Chapter 172:

Chapter 172:

Chapter 172

Yu-hyun looked around.

The sky was clear, and below it, he saw wooden buildings and stone walls built in the old Chinese style.

There was no one around.

The atmosphere itself was strange.

‘What’s going on? The city is so big, but there are no people.’

Upon closer inspection, he saw that many buildings were damaged and collapsed.

Yu-hyun sensed that a huge fight had swept through this place once.

‘Did a war break out? I’ve heard a lot about the martial world where the righteous and evil factions clash.’

It was one thing to come to a completely unfamiliar world, but there was another problem.

He couldn’t see Kwon Jia and Kang Hye-rim, who he thought had entered with him.

‘Did we enter a mind world where we get scattered as soon as we enter? This is troublesome.’

Sometimes, there were places like this.

The entrance they came in would disappear, or the people who came in together would be separated.

The last time they entered the Moby Dick mind world, the entrance also disappeared after they entered.

Of course, that meant that the difficulty of the mind world was higher than other places.

‘This is a headache. It’s not even a story from Earth, so I don’t know what conditions it has. I have to focus on rescuing Seo Sumin and Kang Yura first.’

Kwon Jia and Kang Hye-rim were not easy to deal with wherever they went, so he had no choice but to trust them for now.

Fortunately, the entrance he came in was still near Yu-hyun.

At least, he had a way to get out if he found it.

‘Usually, in this situation, you can’t communicate without the special walkie-talkies made by the association. But I’m different as a teller.’

Because they were bound by a contract, telepathy was possible as long as they were not too far apart on a national scale. Yu-hyun immediately sent telepathy to both of them.

‘Are you both okay?’

-Ah! Yu-hyun! Yes, yes, I’m fine.

-Me too.

‘Where are you?’

-Um, well. I don’t know. But I’m in an alleyway where there are a lot of shady people around. The stench and stuff is really bad.

-I’m in a bamboo forest. I can see a city far away, but there’s black smoke coming out of it. It looks like there was a fight.

‘Black smoke?’

Yu-hyun looked around.

He saw collapsed buildings, but no smoke.

That meant that Kwon Jia was looking at a different city.

Yu-hyun realized that this mind world was much bigger than he thought.

Then, it might take longer than he expected to find the two of them.

‘At least I can find them right away if I’m close enough through the books, but it’s difficult if it’s this wide.’

He didn’t think that Seo Sumin or Kang Yura would go somewhere and be guests.

At least if Seo Sumin was with Kang Yura, they would be able to hold on for a while.

‘It seems like it will take some time to join up since we don’t know the terrain or each other’s locations.’

-Ugh. Then what do we do?

‘First of all, please focus on finding the civilians who got caught up in this. We’ll join up after that. Please.’

-Okay.

-Got it.

Kwon Jia and Kang Hye-rim also knew that the situation was quite serious, so they decided to follow Yu-hyun’s will.

After finishing the telepathy, Yu-hyun crossed his arms and thought about what to do next.

He wanted to sort out the order and move accordingly.

In the meantime, the library opened and the spirits poured in.

“Ah, spirits. Hello?”

The number of viewers reached 9,000 in an instant.

And not only that, but the number of viewers was still increasing slowly but surely.

Maybe if word got out that this mind world was another unusual place, it would soon break through the 10,000 barrier.

[The spirits are interested in the new mind world.]

[The spirits are puzzled by the three-split screen.]

[Some spirits nod their heads as if they recognize the place.]

‘Recognize the place?’

Yu-hyun wanted to ask the spirit what he meant, but he knew he couldn’t.

The spirits were always watchers.

And all they could sponsor was a little bit of points.

Even if a human from Hage asked them something curious, the spirits could hear it but not tell them anything.

The system strictly blocked it.

‘Of course, it’s not without loopholes.’

It’s possible for some spirits to blabber something without being asked by this side.

However, depending on how much information it is, the Genesis system will decide whether or not to sanction it, so the spirits don’t say much because they don’t want to get into trouble.

He thought he might get some information, but it was a shame.

Yu-hyun briefly explained to the spirits what had happened.

“Spirits. This world of thought is a bit unusual, so as soon as we entered, we all scattered. I apologize for not being able to stay together.”

There were spirits who came to Yu-hyun’s library because they wanted to see Gwon Jia, and there were spirits who came because they wanted to see Kang Hye-rim.

I assumed that Celine had arranged them according to their preferences, but I preemptively apologized in case they felt uncomfortable.

‘Celine. I’ll leave the rest to you.’

-Understood.

Crunch.

He heard a faint sound in his ear.

It was so small that he could have believed it was a mouse passing by.

But Yu-hyun’s eyes narrowed.

[Yu-hyun.]

‘I know.’

Baek Ryeon warned him.

Yu-hyun nodded and focused his senses.

He started to feel the presence of people outside the building he was in.

He immediately shared his vision with Baek Hyo.

From the rooftop, he saw people in black clothes moving in an orderly manner.

‘They’re pretty skilled.’

They moved in large numbers, but their footsteps were barely audible.

In no time, more than 50 people in black surrounded the house where Yu-hyun was.

The enemy was a fantasy entity manifested in this world of thought. And if they were fantasy entities of this martial world, they must be martial artists.

Yu-hyun pretended not to notice and went outside.

In the middle of the garden, an old man was sitting on his back.

There was no one else around. But he could feel that many people were watching him from behind the walls, on the roofs, or in the thick bushes.

“This is interesting.”

The old man saw that Yu-hyun was alone and snorted as if he had been nervous for nothing.

Yu-hyun also examined the old man’s appearance.

He was an ordinary old man.

He was short, slightly hunched, and had white hair.

But there was one thing that bothered Yu-hyun’s nerves.

‘He looks like he’s trying to appear as a good person.’

The old man had a pleasant expression.

If he smiled with that face, he would really look like a kind person.

Yu-hyun felt a sense of incongruity.

The old man’s appearance was not natural, but artificial, made to look that way for someone else’s sake.

‘But there’s no need to point that out.’

He had to avoid conflict as much as possible in this situation.

Yu-hyun stood in front of the old man and asked politely.

“Nice to meet you. My name is Kang Yu-hyun. Who are you?”

“I’m Hwang An Jun. But more importantly, do you know me?”

“No. But I thought you must be someone important, since you have so many people following you.”

“That’s true.”

Hwang An Jun didn’t seem surprised that Yu-hyun pointed out the hidden people.

He also knew that Yu-hyun was not an ordinary person.

“So. How did you end up here, Kang Grandmaster?”

Kang Grandmaster?

Yu-hyun felt strange about that unusual title. But what could he do?

This world had its own rules.

“I’m looking for two people.”

“Hmm, people? Who are they?”

“Yes. Have you seen two soldiers wearing unique outfits? They’re about sixteen years old.”

“Two soldiers who just reached puberty (破瓜之年) wearing unique outfits? Unfortunately, I don’t remember seeing them.”

“Is that so?”

Yu-hyun didn’t feel sorry.

He could give up on this city with that answer.

The old man suddenly became curious and asked.

“You don’t seem to be wary of me?”

“You don’t seem to be hostile to me either?”

“Well, I thought you might be a spy sent by the faction at first. But when I saw your outfit and your casual attitude towards this side, I realized you were just a third party unrelated to this matter. The faction bastards always talk stiffly and act formally.”

“Thank you for the compliment.”

“You take that as a compliment? You’re quite an unusual person indeed. Where did you get that unique outfit?”

“I got it from the west. I had some connections there.”

“Oh. You’ve been far away.”

“I’m a wanderer. I just go wherever I can. But what’s going on around here? Is there a war or something?”

“You’re a wanderer and you haven’t heard the rumors?”

“I was too busy looking for people.”

They had enough of each other’s talk.

Hwang old man knew that Yu-hyun was not an enemy, and Yu-hyun also knew that he was not hostile to him.

Skilled people could recognize each other.

Yu-hyun wanted to get some information about this world of thought from the old man in front of him.

“If you don’t mind, could you tell me what happened here?”

“Well, I don’t have anything to hide, so I’ll tell you. But we should move to another place, just in case there are eyes watching us here.”

Hwang old man stroked his beard once and turned his back.

At the same time, the presences that surrounded Yu-hyun quickly moved away.

Yu-hyun followed the old man.