Chapter 2
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 2
Chapter Title: Boss Down, Let's Begin (2)
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“Backline healer, what are you doing? We’re a party—hurry up and heal him!”
The raid leader shouted at the frozen Ha Yeonsi. She approached on trembling legs before collapsing to her knees.
“Gonghyeok oppa. Why did you go down here? What about the kids?”
Gonghyeok and Yeonsi were the eldest siblings at the orphanage. After awakening as hunters, they had used their earnings to keep the place running and devoted themselves to caring for the children.
Gonghyeok had a mediocre avatar and wasn’t exactly the most dependable big brother, but he was the only companion who had always joined her on these terrifying raids.
With the orphanage director dragged away to Dungeon Babel, only the pitiful orphans remained. Among them, she couldn’t simply let Gonghyeok—the one who had always tried to play the big brother to everyone—die.
Her face deathly pale and her hands trembling, Ha Yeonsi chanted the spell over and over.
“F-Flesh Mending Flower, Flesh Mending Flower, come on!”
Dozens of flesh-colored flowers bloomed from her hands, wrapping themselves around Gonghyeok’s legs.
The flowers glowed as torn flesh knitted itself back together and shattered bones slowly realigned.
Her low rank meant that a full recovery would take twelve hours. But being able to patch up legs that had been shattered into dozens of pieces with only a few casts? That was the advantage of a unique skill.
“Gonghyeok oppa. Please get up. Please!”
Tears splashed onto Gonghyeok’s face as she clutched her chest and sobbed.
Gonghyeok placed a hand against his chest and slowly sat up, then rested his hand against his jaw.
“Don’t cry, Yeonsi.”
Yeonsi kept her face buried against his chest. She clearly didn’t want him to see the tear- and snot-streaked mess she had become.
As Gonghyeok quietly stroked her hair, raid leader Park Juntae approached.
“Come on now. Save the lovey-dovey stuff for when you get home.”
Clap, clap, clap.
Park Juntae clapped his hands to draw everyone’s attention.
“The casualties and corpses have been dealt with. Time to divide the loot. Here’s your agreed-upon share.”
Park Juntae shoved roughly forty percent of the pile of coins and material items toward them.
There were eighty-two purple coins, along with various materials.
The roughly fifty coins and materials obtained from the boss fight had been automatically distributed through the contribution system, so no one could touch them. The rest had come from clearing the dungeon’s trash mobs.
But Gonghyeok noticed one problem.
“You. You skimmed the skill coin.”
Skill coins and certain items weren’t included in the automatic distribution. It was almost as though the system had been designed to make parties fight over them.
The atmosphere soured instantly.
Everyone knew why. Skill coins were worth far more than ordinary coins or materials.
That was why, even after keeping all the boss loot for himself, Park Juntae had handed over the rest fairly. It meant he intended to keep the skill coin for himself or sell it later, leaving no room for argument.
One-Strike Firework was the lowest-tier strike skill, but it was still worth at least 150 purple coins.
Divided among the remaining nine people, that would amount to roughly fifteen coins each. It might sound insignificant, but increasing a stat by just one point cost ten coins.
“No, come on. That’s too much, even for you. You got carried all the way to the boss room. We got wiped out, and then you swoop in and take everything.”
“The skill’s nothing special. That avatar, though? Pretty solid. Too bad the personality is garbage.”
The other hunters grumbled, clearly warning Gonghyeok to back off and leave.
“Enough. She pulled her weight and then some. She has every right to claim what dropped from the boss.”
Park Juntae cleared his throat and looked toward Gonghyeok.
“We’ll throw in another ten percent in coins. The skill coin would be safer sold through our Bronze Giant raid group. It’s dangerous for kids like you to keep something like that.”
“Is there a dog barking in your guts or something? Why’s all this bullshit coming out of your mouth, old man?”
As Gonghyeok casually picked at his ear, one of the hunters spat out a curse.
“This prick has been talking down to us the whole time! Bronze Giant Juntae hyung is your buddy? I’ll smash your skull right—”
“Ho ho ho, Jang. Take it easy. I’m fine. You’re quite brave yourself... mouthing off to the guy who just soloed a minotaur.”
“No, even so, that bloody runt has no manners...”
Manners?
Gonghyeok had forgotten how to count his own age after more than two hundred loops.
Calling someone an “old man” instead of “pathetic trash” was about as much social grace as he had managed to scrape together after countless regressions.
Around his third loop, he had grown fed up with everything—titles, honorifics, polite speech—and started mouthing off to everyone, which led to endless fights. After that, he had at least made a minimal effort to behave.
Watching the scene unfold, Yeonsi quietly whispered to Gonghyeok.
‘Oppa, what’s gotten into you all of a sudden?’
‘Nothing. I’m just watching.’
‘...Oppa?’
His drastically changed demeanor made Ha Yeonsi uneasy.
“Ahem. Sorry about that, young folks. I got greedy without thinking. They say the sight of treasure can stir the heart... Here’s the skill coin.”
When Park Juntae handed it over without further fuss, Ha Yeonsi politely accepted it and stored it in her inventory.
Gonghyeok gathered up the rest of their spoils.
A skinny man from the corner, his face twisted as though he had eaten something foul, suddenly stepped forward.
“Hey. Park Juntae. Who said you could hand that out? Do you think this is your raid group just because a few of your people tagged along?”
“Whoa, Sangmin. Calm down. We’ll call these kids tomorrow and run it again. It’ll be safer if we clear the dungeon a few more times, right? Isn’t that right, Miss Ha Yeonsi?”
“Huh? Oh, y-yes. Probably...”
Kraaak—ptoo!
Even after hearing her answer, Sangmin remained dissatisfied. He spat on the ground and glared at them.
“Park Juntae. You kept bragging earlier about how your Bronze Giant group handled things, too. Keep it up, and someone’s going to cave your skull in with a pickaxe for real.
“And you brats. Don’t take this world lightly. You never know when you’ll end up dead in a ditch. All over some petty greed. An item or a coin goes missing, and the next day you find bodies floating in the Han River. Happens all the time.”
With Sangmin’s ugly rant, the contentious division of the loot finally came to an end.
The hunters exited the dungeon and disbanded the raid at Seoul Station.
“Tch. That gold-spoon avatar duo strolling off together. How’s anyone supposed to stomach that?”
“Even in the final dungeon, they’ll just keep everything between the two of them.”
Yeonsi sighed at the malicious comments following them.
“Oppa, what are we going to do tomorrow? Rumors like this are going to spread.”
“It’s fine. We won’t be raiding with those guys anymore anyway. The two of us are enough.”
“Even after you just soloed that minotaur...”
Gonghyeok didn’t wait for her to finish. He ducked into a nearby convenience store, bought a pack of Camel cigarettes, and lit one.
Flick—flick flick—
‘Can’t even compare to the crap rolled by Babel’s hunters. Unless it’s been alchemized, anyway.’
As Gonghyeok puffed away, Ha Yeonsi looked at him in confusion.
“Oppa, you never smoked before, did you? Even back then... When did you start...?”
“...Yeonsi.”
Gonghyeok exhaled a plume of smoke toward the sky before stepping closer to her.
“The two of us are enough for raids. Don’t worry about the trash strutting around pretending to be hunters. They’re nothing but scraps who can’t even reach the final dungeon.”
He crouched down to meet her eyes, his voice flat.
“And don’t be afraid of the monsters. Those monsters are the ones being hunted by the likes of that trash. Have you ever seen a butcher afraid to dress meat, bawling like a baby?”
“Y-yes...”
Ha Yeonsi shrank back, chilled by his hollow gaze and emotionless tone.
“Good. Yeonsi is still a good girl this time, too.”
“This time?”
When she questioned his strange choice of words, Gonghyeok ruffled her soft hair.
“It means you’re still lovable, even after I kill you ten times.”
“W-what? Oppa, isn’t this moving way too fast? What are you even talking about?!”
Watching her blush and back away, Gonghyeok pondered.
‘When should I kill her this time?’
Last loop, killing her too soon had made the late game a living hell. He would be better off choosing the timing carefully this time.
He remembered.
Even after finally... defeating the Demon King and saving the world.
The hunters, who could only bring about the world’s destruction in turn.
Ju Gonghyeok had to carry that horrific fate on his back and keep moving forward.