Chapter 185
Chapter 185
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 185
Chapter Title: Part 2 Chapter 48
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Creak, creak.
Hot water poured from the showerhead, cascading down over Dun's head.
His hair, a total mess from tumbling around in the snowy field for so long, settled calmly as it got wet.
The guest room Seol Do-yun had provided was stocked with bath products in a truly wide array of scents.
Conveniently, there were several varieties of his favorite scent, so Dun lathered it into his hair, humming contentedly as he finished washing up.
After changing into spare clothes, Dun inhaled the fresh fragrance wafting from his body and felt his mind ease.
Current time: 12:59.
He'd left the warm water running while zoning out, and time had slipped away in an instant.
Since he was set to meet Seol Do-yun in the strategy room by 1:00, Dun gave his hair a rough towel-dry and opened the door to step out.
"You're one minute late?"
As soon as he entered the strategy room, he spotted Seol Do-yun diligently scribbling calculations on the whiteboard.
Freshly showered, hair neatly blow-dried, changed into tidy clothes, Seol Do-yun smiled.
"Don't be so strict."
Dun pulled out a nearby chair and plopped down, shaking out his damp hair with the towel draped around his neck as he replied indifferently.
Cool orange juice sat on the desk.
One in front of Seol Do-yun, one at the seat across from him. He'd once loved chugging ice-cold orange juice right after a shower.
Chiiiik.
Dun stared at Seol Do-yun for a long moment before popping the tab on his juice.
......So, did you find the entrance?
Dun took a sip of juice and spoke up.
"Not completely. I've narrowed it down to a few candidate areas."
Seol Do-yun shoved aside the whiteboard crammed full of dense equations and powered on the screen behind it.
The screen lit up, displaying a map of the Arctic. Red dotted lines crisscrossed wildly across it.
Dun squinted at the dotted lines before turning back to Seol Do-yun.
"Looks just like a tracking map."
"Right, similar. I've implanted tracking sensors in the mutated animals spotted at mana concentration points in all directions—east, west, south, north, southeast, northwest. Every time they move, those red dotted lines get drawn."
"The entrance might be in the direction those creatures are heading. There are three in total?"
Dun tapped the three spots where the dotted lines tangled most densely with his fingertip.
"That's the current estimate. Yesterday, someone interfered with additional data collection, so I haven't pinned down the exact entrances yet."
"Don't secretly blame me. Let's just check all three."
......Some of them might be traps.
"Why?"
Seol Do-yun fiddled with the flowering tree pattern on the back of his neck.
‘Observer’s Vision.’
[Usable Status: True]
From birth, he'd never been able to shake the feeling that someone was watching him.
When he gained soulstone-related abilities and ran various experiments, he'd come up with ways to test that sensation too.
After recalling the phrase "Observer’s Vision," he detected instances where parts of his memory stone were being read externally and created a program that displayed "True"—adding it to his broken system.
Recently, he'd discovered that a fragment of the soulstone allowed him to view the system window, so he could craft and add what he needed.
‘It says True, so I need to watch my thoughts.’
Before Seol Do-yun could dwell on why this might be a trap, he recalled Yi Sae-byeok bombing a pun attempt and getting chewed out.
Amid those stray thoughts, he activated his newly created program.
‘Thought Record Protection Management.’
[Thought Record Usable Status.]
[ver.p.T746.null requests access to record editing. Allow?]
True to its final-version form, it was utterly brazen.
With a hollow chuckle, he permitted one-time editing.
* * *
Agreeing with Seol Do-yun, Dun prompted him to brightly smile and hand over a tablet. It showed a photo of land blanketed in snow.
‘Wanna come to the Arctic with me to cool your head?’
......
‘Studying for entrance exams there'll keep your brain from overheating. I'll even tutor you for a special thousand-won-an-hour rate.’
......
Seol Do-yun retrieved the tablet and swiped through a few photos before holding it back up in front of the dumbfounded Yi Sae-byeok's face.
Sae-byeok is an idiot.
* * *
[[Random] section loaded.]
[Approximately 200 characters overwritten successfully.]
[Original saved as original1 in ver.p.null's storage.]
[SUCCESS!]
‘It says success for now, but I wonder if it actually worked.’
Seol Do-yun blinked, having thought freely about things other than Montghel's black curtain, then smiled.
"Wouldn't it be better to play it safe with everything?"
Suddenly spacing out for a while before brightly replying, Seol Do-yun struck Dun as suspicious, narrowing his eyes.
"Fair enough. So what's your plan?"
"Collect more data until we can confirm one definite entrance."
"How many more days will that take?"
"No idea. Feels like we might need another month of data."
Dun scowled at the mention of another month of data collection.
He knew the guy was cautious, but he hadn't expected him to drag his feet this much even with the clues already narrowed down.
"I'll watch your back. Let's just go."
"No way. What about mental interference?"
"Seol Do-yun, you're such a scaredy-cat?"
"It's more about the severe aftereffects messing with work."
"Same difference."
Dun draped the towel over his head and shook out the last of his damp hair, chuckling.
Whenever Seol Do-yun talked like that, progress slowed to half speed.
That stubbornness born of anxiety was always impossible to dissuade, as far as he remembered.
Dun recalled Seol Do-yun emerging from the Hysis Gate covered in wounds.
If things followed their course, Seol Do-yun getting roughed up was an inevitable future. So in a way, it was anxiety with reason.
‘Pfft. Poor guy.’
But true to his Bacinum nature, he'd be right as rain the next day, displaying the same infuriating attitude, so Dun didn't worry too much.
As long as he was alive.
Dun stared intently at the map and memorized the locations of those suspicious zones.
‘Dragging this out might make us miss the Hysis Gate.’
Dun, who wanted to be near when the Hysis Gate erupted, strode toward the strategy room exit and grabbed the doorknob.
"Dun?"
Seol Do-yun called out to Dun suddenly leaving the room, but Dun departed without explanation.
* * *
Boom!
About two hours later, Dun returned to the strategy room.
Seol Do-yun, midway through jotting a long equation on the whiteboard for position calculations, turned to glance at Dun striding toward him.
"Where'd you go?"
Seol Do-yun turned back to the whiteboard to continue his calculations, but Dun snatched his marker.
Dun shoved the whiteboard aside, powered on the screen again, and circled all three zones from the earlier map.
"This zone here is a dungeon-style monster field."
Dun marked one zone with an 'X'.
"This one's definitely mental interference. It was so weak I blew it away."
Dun marked another zone with an 'X'.
He tapped the remaining zone with the marker tip.
"These mutated creatures got swallowed up the moment they gathered here. I got swallowed too, and a notification popped up saying I'd entered a new area. The error-processing zone is called 'Tronlop.'"
......
Seol Do-yun took the board marker, blinked, and stared blankly at Dun.
"You checked all of them already?"
Since he'd been recalculating positions, when Dun left without a word, he'd assumed he went for a nap.
"Yeah. You were dragging it out, so I got annoyed."
"Wow......"
Seol Do-yun crossed his arms and eyed the error-processing zone equations he'd been diligently calculating.
Ever since arriving here, he'd been cross-referencing with Montghel's entrance to locate this one's.
Seol Do-yun gave the densely packed equations one lingering glance before erasing them all.
"That hurts my heart......"
"We know now, so let's go quick."
"You're so impatient. Fine."
Seol Do-yun peeled off the materials pinned to the wall one by one, organizing them. There were quite a few pinned up, so a good handful of thumbtacks too.
Seol Do-yun neatly stored the thumbtacks in a small glass case and tucked it into a drawer.
"Dun. Come here a sec."
"What."
Seol Do-yun smiled brightly and pulled Dun into a hug.
"Thanks for going through the hassle and checking them out."
"???"
Dun's shoulders hunched up tight, so Seol Do-yun reached out and patted those hunched shoulders with a bit of firm pressure.
"W-Why are you doing this?"
Seol Do-yun gazed at Dun warmly.
"Just. Seeing you charge ahead relying on your overwhelming strength made me want to comfort you."
At those words, Dun's face twisted in fury as he shoved Seol Do-yun away hard.
"You bitch even when life's handing you easy wins. Don't go charging around yourself. Just die already."
The shoved Seol Do-yun grinned.
"More importantly, shall we head straight to the spot you mentioned? No reason to delay."
"Music to my ears."
"Got it. I need to pack some gear, so wait a bit."
Whether thrilled that Dun had solved it so quickly, Seol Do-yun headed back to his quarters with a bright expression, stuffing his bag full of various devices.
* * *
The zone Dun had circled.
Far from base, so they had to ride snowmobiles for quite a while.
At the marked spot stood a massive igloo. Surrounding it were circular patterns etched like mysterious crop circles.
Strange creatures gathered around: Arctic foxes with rainbow-colored snow, reindeer with horned hooves, short-necked giraffes with gills, camels with amphibian skin, and more.
Seol Do-yun, who'd been watching the surroundings while lugging a gear bag twice his size, set it down nearby.
"The Tronlop entrance was inside that igloo?"
"Yeah, follow me."
Dun jammed his hands in his pockets and jerked his chin. Striding toward the 'Tronlop' entrance, he suddenly got his hand grabbed by Seol Do-yun, who held him back.
"Hold on, Dun."
Smiling, he pulled a complex device from his bag. It was a wearable like a black vest.
"Just in case, let me equip you with a safety measure."
"I don't need that crap."
Seol Do-yun took off his outer layer and donned his own safety device first.
"It's a mental augmentation magic safety device. It'll sound an alarm if someone tries casting similar magic. I know you're strong, but don't get careless and hurt."
"Don't need it. Looks super bulky."
"Tch."
Seol Do-yun put on a playfully stern face and held the device out to Dun, who rolled his eyes and glanced at the one Seol Do-yun was wearing.
Same shape, so probably the same device.
"Fine. Gimme that."
"It's tricky to put on, so let me do it."
"You've been acting weird for a while now. Don't tell me you like me?"
Seol Do-yun slipped the device's arm opening over Dun's arm and locked the front. He even adjusted the straps perfectly before flashing a grin.
"I do like your infinite abilities. Of course, you yourself aren't bad either."
Seol Do-yun reached out to ruffle Dun's hair wildly, then swiftly dodged the incoming fist.
The two strode toward the igloo.
The moment they stepped inside, the patterns encircling the igloo began to glow.
The glow brightened steadily, reaching its peak when Seol Do-yun arrived at the igloo's center.
The pattern's light began enveloping Seol Do-yun and Dun.