“Looks like you’re living the good life, huh?”
Ban Eun-hyeol sneered, looking at the iced latte in Chae Yu-hwan’s hand.
Chae Yu-hwan, noticing our hostility, flinched and surveyed his surroundings.
We couldn’t make a scene.
I nudged Han Ji-bin, who was standing next to me, and whispered into her ear.
“I think we need to get out first.”
Han Ji-bin then looked at Ban Eun-hyeol with a serious expression, then quickly grabbed Ji Kang-han’s arm, twisting it, and whispered.
“Hey, hey, she’s really pissed off!”
At Han Ji-bin’s words, Ji Kang-han quickly glanced at Ban Eun-hyeol, then muttered with an incredibly serious expression and voice.
“No one can stop her when she’s angry.”
Come to think of it, Eun Ba-da also had a serious expression, no less so than Han Ji-bin and Ji Kang-han.
Han Ji-bin grabbed my shoulders and looked me in the eye, saying seriously,
“When Eun-hyeol gets angry, truly no one can stop her. You’re the only one here who can stop her.”
No one can stop her, huh…?
In my bewildered state, I wanted to ask why they thought I could stop her, and what they would do if she rampaged uncontrollably just because she was angry.
“No, wait!”
But Han Ji-bin simply pushed my back towards Ban Eun-hyeol.
I found myself standing next to Ban Eun-hyeol, who was exuding a truly chilling aura, as if no one could dare touch her.
I briefly looked up at her face, which held a crooked smile.
Her sharp eyes, staring down at Chae Yu-hwan, even contained a hint of murderous intent.
‘I don’t think I can stop her with my current strength, let alone before I was possessed…?’
Despite that, Chae Yu-hwan, with his gutsy spirit, didn’t even sit down, standing firm and facing Ban Eun-hyeol.
It seemed he wasn’t just aimlessly causing trouble at Iljin Sang-go, where Do Yi-hyeon was firmly established.
He certainly seemed like an unusual fellow.
However, Chae Yu-hwan couldn’t even attempt any resistance against Ban Eun-hyeol.
There was a significant gap between an awakened person and a non-awakened person, but there was also such a power disparity that it wasn’t even a fair fight to begin with.
It often happened that awakened individuals would fight non-awakened ones without using their full power.
But for Ban Eun-hyeol, subduing Chae Yu-hwan without using her full power was as easy as pie.
Chae Yu-hwan seemed to know this, as he didn’t make any hasty moves, merely staring wide-eyed.
“Damn it!”
Surprisingly, Chae Yu-hwan, who I thought would just keep standing still, moved first.
It seemed he decided to use a different strategy since force wouldn’t work.
He threw the iced latte he was holding at Ban Eun-hyeol, then jumped onto the table, trying to escape past us, who were blocking his way.
But there was no way he could escape from Ban Eun-hyeol’s grasp by doing that.
“Aargh!”
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Ban Eun-hyeol struck Chae Yu-hwan’s leg hard, making him fall off the table.
Chae Yu-hwan tumbled forward with a loud crash, and just as he seemed about to get up, he suddenly clutched his leg, his face contorted in pain.
“Ack! My leg! A-an awakened person is attacking a non-awakened person!”
“Look at that bastard, purposely stuttering?”
Yeon Ha-yeon, looking at Chae Yu-hwan with a sneer of amusement, chuckled and said.
She was laughing, but her aura was as chilling as Ban Eun-hyeol’s.
Eun Ba-da and Han Ji-bin, who had friendly images, were asking for the cafe customers’ understanding, while Ji Kang-han and Ban Eun-hyeol stood completely blocking Chae Yu-hwan’s front and back.
As I and Yeon Ha-yeon also joined, surrounding him from all sides, his face, which had been contorted in pain, instantly hardened.
He rolled his eyes, looking at us, seemingly pondering what trick to use to escape.
Then, Ban Eun-hyeol clenched her fist, pressing it into her other hand with a cracking sound, and took a step forward.
Chae Yu-hwan scrambled to his feet to avoid her.
Ban Eun-hyeol casually placed her hand on his shoulder and gently pressed down on it.
“You gotta pay back what you got, twofold. Don’t you think?”
I calmly replied to the sudden question directed at me.
“Of course. Let’s take her outside and take care of it.”
As I said that, I grabbed Ban Eun-hyeol’s wrist and pointed my index finger towards the back door of the cafe.
The entrance was already practically blocked by students and existing cafe customers who had heard that the Four Heavenly Kings and Yeon Ha-yeon were here.
In such a situation, the only way to quietly take Chae Yu-hwan out was through the back door.
Because Han Ji-bin and Ji Kang-han had said, ‘No one can stop her when she’s angry!’, I was worried if Ban Eun-hyeol would meekly listen to me.
But surprisingly, Ban Eun-hyeol, whom no one could supposedly stop, obediently nodded and dragged Chae Yu-hwan towards the back door.
The cafe was filled with the screams of excited female students, enthralled by Ban Eun-hyeol’s rough demeanor.
It was then.
“Kyaaaaak!”
The excited screams, which had clearly been shouts of enthusiasm, instantly turned into screams of terror.
Noticing the change in the air’s flow, we quickly looked around the cafe.
The cafe was bustling with students who had rushed in to see the Four Heavenly Kings and Ban Eun-hyeol, along with the regular customers.
Soon after, a status window appeared, announcing the appearance of a sudden gate before our eyes.
[You have entered the dungeon.]
[Rank: A]
[Good luck! ^_^]
With that last, seemingly teasing phrase, which felt like an eternity since I’d seen it, the surrounding scenery changed dramatically, and a heavy silence fell.
“A-rank?”
“Ah, of all times.”
“Guys… too many people got caught up in this. First, let’s protect them and then think about how to clear it.”
“Everyone, calm down! We’ll make sure you all get out safely!”
Ji Kang-han frowned, seeing the dungeon’s rank, while Ban Eun-hyeol roughly tossed Chae Yu-hwan aside by the scruff of his neck and ran a hand through her hair.
Eun Ba-da calmly spoke to the visible crowd of people, and Han Ji-bin had already started calming them down.
Despite the sudden gate, the Four Heavenly Kings remained composed, each fulfilling their roles. Yeon Ha-yeon silently assessed the dungeon’s interior.
The dungeon was a common, ordinary cave type.
The area we were in seemed to be the center of the cave, with a spacious interior, a high ceiling, and six distinct paths branching off the rounded inner walls.
I calmed my pounding heart and surveyed each path.
‘Is there a way back to my original dimension?’
This was the first A-rank gate since being possessed, a high-grade one, a cave-type dungeon, and crossroads.
It closely resembled the internal structure of the S-rank gate that appeared when I was possessed.
The probability was low, but a glimmer of hope unexpectedly emerged.
However, seeing the completely chaotic interior of the cave, I quickly snapped back to reality.
The murmurs and cries of people in a panic could be heard everywhere.
Many were relieved that the Four Heavenly Kings and Yeon Ha-yeon were caught up in this too, but a fair number were terrified by the fact that it was an A-rank gate, which had never appeared before.
Eun Ba-da, with her gentle leadership, gathered these people together and cast a large shield around them.
A thin, blue film of water protected the people.
Chae Yu-hwan, as if he hadn’t fearlessly confronted Ban Eun-hyeol moments ago, was now gasping for breath amongst the crowd.
Even if he had the guts to face an S-rank awakened, getting caught in a dungeon seemed to be terrifying.
Grrrrr-
A beast-like roar came from the direction of the crossroads, drawing everyone’s attention.
Sensing something ominous, everyone stood alert, watching the paths.
Something shot out from the gloomy depths at a terrifying speed, charging towards us.
“It’s an undead!”
Han Ji-bin, who was closest to the crossroads, shouted, blocking the first one that burst out.
As if on cue, undead poured out simultaneously from all six paths.
Did the undead also get influenced by the country where the gate appeared?
Unlike the slow undead commonly seen in Hollywood movies, these were disturbingly fast, like the zombies in Korean films.
“Tch, this is annoying.”
Yeon Ha-yeon grumbled and moved closer to me.
She looked outwardly relaxed, but the tension was palpable.
Among monsters, the undead were particularly tricky to kill. Unless their heads were severed, they wouldn’t die, no matter how much damage their bodies took, and would continue attacking.
But with their speed, the sheer number of undead, and unfortunately, the large number of people caught in the dungeon, there were countless things to worry about.
Moreover, as monsters from an A-rank dungeon, severing their heads was no easy feat.
The Four Heavenly Kings and Yeon Ha-yeon, experiencing an A-rank dungeon for the first time, seemed quite overwhelmed.
The difficulty of the dungeon had increased along with my rank, making it harder to clear.
“You don’t see Yeon Hyeong-gwang, do you?”
“She got a call before coming to the cafe and left.”
In a situation where even one awakened person was sorely missed, Yeon Hyeong-gwang’s absence was keenly felt.
While we were walking and discussing how to get revenge on Chae Yu-hwan, Yeon Hyeong-gwang had received a call from a friend and left early.
Yeon Ha-yeon, who had been looking around for her sibling, shrugged her shoulders regretfully at my words and immediately focused on the undead in front of her.
“Kyaaaak! Get—get away!”
“Is the shield going to break, this?!”
“They’re the Four Heavenly Kings! Surely it won’t break?”
“B-but it’s an A-rank dungeon! The Four Heavenly Kings seem to be struggling! Aren’t we all going to die?!”
Ban Eun-hyeol set fire to all the undead surrounding us, but it wasn’t enough.
Since they were undead, if their heads weren’t directly struck, they would just charge at us while on fire, putting us at a disadvantage.
“Kyaaaaak! They’re coming at us, on fire!”
Even with the Four Heavenly Kings protecting them, people started screaming in terror at the undead that seemed like they would break through the shield any moment.
No matter how much Eun Ba-da assured them, it seemed their words weren’t reaching their ears.
Fire, water, earth, and wind couldn’t strike the undead’s heads.
Looking at the struggling Four Heavenly Kings and Yeon Ha-yeon, and the screaming people, I made a decision.
“Come out.”