Nothing Lasts Forever
Before we set out, I handed over all the runes I'd collected to Yeonhee. I'd briefly considered just pretending I didn't have them, but the Helen combo weren't the type to miss something like that. Besides, I remembered Helen's little speech about honesty and trust earlier, so I couldn't bring myself to do it. And if they had any conscience at all, they'd probably give us a bigger share anyway.
"Ah... six of them..."
"Whoa, that Lee Yeong-cheol guy supposedly ran a ton of dungeons, but half of these are just regular runes? And only six total? Was his luck that garbage?"
"Maybe he was the type who skipped runes in exchange for higher settlement money? I know a D-grade hunter who's still nowhere near filling their rune slots."
"Really?"
"Yeah. And six isn't even that bad of a drop rate, honestly."
Yeonhee, who had been listening to their conversation, spoke up cautiously.
"Um, since we agreed I'd take the first three, I'll take one of the Mana runes for now. The remaining five we'll rotate in order..."
When Yeonhee picked up the Mana rune with her finger, Helen and Jin-gyeong seemed to hesitate for a moment before responding.
"We basically just lay around the whole time. You should take them all, Yeonhee."
"She's right. If it wasn't for that skeleton of yours, we'd all be dead... or worse, we'd have suffered something even more horrible. So yeah, you should take everything."
I found myself nodding without realizing it.
"No, let's stick to what we decided at the beginning."
"We have a conscience too, we can't just..."
But Yeonhee emphasized the principles we'd set beforehand several more times. In the end, the Helen combo agreed to take only three regular-grade runes.
It was normal for people to fight over even a single extra rune, so I stared at this unfamiliar sight in a daze.
It felt strange, like I was seeing a glimpse of the side of her that had always loved following manuals to the letter in her previous life. At the root, people's fundamental tendencies probably didn't change that easily.
Yeonhee tried to give me all three of the lower-grade runes, but when I pushed the Mana rune back toward her, she scratched her head with an embarrassed look.
Even though a summon's accomplishments were technically her own power, she had a strong tendency to view me as completely separate. Anyway, the two Vitality runes I received were both normal +7 values.
Thanks to the runes, my Stamina rose by 14. After gaining two levels, I invested points into Agility, Wisdom, and Senses. The level-five milestone perk added 8 to each of those stats. This put me in the upper-middle range among lower-grade summons.
Some might think, Even though my stats have been rising steadily, I'm still only upper-middle? But considering how trash my base stats had been to begin with, pulling them up to this level was already remarkable. Of course, numerical stats and actual combat power were two different things. After all, I had Skeleton Bomb.
Eight runes in total.
The matching numbers made me feel a little better about the slightly awkward situation.
"Yeonhee, shall we head out once you've filled up your magic power?"
"Yeah. We'll end up attracting them with our scent even if we stay still, so moving seems better."
"Okay!"
The path back to the entrance wasn't too difficult. We did run into battles along the way, but none involved more than ten monsters. After experiencing that one crisis, the three of them had become noticeably more... aggressive in combat.
"Die! Just die already!!"
"Number One! Wipe them all out!!"
Crunch! Crack!
"Sis, wait! Let me steal one real quick!"
Clink—
Jin-gyeong didn't forget to diligently collect silver either. Since a Thief class stealing silver during battle could yield up to fifty percent more than what dropped from killing monsters, her diligent behavior was something we welcomed. It wasn't a huge amount of money, but it was a matter of attitude.
After our kill count exceeded ten lizards, I was finally able to steal the second trait from the Lizardmen.
Booom—!!
Keeek—!
The legacy left behind by Pitp, the great warrior of the Lizard race.
As battle time increases, stamina recovery speed rises (up to 50% maximum).
I thought to myself that my choice hadn't been so bad after all as I read the newly acquired trait.
Slash—!! Clang clang!!
Slurp?!
The last remaining Lizardman swung its machete with all its might across my torso from left to right, but I didn't take any damage at all.
Boom—!!
The Lizardman wore a puzzled expression, wondering why its attack hadn't worked. Then its lower body was blown away by a bomb that exploded from the ground.
Skeleton Bomb has reached Level 4.
Skeleton Bomb Lv.4
Processes bones from personally killed monsters into magic bombs for storage. When thrown, deals damage equal to 330% of attack power.
Higher-grade processed bones grant additional damage.
Currently stored: 0/56
Maybe because I'd killed Lee Yeong-cheol with a bomb, the Skeleton Bomb skill leveled up quickly after killing just a few more Lizardmen. Rather than the ten percent increase in attack power, I was happier that the storage capacity had gone up by two.
"Hya— These lizards really are nutritious and great for practice. They're a bit dumb, but they still have decent combat intelligence, so fighting them is actually fun."
"Jin-gyeong, saying that while looking like such a bloody mess isn't very convincing, dear."
"But I'm serious! You said it was fun earlier too, sis!"
"I meant the fun of collecting runes, not the fighting. Honestly, this environment doesn't suit me at all. Look at this. Waterproof or not, it's completely useless here."
"You're covered in blood all over your face and you're worried about that?"
"I heard their blood is good for the skin."
"Wait, really?"
"Just kidding."
"Ugh! Seriously!"
I could see the corners of Yeonhee's mouth twitching as she listened intently to the Helen combo's cheerful(?) conversation from the side. She didn't have the courage to join in, so she seemed content just listening.
We circled around toward the entrance, experiencing four more battles and killing a total of thirty-seven Lizardmen. By the afternoon, it seemed like our coordinates had been properly marked. The monsters came at us without us even needing to search for them, which was convenient. Just as Helen had said, the rune drop rate here was higher than in other dungeons. We managed to obtain two more runes.
Getting four runes in a single day of hunting—when it was hard to see even one per day in other dungeons—was a very satisfying result.
We divided the runes one by one in order. This time, we ended up taking a slight loss. Ours was Strength +6, while theirs was Strength +10. In other words, they had received the best possible option available from lower-grade runes.
Human greed truly knew no bounds.
A little later, when the entrance finally came into view, Helen looked at Yeonhee with pitiful, longing eyes.
"......"
Yeonhee tried hard to avoid that gaze, but eventually she couldn't take it anymore and spoke to Helen.
"Would you like to continue together tomorrow as well?"
It seemed like Yeonhee really belonged in a guild that would take care of her. Or maybe she needed someone cunning like me by her side to handle those matters.
Before long, the Helen combo had linked arms with Yeonhee on both sides and were endlessly showering her with sweet words, acting like a bright tomorrow was waiting just for us. It was like they were drugging her with hope.
Yeonhee, trapped between their arms and looking flustered, sent me a pleading glance for help. But I simply clasped my hands behind my back and stared off into the distance. Setting aside their actual abilities, the fact that they were proactively sticking so close to Yeonhee was a good thing in my book.
I knew that Yeonhee had come to rely on me quite a lot at some point. I wasn't sure why it had turned out that way, but since our relationship couldn't last forever, I needed to gradually help her learn to live in the world outside my protection.
There was still the possibility that I might suddenly lose my mind and turn into nothing but a stupid skeleton, especially since I had no idea how I'd even become a skeleton in the first place. That's why she needed to build relationships with other people. If she ended up liking them so much that she forgot about me... well, I'd feel a little hurt, but there was nothing I could do about it.
Of course, I had no intention of just sitting still either. Protecting Yeonhee was a given, but aside from that, I needed to find a way to escape the Dark Space before any variables appeared in my life. Or at the very least, I needed to reach a point where I could come and go as I pleased.
Separate from my wish for Yeonhee to do well, I had my own life to live. The word "life" carried meanings like living, existing, and being. I might not be alive in the conventional sense, but I still had to keep on living.
According to what I heard from Yeonhee after we returned home, the Lee Yeong-cheol incident had been quietly swept under the rug as expected. It was an obvious outcome.
The civil servants working for the Hunter Management Agency weren't exactly people with a lot of free time. Half of every month had to be spent inside dungeons producing results to increase their own power, while the other half was filled with paperwork and management duties related to dungeons. Even if they had ten bodies, it still wouldn't be enough. Of course, they received incredibly generous compensation in return, but at their core, they were still hunters. In the end, they weren't all that interested in who died inside a dungeon.