🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 23
Adaptation (4)
Team Leader Jung had been completely distracted for a while.
Strange messages had been appearing nonstop, ones that were hard to make sense of.
[The sound of the flute can no longer be heard. The curse begins to weaken.]
[The Hidden Boss has appeared.]
[The flute has been destroyed.]
And so on.
But the most shocking message was this one:
[The curse of the flute can no longer dominate the dungeon.]
[Raid Progress: 29.6%]
“What the hell is going on! How long have they even been in the city? How could the curse already be gone!? And what the hell is this Hidden Boss!?”
The reason Team Leader Jung had sent only Lee Hyun and Kim Min-jung into the city was simple.
To screw them over.
He wanted to teach those bastards a lesson for humiliating him.
His plan was to let them get into trouble. If things got really bad, he would “save” Min-jung and only her. That way, she wouldn’t be able to stand against him anymore.
As for the thorn in his eye, Lee Hyun? He could just chalk it up as an “accidental death.” That would cleanly get rid of him.
It wasn’t like this would be the first time—he’d already “handled” a few troublemakers in past teams this way.
But things were going very differently from what he expected.
“T-Team Leader! Shouldn’t we hurry and get to the city now?”
The other members of Team Z were just as dumbfounded.
For ten years, the raid progress had been completely stuck. Now it was shooting up at incredible speed.
[Raid Progress: 33.9%]
Their hearts grew restless.
If the report ended up saying they had only sat around waiting without doing anything, they’d definitely be punished.
“You’re right!”
“We need to check what’s going on!”
“There’s been no report through comms either! They might be in a situation too desperate to even send a rescue call!”
Only then did Team Leader Jung snap out of it.
“Y-Yes! Let’s hurry! If there really is a Hidden Boss, then Manager Jang and Assistant Manager Kim could be in danger! They’ll need support! Move!”
“Orders confirmed!”
“Orders confirmed!”
Team Z bolted in unison.
With the flute’s curse gone, they felt confident about tackling the dungeon.
Even as they sprinted, using movement skills, the dungeon messages kept pouring in:
[The Hidden Boss has entered Phase 2.]
[Citizens waking from zombification are confused and panicked. Calm them down.]
‘Damn it, damn it…! This is all because of Jang Lee Hyun! Everything went wrong the moment that bastard showed up!’
Team Leader Jung blamed all of the chaos on Hyun.
Ever since he appeared, nothing had gone according to plan.
And then—
[A hidden new <Page> has been unlocked.]
[An epidemic may spread. Beware.]
‘A new Page? An epidemic?’
That message made Jung’s eyes widen.
Not Phase, but Page.
That meant new quest objectives had been added.
And sure enough:
[Objectives]
Defeat the Flute Player. (clear!)
Find the missing children.
Protect the citizens of Hameln.
Stop the epidemic. (new!)
A fourth objective had been added.
And then—
[A swarm of rats begins to appear!]
Squeak! Squeeeak!
From just a short distance from the city walls, the sound of rats rang out.
But it was much louder than expected.
“Everyone, battle stations!”
Jung instinctively sensed danger and shouted.
The team members quickly raised their weapons with tense expressions, just as—
Squeeeak!
From the forest surrounding the fields, from the city walls, from gaps in the rocks—an overwhelming tide of rats poured forth.
Not just ordinary rats. Each one was as big as a human forearm, pitch-black, and moving by the tens of thousands.
It looked less like rats and more like a massive black tsunami crashing toward them.
“Rotten Rats! It’s Rotten Rats! Everyone, run for the walls!!”
[Rat Plague (Rattenplage)]
They travel in swarms of hundreds or even tens of thousands. Like locusts, they devour everything in their path. Wherever they pass, they leave behind a stench of plague and curse.
If they fail in an attack, the curse only deepens out of spite.
– Origin: From the saying “Wish the plague on your neck.”
A single Rotten Rat wasn’t that strong—one sword strike was enough to kill it.
But the real problem was what happened after they died.
Their corpses burst with a corrosive rot so strong it could melt steel.
And if they moved as a swarm?
It was nothing less than a plague.
That’s why the manual said: if five or more Rotten Rats are spotted, retreat immediately. But…
“G-Get away! Get away from us!”
The Rotten Rats had already encircled Team Z.
“Damn it!”
“Die!!”
Flash! Boom!
The team unleashed every skill they had to shake them off.
Hundreds died in an instant. But that only enraged the swarm further.
For every rat that died, several more poured into the gap.
“N-No…!”
Team Z was swallowed whole by the black tsunami.
Until the very end, Team Leader Jung thrashed and screamed.
“Lee Hyun! Lee Hyun! This is all your—ughkkk!”
And then he too was buried, silenced forever.
[Monster Rush has begun!]
Sixteen curse-users had been living in hiding in the city sewers.
They had all been childhood friends from the same hometown.
■■ was one of them.
‘■■■’s spirit-link was severed. I’m the closest one to them. That means I’ll probably be the next target…’
In the pitch-black sewers, ■■ stacked several curses he had learned from an old mentor.
Sound waves, detection, marking, pursuit, observation, persistence…
Small curses individually, but when combined like puzzle pieces under precise calculation, they formed a bizarre and effective curse.
It was a detection curse he’d been researching alone.
Fwoosh!
Through those cursed senses, he scanned his surroundings, careful not to make a sound.
『Everyone okay? See anything?』
『Nothing.』
『Same here.』
『Me too.』
『Everyone, respond one by one.』
『I’m still fine.』
『Me too.』
As they spoke through their spirit-links, they realized something was wrong.
『Wait. ■ isn’t answering. ■! Answer me, ■!』
『……』
『Damn it.』
『Rotten Rat bastard… where did you go?』
■■ bit his lip hard.
Another spirit-link had been cut.
『That makes four already! Where the hell are they hiding—』
『■■■■? Damn, again!』
A chill ran down ■■’s spine.
Spirit conversations were being cut off mid-sentence?
That meant his friends were being taken out before they even realized the enemy was there.
Just as he was about to speak—
Splash.
The faint sound of footsteps in the distance.
‘It’s here!’
■■ froze, focused.
He considered calling for his friends, but—
‘No. Better to strike first. They don’t know I’ve noticed them yet.’
He suppressed his presence further and crept closer—
“…So that’s how you detected me. Spreading bait curses randomly around, then tracking anything that triggered them? Interesting.”
■■’s skin crawled.
The voice in his ear was cold, ghostly.
He whipped around, trying to unleash his curses—
Thud!
But a hand shot from the darkness and clamped over his face.
“Thanks for the lesson. Now, take a nice rest—”
Suddenly, a magic circle spun above Hyun’s head.
‘Got him!’
■■ had deliberately acted as bait.
Dozens of curses flared like a waterfall crashing down.
[‘Curse: Blindness’ activated!]
[‘Curse: Numbed Senses’ activated!]
[‘Curse: Enervation’ activated!]
…
[Cursecaster15 uses ‘Skill: Curse Chains’ to bind the target!]
■■ smacked Hyun’s hand aside and leapt back.
“Hmph! I don’t know how you’ve been hiding your presence, but with this many curses stacked on you, you won’t be able to—huh…?”
He had expected Hyun to be crushed under the weight of the curses.
But instead—
“Well, this is an interesting trick.”
The chains of curses rattled uselessly.
[All curses nullified due to Curse Resistance (S)!]
Crack!
The chains shattered—instantly.
“……!”
“You shaped the curses into links, chaining them together to bind the target. Impressive. All of you curse-users have real talent. I’ve been learning a lot.”
“H-How…?”
Hyun shrugged.
“I just have a bit of high curse resistance.”
Then he hurled his axe.
Whirr!
The cursecaster ducked in panic—
Swoosh—Crunch!
—but Hyun was already there, clamping a hand over their face again.
This time, the curses never even activated.
Lightning qi surged into their body, forcibly shutting down their mana circuits.
Bzzt!
“Sleep for a while. By the time you wake up, it’ll all be over.”
The cursecaster couldn’t even reply.
Their vision went dark, and a sharp blow to the back of the head knocked them out cold.
Thud!
[Cursecaster15 has been eliminated.]
Hyun clicked his tongue as he looked down at the unconscious enemy in his arms.
Their hood had fallen back, revealing a young girl’s face.
She couldn’t have been older than fifteen.
Even if they were classified as “monsters,” it was hard to go all out against someone who looked so young.
“Missing kids turning out to be the hidden boss’s henchmen? What kind of twisted fairytale is this?”
Hyun clicked his tongue again.
[You have solved one of the dungeon’s hidden mysteries.]
[Objective #2 complete. You have obtained part of ■■■■’s Karma.]
[Raid Progress: 41.5%]
“So the citizens were all their family and relatives… yet the kids show this much hostility? Is that also because of <Adaptation>?”
He didn’t know the exact relationship between the Flute Player and the children.
But he could guess:
“Obvious. The Flute Player was the only friend to children disappointed in greedy adults. He was wronged and killed, and they took revenge for him… classic setup.”
The Monkey King chuckled atop Hyun’s head.
“But you’re not really interested in the story, are you?”
“Correct. What matters is fulfilling the objectives 100%. And more importantly—”
Hyun smirked at the new message before him:
[Through the Sacred Relic: Golden Eyes, you have found clues of ■■■■’s Myth within Cursecaster15’s curses.]
[You have obtained part of ■■■■’s Karma.]
[Assembling the pieces of the clues you have gathered… Analyzing contents.]
“This is what’s most important.”
From the curses of the casters, Hyun glimpsed fragments of the Monkey King’s myth.
Just like with the flute’s curse, all the curses here were connected.
If his guess was right, then the master of this <Tale> was…
‘This fragment is indispensable to completing Sun Wukong’s myth. And it will push my S-rank curse resistance from “near immunity” into true complete immunity.’
That was why he had left Min-jung and Team Z above while he entered the sinkhole alone.
“Find it. Don’t let it slip away.”
“Of course.”
Even the Monkey King’s voice carried weight—this fragment mattered to him as well.
Hyun nodded and activated the Golden Eyes.
Fwoosh!
With them, the entire sewer layout was laid bare in his mind.
The curse-users he’d already knocked out were all gathered safely with their mana sealed, so no worries there.
‘Keep going until only the Hidden Boss is left.’
Flash!
Hyun pressed forward, like a goblin stalking through the night.
[Cursecaster10 eliminated. Found a clue to ■■■■’s Myth.]
[Cursecaster13 eliminated. Found a clue to ■■■■’s Myth.]
…
“Damn it, to be taken out by an outsider…!”
Occasionally, one managed to sense Hyun’s presence.
Thud!
[Cursecaster4 eliminated.]
Each time, Hyun felt a chill…
But then—
[The Sacred Relic: Golden Eyes is analyzing curse traps set throughout the sewers.]
[Obtained more clues to the curses. Assembling the fragments collected so far.]
[You have obtained part of ■■■■’s Karma.]
…he only smiled.
Every encounter became fuel for his growth.
‘So many different types of curses. I’ve never seen half of these before.’
[‘Curse: Self-Slaughter’ fizzled!]
[Your understanding of curses has slightly increased.]
[‘Curse: Gluttonous Thirst’ fizzled!]
[Your understanding of curses has slightly increased.]
…
[Based on your increased understanding, your Curse Resistance (S) proficiency has slightly improved.]
…
[Analyzing…]
‘So many techniques too. If they’d all attacked together, things might have been dicey. But this way, I’m gaining far more.’
Bzzzt!!
[The Rotten Rats targeting you have been annihilated.]
[All plague pathogens have been eradicated by the Goblin’s lightning cloak.]
Even the Rotten Rats, rulers of the sewers, were blown apart by his lightning.
Aboveground, they were nightmares to citizens and hunters alike.
But to Hyun, they weren’t even a threat.
Here in the sewers, he was essentially invincible.
‘Still, they’re impressive. To grow this strong without a proper teacher… their unity too, reminds me of the Azure Lightning Squad.’
Feeling a strange kinship, Hyun eventually subdued all the curse-users and arrived at the central chamber where the Hidden Boss resided.
It was a vast circular cavern, shockingly large for an underground space.
The boss stood at its center.
They too must have realized that all their comrades’ spirit-links had been severed.
‘Take him down in one strike.’
Hyun prepared to strike while the foe was distracted—
Ding!
At that exact moment:
[Monster Rush has begun!]
[The Rat Plague engulfs the city.]
[The Black Death spreads.]
In the darkness, Hyun lifted his head.
‘So it begins.’
He had expected this moment, though he couldn’t help but feel a flicker of concern for Kim Min-jung.
Still, he wasn’t truly worried.
The woman he knew could handle it.
Which meant…
‘Time to claim it—the fragment of Sha Wujing.’
