Chapter 331

Episode 331

“....”

“....”

Lee Jae-heon, who had been silent for a while, opened his mouth.

“...I don’t know what I felt, but I keep thinking of areas for improvement.”

“It’s gross.”

“I wonder if that’s what In-ho Jeong would say.”

He recovered his momentary blank expression and spoke in his usual dry tone.

“...I think I’ve said this before, but it’s a common occurrence. “Whether someone comes to kill me, or I have to kill someone, or we all die from something else... it’s not that surprising.”

Those words reminded Jeong In-ho of Lee Jae-heon’s old colleague who had already died. This strange criminal left many questions, but we knew nothing about him other than the fact that he was Lee Jae-heon’s former colleague.

“....”

Jeong In-ho asked Lee Jae-heon whether it was because his thoughts were focused in that direction.

“Does that happen to everyone who stays in the other world for a long time?”

“what.”

“Like the person who tried to kill the manager before.”

“ah.”

“No matter how desperate I was, I tried to kill the manager.”

The problem was that he did not simply commit murder, but attempted to kill Lee Jae-heon, a person he depended on and liked. If he is pushed that far, wouldn’t Jung In-ho someday try to kill Lee Jae-heon for his own purposes?

I had such a delusion.

“I...”

Jeong In-ho, who was muttering something, closed his mouth again.

“....”

He was afraid of Lee Jae-heon’s death.

Even if I were in Lee Jae-heon’s position, I didn’t think dying would be any less scary. This was even true in the previous episode, where Jung In-ho died because he wanted it.

The feeling of being momentarily out of breath due to an abnormality in my body gave me a physiological eerie feeling, and even though I knew that there would be another opportunity after that, I was afraid of the momentary emptiness. That’s what death was like.

“...Chief, you really shouldn’t die.”

He didn’t know why he was saying this, but Jeong In-ho continued, forgetting even the context.

“It’s so scary.”

Even Jeong In-ho didn’t know who was scared of what and how.

“Because that can’t be done...”

What does it mean that it can’t be done?

“....”

In the end, Jeong In-ho closed his mouth again.

Until just now, I was really curious about Lee Jae-heon’s story, but not anymore. His story is gloomy, but he himself is so calm that his head hurts as he listens to it. I was already tired, but I didn’t think there was any need to become more tired.

“....”

“...I guess I’m tired.”

Lee Jae-heon, who managed to notice it, said.

“I will get up soon. These days, kids keep asking me to play with them...”

“It’s cute.”

“Let’s talk more later.”

“Yes, I like it.”

Still, didn’t it come out quite well that the target was Lee Jae-heon? Thinking that this was enough for today’s conversation, Jeong In-ho looked up at the sky again.

A ceiling so white that it hurts the eyes.

“...Let’s talk again later.”

My head goes blank.

* * *

And there was to be no ‘later’.

‘How dare this bastard try to fool around?’

No, rather, that bastard was worse.

‘Kim Yeon-woo is good at managing his mental and physical health on his own, even without self-awareness, so what the fuck are you doing?’

He seems fine now, but Hong Gyeong-jun had a tendency to turn around as if there was some kind of Bluetooth connection when a problem came up that Jae-heon Lee couldn’t handle. Didn’t we just confirm that during our last expedition to Eonhak High School?

‘You stuffy bastard.’

In Lee Jae-heon’s thoughts, Hong Gyeong-jun was already like a candy that would slowly melt if left under the midsummer sunlight. It doesn’t mean that he melts away as cleanly as snow like Kim Yeon-woo, but that he is a nuisance that makes the situation sticky.

Hong Gyeong-jun, who did not know Lee Jae-heon’s true intentions, was making an ambiguous expression, perhaps because he was dragged in right away.

“Um... first of all....”

“Please explain.”

“What do you mean by explanation?”

“You two were talking about the results of your exploration and that of another team.”

“Aha... I understand if you mean monsters or terrain around here.”

Still, as long as ‘Lee Jae-heon’ is fine, it is worthy of praise for being much more efficient than last time at the park.

‘...Yes, in a way, that is also the result of struggling to survive in the underworld, so you can’t criticize it for being useless at all.’

Aside from those thoughts, just looking at Lee Jae-heon’s face, he seemed to be seriously listening to Hong Gyeong-jun’s story, and Hong Gyeong-jun and Kim Yeon-woo also had no doubt that they believed in Lee Jae-heon’s sincerity. Lee Jae-heon’s strength was that he could manage his facial expressions like breathing.

“I remember that Unhak High School was structured enough to be called a school, but this apartment complex is a little twisted. Well, the deformation is not that severe, but if you go into the center of the complex, there

are buildings closer to houses than apartments...” “The buildings are gathered in a circle. You can look for a mixture of apartments and houses in real life, but the problem lies in the form, not the form. “Because those houses are gathered inside the sinkhole located in the middle of the complex.”

“I had no idea how to get down there. Since there aren’t many monsters, it’s hard to understand the rules... Of course, thanks to that, exploration wasn’t that difficult. I was worried about Han Do-yoon, who was imprisoned there, but surprisingly, he was walking around fine. “It was fortunate.”

“As for my monsters, first of all, there are a few mannequin monsters that look like they work in the local office and a few eyeball monsters in the security office. It looked bizarre, but it was easy to observe because it didn’t come out of the security room. “It has been identified that there are a total of 10 security offices within the complex, but we cannot be certain as sinkhole exploration has not been conducted.”

Jaeheon Lee, who was listening to the story, asked.

“Wait, did you say eyeball monster?”

“It was a name we chose at our own discretion... but we really had no choice but to call it that. “It was a round eyeball that filled the small security room.”

“...That....”

Was it in the novel?

“Oh, do you know someone?”

“Who do I know here? There are only monsters in the world.”

“I made a mistake for a moment. Do you know any monsters?”

“Hmm....”

I know.

‘Not this way... he went to the other side of the apartment complex and appeared.’

I wasn’t sure about the sinkhole, the house, and the Nabal, but I remembered the eyeball monster. The protagonists of the original story were much more passive in their exploration because they could not return like they do now and lacked common sense about the underworld, and even if they could not let go of their minds, the only place where they could rest their bodies was an apartment complex.

In most apartment complexes, the number of monsters was small and the rules were not that harsh, and there were cases where monster access was conditionally blocked. It was quite common to sit down and check if an apartment complex was visible, as if opening a random gift box.

“...That...”

And among them, the eye monster appeared only three times.

“....”

“That?”

“....”

“I’m curious about the story behind it.”

“hmm.”

‘Lee Jae-heon’ looked around the garden with a nervous expression.

“...This was the altar.”

discharge. In other words, an altar. In general religious groups, it is similar to a table where ancestral rites are held or mass is held, but in the other world, the meaning of the term is slightly different.

“Discharge? So...”

“Of course, this is not a religious facility, but isn’t anyone able to offer sacrifices?”

“....”

“...The scarecrows have strange tails.”

It seemed like this could bring a new breath of fresh air to the depressed survivors.

Oh, of course it will be bloody.

(Continued in the next part)