Editors: Spade, Roki
Proofreader: Sapphire
As the fourth dungeon raid was officially announced, all of Chord went into preparation.
Although they were able to re-enter and finally clear the third dungeon, this time, thorough preparation and training were carried out so that they wouldn’t be forced to give up at any point during the raid. After predicting the attack pattern most likely to appear in a dungeon modeled after the Temple of Artemis, they decided to prepare all the necessary items in advance, most of which could be found within the HN Guild.
The HN Guild was most famous for its elite team, but it was a large guild even before Chord was formed. Naturally, they had a potion team, a weapon crafting team, a magic stone processing team, and so on at their disposal in the guild, and the Chord Hunters would go back and forth between them to find items.
Since Yisun only ever went in and out of the 42nd floor used by Chord, he marveled at the appearance of the 55th floor he visited with Na Gunwoo. They said it was a dedicated space for the potion team, but it felt more like a department store. The potions were lined up on the shelves, and even their cases looked luxurious.
While pretending not to, Yisun curiously scanned the space around him. Na Gunwoo chuckled, “The entire space from the 51st to the 55th floor is used by the potion team. You’d definitely freak out if you were to see all of it.”
“Seriously…?”
“Why would I lie about that? But I don’t think the leader would be too pleased if you were to enjoy the 55th floor…”
Seeing Yisun’s puzzlement by the sudden remark, Na Gunwoo raised his finger and pointed to the very end of the 55th floor; it was a space separated by a glass door, and it looked like someone’s private laboratory.
“The 55th floor is almost exclusively for Sa Yoonkang’s use. However, we have no choice but to come here since the best potions are on this floor. So, when making a list of items necessary for attack, Chord Hunters will prioritize the items from the 55th floor.”
“Ah…”
“Actually, even our team leader doesn’t mind going in and out of the 55th floor, but every time he comes here, Sa Yoonkang starts making a scene… So it’s better to avoid it altogether.”
Na Gunwoo shook his head, saying that nothing good came out from the two of them meeting. Yisun instantly agreed with his words, recalling the conversation the two had had in the elevator before. He seemed to understand why the other Hunters were trying their best to keep them apart.
Soon enough, Na Gunwoo was walking around the space and gathering the necessary potions. They were mostly Mana and Stamina recovery drugs, and occasionally potions that increased elemental resistance. Chord received a discount on the items since they belonged to the HN Guild, yet Na Gunwoo stuffed the potions into his bag, saying that discount or not, there was no need to worry about saving up money.
Yisun’s gaze, which was watching the bag grow heavier by the second, suddenly turned to the shelf at the end. He had heard that all of the potions that Sa Yoonkang had made himself were put there, and he spotted one with a familiar name written on it.
[Abnormal Status Relief Potion]
His light brown eyes read the letters slowly. Even though the words were recognizable at a glance, they felt unfamiliar. Yisun read them over and over again. In front of him was the potion he had been searching for for the past half year, hoping it could bring salvation to his friends who had turned immortal.
Although it was something caused by his Restoration ability, he couldn’t fight the glimmer of hope brewing inside of him and persistently sought to acquire the potion. The memories from half a year ago suddenly flooded his mind. Yisun stared at the potion with a slightly subdued face, then slowly approached it. He just wanted to take a look.
Although Sa Yoonkang was an A-class Healer, he had little experience in dungeons due to his proficiency in potion making. He claimed it was to devote himself to making top-grade potions, but rumors circulated online that he was too scared of entering dungeons and only made potions safely outside. Whether the rumors held some truth to it or not, Sa Yoonkang’s potions were the most valuable in the current potion market.
Despite the many controversies, Sa Yoonkang was still the Vice Leader of the HN Guild. Yisun checked the display wordlessly as he recalled the most recent bid for a potion made by Sa Yoonkang. His gaze was calm as he stared at the transparent case with the name of the guild embossed.
Suddenly, he heard a voice right next to him, “What is a Restorer doing here?”
“Ah…”
It was Sa Yoonkang. He wore a lab coat over his suit shirt, seeming to have just left his laboratory. Sa Yoonkang looked at Yisun from behind the glass door with a very puzzled expression on his face. For a moment, Yisun stood stunned, startled out of his past reverie when someone addressed him.
Yisun managed to calm himself down and said, “We’re here to collect the potions necessary for the fourth dungeon raid.”
“Do you really think I don’t know that?”
“….”
“If it’s the potions needed for the dungeon, they should be on the frontmost display. If that’s the case, why did you come all the way to the “status? Does the boss monster use curses?”
As sarcastic questions poured in, Yisun wondered for a moment whether this was Sa Yoonkang’s default mode. He blinked quietly before nodding in greeting.
“We’ll leave as soon as we find what we came here for.”
Yisun had no intention of being swayed by Sa Yoonkang’s attitude, as he had experienced quite a few hostile gazes by now. Moreover, Sa Yoonkang’s tirade gave the strong feeling of throwing attacks that didn’t get a rise out of Sa Hyeon at other people, so Yisun didn’t feel like entertaining him.
Seeing Yisun bow neatly before stepping away, Sa Yoonkang’s lips twisted in disbelief. However, his gaze remained on the shelves for quite some time.
As Yisun approached Na Gunwoo, he suddenly felt a vibration in his pocket. Was there anyone who would contact him? Yisun took out his cell phone curiously. The only contacts saved on his phone were the Chord Hunters and Won Taesik , but the Chord people knew he was in the guild building, so they probably wouldn’t text him. Yisun’s eyes slowly scanned the screen.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
[I’d like to make you a good offer. Let’s meet.]
There was an address linked below, but the number was unfamiliar. The fact that this person was talking about offers without even revealing themselves was baffling…
He suddenly wondered why there were so many people around him who wanted to talk offers with him, and eventually concluded that the other party had sent a message to the wrong number before turning off the screen.
Time went by fast, and only one day remained until the fourth dungeon raid.
In order to clear it in one go, everyone in the Chord team underwent training in preparation for all kinds of different attack patterns, and Yisun also carefully studied the restoration maps of the Temple of Artemis. It proved to be a little trickier to memorize than the Temple of Zeus due to its numerous columns and further sophisticated details.
Since the upcoming dungeon’s clue mentioned ‘offering a sacrifice,’ he mainly focused on the altar, but the past Temple of Artemis altar had no distinctive characteristics. Rather, Yisun had a hard time finding it because of a lack of related materials.
As a result, Yisun sported a tired expression since the morning, prompting Sa Hyeon to say to him, “You worked enough in the morning, let’s call it a day now.”
“Yes? But the dungeon raid is tomorrow…”
“It’s okay, I think you’ve already memorized the restoration plan. You’ve been looking at these materials for ten days already, let’s do something else in the afternoon.”
“Something else…like training?”
Yisun looked puzzled at the sudden suggestion, while Sa Hyeon put on a smile.
“It’s only been a few seconds since I told you to take a break, do you have a tendency to ignore what other people say while memorizing restoration plans?”
Now that he was used to Sa Hyeon’s way of speaking, Yisun let it slide. Seeing that his only reaction to the sudden vacation was such a vague response, Sa Hyeon calmly asked him, “Have you thought of something that might make you feel better now?”
“Ah, well…”
“It’s taking you quite a while to find something you like.”
Hearing the words spoken by Sa Hyeon, Yisun froze. Even when he was with his friends in the past, he didn’t care about what they did as long as he was with them. It wasn’t out of a lack of opinion or assertiveness, but in a relationship where they only had each other, he always conceded to avoid unnecessary friction. And even if he didn’t need to, he always went along with anything they did, because for him, everything was fun and enjoyable as long as it was with them.
Therefore, Yisun always found it difficult to answer what he liked when using himself as the standard. He pursed his lips for another long moment before he realized that the car had pulled up in front of the guild building. Sa Hyeon’s gaze was still fixed on him, so Yisun knew he could only leave for the car once he gave an answer.
He replied with great difficulty, “Books… I think I like…reading…?”
“Is it so hard to say what you like?”
“…….”
“If you liked books, you’d be reading a ton of them even now…”
“I think… I used to like libraries as well. I went to the city library a lot when I was younger…”
Although the library was destroyed in the First Great Dungeon, Yisun still had memories of it from his childhood. He also loved to sit in the school library when in middle and high school. Even when his friends were overly active and he was sometimes dragged to the sports field, he’d always sit quietly on the sidelines, then sneak away into the library during lunch breaks. Sometimes, when he didn’t feel like being dragged around by his friends, he would ask the librarian to tell them he wasn’t there.
Yisun, faintly reminiscing, confessed that he enjoyed the library’s atmosphere, to which Sa Hyeon nodded slowly. Feeling that he could now leave for the car, Yisun reached for the car door, when a sudden warmth enveloped his other hand. Sa Hyeon had casually leaned over and wrapped the back of his hand, as if holding his wrist.
As Yisun watched him, perplexed, Sa Hyeon gently patted the back of his hand in a soothing gesture.
“I don’t know why you speculate so much when talking about things you like… but still, come up with a few things. You can try them all and pick the ones you like best.”
“Is it…. really necessary to go that far?”
“It’s just to make sure we’re thoroughly prepared, Yisun-ssi. I believe that we’ve already established a way to deal with your anxiety, and now all we need to do is look for ways to improve your overall condition.”
Yisun’s expression grew very subtle at the calmly uttered words. He was sure that in Sa Hyeon’s mind, there were plans A, B, and C, all ready for when something went wrong. Even now, he would experiment and try all sorts of things, then select the most efficient ones to use when needed.
It was so strange, yet so characteristically “Sa Hyeon” that he could only nod in agreement.
Yisun suddenly recalled how Sa Hyeon had rented the entire hotel lounge a few days earlier. This time, however, he clearly said that he liked to read, and also mentioned that he liked the mood in the library, all so that Sa Hyeon wouldn’t summon them for a special Chord meeting again. Yisun tried to calm his nerves as he headed to work.
It turned out Yisun’s worries weren’t unfounded.
“…….”
How should he react to the situation unfolding in front of him? Yisun opened his mouth to speak, yet, unable to find the right words to say, he closed it again.
He had finished analyzing the data for the morning, and had come to the library after lunch at Sa Hyeon’s behest. Yisun felt relieved that none of the other Chord members had come with them. The car stopped in front of one of the more famous libraries in Seoul, the one closest to the guild building. It was rumored to house tens of thousands of books and was even used occasionally as a filming location for dramas.
It was a popular place for people to relax, so Yisun pulled his hood further down to make sure he didn’t stand out. But there was no one inside once they entered the library. Not even a librarian or a custodian could be found.
“You can read as much as you want until evening. If you find something you like, we can buy it.”
“…Did you rent out the whole place again?”
“Of course?”
“….”
“We can’t have other people taking the books Yisun-ssi wants to read, and it’s better to rent it out than have you be uncomfortable with the public’s gaze.”
At Sa Hyeon’s tone that implied that he was simply stating the obvious, Yisun fell silent. He actually liked the unique atmosphere of the library, the muted sound of footsteps and the hushed whispers…
In other words, he wanted to experience something akin to solitude within a crowd, but he ended up in a situation where he was truly alone.
“…”
Yisun briefly wondered if he was being too demanding, but decided that there was something wrong with Sa Hyeon’s judgment instead.
“If you don’t like it here, should we consider moving somewhere else? I can arrange for something else in about an hour…”
“No, I like it here. Really.” Yisun hastily cut him off; then, before Sa Hyeon could look at him again, he briskly walked towards the bookshelves. Thankfully, Sa Hyeon didn’t follow.
Yisun realized that in the future, he should be more careful about telling Sa Hyeon what he liked. He decided to firmly advise against renting a large place and emphasize that what he desired was at a more modest level. In hindsight, it was a bit unfair, as everything he had mentioned so far was obviously very trivial.
Even as he thought that, Yisun’s gaze was honestly fixed on the bookshelf. A space where the smell of books, new and old, mingled together wasn’t a bad place to be. Rather, it evoked a feeling of nostalgia within him. Ever since he had been tied up and forced to work for the Honshin Guild, he hadn’t had the leisure to visit a library. Besides, being an S-class Restorer made him easily recognizable, so he refrained from going out too often.
He walked slowly, his fingertips gently caressing the spine of a book. The sensation of his fingertips touching the pages was unexpectedly pleasant. Yisun used to frequent the school library until he was 19 years old, so it had been six years since he’d last been to one. The fact that he hadn’t read a single book in such a long while, with the exception of a recent one on the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was quite shocking.
“Wow…….”
There was a time when he was still a student sitting in the school library. Was it in middle school? Yisun’s smile held a tinge of bitterness as he remembered. On the shelves were familiar books among unfamiliar ones. Yisun looked for the ones he knew, the ones he had seen before. Over the course of six years, the book Yisun once liked had seen several editions published. Some had new covers, some were revised editions, and others had a completely unfamiliar appearance.
Even though he knew that the entire library had been reserved, Yisun couldn’t help but suppress his astonished sigh. “Woah, It’s been so long…” As he muttered to himself, he flipped through the book and reminisced about old memories whenever he came across a familiar passage. Only now did he remember that he once considered transcribing books as a hobby.
It truly felt like such a distant memory—no, not just an old memory, it felt more like he was peering into someone else’s memories. It was so strange to realize that he had once enjoyed such things.
The past year had completely detached him from his past self. As if the lingering remnants of his past emotions were a heavy weight pressing down on his chest, breathing became strangely difficult. For over an hour, Yisun wandered between the towering bookshelves until his feet began to ache, before finally pulling out a book and sitting down.
It was his favorite book from high school. He stroked the cover a few times, feeling a strange mix of delight and the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia, then slowly opened the book. Sa Hyeon was nowhere to be seen, and he felt no sign of his presence anywhere, but Yisun threw the thought aside, thinking that that was just the way Sa Hyeon was.
The room was warmly lit as sunlight flitted in and spilled generously over the open bookshelves. Yisun glanced out of the large window next to him for a moment, then lowered his gaze again, refusing to move. His hazel eyes, even lighter in the sunlight, scanned over the printed lines.
In the silence and warmth of the room, he started reading for the first time in a long, long time.
Sa Hyeon was still standing at the entrance where Yisun had left him. He hadn’t come to the library to read, so he sat on the couch near the entrance and checked his tablet. He ran through dozens of expected patterns and countermeasures for the fourth dungeon in his head.
Since he and Yisun were the only two people in this space and he could sense his presence, he didn’t bother following him. As an S-class combat-type Hunter, he was sensitive to all movements and sounds, so he knew Yisun had been walking around the bookshelves for over an hour, and he’d heard him mutter to himself from time to time. When he finally sat down at the desk by the window, he briefly thought he was finally reading a book. Every once in a while, he could hear the sound of him turning pages, but he didn’t pay much attention.
After a couple of hours, the page turning stopped. Still not paying attention, after a few minutes, he heard soft breathing and his gaze dropped from the tablet. He had brought him here because he loved reading, so what did it mean when he abandoned his book to sleep so peacefully?
Maybe he was tired from his recent research? But he’d told him to take care of his condition, and Yisun had made sure to get enough sleep. He seemed to be sleeping pretty soundly, did he doze off because he felt comfortable in this place? If he was uncomfortable, he wouldn’t have fallen asleep. After casually reaching his answer, Sa Hyeon closed his eyes for a moment.
When he opened them again, he was standing right behind Yisun. It was one of his Shadow Trace abilities. By marking an opponent through touch, he could instantly move into their shadow without being noticed, even if he isn’t looking at them directly and no matter distance.
It was an ability he’d often use when facing a boss monster in a dungeon to move directly to its shadow even when he couldn’t see it. Most of the Hunters in Chord had figured this ability out, but Sa Hyeon never talked about it openly, so they kept their mouths shut.
The ability could only mark a single target at a time and could be maintained for up to a week with prolonged physical contact. Maintaining it required a considerable amount of mana, but when Sa Hyeon first met Yisun, he’d marked him for a long period of time. This allowed him to appear right behind him when he’d gone to restore the district office annex. Sa Hyeon had also appeared in Yisun’s shadow quite often afterwards without him noticing.
However, marking someone for a long time would take a lot of mental energy, so once he had a full grasp of Yisun’s range of movement, he made several short marks instead. In addition, marking allowed him to get a sense of his surroundings through the marked party’s shadow without having to move.
He would listen for sounds and check for signs of movement, however small, to get a rough idea of what was going on around Yisun before moving. It took a large amount of mana, and one part of his attention always remained on the other party, but Sa Hyeon continued keeping a mark on Yisun.
It was partly a precaution against dangerous situations because he was a non-combat Awakener, and partly because he didn’t know when exactly Yisun could mention the guild leader’s death and follow-up restoration. It was also through his ability that Sa Hyeon had sensed the corpses Yisun was carrying along.
“….”
Sa Hyeon stood in Yisun’s shadow and stared down at him as he slept with his head resting on the desk. The sun was slowly setting, and the sunlight poured in through the window, casting a diagonal glow on his face. Sa Hyeon watched as the waning rays gradually moved away.
Looking at him like this, he looked like a corpse, sleeping peacefully.
It was a rather blunt observation, but one that crossed Sa Hyeon’s mind several times. Even when he made sure he was fed properly, Yisun often didn’t look like a living person. His white face was still pale and lacking in vitality, and so were his eyes.
He reacted to most things with a blank stare, and even when his eyes moved, there was something lifeless about them, not unlike a doll. Even though Sa Hyeon could clearly hear faint breathing, Yisun looked more like a taxidermied body”” or a wax statue than a living human being. It gave a strange sense of dissonance. After living among the dead for a year, had he become one of them?
Sa Hyeon sat down next to him in silence. The sunlight from the window was blocked by his back, plunging Yisun into complete darkness. The frown that had formed due to sunlight falling on his eyes faintly lifted. Sa Hyeon stared at him, then shifted his gaze to the book in his hands.
He wasn’t sure why he was still holding the book even after falling asleep. The spine of the book looked like it would fall to the desk at any moment. It seemed like it might make noise if it fell, so he reached for it.
He was about to pick it up when Yisun whimpered. “Don’t, Park Woojoon…”
The words left him in a sleepy mumble. Park Woojoon was the name of the friend who was nullified by Sa Hyeon after clearing the third dungeon. As Sa Hyeon scanned him with a calm gaze, he reached for the book once again.
“I said I wasn’t sleeping…”
It was a peculiar sleeping habit. Sa Hyeon looked down at him, suddenly remembering the last time Yisun had been so restless. He thought he was taking care to sleep well, but if the quality of his sleep was this bad, then it surely wasn’t doing his condition much good. Besides, a dream where he was seeing a dead friend couldn’t be anything good.
Sa Hyeon pondered for a moment. If he woke him up now, would Yisun remember the dream, or would he just forget about it by the time he woke up on his own? He seemed to be in the “REM” cycle of sleep, and in this state where he would be experiencing multiple dreams, wouldn’t it be better to replace it with another dream and let him forget about it? He thought calmly, eventually giving up on taking the book and just putting his hand behind it to prevent the book from falling onto the desk and making a noise.
Yisun’s sleepy mumbling continued for a while more. His lips were pursed and he was muttering something about not wanting to go to the playground, seemingly dreaming about his middle school days.
As Sa Hyeon sat with his back to the sun, the sunlight falling on Yisun disappeared, but beyond him, the glow of dusk was spreading. As the light on the desk slowly reddened before fading to darkness, Sa Hyeon saw that Yisun had stopped mumbling in his sleep.
He set his gaze ahead briefly, sending a book from the nearest bookshelf flying with his shadow ability, catching it lightly with one hand, then placing it underneath the book Yisun held. It would be much better for him to go back and plan for the fourth dungeon.
Sa Hyeon was about to walk away when Yisun grabbed his hand. More precisely, he covered the back of his hand with his palm. Taken aback, Sa Hyeon stood up and looked down at Yisun who pursed his lips a few times, “Please…don’t go…”
“…….”
“I, I was wrong, ugh… don’t die…”
Yisun’s words, soaked in sobs, hung heavily in the air. He groaned and whimpered as he clutched at Sa Hyeon’s hand. Jet-black eyes sank deeper into darkness, and what Sa Hyeon had hoped could be replaced with another dream came around in full circle, more vicious.
At the time, Yisun was truly lost in a nightmare. Clearly, he had been reading a book in the high school library. He’d hidden from his friends who’d wanted to take him to the playground at lunchtime, only to be caught and dragged out. He protested and argued, and at some point, the room slowly darkened and his friends began to die, one by one.
The high school library was dim, and all light within it was blurred and muted, but the transformed space was a vivid crimson. Red like the blood that was flowing out of them—no, like the blood that had, at some point, stained his hands.
It was then that the scene unfolded before him with brutal clarity. He found himself standing in a pool of blood. The blood clung to his feet, climbed up his legs, and tried to choke him, but Yisun knew. His own life would never allow him to die.
In this deceitful life, he was miserably seeking warmth. He groped the hands of his friends’ corpses, searching for any lingering warmth that was somehow retained within their torn bodies.
At one point, he felt a weight pressed firmly over his eyes. It pressed down so hard Yisun could only open his eyes with a shudder. Once awake, Yisun realized that he had been dreaming.
The other person must have sensed that he was awake, as they slowly moved their hand away. His vision was slow to return and his eyelids were trembling, either because someone had pressed their palm firmly over his eyes or because of the after-effects of the nightmare.
The first thing he noticed was the faint sunset light streaming in through the window, then the darkness stretching in front of him. In fact, his vision could only distinguish colors at this point. Yet, he vaguely sensed that there was warmth within the darkness, and realized he was holding onto someone’s hand.
As his blurred vision gradually focused, he saw the other’s face. In the darkness, he soon recognized the piercing black pupils facing him, and understood what was happening. Sa Hyeon stood in front of him, and Yisun was holding onto his hand, which was resting on the desk.
As Sa Hyeon bent and leaned over, completely trapping Yisun’s body within his shadow. Yisun blinked slowly in the shadow cast over him.
“Jung Yisun-ssi.”
Yisun knew that Sa Hyeon only called him by full name when he wanted to make sure of his condition, or when he was in a bad mood, and right now it seemed to be a mix of both.
“Why do you keep crying?”
Sa Hyeon looked down at his own palm, perplexed. After he’d woken Yisun up by pressing his eyes only a moment ago, his palm was wet with the tears he’d shed. His jet-black eyes scanned it slowly before disappearing beneath his eyelids, then looking straight into Yisun’s eyes. They were cold, devoid of any warmth.
“…….”
As Yisun remained deathly silent, Sa Hyeon’s hand suddenly reached toward the corner of his eye. His hand was so close that he could almost touch his tear-soaked lashes, and even though Yisun flinched and squinted in response, Sa Hyeon firmly touched the corner of his eye.
The hand that had been gently wiping at the tear-stained skin soon pressed firmly at the corner of Yisun’s eye. It was a gesture that showed he was feeling pretty annoyed.
Finally, Sa Hyeon muttered to himself, “Every time you cry, I feel like all my plans are going awry.”
The softest of whispers reached Yisun’s ears before fading away, and just as Yisun’s gaze turned to him, Sa Hyeon stood up completely and turned to leave. Yisun was reflexively taken aback when Sa Hyeon’s hand slipped from beneath his own, but he managed to keep his lips sealed.
The space where the sunlight had faded was desolate.
Min: Hi… Um, it’s been a while (*´◡`), brief update is I graduated, moved back to my hometown, and got overwhelmed with some real life stuff, couldn’t get myself to translate more than a line a day… But I did break my promise for weekly updates so ;-; I’m sorry… (つ﹏⊂)
Also now we know the reason for all those touches and hand-holding (✿´ ꒳ ` )
We know, but Yisun doesn’t
Thank you for your translation 🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍
come on Sa Hyeon you know that he didnt properly mourn his lost friends yet. And as long as the rest of them are living corpses he will never get over their death.
Don’t worry, take care of yourself if needed 💐
Congratulations on your graduation. Real life stuff is more important and your health too.
Thanks for the chapter
Thanks for the update and congratulations on your graduation! ❤️❤️❤️
hi translator, i hope things are going well for you now! life can be stressful so take it one step at a time! thank you for the update! i’ve missed you