun mentioned mana.

Kim Chae-min asked in a reluctant voice.

“This… cult-like group is Ark?”

“Doesn’t it make sense?”

“…Ark?”

“It’s not a religion, but it’s a cult-like organization.”

I shrugged.

“They use things like this to gather people and then filter out the promising ones. I don’t know the details since I haven’t worked on this, but… finding an artificial awakening method is one of Ark’s goals, so they might be looking for potential test subjects.”

“…”

“…”

“What, what did you say?”

Hong Seok-young, who had been munching on the remaining chicken, dropped his piece. Kim Chae-min’s face was equally stunned.

Why are they so surprised?

“What did you say is Ark’s goal?”

“…?”

This time, I was the one surprised.

“An artificial Awakening method? What is that? Test subjects?!”

“Why do you think they kidnapped the kids? It was to obtain test subjects.”

Their reaction was strange.

I asked, just in case.

“You didn’t know?”

“…”

“Then what did you think Ark was all about?”

“…An international crime organization?”

Well, that’s not entirely wrong, but…

How did this person manage to take down Ark originally?