Chapter 158
Chapter 158
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 158
Chapter Title: ACT.28 Disaster of Solitude (4)
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“But it’s strange. If the Order was truly behind this, why would they do something that hurts themselves? A stigma mine that large is literally a goose that lays golden eggs.”
Seong Woo-hyeon narrowed his eyes slightly.
That part was certainly questionable.
To think they did this knowing it would ruin their relationship with Paradise, just what kind of profit could they possibly gain from it?
“It might not have been the Order.”
Hwang Chan-jin calmly stated his thoughts.
“And the cause of the disaster’s appearance isn’t important right now. The problem is why it suddenly stopped moving, and how we’re supposed to defeat it.”
“…You have a point.”
“Mm.”
The guild masters all agreed with Hwang Chan-jin’s words.
But this guy. Isn’t he being a bit too informal with the guild masters?
He’s just a player from the Jamryong Guild, after all.
“I like how clear-cut that is. Right. Defeating it is what’s important.”
The master of the Silver Hawk Guild, Kim Hyo-jong, clapped his hands with a playful smile.
“But hey.”
“……?”
“Why are you talking down to me?”
Kim Hyo-jong’s expression turned vicious in an instant as he unleashed his killing intent.
Of course. There was no way a wild horse like him would appreciate Hwang Chan-jin’s attitude.
But Hwang Chan-jin’s response was just as formidable.
His eyes merely shifted slightly, as if hearing a dog bark somewhere, before he gave a short reply.
“You have a problem with it?”
“A problem? Ha, listen to this bastard. Damn right, I’ve got a fucking problem with it.”
The atmosphere grew tense.
A palpable tension, like a bomb about to explode, as if they would start fighting at any moment.
“If you want my respect.”
Hwang Chan-jin, however, only added fuel to the fire.
“Then prove you’re stronger than me.”
“Wow, this bastard’s amusing.”
Kim Hyo-jong let out a chilling laugh and shot up from his seat.
The other guild masters immediately intervened, preventing the situation from escalating further.
“Calm down! Now is not the time for us to be fighting amongst ourselves!”
“That’s right, Master Kim Hyo-jong. And you too, Hwang Chan-jin-nim. How about we each take a step back?”
“To be fair, it is true that Hwang Chan-jin is stronger.”
“What did you say, you bastard!?”
“Seon Woo-jin-nim! Why would you say that now!?”
“I haven’t said anything particularly incorrect.”
“You. Follow me outside. I never liked you anyway. Let’s have a proper match today.”
“Tsk, tsk… It’s because you act so barbarically that you’re looked down on even by a mere guild member, isn’t it?”
What a mess.
I subtly shifted my gaze to Hwang Chan-jin.
Judging by his face, he meant every word he just said.
No wonder I’d never seen him use honorifics easily with anyone.
He had a personality that actively made enemies.
Though he did have the power and information to back it up.
Having created this situation himself, Hwang Chan-jin simply watched the masters bicker amongst themselves.
He seemed to have something on his mind, but…
‘Putting everything else aside, he’s right that the disaster is what’s important now.’
Why had the disaster suddenly stopped moving?
It was certainly a crucial question.
Whether the gate opened on its own or someone opened it intentionally, a disaster’s purpose was to destroy blindly, so it didn’t make sense for it to be standing still like this.
‘Wait.’
In that moment, a hypothesis flashed through my mind.
‘Could its objective be…?’
*Thud!*
I pushed back my chair and shot to my feet.
The guild masters, who had been in an uproar, stopped and turned their gazes toward me, but I paid them no mind and continued my train of thought.
This would explain it.
Why the disaster had stopped moving and wasn’t pursuing us anymore.
‘Stigma!’
There was no doubt.
The disaster was currently absorbing the mana from the stigma to restore the power it had lost during its dimensional travel.
“Master!”
“Captain!!”
“Guild Master!!!”
Suddenly, members from each guild rushed into the room one by one.
Not just from one guild, but all of them at the same time.
“What is it?”
“While we were repairing the collapsed wall, the monsters suddenly attacked again…! Battles are breaking out all over the place!”
“Again, so soon? What’s the scale of the attack?”
“It’s more than before, certainly not less!”
“They’re attacking like mad. Hah!”
Choi Dae-han groaned and clutched his forehead.
Worse yet, this place hadn’t even fully recovered from the effects of the Red Zone.
If they couldn’t fend off the swarming monsters in time, they would essentially have to abandon the residence.
They were in a real bind.
I turned my gaze to Jun Bo-ra, whose expression was also grim.
“Is the east side okay?”
“I set up all the defenses before I came. It should be fine even if I’m gone for a bit. Lee Seon-yul is there, too.”
So Lee Seon-yul, whom I sent for reconnaissance, was now completely stationed there.
Still, with no S-class player present, it was impossible not to worry.
If the east fell, things would get difficult later on.
To protect the east, it was best to deal with this disaster quickly.
“All of you, please defend the residence! I’ll head toward the disaster!”
“It’s dangerous to go alone! If you’re going, we’ll provide some of our elite members to go with you…”
“No! With this disaster, having more people will only be a disadvantage!”
“Pardon?”
Leaving a bewildered Seong Woo-hyeon behind, I hurried out of the place.
Hwang Chan-jin and Jun Bo-ra, quick on the uptake, followed close behind me.
I had to leave the other party members behind for this one.
As much as I wanted to raise their coin earnings, as I said before, more people would only make things worse.
“Han Hyeok-jun! We’re going back to the mine! Move it!”
Han Hyeok-jun, who had been lost in thought at our meeting spot, joined us with a dazed expression.
We teleported to the vicinity of Mount Gyeryong, and from there, we ran.
Honestly, even four people was questionable.
The Disaster of Solitude was too strong for me to face alone, but four people wasn't quite enough to defeat it, especially considering its attack patterns.
Most importantly.
[Using the skill, ‘Extreme Eye’.]
Right now, Hwang Chan-jin, Han Hyeok-jun, and Jun Bo-ra lacked something essential for fighting the Disaster of Solitude in a group.
“…Kim Se-hyeon. You go on ahead.”
As we were running frantically, Hwang Chan-jin suddenly stopped.
Before Han Hyeok-jun could say anything, I spoke first.
“How long will it take?”
“I won’t be late.”
And with that, he quickly disappeared in another direction.
As expected, Hwang Chan-jin had been thinking about it too.
Come to think of it, since we were at Mount Gyeryong, there was an item that could somewhat prevent that.
“Weren’t we in a hurry? Where is that guy going all of a sudden?”
“It’s fine. He must have his reasons.”
“You two don’t get along, but you trust him a lot.”
Han Hyeok-jun grumbled before falling silent.
He sounded strangely jealous, which made me laugh in disbelief.
‘What should I do with Han Hyeok-jun?’
His power was barely acceptable, but it would be difficult to explain the strategy for the Disaster of Solitude to him.
He probably wouldn't understand it just by hearing it.
Even if I explained it, memorizing everything and reacting the moment he saw it would be difficult unless he was a genius.
If he were to fall helplessly to the one pattern we had to be most careful of, he would become a liability.
What to do?
“…By the way, you’re not going with him?”
“Why?”
“Well, do you have something that can block that pattern of the Disaster of Solitude?”
“I’ll be fine. I just need to get out of its range.”
Jun Bo-ra said confidently.
To react by moving out of range the moment it uses the pattern.
If she didn’t have teleportation, I would have dismissed it as nonsense.
Honestly, even with teleportation, it would be difficult unless her reaction speed was exceptionally good.
“If you can’t dodge it, I’m knocking you out.”
“That won’t happen.”
Jun Bo-ra scoffed and raised her middle finger.
Great. I’m looking forward to hitting her.
[Aren’t you forgetting one thing?]
Besial spoke to me quietly.
“What?”
[As you said, that thing has deviated from causality. Such an existence is naturally given a penalty.]
An inhibitory force.
I think I vaguely saw that word somewhere.
It was a word I had never seen in the game, but I had a rough idea of what it meant.
“An inhibitory force, you mean its power has been partially restricted.”
[It depends on how much it has deviated, but it should be weakened by at least 40 or 50%. You saw the lightning surrounding its body when it came out of the gate, right? The stronger the inhibitory force, the stronger that becomes. If what I saw was correct, it should be weakened by that much.]
Forty to fifty percent.
I closed my eyes for a moment and compared our strengths.
“If that’s the case, it might be possible.”
Of course, if it was recovering its strength by devouring stigma as I suspected, it would be stronger than that.
Therefore, I couldn’t give it any more time.
Since it emerged from the deepest part of the mine, there would be plenty of high-quality stigma nearby.
It was a good thing we had already taken the A-grade and good B-grade ones; otherwise, it would have recovered much more power.
“To think I’d be running back and forth here twice in one day.”
Han Hyeok-jun muttered as he looked at the completely collapsed mine.
Night falls quickly in the mountains.
The surroundings were already growing dark, making the mine pitch black.
Although the entrance had collapsed even further, the path we had cleared earlier should still be there. We just needed to dig down to it.
I stared at Han Hyeok-jun.
He tilted his head, then finally understood the meaning in my gaze and approached the collapsed mine entrance.
To think that digging skill, the embodiment of bad luck, would be so useful.
Jun Bo-ra looked on, bewildered, asking, “Why does he have that skill?”
“By the way, Se-hyeon.”
“Yeah?”
“Is digging this right now the correct move?”
“Probably not.”
“Right?”
We exchanged smirks and quickly moved away from the spot.
*Swoosh!*
A volley of arrows embedded themselves in the ground where we had just been standing.
Arrows, not guns.
They chose something with less noise to avoid attracting the monsters’ aggro. At least the enemy wasn't a fool.
Han Hyeok-jun was in the hole he had dug, so the arrows didn't reach him.
“My, my. I thought we were quite well hidden… When did you notice?”
From between the surrounding trees, people dressed uniformly in black revealed themselves.
Since they were discovered anyway, they showed themselves to apply numerical pressure… or so it seemed, but half of them were still hidden.
They would likely launch a fatal attack from a blind spot the moment we let our guard down.
‘About 100 of them.’
They brought quite a few.
It seems they were certain we would come back.
“The culprit always returns to the scene of the crime. It’s quite fascinating. Why is that?”
I identified the figure who had fully revealed himself.
“Huh,” I let out a small exclamation.
This was a big shot.
Jun Bo-ra also recognized him and frowned.
“Cheon Jin-ha…? Why is he here?”
One of the three Guides of Paradise.
‘Guide of the Abyss,’ Cheon Jin-ha.
Contrary to his lighthearted appearance, he was a schemer, a troublesome type to deal with.
I never expected a Guide to show up in person.
Then again, no matter how collapsed it was, they couldn’t easily give up a stigma mine.
It was, after all, a goose that laid golden eggs.
“It must be because the unfinished business was weighing on your mind.”
“That’s one way to look at it.”
Cheon Jin-ha shrugged and smiled.
“Then, if it’s your unfinished business… it must be because of something that was deep inside, right?”
“You knew and continued to excavate the mine?”
“What are you talking about! That’s all the more reason to do it!”
His face was filled with ecstasy.
Perhaps the nickname ‘Guide of Madness’ was more fitting for Cheon Jin-ha.
“Anyway, you don’t seem tense at all. Do you have something to rely on?”
“Why would I be tense?”
“Are you too stupid to grasp the situation? Why do you think we used bows instead of guns? This Mount Gyeryong is teeming with strong monsters. The moment you make a loud noise and draw their aggro, you’re dead…”
*BOOM!*
Before Cheon Jin-ha could finish his sentence, I hurled a mass of Black Flame in one direction.
An explosion erupted, and those engulfed in the black flames screamed in agony as they collapsed.
The fire on the trees spread to the surrounding ones, and the blaze began to grow.
The enemies who had their bows drawn, as well as Cheon Jin-ha, stared with blank expressions before he finally shouted.
“Are you insane!? If you make such a commotion, all the monsters on Mount Gyeryong will swarm here now!”
“Good.”
“What?”
“You guys can draw all the monsters’ aggro for us, can’t you?”