Hidden Piece (4)
Like dropping a rock into a still pond, a pillar of light shot straight up from the shrine.
The vast underground cavern, which had been shrouded in darkness, instantly brightened as if it were midday.
“What!?”
“Wh-what is this!?”
The low-grade and evil spirits froze solid like stones in that dazzling light, while the guards instinctively turned their heads. The blinding brightness forced out a single scream.
“Paraaaah!!”
Soon a sacred wave exploded outward from the shrine and spread throughout the entire cavern like a stretched bowstring released.
The invisible force swept away the demons like dust, sending them flying.
“Sa…aaaah…”
The light bathed the whole area in blinding white before gradually fading, plunging the cavern back into darkness.
The shrine grew deathly silent once more.
The guards rubbed their stinging eyes and quickly scanned their surroundings.
“Eh…”
“Everyone safe?”
“Three o’clock direction—nothing abnormal.”
“W-what was that just now?”
“I-it’s… over?”
Serina dropped the emergency escape artifact she had been about to activate, her hands trembling.
“U-um…! Hmph!”
A gust of wind swept through the soil-covered rubble and vanished.
The hungry ghosts that had lunged like starving wolves disappeared along with the light.
The guards, still on high alert, slowly lowered their guards upon seeing the quiet battlefield.
“Hah… I thought I was dead.”
“It’s over, right…?”
“Yeah, it looks that way.”
The guards tried to hide their excitement as they caught their breath.
“But that thing at the end…”
“No one missed it, right?”
“Of course not. My eyes are still stinging.”
“It wasn’t just some property—it had some real power behind it…”
“I don’t even know what to say anymore…”
A single light wave had wiped out an entire horde of demons in one strike—its range, speed, brightness, and the sheer purity it exuded were all extraordinary.
Among light-attribute users, even A+ rank hunters would barely be able to see something like that.
“What exactly is that…?”
While the guards murmured in admiration, gazing toward Kang Seojun,
“We don’t have time to sit.”
Kang Seojun walked out of the shrine with hurried footsteps.
“It’s not over yet. The shrine is about to collapse. Everyone stand up and follow me!”
Jin Serin and the guards’ faces turned pale at his words.
“Still… not over yet…?”
“Ahh… this is at least Epic-rank difficulty!”
“I-I’m almost at my mana limit… Uwehh…”
“Hey! Hey! Pull yourselves together and move!”
Kang Seojun shuffled along with heavy steps, and the Jin Serin escort team hurried after him.
“Kugugugugu!”
Soon, an earthquake signaled the start of the second phase, shaking the vast cavern.
“Run!”
“Crack… crack…”
The shrine groaned like breaking bones and then sank into the ground, disappearing.
The central earth dropped away sharply, pulling Kang Seojun and the escort team into an ant-swarm-like descent.
They flailed their arms and legs desperately to avoid being swept away by the flood of soil.
“Waaah!”
“If you fall, it’s over! Stay focused!”
“Wobble… wobble…”
Kang Seojun tried his best, but
“Ugh…!”
“Thud!”
His body simply couldn’t maintain balance.
“Damn…!!”
“Kuuu!”
Kang Seojun was carried along by the muddy current like a piece of straw.
“Gwaaah!”
Jin Serin’s face turned deathly white at the sight.
“K-Kang Seojun…!?”
Serina’s body stiffened, so Seo Eunha pulled her close.
“Miss! Worry about the others later!”
Even though Seo Eunha was also panicked about Seojun being carried away, she prioritized Serina and her own team over the man who carried multiple high-grade skills.
“Get up!”
“Run! Run!”
Serina and the escort team ran while supporting each other without pause.
About five minutes later,
“Kugugugu…”
The rumbling noise gradually quieted, and the ground finally stopped sinking.
The guards collapsed one by one, groaning in pain.
“Hah…! Haaah…”
“Even tougher than when we were training endurance…”
“This is the first time I’ve felt this drained since the selection exams…”
Serina checked her team for casualties while catching her breath.
Thankfully, Serina and her guards were all safe.
But Kang Seojun, who had fallen and been swept away, was nowhere to be seen.
“Oh no!”
Only now did Serina realize the danger.
Without that man, there was no one left to brief them on the current situation.
“Everyone, wait here.”
Serina gave the order and headed back toward the center of the cavern.
“T-Team Leader? Where are you going?”
“The scout is missing. He might be buried under there, so I’ll look for him.”
The guards’ faces turned pale at the words.
“Ah…”
“We were too focused on saving the people around us…”
“I didn’t see him either… Oh no…”
If Kang Seojun didn’t give them their next orders, the team had no idea what to do.
Jin Serina, barely holding back her panic, said,
“Let’s… let’s all go back and look. If he’s buried under the ground, we have to rescue him before he runs out of air…!”
“What the young lady says makes sense…”
“Get up! Get up!”
“Team Leader! Let’s go together!”
While the sense of duty to save him in a humanitarian sense was strong, there were many other reasons to save him.
They had barely survived this place only to lose the scout and return empty-handed—it would be too unjust.
To successfully complete the raid, that man had to be here.
Serina looked back at the team following her.
“Since we don’t know the situation yet, stay put…”
Just as she was about to order them to wait here, the situation was too dangerous to follow,
“Aaaaaah!!!”
The center of the cavern had become a deep, wide pit.
A chilling howl erupted from its depths.
The howl echoed loudly, bouncing off the round ceiling.
“Uwaah!?”
“H-Hit!”
“Kyaaah!?”
“Cover your ears!”
Someone screamed, unable to identify the source.
This howl was a curse of the fear-type that instilled terror in the minds of the low-ranked and turned their bodies rigid like stone.
“Squish! Squish! Squish!”
The sound of rocks being crushed rose regularly from deep below the pit.
“Squish!”
The closer the sound came, the more certain it felt that the source was approaching.
Jin Serina and the guards could sense it intuitively.
“This… this is…”
“Wh-what…”
Something ominous, impure, and overwhelmingly huge was crawling up from the pit.
“Boong!”
Soon a long, alien limb shot out from the void, then
“Thud! Squish! Squish!”
The colossal monster crawled up to the surface with its full weight.
Red eyes. The face of a Buddha. Arms thick and grotesque. A body long like a centipede. Red flesh and pus clinging to every inch of its form.
The moment the strange monster appeared, the team stared in shock.
It was clear without anyone saying it.
That thing was the true boss of this dungeon—the Demon Buddha, the master of all evil spirits sealed here.
“Ugh…”
“Ah…”
Just as the creature emerged, the darkness of the cavern grew thick again.
Its thick malice, stench, and the red eyes that evoked physiological disgust and fear had already begun corrupting the purified space.
“Thud!”
“Ugh…!”
Jin Serina collapsed to the ground, legs giving out.
“Ugh…!”
Seo Eunha, who had been facing the monster closest, was no different.
Just facing its aura sent a wave of revulsion through her body, as if centipedes were crawling everywhere.
As an A-rank hunter, she was no weakling.
Her Willpower was 26—exceptionally high even for A-rank.
Yet she felt overwhelmed by the monster’s size and trembled at its stench.
That meant the creature was at least Epic-rank or higher.
Serina gritted her teeth.
The average rank of Serina’s escort team was B-rank.
To fight an Epic-rank boss monster, the party rank needed to be at least A-rank.
“It’s impossible…”
Finding the missing scout with such a monster in front of her was impossible.
In this situation, Serina’s only choice was one.
To activate the emergency escape artifact and get Serina and her team safely out.
Serina raised the necklace containing the emergency escape order and shouted,
“Escape…!”
“Bang!”
“Kuhk…!”
But the Demon Buddha had no intention of just watching.
With hundreds of legs like those of a centipede, it quickly closed the distance and swung its arms thicker than a truck at Serina.
“Thud!”
Even though it was blocked by her shield, the heavy weight was transmitted fully.
Every joint in her body felt like it was being shattered.
Serina bit through the pain and tried to activate the artifact again,
“Thud! Bang!”
“Kyah…!”
Each heavy fist from the Demon Buddha forced Serina to her knees, blood spraying from her mouth.
In just three punches, her shield had been completely broken.
“Goooooo!”
The Demon Buddha raised both hands high toward the ceiling, as if about to crush Serina completely.
Red mana gathered in its fists.
“Ugh…!”
Half-broken shield. Collapsed posture. No energy left in her body.
Any A-rank hunter would have been unable to withstand that single strike.
“T-Team Leader!”
The guards rushed to help Serina.
“Run! Save the Team Leader!”
“Deputy Go! Take the young lady and evacuate first!”
But
“Zheaeak!”
No matter how fast they ran, the Demon Buddha’s fists fell faster than they could reach.
The massive, heavy fist filled with mana closed in on Serina in an instant.
“…Like this… is it…?”
Serina felt death approaching even without realizing it.
She didn’t have time to think about where things had gone wrong.
All she could see in her mind was the growing silhouette of death.
That was when
“Blink.”
A calm male voice rang in Serina’s ear, as if the speaker were in a completely different situation.
“Flash!”
And Kang Seojun appeared in front of Serina along with a flashing purple light.
“……!?”
She was shocked, but she couldn’t even process what had happened.
Less than one second remained until the fist, soaked in thick malice, would hit her.
Yet no sense of crisis came from the man’s back.
[Skill ‘Time for Counterattack’ activated.]
It was an event Kang Seojun would never have predicted.
[Critical Hit! Fortune’s Strike hits the enemy’s vital point!]