A flower field bathed in the light of two red moons. Everything stained scarlet.

This peaceful place was now awash with thick Demonic energy and murderous intent.

Massive demonic bodies crashed down, trampling the flowers flat.

THUD! THUD! THUD! Each impact sent a shudder through the earth.

Five demons total.

Unlike Serchel, all of them were beast-type—monstrous, twisted forms.

‘What’s this all of a sudden?’

Gangwoo grinned at the demonic pack. According to the clearing guide, the Mid-Boss spawns varied by route.

That number was six.

Five here, plus Serchel—that told him everything.

‘So they’re all Mid-Boss class, huh.’

Ha Gangwoo summoned the Big Glaive and slung it over his shoulder.

‘Interesting.’

Normal Players only had to take down one Mid-Boss. What kind of reward would clearing the lot bring? He was already looking forward to it.

He gripped the Big Glaive with both hands and dropped low. The weapon’s heavy weight made his palms dig in hard.

‘How did they find me?’

Gangwoo found the situation fascinating—and puzzling.

First Serchel, now these bastards. How did they track him down? He knew the flow had shifted with DLC—Another Story, but it didn’t add up.

Then Serchel’s words flashed through his mind.

[That power… That’s really *His* power, isn’t it? Interesting—how did you get that?]

‘*His* power…’

Serchel had said that when she saw Barzel’s Appetite.

‘So then…’

Gangwoo eyed the writhing, discordant energy of Barzel’s Appetite in his right hand, his gaze sharpening.

‘It was all because of this.’

Every piece clicked into place.

He had opened the Black Box, and the Demonic energy clinging to Barzel’s Appetite spread out, drawing the demons to him.

Five Mid-Boss-grade monsters at once. Any normal Player would be sweating cold, bracing for death.

But Ha Gangwoo’s face showed only satisfaction.

‘Good.’

He’d been wanting a good reward anyway. To him, the monsters ahead were just bonus points.

Just as Ha Gangwoo licked his lips at the demons—

“Uwaaah!!!”

A beast-type demon roared, so loud the vibration burst the surrounding flowers into shreds.

The demon on the far right even wept tears of blood.

The corner of Ha Gangwoo’s mouth lifted.

‘Knows Serchel?’

NPCs had emotions—even monsters. Interesting.

‘Let’s go.’

Ha Gangwoo stepped forward with his right leg and activated his skills.

[Swift Movements] [ON]

[Movement speed increased by 50%.]

[Attack stance activated.]

[Your next attack deals double damage.]

[Demonization activated.]

[All stats increased by 100%.]

His full power, everything he could unleash right now.

A dazzling halo of light shimmered around Ha Gangwoo’s body.

*Crack—*

The instant Ha Gangwoo’s grip tightened on the Big Glaive.

Ding—

[Scenario 1-3 concluded.]

Everything froze.

“Huh?!”

The roaring demon—the one weeping tears of blood—Evan and his party rushing out in shock.

Scenario 1-3 was over.

Ha Gangwoo clicked his tongue, looking at the Gate that had appeared before the demons.

A scenario ending at this desperate moment—a wave of anticlimax washed over him.

‘They’re giving us a breather, huh.’

He understood, though.

Five Mid-Boss-class foes. An ordinary Player would need time to prepare.

With a flicker of his red eyes, Ha Gangwoo approached the spot where the demon had been roaring.

It stood frozen like a well-crafted statue. Up close, it brimmed with lifelike vitality.

“Can I kill it here, too?”

In this world where everything had stopped, curiosity struck him.

Ha Gangwoo gripped the Big Glaive with both hands and swung with all his strength.

*Whoosh—* With a sharp hiss, the blade aimed for the crown of the demon weeping tears of blood.

*Thunk—*

But the greatsword stopped above the demon’s head, as if stopped by an invisible barrier.

‘No good.’

Ha Gangwoo frowned and deactivated Demonization.

‘Let’s get out.’

It was a pity, but entering the next scenario right away would do.

Pulling his hoodie tight, Ha Gangwoo stood before the Gate. The intense light was nearly blinding.

He tugged the hood even lower, then paused mid-step.

‘Come to think of it…’

Because he’d almost left the most important thing behind.

‘Mimic.’

*Shlrp—*

Mimic sucked right into Ha Gangwoo’s palm.

Mik! Mik!

The thing that had been ignoring him all along suddenly rubbed and wheedled against his hand.

He got the gist immediately.

‘Hungry, huh.’

[Satiety: 21/100]

The satiety gauge had dropped considerably.

‘Gotta teach it some manners once we’re out.’

Ha Gangwoo looked at Mimic and curled a wicked smile.

His Master was fighting for his life out there, and this thing had been flirting with an NPC? Unforgivable.

Unaware of that fact, Mimic just went *Mik!* and rubbed its hard body against his palm.

Ha Gangwoo tucked Mimic into his pocket and stepped outside.

*Ding-*

[Main Quest has been updated.]

***

Association treatment facility. A man lies in an old-fashioned private room.

That man is none other than Lee Taewoo.

Lee Taewoo’s eyelids fluttered, then slid open.

‘…Where am I.’

Lee Taewoo had no idea why he was here.

“Ah!”

All he felt was a dizzying pain radiating from his cheek.

Lee Taewoo tentatively touched his cheek.

“Ugh!”

A searing pain shot through his fingertips.

Lee Taewoo turned his head and looked at his reflection in the mirror.

‘…’

His cheeks were swollen like two steamed buns glued together.

“My… perfect face… huh?”

As he muttered to himself, he felt something foreign in his mouth, and pulled it out.

‘…Teeth.’

Four molars, by the look of them.

“Ah!”

Suddenly, Lee Taewoo remembered why he was like this.

“That bastard…”

The crazy son of a bitch who’d asked to party up, then suddenly punched him in the face. The name Ha Gangwoo came to mind.

“Ha-what’s-his-name. How dare he throw a punch at me, does he even know who I am?”

A Player-on-Player fight. As long as no one died, there was no legal recourse. But Lee Taewoo had connections at the Association.

“Fuck! Where’s my phone!”

Was it the pain in his cheek? Lee Taewoo was more on edge than usual.

He frantically looked around, searching for his phone.

‘Where is it.’

He wanted to call his father right this instant and have him tear that punk a new one. But his phone was nowhere in sight.

*Beep! Beep! Beep!*

Lee Taewoo started mashing the nurse call button.

Just as he was nearing a hundred presses…

*Click!*

A nurse hurriedly opened the door and walked in.

“Is something wrong?!!!”

Lee Taewoo ignored her urgency, scrunching his face as he shouted.

“Bring me my phone!”

“Pardon…?”

“Where’s my phone, and where’s my armor?”

“Well… the Association retrieved your equipment, and as for your phone, I’m not entirely…”

“So give me your phone—or go get one. Hurry up!”

“Ah… hold on a second.”

The nurse scowled at the sudden rudeness and stepped out.

“What the hell! Just because you’re the center director’s son, you think you can act like this? What a bully.”

Lee Taewoo was, after all, the son of the Association’s Scenario 1 Zone Center Director.

Left alone in the hospital room, he shook his leg nervously, his fists clenched tight.

“That piece-of-shit box Summoned beast. And the black hoodie. His name was… Ha… what was it?”

He was in the middle of recalling the features of the person who’d put him in this state.

A soft sound—

A presence slipped into the room.

‘Already got it? Fast at least.’

Lee Taewoo smirked viciously and reached out a hand.

“Right! Handpho—one!”

But the moment he saw the man stepping into the room, he felt a terror that choked his breath.

“You… you… you… why… come to apologize now or something?”

That man was the one who’d put him like this. Ha Gangwoo.

The hood of the sweatshirt hid the face, but the killing intent radiating from it was anything but ordinary.

‘Something’s off.’

It was obvious at a glance—they’d come looking for trouble.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Lee Taewoo kept clicking the call button.

But—

“Ah, seriously, I said press it once!!! Jinsu, do you have a spare phone?”

The nurse ignored the blinking light, clicking her tongue as she searched for her phone.

Beep! Beep!

Lee Taewoo scowled, pressing the button over and over.

‘Why aren’t you coming?!’

Then the hooded face revealed itself. Black sclera and red pupils, like a demon’s.

“Hiiik!!!”

Lee Taewoo forgot the ache in his cheek for a moment, his face twisting.

‘Don’t tell me—he’s here to kill me? The crazy bastard!’

Before he could finish the thought, a chill ran through him.

Ding-

[Brainwash has been used.]

[Control: 100%]

[You can brainwash the target.]

And just like that, his mind went blank.

Ha Gangwoo narrowed his eyes, studying Lee Taewoo with clear interest.

The moment he’d used Brainwash, Taewoo’s face had gone slack, drool spilling from his lips.

Gangwoo ran a hand across his forehead as he glanced at the System window.

‘So it’s not all-powerful after all.’

[Demonic energy is eroding your body.]

[Demonic energy +1]

[Demonic energy is eroding your body.]

[Demonic energy +1]

The Demonic energy swelled with every passing moment, each surge bringing a dizzying nausea in its wake.

A reading of 1,000 — that was the threshold right before total loss of control.

He’d almost slipped, almost let go of his grip on sanity just moments ago.

‘No time.’

Ha Gangwoo forced his mind back into focus, then barked out the order.

“Erase all memories from the past seven days. Only use formal speech from now on. And whenever you talk to a woman from now on, raise your right hand while speaking.”

Ha Gangwoo kept on brainwashing,

Ding-

[Brainwash successful.]

The system window flickered up. It seemed Brainwash wasn’t something you could use indefinitely.

‘Did it work?’

Doubt surfaced, but there was no immediate way to confirm it.

‘How far does this go?’

Ha Gangwoo crossed his arms with a look of interest, then melted into Invisible, hiding his body from sight.

The door creaked open—

Right on cue, a nurse stepped into the room, holding a phone.

“Mr. Lee. I’ve brought a separate phone for your use.”

‘….’

The nurse forced a kindly tone, but Lee Taewoo just sat there, drool dripping from his lips, offering no response.

‘Damn, is he pulling another stunt? He can’t be doing this on purpose…’

A sinister thought crept into the nurse’s mind, but she plastered on a strained smile and tapped Lee Taewoo on the shoulder.

At that, Lee Taewoo, who had been staring blankly into the void, snapped back to reality.

“Huh?! What… is this? Where am I?”

Lee Taewoo blinked, his bewildered gaze darting around the room. Then, wincing as if his cheek stung, he lifted a hand and rubbed at the sore spot.

“Ah! Why does it hurt so—much?” he muttered.

Seeing this, the nurse leaned down with a worried look and spoke to him.

“Mr. Lee, are you all right? Could you tell me your name?” she asked.

“Huh? Oh. It’s Lee Taewoo.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” she pressed.

“Huh? Yeah. But where am I?”

“You don’t remember? This is the Association’s private medical facility. You were brought in unconscious from the Scenario 1-3 zone.”

“What? Me? The Scenario zone?”

“This is strange. Wait a moment.”

Sensing something off in Taewoo’s odd behavior, the nurse hurried out of the room with quick steps.

Ha Gangwoo kept his Invisible skill active, his gaze fixed on Lee Taewoo.

Holding the phone the nurse had handed him, Lee Taewoo continued muttering to himself.

“What… the… Why am I here? Huh? Why does my voice sound like this?”

Lee Taewoo, flustered by the honorifics slipping out beyond his control, collapsed onto the bed with a thud.

‘Not bad.’

Ha Gangwoo silently breathed a sigh of relief and stepped out.

***

[Insufficient MP.]

Ha Gangwoo walked out of the Association facility with a satisfied expression.

‘Damn, this is good.’

He’d figured Brainwash had solid versatility, but the effect surpassed his imagination.

Memory erasure combined with subconscious behavioral manipulation—the potential applications looked massive.

‘Still, not quite omnipotent.’

Something nagged at him, though. The command to raise his right hand when speaking to a woman hadn’t been executed.

‘Only two commands at a time?’

Or maybe Brainwash just had a built-in limit.

Beyond that, the skill came with demanding conditions.

Especially the 1,000-point Demonic Energy requirement. That wasn’t an easy number to stack.

‘Tough to pull off mid-combat.’

But even factoring that in, it was insane.

Ha Gangwoo wore a satisfied smile as he made his way to the Association building.

‘Let me just rest a little first.’

He wanted to enter the Scenario right now, but maybe it was because he’d used his head so much. He felt like taking a short break.

***

“Phew…”

Ha Gangwoo toweled off his wet hair and flopped down onto the bed.

“That’s refreshing.”

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this clean. Modern amenities really were something else.

The place he was in now was the Association’s lodging facility, free of charge for affiliated Hunters.

‘The Association’s benefits are pretty good.’

A few things had happened before he got here.

First, there was another incident at the front desk, similar to before. As soon as word got out he was L-Grade, people swarmed in asking for certification photos.

Well, fair enough—there were only two L-Grades in the whole world. The attention was unavoidable.

In the middle of all that, the desk clerk had told him about a feature called Messaging.

Some kind of conversation function between Association Players, apparently.

[Kang Seongbin: I’ll be waiting in the Ranking match. Don’t die before then.]

[Lee Ayeon: I heard the news~! Congratulations on L-Grade. I guess it makes sense that I lost. There’s something I really need to tell you, so let’s meet. I’m leaving my contact info. 010-xxxx-xxxx.]

Two messages had come in for Ha Gangwoo.

“Suddenly asking to meet?”

Lee Ayeon had wanted to win the tournament. And now she was approaching the person who had thwarted that effort?

“Revenge…”

He couldn’t pin down a clear motive. If revenge was the goal, he might have to deal with Lee Ayeon preemptively.

Ha Gangwoo flopped onto his back on the bed and lifted his phone with one hand, staring at it.

‘Will she contact me?’

He’d also left a memo for Chae Seohyun through the Association’s messaging system.

When it came time to actually write it, the words hadn’t come to him, so he sent it as-is.

[Ha Gangwoo: Player Chae Seohyun. I’d like to meet you. Contact me at 010-xxxx-xxxx, and I’ll come right away.]

Just as Ha Gangwoo was looking at his phone, lost in thought.

Mik! Mik!

At his feet, the Mimic poked at him insistently, signaling its intent.

It still hadn’t been fed. That meant it was hungry.

‘Annoying.’

He’d decided to train it, but actually doing it felt like a chore. It was just a warehouse, after all—he figured it didn’t need to be anything more.

‘As long as it doesn’t run away.’

[Mimic]

Rank: E

Status: Hungry. Feed it quickly.

HP: 70/70

Satiety: 12/100

Capacity: 20/50

Ha Gangwoo made a pursed expression and held out his open palm.

Ding—

[8,000 Gold has been retrieved from Inventory.]

Eighty coins instantly sucked into his grip.

At that, the Mimic started bouncing around the room, going “Mik!” all the while.

Mik! Mik!

“Wait.”

The moment the words left Ha Gangwoo’s mouth, the Mimic stood perfectly still on the floor.

“Good girl.”

Ha Gangwoo tossed the eighty coins onto the ground. They scattered across the floor with a clatter, and Mimic scurried around, picking them up and eating them.

‘Should I head out now?’

He’d rested enough. There was nothing stopping him from leaving right away.

But.

Ha Gangwoo looked at his right hand, where Barzel’s Appetite writhed with an alien undulation.

[Satiety: 63/100]

After absorbing Serchel, his Satiety was nearly full.

If he entered the Scenario right now, he wouldn’t be able to absorb monsters properly.

Ideally, he’d reduce the Satiety gauge as much as possible before going in.

‘I’ll burn it down first, then go.’

With that settled, only one thing remained.

[DLC-Shop]

DLC-Book of Job Change: Elemental Master – 500,000,000 Gold

DLC-Equipment Window Upgrade – 80,000,000 Gold

DLC-Costume Set Box – 18,000,000 Gold

(Refresh)

All that was left was to check the DLC-Shop’s list.

‘Let me take a look first.’

Ding-

As he checked the items, a smile spread across Ha Gangwoo’s face.

“No way.”