The Second Coming Of Avarice

Experience is important - this wisdom applied to just about every imaginable area of expertise out there.

The extermination team"s att.i.tude went through an immediate change after they found out that the variants now possessed the ability to camouflage themselves, as well as to regenerate to full spec in almost a blink of an eye.

Mikhail and his team, an old hand in stuff like this in their own way, totally threw away any notion of underestimating their enemies. Veronika carried a far, far more sombre expression than ever before as she guided the team forward. She kept grinding her teeth, her eyes scanning the surroundings and missing not even a tiny speck of dust. Thanks to her diligence, the team"s speed of advancement had plummeted down to a turtle"s walking pace, but no one felt dissatisfied from that.

And when the ambus.h.i.+ng tactic no longer worked, variants changed their strategy and reverted back to simply clas.h.i.+ng with the team head-on.

Actually, the team preferred to breakthrough from the front, anyway. That was because Cho Hong had her mace draped in divine powers, Mikhail sheathed his sword in bluish ‘aura", while Seol Ji-Hu had gotten himself fully ready with his magic spear. And with Maria"s timely a.s.sistance added to the mix, they didn"t have to fear the variants anymore - although they still proved to be slightly c.u.mbersome opponents to handle at the end of the day.

About four hours later, the team was able to completely wipe out every single variant seemingly existing within the night fog zone. They roamed around for a little while longer to make sure, but couldn"t find a single one. Which could only mean that they had succeeded in eradicating the enemy.

"The end!" (Mikhail)

Mikhail sheathed his longsword and formed an expression of pure contentment. Even Gierszal and Veronika displayed obvious hints of being pleased as well. These opponents may not have been the most easy ones out there, but at the same time, they weren"t too tough, either. That was why the trio felt so chuffed right now.

They didn"t have a lot to go before getting their much antic.i.p.ated level ups. It was a rare thing to run into enemies that perfectly suited their current in-between status like these variants.

Unlike them, though, Seol Ji-Hu was dwelling on a different kind of sentiment at the moment. Eradication of the variants was, in the end, only one of the goals he had set out to achieve. He planned to dig into the mystery and lay it bare once and for all, and right now, he couldn"t hide the signs of confusion on his face.

‘There"s… no colour." (Seol Ji-Hu)

From the very moment when the last variant was taken care of, the night fog zone"s colour changed from yellow to colourless. What did this event signify?

‘…..I can"t figure it out." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu rubbed his face. No matter how long he walked around, he couldn"t see anything suspicious at all.

One of the fundamentals in any investigation was searching for potential clues. But, he felt like he was being stonewalled by an invisible force, now that he couldn"t even start searching for the clues anymore. His chest felt heavy and tight as if a boulder got stuck there. Was this how someone would feel after being asked to solve a mystery without any clues whatsoever?

‘This sucks…." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"When we go back to Haramark, the first thing we will do is to make a pitstop by the temples." (Mikhail)

Mikhail suddenly engaged Seol Ji-Hu in conversation as the youth stood there burning his brain cells.

"You know, me thinks this is more than enough. Me, Gierszal, Veronika, all three of us might be able to get to the next stage after today." (Mikhail)

"Is that so?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

"That"s right! When I become a Level 4, I"ll be able to walk around with a bit more oomph in my shoulders, know what I mean? Me, the ‘Sword Actor"! Keuh! Doesn"t that sound so cool??" (Mikhail)

Mikhail laughed good-naturedly and blabbed on. Seol Ji-Hu could only form a weak smile, instead.

"Congratulations." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Huh…. Did I read the mood wrong?" (Mikhail)

Mikhail grinned embarra.s.sedly at the youth"s response.

"Okay, the actual thing I wanna to say to you was that, you shouldn"t be too discouraged by this." (Mikhail)

"Excuse me?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Us three, we aren"t dissatisfied at all if we were to return like this. From the get-go, you told us that the info you have wasn"t a 100% sure thing. And it was us three that made the choice to come with you. Besides, it"s not like this is our first time going home empty-handed, either. Expeditions or explorations, it"s all a big gamble, anyway." (Mikhail)

Seol Ji-Hu must"ve looked far too worried from others" perspective. For sure, he felt unseen weight pressing down on his shoulders from the burden of being the leader. Mikhail"s words certainly did help the youth in that regard.

"Thank you." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Sure, sure. Besides all that, what will you do now? Going back to Ramman isn"t a bad idea, but if it"s too much bother going back and forth, it won"t be that bad to set up a camp nearby, too." (Mikhail)

Now that Seol Ji-Hu thought about it, the sun had set a while ago and dim twilight was slowly creeping into the land. Which meant that the fog should be rising up soon, as well.

It was unwise to doggedly cling onto a problem with no solution in sight. Seol Ji-Hu quickly organised his thoughts and made an announcement.

"Let"s make camp here. We"ll survey the zone during the night, and if we don"t find anything particular, then we go home in the morning." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Nice. Let"s do that." (Mikhail)

Mikhail coolly replied to that.

Evening came and went, and the time now was well into the middle of the night.

The team set up camp a bit further away from the night fog zone. If it was at all possible, Seol Ji-Hu would have preferred setting it up within the night fog zone itself, but the fog thickly covered the area as the night deepened, greatly limiting one"s visibility in the process. They may have swept all the variants away, but one would never know. There was no real reason to deliberately take on any unnecessary risk when they could avoid it altogether.

Dawn was approaching silently. Seol Ji-Hu rubbed his eyes and got up from his sleeping bag. It was his turn to stand as the lookout.

Two people would rotate in turn to serve as the lookout. That was the basics. When he made his way out of the tent, he found Maria sitting before campfire, but she was already nodding off to the lla land by then.

"M-mm, mm…." (Maria)

He settled down cautiously next to her, and as if she was waiting for that, she used his lap as her pillow and laid down completely. A thin smile formed on his lips, but it dissipated soon enough.

Now that he got some much-deserved shut-eye, he no longer felt as anxious as before. Of course, that didn"t mean the elusive answer had suddenly materialised in front of his face, either. He simply stared at the campfire burning away without saying a word, his gaze tracing the reddish arcs drawn in the air by the dancing flames.

‘What did I miss?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

In all honesty, Seol Ji-Hu had already half given up on his quest to unravel this mystery. Well, many other outstanding Earthlings tried and eventually surrendered with their hands - and even feet - raised in the air.

He wasn"t the smartest cookie out there, nor was he overflowing with wisdom built up from extensive experience, either. Indeed, it was wrong for him to jump headlong into this problem, loudly claiming that he would solve it when others couldn"t. The only thing separating him from the rest was his ‘Nine Eyes"….

That was probably why he couldn"t just let this one go. Because, there definitely was something here. There was no doubt about that. His suspicions had morphed into certainty after that meeting with the village head.

‘Should I go back and threaten him or something?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu could only wryly chuckle at his own stupid idea. Obviously, he wasn"t thinking of doing that, ever. He hadn"t seen any colours of danger from the village, and the village head himself showed no ill will towards him, too. The youth wasn"t so thick-faced to force a man living in solitude into saying something that might or might not help him.

Hoping against hoping, he took a glance at the dense fog covering the zone, but he confirmed that there was no change. He slowly licked his lower lip.

‘I"ve succeeded in carrying out the request, yet I don"t feel good at all." (Seol Ji-Hu)

He looked at Maria on his lap, her sleeping face not carrying one hint of worry and suddenly felt a bit grumpy. He then lightly pinched her cheek that still had some baby fat left. She spat out hing~! and turned her head around. He let a soft chuckle escape from his mouth. He gently patted her head, and she grinned and murmured "Heh…." Her soft, steady breathing reminded him of a house cat.

"Haaaaah…" (Seol Ji-Hu)

Argh, I don"t know anymore.

Seol Ji-Hu laid down on his back as well, and turned his attention to the sky above. A bright white moon was casting pale-blue light from the clear night sky.

‘Huh, it"s a half-moon tonight." (Seol Ji-Hu)

When he silently gazed at it, the half moon resembled a white s.h.i.+p gently floating on the endless stretch of a jet-black ocean. Absorbed by this rather beautiful sight, he stared at the sky, unmoving and wordless.

And so… just how long pa.s.sed by like that?

"…..????" (Seol Ji-Hu)

Quite suddenly, he thought that his vision had become blurred. Seol Ji-Hu quickly blinked several times.

‘….What was that?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

At first, he thought it must be a trick his eyes were playing on him. But no - from a certain point onwards, his eyes could clearly see dozens upon dozens of black ‘lines" rising up to the sky.

This event wasn"t happening near him; he couldn"t even see properly what those lines were made out of since they were so far away. However, those black lines still pierced out of the night"s fog and wiggled towards the half-moon as if they were trying desperately to reach out to the night sky.

Wuuuuuuuu…..

Almost right away, an eerie call resounded out from somewhere within the fog - and, at the same time, a portion of the night fog zone suddenly changed colour to yellow. Gooseb.u.mps broke out all over his body in mere seconds.

"OUCH!!" (Maria)

Seol Ji-Hu hurriedly shot up to his feet, and Maria cried out in distress as her sweet slumber was interrupted by her head hitting the ground.

"W-what was that?!" (Maria)

Her pain wasn"t that important, though.

The moment his memories reached there….

Seol Ji-Hu was already running like a wild wind.

"Maria!! Wake everyone up and follow me!" (Seol Ji-Hu)

After leaving behind those words, of course.

Wuuuu….?

When he breached into the night fog zone, that eerie wail began softening for some reason. And the black lines trying to cover the half-moon slunk back into the fog, too - just like a white s.h.i.+p lowering its anchors.

Seol Ji-Hu arrived in his destination in the blink of an eye and crazily swept his gaze around his surroundings. He couldn"t see anything. But, it was definitely here! Not only that, even the colour yellow was disappearing too, converting back to colourless state!!

‘What the h.e.l.l is going on here?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

He genuinely felt that, if he missed this chance, then he"d not be able to find another one any time soon. Seol Ji-Hu was momentarily caught in indecision, but being pressed for time, he quickly ran up a small mound right next to him. He thought that, by being somewhere higher, he might be able to see something, anything.

The mound wasn"t even six metres high, and he climbed to the top in no time at all. He looked down with his Nine Eyes still active and finally discovered the strange phenomenon happening right below.

‘The colour yellow…."

….Was disappearing? Seol Ji-Hu narrowed his eyes. Indeed, the colour was ‘disappearing", but it was completely different to how the colour faded away usually. It"d normally fade away like paint spreading over another colour and changing it, but here, he saw a big, yellow circle rapidly shrink into a far smaller dot.

It was the size of a house, then to a large boulder, then rapidly shrunk down to a size of a clenched fist, then eventually a small dot - and then, gone for good, leaving behind no colour at all.

"What the h.e.l.l…..?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

He muttered to himself in puzzlement, before he sucked in several cold breaths. Others would say that he suddenly had an epiphany. His comrades had arrived around at this time.

"What happened?!" (Maria)

Maria"s loud yell brought Seol Ji-Hu back to his senses. Before he could forget that spot, he took another hard look down below. Although the colour was gone now, he still remembered the location where that yellow was.

"What"s going on?" (Maria)

"It didn"t disappear." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"What?" (Maria)

"It realised that I was looking, and it went below. And that"s why it shrunk like that." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"W-what are you even talking about?! Did you eat something you shouldn"t have??" (Maria)

Maria creased up her brows.

Again, Seol Ji-Hu wasn"t completely sure. But, if his theory was right, then a few questions would be answered straight away. Such as, why only this place was so barren, why there were all those holes in the ground. And then….

Seol Ji-Hu pulled out his spear almost out of reflex, and smacked the hill with it. Pak!! The hardened chunk of sand crumbled and scattered dust in the air.

This was quite literally a lightning bolt out of the blue. All the team members stared at the youth busy pounding the hill with dazed faces. Only Cho Hong hesitantly pulled her mace out after spending a few more seconds observing the youth.

"I really wanna ask you what"s up with your exercise routine in the middle of the night, but uhm, I should just hit this hill like you, right?" (Cho Hong)

"I could be wrong. But, it has to be somewhere here." (Seol Ji-Hu)

SLAM!

With Cho Hong added to the mix, the hill began to crumble at a far quicker pace now. And because the soil itself lacked any life whatsoever, it broke away easily, too. She continued to pound the ground but still didn"t forget to throw him a sideways glance as well as a question.

"And why are we suddenly doing this now?" (Cho Hong)

"Back in the village, I heard about the ‘three taboos"." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Three taboos?" (Cho Hong)

"The sound, the waving hands, and people wearing grey clothes. Ignore these three taboos, and you will end up in another world." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"The sound? You mean, that Wuuuu~ from just now?" (Cho Hong)

"That"s right." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu agreed with her while still digging out the hill.

"The wavering hands was just a figurative description." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Eh?"

"I just happened to see it. Something below here, beneath the night fog zone, would sometimes reveal itself when it thinks there"s n.o.body nearby. And when it detects danger, it quickly hides itself again. When you think about the special characteristics of the variants, the one about them not leaving any traces behind, then it"s not all that strange for the others to miss the signs." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu explained himself at a rapid knock.

"T-then, what about grey clothed people or whatever?" (Cho Hong)

"No need to think too hard about that. Remember what the colour of the variants were?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Hey, I really can"t tell head from tail what you"re on about, you know?!" (Cho Hong)

Cho Hong frowned grandly and swung down her mace with a lot of power. And this happened.

CRACK!

Without any warning whatsoever, the sensation of something hard splitting up got transmitted to her hands. She yanked her deeply-buried mace out and blinked her eyes in sheer dumbfounded amazement.

"This…..?!" (Cho Hong)

"The thing was…." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu"s eyes were gleaming brightly now.

"It was not ‘another world" or something like that. Someone cooked up that rumour in order to hide something." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Cho Hong looked at him with the face of a person still failing to understand. And that was the difference between someone who simply decided to partic.i.p.ate in the request, and someone who investigated everything before coming here.

"Don"t try to dig deeper there. Instead, let"s try to carve down the sides now." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Four Warriors roused up their Magic Power and began digging into the hill, and before long, the whole mound began resembling an apple with its side bitten out.

A short while later.

The team was staring a certain large boulder firmly blocking ‘something" with amazed eyes.

"Holy cow…. So, well, uh, why the heck is this thing here?" (Veronika)

"Remember that the night fog zone is a hilly region. No one would find it odd to see another ‘hill" here." (Seol Ji-Hu)

When Veronika asked in stupefaction, Seol Ji-Hu replied in a soft voice.

"Someone built a small hill to disguise the entrance in order to hide something." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"I, well, I didn"t know. For real. There was no trace of someone artificially hiding stuff around here, you know?" (Veronika)

Veronika stuttered defensively.

"That"s to be expected, though. This place was closed up many years ago, after all. Since it"s only this big, you wouldn"t have needed a lot of time for something man-made to be swallowed up by nature." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Many years ago? Closed up?!" (Veronika)

Seol Ji-Hu was about to say, The person hiding all this was very meticulous, but decided to save his breath. They wouldn"t understand it even if he explained it now.

"In any case, let"s get this rock outta there first." (Cho Hong)

Cho Hong and her short temper stepped up forward before anybody else, her sleeves all rolled up. Gierszal, Mikhail and Seol Ji-Hu also joined in.

Gruntle, groan!!

The boulder eventually issued a heavy creak and was pushed to the side, revealing a rocky cavern it had been blocking up all this time.

"And so…." (Mikhail)

Mikhail nervously swallowed his saliva.

"….The secret to the mystery is sleeping within this hole, is that it?" (Mikhail)

Seol Ji-Hu wordlessly nodded his head. He was sure of it now. The moment this entrance was revealed, the ‘hill" changed its colour back to yellow. He also got to learn that the ‘colourless" was the most variable one out of the four directions and their corresponding colours he had unlocked so far.

"Hah!! This is so freaking great! My level shooting up after solving the mystery once and for all! Can there be any better outcome than that??" (Mikhail)

Mikhail shouted out in excitement, his head already full with images of a rosy future.

"Good! Veeeery good! Hey, mister Leader! Let"s go inside!" (Mikhail)

The team quickly a.s.sumed their previous formation. Veronika hit the entrance a couple of times and even tossed a rock inside, before nodding her head in satisfaction and took the spot in front of the group again.

For a while, the six of them walked in the humid, damp corridor that took them lower and lower underground. By the end of this stony pa.s.sageway, they spotted hints of light. The team cautiously walked further forward and found themselves inside a ma.s.sive underground chamber.

The interior wasn"t that dark, which was somewhat unexpected. Illuminating stones were buried in the walls here and there to provide the necessary illumination. That was one of the clearest proofs that this place felt the hands of humans before.

Unfortunately, there was a slight issue with this place, and that would be - quite unfitting for an area this huge, there was absolutely nothing in here. All they could see was the ceiling, about four metres high up, as well as another pa.s.sageway at the far end of the chamber. This underground tunnel felt so lonesome and deserted, even.

"Mm…. There might something here, so let me take a look around first." (Veronika)

Veronika tilted her head slightly and carefully moved forward.

"This is not what I was expecting…." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu muttered to himself.

"Hey, dude. Just how did you even locate this place? I wasn"t expecting something like this to exist here, you know?" (Gierszal)

Gierszal asked with a face full of curiosity.

"Oh, that. I figured that there was a research centre somewhere near Ramman, you see." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"A research centre?" (Gierszal)

"I read about it in the Empire"s history book. After the Parasites invaded…." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu proceeded to briefly explain what he found out to the rest of the team and sighed out.

"The village of Ramman wasn"t mentioned at all, but Master Ian suspected that the variants were the results of that research." (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Hold on, dude. Didn"t you just say that the research centre was in the Delphinion Duchy?" (Gierszal)

"That"s where the main research centre was located, yes. But the satellite research centres were dotted around the countryside, so I thought that it was possible for one of them to be somewhere around here….." (Seol Ji-Hu)

Seol Ji-Hu didn"t finish his sentence, but Gierszal still nodded his head.

"So, that"s what happened. It"s a bit shoddy in here to be a research centre, though. Doesn"t look like there"s anything of value at all." (Gierszal)

He was right. It was nominally a place to conduct research, yet not one commonly-seen research apparatus could be seen here. Logically speaking, shouldn"t there be at least a single flask or something similar to that? Even a deserted mine wouldn"t be this empty. Considering the technological prowess of the Empire, reputedly at the peak of magic engineering, something like this place made no sense at all.

‘Could it be that the village head wasn"t lying?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

It was then, Veronika finished scouting up ahead and returned to the team.

"D*mn it, I found nothing." (Veronika)

"Did you see anything like footsteps of a person or something similar to that?" (Seol Ji-Hu)

"Well, I"d say this place is definitely man-made, but…." (Veronika)

Veronika shook her head.

"I can"t see any sort of trace in this place. All I can say is that, no one has stepped foot in this s.p.a.ce in the last three months, at the least. That"s as far as I can read, though. Sorry." (Veronika)

Which meant that the only thing remaining would be the cavern on the other side.

"It"d be nice if there"s something in there." (Veronika)

Veronika licked her lips and took the lead of the team again. But, just as she was about to lead them forward, Seol Ji-Hu opened his eyes extra wide and gasped out belatedly.

"Wait!!" (Seol Ji-Hu)

< 73.="" the="" white="" s.h.i.+p,="" the="" anchor=""> Fin.