The Witch of Rot

I had kept open the possibility of a fight breaking out the instant I crossed the threshold into the boss room, but the Witch of Rot seemed to have no such intention.

'Figures she wouldn't attack right off the bat.'

Instead, she merely studied me with an intrigued gleam in her eyes.

"Quite the guts you have. I made similar offers all over the place, yet not a single soul took me up on it."

Several teams besides ours had surely closed in on the boss room by now. Apparently, the Witch of Rot had extended the exact same terms to each of them: send in just one person, and she would let them pass without interference. To them, doing so was equivalent to sending a comrade to a pointless death, so naturally, they had all refused. That left me as the only one to walk through the door.

'I figured Lee Soo-dok or Seo Cheong-yong might have taken the bait...'

Something must have held them up, delaying their arrival past the others.

I answered with an easy shrug. "Understandable. It's only human nature to favor the safe and certain path."

"Then why did you choose differently?"

"Because from where I'm standing, they're one and the same."

If both paths were safe and certain, why bother taking the scenic route when you could just take the shortcut? My answer radiated sheer confidence, prompting the witch's lips to curl into a soft arc.

"Now you've piqued my curiosity. What could you possibly have prepared?"

"You won't be disappointed. I brought along quite an astonishing surprise."

"We'll see soon enough. But before we get to that, won't you spare me a moment of your time?"

She wanted to satisfy her curiosity before we came to blows. Considering my opponent was an A-rank, jumping blindly into a brawl wasn't ideal for me either; finding the proper opening was paramount. I gave a cordial nod.

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"A brief chat shouldn't hurt."

"It won't take long at all."

The Witch of Rot guided me toward one side of the chamber. With an offhand flick of her wrist, a polished table and a pair of chairs materialized from thin air. As we took our seats opposite each other, an ornate teapot and two teacups formed on the tabletop just as effortlessly.

'Now there's a trick Shin Byungchul would kill to learn.'

Tipping the teapot over the cups, the witch spoke in a smooth purr. "If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to see your true face."

Whether it was because she was exceptionally skilled even by A-rank standards or simply sharp-witted like Zhuge Soso, she had seen right through my disguise. It wasn't an unreasonable request, so I slipped off the Totem of Mimicry.

Watching my features shift from Staff Member K back to Kim Ho, a spark of wonder danced in her gaze.

"I didn't expect you to be so young. Are you a student?"

"Yes. A first-year."

"...Now this is getting entertaining."

A mere freshman had punched his way through an A-rank dungeon and stepped into the boss room all on his own. The Witch of Rot pushed a teacup toward me.

"Have a cup."

"Thank you."

Conventional wisdom dictated that you should never consume food or drink offered by an enemy. Even so, I picked up the cup without hesitation and took a swallow.

The Witch of Rot tilted her head, prompting for a review. "How is it?"

"Quite an... unusual flavor. I think a friend of mine would love it."

Was this what Hong Yeon-hwa's beloved 'crude-oil' espresso tasted like? Of course, having already had my palate utterly devastated by all manner of toxic herbs and poisonous pills, maintaining an unflinching poker face was child's play.

The Witch of Rot offered a dainty smile. "It's my favorite blend."

"Your taste is completely ruined."

"I hear that quite often, too. Shall we begin our chat? There's so much I wish to ask."

"Sure. Ask away."

The Witch of Rot paused in contemplation for a second before speaking. "You thought of a friend the moment you took a sip. Are you very close?"

"They're precious bonds to me."

"Would you mind telling me a bit more about them?"

There was no harm in humoring her, so I shared whatever came to mind.

"The first friend I made is a swordsman—the quintessential model student. But at the same time, his thinking is remarkably flexible, and he's sharp as a tack."

"That type tends to go very far as a swordsman."

"Which is why I have high expectations for him."

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The Witch of Rot nodded gently. "And the next?"

"The next is someone who does nothing but laze around and sleep all day."

"A bit sluggish, are they?"

"Yet she follows along diligently whenever I tell her to train. And despite being sheer laziness incarnate, her growth rate outstrips anyone I've ever seen."

"A genius, then."

"Frankly, it's terrifying at times."

We looked across the table and shared a light laugh. The inquiries kept coming.

"And another?"

"Another is an upperclassman."

"A close senior and junior bond—I've always had a soft spot for that dynamic. Does she look out for you?"

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"Yeah. Someone who calculates profit and loss more fiercely than anyone else drops everything and jumps in headfirst whenever it involves me."

The Witch of Rot smiled warmly. "Sounds like you're quite cherished. Is she strong?"

"A bit lacking compared to the first two. But what's lacking can always be filled in."

The witch looked momentarily puzzled, unable to fathom what I meant by 'filled in.' Even so, she bobbed her head, grasping the general sentiment.

"They truly must be precious bonds. Even I can sense how deeply you treasure them."

"Yes. In fact, they're the very reason I exist."

The greatest reason and ultimate objective behind my arrival in this game world: to cultivate EX-rank heroes. World peace was merely a secondary bonus.

This time, I turned the tables with a question of my own. "By the way, why are you so curious about them?"

"..."

She had sat me down under the pretext of wanting to know more about me, yet her questions had fixated entirely on my companions.

Slowly, the tender warmth vanished from the witch's lips, replaced by a grotesque, malice-dripping sneer.

"...Only when you learn what someone holds most dear can you truly relish the pleasure of ripping it away, don't you think?"

"Yep. Your brain really is fried."

This was what happened when you drank foul concoctions day in and day out—your sanity rotted right along with your taste buds. Proper dietary habits were clearly of paramount importance.

The witch let out a soft sigh. "Which makes this rather regrettable. If possible, I wanted to tear them away right before your eyes."

In her mind, my 'friends' were merely first-years, so there was no way they could have joined this subjugation force. Tang Gyu-young was indeed part of the expedition, but I saw zero reason to enlighten her on that front.

Her twisted grin widening, the Witch of Rot continued. "Still, no need to fret. It won't be long before your friends join you on the other side."

"Sounds like you're finally getting ready to move. The 'hibernation period' is almost over, isn't it?"

"...!"

The Witch of Rot flinched violently, her gaze snapping toward me with venomous intensity.

"...How do you know about that?"

"Isn't it obvious? It's drawing to a close, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠so you came out to scout. And while you were at it, stirred up a little trouble."

The Witch of Rot was one of the legion commanders serving the Corpse Dragon. Her active movements meant only one thing: the dragon was preparing to mobilize. And that meant the sovereign beast, locked in deep slumber for so long, was on the verge of waking.

"..."

For a long stretch of silence, the witch simply glared at me in chilling quietude.

I threw her earlier words right back into her face. "Still, no need to fret. I'm going to stop every last bit of it. That's why I came here in the first place."

"I'll grant that you've got guts. But shouldn't your priority right now be walking out of here alive?"

"That's also true."

I readily conceded the point. Tipping the teacup back, I drained every last drop of the liquid in one swallow and set the cup down.

"Thank you for the tea."

Pushing back my chair, I began strolling forward at an unhurried pace.

One step. Two steps. With each stride I took, disbelief pooled deeper into the Witch of Rot's eyes. Her gaze practically screamed, 'How on earth are you still walking?' so I tossed a casual explanation over my shoulder.

"It already tasted awful, but spiking it with weird stuff made it even worse. Not that poison works on me anyway."

"...!"

Her eyes snapped wide.

She vaulted out of her seat in an instant, but by then, I had already drawn an unremarkable, withered twig from inside my coat. Swishing the Crow Branch lightly through the air, I uttered the command word.

"Caaaw—!"

At once, the drab branch drank in the midnight hues of a starless sky. The colors rippled outward across the chamber in a heartbeat, and spatial rifts tore open across the room, blooming into teleportation portals. Beyond their shimmering thresholds lay various dungeon sectors—and the stunned faces of the subjugation force.

'Gathering Portal.'

It was the spatial magic the Crow Great Sage had imbued into the branch. Its function was to rip open portals at the caster's location, assembling separated allies no matter how widely they were scattered across the dungeon.

This was the precise reason I had stepped into the boss chamber alone.

Before long, members of the subjugation force began pouring out through the portals. Some scrambled in frantically, mid-battle, while others stepped through with measured calm.

Lee Soo-dok was among the latter, though he had likely awaited this moment more fiercely than anyone else in the room. As he bared his teeth in a grin, the deep scars furrowing his face twisted into the likeness of a demon.

"We finally meet again."

Seo Cheong-yong seemed just as pleased with the reunion. The Witch of Rot, on the other hand, didn't spare either instructor a second glance; her murderous glare remained locked solely on me.

"You truly did prepare quite an astonishing surprise."

She must have poured considerable effort into seizing control of the Transference Maze and laying her traps: manipulating the portals in the early stages to fracture the subjugation force, then dispatching increasingly potent Ooblecks in the mid-to-late stages to whittle down their fighting strength. Her calculation had been that even if the vanguard managed to reach the boss room, they would arrive battered, exhausted, and heavily depleted in numbers—ripe for easy pickings one by one.

Or so her plan had gone.

Yet every shred of that meticulous scheming had crumbled to dust the moment I snapped a single item. She was caught entirely between shock and profound hollow defeat.

'A moment like this practically begs for some top-tier trash talk.'

My mouth itched to tease her, but with so many pairs of eyes watching, I feigned complete innocence. I had long since slipped the Totem of Mimicry back on, resuming my disguise as Staff Member K. Stowing the Crow Branch away, I drew the sapling disguised as an iron rod.

'Truth is, I've got one more surprise left in the bag.'

The decisive reason I had joined this subjugation force in the first place.

It was time to bestow Immunity to Ten Thousand Poisons.

'Well, Bestowal is sealed for the foreseeable future.'

A cooldown exceeding three entire weeks. Spamming Octopus Arms so relentlessly had caused the penalty multiplier to skyrocket exponentially. Of course, sacrificing three weeks was more than worth the payoff.

As the system notifications flashed before their eyes, every member of the subjugation force gasped in disbelief.

"...!"

"What is this?!"

"Immunity to Ten Thousand Poisons was just bestowed?!"

"Just who in the world did that?!"

Naturally, only a handful of people present knew the source was me: Lee Soo-dok, Seo Cheong-yong, Tang Gyu-young, and likely Zhuge Soso. Because they had been briefed in advance, their shock was relatively muted.

Sensing the need to quell the commotion, Seo Cheong-yong took a step forward and projected his voice across the hall.

"We can win this! Cast aside your fear and fight!"

"...!"

At his rallying cry, the frantic murmurs died down, replaced by a fierce, determined gleam in everyone's eyes. Armed with the ultimate counter-trait for fighting Ooblecks, their confidence surged through the roof.

While the Witch of Rot couldn't possibly fathom that they had received Immunity to Ten Thousand Poisons, she clearly picked up on the sudden, bizarre shift in the room's atmosphere.

She ground her teeth together.

"Fine. Let's see what you've got."

With a furious sweep of her hand through the air, the entire boss chamber began to violently shudder.