Chapter 18

The dungeon was structured in a circular layout, leading to a panic room at its end.

Except for Wi Seoyeon, who stayed in the briefing room, the rest of us split into two teams to secure as many clues as possible by taking separate routes.

Team 1: Kang Han, Gwak Dohyeong, Joo Yidam.

Team 2: Kim Lara, Kim Jinsu, Jin Mugyeol.

Our team, Team 1, chose the left corridor.

Under the irregularly flickering emergency lights, the sight before us was suffocatingly grotesque.

On the walls, there were smudged writings as if scribbled in blood:

“He is watching.”

The letters grew fainter along the corridor, eventually smearing into an unreadable mess, ending as nothing but meaningless blood stains.

“A code left by a survivor?” Gwak Dohyeong muttered quietly, but no one could easily answer.

Meanwhile, scattered all over the corridor were crimson flesh-like pieces.

At first glance, they looked like traces of monsters, but upon closer inspection, they were fused with machinery.

The flesh seemed to root itself between the pipes and metal, as if it had grown there.

Though it looked like raw meat, its edges fused sharply with metal.

Every time the flesh quivered, the metal trembled slightly as well.

It was both a living organism and a machine.

Some of it crawled up the walls to the ceiling.

It wasn’t that the lab had been consumed by monsters—it was as if the lab itself had become a monster.

Broken and shattered devices, scattered documents, and machinery that had come to a halt.

Bent file cases and cracked experimental glass tubes were all eerily preserved as if frozen in time.

Gwak Dohyeong, examining the clutter on the floor, muttered,

“Has time stopped or something?”

“You mean nothing’s corroded?”

“Yeah. Unless someone looted a museum, transported these ancient devices here, and trashed the place right after, there’s no other explanation. It’s bizarre. Nothing has rotted despite how long it’s been like this. This is seriously creepy.”

And then it happened.

“Can you all hear me?”

Wi Seoyeon’s voice came through the speaker.

“Stay sharp. I’ll brief you on any anomalies as they occur. Until then, keep moving forward.”

Another voice, belonging to a woman who identified herself as the head of the lab, also echoed:

[The entrance to the lab isn’t very dangerous. Move quickly.]

The research lab corridor, fused with crimson flesh, looked like a place where a monster could suddenly charge from the darkness at any moment.

But there was no other choice. There was only one path forward.

Relying on the irregularly flickering emergency lights, we began to move forward.

Inside the lab, each section was firmly sealed by heavy metal doors.

To progress, we needed the operator in the briefing room to assist by hacking the panels beside the doors.

Alternatively, we could overload the circuits with enough electrical current to render the defense protocols useless and destroy the door entirely.

Team 1 opted for the former approach, while Team 2, which included the powerful electric user Kim Lara, boldly charged forward using the latter method.

“Are you there yet?”

We were standing in front of the third gate.

A malfunctioning panel flickered beside the metal door.

To open it, we needed precise control from the operator in the briefing room.

Wi Seoyeon’s voice came through the speaker:

“There should be a data port on the panel ahead. Connect it so I can take control.”

Gwak Dohyeong nodded silently and opened the terminal.

The lab’s internal sounds didn’t reach the briefing room.

Only the CCTV was functional, as the microphones were broken.

Gwak Dohyeong knelt and quickly dismantled the wiring inside the panel.

Thanks to Wi Seoyeon’s guidance, analyzing the lab’s defense protocols, he worked at a remarkable speed.

Her voice continued:

“The modules are old and unstable. I’ll hack as quickly as I can, so stay alert and secure the perimeter.”

Time passed.

Gwak Dohyeong wiped the sweat off his forehead.

The work was done.

“Phew!”

“Good job. The door should open now. Be ready for any ambushes on the other side.”

Then, a voice unfamiliar to us—belonging to the lab’s head—came through the speaker instead of Wi Seoyeon.

[From the Umbra Zone onward, monsters roam freely. Be prepared for sudden attacks.]

When we first entered this dungeon, the area was the Novice Zone.

It was a desolate part of the lab’s outskirts, devoid of any threats but also nearly devoid of useful information or clues.

Recalling the time when this world was just a game to me:

The deeper into the lab you ventured, the higher the danger level rose, but the greater the rewards and data you could obtain.

This dungeon had three levels of danger: Novice, Umbra, and Nexus.

We were now about to enter the Umbra Zone.

Chiik.

The door opened, and cold air swept over us.

“So, this is where the real challenge begins,” Kang Han muttered gravely as he moved to step forward.

“Wait… Team 1, stop.”

Wi Seoyeon’s voice halted our steps.

“What? No, this can’t be…”

Though we couldn’t see what she was looking at from the briefing room, the unease in her voice carried clearly through the speaker.

Soon, the reason became apparent.

“The CCTV past this point has suddenly gone offline. I won’t be able to guide you or monitor what happens to you. It might be better to take a detour, even if it costs time.”

[That’s not an option. I can detect the lab’s monsters in advance. Trust me and push through.]

“Wait, does that even make sense? Why should we trust you?”

[There’s no time. Even now…]

Wi Seoyeon argued with the lab head over the speaker.

Their conflicting opinions quietly clashed.

As Kang Han watched them, he turned to me.

“Joo Yidam, what should we do?”

“Hmm…”

The Umbra Zone was the place where monsters could finally start appearing, and now the CCTV had conveniently gone down.

To make matters worse, the corridor ahead was pitch black without a single light.

…

In the pitch-black darkness, the difference between having orders from the briefing room and not having them was as stark as the difference between a sighted person and a blind one.

I glanced at the creaking door mechanism, barely holding under its own weight and emitting steam.

There was no time. I had to decide quickly.

This was a turning point—a moment to decide whether to trust the voice of the lab’s head from the speaker or not.

The sudden blackout of the CCTV beyond the Umbra Zone was unsettling, but whether it was a trap or not, we still had to move forward.

If it was a trap, taking a detour would only lead us into another one.

I handed the greatsword I was holding to Kang Han.

“Use this from now on. I think I’ll need to use light magic.”

“Got it.”

Whoosh, whoosh!

Kang Han swung the weapon with ease.

As a berserker, a warrior born for battle, he could wield any weapon with proficiency.

His natural talent for adaptability was not unlike my own inclination toward ‘perfection.’

“Wait! Guys, hold on!”

Ignoring Wi Seoyeon’s voice trying to stop us, Gwak Dohyeong silently gave a thumbs-up toward the CCTV.

We turned our backs on her protests and stepped into the Umbra Zone.

Inside was utter darkness.

I found myself missing the occasional flickering red emergency lights from earlier.

Now, we had to rely on the faint glow of my light magic to take one step at a time.

As the dim light radiating from my hand illuminated the passage, strange patches of flesh adhered to the metal pipes and ceilings came into view.

They quivered ever so slightly, as though alive.

“Ugh.”

Gwak Dohyeong gagged as he approached the panel to open the blocked metal door.

And then it happened.

Screech.

A sound of metal scraping echoed from afar.

I immediately intensified the light and pointed it in the direction of the sound.

The fleshy and metallic masses fused to the wall began to writhe, shifting and transforming before our eyes.

“Could it be…?”

The answer came from the lab head.

Even though she couldn’t see or hear us, she somehow sensed the monster’s appearance and delivered a warning.

[Prepare yourselves, it’s coming!]

The flesh swelled, enveloping the metal, and began to take shape, forming elongated limbs and a head.

It was a creature known as a Parasite.

Compared to its appearance in the game, it was far more grotesque and horrifying in reality.

Its danger was self-evident.

“Kang Han!”

Before I could finish shouting, the Parasite lunged at us at incredible speed.

“Ugh!”

Kang Han twisted his body, swinging the greatsword in an arc.

The Parasite’s movements were astonishingly quick.

Kang Han’s blade sliced through empty air as the creature swiftly evaded.

“Go for the legs!”

I shone the light onto the creature’s body.

The Parasite, composed of flesh and metal, relied on an abnormally swollen leg for balance.

Despite its speed, its movements were unstable.

Kang Han seemed to have already read its patterns, adjusting his stance and aiming his sword.

As I illuminated the area, Kang Han brought the greatsword crashing down.

Boom!

The blade smashed into the creature’s oversized leg, shattering it.

Flesh and metal fragments scattered in all directions like an explosion.

Without the medium holding its parts together, the Parasite collapsed, lifeless.

Silence fell over the area.

Gwak Dohyeong, who had been working on the panel, let out a breath he’d been holding.

“Is it… over?”

“You idiot,” I said with a smirk, cursing at him.

“Why would you say something like that?”

“What?!”

[Dangerous entities are approaching. Do not engage them. I’ll guide you to an alternate route.]

The lab head, who had previously told us to fight, now warned us to avoid the approaching threat.

I understood why.

The moment I encountered the Parasite, I had ironically regained a sense of calm.

“No matter how the story changes, the monsters remain the same.”

I knew how to defeat them, no matter which one appeared. My knowledge was finally proving useful.

Judging from the lab head’s insistence on avoidance, the creature heading our way was likely one of the strongest types in this area.

Before long, I was certain of its identity.

“The Distorter.”

A massive Parasite that absorbed the lab’s generator as its power source, unleashing explosive energy in all directions.

Its defining characteristic was its ability to reanimate nearby electronic devices with the excess energy it released.

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This discovery is expected to advance human civilization by leaps and bounds. No longer helpless in the face of the—

The scattered devices on the floor and shelves began to activate simultaneously.

It was as if frozen time had started moving again.

Each device displayed something different—news, ads, music—all unrelated, their noise clashing chaotically in the once-silent lab.

Even the broken emergency sensors flickered back to life.

The incessant flashing red lights, the static-filled sirens, and the cacophony of mismatched sounds filled the space we stood in.

Thud… Thud…

And then, a massive presence, consuming all the noise, began to move.

It was coming.