SLAM!!
"Kheuck!"
Blood spilled on the ground; Jeong Min-Woo"s large frame tilted unsteadily to the side, before falling down hard with a loud thud. And from the seemingly empty s.p.a.ce, Hyun Sahng-Min"s figure slowly revealed itself like a ghost. There was a steel bar clutched in both of his hands.
"What the…?!" (Kahng Seok)
The utterly stunned Kahng Seok tried to stand up from the chair, but he couldn"t. s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah was desperately clinging on to Kahng Seok"s waist with both of her hands tightly interlocked, as if the ghost of Nongae had come to possess her. Also, she was pus.h.i.+ng down on him with all of her body weight, as well. (TL note at the end)
"Sung-Jin-ah!!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
She shouted out while lowering her head in a hurry.
"Uh? Oh! Right!" (Yi Sung-Jin)
And so, Kahng Seok had no choice but to watch on helplessly as a chair descended upon his unguarded face. Accompanied by a dull impact noise, his head snapped to the left.
"G, geuwaaaahhh…."
Kahng Seok then slowly fell to the floor, his face dazed and frozen as a whimper leaked out of his mouth.
"….Who the h.e.l.l do you think you are to utter out my sister"s name?" (Yi Sung-Jin)
Yi Sung-Jin angrily spat out while carrying a chair.
Now left alone, Lee Hyung-Sik dazedly stared at Hyun Sahng-Min as the latter man spat on the floor in disgust.
"Hey, man. Why don"t you take a nap." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
One swing of the steel bar later, Lee Hyung-Sik"s upper torso spun as if he was performing a traditional dance, then he crumpled to the ground.
Seol could only stand there and stare at the three of them, still frozen in the middle of trying to throw a spell ball. And as he continued to blink in stupefied state, he ended up witnessing something quite… extraordinary.
Kahng Seok, even as his eyes were swimming from the impact to his head, was pulling out his other paper talisman, almost unnoticed; at that moment, s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah, baring her teeth like an angry lioness, pounced on that hand holding the talisman.
"Euh-waaaaack!!" (Kahng Seok)
Her teeth tore into his flesh; Kahng Seok threw his head wildly while screaming in pain. She didn"t stop there, though - she then proceeded to climb up on top of his writhing body and lifted her hands up high.
"In all my life, I…. I…!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
Slap!
Her wide open palm powerfully slapped Kahng Seok"s face.
"I"ve never, ever seen….!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
SLAP!!
"….A d.a.m.n perv like you who"s so fixated on a girl"s naked body before, you d.a.m.n son of a b*tch!!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
Slam!
Her third hit was an elbow drop roughly aimed at Kahng Seok"s philtrum. Blood exploded out from his nose.
Kahng Seok was laid out on the floor like a dead frog, and when her elbow hit, he began convulsing like a person having a seizure. However, that must have not been enough to cool her anger - s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah stood up while breathing like an angry bull, and then, lifted her foot up as high as she could.
"….No, she wouldn"t…." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Seeing this, Hyun Sahng-Min flinched and stopped his actions of making sure that Lee Hyung-Sik and Jeong Min-Woo would not get up again with the help from the steel bar meeting their faces. And, he squeezed his eyes shut when her heel accurately slammed down on Kahng Seok"s family jewels.
"@%#%^%!!!!!!!" (Kahng Seok)
Maybe he had some energy left over, because Kahng Seok"s scream was loud enough to tear open his own vocal cords.
Only then, Seol could feel the restriction spell being deactivated. Since the owner of the spell lost consciousness, it was only natural that it would be cancelled.
Seol was able to regain his focus when he heard the wet, sticky footsteps coming from his rear.
It was the monster, Gaeg-gwi. It would"ve been strange if the creature didn"t show up after so much noisy chaos unfolded here already. Although Seol was confident of killing the monster, he"d rather make sure that an unlucky accident wouldn"t happen.
Seol hurriedly carried Yun Seo-Rah into the safe zone, and then pulled the still-enthusiastic s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah inside as well.
"Miss s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah!! Miss s.h.i.+n! Please, stop!" (Seol)
"Let me go! Let me go, right now! Do you have any idea how much this b*stard…!! I, I….!!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
"It"s the monster! The Gaeg-gwi has shown up!" (Seol)
"….Eh? ….?!?! Mommy!!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
When s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah confirmed the monster"s terrifying outer appearance approaching them, her att.i.tude did a 180 real fast and she jumped into Seol"s arms. Somehow successfully calming her down, Seol carried her back into the safe zone and only then could the four of them breathe long, long sighs of relief.
It felt like they had to go through a torrential storm all thanks to a certain someone.
"Whew. First time ever hitting another person like that." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Hyun Sahng-Min"s hand, as it pulled out a cigarette, was unsteady. He offered what he extracted out from the packet first to Seol.
Seol was about to pull out his own, but quietly accepted that, instead.
"Hey, man. What are we going to do about those three outside the cla.s.sroom?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"? Should we bring them inside, then?" (Seol)
"You do that, and we are through." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Hyun Sahng-Min bitterly spat out his opinion.
Not too long after, the two men looked at the corridor through the cla.s.sroom window. The Gaeg-gwi had come closer before anybody had noticed, and was in the middle of slowly devouring Jeong Min-Woo.
Crunch, crunch.
Seeing the monster chew and swallow the man from his head first, Seol could only feel the sense of astonished disgust.
"What happened just now?" (Seol)
"Mm? Oh, that. Yeah, well. Me and the boy over here exchanged some eye signals, you know what I mean? I was the one who signaled Miss s.h.i.+n over here, though." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Did that really happen? Seol felt rather dazed after hearing that, since he genuinely had not noticed it. Hyun Sahng-Min chuckled, sounding rather pleased with himself.
"What? You thought we really betrayed you just now?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"How did you signal to each other?" (Seol)
"Like this. I just had to show this off a bit, and…." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Hyun Sahng-Min began fiddling around with a half-torn piece of paper - but, "it" happened right then.
"K, khhhh-euhhh!!" (Kahng Seok)
Suddenly, the sliding door was flung open and Kahng Seok"s face entered the cla.s.sroom. His arm was clawing the floor, desperately trying to reel himself inside.
The two men couldn"t hide their surprise. To think, he was able to regain his consciousness so quickly after being pummeled like that. His endurance was indeed higher than average, according to his Status Window, so that might have been enough to explain his resilience.
"Where the h.e.l.l do you think you"re trying to enter?!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
As soon as she saw him, s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah ran hard and kicked Kahng Seok"s head like a ball.
"K, keok!! P, please! H, help me!" (Kahng Seok)
"Help you?! You cheeky b*stard! Have you forgotten all the c.r.a.p you did already?!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
"…P, please!" (Kahng Seok)
"Get lost! Get lost!!!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
She stomped down on his hand that was desperately clinging onto the floor. In the end, he couldn"t continue holding on, and his body was sucked out of the doorway like a receding tidal wave.
Meanwhile, the Gaeg-gwi had finished devouring the two lackeys, and when it saw the bloodied Kahng Seok, it reached out and grabbed him as if he was a delicious dessert.
"Hey! You, you devour that a*shole slowly, okay?! You eat him piece by piece, got that?!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
The Gaeg-gwi blinked its large eye several times while hearing that. Then, it proceeded to chew on Kahng Seok from his feet onwards. Hyun Sahng-Min began shuddering after witnessing all this.
"I, uh, I didn"t know she was this insane." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Seol almost ended up agreeing out aloud with him there.
"And well, there we go, that thing finis.h.i.+ng everything up. I hadn"t gotten my share of satisfaction yet, though." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"Isn"t it enough just watching them die like that?" (Seol)
"Yeah, actually, you"re right. I guess this is a fine end, too…. But still, f*ck this, man. How are we supposed to deal with that thing now?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Hyun Sahng-Min sighed and covered his face.
They might have taken care of Kahng Seok and his lackeys, but a new problem rose up to replace them: the monster Gaeg-gwi. If that thing decided to camp out in front of the safe zone"s door, then they had no answers to that, at all. And it was obvious that they couldn"t just stay in the safe zone for thousands, ten thousand years, either.
"In that case, we better kill it, then." (Seol)
"Eh?"
Seol"s voice was refres.h.i.+ngly confident.
Kahng Seok"s screams that grew louder and louder eventually stopped at a certain point. When Seol opened the window and took a look, he could see a dead body that was missing the entire lower section below the chest.
Seol then lightly tapped on the window sills. The Gaeg-gwi spun its head around like a bolt of lightning, faced him, and opened wide its jaw while emitting a chilling, shrill cry.
Seol found the sight of the chewed-up human flesh stuck in between the monster"s teeth rather disgusting and unappealing, so he quickly chucked in a spell ball down its basketball-hoop sized throat.
The desired result occurred right away; the Gaeg-gwi began showing an unusual reaction after swallowing the spell ball. It began falling down on the ground while all of its limbs began convulsing uncontrollably. Its large eye shook so hard, the hidden whites could be seen; out of his wide open mouth, the monster belched out a thick, dark fog.
"I guess one ball wasn"t enough." (Seol)
"What did you throw in there?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"It"s a spell ball called "Poison Fog"." (Seol)
Seol answered rather briefly and pulled a couple more spell b.a.l.l.s out from his pocket, before asking Hyun Sahng-Min a question.
"Right. What was that thing earlier?" (Seol)
"What thing?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"You suddenly appearing out of thin air like that." (Seol)
While speaking, Seol carefully took aim and threw another spell ball. The red-coloured spell ball drew a small arc in the air and landed perfectly inside the Gaeg-gwi mouth once more.
"Oh, that? I also got a paper talisman through my Random Box, you see. For concealment." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"Concealment, is it?" (Seol)
Hyun Sahng-Min nodded his head while paying very close attention to the suffering Gaeg-gwi.
"I can stay invisible for a long time, but it gets cancelled if I attack someone just once." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"Didn"t you say you only received 500 Survival Points?" (Seol)
"What the?! Hey, man, let that one go, will ya? In any case, I helped out, didn"t I? And, I need to hold a hidden trump c…." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Boom!!
Hyun Sahng-Min couldn"t finish his sentence thanks to the sudden explosion. Hyun Sahng-Min mouthed What the h.e.l.l was that? and quickly took a look outside the window - only to yank the sungla.s.ses off his face.
Kkkkiiiieeeecccckkk!!
That terrifying monster Gaeg-gwi was rolling on the ground, evidently in a lot of pain. And whenever there were the sounds of explosion coming from its innards, its entire body took on a reddish hue and began swelling up.
"You, you even had things like this?!" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"Well, I was going to use it just now, but you guys made a move first, so…. Oh, it"s running away." (Seol)
The Gaeg-gwi was doing whatever it could to scramble away, but Seol simply chucked another spell ball, which accurately landed on the fleeing monster"s back. An explosion of light occurred next, and dozens of spider web-like things shot out, tightly bounding the Gaeg-gwi to the spot.
"…………….." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
It was about here that Hyun Sahng-Min decided to shut up and simply watch the proceedings unfold. All the enthusiasm he felt had been drained out of his system by now, and not only that, he was too worn out to feel shocked anymore.
"This should finish it off." (Seol)
The last spell ball landing on the monster transformed into clear liquid and rained down on the monster that couldn"t go anywhere.
"What happened?!" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah asked after belatedly approaching them.
"I killed it." (Seol)
Seok spoke while pointing at the corridor.
As it turned out, the most powerful spell ball of the four was the Hydrochloric Acid one. It even melted that scary monster into nothingness in the blink of an eye.
Within the corridor, a ma.s.s of rotting flesh that was once the Gaeg-gwi could be found lying on the floor.
"Oh, wow…. Really…." (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
Seol explained himself further as the others showed disbelieving reactions.
"The Guide was right. By drawing a couple of spell b.a.l.l.s, we could"ve got to have fun with this mission. And well, I got lucky with the right combination of spells." (Seol)
"Spell b.a.l.l.s? Combination?" (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
"Yes. I spread the "Poison Fog" inside its body, which served to strengthen the explosions caused by the spell "Ignite". I tied down the escaping Gaeg-gwi with the spell "Spider Web", and then showered it with Hydrochloric Acid." (Seol)
"Oh, my…." (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah"s mouth opened wide, and she quickly brought up her hand to cover it.
"….Isn"t that a bit…. too cruel…." (s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah)
Seol and Hyun Sahng-Min could only stare at her totally dumbfounded - even Yi Sung-Jin too, as he sat there with his back against the wall.
Dawn was mercifully uneventful.
Inside the safe zone where only eight people now remained, two men were busy chatting to each other in a relaxed manner.
After that chaos had died down, s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah regained her bearings and quickly treated Yun Seo-Rah"s injuries. Thankfully, her life was spared, but s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah had no confidence about the arm - saying there was nothing she could do anymore. Besides, the treatment itself had been delayed, which didn"t help.
The four of them discussed, and they decided to stay put until midday. They were thinking of waiting for Yun Seo-Rah to regain her consciousness, but also, the main issue was with them all being just too d.a.m.n fatigued to carry on any further.
While looking on at the trio of Yi Sung-Jin, Yun Seo-Rah, and s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah softly snoring away, Seol quietly asked a question.
"I don"t see that middle-aged man." (Seol)
"Mm? Who?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"You know, that guy with gla.s.ses." (Seol)
"Oh, the guy who gave up on his fami…. Cough. Why? You wanna go out and look for him, too?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
Seol didn"t reply, and simply chugged down a bottle of energy drink.
A short period of awkward silence flowed between them, before Hyun Sahng-Min tapped a cigarette loose from the packet.
"Hey, man…. Can I ask you about something?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"Mm?" (Seol)
"Back then, when you were staring down at Kahng Seok…. You were going to use those spell b.a.l.l.s, weren"t you?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
For the first time in a long while, a thin smile formed on Seol"s formerly composed, serene face.
"You were planning to use one, but didn"t, right?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
When Hyun Sahng-Min asked again to make sure, Seol simply nodded his head.
"Why did you do that? Well, the result was good, so there"s that, but still." (Hyun Sahng-Min)
"You said it before. Human beings would only reveal their true colours when pushed to a corner…. I just wanted to confirm with my own eyes." (Seol)
This time, Hyun Sahng-Min became speechless.
Another bout of silence descended upon them. But, a short while later….
"F*ck, man. So, did we pa.s.s or what?" (Hyun Sahng-Min)
The two men laughed out at the same time.
< 17.="" a="" dangerous="" treasure="" hunt="" (5)=""> Fin.
(TL: Nongae was a Korean "gisaeng" born in 1574. A gisaeng is the Korean equivalent of a geisha. She"s famous for drowning herself and the j.a.panese general Keyamura Rokusuke by utilising the same method as s.h.i.+n Sahng-Ah employed in the chapter. She flung herself and her victim into the sea below a cliff where the invading j.a.panese army was celebrating their victory. In hindsight, it was probably not a good idea to have a drunken orgy on top of a cliff, that….)