28. Mock Dungeon Trial (4)
Bitna Choi stared at the night sky.
It was a landscape embroidered with stars that I hadn’t seen in a very long time.
Her sprawled body was soaked in sweat.
Lee Do-jin, sitting on a rock, filled his stomach with a row of gimbap.
Choi Bit-na laughed at Lee Do-jin, who was eating gimbap.
“Does gimbap go down your throat after fighting so hard?”
“Since we fought so hard, we eat gimbap.”
Lee Do-jin handed over the remaining gimbap to Choi Bit-na.
Choi Bit-na took off her wrap and chewed her gimbap.
“… It’s delicious.”
It was really delicious.
It’s been a month since she entered Iroas Academy.
Choi Bit-na was more impressed with her day with Lee Do-jin than any other lecture or meeting.
“I thought it was a curse. My instincts.”
So, during her high school years, she lived like a rat dead.
I was scared after almost killing a life.
So she was isolated. At , A special high school for awakened people like .
Kim Ye-rim, whom we had a quarrel with at the cafe yesterday, was the class president back then.
“Now I know that this is the power that I can control according to my will, thanks to you.”
“If you’re thankful, pay for your meal tomorrow.”
Bitna Choi nodded her head.
“Yes, I will pay for what you taught me. Teacher.”
Lee Do-jin’s forehead crumpled.
“S… what?”
Choi Bit-na raised the corner of her mouth.
“Teacher.”
Lee Do-jin stared at Choi Bit-na with a dumbfounded expression.
“Why am I your teacher?”
“Wow, this is the first time I’ve seen the teacher panic. Are you just confused about this? Master?”
Choi Bit-na giggled, not caring at all about her tousled hair in her sweat, and she laughed.
After a while, Choi Bit-na withdrew her laughter and opened her mouth again, leaving only a calm smile.
“You are my teacher, then. He was the first person to learn at the academy.”
Lee Do-jin felt the sincerity in Choi Bit-na’s words, so she was speechless.
“… Still, don’t call me Master. I’m not going to teach you spearmanship.”
“I taught you how to fight. If that’s not a master, what is it? I will continue to call you Master!”
Choi Bit-na smiled bashfully and began to lightly descend her mountain carrying her bag.
Lee Do-jin kicked her tongue and followed Choi Bit-na.
Then, she returned to Seoul by train and arrived at Iroas Academy late at night.
**
It’s Monday.
All first year combat students gathered in front of the simulated dungeon gate.
All of the combat students were wearing navy blue battle suits provided by Iroas Academy.
The battle suit was a necessity for hunters who went through dungeons.
“Wow, it’s a group supply, but is it true that everything is lightweight? Academy class.”
Students were amazed at the elasticity and light weight of the ultramarine armor.
Lee Do-jin was also quite surprised.
‘It’s strong, but it’s this light. Even if I practice taijutsu, it will be useful enough.’
It was always an emergency.
Lee Do-jin’s ego was a prosecutor to the core.
Park Cheol-woong, who is the homeroom teacher of the combat class 1 and was in charge of managing and supervising the mock dungeon test, took the microphone again.
“The shape of the dungeon is a cave. The motif is a cave-type dungeon with an entrance gate that occurred last year in Incheon. The dungeon is famous for its size.”
Excluding magic classes, the number of combat-type classes is approximately 500.
The dungeon of the test was bound to be vast.
“The horse is the motif, and the feature has been considerably twisted. The locations where monsters appear are also set randomly, so there won’t be a big advantage even if you study the dungeons that occur quickly.”
As soon as Park Cheol-woong’s words finished, sighs flowed from all over the place.
“Ah, the cave type.”
“The most variable.”
Kim Ji-hoon also sighed.
“It’s archer rat poison. Cave type.”
Certainly, archers were at a disadvantage in a cave where space was severely restricted.
It’s not open and there are no trees or structures.
However, it was the hunter who had to prove the value of existence in all types of dungeons.
Kim Ji-hoon had to find a way on his own.
“Everybody, go up the portal.”
According to Park Cheol-woong’s words, all the groups went up the portal to the mock dungeon.
Park Cheol-woong confirmed that all personnel had gone up. He opened his mouth again.
“There is one last thing I want to ask you. A simulated dungeon is also a dungeon. The filter that sees halos instead of blood, which most of you would have experienced, does not apply this time.”
I could hear students gulping in tension.
“It’s just that there are no attempts at indecent behavior or forcible s*xual behavior peculiar to each monster. The acts of biting and hacking flesh will be reproduced. The bones and flesh are separated. There will be blood.”
Dungeon horror.
This mock test has meaning in itself, but the purpose of telling combat students about it was greater.
“Of course, if 10 is real, pain is realized with about 4. In a suppression situation where there is a high probability of being subjected to acts similar to torture, we will immediately drop the target and take measures to prevent mental damage.”
Park Cheol-woong clapped his hands.
The eyes of all the first year cadets who were seen here flashed.
**
The white light was removed from sight.
Lee Do-jin, Choi Bit-na, Ryu Ji-ah, Kim Ji-hoon. The four of them confirmed each other’s existence first.
Lee Do-jin started to speak out the things he had organized in his head before going to sleep last night.
“Until an hour before the finale, if you kill someone else, not only that member, but the entire group said you would be eliminated, so be careful.”
At Dojin Lee’s words, the three nodded their heads at the same time.
When the three of them put aside their thoughts about fighting, Dojin Lee was still thinking about him.
‘But they said that it is possible to subdue a line that does not kill. It must be a rule with the monster in mind to compete.’
After organizing his thoughts, Lee Do-jin started giving instructions again.
“I and Choi Bit-na are in charge of the front. And you take care of the rear.”
Jiah Liu nodded her head with a smile, her eyes closed, as always.
Lee Do-jin stared at Choi Bit-na.
“Because I will stand at the forefront. In the direction of supporting behind me.”
“Yes, Master.”
Kim Ji-hoon cautiously approached Lee Do-jin’s side.
“Me, me?”
“You seem to be in a situation where you have no choice but to be flexible. Don’t worry. Because you won’t die.”
Whether the opponent is a monster or a human.
Lee Do-jin had no intention of letting any of the three members die and be eliminated.
“Let’s move fast. Killing a lot of monsters is the easiest thing to become number one.”
Person-to-person battles are legally established only in the final hour.
Until that time, it was clear that everyone would do their best to hunt monsters.
Lee Do-jin did not let go of the tension.
Most of the monsters that appear here will not be your opponents, but dungeons aren’t the only monsters to be afraid of.
Because the dungeon itself can be seen as a huge monster.
Kieek!
I’ve already started hearing the monster’s cries.
Lee Do-jin and his party hastened their steps.
“What monsters usually appear in caves?”
Kim Ji-hoon mumbled, Choi Bit-na said.
“Goblins, lizardmen, giant bats, cave spiders… Gargoyles.”
“The gargoyles are only in the boss area. How did the first year defeat the gargoyle?”
“I don’t think so.”
Gargoyles were A-S grade monsters.
Choi Bit-na thought that it might be possible with Lee Do-jin. She didn’t say anything because she had yet to face the monster.
Liu Jia suddenly stopped her steps.
She opened her mouth, still with her eyes closed.
“… I can smell blood. I can hear a squeak, too.”
Lee Do-jin raised his right hand to stop the party.
“Isn’t that the front?”
I didn’t name it, but everyone in the party knew who the question was being addressed to. Ryujia answered.
“Yes.”
Lee Do-jin meditated with Liu Jia every morning and practiced with her wooden sword.
I had concluded in my head that my senses, such as hearing and touch, were superior to those of others.
“Stand together while looking in each direction from three angles. I’ll go to the front for a while by myself.”
Lee Do-jin stepped forward alone holding her wooden sword.
Kihehehe!
Creepy laughter came from behind a huge rock right beside me.
Blood and flesh were splattered everywhere.
A man’s head was held in the turquoise-skinned goblin’s savage hand.
She was dead with her eyes wide open.
Lee Do-jin escaped the man’s dead gaze and looked at her ground.
There were three more bodies. One woman had a round hole in her heart.
There was also a male body missing both feet.
Kihehehe!
I heard laughter again. Dojin Lee raised her head.
I saw a goblin clinging to a huge stalactite.
‘Surely.’
It looked like it was hanging there like a bat and then attacked at once.
‘This is a dungeon.’
This is a monster. This was the battle
With half-hearted determination. If you shoot through the dungeon with half-dozen skills, you will only die.
Fortunately, their deaths were faked.
A tragedy like this would happen every day in a real dungeon, not a virtual one.
Kiaaak!
Three goblins attacked Dojin Lee at the same time.
The two charged from the front. One fell from above.
The wooden sword was swung horizontally only once.
Pee-it!
Red drops of blood embroidered round circles in the air. The backs of the three goblins tilted to the side at the same time.
The corpse disappeared in a cloud of red smoke. In the place where the corpse had been, there was a small black marble.
Lee Do-jin waved his hand and called the three members.
The sight of a pair of corpses mixed with a goblin’s corpse stuck in the eyes of the members.
“Wow!”
Kim Ji-hoon immediately sat down and began to vomit.
In comparison, Choi Bit-na’s eyebrows were crumpled, but she didn’t do anything different.
Jia Liu was still standing calmly. Even though the smell of her blood would have filled her senses.
“The beads seem to mean this.”
Lee Do-jin showed the three black beads and put them in the black cloth bead bag assigned to each group.
It must have been a sorcery tool made only for this mock dungeon test, so it didn’t increase in weight or volume even when three beads were inserted.
“It’s okay.”
Lee Do-jin looked alternately at Kim Ji-hoon and Choi Bit-na, who seemed quite shocked by the torn body of Joe, whom he killed earlier.
“I have no intention of becoming the prey. We should be hunters.”
To go ahead alone is poison.
Since it’s a team match, it’s going to play a significant role in the results of the team’s joint test.
“Let’s go.”
After clearing his mind, Lee Do-jin took the members and started to move forward again.