A Diabolical Satiety Drain

The Flame Ghouls themselves were at a level they could easily handle. The problem was the dungeon's penalty, which drained their satiety with every single swing of their weapons!

"Crazy!" Cain gasped in shock. He knew hunger would set in quickly, but he hadn't expected to starve after defeating just a single monster. At this rate, how much food would he even have to pack in his inventory...?

Crunch!

"Graaaah! Give me flesh! Give me flesh!"

"Gasp!" Cain, who had let his guard down after bashing the creature with his shield, shrieked in terror. The monster had made an unexpected move, biting down on his shield and lunging past it.

"Cain, snap out of it! The monster's attack patterns are different!" Tae-hyun unleashed a flurry of strikes at the approaching ghoul's legs, halting its movement, before landing a devastating critical hit right on its weak point.

The ghoul, which had been savagely lunging at Cain, was utterly helpless under Tae-hyun's relentless assault. The difference in their reaction speeds was simply too vast!

Cain was essentially an average player who relied on holding his shield up to endure attacks before counterstriking when the enemy paused. Tae-hyun, however, didn't bother with defense. He read and dodged every single attack, delivering counters in a high-difficulty style that seamlessly blended offense and defense!

It was a combat style that was extremely rare even in Pan-On—one that couldn't be copied just by understanding it. Only a handful of damage dealers chose such a path. It was a high-risk style where a single control mistake or a stroke of bad luck could get you instantly killed! But once mastered, it was the most terrifying style of all.

The most infuriating situation where none of your attacks land, yet the opponent's strikes keep pouring in! On top of that, Tae-hyun's burst damage was among the highest in all of Pan-On.

"Screeech!"

In an instant, the pack of ghouls was cleared. Tae-hyun clicked his tongue as he watched his satiety bar rapidly deplete.

I finished that pretty quickly, and it's already down this much... That means we have to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠eat after every single battle. What a truly vicious dungeon! But there was no use complaining. He just had to do his best to clear it.

It's a good thing I didn't bring the whole group. If we had to share the food, we would have run out even faster. Though it would have been much easier if I'd brought Lee Da-bi instead of Cain...

Unlike Cain, Lee Da-bi had a merchant class, meaning she carried an absurd variety of items. Cooking ingredients were no exception.

"Wow, I'm seriously starving," Cain groaned. Getting hit in Pan-On didn't hurt exactly like it did in reality. However, heat, cold, and hunger were felt quite vividly. He was genuinely hungry! Since food was abundant in Pan-On and Cain was a high-ranking player, it had been a very long time since he had felt true hunger in the game.

"The bread... the bread I packed... did it go bad?! Sob!" Cain reflected on his life choices. I never truly appreciated the value of a single loaf of bread!

"Here. Eat some meat."

"Gasp!" Cain eagerly snatched the grilled meat Tae-hyun offered and wolfed it down. It was a bit tough, smelled strange, and left a tingling sensation on his tongue, but meat was meat. Perhaps because of his hunger, it tasted surprisingly delicious!

"Is this Abnormal Cooking too?" Cain asked, chewing vigorously. It felt like he hadn't seen Tae-hyun cook anything other than Abnormal Food lately.

"Of course."

"Normally I wouldn't be able to stomach it, but right now, it actually tastes good."

"How admirable of you to say that."

"What kind of meat is it? Pork?"

"No. Ghoul."

"Ah, gruel... Wait, is this some kind of porridge?"

"No, a ghoul."

"...???" Cain stared at the grilled meat in his hand, his chewing coming to a sudden halt.

"N-No way..."

"What do you mean, 'no way'?"

"It's not, right? Please tell me it's not...! The one we just killed..."

"It is."

!

He had literally butchered the ghoul meat on the spot, prepared it using Abnormal Cooking, and handed it over.

No wonder my notification window kept flashing with poison warnings and stuff! No matter how edible it was made through Abnormal Cooking, contaminated ghoul meat could never be completely safe. It was only because of Cain's high level and passive skills that it barely affected him!

"Hey! This is crossing the line!!" Cain yelled, his emotions flaring. Up until now, Abnormal Cooking had at least been beneficial to his health. That was why Cain had managed to force it down, brainwashing himself with thoughts like, This is just herbal medicine, this is just herbal medicine!

But this was just... feeding him inedible ingredients turned into an inedible dish!

"Even so, are you seriously feeding me this garbage just to level up your cooking skill?!"

"What are you talking about?" Tae-hyun looked at Cain as if he had lost his mind.

"You're... you're not feeding me this to level up your cooking?"

"...Do I really look like that kind of person to you?"

Cain wanted to scream, Yes! but he flinched. He had a feeling that if he said yes, he would be relentlessly nagged and tormented for at least a week!

"N-No."

"I'm feeding you this to clear the dungeon, obviously."

Tae-hyun had already calculated the odds after their first battle with the ghouls. This dungeon was impossible to clear through normal means! At first, he had wondered, Is this a dungeon where you're supposed to pack a mountain of food in your inventory and just push through? But that wasn't it. If satiety hit zero even when clearing monster packs as fast as possible...

It wouldn't matter how much food you brought. It's impossible. This dungeon was truly diabolical. In other dungeons, you might encounter monsters that could be harvested for edible meat, but here, only contaminated undead appeared. Ingredients that normal players would never dare to eat, no matter how starving they were! Cooking them was normally impossible, and taking even a single bite would inflict all sorts of penalties. It was only because of Tae-hyun's Abnormal Cooking that they could barely manage...

Wow. This dungeon is incredibly malicious. Even Tae-hyun, who had spent a vast amount of time in Pan-On, couldn't help but admire the sheer cruelty of its design!

I'd love to drag the people I hate in here. He wondered if he could take down high-level NPCs that were normally impossible to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠defeat by luring them into this place. If he dragged them in, ran away, and then showed up about five days later...

"Ugh... sob, sob..." Cain wept sorrowfully as he chewed on the ghoul meat. No matter how good the quest and its rewards were, wasn't the whole point of playing games to enjoy life? Did he really have to go this far?

"Cain, you should actually be glad it's just ghouls."

"?" Cain stared at Tae-hyun as if he were speaking gibberish.

"We don't know what kind of monsters will appear next."

"...!!" It was true. Ghouls, at the very least, had flesh that could be chewed! What if golems, tree monsters, or things like that appeared next?

"Don't worry."

"R-Right? We won't have to eat things like that, right?" Cain asked, a faint sliver of hope in his voice. Of course, Tae-hyun never failed to shatter his expectations.

"No. I will do my absolute best to cook them for you."

"...D-Do you have any of your usual leftover dishes?!" Cain was so desperate that he actually begged for the Abnormal Food he usually refused to touch even if offered. Looking back, those dishes seemed like absolute delicacies now!

Contaminated meat! At least it's edible.

Rotten slime! ...At least it's edible!

Smelly leather shoes! ...If we tan the leather properly, we can somehow eat this too...!

Golem stones! Cain finally exploded. He had desperately hoped against hope, but a golem had actually appeared! What a godforsaken dungeon!

"We can't eat this!!"

"Hmm. What a shame."

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Tsk. If he had possessed the Master-tier Abnormal Cooking skill, he might have been able to cook the golem stones. But Tae-hyun's cooking skills were still only Advanced! Both his Cooking and Abnormal Cooking skills were at the Advanced tier.

Tae-hyun reflected on his shortcomings. Ah, if only my cooking skills were a bit higher, I could have helped a starving Cain! I should have worked harder!

I feel like that guy is plotting something incredibly terrifying. Cain stared at Tae-hyun with a deeply unsettled expression. He was starving, but Tae-hyun was far more frightening than his hunger.

"Are we even heading in the right direction?" Cain asked, seeking directions. One of the most important aspects of clearing a dungeon was mapping! And when it came to pathfinding, Tae-hyun was practically a cheat. Not only did he possess incredibly sharp intuition, but he also had his Map Generation skill, meaning he could hardly ever get lost!

"We're going the right way." However, his mapping skills were practically useless in this dungeon. Because the path was... a straight line!

Has this guy seriously not noticed that we haven't hit a single fork in the road? Tae-hyun stared at Cain with utter disbelief. No matter how dense someone was, they should have realized it by now!

It seemed the dungeon's sole purpose was to make the journey as long as possible, forcing them to walk forward continuously without a single intersection.

It's a spiral. A dungeon shaped like an inverted cone! They were winding their way down along the inner walls of the cone. He could feel the sheer malice of the design, trying to force them to walk endlessly to drain their satiety. Pure evil!

Lately, it feels like Archisus is showing his true colors. In the past, the god had at least pretended to be somewhat benevolent, but lately, he wasn't even bothering to hide it!

......

I'm not thanking you, though?

"Bwahaha! Hahaha! Ahahaha!" Su Ning roared with laughter, absolutely thrilled. So this is it! This is why Kim Tae-hyun went around playing bandit all the time!

Until now, Su Ning had believed that the easiest way to make money was through taxes. Raising the territory's taxes accumulated gold at a laughably fast rate. But there was an even faster way in this world: going to a scenic, well-traveled road and shouting, "Hand over your money!" to plunder travelers!

"Is our guild really going to be okay?"

"He kept getting pushed around by Kim Tae-hyun, and now he's finally losing his mind..."

The guild members whispered among themselves. Su Ning had been looking more and more unhinged lately. Rumors were already bad enough with several guilds leaving the Guild Alliance and investments drying up, but now even their guild leader was acting like this... Should we just jump ship?

"Well, we still need to get our share of the loot."

"Exactly!"

The guild members waited with pounding hearts. Why else would they engage in banditry and plundering? For the sweet, sweet loot!

"Guildmaster Su Ning, you need to distribute the rewards."

"What? Ah... do I really have to?"

Su Ning looked at the mountain of gold with deep regret. Can't I just take this and use it for the guild's development fund? We're already ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠struggling with a gold shortage...

"Guildmaster, even Kim Tae-hyun distributed the loot after plundering."

One of the officers, who was relatively quick-witted and sharp, spoke up. Even Tae-hyun distributed most of the loot after a raid! It wasn't because Tae-hyun was kind or foolish. It was because keeping it all to oneself always led to trouble. A person might forget who attacked them, but they would never forget the bastard who hogged all their gold!

"...Fine! I get it."

Normally, Su Ning wouldn't have listened. But he, too, had grown. He had learned that if Kim Tae-hyun did 'A', there was a damn good reason for it. Copying him! By mimicking everything Tae-hyun did, Su Ning was evolving.

Clink, clink, clink— "There's no need to thank me!"

"??"

"This is..."

"Only half...?"

Murmurs rippled through the guild members. Su Ning nodded and spoke with a straight face.

"Don't go spreading this around too much. Giving you a whole fifty percent... Sigh, I really am far too generous..."

Su Ning rubbed the bottom of his nose. The guild members stared at him, utterly dumbfounded. They were the ones who had personally gone to the village, gathered the items, and extorted the gold, yet he was taking a fifty percent cut? The real robber was standing right in front of them!

"G-Guildmaster Su Ning, isn't this a bit too much..."

"Are you asking if I'm returning too much?"

"No, aren't you taking too much of a cut?"

"What? Isn't this a massive amount to give back?"

This guy is dead serious! The officer was horrified. The look in Su Ning's eyes was one hundred percent genuine. But Su Ning had his own justification.

"Kim Tae-hyun puts his subordinates to work for free!"

"Guildmaster, you..."

The officer wanted to scream, ...You don't have a fraction of Kim Tae-hyun's popularity, you idiot! but he held it in. His position as an officer was precious to him!

"What about me?"

"...You aren't nearly as evil as Kim Tae-hyun, are you!"