Dungeon Closure
Inside the cave, No Hayun asked while gripping the Lizardman's protruding horn tightly, "So the phenomena change every time it closes, right?"
"That's right. The one I experienced was the weasels' dungeon. Their specs skyrocketed to ridiculous levels, and I barely managed to escape."
It's the Dungeon of Weasels... In the end, after the dungeon closure, its rank was upgraded to C-grade.
"What kind of phenomena occur when it closes?"
"The probability of variants appearing skyrockets, or monsters that never appeared before start showing up?"
"I heard the exit can randomly generate in multiple locations!"
"That sounds truly terrifying. The risk of a dungeon break would increase dramatically."
"The absolute worst is when multiple boss monsters appear, but that has an extremely low probability."
The story about the final boss was accurate, but one more detail needed to be added. Survival...
I had never experienced a closure inside a dungeon, but I knew about it because I had gone through something similar outside one. The sky filled with dark crimson storm clouds, and every monster within my sensory range simply stood still, staring upward. Still, compared to back then, the situation seemed somewhat better...
...How many days will we have to hold out this time? Three or four days, maybe?
During my hunter days, I had endured a full month. I still remembered being trapped together with Hyeon Jung-gil, the leader of the Ilseom Guild, by chance. Thanks to that, I had grown closer to the old man, but the situation itself had been excruciating. No matter what we tried, we couldn't leave the dungeon. The only solution was to survive until the time limit the System announced.
Rumble!
"That startled me!"
"Is the dungeon collapsing instead of just closing, meow?"
"Don't say such unlucky things."
The anomalies were intensifying, and the sensations within my wave confirmed it was no different from that time. The exit was more than thirty minutes away at a nonstop run. Yet the anomaly had already begun, and the exit would close before we could reach it.
This won't work...
If we went to the exit only to find the gate already closed, as expected, we would simply waste time. Moreover, this dungeon's exit formed atop a stone altar—an open space on all sides where we would likely be surrounded and killed by the overflowing monsters.
It's dangerous to stay in the field.
We needed to move to the nearest hidden cave among those scattered throughout the dungeon. I took the lead and began gradually veering right. The party members followed without question, and so we headed in a completely different direction from the exit.
— Hey! — Slow down a bit!
People who had shaken off the monsters in the canyon and were now hurrying after us called out.
— C-can't we go together?
......
From my perspective they were a nuisance, but I had to think long-term. Someday we would have to fight together for humanity's survival. So... I couldn't coldly push away people desperately clinging to life like that.
There were forty-three of them. I wondered how far they could keep up with our pace.
Not long after I took the lead, Yeom Tae-seok and Arin noticed the change almost simultaneously.
"Hm?! This isn't the direction of the exit, is it?"
"Right, the direction has completely changed."
"Why? Ilwol?"
Because their trust in me was high, their voices carried the expectation that there must be a reason. But what could I possibly explain right now? That I knew from experience in my human days that going to the exit now would be too late?
In the end, I simply kept running in silence. When I, who always responded immediately, remained quiet, my companions' expressions grew unusually grave.
"Is it dangerous to go to the exit...?"
"Whenever Ilwol changes direction, there's always something."
"Is that so? Hmm..."
The way they reacted to every little change in my expression or behavior, as if I were some kind of prophet, stirred up old memories I had forgotten.
Back in my rookie days, things like that made everything so difficult.
Expectations could become poison to someone. But if you couldn't overcome them, you simply fell behind—and because I had talent, I had managed to endure somehow. So just because I couldn't live up to their expectations for a moment didn't mean I would waver.
...It's about time.
In my previous experience, it had happened in less than ten minutes. Only about seven minutes had passed since the storm clouds appeared. My wait didn't last long. An absurd message surfaced in my mind, and everyone stopped running, their faces filled with shock.
Quest - Dungeon Closure
Clear Condition: Survive inside the dungeon for one week.
"W-what?! Are they insane?!"
"How are we supposed to survive a week here? This goes against balance!"
"Whoa... There was a quest like this?"
"Oh... As expected..."
A week... That's quite long.
That was the single thought that crossed my mind after reading the quest. Most of those who read it fell into near-panic, but the ones maintaining composure were Yeonhee and No Hayun. Especially No Hayun, who wore an expression that seemed to say "finally, it's here," her twisted face sending a slight chill down my spine.
So this is what she was expecting...
The vague expectation that traveling with me would bring events she had never experienced before.
It's true... We do encounter strange incidents far more often than usual.
I didn't know whether it was because of me or because Yeonhee had a unique class. It might simply be bad luck.
The monsters that had been blankly staring at the sky began moving the moment the quest appeared. Countless portals started opening throughout the dungeon.
Damn it... Monster Drops are falling at almost 200-meter intervals. Are they serious?
Portals shimmered like mirages in the sky, beneath the ground, and across the surface. Monsters poured out in swarms and immediately began running, their target clear.
— Something's coming... It's coming! Something's coming! Everyone, run! Damn it!
A hunter who seemed to be a guide shouted at the top of his lungs after sensing something.
"......!"
Only then did the hunters, who had stopped, start moving their legs again. I tore my gaze away from them and calmly pulled a brown bottle from my inventory, handing it to Yeom Tae-seok and No Hayun beside him.
"??"
They looked confused, but when I pointed at Chehwa, they nodded in understanding. I had given it to them because the fastest approaching threats were the Spectres and Ghosts.
"So it had this effect too..."
No Hayun, who had tried it once before, drank the water from Irma Lake straight down. Since she wouldn't be coating her weapon with it anyway, drinking it to recover mana was better.
"I don't know what it is, but I'll trust you and use it!"
Yeom Tae-seok poured the water from Irma Lake onto his thick mace and immediately tested it on the Spectres that had already closed the distance.
Crack-!
The massive mace struck two Spectres at once, instantly erasing them.
"Hm?! It really works! This doesn't seem like holy water—what exactly is it?!"
But we, being chased by Ghosts and Spectres, had no time to leisurely answer such questions.
"Can't we go any faster?!"
"Everyone, hang in there just a little longer!"
"Churrrrp!"
The Lizard unit carrying the party members increased their speed further.
"Spotty!"
Yeonhee gave an additional order to the Screaming Mushroom. A piercing shriek burst from its mouth, and the Spectres that saw it began stopping one by one.
— Kkyaaaaaaaak——!!
At the same time as the Screaming Mushroom's cry, the Spectres flinched and fled far away.
"Haha? There was something like this?"
"So they had a weakness to the Screaming Mushroom's noise?"
Of course, this was information ordinary hunters didn't know. After all, Screaming Mushrooms and Spectres almost never appeared in the same dungeon.
Shhhhaaaaa—
The Spectres kept a certain distance from us for a while before eventually disappearing, as if realizing it was pointless. The remaining Ghosts were cleanly eliminated by Bae Jua and No Hayun. With two mages on our team, incorporeal monsters posed no significant threat.
We instantly defeated over fifty of them and even obtained five Rage Runes, but we simply kept running in silence. Of course, the forty or so hunters following us did the same.
They're managing to keep up pretty well...
They had also been harassed by Spectres and Ghosts, but they handled it without much trouble. While running, I relayed a message through Ran.
"He says we should change direction further to the right..."
"Eh?"
At Yeonhee's words, Yeom Tae-seok, who had been running at the rear, came to a sudden stop. In the end, Yeonhee had no choice but to halt her summons as well.
Why does that old man keep stopping? How annoying.
When I urgently gestured for us to keep going, Yeonhee grew impatient and flailed her arms.
"H-he says to follow for now!"
"...Sir Knight! We're going ahead? Ilwol has never led us wrong before, so I'll try riding the bus this time too."
"Me too!"
"......"
"Let's go, old man!"
Bae Jua and Arin thanked me by trusting me, and No Hayun shouted from atop the Lizardman's shoulder for Yeom Tae-seok to follow. After staring at our backs for a moment, Yeom Tae-seok began running again.
This is the hardest part.
I shook my head. If there weren't a limit on the number of people who could enter the dungeon, Yeonhee and I could just go alone. With our current strength, that would be more than enough. Ah, but we still need support, so Ham Eun-yeong, who follows orders obediently, might be fine.
Anyway, this quest wouldn't end as a simple survival game. The hunters who had entered here were all skilled in their own right. Under normal dungeon conditions, surviving for a week would be entirely possible.
There must be points where it gets much harder.
And if my guess was right, that would most likely be the being sleeping on the second underground floor. Nargul, the ruler of this dungeon. If that creature was summoned here—and especially if it wasn't alone—this survival game would almost certainly become hellishly difficult.
It was the being that led the Legion of Death. Considering its ability to continuously revive skeleton-type monsters...
The inside of the cave would actually be better.
It would be far easier than fending off enemies coming from all directions. I didn't particularly like how the terrain kept forcing us into narrow spaces, but since that cave was essentially a separate location from this area, the influence might be minimal or nonexistent.
This should be the right direction...
Even during the mine incident, the distance had been somewhat different, but the directionality hadn't changed much, so I was confident about the cave's location.
Found it.
"Where on earth are we going?"
"Ha... I don't know. We have no choice but to trust him."
"A few other parties have split off."
Blindly following us wasn't an easy choice either. I would have preferred if the remaining twenty-five hunters had dropped out as well. But contrary to my hopes, they stubbornly kept following, and in the end, they reached the place I had been aiming for.
"What's supposed to be here?"
A tree that must have been lush when alive now lay fallen on the ground. Even in its fallen state, it was enormous, over three meters tall. When I moved to the center of the trunk and lifted the base with force, a passage large enough for a medium-sized Giant Skeleton Soldier to enter appeared.
"Whoa..."
"Wow— How did you know there was a passage here?"
"......As expected."
The other hunters who had followed us were even more shocked than our own party members. But there was no time to stand around with our mouths hanging open.
Kyaaaaaaaak——!
The undead screams were growing closer, and they sounded ominous. Just how many of them had to be screaming to create such an unnatural noise?