READ NOVEL ONLINE Chapter 306. Deep Groove
Kim Gi-ryeo was behind, nagging to keep his eyes shut and maintain the barrier.
In front, minor demons were hopping around, making it hard to see anything clearly.
“I checked with the analyzer, and their weakness is bright light and high heat. Ha-seong, let’s widen the skill range a bit.”
“…Wait, how can you read the text when the visibility is such a mess?”
“Uh….”
Terrible.
However, now that they had entered the dungeon, there was no other way. Ha-seong focused on his master’s voice.
Following the instruction from a colleague, he ignited fire as close to his body as possible, trying to engage in close combat without getting caught up in it.
But fighting like this was naturally hot.
No matter how much of a heat-resilient superhuman he was.
On days when the flickering flames grazed him even slightly, it felt like he was grinding his skin with icy cold.
The more they fought, the more his skin stung and hurt.
There was a rank difference between an A-Class dungeon and an S-Class hunter, after all.
Jeong Ha-seong was so experienced from hunting a variety of beasts that he could handle the dungeon exploration somehow.
Surprisingly, it went quite smoothly.
Tap!
While he was blazing intense flames in the middle of the dungeon, taking down every enemy that charged like moths to the fire…
The young man with black hair expressed his dissatisfaction despite wielding such tremendous powers.
‘Why did I awaken with such a lousy attribute…’
The top-ranked hunter in Korea.
Jeong Ha-seong.
But what use was that fancy title?
No matter how he thought about it, he wasn’t fond of his abilities.
To be precise, it was a skill he simply could not love.
If only it were a curse attribute that wouldn’t harm the structures everyone worked so hard to build, like Seo Esther’s.
Or some enhancement ability suitable for urban warfare like Kang Chang-ho’s.
He didn’t even need to have such grand ambitions. If only he had awakened with a water attribute contrasting to what he had now, he wouldn’t dislike his future so much.
Current Jeong Ha-seong was tirelessly bringing down enemies.
3rd floor, 4th floor, 5th floor.
At this level, most of the enemies were clearly biological, so he got some help from Kim Gi-ryeo — or more precisely, from the Hydra’s assistance.
6th floor.
A familiar boss showed up.
“That guy! Do you see it too?”
“Yes. Even if it’s flipped, I remember that distinctive look right away.”
“I knew the level was off. Oh wow, upon closer inspection, its epaulettes are a different color. Looks similar, but its magic power is A-Class.”
The mutated steel monster that appeared in the final battle of the [13th Month’s Maze] had now come to this world.
Thus, Kim Gi-ryeo tried to step back as much as possible, while Jeong Ha-seong made many mistakes in the process of defeating this monster.
As the saying goes, “an eye for an eye,” the barrier of visibility had a dramatic impact.
‘Back then, I could have just split it in half.’
Hoo!
In the dark world behind his closed eyelids, he heard something heavy approaching, accompanied by the sound of wind.
Without realizing it, Jeong Ha-seong drew his sword, supporting the flat side of the blade with his other hand.
Crash!
Then the monster’s iron fist collided with his legendary blade, breaking through the fire barrier.
After several trial and error, he finally grasped the overall combat.
‘If it’s like this…’
And in that moment, a teaching from somewhere flashed through his mind.
It was from a time when the chill hadn’t fully settled in, and he had only deposited a mere 3 billion once.
Reflecting on it, he felt like he had prepared for such situations since the past.
“Jeong Ha-seong, by the way, I heard this gym provides first aid supplies, do you know where it is?”
No matter how smart a genius he was, it was highly unlikely anyone had foreseen such a sudden situation like the White Tower, let alone trained for it.
‘…No, upon reconsideration, I have a feeling that person could plan even this.’
The entity standing on a clearly higher step, tugging his wrist roughly to enlighten him.
The source of miracles. Mana.
In this critical situation, Jeong Ha-seong recalled how to sense the flow someone had taught him.
As a result, he was able to easily defeat the mechanical monster he had met again in the White Tower.
Thud! Clatter…
Anyway, that body would take too long to melt away with mere firepower.
Like the death he experienced before. The red Sword of Sunset pierced through, and soon the monster met a gruesome end.
So, having taken down the gatekeeper, what followed?
7th floor, 8th floor, 9th floor.
By the time they climbed this much, everything was surprisingly easy to adapt to.
‘At first, I wondered what to do about this.’
Learning through being hit certainly sped up the acquisition.
Plus, there was a capable industry colleague correcting his shortcomings in real-time on one side of the dungeon.
As the Great Mage predicted.
Honestly, the White Tower raid wasn’t so dangerous that someone here would die.
It was that much of a risk that Gi-ryeo had decided to join without a second thought.
Only when A-Class Awakened ones came did the cries emerge.
If they weren’t the hardworking S-Class weirdo who had absorbed advanced magical knowledge from an alien planet, then the premise was entirely different.
‘That’s a relief. Speaking of which, I heard the total layers of this gate were about 10 layers. Does that mean we’re already close to the last boss?’
Swish.
A man crouched in a corner, fearful of catching fire, stood up.
Currently, Jeong Ha-seong was dealing with the various leaders that appeared on the 9th floor, and just seeing the flow of this fight, Gi-ryeo was confident in his comrade’s victory.
What would appear in the long-awaited 10th floor?
‘Huh?’
At the moment he felt at ease, sensing the workday was drawing to a close.
“Kiyaaa!”
With a woeful cry, the final monster of this floor met its end, and before he could even mourn for the death of a creature, the scenery changed.
It was the 10th floor.
Compared to the previous layers, it was a remarkably large room.
Purple.
And if you looked closely, the walls were painted provocatively, with glimmers resembling meteors embedded here and there.
‘This is the… final opponent of the White Tower.’
The two hunters, captivated by the flashy structure, suddenly turned their heads.
Zoom.
Dense mana converged at the center of the space where they stood.
Moreover, this gathered magical ingredient was not merely increasing its density but began to take on a special form…
“What is that white thing?”
The neat-looking Korean known as Jeong Ha-seong suddenly frowned.
But in reality, the one who was more shocked was this side.
“Oh no.”
The flowing, damaged voice of a man was almost paralyzed for various reasons, as he soon groaned.
“Is that real…?”
Ha-seong turned his head back immediately upon hearing that.
In the jumbled reflections where up, down, left, and right were reversed, Kim Gi-ryeo was looking seriously at the opponent that appeared before him.
For a normally dry Kim Gi-ryeo Hunter to react like this.
‘Just what is that monster that just appeared?’
They finally met the glorious boss of the [White Tower] on the 10th floor.
The form of the monster that appeared in this space was as follows.
It resembled a marble statue placed in an exhibition hall that had suddenly come to life, its entire body cold and rigid, crafted of a specific white stone.
On its head were features like eyes and a nose resembling a human, and flowing from its crown were long, curly strands that looked like hair.
“Wait a minute. Now that I see it, that’s completely…!”
Realizing this late, Jeong Ha-seong exclaimed loudly.
The newly appeared monster was in every aspect a mimic of human flesh.
A replication of an Earthling.
Jeong Ha-seong had never encountered such entities while working as a hunter, so he stiffened instinctively out of discomfort.
However, the hunter standing behind him wasn’t scared for the same reason.
‘Its entire body is white and closely resembles a person…’
Facing such an enemy, flashes of the word “angel” unexpectedly popped into his brain.
Kim Gi-ryeo recalled that this “angel” was a religious symbol widely believed in by Earthlings and internally shouted.
‘A monster in the most sacred form!’
Though Jeong Ha-seong didn’t know, it was a matter that could cause a panic for the Alphauri.
‘Warning of [Descend]!’
His mouth fell open in shock.
A total of three phases in the invasion of a particular alien creature.
Yet they were already in the midst of the second phase, “Possession,” and he was astonished by the swift progression, wondering how fast it could go if they got to the initial phase of “Descend,” especially when it had turned half of the area of Alphauri into hell.
Not to mention that over here, they hadn’t even recovered a fraction of their strength…
And it was also the Great Mage, who hadn’t even regained half of his power.
Instantly after gathering the details from his time as a Mage Commander.
Gi-ryeo was momentarily gripped by fear, thinking that a clue to the “Descend” had appeared.
“Mr. Kim Hunter, what’s wrong?”
But after a few seconds, the entity occupied clarified the misunderstanding for him.
‘W-what? Oh… so, the original angel needs to have wings to be complete… what? Then that’s not the final form of Ki-simche, right?’
Oh boy? What a surprise I got for nothing.
As Jeong Ha-seong looked bewilderedly between the monster and his comrade, Gi-ryeo sorted out the incomprehensible thoughts and returned to the present.
The first thing he did upon regaining his composure was to take out the analyzer.
And sure enough, the results were as expected.
Beep.
[???]
[Rank: S]
[Description: No registered explanation.]
“Now, does it just automatically assign a rank as soon as it exceeds the previous range?”
“Excuse me?”
“It says that thing in front of me is an S-Class.”
“WHAT?!”
When the blond man said it nonchalantly, the national hero nearly jumped in shock.
Indeed.
This final boss of the [White Tower] was a formidable counterpart to Ha-seong.
“Damned analyzer!”
“That’s why I’m surprised every time you say something about being strong, Ha-seong.”
“Ah! I-I’m sorry?!”
Back when they faced the Nukelave, it was so rare; however, recently, it appeared almost cheaply, introducing an S-Class monster that followed after the newly coined Champagne Janus which emerged from the six-legged corridor beside the Black Dragon King.
Still, Ha-seong wasn’t excessively flustered.
‘This isn’t just a problem limited to our country.’
The clearly rising danger level of dungeons revealed in recent papers showcased its influence in various aspects, which meant there were two S-Class gates discovered this year alone, both overseas and in Korea.
‘Though I heard neither was a national catastrophe since their danger levels were relatively low, like the six-legged corridor…’
It wasn’t surprising to encounter enemies threatening the highest position in the food chain.
But why did the analyzer suddenly curse?
The space known as a dungeon doesn’t have perfectly uniform mana density – in fact, even ordinary planetary atmospheres don’t – so sometimes monsters exceed the measurement results at the entrance.
If one were to be lucky, a C-Class could even pop out from a B-Class dungeon; thus it was an irritating situation in many ways.
‘Even after all that noise, it doesn’t move. Is it a rear-line type monster?’
Moreover, this wasn’t the only piece of bad news.
“The mana leaking from it isn’t anything special, but the energy inside is ridiculous…”
“Is that so?”
“Well, it seems the [White Tower] was designed so that a boss of some kind appears no matter what dungeon, so it’s no surprise a powerful one showed up.”
The blond man in the back slowly explained.
“No matter how strong you are, Jeong Ha-seong, trying to take that one down alone would probably lead to disaster.”
It seemed even a person who had single-handedly crushed a boss rush spanning the entirety of the 9th floor shouldn’t carelessly attempt this hunt.
“But that’s okay.”
Just then,
An Awakened who had been hiding at the edge stepped forward.
And he pulled at something covering his hand with flesh, stating,
“I’ll join you for this layer.”
-!!
“But help will only be once. I won’t reveal when I will intervene for now. You should have adjusted pretty well by now though…”
“Mr. Kim Hunter.”
“As the dungeon mentioned at the entrance, if the trials are too mundane, then it would likely be genuinely uninteresting.”
In reality, there was a different reason for the only once of assistance he could offer, yet he was rather brazen.
‘Poor primitive. Since the monthly rent is exempt, as a leading wizard, I might as well offer you a little cooperation.’
Taking a few steps forward, he was now perfectly positioned on the same level as Jeong Ha-seong.
He prepared for battle while bringing forth the cause of the current arrogance back to his wrist.
【Midnight Gloves】
(Excluding taxes for the next year, the true powers of the thousand billion won would finally be revealed.)