Chapter 83
Chapter 83
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 83
Chapter Title: The Healer Skeleton
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Bonechili let out a low “Mm.”
When I opened my eyes, we were already outside the dungeon.
We stood on the central ridgeline of Todang Mountain, where Incheon’s Geokdan district sprawled into view.
The familiar sky strode into sight.
“Ugh……”
“Groan.”
Around me, the intermittent groans of the Black Sword members echoed.
Kim Jin-soo, Kang Yu-jeong, Kang Ji-hoo.
Everyone had survived.
We’d made it out alive from that horrifying immortal legion.
“Haha.”
The deputy team leader, Kang Ji-hoo, laughed.
“Hahaha, did we really make it? For real?”
“Hic, thank goodness. Really.”
Tears finally welled up in Kang Yu-jeong’s eyes.
“I thought we were all done for because of me……”
The pain came second.
The psychological burden of thinking her mistake might kill everyone must have been immense.
“Skeleton King.”
A voice thick with exhaustion came from beside me.
It was Black Sword, Lee Seon-ah.
Right.
She truly was a ranker.
Without her, I would’ve died, and without me, she wouldn’t have cleared the dungeon.
We owed each other our lives.
Anyway.
“Hmm, Black Sword……?”
“……?”
“To be honest, up to the lord, it was kinda tolerable……?”
“Yes?”
Lee Seon-ah tilted her head.
I continued.
“But ‘King’ as a title? It really makes my toes curl. Ugh, goosebumps.”
King!
Wang, the sovereign!
The quintessential word for a nation’s monarch.
It felt like a title you had to earn by hitting number one on the rankings.
“I only call people with official titles by those titles. King.”
“……For real?”
Come to think of it, yeah.
I’d never heard a single real name from Lee Seon-ah’s mouth.
She called the Five Stars of Seoul by their titles, and she’d never once called me ‘Joo Dong-hoon.’
“Why?”
“Habit, I guess? The details are a secret.”
“……?”
What’s with her.
Didn’t she hate being called ‘guild master’ herself?
“Anyway, thanks to you, Skeleton King, we survived. It was an incredible battle—one of the best in my life.”
“Haha, exactly! You were amazing. That skeleton legion that blanketed the world……”
The deputy team leader gave a thumbs-up.
“Thank you.”
“We won’t forget this favor.”
The Black Sword members approached and bowed their heads.
Kang Yu-jeong, even having lost an arm, showed her unyielding spirit without losing composure.
“……Well, I too.”
I bowed to them.
“Thank you.”
Whatever the intentions.
In the end, it was a dungeon for me.
A dungeon that tested me, and in the end, it was I who awakened.
In contrast, Lee Seon-ah had used her innate energy.
And Kang Yu-jeong had lost an arm.
“……”
Just imagining how it felt for a swordswoman, not just any hunter, to lose an arm……
I couldn’t even fathom it.
As if reading my emotions, the mood sank.
[Clear rewards have arrived!]
[Please check your rewards!]
‘Right, rewards!’
I perked up.
Most of the rewards were stat boosts for my bones.
Overall stats had risen, and a few skills had leveled up.
But the best reward by far was.
‘Bonechili’s seal finally breaking.’
I instinctively opened Bonechili’s status window.
[Name: Bone 7]
[Vitality: 200/200]
[Unique Ability: Skeleton Knight]
[Class: Healer]
[Grade: A]
[Strength: 40] [Agility: 40] [Vitality: 40] [Mana: 40] [Technique: 40]
[Possessed Skills]
-‘Intermediate Healing’(Lv.1)
-‘Recovery’(Lv.Max)
-‘Skeleton Summon’(Lv.Max)
“……?!”
My eyes darted across the info.
‘Healing? Recovery? Healer class?’
I couldn’t help but widen my eyes.
A healer’s unique ability was even rarer than a necromancer’s.
I’d never seen one in all my dungeon runs—that proved it.
‘An undead healer……’
Didn’t healing usually harm undead instead?
‘Healing’ had that holy vibe, opposite to undead……
‘Plus.’
I didn’t even need a healer.
My skeletons could recover anytime as long as they had vitality.
‘But right now.’
Just this once, I might need one.
[Skill: Intermediate Healing]
[Level: 1]
[Description: Rapidly restores status.]
[Effect 1: Seals wounds, stops bleeding, and reduces inflammation.]
[Effect 2: For skeletons, aligns and restores bones.]
[Effect 3: Consumes 10 vitality.]
‘Whoa.’
From effects 1 and 2.
It was a special skill that worked on hunters and skeletons alike.
‘Next, Recovery?’
[Skill: Recovery]
[Level: Max]
[Description: Reverts physical state to previous condition.]
[Effect 1: Reverts body to 24 hours prior. Cannot be used on the already dead.]
[Effect 2: Reuse cooldown - 30 days.]
[Effect 3: Consumes 50 vitality.]
“Wow!”
My tightly shut lips parted for the first time.
An exclamation slipped out automatically.
‘This is straight-up broken?’
I thought a healer would just do basic recovery at best.
‘Insane.’
But this was beyond that.
Straight-up insane.
‘Reverts body to the past……’
Meaning, depending on the situation, it could fully heal someone on the brink of death.
For chronic illnesses.
Or…… couldn’t heal injuries over a day old.
‘But in combat, it’s totally busted.’
With this one skill alone, every guild in the country would beg for me.
Just following a ranker around, I could be their life battery.
Even with the month-long cooldown penalty.
It made the penalty irrelevant with its power.
“……?”
The silence around me lingered.
My sudden exclamation had everyone staring curiously.
“What’s up, King?”
“Did something come to mind?”
Yeah, they’d be curious.
But no rush.
I’d explain slowly.
I grinned at her, still clutching her arm.
“Kang Yu-jeong?”
“Yes?”
She blinked in confusion.
“Mind if I see your arm for a sec?”
From my memory.
It hadn’t even been 24 hours since she was injured.
* * *
‘Arm……’
Kang Yu-jeong stared blankly at the ground.
What emotion was this?
Honestly, she didn’t know.
Sad, unbelievable, yet more calm than expected.
Her feelings tangled like a broken machine.
‘……To think I’d be the protagonist in those dungeon accident news stories.’
Chills ran down her spine.
The cold, sharp blade of the death knight slicing her shoulder.
That sensation and pain she never wanted to recall again.
Her arm still throbbed.
‘Life as a one-armed woman.’
No matter how positively she thought, it suffocated her.
Daily inconveniences aside, no arm meant poor balance.
Gait, footwork, swordsmanship—all unnatural.
Awkward.
She was barely A-rank with two good arms.
How much more effort for S-rank, or beyond to ranker?
Was it even possible?
“……”
She despaired.
She’d probably have to quit hunting.
Leave the Heavenly Demon God Church too.
Maybe become a trainer.
At least as an A-rank, she could make a living.
Lost in such thoughts.
“Kang Yu-jeong?”
Joo Dong-hoon called her.
‘Joo Dong-hoon.’
At first, hearing B-rank, she thought he was just for breaking gimmicks.
But he was no ordinary B-rank.
‘B-rank my ass……’
No matter how she thought, at least S-rank.
Honestly, even ranker seemed believable.
Calm judgment, split-second responses.
Commanding that skeleton legion that flooded the world like a tsunami.
‘How’s that B-rank…… It’s ridiculous.’
She shook her head and replied.
“Yes.”
“Mind if I see your arm for a sec?”
“My arm?”
Arm?
Left or right……
Her left was already gone……
But why?
Seeing his smile and confident expression stirred an inexplicable feeling.
‘Miracle.’
He was someone who showed miracles.
“Why the arm?”
With a glimmer of hope, Kang Yu-jeong slowly approached him.
She gave him a look asking what to do next.
Then.
Whoosh!
He swung his staff.
Crack-crack!
A white skeleton rose from the ground.
That skeleton held a staff too.
Joo Dong-hoon looked down at it and said.
“Bonechili, heal.”
Creak!
The skeleton’s staff slowly rose and touched! her shoulder.
“Heal?”
The deputy team leader gasped.
“Did you say heal, King?”
Even the ranker team leader gaped.
Kang Yu-jeong stared at her arm in disbelief.
‘A skeleton that heals? The world……’
If there was a show like [Is There a Hunter Like This in the World?], he’d be top pick.
Hummm!
Then, pure white light poured from the skeleton’s staff, gently enveloping her left arm.
The throbbing pain vanished, the blood fully clotted.
As time passed, fresh flesh budded on the red stump.
‘But.’
That was it.
A missing arm couldn’t regrow.
Yeah, that’d be an absurd miracle.
“Hmm, heal won’t cut it.”
A faint sigh escaped Joo Dong-hoon’s lips.
Was he disappointed too?
‘Of course.’
But it was fine.
This alone was a huge blessing.
Her life saved, pain gone!
“I’m……”
Kang Yu-jeong bit her lip.
“Fine. Really.”
She bowed again.
“It’s just a dungeon accident many hunters face…… Saving our lives, our team returning alive—that’s enough for me. I mean it.”
Her tone was calm and steady.
“Just caring like this is……”
“Hold on. One more to go.”
He grinned.
Then shouted.
“Recovery!”
That moment.
At Joo Dong-hoon’s word.
The light from the skeleton’s staff grew whiter.
Holier.
Swish!
Mystical energy surged toward her arm.
A message popped up.
[Skill ‘Recovery’ touches your body.]
[Your physical state reverts to 24 hours ago.]
“Whoa?”
The flooding energy began reshaping Kang Yu-jeong’s body.
Time flowed backward.
Blood flowed again on the healed arm.
Finally, bones began to sprout.
Flesh bloomed over them, veins wrapped, nerves formed……
As if.
From the beginning.
It had always been there.
“Ahh……”
Her vivid arm regrew.
Sensations returned to the left arm she couldn’t feel.
She clenched and unclenched her fist.
It was definitely her arm.
“What…… is……”
Stunned, Kang Yu-jeong’s mouth fell open.
She looked up at Joo Dong-hoon with trembling eyes.
The Black Sword members around her were all aghast.
A god couldn’t even do this.
How could a severed arm be restored!
“It’s a new skill I got this time, Recovery. Glad it worked.”
“……”
Kang Yu-jeong couldn’t speak.
Emotions surged, tears falling instead.
‘Is this real?’
‘Did my arm really regenerate?’
‘Can I fight again?’
If so.
He was her benefactor.
Not just of life, but something greater.
The one who saved her dream.
“Truly, truly…… thank you.”
That day.
Kang Yu-jeong tasted miracles twice.