The Demigod Dungeon

Thud.

In that instant, he was back where he started.

What?

Did I just dream that?

He stood there, utterly blank.

What the hell had that been?

But it hadn't been a dream.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thudthudthudthud.

The world spun. He wanted to vomit. The scenery flipped without pause, and his position flipped with it. Sky and ground traded places in a nauseating blur as the distance between them steadily closed.

Before he knew it, Haksal was outside the carriage.

Far off, the armored figure who had emerged from the spot where he'd been hiding kept swapping places with him, the gap shrinking with every exchange.

And when at last they stood practically on top of each other—

"Bleeaaaargh—!"

His guts twisted into knots and he heaved everything up.

That was the end of it.

Haksal collapsed onto the steaming pile of his own vomit.

The world kept spinning. He couldn't even think of fighting back.

"Heh."

That was the last sound Haksal ever heard while he was still alive.

So he was a Player?

I stroked my chin as I studied the messages that had appeared.

A slaughterer who'd gone Chaos from habitual PK.

Handing over a Golden Rule fragment with forty-nine hours on it made it certain—the man had been a Player.

Had someone deliberately planted a Level 10 assassin along my route?

Or pure coincidence?

Haksal.

I dug through the Hall of Fame and confirmed that Haksal's name had vanished.

Of everyone who'd been sitting near the top, he was the only one gone.

That lunatic came after me and got himself killed by Serengeti.

Haksal was infamous for farming PK kills in the low-level brackets.

The so-called "Newbie Slaughterer"—that was Haksal.

He'd clearly meant to snuff me out the moment I became a Player. Bad luck for him, though. His opponent was the wrong one.

Serengeti was a 1-Star Transcendent.

And "1-Star" barely did her justice—she was a monster who could go toe-to-toe with 2-Star Transcendents without breaking a sweat.

That was exactly why I'd kept her as my closest retainer.

If Haksal was here, that means no other factions are.

I wasn't surprised.

I'd already figured someone might come hunting me around now.

If Haksal had been the one after me, that was actually good news.

It meant no other Player factions were operating in the area.

"Not even a proper warm-up."

Serengeti spoke as if she'd just come back from a stroll.

Level 10 was formidable by any ordinary measure, but even so, an unbridgeable wall stood between that and a true Transcendent.

"You look to be in excellent condition, at least."

"Leave it to me. I'll finish things quickly."

Thump, thump!

She rapped her armor, radiating confidence.

I could only hope that confidence wouldn't turn into screaming.

We pushed through the forest and ran for a long while before a massive cave came into view.

"A dragon's nest…?"

Serengeti's expression went rigid as she stared at the cavern mouth.

Caves of this size were rare.

When they did exist, most of them were nests claimed by dragons.

"It's the nest of a dead ancient dragon."

The nest of some nameless fallen elder dragon.

This was the gateway to the Demigod Dungeon.

We climbed down from the carriage and approached the entrance.

Ziiing!

The mouth of the cave rippled.

A barrier the ancient dragon had left behind, designed to keep the unqualified out.

A Trait Dungeon.

This was a place where you could fight with nothing but the talent and traits you carried.

Everything was locked down except the authority gained by devouring a Star and transcending!

Strong ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and weak were forced onto the same starting line, so betrayal and scheming were inevitable. The dungeon itself actively encouraged treachery, turning the whole place into pure pandemonium.

Equipment and tools could only be used if found inside the dungeon, and even those came with "usage conditions" attached—everything about it was deliberately vicious.

The notification that Main Quest 6 had begun.

No reason to hesitate.

Completely conquering this place and setting a record had been my goal from the start.

Then it happened.

Condition deletion, huh.

The Heart of the Iron-Blooded Lord had been a trait that steadied the emotions and shielded the mind against mental skills and attacks.

It was an extraordinary Hidden Trait—one that had kept me composed even before the White King—but it had never been the kind of trait that actively created advantages on its own.

Yet after evolving into the Eternal Lord, it hadn't merely withstood the Demigod's pressure. It had gone so far as to delete a condition outright.

I had never seen condition deletion. Never even heard of it.

It was, quite literally, an act that surpassed the limits of what a "trait" was supposed to be able to do.

The Demigod had laid down four absolute laws.

And one of them—the ban on tools—had just been shattered.

This wouldn't stop here. It would apply the same way in other "Condition Dungeons" and "Towers."

…Incredible.

Just thinking about the advantages the Heart of the Eternal Lord now carried made ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my shoulders roll of their own accord.

Conditions designed to force everyone to start from zero.

And it had turned that zero into a one.

It wasn't like standing a single step ahead in a race around the track. It was like starting half a lap ahead of everyone else.

I could even prepare more before going in.

We still hadn't entered.

If tools were usable now, all I had to do was stock up and then walk through the gate.

No more tricks allowed, then?

A little disappointing, but still more than enough.

"Hmm…"

After her interview with Gracia, Kim Hana had thrown herself into covering Dimension Warriors across the entire world.

Who were they, and where had they come from?

What exactly did they mean by "Descent"?

"What's with the serious face, Kim-won?"

Inside the Warrior desk at CK Broadcasting Station, Kim Hana sat with her notebook in hand, brow furrowed in thought.

When Seo Jeong-a, seated beside her, asked, Kim Hana let out a long sigh.

"I just can't figure it out."

"There's something our newsroom's best-career Kim-won doesn't know?"

"It's Kim Hana, not Kim-won… Haah. Forget it."

Kim Hana shook her head.

By now it wasn't just Seo Jeong-a—every reporter at CK called her Kim-won.

The Gracia interview had sealed it.

"So what's wrong?"

"They're subtly different."

"What is?"

"What the Dimension Warriors say. It feels like they're hiding something…"

"When I covered them, they all said the exact same things."

Seo Jeong-a wasn't wrong. The coverage had all been more or less identical.

The Warriors repeated the same story as if they'd rehearsed it together.

That they were great warriors who had crossed dimensions from another world to protect Earth. That they borrowed the bodies of Earthlings and Descended as other-dimensional "Descent vessels." That sort of thing.

But Kim Hana felt a gut instinct that they were concealing something.

"Are those people really heroes?"

"You mean the so-called Eight Heroes from the other dimension? It's a little ridiculous, but looking at how the other Warriors revere them, it doesn't seem entirely wrong."

"Do people usually fear their heroes?"

"Fear them?"

What was a hero?

There were many kinds, but the heroes the Warriors spoke of were the textbook definition of the word.

True heroes who protected the world from threats and shouldered their responsibilities—that was the story.

So why, then, did they fear their heroes?

Seo Jeong-a hadn't noticed at all that the other Warriors were afraid of the ones called heroes.

Every other reporter was probably the same, Kim Hana excluded.

A fear and unease so long-lived they don't even recognize it in themselves.

They feared the heroes more than the monsters.

Shouldn't it be the other way around?

And that suspicion had only grown sharper today.

She carefully opened her notebook. Wedged in the middle was a single yellow sticky note.

Just three sentences on the note—but someone had identified her notebook with perfect precision and slipped it inside.

Security in the Warrior desk was airtight.

Even rewinding the CCTV turned up no sign of an intrusion.

No one on the inside would bother with a prank like this.

And more than that—

"Can you read what's written on this?"

"What is this, some kind of worm scribble?"

To anyone else, the writing on the note looked like random scrawl.

Only she could see it as actual letters.

The only people capable of something like that were Dimension Warriors.

The only ones who call themselves heroes are the Eight Heroes.

Gracia, Master, and the rest of the eight.

Technically seven. Wilhelm, the missing one, was someone even they claimed to be searching for.

Either way, the message was clear: do not trust those seven.

"There are no Dimension Warriors." What does that mean—that the whole thing is a lie? And what about "addicts"?

There were plenty of kinds of addicts.

Drug addicts?

Gambling addicts?

Alcohol? Games?

Probably not workaholics or exercise addicts.

"What is your relationship with the master of the Hydragon? Do you know where he is?"

The question Gracia ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠had thrown at her out of nowhere during the interview.

He had spoken of the man who commanded the colossal monster called the Hydragon.

The man who had first protected her from the Giant Mantis.

The same man who had later saved her again at the steakhouse in Cheongdam.

They had no relationship whatsoever—but a sudden, inexplicable chill had made Kim Hana deny Gracia's question on the spot.

Could it have something to do with Park Hyunmyung…?

The thought that he might be the Warrior who owned the Hydragon flickered through her mind, but she shook her head.

Coincidence. It had to be.

But what if it wasn't?

What if this vanishingly small possibility were true?

Should she tell him?

That unplaceable chill. Whatever reason Gracia had for hunting the man, it didn't feel like simple goodwill.

And previously, Gracia had appeared in Eunpyeong-gu.

Pillars of light had filled the sky and thrown the whole district into chaos, and Kim Hana knew Gracia had been the one responsible.

She lived in Eunpyeong-gu herself, after all.

She had seen those pillars of light with her own eyes.

Why did Gracia go to Eunpyeong-gu?

Eunpyeong-gu.

Besides being the place she lived, it was also where she had first met Park Hyunmyung.

The Warrior who owned the Hydragon—the one who had slain the Giant Mantis—had appeared there as well.

Of course it wasn't strange for Gracia to search Eunpyeong-gu.

But his intent was what she wanted to know.

If he'd been trying to wipe out all of Eunpyeong-gu…

She told herself that was impossible, but she couldn't erase the chill she'd felt from Gracia.

A suspicion had begun to take root—that they might not be heroes in any true sense of the word.

The warp into the dungeon left me with a mild wave of dizziness.

Every stat had been locked at 20, and the equipment we'd worn in had cleanly evaporated.

I supposed I should be grateful the Demigod had at least left us our shirts, pants, and underclothes.

"Nngh."

Serengeti, Isaac, and Isabella all swayed slightly as the vertigo hit them.

Natural enough, with their stats suddenly gutted.

Serengeti was the first to recover.

She scanned the area ahead and spoke.

"There are weapons and armor."

Just as she said, equipment was laid out in rows before us.

The message was clear: pick what you'll use before the real run begins.

But the signposts carved conditions into the display.

One each. That was the rule.

Serengeti tilted her head.

"What does it mean that the other party members' stats will decrease?"

"It means the stats of the other three—everyone except the one who picks—will drop."

"This Demigod creature is thoroughly malicious."

Understanding the intent, Serengeti's brow furrowed on its own.

This was only a taste.

A warning of how the rest of the dungeon would proceed.

"If we can only choose one each, shouldn't we start with weapons?"

Arm everyone and fight.

Given our aggressively offense-oriented party composition, it wasn't a bad call.

But I shook my head.

"One weapon is enough."

"One?"

"The rest take a shield, armor, and a helmet."

Hearing that, Serengeti nodded.