Solo Night Watch

Damn. I didn't see that coming.

Status ailments were one thing — you just cured them the second they hit. But scattering the party? That was something no recovery mage could fix.

I flicked on the flashlight built into my smartwatch ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and swept the beam around, taking a quick headcount.

Yoon Jia. Song Ara. Two cadets. One security guard.

The silver lining was that, unlike last time, the mix wasn't terrible. The problem was that we had no Hero among us.

Everyone stuck in the same pocket of darkness as me was glancing around, anxiety written all over their faces. I snapped myself into focus and turned to Yoon Jia.

"Instructor Yoon Jia, could you get in touch with the other two?"

"Yes!"

I left the call to her and immediately tried reaching the remaining cadets myself.

The result…

My group, and the group with Oh Jin-ho and Park Huiyeon — that was it. On top of that, once you pushed deep enough into a dungeon, communication with the outside world tended to cut out entirely.

Oh Jin-ho and Yoon Jia talked it through and settled on a plan.

"Understood."

Find the exit. Find our people. Simple enough.

"Yes, sir. Understood."

Oh Jin-ho signed off. Yoon Jia ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drifted over to me and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠murmured,

"Um… what should we do?"

On paper, the person who ought to be leading us was Yoon Jia — she was the instructor. But she wasn't built for command. She came straight to me without a second thought and asked what to do.

I glanced over the cadets and the guard, then spoke quietly.

"We move out."

Oh Jin-ho and Park Huiyeon took point, the cadets and security guard trailing behind. The two of them kept their voices low enough that no one in the rear could overhear.

"Lucky us. Everything went exactly the way we wanted."

"Yeah."

Unlike last year, Oh Jin-ho and Park Huiyeon had bumped the dungeon difficulty up a full tier. And just in case, they'd deliberately chosen a dungeon with incomplete intel. Most new dungeons were littered with gimmicks, and dispersion traps in particular went off all the time.

But this particular scatter effect wasn't a real dungeon mechanism at all.

Oh Jin-ho rolled a bead in his pocket and whispered,

"I doubt they ever imagined we'd be carrying something like this."

The orb in his pocket was an item that forcibly scrambled a dungeon's gimmicks. It couldn't create a specific trap on demand, but inside a dungeon it was more than useful enough. The reason the cadets had walked straight into a gimmick mid-exploration was, in the end, Oh Jin-ho himself.

Park Huiyeon asked quietly,

"Where'd you even get something like that? Black market?"

She wasn't wrong — it wasn't the kind of item you picked up off a shelf. But even Oh Jin-ho, who usually wore his thoughts on his sleeve, shut his mouth tight.

"…There's a place."

"Aww, so stingy…"

They weren't lovers, but years of working in lockstep had made them the kind of partners who shared certain secrets. Park Huiyeon laughed it off, and Oh Jin-ho smiled at her reaction before steering the conversation back to Sung Suho.

"Even if he's skilled and experienced, at the end of the day he's just support."

"And looking at how long the advance team took to get in and out, this won't wrap up in a single day."

Neither of them harbored any real personal grudge against Sung Suho. But both of them belonged to the Church, and both of them had a position to protect.

Cadets watching an assistant instructor flounder. Cadets watching Church Heroes clean up the mess. It was a cheap play and they both knew it — but if you wanted good public optics without looking like you were strong-arming anyone, this was the only real option.

"What if that assistant instructor… dies?"

"…"

Oh Jin-ho went quiet for a moment at Park Huiyeon's question, then flicked a glance back at the cadets and murmured,

"Then he just got unlucky."

"Oof. Cold."

"Besides…"

"…?"

"The cadets with us will be fine — that's a given. But the ones stuck with that assistant instructor? Something's going to go wrong. We might take a little heat for it, but for the Church it's a net positive."

"That assistant instructor. All that showing off, and now he's walking himself straight into a funeral."

Wearing perfectly ordinary expressions, the two of them led the cadets deeper into the dungeon.

We'd been exploring for hours in a place where you couldn't even tell night from day. The only reason I knew the time at all was the smartwatch.

Ten o'clock at night.

The cadets and the guard were already dead on their feet. The only one still holding up was me. When miasma built up in my body, I just handled it myself. The second it started stacking during a fight, I cleared the status ailment on the spot.

The cadets and Yoon Jia didn't have that luxury. Even Yoon Jia, who could purge status effects, was visibly worn down. She wasn't in the thick of combat, but she'd been burning through cleanses far more than usual, and it showed.

For Yoon Jia's sake more than the cadets', I decided we needed rest right now.

"Hold here for a bit."

"Yes…"

Not just Yoon Jia — the whole group dropped to the ground, spent. I raised Oh Jin-ho on the radio. His group, as it happened, was already prepping to sleep.

I acknowledged, then turned to the cadets.

"Pull the collapsible tents out of the packs and get set up to sleep."

"Yes. Uh… Teach?"

"Hm?"

Song Ara answered, then fidgeted and worked up the nerve to ask,

"If we need a night watch, I'll take the middle shift."

"…"

A kid who'd never stood a night watch in her life had just volunteered for the single worst slot on the roster. If you had to pull watch, the first and last shifts were the easy ones. The closer you got to the middle of the night, the higher the odds of drifting off into deep-space philosopher mode.

I smiled at her.

"You worked hard today. I know you're exhausted. Don't worry about the watch — just sleep."

"…Huh?"

The other cadets were staring at me with the same puzzled look. I said roughly the same thing to the ones still putting up tents.

"You all got hit with something unexpected today. No idea what tomorrow looks like, so rest easy tonight."

"Uh… Teach… then the night watch…"

I smiled at the security guard, who was watching me with a distinctly uneasy expression.

"I'll handle it somehow. Go inside and rest."

"B-but… then…"

Song Ara wasn't the only one starting to look around for cues. I hardened my face and pushed harder.

"Or… are you saying you don't feel like listening to your instructor?"

"Th-that's not it…"

"Then go inside and sleep. One more word out of any of you and it goes on your evaluation score at the academy."

"…Yes, sir."

Song Ara looked thoroughly put out, but she folded and started setting up the tent. Collapsible tents didn't take long. Once hers was up, she started eyeing me again.

I narrowed my eyes and jerked my chin toward the tent. She sighed and said,

"Um… if anything happens, please tell me right away."

I grinned.

"Isn't that what the night watch is for?"

"Hehe…"

Song Ara gave a bitter little laugh and ducked inside.

We had two tents. One for the men, one for the women. Ideally everyone would have their own, but if the single security guard had to haul that much extra gear, we'd lose food space — and that could get ugly fast. So this was the only real choice.

Women: Yoon Jia, Song Ara, Cadet One.

Men: me, the guard, Cadet Two.

I quietly beckoned the security guard over.

"…"

He looked about ready to jump out of his skin.

Anyone watching would think I was about to stick him with night watch.

…Do I?

Now that she mentioned it…

If someone called me over like that, I'd probably be cursing them out in my head too.

I leaned in and whispered so no one else could hear.

"I'm taking the whole night watch myself tonight."

"Uh…? A-are you sure you'll be all right?"

"I plan to cover it alone all the way through if I can. Just know that if my condition starts to slip, I might call you. That's all."

"…Yes, sir."

The guard still looked half-convinced I was joking, but he ducked into the tent anyway.

That left Yoon Jia.

"I… I could stay up with you…"

She wasn't the type to sleep easy in a situation like this either. She was far too conscious of other people's eyes for that. But I shut her down just as firmly.

"Sleep tonight. Especially you, Instructor Yoon — you worked yourself ragged today."

"But… Instructor Sung, you also…"

"Don't worry about me. I'm the one in charge, so the workload just goes up. That's all."

"Ah…"

Yoon Jia listened, bowed her head for a moment, then murmured under her breath,

"…You're nothing like Oppa."

"Pardon?"

"Ah — nothing…"

"Go on. Sleep. Stop fretting."

"Mm… okay. If anything happens, please wake me. Promise."

"I will."

I smiled and watched until Yoon Jia was fully inside the tent.

Three portable lanterns were set around the camp, throwing a clean circle of light. The tents were built for dungeon work, so the blackout material was solid — from outside, you couldn't tell who was moving or how many people were inside. And it would work the same the other way.

Armonia.

I checked the perimeter one more time, then spoke over the link.

Get Rena and Beatrice ready.

"Haaaaawn…"

One of the male cadets stretched with a huge yawn. The female cadet beside him started grumbling at the sight of it.

"I'm so sleepy… Why can't we just do one-person watches? Why are we doing it like this?"

Oh Jin-ho and Park Huiyeon's group had been looking for a place to camp as bedtime approached, and they'd found a decent spot — a cave corner where you only needed to watch one approach. A huge advantage.

The problem was that they were completely ignoring that advantage and posting two people on watch at a time.

And the worst part of all…

"Krrrngh…"

"Hss…"

…was that both Heroes had been exempted from night watch entirely.

"Ugh… The miasma's already killing me, and now I'm falling asleep on top of it…"

"What can you do? Honestly, those two handled everything. During the exploration we could at least keep up."

"True… Better tired than dead. Think the other group is okay?"

"That assistant instructor seems decent enough, but… he's still just an assistant instructor. Those kids are probably having a rough time."

As the cadet said, the ones in Sung Suho's group might be sleeping comfortably — but the combat fatigue they'd stacked up wasn't even in the same league. No matter how much Suho helped, he was ultimately limited to long-range support.

They were still talking when a voice drifted out of the tent.

"Shut up…"

"Hhk!"

"Eek!"

Both cadets jumped at Oh Jin-ho's irritated mumble and scrambled to apologize.

"S-sorry, sir!"

Oh Jin-ho didn't answer. Instead, through the sound of his breathing, he started muttering nonsense.

"Stupid archer bastard… always full of excuses…. Krrrngh…"

"…Whew."

The two of them exhaled in relief and opened their mouths again.

"Man, he's so composed when he's awake, but his sleep habits are wild."

"I used to think he was cool, but seeing him like that kind of ruins it…"

"I honestly expected Hero Park Huiyeon to talk in her sleep and snore. Turns out she sleeps like a total angel."

As the male cadet said, Park Huiyeon was barely making a sound.

"Hss…"

They stared toward the tent for a while, then turned their attention back to the front for watch duty.

That was when it happened.

Rustle…

"Hhk!"

"Wh-what? What is it? Something there?"

The female cadet's startled cry made the male cadet jump up with her, weapon already in hand. He hesitated over whether to wake the others and locked his eyes on the dark ahead — but nothing moved in the blackness.

"What? Did you actually see something?"

"I… s-something went past…"

"Hold position. Be ready to wake them."

"Okay."

The female cadet was on her feet too, set and ready. Once he'd checked her stance, the male cadet took a flashlight and carefully stepped into the dark. After a few sweeps, he came back and grumbled,

"Come on… there's nothing out there."

"No, but… I swear I saw something…"

"Maybe… a ghost?"

"D-don't say stuff like that…"

"The grudges of every Hero who's ever died in a dungeon…"

"Ah, damn it! St-stop it…"

The male cadet chuckled under his breath and kept ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠needling her.

I stretched, humming under my breath.

Perfect. Let's go.