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Chapter 111
“Help with what?”
It was a simple question, but Cheon Sooji was suddenly stricken by the thought that Kim Hyukjin was sexy. This feeling didn’t stem solely out of an attraction to Hyukjin as a man, but from a longing towards the strong. No matter the situation, he always maintained his calm, mature, and relaxed appearance.
Unbeknownst to herself, Sooji licked her lips and made a sound of admiration.
“Ah…”
Gong Jinhoon, who’d gotten a tongue-lashing from Sooji, looked askance at her. “What’s with you all of a sudden?”
“That man. Isn’t he too sexy?”
“...”
Sooji seemed to be asking it rhetorically.
“Even if you ask me that, I—”
“I want him. That man.”
A desire to possess blazed in Sooji’s eyes. It wasn’t a simple desire to possess. She mumbled unconsciously to herself.
“It feels weird.”
She didn’t vocalize it, but she was wholly immersed in the completely new feeling. She was used to someone else submitting to her and doing her bidding, and that was what she preferred. The ‘Queen’ that Hyukjin saw in her status window before was proof of that.
‘I…’
She bit her lips. What was it? What was this new feeling?
‘I want to obey.’
To put it into her own words…
‘I want to become subordinate to him.’
Her face reddened slightly. A certain word flashed in her mind, but she shook her head and quelled the thought. There was no way. That wasn’t her taste, no way. It wasn’t. It wasn’t. It wasn’t.
Despite her furious denial, Sooji’s summary was captured by Hyukjin’s Eye of Perception.
Summary: Queen Wanting to Submit
He couldn’t figure out for the life of him why Sooji’s summary was like that. Yeonseo was aspiring to become a wife, Sunhwa had a brother complex, and now, there was a strange ‘Wanting to Submit’ tacked onto Sooji’s usual ‘Queen’.
He was so flabbergasted by it that his eyes were momentarily drawn to her, but he continued his conversation with the boy.
“...And that’s the situation. I beg of you. Please help me.”
“So basically, your grandfather disappeared, and you think he’s been kidnapped by monsters? We just have to find him?”
“Yes.”
A quest window popped up.
[The quest ‘Rescue Even’s Grandfather!’ has been generated.]
The quest window floated in front of Hyukjin’s eyes. He examined it carefully.
‘Something’s different about it.’
He couldn’t explain exactly how, but it was vaguely different somehow. That was the niggling feeling he got from looking at the quest window with Observer’s Eye.
‘That’s only natural.’
Because this wasn’t a real ‘quest’. It wasn’t a quest imparted by the System.
“Alright, we’ll help.”
Hyukjin’s eye, the Observer’s Eye that discerned the true nature of things, captured each and every minute change in the boy’s expression. The boy who was so desperate to rescue his grandfather had an ever so slight upwards curl to his lips, a peculiarity that was visible only to Hyukjin. To the physical eye, Even looked desperate.
“But you know…” Hyukjin raised his chin. “Who are you?”
“What? What do you mean by that?”
“Is your name Even?”
“...”
Hyukjin asked again.
“Who are you?”
“...”
Even took one step backwards. “I really don’t get what you mean by that.”
“Your name. Is it Even?”
Even’s body twisted unnaturally. His neck bent, and the joints of his limbs twisted in strange directions. His body trembled as he spasmed, and drool streamed from his mouth.
“Who are you?”
Choi Sung-gu shivered as he watched. Hyukjin’s nerves were really something. It was almost scary. How could he be so composed, so level-headed? The bastard probably had steel or lead for blood. After one full-body shiver, Sung-gu prepared for the 2nd floor raid.
‘It’s really going as Hyukjin said.’
Somehow, it didn’t feel novel anymore. Sung-gu nudged Sunghyun in the ribs.
“Oi. You ready? You gotta do good.”
“I think I’ll do better than you, hyung.”
“Big talk for a lil’ pipsqueak. This hyung of yours was numba one back in my homeskillet.”
Jo Sunghyun also shivered, contempt flooding his features. Numba one? And homeskillet wasn’t even used correctly… He felt zero worth in responding to such outdated, tryhard language.
“...”
He very quietly began to chant a magic incantation.
* * *
Hyukjin gazed calmly at the kid who had introduced himself as ‘Even’.
It was the same as the strategy in the past.
–The name of the 2nd floor boy is Even, and he’s been possessed by a ‘ghost monster’.
At first, many Players failed to figure out this unassuming boy’s true identity and were lured and killed by his trap.
–It is highly likely that the ‘ghost monster’ possessing the boy is one of two monsters.
One was White Fox, a fox ghost monster, while the other was White Rabbit, a rabbit ghost monster.
–The strat differs completely depending on whether it is White Fox or White Rabbit.
It wasn’t that hard to make ghost monsters expose their identity. All you had to do was ask, ask, and ask again.
Hyukjin grinned.
‘Both are perfectly welcome.’
He knew all too well what the Guardian who sent him a message earlier, the Shepherd Boy, wanted to see. Hyukjin pulled out the item he’d been given.
[Fig Tree Club]
A club made from the wood of a fig tree over 100 years old. Effective in provoking ghost monsters that have possessed someone. However, it has no physical attack power.
It was Hyukjin’s first time handling a club.
‘Feels perfect in the hand.’
Just like when he tried a wrestling technique and threw a dagger for the first time, the club felt like a weapon he’d trained with for many years.
He swung the club forcefully.
Bam!
The club made impact with a crack, and the boy staggered.
“I asked, who are you?”
He swung the club again, the weapon whistling from right to left.
Bam!
The boy was unable to defend himself.
“AHHHHHH!”
He screamed. Gong Jinhoon scowled. It was true that the NPC had changed unnaturally, but there was no doubt that the boy was a quest giver.
‘Huh?’
Jinhoon blinked and was startled to find that the boy had returned to looking like a regular kid.
Even knelt, crying. “Why are you doing this? It hurts. It hurts so much. I beg you, please stop.”
Hyukjin paid him no heed.
Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
He beat the boy mercilessly, already 100% certain that the boy wasn’t really an NPC.
Sunghyun was amazed in his own way. ‘The Lady of the Scales… isn’t sending me any notices.’
Normally, his contracted Guardian, the Lady of the Scales, wouldn’t turn a blind eye to such a ruthless beating. Her silence meant there was definitely a reason why this boy deserved to be beaten.
Unable to bear it any longer, Jinhoon tried to step forward. “Stop! S–mmpgh!”
Sooji put a palm over the blond-haired man’s mouth. “Oi. I told you to shut up, didn’t I?”
“Mmgh! Mmgh!”
The healer Gong Jinhoon was no match for Cheon Sooji’s strength. Unlike him, she had realized that the boy was no ordinary NPC. There was something about him that they didn’t know.
The next moment, she saw what that something was.
Possessed One LVL 34
The boy’s appearance was changing rapidly. His body became much bigger.
‘Massive body. And… white fur on two legs?’
White fur had grown all over his legs, which had changed to look like the hind legs of a massive rabbit. The boy’s face lengthened, and two front teeth approximately thirty centimetres long protruded. The arms also became covered in white fur, making the boy look like a human with the arms and legs of a rabbit.
Hyukjin grinned.
–The White Rabbit makes the person it has possessed transform into a rabbit monster. One eye should be black and the other should be red.
It wasn’t difficult to pull the White Rabbit out of the person it possessed.
–It is best to give a hard strike to the temple on the side with the red eye. Though it is ideal to use an anti-ghost item like the Fig Tree Club, it’s fine even without.
Hyukjin said one word.
“Sunhwa.”
Sunhwa stepped forward without delay. She had been standing by.
Clang!
The little tank blocked the Possessed One’s paw swipe.
‘Nicely done.’
As expected of a tanking genius, she blocked the attack with ease.
“Hyungnim! I will take down its hind leg! Oryaa!”
Yoohyun wrapped his huge, muscled arms around the Possessed One’s leg, squeezing with such force it seemed he would crush its knee. In the meantime, Hyukjin jumped on Sunhwa’s shoulder to leap into the air, a natural movement he achieved purely physically, without any System-assisted foot techniques. The fluidity and ease of the movement was almost comparable to what the combat class Yeonseo could pull off.
He nimbly wrapped his legs around the Possessed One’s neck and began to swing the Fig Tree Club mercilessly.
The Possessed One screamed and flailed.
“Stop! Stop! Stooooop!!!”
Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
It was a one-sided beating. After a great deal of agony, the Possessed One crumpled to the ground and began to loudly vomit.
Sooji cautiously approached Yeonseo. “How long should we just stand by? It feels like we’re the only ones who are clueless here. Since we’re on the same boat, please give us a chance to contribute.”
“...”
But Yeonseo didn’t respond. She wasn’t ignoring Sooji on purpose; she was simply focusing on something.
Sooji realized that. ‘What’s she focusing on so hard?’
Just then, Yeonseo moved.
[Using the skill Single Hit Finisher.]
Her sword strike blitzed forward, aiming for the ‘White Rabbit’ that had been expelled from the Possessed One. The ghost monster looked mostly human.
White Rabbit LVL 30
Pierced by Yeonseo’s sword, the White Rabbit disappeared with a grating, cackling laugh. Yeonseo had long since learned that her physical attack wouldn’t work on a ghost monster. She had heard what would happen from Hyukjin.
‘So now…!’
If it was as Hyukjin said, three holes should appear in the ground. That was what he said would happen once the White Rabbit received a set amount of physical ‘damage’.
‘It’s true!’
That meant it was now time for Sung-gu and Sunghyun to take action. Hyukjin’s party moved like one fluid entity. Each person knew exactly what their role was and moved all too naturally within Hyukjin’s scenario.
Smoke suddenly billowed out. Sung-gu had lit the holes on fire, and it wasn’t purely magic fire. He had stuffed the holes with straw that burned well and produced lots of smoke.
Hyukjin kept Eye of Perception going constantly.
‘Our chance will come soon.’
Ghost monsters were very tricky to deal with before you found out their identity, but once you knew what they were, they were relatively easy monsters to fight.
Black smoke puffed from the three holes the rabbit had dug. Before long, something jumped out of the ground, and a high-pitched squeal shattered the air.
“KYAAAAAAAAAK!”
Sunghyun chanted an incantation directly towards it.
[Wend Kiratia Metiase–]
A 3-meter-long spear made of wind appeared in the air and shot forward like an arrow. Like a well-written script, everyone moved in perfect order to subdue the ‘White Rabbit’ in mere moments.
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