Chapter 3

The dying hunter lifted his intact left hand in a faint wave. Seeing Eui-rim linger in hesitation, the Guild Master delivered one last nudge, quipping dryly that he wouldn’t be able to walk him to the door.

In the end, unable even to offer a proper farewell, Eui-rim turned and began retracing his steps. His professional guilt weighed too heavily to look the man in the eye and say goodbye. No matter how indifferently Seo Hae-gun acted, the reality of abandoning a dying patient clung to the healer’s conscience, snowballing into agonizing distress.

“Damn it…” Eui-rim cursed under his breath, clenching his fists as he navigated the pitch-black corridor.

Yet he could not afford to linger. To avoid becoming the Seed’s next incubator, the young civil servant had to flee as far as possible while Seo Hae-gun was still holding the corruption at bay.

Eui-rim shook his head violently, trying to cast aside his lingering attachments.

Stop thinking about it. Even if Shim Woo-joo, an S-rank healer, came here, the situation wouldn’t change. Seo Hae-gun knew that—that’s why he told me to run. Right now, escaping this place and reaching the evacuation line is all that matters.

So move your feet. Don’t stop. Keep going. Don’t worry about Seo Hae-gun; just focus on surviving somehow while he holds the line.

When the healer finally came to his senses, he was already standing before the iron ladder leading to the surface exit. Wiping his sweat-slicked palms against his trousers, Eui-rim caught his breath.

Thump. Thump. Thump His heartbeat hammered wildly against his ribs.

He grasped the cold rungs with trembling hands and climbed. The iron rattled loudly beneath his weight, and tension knotted in the pit of his stomach at the prospect of stepping back out into the open, where the Shadow’s gaze might be waiting.

Rattle

At the top, Eui-rim pushed against the heavy hatch—and nothing happened. No matter how hard he shoved the metal handle, the door refused to budge. Just in case, he tried hauling it downward, but the hatch remained sealed fast.

What? Why is it shut? It’s not as if any latch was engaged…

“Healer. Are you finished treating the Guild Master?” a voice called from just outside the hatch.

The words drifted in from beyond the heavy bunker hatch. For a split second, sheer, ice-cold terror nearly sent Eui-rim plummeting from the iron ladder.

He had naturally assumed the passage above would be empty. Yet from beyond the steel barrier that refused to budge no matter how violently he shoved, that familiar voice called out again—unhurried, and terribly, unmistakably sweet.

The hallucination is still guarding the entrance? Shouldn’t it have vanished by now, after dragging me all the way down here?

“Are you sure you’re all done?” the voice asked through the metal, dripping with mock concern.

Or does it intend to stand guard like a gatekeeper until I become the Seed’s next host?

“Healer?” the voice prompted, sickeningly sweet.

Eui-rim tore his hands from the door handle, his entire body trembling as his pulse hammered violently against his temples. Striving to make as little sound as humanly possible, he scrambled back down the rungs.

Cackle, cackle, cackle…<

A bizarre, echoing laughter trailed after him down the shaft. As if realizing he had stepped away from the exit, an utterly delighted voice began shrieking the same words over and over:

“You cannot leave!”

“You cannot leave!”

“You cannot leave!”

And when the hallucination’s shrill chant swelled into an ear-splitting screech—

“YOU CAN’T LEAVE!”

BOOM!

As if struck by a falling meteorite, the reinforced steel of the bunker hatch buckled downward into a mangled wreck.

Eui-rim had gripped the iron rungs so fiercely that his knuckles were drained completely white. He scrambled down the remaining distance, and the moment his boots hit the concrete floor, a violent tremor wracked his body, as though his internal organs were twisting inside out.

Drawing a ragged breath, Eui-rim gritted his teeth against the rising panic.

He had walked into the hallucination’s snare from the very beginning. Escaping this subterranean bunker was an utter impossibility.

Even if he managed to breach the concrete ceiling by some miracle, fleeing the sector would be impossible so long as that monstrosity held the ground above.

“Ha…” A breath of sheer disbelief slipped from Eui-rim’s lips.

Drained by the sheer futility of it all, a hollow, bitter chuckle rose in his throat. Even knowing full well that succumbing to the illusion wasn’t his fault, he still cursed his own fatal gullibility.

Forcing his leaden legs to move, Eui-rim returned to where Seo Hae-gun lay slumped in the dark. Almost immediately, he felt an inquiring gaze settle upon him. Meeting the faint gleam of blue-gray eyes turned his way, Eui-rim offered a wry, helpless smile.

“The exit is blocked,” Eui-rim said quietly as he stepped back into the inner chamber.

“Blocked?” Hae-gun rasped, slowly lifting his heavy gaze.

“The hallucination is guarding the hatch,” Eui-rim explained, steadying his breathing.

Rather than demanding a detailed account, Seo Hae-gun narrowed his eyes. He seemed visibly caught off guard, clearly having not anticipated such a turn of events.

“It was screaming at the top of its lungs that I couldn’t leave,” Eui-rim continued. “It even crushed the reinforced hatch like tinfoil.”

“You’re saying it launched a physical attack?” Hae-gun asked, his brow furrowing.

“Yes,” Eui-rim replied with a nod.

“Unbelievable.” Seo Hae-gun’s torn lips twisted into a grimace. He seemed to want to scoff, but his lacerations were so severe that the expression distorted awkwardly across his ruined skin. “At that level, you can hardly call it an illusion. That’s just an outright monster.”

“Could it be that I was bewitched by a psychic illusion and hallucinating the whole thing?” Eui-rim asked tentatively.

At Eui-rim’s hesitant query, Hae-gun shook his head. “That shouldn’t be the case. You said the hatch wouldn’t budge in the first place, right?”

“It was completely sealed,” Eui-rim confirmed.

“As the Shadow’s domain expands, its power must be growing stronger,” Hae-gun noted in a low voice. “When those apparitions first appeared, they didn’t even have distinct physical forms. It seems they’ve evolved.”

…Now that Hae-gun mentioned it, that was true. Because the entity mimicked the voices of loved ones, people had initially mistaken it for the mythical Jangsan Tiger cryptid rather than a psychic apparition born of the apocalypse.

Roughly rubbing his face with blood-streaked hands, Eui-rim leaned back against the cool concrete. Dealing with the Shadow alone was overwhelming enough; the realization that they now faced an evolved entity capable of physical destruction left a suffocating weight on his chest.

“What was the surface like before you came down here?” Seo Hae-gun broke the silence, his rough voice cutting through the dark.

Narrowing his eyes, Eui-rim searched through memories that had already faded like bleached photographs. Not even an hour had passed, yet under the relentless pummeling of catastrophic shocks, everything felt distant and unreal.

“The Gaze shifted toward the north, so the remnants were attempting to evacuate,” Eui-rim replied quietly. “The number of survivors had already dropped by more than half compared to yesterday. All communications from the high-ranking Hunters—including yourself, Guild Master—had been severed. Hunter Yoo Tae-geun was the only one the rear command still had contact with, but… I haven’t been able to return to the safe zone for three days myself, so I can’t say for certain.”

A low, hollow sigh escaped Eui-rim’s lips. Delivering a report devoid of even a single sliver of hope tasted like dry ash on his tongue.

At this rate, total human extinction won’t take even a month. The only combat power left consisted of low-ranking Awakened who had volunteered for rear-guard support, like himself. If contact with Yoo Tae-geun was lost as well, the entire continent would effectively be doomed.

“…Is there anything else you’d like to know?” Eui-rim asked, intentionally pitching his voice light to stave off the suffocating gloom. “Since we’re trapped down here together, I can at least keep you company, Hunter Seo.”

Seo Hae-gun let out a raspy chuckle, sounding thoroughly amused by the absurdity.

You find it funny? Well, fair enough. If Eui-rim were in the man’s position, he likely would have laughed from sheer absurdity as well. Slumped in the dark waiting only for death, only to suddenly be saddled with a chatty conversation partner—how bizarre must that seem?

Sliding down to sit a short distance away from Hae-gun, Eui-rim pulled his knees to his chest and wrapped his arms around them.

Perhaps infected by Seo Hae-gun’s uncanny nonchalance, a quiet resignation seeped through Eui-rim, easing the rigid tension in his shoulders. Even backed into an inescapable corner, his mind grew strangely tranquil—so much so that a gentle drowsiness began to pull at his eyelids.

Had I really been that exhausted all along? The realization that he no longer had to fight or run brought a peculiar, melancholic relief.

“Are you really a D-rank?” Seo Hae-gun asked, breaking the brief lull.

Eui-rim turned at the unexpected inquiry and found Hae-gun’s eyes gleaming with genuine curiosity. Rather than asking what he meant, Eui-rim simply knitted his brow, prompting Hae-gun to elaborate.

“You haven’t shown a shred of fear from the moment you walked in here,” Hae-gun noted. “Or do you happen to possess some high-tier mental fortitude skill?”

“…You know better than anyone that makes no sense, don’t you?” Eui-rim replied, his voice dry.

“Huh? No, I don’t,” Hae-gun answered smoothly.

“…”

“I’m asking quite seriously,” Hae-gun insisted, his tone deceptively innocent. “I’m genuinely curious.”

He already checked my status window with a skill, so why ask something so obvious? Has delirium set in already?

“What’s your name?” Hae-gun asked suddenly.

While Eui-rim kept his lips sealed in wary hesitation, that abrupt inquiry cut right through his thoughts. Blinking in the dimness, he gave a dazed start, as though only just snapping back to reality.