Acquired the Scam Rune in the Academy

Chapter 95: Stained Rock Pile (7) (2)

The only thing that bothered me was…

She said she had something she wanted to ask us…

Well, whatever it is, I’ll answer it.

It’s Yoo Eun-seol who’s asking after all.

I cautiously asked her,

“Are you sure that’s okay?”

“Yes. If you two agree, I’d like to conquer it together.”

Tap-tap.

I felt fingers tapping on my back.

When I turned around, Kim Chae-eun was nodding vigorously.

She meant she was all for it.

Seeing her made me chuckle.

Whether it was Jeong Seon-young or this time Yoo Eun-seol, Kim Chae-eun seemed to really like high-ranking Holders.

I nodded once and spoke to Yoo Eun-seol,

“Then we won’t refuse and will accompany you. We look forward to your guidance, senior.”

That’s how our journey together began.

It was my first party hunt with an S-grade Holder since becoming a Holder myself.

***

Ippotranslation

***

When I first met Kim Chae-eun,

And when I saw my face in the mirror…

There seem to be quite a few cases where the first impression is different from the actual image.

Kim Chae-eun had a colder image at first glance but had a warmer and brighter personality than anyone else. I also have a dull personality contrary to my sharp appearance.

It’s the opposite of what you’d expect from someone who seems hard to approach.

And that was also true for Yoo Eun-seol.

She didn’t show her emotions well and her tone of voice was stiff, but surprisingly she answered well about things we were curious about,

“Athena… you say?”

“Yes. It’s an A-grade monster that often appears in dungeons within Seoraksan Field. It has a habit of forming packs of wolf-like monsters and occasionally goes hunting leading them. In academia, they call it a mid-boss monster.”

The A-grade monster Athena.

It was the identity of the giant wolf we encountered at the entrance of the dungeon.

‘So that was the mid-boss….’

Of course, I also knew about mid-bosses.

Monsters stronger than normal ones that you encounter before reaching the boss room.

They can be hidden in terrain features within the dungeon or appear when certain conditions are met.

But I had never heard of a lord-type monster like this one that leads many normal monsters around.

“Many Holders have been attacked by Athena while normally conquering dungeons. So when conquering dungeons within Seoraksan Field, you must always have an A-grade or higher Holder as your leader. You never know when Athena will appear leading a pack of wolves.”

It seemed that it usually led around thirty wolf monsters and rarely appeared in several places within the dungeon.

We were attacked by such ‘rare’ attacks right from entering the dungeon.

It was an incredibly unlucky case.

Awooo-!!

“I’ll prepare for battle.”

In the midst of exchanging stories, the wolf-type monsters appeared once again.

This time it’s a different species from the Gray Wolf.

It’s a B-grade monster, the Black Wolf.

Without the mid-boss Athena, the number of this pack was average, five.

“Huff…!!”

I raised my shield and blocked the wolves’ attack first.

The battle formation of our party, which Yoo Eun-seol joined, was ordinary.

I took the lead as a tank, Kim Chae-eun used light control magic.

And Yoo Eun-seol’s attack finished it off.

It was a well-mixed party composition of damage, tank, and support.

‘The power is unbelievable though….’

Hunting Gray Wolves or Black Wolves is not difficult.

Unless Athena leads dozens of them like before…

Kim Chae-eun and I alone are enough to hunt them.

But Yoo Eun-seol, the top-level dealer, her participation in the battle made a huge difference in hunting speed.

Swoosh- Swoosh- Clang!

Awooo?!

Awooo-!!

Watching her movements that shoot out like light.

How many seconds was it this time?

2 seconds? 3 seconds?

Yoo Eun-seol’s use of her martial arts rune and dagger rune was beyond imagination.

Her body moving like the wind was hard to see with the naked eye, and when I confirmed that her dagger had stabbed several wolves, her short sword was already spewing fire and slaughtering another wolf.

I didn’t even get a chance to see [Snow Plum Blossom], her main rune.

By the time I blocked an attack with my shield, the battle was over.

It was an overwhelmingly high level of hunting speed that was embarrassing to compare with us in terms of efficiency and speed.

[You have won the duel! Your high contribution in the duel is recognized. With the mysterious power of Rune Hunter, you can duplicate one of your opponent’s runes. Please select a rune to duplicate.]

[You have selected Sharp Fang. As it is a level 9 rare rune, its level will be reduced and registered at level 5.]

[You have obtained a new rune.]

[Due to the nature of the rune, you gain 1 strength and 1 toughness each.]

After hunting, several information windows popped up again in a row.

There were only [Sharp Fangs] available for selection from Black Wolf, so the rune was registered without any choice.

‘Come to think of it….’

I looked at the information windows that I had put off for a while.

The countless information windows that popped up when I first met Yoo Eun-seol.

All the runes they had were registered by [Rune Hunter] as she swept away all the Gray Wolves and Athena, an A-grade monster.

Just remembering things like [Tough Wolf Skin], [Agility], [Prey Search] etc… including [Sharp Fangs] I got this time, there were quite a lot of runes.

I wanted to check these runes slowly.

“Holder Yoo Eun-seol. Can we take a break for a moment?”

Yoo Eun-seol, who was checking her equipment for a moment, nodded slightly at my words.

“Yes, please do.”

In fact, we’ve been running at too fast a pace compared to normal party hunting.

We needed to rest for a while too, and Yoo Eun-seol seemed to feel that too as she readily agreed.

Since all structures within the dungeon are made of rocks and stones and there is no suitable place to rest, Yoo Eun-seol and Kim Chae-eun found suitable rocks and sat down to rest.

I also sat on a rock.

Pretending to check my equipment, I checked the information windows.

The information windows that I had put off from entering the dungeon until now.

‘Let’s see… first off, what I got from Gray Wolf… huh?’

But something was strange.

Gray Wolf and Black Wolf. And the rune I got from Athena.

These were definitely information windows that I called up to check them…

‘What’s this?’

There was one strange information window. It was something I had experienced once before, a dazzling golden information window.

[There are currently combinable runes available. You can obtain higher-level runes using Rune Hunter’s mysterious power.]