#19 Those Who Chase the Wolf
#19 Those Who Chase the Wolf
KWA-KWANG—!
A thunderous roar and a plume of dust erupted. Acrid smoke and the billowing grit left not an inch of visibility. Who had won? Had we survived?
"It's... it's dead, right? Yeah?! No way it's still alive!"
"...Don't say things like that."
"Why—why not?"
"I said don't say it!"
The middle-aged hunter who'd just snapped at the lone hunter from the other clan still on his feet gnawed at his lip and quietly shut his eyes.
* * *
The crashing noise that had been thundering through the room slowly faded. Park Mu-taek cupped his hands to his ears. E-rank Weak Hearing. He concentrated, and the sounds reached him—gnashing, crunching—crack! Who was eating whom? Was the Wolf eating the spider, or the spider eating the Wolf? His heart lurched until, at last, the dust settled.
"Ah—sir! Sir!"
The flush-faced hunter's shout made the middle-aged man release the breath he'd been holding.
"Looks like the Wolf won."
Kreak—
The door to the boss room, which had slammed shut, began inching open. The middle-aged hunter steadied his breathing and grabbed the other hunter's shoulder.
"Keep quiet. Are you in your right mind or not?"
"Why—what do you mean?"
"Don't fool yourself. We fought together up to now because we needed each other. But Aranea is dead. Do you not understand what that means?"
It was the powerful enemy called Aranea that had let the hunters and the Skull Wolf fight side by side. But what happened when that enemy was gone? How quickly did an enemy's enemy change? Especially if it was a monster? The other hunter's face went pale as the realization sank in, and the middle-aged man whispered to him.
"Listen well. The joint front is over. We need to get out of here right now. Lucky for us, the thing's busy feeding. We have to move now."
The hunter swallowed dryly and nodded his head frantically. The middle-aged man hoisted two of the three who had fallen—his own clan members—onto his back.
"You handle your own. I'll do the same."
"Understood."
"If we're spotted, we die."
The middle-aged hunter's grave look made the younger man swallow again and nod. The two of them stepped carefully through the open door on tiptoe, making not a single sound...
***
"...And that's what happened."
Yu Ah-hyeon, who had just woken up, frowned as though she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"So you're saying they completely screwed us over? Walked away with nothing?"
"The representative clan formed an investigation team the next day. But I heard they found nothing."
"Hey! Does that make sense? You think those bastards didn't just pocket everything on the sly?"
The spoils from a dungeon rightfully belonged to the hunters who cleared it. Some of it got chipped away by the clan or taxes, true, but it still meant a few thousand each coming back.
"Hard to know for sure."
Who could ever really know what happened inside a dungeon? The hunter Joo Seong-in watched her fail to hide her temper, pounding her chest in frustration, and handed her a cup of water.
"No, this is insane."
Aranea's assessed grade was B-.
The spider silk alone had limitless applications. And that wasn't all. Aranea's venom was lethal beyond lethal—its very name commanded a price. It was a substance so rare people couldn't get their hands on it. A single Aranea had claimed an entire boss room, and now they said—nothing? Nothing at all?
"AAAAARGH! My money! My money!"
"Noona. You only woke up two days ago. Please calm down."
"Do I look like I can calm down?! Do you have any idea how much that was?!"
Getting robbed blind was one thing, but this was beyond. She fumbled at her chest by habit and then sighed.
"Ahhh... right. Hospital."
"I told you to quit."
"Yeah. I quit. Just a habit. So?"
"So what?"
"Nooo! Agh, fuck, it stings like a bitch. You're fine?"
"Sure took you long enough to worry about me. I've got F-rank Regeneration, remember?"
"Weak Regeneration? So damn jealous right now."
It was only F-rank, but recovery skills were always useful. Resigned, Yu Ah-hyeon had to lie back down, the pain jabbing at her.
"So what did the Clan Leader say?"
"...He said he would form one more investigation team."
Not a complete fool, then. But that wasn't what Yu Ah-hyeon was curious about.
"Ha. Not that. I know the man. He must've had something to say about me, right?"
Joo Seong-in hesitated and hemmed and hawed until she prodded him again.
"What. I said talk."
"Well, it's..."
"Hey. What did the Clan Leader say? I can find out with one phone call anyway, you know."
"...Demotion."
"Demotion?"
Yu Ah-hyeon's head tilted sharply.
Demotion. A demotion. She held the position of Team Leader in the clan. If she was demoted...
"Vice Team Leader?"
"To regular team member."
"Reason?"
"Lack of pre-mission intelligence, casting doubt on your competence. And there was a formal complaint from the other clan."
"A complaint? Ha. Unbelievable. Fine. Let's hear it. Tell me."
"That their clan member died protecting you... that you were a liability."
Died protecting her? —Ah. A bitter smile spread across Yu Ah-hyeon's lips. She knew exactly which warrior they meant.
'Fuck. That pisses me off.'
It wasn't entirely wrong. But that warrior had chosen to lay down his life, and if he hadn't, the odds were high no one would have escaped the dungeon. That death had meaning, and she had proven it had meaning.
He met a heroic death—so they were going to twist what a dead man thought?
Yu Ah-hyeon ground her teeth.
'So this is how they're going to play it.'
While she was unconscious, no less. How convenient for them.
She had a pretty good idea why they'd go this far. Cutting off the tail. Dumping the responsibility for the casualty count, which was high compared to the dungeon's projected grade. And on top of that, keeping her own rising influence inside the clan in check. She could only conclude both clans had gotten their stories straight.
In other words, dirty politics.
'There was an Aranea in there!'
Who could predict what would happen in a dungeon? All anyone could do was guess based on past experience. That was why she always prepared ruthlessly.
Joo Seong-in let out a long sigh as he watched Yu Ah-hyeon clench her fist. The rumpled bedsheets spoke for her mood.
'I knew I didn't want to tell her.'
And he felt the same.
A party of just two C-class and eight D-class hunters faced an Aranea and wasn't wiped out. That was something you could call a miracle. In any other clan, it would've been cause for a reward, not a demotion.
—Even if some Wolf had lent them a hand.
"Fucking bullshit. For real."
She missed not being able to smoke. No, she missed having a cigarette.
"Noona. What do we do now?"
"......."
"Ji-tae. Ji-hoon. They're all dead. They're all... all dead."
"Seong-in."
Joo Seong-in seemed to wrestle with himself before he let out a long breath.
"I'm sorry to lay this on you the moment you woke up, but... I can't do this anymore."
"You?"
"God dammit! Does this make any sense? The way we fought in there! Everyone knows we all would've died if you weren't there, noona!"
He'd been chewing on his words and his emotions had boiled over. Seeing him in a rage, Yu Ah-hyeon fell speechless for a moment.
"We all would've died if not for you! Fuck. A complaint? A complaint?!"
"Seong-in. We're in a hospital."
"How the hell does that clan file a complaint?! They swooped in first, took a shit all over the place, and at the end, we all—!"
"Joo Seong-in!"
This time it was Yu Ah-hyeon who stopped him. Joo Seong-in's fists shook with indignation, but she understood exactly how he felt. He was still too young to grasp just how filthy this world could be. Even when you thought of someone as a comrade you'd risked your life beside, once the situation was over, people looked for their own way out.
And Yu Ah-hyeon knew that all too well.
That was the only difference between them.
"What you're thinking. I feel the same. The ones who died. And you—you're all my team."
"Noona."
"You're quitting? Fine. Quit. I've been wondering myself how much longer I need to rot in this shitty clan."
"......!"
"First, the bereaved families?"
"I heard they were contacted. Compensation's probably..."
So that was it. Since the whole point was keeping her in check, they meant to heap the entire blame on her. At least they'd observed the bare minimum decency.
'Sons of bitches.'
That didn't mean she accepted it. Her head was a mess. A clan she'd have to transfer to. Things she'd need to do next. Ways to strike back at the Clan Leader's scheming. Everything was a throbbing headache.
"Haaah. Maybe I should just go free."
"That's a little..."
Free sounded nice—it really just meant lawless.
All dungeon subjugations were decided by the area's representative clan. The only way a free agent could claim a dungeon was to preempt an undiscovered one—
'Or kill everyone.'
She didn't have the skill for that, and she didn't have the stomach for it either.
"To be honest, it still doesn't feel real. I'm sure it's even worse for you, noona."
"Yeah...."
Most of all, the fact that her team was dead hadn't sunk in.
Her head understood, but her heart always struggled to accept it. An awkward silence settled in the hospital room. Maybe they were sorting through their thoughts. Maybe they were mourning. By now they should have been used to it, but sending someone off was always hard, always painful.
Then the door slid open with a rumble, cutting through the stillness.
"Who is it? If you've got the wrong room..."
"It's been a while."
"You? How dare you show your face!"
Joo Seong-in was flabbergasted and about to blow up, but Yu Ah-hyeon raised a hand to stop him and immediately pieced things together. There was only one reason he'd come looking for them. One possibility.
"Ah. So that's how it is."
She cast a sardonic smile toward someone. The middle-aged hunter gave a bitter smirk of his own and nodded.
"You catch on fast. It's always the tail that gets cut off."
Hunters who had to hold back the monsters were indispensable. That meant they had to remain idols. And idols could never, under any circumstances, be seen to fail. The clan would sooner pin the blame on an individual than shoulder it themselves...
"The higher-ups all think exactly alike, don't they."
"...Well. I didn't know I was the tail myself."
"What a coincidence. Neither did I."
Joo Seong-in pieced it together belatedly and made an awkward face, but the middle-aged man waved it off.
"I unintentionally overheard most of your conversation from outside. So here's the thing—would you consider coming with me?"
"Why? You know a place?"
The middle-aged hunter, Park Mu-taek, rubbed under his nose and tilted his head.
"Ah. Right. Got the order wrong. There's someone who wants to meet you."
Who on earth? They exchanged baffled looks, and then their eyes went wide.
Because the man who walked into the hospital room next was too famous. Someone you couldn't not know if you lived as a hunter. His coat flared behind him, his figure strikingly surreal.
"No way... Dawn's..."
"That's correct. Team Leader 3 of Daybreak's Dawn. He said he could help you."
A lifeline had dropped from the sky—no, not a lifeline, a line even stronger than Aranea's spider silk—!
If he helped them, nothing from here on out would be a problem. The Clan Leader? What could some regional backwater clan leader even say to Dawn's Team Leader 3? It was a golden opportunity to recover the stolen money and, if things went well, even join Dawn.
The two of them nodded like mad. The Team Leader gave a wry smile.
"I'm sorry, but may I start by asking you about what happened that day?"
"Ahem. Of course. Anything at all~."
"Whoa... Noona, what's gotten into you."
"Shut it. Whoops. That came out wrong. Right. What exactly are you curious about?"
"That Wolf you said you saw. I'd like to hear about the Wolf in detail."
The two traded mystified glances. The Wolf? They understood instantly that he meant the Skull Wolf. But why would a figure like Dawn's Team Leader 3 be chasing after a mere Skull Wolf? That was what they couldn't grasp.
"Alpha. That's the name we've given the Warg we believe may have evolved. Embarrassingly enough, we've been tracking it since Jirisan Mountain, but we've completely lost it now."
Team Leader Gu Jin-ha rubbed at his eyelids as if exhausted.
"You two know better than anyone how dangerous that thing is. We have to catch it as soon as possible."
"My, my~. So thoughtful~."
"Noona..."
"Therefore."
Gu Jin-ha paused a beat, then continued.
"Will you tell me? About that Wolf you saw."
***
"Grrr?"
My ears felt ticklish. Was someone talking about me?
"KUH-HEEEK!? KUH-HEH-KWAEK!"
...No, this noisy brat just made me imagine things. I dug my claws in and pressed down on its throat until the breath stopped. Ever since I'd gained a sense of taste, eating things raw had become pretty off-putting.
[Boar consumed. Satiety rises.]
[Satiety at maximum. By the effect of Evil Devouring (D) Lv.6, Satiety is converted into Experience Points.]
[Experience Points at maximum. Lv.6 -> Lv.7]
I'd stubbornly forced myself to eat the Aranea, but thinking back, there was no need. Why hadn't I remembered the Evil Devouring skill I'd been using so well...? Why had I choked down every last bite of that revolting meat? Maybe that was why the hunters had fled in such a panic.
'As if that'd be why.'
In truth, I hadn't even known they'd fled. I'd been too out of my mind from the horrific assault on my taste buds. Even now, just recalling that flavor made me shudder.
'Well. They ran because I'm a monster.'
It was a bit of a shame, but trying to establish communication with them would've been awkward anyway. This was probably for the best.
'Honestly, I was hoping that if I ate the spider silk, I might get a similar skill.'
No such thing happened. I gained Satiety, clean and simple, and Evil Devouring converted all of it straight into Experience Points.
'I'm Level 7 now, so.'
Time for another review?
[Dungeon Horror (Skull Wolf) Lv.7] [EXP 709 / 57128]
[Karma 0.06%]
[Body Length 1.87m] [Height 88.9cm] [Weight 97.8kg]
First, my Karma—which had briefly touched 0.1%—had dropped to 0.06%. I'd spent the 0.1% and cleared a dungeon, which raised it by 0.06%.
'And my title changed.'
When I handled the Sewer Calamity, my title had stayed the same, but now it had shifted to 'Dungeon Horror.' Apparently it was a better title than Tyrant of the Mountain.
[Dungeon Horror: A title granted to one who has made a dungeon boss know fear. All within the dungeon feel terror and dread.]
'...This seems pretty good, actually?'
If this applied in other dungeons too, wouldn't it be highly useful? It seemed like something I could leverage in battle. I moved on to check my Status.
Before Evolution [STR 123] [AGI 140] [VIT 210] [MP 94] [Will 1]
After Evolution [STR 159] [AGI 177] [VIT 231] [MP 140] [Will 4]
Every stat had surged. Compared to Level 19 before evolution, the growth was staggering. The greatest leap was unquestionably in MP, and the reason for that was tied to the Skull Wolf species itself.
[Skull Wolf: The threshold of the Demon Wolf. The evolved form of a Warg exposed to mana for an extended period. Possesses high affinity for mana.]
Thanks to that, my MP growth rate was irrational—a full 4 points per level. Double what it had been as a Warg.
'...Though the Experience needed is even more insane.'
I could no longer gain any Experience from ordinary animals. And what was truly staggering was the amount of Experience required. Even after consuming an absurdly powerful monster like Aranea, along with all its spider silk, I only reached Level 6.
'Who starts at thirty thousand?!'
It had started at 30,000 and now I needed 57,128. When I did the math, that meant a single Aranea had given me over 200,000 Experience Points.
How was I supposed to level up from here? Was I supposed to sweep every single dungeon in South Korea? Stat-wise alone, I was now at the level of a competent hunter. Though still not on par with the two most impressive people I'd seen in the labyrinth—the middle-aged hunter and the female hunter.
'But combat is a different matter.'
Lower stats didn't mean I'd lose. In fact, I could win without too much trouble.
The reason was obvious.
[Skill List]
Evil Devouring (D) Lv.6, Tentacle Bundle (E) Lv.5, Detection (D) Lv.4, Regeneration (D) Lv.1, Stealth (D) Lv.6, Spying (E) Lv.7, Weak Hearing (E) Lv.5, Weak Sixth Sense (E) Lv.1, Weak Sight (E) Lv.7, All Damage Reduction (D) Lv.4, Hardening (D) Lv.5, Change (E) Lv.4, Faint Poison Resistance (F) Lv.8, Intimidation (F) Lv.7, Appetite (D) Lv.3, Swimming (F) Lv.7, Diving (F) Lv.7, Superior Elasticity (D) Lv.1, Perception (E) Lv.5, Charge (E) Lv.5, Gale (D) Lv.3, Weak Olfactory Sense (E) Lv.6, Excellent Intuition (D) Lv.2, Dark Vision (F) Lv.5, Mana Regeneration (D) Lv.2, Ember (D) Lv.2, Pain Nullification (D)
[Remaining Skill Points: 6]
I caught myself before my mouth could pull into a slack grin. Twenty-seven skills total. Considering the effect each skill had in battle...
'Whoa, boy.'
It was still a stretch now, but it wouldn't be long before I could fight a 1-on-1 with an Aranea and not lose. I'd already clearly surpassed the monster wolf.
'...I'm definitely stronger since evolving.'
I'd honestly been worried when I discarded all my amorphous traits. My entire fighting style up to now had relied heavily on having an Amorphous body. Not to mention all the other conveniences.
'But I still have Change.'
I couldn't morph as easily as in my Slime days, but altering my appearance was still perfectly doable. Only the exterior, of course—if I wanted to change my physical properties, I needed mana.
'My fur turns into tentacles.'
Tentacle Bundle worked without a hitch. The fur would converge and shift into tentacle-like forms. The one downside was I couldn't use it from my furless skull.
'And the most encouraging news...'
I could now acquire C-rank skills. I didn't yet own any, mind you. For reference, the Skill Point cost to acquire one was 8. F was 1, E was 2, D was 4. Just as I'd predicted, the cost doubled with each tier.
'...That still stings, though.'
One C-rank skill per eight level-ups. Of course, C-rank skills were worth that price.
'Just look at Ember and Gale alone.'
Even though they were D-rank skills, they dealt plenty of pain to an Aranea. Couple them with Intuition and a handful of other skills, and I could even overwhelm an opponent with higher Strength and Agility than me in a head-on fight.
'I'm strong enough now.'
I couldn't go strutting through a city in broad daylight, but I was confident I could hold my own as long as it wasn't against freaks of nature like Hong Yuri or Jeon Woo-taek.
So it was time to get moving.
'Gu Ma-jun.'
I had no idea if he was still in Daegu, but I planned to search for the man named Gu Ma-jun, who led to the tail of the Prodigal Sons.
—To the War Shrine.