Chapter 150

The Entity was silent for a moment at Cho-i Hyeon’s question. Cho-i Hyeon also kept her mouth shut and waited for the Entity to answer. And in a few seconds, the Entity broke the thin silence and replied.

‘It’s related to us, and yet it isn’t.’
“What do you mean by that?”

Cho-i Hyeon frowned as if it was difficult to understand. The Entity hesitated, as if it was hard to express it in words, but its emotions were clearly felt in her mind. It felt unusually clear ever since they shared eyes to break the dungeon core last time. Everything related to the Entity.

‘We came here to find a successor to inherit the Legacy of our world.’
“What do you mean, ‘came here’?”
‘It means we transmitted fragments of our world here.’
“By ‘fragments of the world,’ you mean the dungeons, right?”
‘Yes.’
“Please, speak simply. Simply.”

Cho-i Hyeon grumbled to herself. So, the dungeons appearing in their world now meant that they were beings sent from the Ruined World to find a successor. Cho-i fell into thought again.

“What do you plan to do after finding a successor in this world? You said your world was destroyed by the Calamity anyway.”
‘……’

The Entity was silent for some reason. Cho-i Hyeon felt something was strange, but she didn’t know exactly what, so she kept quiet. It might be because she couldn’t understand their desperation. The hearts of those who, having lost their world, fragmented themselves and sent themselves to other worlds to convey their will.

‘I think I’m missing something.’

Cho-i Hyeon scratched her head and returned to her original question.

“So, what’s this nonsense about this dungeon being related to you but not being related to you?”
‘That is not us.’
“It’s not you?”
‘But it was created using us.’
“What does that mean?”

Plink, plink. Just then, Cho-i Hyeon felt something flowing from her eyes and wiped the corners of her eyes with her finger. The Entity was red tears.

‘Just as our world vanished due to a Calamity, you too shall vanish due to us, a Calamity.’
“You’re talking nonsense. Why would we disappear?”

Cho-i Hyeon said, frowning deeply.

‘The way to stop that is…’

The Entity disappeared again with more incomprehensible words.

“Hey, what do you mean by just leaving like that?”

Even after calling out several times, there was no answer. Choi Hyeon scratched her head, then lay down on her bed.

“What’s going to happen…?”

She slowly closed her eyes. She felt sleep slowly invading her body. Choi Hyeon felt herself drifting off to sleep. ‘I feel like I’m missing something, but what is it?’

* * *

The next day, 9:45 AM. Choi Hyeon sat in the meeting room, yawning widely. There were ten remaining seats around the circular table. She vaguely heard that all guilds ranked within the top 10 in Korea had been called. Choi Hyeon turned her head to look at the front seats. Those were probably the seats for Geumsin and Hwayeon. In reality, although all top 10 guilds were called, only Geumsin and Hwayeon could provide significant combat power here. At least, they were the ones with S-Ranks. Choi glanced at her Watch. All of Paehyeok’s members, except for Taehyeok Sa, were present. It was now 9:50 AM. Choi Hyeon alternately looked at Dongju Kim and Yeonhan Kim, who were sitting on either side of her. It felt like a very long time since she had seen them.

“How have you been?”

“Things were so serious yesterday that I couldn’t greet you properly.”

Yeonhan Kim said with a light laugh.

“Are you laughing right now?”

“So, should I cry all day?”

Yeonhan Kim glared at Dongju Kim as if to say, ‘Don’t annoy me.’ Dongju Kim sat with her fingers interlocked behind her head, crossing her legs. She still looked like an irritable loafer, no matter how you looked at her.

“Looks like you both have been doing well.”

Choi Hyeon arbitrarily concluded by looking at the two of them and then looked at her Watch again. Exactly at 9:55 AM, people started entering the meeting room one by one. And among them were Jihan Kim of Geumsin and Gihyeon Park of Hwayeon.

“Hello~?”

Gihyeon Park shamelessly greeted only Choi Hyeon and waved, even though there were people from other guilds. However, as the situation was serious, he didn’t flirt any further and went to his designated seat. Jihan Kim was the same. And exactly at 10 o’clock, when all the members of each guild had arrived and taken their seats, Taehyeok Sa entered. He’s so shameless, too. He loves being the center of attention.

“I appreciate you all gathering like this despite the short notice.”

And he’s rude.

Taehyeok Sa soon walked towards the circular table and sat in the seat his guild members had intentionally left empty. Yeonhan Kim’s seat was next to his, like an assistant to Taehyeok Sa, and indeed, as soon as Taehyeok Sa sat down, Yeonhan Kim stood up and continued speaking.

“We will now begin the meeting for the strategy to conquer this large-scale EX-Rank dungeon.”

Yeonhan Kim stepped to the center, and immediately lasers shot from the floor and ceiling, creating a giant mountain in the air. Standing next to an image depicting a dungeon shaped like a giant mountain with a circular entrance open in front of it, Yeonhan Kim spoke.

“As you know, its scale is the largest in the world, no, the largest in history. It’s an EX-Rank, and other than the fact that a hundred people can enter, not much else has been confirmed. As always, we won’t know what kind of dungeon it is until we go inside.”

At that moment, Choi Hyeon raised her hand.

“It’s probably the Mantis Dungeon.”

At her words, the hall was momentarily stirred. But Cho-i Hyeon just stared at Yeonhan Kim with wide eyes. Yeonhan Kim, Taehyeok Sa, and the rest of the group all looked at Cho-i with expressions that suggested they had never heard of such a thing before.

“Hunter Cho-i Hyeon, how do you know that?”

Then Jihan Kim stepped forward and asked her. Cho-i Hyeon pondered how to explain this and came up with a very simple reason.

“Those who know probably know that I’ve been to a hidden dungeon where mantises appear. After visiting that hidden dungeon, I get a feeling about related dungeons.”

“A feeling, you say?”

“I just feel it. That that dungeon is related to the one I’ve been to.”

“Related, how?”

“Dungeons that use the same language.”

Jihan Kim raised an eyebrow.

“The same language?”

Cho-i Hyeon blinked, then turned her head and requested something from Taehyeok Sa.

“I’ll need the video information from Hunter Ganansu.”

“Which one?”

“There were some written characters in the dungeon where the Angel appeared, weren’t there?”

Then another guild member raised their hand. Yeonhan Kim pointed to them and said,

“Speak.”

It was the Pil-an guild, which was at Korea Rank 6 tier, and the Guild Master himself was participating. He lowered his hand and asked Cho-i,

“Everyone knows that unreadable characters appear in each dungeon, right? And what Hunter Cho-i Hyeon is talking about seems to be related to the Entity, is that correct?”

“That’s right. Those who have been to a hidden dungeon can read the characters in dungeons that share the same language as that hidden dungeon.”

Then Suui Kim raised her hand.

“That’s correct. I also experienced that.”

Then people’s gazes turned to Gihyeon Park of Hwayeon. Gihyeon Park let out a short “Uh” sound and then scratched his cheek.

“Unfortunately, I’m not aware of that. I’ve never entered a related dungeon after destroying a hidden dungeon in the first place.”

“Understood.”

Yeonhan Kim, who was observing, quickly summarized. Then, the Jong-ya guild, next to Pil-an, raised their hand. It was the 4th ranked guild, right after Geumsin.

“Can we also consider the rule of hidden dungeons, which requires going through three similar dungeons, to mean going through three dungeons that share the same language?”

“Yes.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I’m the one who leaked that information in the first place.”

With Cho-i Hyeon’s answer, the hall grew noisy once again. Cho-i Hyeon yawned indifferently, watching the people exchanging words among themselves.

“Anyway, for that reason, I’m sure that place is a dungeon where mantis monsters appear.”

“You’re sure, then.”

“Of course, I don’t think they’ll look exactly the same. In fact, when the dungeon ranks in Chonghyeon all rose at once recently, they changed to dungeons where mantis-type monsters appeared, but their appearance was very different.”

“Are you referring to what happened in Chonghyeon?”

“Yes, and I believe that incident was a precursor phenomenon that appeared before this EX-Rank dungeon emerged.”

Jong-ya’s Guild Master briefly rested his chin on his hand.

“Then, there have been many instances of dungeons increasing in rank over the past year. Do you believe these were all precursor phenomena before the emergence of this highest-tier dungeon?”

“I can’t say for sure, but isn’t it highly likely?”

Cho-i Hyeon shrugged his shoulders and concluded his statement. Seeing Cho-i Hyeon lean back deeply in his chair as if he had nothing more to say, Jong-ya’s Guild Master also fell silent. Yeonhan Kim looked around once, then addressed the people.

“Then, does anyone else have questions regarding Hunter Cho-i Hyeon’s opinion?”

“For now, since we have no information anyway, I don’t think it’s bad to believe it. Mantis-type monsters are not a new kind of monster, and if that’s really the case, we should be able to deal with them.”

Cho-i Hyeon thought to himself, ‘They won’t be able to handle it.’ In fact, the Mantises in Chonghyeon’s S+ Rank dungeon were different from what he knew. The problem was that they kept moving even after being cut, like zombies. Here, they were likely to appear in an even more troublesome form. Cho-i Hyeon was staring into space, wondering if he should explain this, when Suui Kim, who was watching him, raised his hand and spoke.

“In the S+ Rank dungeon we recently visited in Chonghyeon…”

As Suui Kim began to explain articulately, everyone nodded in agreement. Cho-i Hyeon smiled contentedly as he watched Suui Kim.