The female student who called out to me from behind immediately ran towards me.
“Are you going home alone? Let’s go together then!”
“Have you seen the news? It’s so scary to walk alone these days. You have to grab someone, even a stranger, and go together. Especially in alleys like this.”
She doesn’t know me?
I was so famous that it was safe to assume all the female students in my grade knew me.
My reputation, even if somewhat exaggerated, preceded me.
I was the ‘Terrifying Hunter Who Commands Spirits,’ a title that usually made people subtly avoid me, especially other Awakeners who understood the weight of such a designation.
Yet, this girl, seemingly oblivious, had approached me with a casualness that was unsettling.
For her to see my name tag and still not know me… it was a blatant disregard for common knowledge, or perhaps a deliberate act.
My gut warned me this student was dangerous.
It wasn’t just the lack of recognition; it was the strange eagerness in her voice, the almost predatory gleam in her eyes that sent a shiver down my spine.
I had faced down numerous criminals and terrifying beasts in my time as a hunter, but this subtle, insidious danger felt different.
It was the kind that lured you in before striking.
As I walked alongside her, my eyes carefully scrutinized her appearance.
She maintained a cheerful facade, chatting idly about school and recent events, but I could sense an Awakener’s aura, faint but undeniably present.
Outwardly, she was just an ordinary female student, with her neat uniform and innocent smile.
But underneath that veneer, something sinister pulsed.
Then, the news report I saw this morning suddenly came to mind, a chilling reminder of the world we lived in, a world where hidden dangers lurked around every corner, especially in the growing number of gates.
[Shocking investigation results have been announced, revealing that the victim of the recent ‘Dungeon Murder Case,’ which has shocked many people, is not just one person.]
The culprit of the Dungeon Murder Case was still at large, a shadow haunting the city.
The details of the case had been gruesome, whispers of victims dragged into dungeons and never seen again, or found in fragmented, unidentifiable states.
The police and Dungeon Management Bureau were baffled, their resources stretched thin, and the public was gripped by a palpable fear.
Could it be… her?
The thought was absurd, yet my instincts screamed otherwise.
My parents’ urging to come home early, even though I was confident I’d win, echoed in my mind.
“Hmm… I’ll win.”
I had murmured to myself this morning, a silent affirmation of my own strength and skill.
“Haha, okay. That’s fine then. Still, come home early.”
They said, their words laced with the usual parental concern, unaware of the grim reality of my everyday life.
As these thoughts flashed through my mind, a subtle killing intent emanated from the cheerfully walking female student.
It was an aura that seemed to have been poorly contained, a leak in her carefully constructed disguise.
It was undeniable, a cold, sharp edge to the air around her that only another Awakener, especially one attuned to such things, could perceive.
Oh, no way.
It can’t be.
How often does one encounter a fugitive murderer in their life?
The odds were astronomical.
Yet, the subtle shift in her aura, the faint, almost imperceptible tremor of malicious intent, confirmed my suspicions.
Even if it were, I’d win if we fought.
I had to believe that.
My past experiences, both before and after transmigrating into this world of gates and monsters, had hardened me.
I needed to confirm if it was truly him, this elusive culprit who had terrorized the city.
Even before transmigrating, I had experience catching hunter criminals, but it was always me going after them, never being targeted while walking down the street like this.
My face was widely known, and there was a pervasive perception that I was a terrifying hunter who commanded spirits, so many people would subtly avoid me when they saw me, crossing the street or looking away.
This direct, brazen approach was completely out of character for anyone who knew of my reputation.
The gate was getting closer, its shimmering distortion in the air a beacon of danger and opportunity.
I stopped near the gate and rummaged through my bag, feigning distraction.
“Ah, I left something at school. You should go ahead.”
I hoped she would leave, that this whole unsettling encounter would simply dissipate.
“No, there’s no need for that.”
Her voice was still sweet, but there was an underlying firmness now, an impatient edge.
Then, in my sight as I rummaged through my bag, the female student’s shoes, which were gradually changing shape, came into view.
They were clearly new white sneakers, but they gradually grew larger and turned into black, worn-out shoes.
The illusion was slipping, the transformation accelerating.
It was no longer a subtle shift, but a grotesque morphing of reality.
“Time’s up.”
It was a man’s thick voice, rough and guttural, completely devoid of the feminine lilt from moments ago.
He must have thought I was defenseless, caught off guard, as he grabbed my arm with surprising force and threw me sideways.
Alright, this is self-defense now.
The pretense was over, the charade shattered.
As I flew into the gate, I saw the face of the guy who threw me.
The transformation was complete.
The delicate features of the female student were gone, replaced by the hardened, brutal face of the suspect from the Dungeon Murder Case I’d seen on the news.
His eyes, now cold and calculating, held a hint of triumph.
Thrown by the man, I passed through the gate, and the scenery instantly changed.
There was nothing but a desolate plain, an empty, alien landscape stretching out before me under a bleak, colorless sky.
I braced myself to land as safely as possible, twisting my body in mid-air to mitigate the impact.
But then…
Huh?
What?
My body, which should have rolled on the ground, began to fall straight down.
It wasn’t just an endless desolate plain.
Thrown backward, I hadn’t properly checked inside the gate, but as I fell, the view below showed a steep cliff leading to a swirling sea that looked like it would devour me, it’s dark waters churning ominously below.
And with a splash, my body sank endlessly into the water, the cold depths enveloping me.
Hurrying to the surface and sticking my head out, gasping for air, I saw the man appear on the low cliff above, a grim silhouette against the dull sky.
He must have intended to throw me into the gate where no one would see, and then deal with me inside, away from prying eyes.
He probably hadn’t expected it to be a dungeon with a sea stretching out from a cliff, a dungeon with a perilous drop.
The man clicked his tongue as if annoyed and looked down, his frustration palpable even from a distance.
Ah, my school uniform is all wet.
The mundane thought momentarily cut through the adrenaline.
I needed to catch him quickly and hand him over to the Dungeon Management Bureau.
This murderer, who had so carelessly revealed himself, needed to be apprehended.
To do that, I first had to climb the cliff, a sheer face of rock that seemed to defy ascent.
If I used Shadow Form, climbing the cliff would be quick, a simple matter of dissolving into the shadows and reappearing at the top.
Just as I was about to use Shadow Form, a person fell from above.
It was the man who had thrown me here.
He had miscalculated, or perhaps over-confidently leaned too far.
“Aaaah!”
He threw me earlier, but now that he was falling himself, he seemed scared, and his face was filled with terror, a stark contrast to his earlier smugness.
Following his gaze, I looked up, and a familiar face was looking down with an anxious expression, a face that belonged to someone I never expected to see here.
“Lee Dana!”
“Ban Eun-hye…?”
Why is she there?
My question lingered for a moment, then Ban Eun-hye roughly ran her hand through her hair and muttered something, her voice a low growl of frustration.
From her demeanor, she was definitely cursing.
Ban Eun-hye looked around, her eyes scanning the desolate landscape, and then shouted at me.
“I’ll find a way to climb up! For now, stick to the cliff!”
Her urgency was clear, her worry for my safety overriding any other thought.
[Skill, ‘Shadow Form’ is activated.]
Hidden in the shadow of the cliff extending over the sea, I quickly cut through the current, becoming one with the darkness, moving unseen beneath the surface.
Then, Ban Eun-hye’s shout came again from the top of the cliff.
“Lee Dana! Are you under the cliff? Huh? Answer me!”
She seemed quite flustered by my sudden disappearance, her voice tinged with panic.
“Hey, hey! Oh, damn it!”
He peered over the edge of the cliff, looking down with disbelieving eyes, his fear and confusion evident.
He looked as if he was about to jump down at any moment, driven by desperation or pure idiocy.
[Skill, ‘Shadow Form’ is deactivated.]
His body, which had been leaning forward as if to really jump, twitched and then stopped.
His blank eyes stared at me, who had suddenly appeared in front of him, having used my skill to materialize directly in front of him.
“You, what, what kind of…?”
He stammered, his mind struggling to comprehend what he had just witnessed.
“Ah, it’s my skill.”
I replied simply, a small, wry smile playing on my lips.
“Oh.”
He looked utterly defeated, the fight draining out of him.
I wanted to ask how she got here, what chain of events had led her to this exact gate at this exact moment, but finding and capturing that murderer was the priority.
Since there was nowhere else to run, we sat at the edge of the cliff, a silent vigil, waiting for him to fall into the water, to be swallowed by the churning abyss below.
He silently looked down at the side for a moment, contemplating his futile situation, his options narrowing to nothing.
“Puh-ha!”
The guy surfaced quickly, coughing repeatedly, as if he’d swallowed a lot of water.
He didn’t seem to have the energy to swim, sputtering and struggling against the relentless current.
“Oh.”
I watched dispassionately, a hint of satisfaction in my gaze.
“You took him out in one shot?”
Ban Eun-hye asked, a hint of admiration in his voice.
“Well done.”
A brief conversation passed between us as I looked at him, the murderer flailing in the water below.
He ran both hands over his face several times, then frantically looked around, his eyes wide with desperate fear.
That’s when he spotted us sitting above, two figures on the cliff, calmly observing his demise.
“Th-The Rank 1 is trying to kill someone…” he stammered, his voice weak and pathetic, attempting to twist the narrative, to play the victim.
“That’s not it.”
I, next to Ban Eun-hye, seemed to be completely out of his mind now.
Ban Eun-hye cut off the man, who was trying to sound like the victim, in an instant.
His patience had clearly worn thin.
“If you want to die, keep yapping.”
When he warned in a low voice, a subtle threat laced in his words, the man could only move his lips without speaking, his terror silencing him.
After throwing me earlier, he was truly a disgusting example of someone who bullies the weak and cowers before the strong, a despicable display of human nature at its worst.
“I’ll go report this to the Dungeon Management Bureau. Keep an eye on him.”
Cell phones didn’t work inside dungeons, a common restriction, so I raised my phone to Ban Eun-hye, intending to go outside the gate to make the call.
Just then, a school uniform shirt was thrown over my head, landing with a soft thump.
“Put it on before you go.”
Ban Eun-hye said without looking back, wearing only a short-sleeved shirt himself, his damp uniform discarded.
I took the uniform shirt that had landed on my head with one hand and quietly draped it over my shoulder, the fabric cool against my skin.
“Thanks.”
Ban Eun-hye raised his hand as if to say, “It’s nothing,” in response to my words, a casual gesture that spoke volumes about his character.
Thankfully, even after falling into the sea, my phone worked normally.
As soon as I got out, I called the Dungeon Management Bureau to report the murderer’s location and the situation.
When I went back in, the man’s desperate screams could be heard, echoing across the desolate plain.
“Aaagh! Help me!”
A monster had appeared, rising from the swirling depths of the sea.
The man was tied to a giant Kraken’s leg, being swung around like a ragdoll, and Ban Eun-hye stood with his arms crossed, watching, a grim expression on his face.
“What is it?”
I walked over to him and asked, and he gestured with his chin towards the Kraken, indicating the monster.
“To kill that, you’d have to burn it down in one go, but then that bastard would burn to death too.”
He explained, a hint of reluctance in his voice.
It was possible to attack it partially to make the man fall into the sea, but sharks were swarming in the water, appearing out of nowhere, their fins cutting through the choppy surface.
Either way, the man was doomed to die.
My recently acquired skill, Dark Cloud Blade, was no different.
The man would melt away with the Kraken, a gruesome, inescapable fate.
“Wait, you can use a shield, right?”
As I was seriously contemplating, a sudden thought struck me, remembering a past incident.
I suddenly remembered what happened when Ban Eun-hye and I got caught in a sudden gate.
Back then, he clearly shielded me and burned down the trees, didn’t he?
His fire-based abilities coupled with a defensive skill seemed like a viable option.
“Yeah. But I’m reluctant to shield a murderer.”
He admitted, his ethical dilemma clear.
“Right…”
Many people died in dungeons.
Non-Awakeners would die if caught in a sudden gate, or Awakeners would die during combat with monsters.
If that man died, it would be attributed to a monster, a common, if tragic, occurrence.
I had no particular desire to step in and save him; he was a murderer, after all, and his fate seemed to be catching up to him.
While we were caught in thought about what to do, the man’s head slumped forward weakly, as if he had lost consciousness, his struggles ceasing.
Having lived in a world with gates and monsters since birth, I had seen countless people die in dungeons, their lives extinguished in a flash of violence or the cold indifference of the environment.
But Ban Eun-hye wasn’t like that; he seemed to be in serious conflict, his conscience grappling with the morality of the situation.
If he saved him, he was a murderer; if he left him, it would feel uneasy, a burden on his conscience.
I was much more desensitized to such deaths than Ban Eun-hye, so I could have turned around and left the dungeon at any moment, walking away from the gruesome scene without a second thought.
Just then, dark clouds gathered thickly in the already dim sky, swirling above us.
Between the dark clouds, which looked like they would unleash lightning at any moment, a flickering light gradually appeared, growing brighter with each passing second.
And then, a flash. With a sound like the sky tearing apart, lightning struck.
The lightning fell precisely on top of the Kraken, illuminating the monster in a brilliant, blinding flash.
The Kraken thrashed about, smelling like burning squid, its colossal form convulsing.
The man, who had been held by its leg, was nowhere to be seen, having been incinerated or blasted into oblivion by the sheer force of the strike.
The person who made the lightning strike walked steadily forward from behind, their footsteps calm and deliberate.
“Are you the one who reported it?”
It was Hwan.
Rank 6, famous as a civil servant hunter, known for his efficiency and his powerful lightning abilities.
“Yes. But the culprit is caught by the Kraken.”
I replied, gesturing towards the still-thrashing monster.
As the Kraken rampaged, Ban Eun-hye created a shield around us, a shimmering barrier of flames that deflected the spray and debris.
The ground shook as if there had been an earthquake, due to the Kraken’s leg striking the cliff hard, each impact resonating through the earth.
“He must be dead already.”
Hwan stated, his voice flat.
“That’s what I thought, too, right?”
Hwan hadn’t known the man was still caught, and with the Kraken thrashing like that, it was safe to assume he had almost no chance of survival.
My attempt to neatly catch him and drop him off in front of the Dungeon Management Bureau had been thwarted.
All my acting, my elaborate feigned distraction, had been for nothing.
Ban Eun-hye, hearing our conversation, seemed to think there was nothing holding him back now and immediately attacked.
The Kraken’s body was engulfed in hot flames and burned fiercely, its colossal form alight.
The Kraken’s legs thrashed even more violently than before, slamming hard against the shield, desperately trying to break free.
Ban Eun-hye’s attack continued relentlessly.
Fiery arrows densely materialized in the air and swiftly flew toward the Kraken, piercing its burning flesh.
While burning, the Kraken, riddled with arrow holes, gradually began to collapse, its immense structure weakening.
Finally, the Kraken’s body was entangled by the flaming whip Ban Eun-hye wielded, a magnificent display of his control over fire.
As he put force into the hand holding the whip and pulled it back, the entangled body was so compressed that it was cut off in the shape of the whip, the segments of its colossal form severing.
Before the Kraken died, I also contributed to the attack, a small gesture to ensure I received credit for the kill.
Although I knew it wouldn’t inflict much damage, I pulled out my gun from my inventory and shot at the Kraken, aiming for its exposed flesh.
Since it was a boss monster, even one hit would count towards the kill, a crucial detail for my personal progression.
Then, my skill would be unlocked here.
It would be even better if a spirit also appeared, a powerful ally to aid me in future battles.
As the Kraken’s body was completely severed, its life force ebbing away, a status window popped up in front of me, a familiar, welcome sight.
[<Quest> Kill the Dungeon Boss! Lv.3 10/10 Reward – 1 existing skill (random)]
[Congratulations! You have met the conditions for Quest Lv.3, and a skill has been randomly unlocked!]
[Skill ‘Necromancy’ has been unlocked.]
“Hup!”
Finally!
I was overjoyed, feeling like I could fly, at the status window announcing that the skill I had so desperately wished for had been unlocked.
This was the skill that would revolutionize my combat style, opening up a whole new realm of possibilities.
I almost shouted out loud to the empty air, the sheer elation threatening to escape me, so I quickly covered my mouth, restraining my excitement.
It starts now.
From now on!
My heart pounded at the thought of fighting using necromancy and meeting new spirits, of commanding an army of the undead.
As I watched the cliff we were standing on gradually turn into a path, the dungeon dissolving around us, another status window appeared before me, signaling further progression.
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