Chapter 123
Chapter 123
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 123
Chapter Title: Nuclear Bunker (1)
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The slope, already steep, rose at an angle close to a sheer cliff.
That said, it wasn’t quite a wall.
To call it a wall, wouldn’t it have to be a perfect ninety-degree vertical drop? This was maybe around seventy degrees? Either way, it was an unstable setup that instilled unease in anyone who looked at it.
Clinging awkwardly to that slanted incline was a single iron door, thick with rust blooming like moss in vivid red patches.
‘If I snapped a photo and posted it online, I could spin up a creepy urban legend in no time.’
This alone was plenty of material for a ghost story. But adding to that was the inscription on the iron door.
If you don’t open it, a million will die. If you open it, one will die.
“At this point, it just feels kinda childish, doesn’t it?”
I turned my head for a moment to look at Gu Jin-cheol.
“It wasn’t here before.”
“Then the chairman must’ve written it.”
Plus one to Cheongho’s survival score.
Minus one to Cheongho’s intact score.
“Couldn’t someone else have written it?”
“In Tan-hyeon...? You remember how we even got the car this far, right?”
It wouldn’t have been possible without Jang Hyun-deok.
“It wasn’t Tan-hyeon from the start...”
-G’hyaaaaaaa!!!!
-G’hyaaaakkk!!!!
“Gah!? What the hell is that?”
Jang Hyun-deok pointed wildly at some vague spot in the sky and screamed. Not that direction... Actually, telling him the exact spot might make him faint. I calmed Achilles, who was about to bolt, and said to Jang Hyun-deok,
“Maybe a crow?”
“A crow? What crow makes a sound that creepy!?”
Gu Jin-cheol didn’t add much, but his face had gone pale, his body trembling noticeably.
‘Pretty ominous omen, huh?’
Just the sound alone had enough presence to mess with a person’s mind. I gazed up at the shadow perched on the branch above.
The moment my eyes reached it, that ‘black thing’ vanished behind the tree with a sluggish motion.
A crow? A shadow?
No, it was just a ‘black thing.’ Right now, it existed only as an indescribable presence, but who knew what it might become later.
-G’hyaaaaaaa!!!!
Ah, that bastard. So damn noisy.
“Jil-omok... Is that it?”
“What?”
“That, uh, Mr. Cheongho? The Park guy?”
“Exactly.”
“Oh, got it.”
“Why the dramatic buildup?”
“It’s not this neighborhood, but there was this Park... I knew his name once, what was it? Anyway, he was scouting for a prime burial spot and couldn’t find one.”
“You?”
“Nah, not me. It was Jeon-seol.”
“Ah, Jeon-seol.”
“So, the guy was about to give up when...”
“When?”
“He heard a crow cawing and stopped. Turned out that spot was a killer feng shui site.”
Come to think of it, this guy had dropped lines like this before.
The amazing part was, every time he rambled like this, something huge went down.
“Isn’t that the Ogeum-ri story?”
Gu Jin-cheol suddenly chimed in.
“Oh, is it?”
“Mr. Jang, where’s Ogeum-ri?”
“A neighborhood in the corner of Tan-hyeon. Northwest from here, quite a ways.”
“So, crows...? Prime burial spots? You trying to say we came to find our graves?”
“Nah, just popped into my head. You hear all kinds of crap driving a cab.”
“Hmm... Like last time, just popped up?”
“What?”
“You told that legend before about the heavenly nymph dancing over in Tan-hyeon.”
“Did I say that?”
Jang Hyun-deok looked utterly baffled.
This feels ominous somehow.
“Let’s drop it. Better to chat about this later when we’re comfy.”
For now, let’s head in.
“I’ll open it.”
“No. Step back a sec.”
[Trap Detection]
[Mana Detection]
[Lifeform Detection]
[Invisibility Detection]
“Ugh. What’s this?”
A flood of info poured into my head all at once, giving me a mild dizzy spell.
‘The mana density inside is way too high.’
“Whatever it is, it’s no joke.”
“What? Something weird in there?”
“Not just weird.”
“Eh?”
“Honestly, it’s less like Tan-hyeon expanded and messed up what’s below, and more like whatever’s below made Tan-hyeon expand.”
“You’re just trying to scare me, right?”
“Shut it for a bit. Not sure yet. Gotta open it to know.”
“There are security measures inside. Opening it carelessly is dangerous.”
“I know.”
Less security measures, more traps.
Unauthorized touch sets off blaring alarms, drops barricades, starts shooting guns out of nowhere, and there’s even a section with high-voltage lines that insane Cheongho rigged—mess it up and you’re fried.
I stretched my hand toward the doorframe and activated a spell.
[Gremlin’s Scream]
[Spell Enhancement: Increased Range]
Ziiiiing!!
The iron door hummed and vibrated, repelling the magical sound waves.
“Whoa?”
“The chairman invested a fortune adding all sorts of devices. Some were specifically to keep out wizards.”
Gu Jin-cheol wore a faintly proud expression. Oh, really now?
[Discernment]
Adds an artifact’s effects to detection and analysis spells. Perfect timing—I’ve got just the artifact for this.
[L-Grade Accessory ‘Mask of Carcosa’s’ unique function, ‘Madman’s Handiwork,’ activates.
// Madman’s Handiwork: Attempt to unlock an artifact’s hidden abilities or modify it to grant new ones.]
Golden-glowing mana threads extended from the mask.
Clear enough for even non-mana sensitives to see.
Dozens of threads touched the door and instantly burrowed in at tremendous speed. They branched out into hundreds, thousands, forming a complex circuit diagram.
The internal structure, invisible to the naked eye or basic senses, became crystal clear, like I could touch it.
‘Silver plating under the iron door. Consecrated silver, too. Where’d he get this stuff?’
And electrical wiring threading complexly between the iron and silver. Touch it blind and you’d get zapped. But it wasn’t just for shocks.
High-voltage electricity mimics mana properties to some degree.
The cheapest barrier non-mages could make. Nah, quality juice here? Internal generator powered by mana stones? Solid enough—low-tier wizards couldn’t breach it.
‘Was gonna blast it with lightning to overload, but too nice to smash.’
No need to destroy anyway. I infused the probing threads with new properties for analysis.
[Mechanism Erosion]
Kriiiik.
A barrier against wizards? Just crude handiwork from those who couldn’t cast. Didn’t destroy it—infiltrated the structure and rewrote it from within.
‘And since I’m in...’
Pzzzzzt!!
Deeper now. Alarm? Silenced. Intruder-triggered barricade? Stay put. Motion-sensing turret? You’re hazardous—blow yourself up.
Boom!
Finally, unlocked the door’s mechanism.
Kriiiik, click.
Added physical force to the threads and yanked the door open.
Kreeeeak.
The massive iron door swung open with a heavy groan.
“Let’s go in.”
“No way, wizard!”
“What, over this?”
“You can’t go in yet! I said there are traps inside!”
Why is this idiot such a massive idiot?
No, my fault for dragging Jang Hyun-deok this far.
“All cleared.”
“Huh? For real?”
“Yeah.”
“Amazing... They said even a wizard couldn’t breach the defenses.”
Good thing I brought Gu Jin-cheol. Yeah, that’s the normal reaction. Didn’t need the praise, but after Jang Hyun-deok’s dumbassery, it almost touched me.
“Eh, handled it.”
First room had some bad-taste traps, but I’d neutralized them from outside.
Deep structure inside.
Less a room, more a corridor.
Nothing else stood out. No need for aesthetics in a place like this—just thick waterproof paint.
Step, step, step.
No furniture to muffle sounds, so footsteps echoed loudly. Annoying.
“The vibe here’s weird, huh?”
“Poor ventilation makes it feel oppressively stuffy.”
Ventilation?
No, not that. Mana density so thick it blocks senses. Even non-mages would feel the discomfort.
For me, it was like pushing through dense foliage.
‘Intrusive.’
I expanded my influence to shove it back, but it grew heavier the deeper we went.
“Nothing much, huh?”
“I cleared it all.”
“Ahh... Genius wizard indeed.”
“Cut it out.”
At the far end of the long room, another thick iron door on the floor.
No, big, thick, round...
“That submarine thing? Y’know, the... iron door. Yeah, door.”
“You mean ‘hatch,’ right?”
“Oh, yeah! That. Why’s it even here?”
“Apparently built as a nuclear bunker originally.”
“Nuclear bunker?”
“Yeah. Made about thirty years ago, before the Great Cataclysm.”
A nineties-era nuclear bunker.
“Eh? That old?”
“Some paranoid type built it.”
“Oh, I get it. Prepping for the Great Collapse?”
“Nah, how could anyone predict that?”
“Eh? Then why?”
“North Korea was still around back then.”
“Right, North Korea. Scared of incoming nukes.”
“Nukes? What’s that got to do with North Korea?”
Hm, never chatted NPCs with these keywords before—interesting.
Jang Hyun-deok was a kid born right before the Great Cataclysm. His knowledge of North Korea would differ completely from kids my age in my old reality.
“North Korea was originally... Never mind. I’ll explain later.”
Even oblivious Jang Hyun-deok could tell now wasn’t the time for a long history lesson.
Besides, exciting stuff was right in front of us.
“Nngh.”
Gu Jin-cheol gave it a heave, and the hatch opened easily.
No clue what he was thinking, but the moment it swung open, he yelled down.
“Chairman! Chairman Cheongho!”
Thud!
Hee hee hee!
Thud, followed by laughter. Or was it?
“That? Laughter?”
“Doesn’t sound human.”
“The chairman really is...”
To escape fear, people do all sorts of things.
Pointless chatter, deranged nonsense—Gu Jin-cheol’s idle talk about this secret vault’s origins was his way of ignoring the hard-to-pin-down chill and unease.
But even that vanished with the laughter from below.
I peered down the hatch again.
A long vertical shaft, ladder rungs densely packed.
Lights below, yet it looked like a horrific pit leading to a dangerous dungeon.
“This... okay?”
“It’s a tiny bunker, just three rooms. We’ll be done quick.”
Personal build, after all.
‘Nothing special.’
If memory served—no changes—past the security and defenses: one storage room, one room, done. Generous estimate, maybe 300 square feet?
Not like those dungeon-crawl scenarios with endless rooms, corridors, deadly traps.
“Good, if true, but...”
Once more, the monster’s lure drew us in—not temptation, but laughter.
Hee hee hee hee!!
Ee hee hee hee hee!!!
Uh ha ha ha ha!!
Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!