I Became an Apocalyptic "Physical" Therapist (37)
“There's a black one too?”
“The red is so intense that it looks black.”
“You don't even need an explanation to know that's dangerous.”
“But remember this. It didn't look like that before.”
Jeon Hye-ji's face was etched with shock.
“That just means a Gift is never absolute.”
“Well, that's...”
“Think through the possibilities. One is that the danger level rises under certain conditions.”
“Like a split personality — is that what you mean?”
“That's one option. Either way, it's not your fault, Hye-ji. And it's not entirely impossible to fool it.”
“Yes, sir...”
“And it's not like I didn't see this coming. I just didn't expect it to happen the moment they started.”
“Should we assume they're all dead by now?”
It was Mu Beob-sa who asked.
“I don't think so. The survivors who would chase someone into a dungeon aren't weak enough to fold that easily. The strength of numbers is nothing to sneeze at. Most likely...”
“Most likely?”
“They drugged them before they even came in here.”
“You mean they formed another small group inside?”
“That's speculation. You saw it, didn't you? Be careful in dungeons. That's the kind of place where these killers run wild.”
It had been true in the old world, and it was true now — murderers were the objects of universal shunning.
Most survivors living through the apocalypse had blood on their hands, but that alone didn't make them killers.
Survivors killed people after cold, clear cost-benefit calculations.
But murderers killed without any such reason.
When a man kills for the simple fun of it, there's no choice but to avoid him.
“Let's go in.”
At Gong Won-goo's words as he stubbed out his cigarette, the crew moved. Geum Chul-soo had already cleared the bodies off the floor and pushed them to one side, so nothing was in the way.
“Th-the right, r-right?”
The words spilled out of Suwon the moment Won-goo turned left.
“We're just going in to check something.”
No sooner had they rounded the corner of the left passage than bodies came into view. More than they'd expected.
Five.
“That's a lot.”
“Yeah. Everyone take a look. How they died. Check for traces of poison, too.”
As he spoke, Won-goo pulled a cigarette from his case. It wasn't a single brand — the case held several different kinds.
He picked one even stronger than what he usually smoked.
“Is there poison strong enough to warrant that?”
“It isn't only lethal poisons that count, you know. Even something that just dulls your movements for a moment is plenty against a skilled fighter.”
By pre-apocalypse standards, it would have been potent enough to kill on contact.
But for survivors who'd invested a mandatory three to five points in Toughness, it wouldn't rank as extreme poison at all.
“I don't think it's poison. They were just...”
Jo Mu-sa spoke up, having examined the corpses closely.
“Then it's someone handy with a blade.”
“Yes. Ambushed them from behind. Didn't take long at all.”
“Judging by their movements, I'd say that one isn't a pure-strength type either...”
“That would make him a very troublesome opponent indeed.”
“Good enough that it's not poison. We're turning back.”
“Just like that? Shouldn't we chase them down?”
“We only came in to check. We started on the opposite side, remember?”
“Are you sure the Director's plan will hold up?”
Jeon Hye-ji chimed in.
“It'll hold. A nastier bastard than we expected did crawl in, sure. But I can leave this much alone. That's exactly why I packed the place full of liars.”
“Can we really handle it?”
“Hye-ji. Don't get this twisted. Danger level is a measure of how dangerous something is — not a scoreboard for skill. Every one of them has their own tricks, that's why they come into dungeons at all. No matter how crazy the world gets, nobody walks in here planning to die.”
* * *
“There aren't many traps either.”
“Bored, Chul-soo?”
“That's not what I meant.”
Jeon Hye-ji had shown the greatest growth among the crew, but a large share of that came from the gold coins.
Which meant the crew member who'd truly grown the fastest in such a short span was arguably Geum Chul-soo.
Unlike his bumbling early days, Chul-soo was now pulling his weight beautifully.
“Keep this in mind. This isn't a game you play for fun like before the apocalypse. The easy path is always the right one. Collecting lots of items with ease? That means your plan was solid and you're heading the right way. So keep doing exactly what you're doing. You're all doing well.”
With that, Won-goo plopped down on the corpse of a kobold, fished half a pack of crackers out of his coat, and shoved them into his mouth.
“Hyeong-nim. All accounted for.”
“Yeah? Then sit down and have a quick bite.”
“Understood, Hyeong-nim. Everyone, sit down and rest!”
Hyun-sung snapped off a crisp salute and relayed the order to the crew.
Geum Chul-soo brought over the rations backpack on his own initiative.
Just as the crew settled down to snack, Won-goo finished the last of his crackers and got back to his feet.
Hyun-sung immediately started to rise as well.
“Sit and eat.”
Won-goo walked to the entrance and turned the lever.
Creeeak. Creeeak.
The lever turned and the door swung open.
And there it was — a staircase leading down.
“Is it over already?”
Mu Beob-sa asked.
“It's just the first floor.”
“Still, isn't that a bit short?”
“The dungeon might simply be small. Though since the Yang sisters never said anything like that, we may just have taken the shortest route.”
“We really are ahead of schedule, right?”
Jeon Hye-ji asked.
“That's right. We might have brought too much food. If the other floors are like this.”
After their snack break, they descended to the next floor.
Around a full turn of the dark stone stairs brought them to Basement Level 2.
This time Lee Hyun-sung stepped forward and turned the lever.
And what greeted the crew was a field of kobold corpses.
Among them were large kobold warriors they hadn't seen on the first floor.
“They've already passed through here.”
“Good, they cleared the path for us. Let's move. From here on, the road should run straight.”
Floor 2 was even easier than Floor 1. So easy, in fact, that there was nothing to do at all.
The path had already been made for them.
Clearing the second floor took less than two hours.
The crew descended from Floor 2 to Floor 3 without spilling a single drop of blood.
Only fifteen hours had passed since they entered the dungeon.
Floor 3 was more of the same. That was when Won-goo finally began to sense that something was off.
Traces of kobold corpses kept appearing all the way to the middle of the third floor.
“Something's not right about this...”
“You're right that something's not right.”
A voice floated in from another passage.
The man walking out of the side corridor was Sde.
“So it was you. But seriously, what kind of name is Sde? It's childish — just call yourself Death.”
“Pretty relaxed, aren't you?”
“Why wouldn't I be?”
“Oh. Because it's all been handled.”
At those words, Won-goo's eyebrows twitched.
If Sde had dispatched every survivor who'd gone ahead on his own, that meant he was someone to be very, very careful with.
But the traces lining the path they'd traveled told a different story.
“‘All handled,' huh... Not by yourself, though. So you had a purpose.”
“The purpose was you. Who gave you the right to trample through someone else's dungeon?”
Behind him, other figures appeared.
Four in all, and the first thing that caught the eye was a man standing a good two meters tall.
He pushed his way to the front and stopped at a comfortable distance.
“What do you think, hyung? That one look good?”
Sde asked, jerking his chin toward Jeon Hye-ji.
Goosebumps rippled across her skin in an instant. She'd felt that same filthy sensation once before, back in 3B.
Her lips clenched tight.
“You're Gong Won-goo, the one who came up with this little plan, aren't you? I'm Ralph. Ever heard the name?”
“Nope. You punk. Don't tell me you picked that cheesy nickname because of some Punch King game or whatever. You're not even holding a weapon, so... nah, no way. You can't be that retarded — who'd take such a stupid...”
“Kukukuku. Just as they said — you're a funny bastard. Let's see if you stay funny after this.”
Up close, Ralph was even bigger. His build was practically strongman-tier, so massive you'd doubt he was East Asian at all.
When he beckoned, one more figure emerged from the corridor.
“Is this a fashion runway? Why do you keep showing up one at a time? Just come out all at once.”
“You don't recognize your friends' faces?”
Two of them, crawling out on all fours, bound in chain collars.
The Yang siblings. Gagged and badly hurt, their eyes brimmed with terror.
“Fresh new slaves. These ones are sturdy — should be nice to raise.”
“This is exactly why I hate dungeons. It's where the crazy get crazier.”
“The world's changed and you're still stuck on that sentiment? It's simple. Measure, take, steal when you win. I'll raise them well too. Not my type, but they'll be fun.”
Bang! Bang!
Won-goo squeezed the trigger without a moment's hesitation.
Drawing, aiming, firing — it all happened in a blink, so fast that no one could react properly.
Ralph least of all.
What was even more astonishing was that Won-goo hadn't only shot Ralph.
In that sliver of time, he'd lined up and hit both Sde and Ralph.
Sde twisted just enough to take a graze; the bullet smacked Ralph square in the forehead.
“So people still carry these things around. Does this actually work on you?”
Tok.
The bullet dropped from Ralph's forehead.
Won-goo's expression hardened.
'He bit down on the bait properly. Already this strong, huh.'
A bullet that didn't pierce meant he'd poured a fortune into Toughness.
Heavy investment, and a Gift clearly built around it.
The gunshot became the starting bell.
The shock of the Yang siblings' capture was real, but the crew wasn't the kind to waver over that.
They outnumbered the enemy besides, and every one of them had adapted and grown fast, so there was no hesitation at all.
Ting!
Dulla-han swung his sword at Ralph.
Ralph blocked it with a raised arm. The sound of arm meeting steel was wrong somehow.
Thud!
Ralph's counter came next.
Dulla-han's body lifted off the ground, sailed through the air, and slammed into the ground.
Monstrous strength.
Toughness enough to shrug off Won-goo's bullets.
But that didn't mean there was no answer.
Won-goo flipped his rifle to a different mode in a flash, leveled the muzzle at Ralph, and pulled the trigger.
A torrent of roaring flame erupted forth.
“GRAAAAAAAGH!”
Ralph shrieked — and in that gap, a harpoon came flying through the fire.
It was aimed at Won-goo, but Mu Beob-sa stepped in and batted it aside.
The rest of the crew was locked in ferocious combat with Sde and the remaining enemies.
Lee Hyun-sung's elbow and thigh had already taken gashes several centimeters deep.
“We should be careful here.”
“It's over. Grab the head and the rest of him...”
“I don't think it's over. That's the problem.”
And sure enough, Ralph — writhing on the floor, wreathed in flame — was still moving. By the time he'd finished rolling, the fire had all but gone out, and he was pushing himself upright again.
Skin burned to cinders was regenerating. Not at an absurd pace, but visibly knitting back together.
“Hyper-regeneration... A proper monster of a bastard after all.”
If you had to name the most irritating type of enhancement fighter to deal with, it was, without question, a survivor with recovery traits.
A regeneration-type Gift stacked with a matching Milestone Trait made you nearly unkillable — a zombie in all but name.
Ralph was exactly that case.