Hospital (4)

Rumble rumble rumble—

The moment I chanted the incantation, a terrifying gravitational pull erupted from my palm.

The storm-like momentum that spread out, corroding everything in its path, felt just like staring into a black hole.

A flow of force that sucked in the very thoughts of everything it touched, compressing them all into a single point.

Crunch, cruuunch...

Aside from our group, shielded for protection, every object in the first-floor lobby was ripped free and dragged into the vortex.

Of course.

The boss monster, the doctor, put up a decent fight against the pull.

Its form was utterly grotesque.

Its slime-like, liquid body was covered in big and small eyeballs clustered like acne, and limbs sprouting from it flailed wildly ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in the air, clutching bloodstained medical tools.

It twitched incessantly from the damage of my Guiheo, but it resisted by emitting its unique mana.

It was probably planning to outlast my spell in this stubborn endurance meta, then unleash its reserved power once my magic faded.

But it was mistaken.

I hadn't activated Guiheo to swallow the doctor's main body directly.

At the center of the vortex floated a bubble of chaos, boiling in extreme condensation.

Bubble bubble bubble...

Guiheo's second form was a devouring magic that greedily pulled in and consumed everything within range.

And that included the remains of the aberrations I'd massacred with the first form, Changhae.

The irregularly writhing aberration chunks gathered without exception at Guiheo's singularity and began compressing.

I levitated the mass above my palm and chanted lightly.

Beings from the Outer Sea all shared one thing in common, no matter their appearance, abilities, or behavior: they were information entities.

Residual echoes of information, sedimented, decayed, and assimilated over eons of endless time. That was the essence of Outer Sea creatures.

These impure clumps would synergize with my magic, forming the groundwork for an explosive chain reaction.

Fuel—or catalyst—for a spectacular climax to this battle.

I chanted.

Fwoosh!!

Fire's power varies by its medium. Even ordinary thermite, a chemical fuel, generates thousands of degrees of heat—what about flames fueled by the complex information bodies of the Outer Sea?

The gathered aberration remains were instantly engulfed in flames, forging into a large, magnificent spear.

The doctor clearly sensed the threat, but it had no choices left.

Get close, and it'd be dragged in by Guiheo's pull and absorbed.

Pull away, and it'd enter Fire Spear's range and get intercepted.

The epitome of unreason—checkmate!

Furious at its hopeless situation, the doctor chanted something urgently, but I just snorted and hurled the spear.

Screee—!

The flaming spear hurtled forward.

With a sonic boom tearing through space, a dazzling crimson flash lit up the dark ward.

The moment it struck, the mana infused in Fire Spear triggered a chain reaction, unleashing a monstrous explosion.

KABOOOM—!

A thunderous blast that shook the entire space for an instant.

Moments later, as the smoke cleared, the lobby came into view—trashed like it had taken a bombing run.

The doctor aberration hadn't even left debris behind; it was completely disintegrated.

The battle ended in a flash.

"…"

The exploration team stared blankly at the destruction.

"Cough, cough! Mage, this is all great, but do something about this ash cloud!"

Zero was the only one griping loudly.

Nothing's worse than inhaling monster remains. I replied softly.

"Let's head up to the second floor quick. No point sticking around the first anyway."

We stood before the creaking steel elevator.

Jangwi and the exploration team were trembling; their earlier bravado gone, reduced to meek rabbits.

"…We're really going up now, right?"

Jangwi asked in a quivering voice. Instead of answering, I pressed the call button.

Beep.

The indicator lit red, activating. The button's glow in the darkness was ominously bloodlike.

Ding—

Soon, the signal chimed, and the elevator arrived. The steel doors parted slowly.

But the moment the interior fully revealed itself, we couldn't help but gasp.

"W-What the hell is this?"

Jangwi yelped in shock. And rightly so—the view beyond the doors was nothing like the cramped elevator we'd expected.

A bustling upper-class cityscape: skyscraper billboards flashing, maglev trains zipping along tracks.

The doors half-closed like a sensor glitch, then reopened—to a dense primordial forest. Giant ferns intertwined, unknown beasts roaring.

Each shaky opening shifted scenes: a normal living room, a noble mansion with glittering chandeliers, and more—endlessly morphing.

Zero added as we watched the bizarre display.

"The dungeon's overloaded briefly, systems going haywire. Resonating with that weird magic you used, mage."

He reflexively reached for a cigarette, then remembered where we were and lowered his hand.

"Injured dungeons overlap partially with reality. This elevator's the same—a passage linking the abandoned hospital to the real world. Kidnaps random folks from reality and drags 'em here."

That's when I grasped the dungeon's horrific mechanism.

Many of the corpses and aberrations littering this place were probably ordinary people yanked from daily life into this hospital without a clue.

"…Scary place."

I commented curtly.

Even a stabilized dungeon shouldn't be left alone if it periodically sacrificed real lives. Why did the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Management Bureau ignore it?

Was farming the artifacts it spat out worth more profit than a few citizens' lives?

In this brutal city, entirely possible.

Finally, the elevator locked onto the hospital's internal coordinates. We headed to the second floor.

The moment the doors opened, silence hit us.

Considering a hospital's nature, this quiet was probably normal.

I paused briefly.

In a normal building, I'd use Sound Control for echolocation mapping, but instinct stopped me.

Too quiet.

Silence can be more dangerous than noise sometimes.

In a zone this still, even a tiny commotion or vibration could trigger every aberration in the area.

First floor was a brute-force push thanks to the team's earlier chaos, but second floor onward? Different story.

Real artifacts hid here; rampaging would just waste energy and blow them up.

…And that's why I'd brought these scrubs along.

"Team Leader Jangwi."

"Y-Yes! Mage!"

He jumped at my call.

I pointed to his stored recon drone.

"You said you'd deploy drones up front earlier? Use 'em now. Launch quiet, map this place."

"Uh, but drone battery and connection are unstable in dungeons…"

"Make it work. Your team's gear all high-end, isn't it? What's it for if not this?"

Under my cold gaze, he gulped and fumbled with the controls.

Soon.

Whirr— Two small anti-grav drones vanished into the corridor shadows with faint hums.

I leaned against the wall with Zero, watching the hologram feed.

"You're cautious for a guy with that firepower. Could've just blasted through."

"Not forgetting why we're here, right? Blow everything and risk nuking ID data or artifacts?"

Zero smirked, adjusting his shades.

"Not just a meathead after all. Spot on."

Moments later, the feed caught something eerie.

Far end.

Iron doors lining the elevator hall walls swung open, white-uniformed nurse aberrations marching out in a line.

The hulking nurses from the first floor, carrying large metal stretchers—with people on them.

Clothes varied, but all bore horrific gashes like they'd been butchered.

Seemed they kidnapped reality folk ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this way.

"…Collecting."

Zero muttered at the horror.

"Those bodies get hauled to surgery, turned into new aberrations—or fuel for the hospital's mana."

We held our breath until the procession crossed the hall into the surgical wing.

Jangwi's team was pale, shaking.

I frowned too, but no time for sentiment.

Whirr—

Drones returned from scouting.

I checked the hologram map, confirming my pre-planned target spot.

Optimizing the route in my head, I said.

"Now. Shortest path. Everyone, quiet steps."

Moving stealthily, Zero whispered low.

"Standard second-floor strat is RP—role-playing. Act like visitors, deal with aberrations in character. Keeps things safe unless big noise."

Zero's trivia.

Common tactic: conform to the gap space's setting. Blend by following dungeon rules.

But I thought differently. Why bother with tedious rules?

"Those aberrations, Uncle—they're like automatons driven by mana flows, right?"

"…Theoretically. But their detection range is insane. That's why you're creeping quiet."

I smiled, pointing to a map section from the drone data.

"This—the heart of the second floor, yeah? Got something in mind."

"Hm…"

Zero pondered but didn't argue.

"…Fine. You got a plan."

Step, step.

Avoiding aberration paths, we reached the power room swiftly.

Click—

Locked as expected, but not enough to stop me.

Who am I? A mage.

Creeeak—

"Going in."

The moment we entered, Jangwi and the team retched.

"W-What the… No way…"

The walls were blanketed in massive flesh masses forming a control panel shape.

Dozens of human body parts hacked up and stitched like rags into bio-circuits.

Pulsing veins instead of copper wires, tangled guts and nerves instead of metal parts—transmitting power in a living control room.

Most horrific: victims retained faint consciousness.

Faces embedded sporadically in the flesh panel gasped, moaning occasionally.

Kidnapped, grotesquely modified, tortured eternally…

A bio-circuit panel designed to mock humanity itself.

Heard "humans as societal parts" plenty, but actually turning people into literal parts? First time.

I approached the bio-machine cautiously.

"Wait, you! What're you doing? Touch that, and every aberration on the floor swarms us!"

Zero panicked, but I'd already opened my Grimoire.

"Yeah, exactly. That's the point—draw 'em in."

"You…! Possessed or—"

Ignoring his shock, I placed my hand on the panel's center and chanted.

Crackle crackle!

Lightning arced up my arm.

"…! No way!"

The electric surge spread like a net over the entire panel. I closed my eyes, focusing.

I'd learned bio-tissue manipulation before.

Like hijacking Hugo's nervous system with lightning during the Mosaz Cartel takedown… finely control this bio-panel.

Channel current through the nasty veins and nerves.

The lightning overtook the panel. Through its neural net, I overviewed the entire mana flow on the second floor.

Confirmed emergency exit location first, then next step: focus aberrations' attention on one spot.

I targeted an isolated room at the far end, concentrating mana.

Zzzzzt—

With trembling currents, the floor's mana flows rearranged precisely.

Opening my eyes, the hospital buzzed with eerie alarms and aberration footsteps from the hall.

Weee-o weee-o—

My fake signal worked.

A quick mana probe showed hundreds of nurse aberrations rushing somewhere down the hall.

"Now! While their aggro's diverted—raid every room and OR. Artifacts'll be overflowing!"

"In sane… You're actually insane!"

Jangwi freaked but realized it was one-shot opportunity.

His brain kicked in; he led his team sprinting down the empty hall like mad.

Watching, Zero muttered incredulously.

"You really a mage…? Or saboteur?"

"I'll take that as a compliment."