Chapter 187
Chapter 187
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 187
Chapter Title: What Can Be Stopped (3)
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“So you planned to dump the grunt work on me from the start. How cunning. Fine. I'll take care of them.”
“You know where they are, right?”
“...Just make sure *you* don't get caught off guard.”
“You’re worried about me?”
“Right. It’s ridiculous for me to worry about you.”
Hwang Chan-jin let out a smirk and headed back down the stairs.
It seemed he remembered their location.
Min Ji-ah, who hadn't been able to follow the conversation, asked blankly.
“What was that about? ‘Them’?”
“Failures. Difficult to handle, unstable subjects.”
Not every experiment had been a success.
There were plenty of failed subjects that had been neglected and abandoned.
Normally, they would have been trapped here when the mine collapsed, left to die in the darkness, but L-Team had reactivated the facility, and not much time had passed.
If anything, their hunger would have made them significantly more aggressive.
‘L-Team could use them to surround us from the front and back.’
Hwang Chan-jin had moved to prevent that from happening.
Since he was alone, he had nothing else to worry about, no other factors to consider in a fight.
“We'll proceed as planned, rescue Min Dan-ah-ssi, and take care of the remaining L-Team members.”
Jeong Ha-yeon and Min Ji-ah nodded grimly.
We cautiously ascended the stairs to the third floor.
Passing through a hallway that had grown even eerier, we headed toward the room where Min Dan-ah was being held.
We hadn't walked far before we found it.
Min Dan-ah, sitting listlessly inside a room with one wall made entirely of glass.
“Dan-ah!!”
Min Ji-ah immediately ran forward and pounded on the glass wall.
Min Dan-ah seemed to notice, shouting something as she tried to approach the glass, only to be stopped by her cuffs.
It looked like one arm and one leg were chained to the floor.
‘The door is locked.’
Was this their way of saying we had to defeat them and get the keycard if we wanted to rescue her?
Or perhaps they had deliberately imprisoned her here, where we could see her, to show us that her cuffs were no ordinary restraints and that she could be killed in an instant.
There were too many possibilities.
I activated Extreme Eye and scanned the area.
Still no movement from the two L-Team members. No sign of them preparing to teleport, either.
If their goal was to attack, they would have moved by now.
Ding!
Just as I was calmly sorting through my thoughts, the tightly shut door suddenly opened with a chime.
Clank.
Not only that, but the cuffs restraining Min Dan-ah were also released.
‘What is this?’
My guard shot up.
They had her securely captured, but they release her the moment we arrive?
It was impossible not to be suspicious.
However, I was so focused on Min Dan-ah that I failed to notice Min Ji-ah’s actions.
“Dan-ah!!”
Min Ji-ah rushed toward Min Dan-ah without a second thought.
And Min Dan-ah, calling her sister's name, rushed into her arms.
On the surface, it was a scene of a family reunited.
‘No.’
This prickling sense of unease.
I didn't know why.
But I had a feeling I had to stop what was happening.
“Min Ji-ah-ssi, wait—!”
“Se-hyeon-ssi!”
At the same time as Lee Min-hwa’s sharp cry.
Fwoosh!
A flame in the shape of a sword moved behind me.
A sharp-tipped tentacle, having shot up from the floor and aimed for my back, burned to a crisp.
“Be careful! I can suddenly sense enemies all around us!”
Just as Lee Min-hwa said, I could sense dozens of them.
The failed subjects from the demonization experiments.
Hwang Chan-jin had gone to stop them, but had some escaped before he could block them all?
‘This would be impossible unless they knew this facility inside and out.’
As expected, things became quite troublesome when facing an opponent who knew a lot about the game's mechanics.
They couldn't have opened just that one door remotely.
Seeing that the cuffs were also released, it was correct to assume they had unlocked every lock in the facility.
As a result, the failures imprisoned throughout the facility had escaped and were now swarming this location.
“Of course. They wouldn't just hand her over. It was a trap.”
Lee Min-hwa narrowed her eyes, gathering flames in both hands.
The mindless failures, with their vacant eyes, slowly closed the distance.
I drew the Black Moon Divine Sword, but I still had a bad feeling, like something was caught in my throat.
‘Was the source of my unease just them?’
I had fully anticipated they would use these things to attack us from behind.
Besides, they weren't a significant threat.
There was no way I would feel anxious because of a few failed experiments.
Then why…
Shunk!
From behind me came a sound that should never have been heard.
Both Lee Min-hwa and I forgot about the failures and turned our heads.
Drip, drip.
Blood was rapidly spreading across the floor.
There was no need to see whose blood it was.
Because the dagger held in Min Dan-ah's hands was buried deep in Min Ji-ah's stomach.
“…”
A trickle of blood ran from Min Ji-ah's lips.
Her eyes seemed to ask, ‘Why?’
Min Ji-ah’s mouth moved wordlessly before she collapsed sideways.
A horrified Lee Min-hwa raised her voice.
“Min Dan-ah-ssi…!? Why!?”
“Hold off the failures! I'll go!”
As if Min Ji-ah’s fall was a signal, the failures all moved at once.
Lee Min-hwa bit her lip and directed her flames, while I turned my back on the fight and rushed to separate Min Ji-ah and Min Dan-ah.
Min Dan-ah staggered and slumped to the ground.
Her movements were limp, as if she were a puppet with no strength of her own.
“Damn it.”
Her eyes were unfocused.
Min Dan-ah was still under mind control.
I had clearly seen her run toward her sister with a tear-streaked face, calling her name.
That was an emotional display, an impossible act for someone under mind control.
So why?
That wasn't the only thing I couldn't understand.
‘Why did they try to kill Min Ji-ah?’
Their goal must have been to awaken the Guide of Madness.
To do that, Min Ji-ah, the one with ‘Madness,’ was someone who shouldn't have been killed.
I gritted my teeth, took a potion from my inventory, and poured it into Min Ji-ah’s mouth.
“Ah…?”
Min Dan-ah’s focus slowly returned.
She blinked at me like someone just waking up, then startled violently upon seeing the pool of blood on the floor.
“Blood, why is there so much blood…”
Where did all this blood come from?
Her eyes followed the source and witnessed the cause.
Then, her lips turned deathly pale.
“Un… ni…?”
Her face was one of utter confusion, as if she had no idea how Min Ji-ah had ended up like this.
But that expression didn't last long.
“Ah, ah.”
Min Dan-ah clutched her head with both hands.
Her pupils trembled uncontrollably.
She was remembering what she had done while under mind control.
“Aaaaah.”
She grabbed her shoulders with both hands and bent forward.
A chilling sensation ran down my spine.
Something was wrong.
It felt like Min Dan-ah's power was suddenly amplifying…
‘Don't tell me.’
[Using the skill, ‘Extreme Eye’.]
A bad premonition never fails.
As if to mock that very saying, a single word that shouldn't have been there was clearly displayed in Min Dan-ah's status window.
[Character Information]
Name: Min Dan-ah
Age: 22 (Female)
Strength: 13 | Stamina: 10 | Agility: 15 | Mana: 5
Unique Ability: (Empty)
Traits: Intelligence (C), Pathfinder (D), A Heart for Someone (A), {{Madness}}
Skill: Bond of Fate (D)
“Aaaah…!!”
The more Min Dan-ah's body trembled, the more the characters for ‘Madness’ flickered in a violet light.
It was the sign of the Guide of Madness awakening.
And it was appearing not in Min Ji-ah, but in Min Dan-ah.
“Se-hyeon-ssi! What's going on!?”
Sensing something was amiss, Lee Min-hwa asked without looking back, but I couldn't easily answer.
‘Min Dan-ah didn't have Madness.’
I could swear to it, as I had checked just yesterday.
But now, a day later, she had it.
-You thought we were trying to awaken Min Ji-ah, didn't you? Too bad! It was actually Dan-ah~
A woman's voice flowed from a speaker somewhere.
The L-Team member with the mind control ability.
“Mind control isn't something you can just turn on and off.”
-It's not mind control. It's a suggestion. In other words, hypnosis? Anyway, I placed something like that on her. To make her perform a pre-programmed action when a specific situation arose.
It immediately made sense.
L-Team hadn't simply retreated.
They had planned for every contingency, even a situation where they might be defeated and forced to withdraw.
Fwoooosh!!
Flames raged violently, filling one side of the corridor.
As dozens of failures screamed and burned to death, the other failures seemed to feel a flicker of fear, hesitating to charge forward recklessly.
Lee Min-hwa spoke in a voice thick with suppressed rage.
“What is the meaning of this?”
-Madness cannot be stopped.
“It could have been.”
-That's just your opinion.
KABOOM!!
Enraged, Lee Min-hwa blew up the area where the voice was coming from.
What was left of the speaker rolled out pathetically from the rubble of the collapsed wall.
-Well, we've achieved our goal, so we'll be on our way. Bye-bye~
“You…!”
The speaker, which had been lit up, lost its light after that final word.
Lee Min-hwa, unable to contain her anger, clenched her fists so hard they could have shattered, then turned her gaze back to the failures.
Kwoooaaaaar!
I didn't need to watch any further.
I turned away from Lee Min-hwa.
‘She's past the worst of it.’
Thanks to the high-grade potion, the color was returning to Min Ji-ah’s face.
She hadn't woken up, likely due to the shock, but her life was no longer in danger.
However, Min Dan-ah's condition was so abnormal that I barely registered this fact.
She seemed to be resisting to some extent, given how long she was holding on.
After confirming that L-Team’s presence had vanished, I took the Madness Suppressor from my inventory.
“I thought you knew about the existence of the Madness Suppressor.”
“Aaaaargh!!”
Finally losing her reason, Min Dan-ah screamed and charged at me.
It was a speed Min Dan-ah couldn't have achieved until recently.
‘First, I need to subdue her.’
Wet drops of blood flew from the dagger.
She hadn't fully awakened yet.
The gap between us was still wide enough for me to be comfortable, so I easily dodged and grabbed the arm holding the dagger.
Then, I immediately fastened the Madness Suppressor onto Min Dan-ah's arm.
Click.
“Ah… ugh…”
Min Dan-ah’s body shuddered as if an electric current had passed through it, and she collapsed.
The violet flickering of the ‘Madness’ trait subsided.
The suppressor had successfully brought her under control.
‘I stopped it before she fully awakened.’
If I had used this the moment I saw the ‘Madness’ trait on her, who knows what other trick L-Team might have pulled.
‘If they had known about the Madness Suppressor, they wouldn't have left so quickly.’
Then again, the Madness Suppressor had never appeared in item form before.
Preventing Madness in the first place had been impossible for various reasons.
I'd remembered its existence, mentioned only in passing like an easter egg, because I had a strange feeling about it, and that memory became my trump card.
‘Though it's not good news that both Min Ji-ah and Min Dan-ah now carry the risk of awakening Madness.’
“Zeta.”
The shadow clinging to the ceiling vanished.
Teleportation couldn't cover a great distance in one go.
Even with an S-rank teleport, Zeta's tracking ability should be more than enough to follow them.
I had let them think they succeeded in awakening the Guide of Madness, so all I had to do was resolve the situation with these two and then go after them.
“Ah, ugh…”
“Min Dan-ah-ssi. Are you conscious?”
“Ugh… Ah. My sister. My sister…! I… to my sister…”
“It's okay. Her life isn't in danger. Her wounds are mostly healed.”
“Ah…”
Min Dan-ah’s body went limp, as if a great weight had been lifted.
The pool of blood on the floor remained, so her pale complexion didn't change.
“Why on earth did I…”
“It was the mind control. One of the enemies had that power.”
“Mind control… you say?”
Min Dan-ah, who had been dazed, saw her face twist in an instant.
“Those rotten bastards…!”
“It's fine to be angry, but we need to get out of here first.”