abcnovels
Chapter 49
Chapter 49
Chapter 49 – Forest of Benandi (3)
Right after entering the dungeon.
Park Ho-yeon led the Fire Dragon Guild and came to find Kang Hyeon.
“Kang Hyeon.”
“What is it?”
The Fire Dragon Guild participated in this raid with the largest number of members.
That number was as many as 80 people.
Perhaps believing in the solid number standing behind him, Park Ho-yeon looked even more confident.
“You’re still as insolent as ever.”
“And you’re still as unpleasant as ever.”
“You and those thugs of yours. What do you think you can do with just the three of you?”
As Park Ho-yeon’s provocation continued, Kang Hyeon’s expression gradually became grim.
Nevertheless, Park Ho-yeon openly looked down on Kang Hyeon and smiled coldly.
“You guys are of no help at all in this dungeon raid.”
“How would you know that?”
“I know well. I know what kind of ideology insignificant specimens like you live by.”
“You bastard, did you come here to pick a fight?”
Finally, harsh words burst out of Kang Hyeon’s mouth.
“Being of low birth, your language is crude too.”
“Shut up! What do you want?!”
As Kang Hyeon got excited, Park Ho-yeon gestured for him to calm down while keeping his distance.
“Whoa, whoa, calm down.”
“If you wanted me to calm down, you shouldn’t have come to find me suddenly and acted like a jerk.”
“If you’re so upset, how about making a bet with me?”
“What…?”
“Let’s compete to see who can make a bigger contribution to clearing the dungeon.”
Kang Hyeon fell into thought at the sudden proposition of a bet.
“What kind of bet is it?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
All the raid parties had gathered around Kang Hyeon and Park Ho-yeon by now.
Looking around at them, Park Ho-yeon continued speaking.
“Who can defeat the boss and clear the dungeon first.”
It was truly an arrogant statement.
A dungeon clearing bet.
In other words, it meant that he would clear the dungeon ahead of the other guilds here.
At this blatant disregard for others, the expressions of the people gathered there twisted.
‘It’s the Fire Dragon Guild that I’ve built. There’s no way we can’t do it.’
But Park Ho-yeon didn’t care.
‘Did you think you’d be so great forever?’
In fact, Park Ho-yeon harbored an inferiority complex towards the other guild leaders.
‘Just passing the tutorial with a high score is nothing.’
Park Ho-yeon had only cleared up to the 4th level of the tutorial.
Although he was known as the ‘Flame Emperor’ and was a renowned flame ability user, that inferiority complex never disappeared.
What he chose to overcome this complex was to grow his guild.
‘I am the guild, and the guild is me.’
Finally, he had grown the Fire Dragon Guild to be the best in South Korea. Now the guild was just like himself.
“Hey.”
Park Ho-yeon snapped out of his thoughts at Kang Hyeon’s sudden call.
“You’ve got some nerve. You come here with a mob and all you have to say is you want to have a dungeon clearing bet with just three people?”
“It’s a guild versus guild fight.”
“…”
“The number of guild members is ultimately the strength of the guild. Is there a problem?”
Park Ho-yeon looked as if he really didn’t see what the problem was.
‘Is he serious? This guy’s a nutcase.’
Swallowing a derisive laugh, Kang Hyeon continued.
“Ha! Interesting. So what will you give me if I win?”
“It won’t happen, but if by chance you win, I’ll give you this.”
Name: Easter Egg
Grade: ?
Durability: 10/10
Description: An Easter egg created by someone who likes pranks. Activates when destroyed.
Ability: ?
“You should know what this is, right?”
“What is this…?”
Despite his calm words, Kang Hyeon’s eyes shook slightly.
‘This is definitely an item related to the Administrator.’
A heavy sphere about the size of a fist.
‘Someone who likes pranks’ was clearly referring to the Administrator who created this dungeon and system.
‘But Park Ho-yeon didn’t graduate from the tutorial… How does he know about this?’
Kang Hyeon’s concerns were resolved by Park Ho-yeon’s following words.
“Don’t play dumb. I know that you’ve already joined the Special Ability User Management Team.”
Special Ability User Management Team.
Team Leader Shin Tae-gil had explained about the Administrator there.
Kang Hyeon already knew about the Administrator, but he pretended not to know and listened for a while.
‘So this guy was also part of that…’
Having grasped the situation, Kang Hyeon nodded.
“Wow! You! You’re quite sharp, aren’t you!? Hahaha…”
“Hmph.”
And then came some bad acting.
“Anyway, you’re betting that. Good. Then what should I bet?”
“If you lose, join the Fire Dragon Guild for a day.”
“Hmm… And?”
“That’s all. But during that time, you must thoroughly act as a guild member and follow my orders. I’ll treat you as a guild member too.”
The conditions were not as bad as expected.
Despite the uncertain value of that ‘Easter Egg’ item, it seemed like a gamble worth taking.
“So, do we have a deal?”
“Yeah. I’m already excited thinking about getting that Easter Egg.”
“Haha! Well, we’ll see about that. Then everyone here is a witness.”
Park Ho-yeon said, looking at the ability users filling the surroundings.
“I don’t go back on my word, you bastard.”
Kang Hyeon responded with a bright smile.
***
Ippotranslation
***
For a moment, Kang Hyeon recalled an item and smiled contentedly.
“But will it really be okay?”
“Pardon?”
“The Fire Dragon Guild is a huge guild. It won’t be easy to win against them… No, clearing this dungeon with just three people itself is unreasonable.”
“I have something in mind for that.”
Kang Hyeon’s words were filled with confidence.
Choi Dong-woo reluctantly nodded.
“I don’t think you’ll fail, but always be careful.”
“Yes.”
“As you expected, little brother Kang Hyeon, the flare gun is just a formality. It won’t be of any use.”
Among those participating in this raid, no one thought they would fail to clear the dungeon.
And they had no intention of sharing the achievements with other guilds.
“If the dungeon difficulty remains low like now, it’s even more certain.”
“…”
“Some might even hope for competing guilds to fail.”
“Yes. I’m anticipating that too.”
“Always be careful. If a crisis occurs, fire all three flare guns at once. No matter how far I am, I’ll come running.”
“Thank you for saying that, at least.”
“I mean it. Hahaha!”
With that final greeting to Choi Dong-woo, the Badass Guild parted ways with the Ability User Union.
***
Ippotranslation
***
“How many times does this make?!”
Park Ho-yeon, the guild master of Fire Dragon Guild.
Unlike his usual composed and arrogant self, he was extremely agitated.
“Huff… How many casualties this time?”
“Two dead, three severely injured. We’ve healed them enough to keep them alive for now, but it will take time before they can participate in battle again.”
“Damn it! Damn it! Aaaaargh!!!”
Park Ho-yeon felt like his blood was drying up day by day.
“Because of those rat bastards…”
For the first two days, they hunted with great enthusiasm. Contrary to expectations, the monsters’ level wasn’t that high.
The only difficulty for the Fire Dragon Guild in slaughtering enemies was the rugged mountain terrain.
But on the third day, the situation changed.
“Who would have thought that ‘Benandi’ was the name of a species…”
C-rank dungeon, Forest of Benandi.
Here, ‘Benandi’ wasn’t just a simple boss monster as everyone had expected.
Benandi was the name of the species that could be called the masters of the mountain range.
“Those lanky bastards. If I catch them, I’ll roast them all alive!”
The Benandi were about 2m tall and primarily used bows as weapons.
They blended into the forest as if they were part of it, and thoroughly engaged in guerrilla warfare.
Sniping with bows.
Traps using terrain features.
They even lured other monsters to provoke chaotic battles.
The arrows that occasionally flew during these battles were infused with magic power and were extremely lethal.
“What should we do?”
“Finding and destroying their base seems to be the only solution.”
At the vice guild master’s words, Park Ho-yeon struck his staff.
“Do you think I’m asking because I don’t know that?!”
“I’m sorry…”
“At this rate, it’s do or die.”
“Pardon?”
“If we keep losing guild members like this, we’ll end up annihilated!”
“…”
“We might as well burn down the entire forest so they have nowhere to hide.”
The vice guild master’s eyes widened at Park Ho-yeon’s words.
“But Guild Master! If we do that, we could be in danger too. Rather than that, perhaps we should ask other guilds for help…”
“Do you really think they’ll come if we fire those useless flare guns?”
Park Ho-yeon’s anger rose at the naive vice guild master’s nonsense.
“Even if they come, what’s the point? We’ll end up following behind them, being looked down upon.”
“…”
“Then the guild’s honor is finished! Clearing rewards? Ha, it’s obvious we won’t even get a glimpse!”
Despite people dying, Park Ho-yeon only talked about honor and rewards.
‘Is that what’s important in this situation?!’
The vice guild master was on the verge of cursing but ultimately said nothing.
“Get the guild mages ready. The wind is blowing towards them now, this is our chance. We’ll end this in one go.”
“Understood…”
Kang Hyeon, who parted ways with Choi Dong-woo.
Unlike usual, he showed a cautious appearance and slowly advanced through the forest.
“There’s still quite a distance to the core. Let’s conserve energy since we don’t know what might happen.”
***
Ippotranslation
***
The densely vegetated mountain range demanded considerable energy expenditure just from walking.
Kang Hyeon felt that the core wasn’t a distance reachable in a day or two, so he decided to advance steadily.
“Mr. Kang Hyeon. Wouldn’t it be better to move a little faster, just in case?”
“It’s fine, don’t worry.”
Kang Hyeon shook his head at Shin Seong-a’s question.
“There’s almost no chance that the fire dragon, who doesn’t know the core’s location, will arrive faster than us anyway.”
“…”
“It’s right to move as carefully as possible, even if we’re a bit late. Shouldn’t we have some energy left when we reach the core for what we need to do?”
“I understand.”
Shin Seong-a nodded, convinced by Kang Hyeon’s explanation.
“So, let’s do some reconnaissance.”
“Pardon?”
“You’re the expert in that area, right? I plan to move while avoiding monsters as much as possible, but just in case.”
“…”
“Let’s go with you quickly scouting our direction of progress and us following behind.”
“Understood.”
“I’m sorry. It’ll be tiring, but it’s better than continuous combat.”
“It’s fine.”
Shin Seong-a was specialized in stealth, reconnaissance, mobility, and sniping.
As such, she had often taken on roles like this, so she didn’t particularly mind.
“Let’s move slowly.”
Kang Hyeon and An Yu-seong slowly walked along the path Shin Seong-a had passed.
“Brother.”
“What?”
“Are you planning to go all the way to the core like this?”
“That would be best.”
“Tsk. It’s going to be boring.”
“Even so, it’s not that far in a straight course. We’ll probably arrive in about 3 or 4 days.”
“You’re saying we just keep walking the whole time.”
“What, do you want the three of us to fight an army of monsters instead?”
“That doesn’t sound bad either.”
Kang Hyeon frowned at An Yu-seong’s response.
“You crazy bastard. If you want to die, die alone.”
After that, it was a repetition of the same pattern.
Kang Hyeon detects the monsters’ magical energy in advance to determine a safe route.
Shin Seong-a checks that route to see if Kang Hyeon missed anything.
They walk like this all day, then sleep, and start walking again the next morning.
“Phew… Another day of mountain climbing. Climbing. Climbing!”
“What’s wrong with mountain climbing? Enjoy it, man.”
“Usually, at times like this, something suddenly happens with a bang!”
“Are you trying to jinx us?”
It was when Kang Hyeon and An Yu-seong were exchanging jokes to alleviate the tedious mountain journey.
“Kekeke. It’s here.”
Suddenly, An Yu-seong let out a laugh.
“What?”
Kang Hyeon looked around, feeling a sudden rush of anxiety.
‘I can’t really sense any magical energy…’
“Mr. Kang Hyeon!”
“What is it?”
Shin Seong-a, who had been out scouting ahead, came running back breathlessly.
“Huff, huff! Enemies!”
At the same time, unfamiliar monsters appeared between them.
“Sigh… This is because of you.”
“What did I do?”
“This situation is happening because you kept spouting unlucky words!”
An Yu-seong ignored Kang Hyeon’s irritation with a slight smile.
[Benandi Scout]
Kang Hyeon suppressed a groan as he saw the name floating above their heads.
“To think Benandi was actually a species name.”
Everyone’s guess that it might have been a boss monster or place name was spectacularly wrong.
‘For now, are they bipedal monsters? Long limbs… And they don’t seem to have particularly developed muscles.’
Their impressive height of over 2m and skin blending forest green and brown colors were striking.
“Haak!”
“Hyaak!”
The creatures that appeared kept making ‘haak’ sounds at Kang Hyeon.
“Brother. It seems like they’re trying to say something.”
“Haaak!”
“To me, it just sounds like growling?”
But on closer inspection, as An Yu-seong said, it did seem like they were trying to communicate something.
The fact that they weren’t approaching and kept going ‘Haak! Haak!’ clearly indicated they were attempting some form of communication.
“My intuition tells me they’re saying – ‘If you come any further, we won’t leave you alone.’”
“What kind of intuition has telepathy? That’s nonsense.”
“It’s true though.”
An Yu-seong’s expression was serious.
“Well, that’s a convenient ability…”
In truth, it didn’t matter what they were saying. Kang Hyeon had to pass through this path to advance towards the core anyway.
“Don’t let your guard down, we’ll strike simultaneously when I count to three.”
“Yes.”
An Yu-seong and Shin Seong-a nodded at Kang Hyeon’s words.
“One, two, three!”
-Swoosh!
The group, launching from their positions exactly on three, rushed towards the creatures at full speed.
“Haaak!”
Then the creatures turned their backs and started to flee.
With tremendous speed and agile movements, they climbed up the trees and quickly disappeared from sight.
“What the…?”