Chapter 2

He clicked his tongue softly and turned his gaze away. Killing the boss that was charging at him had to come first. He quickly stepped to the left, and the centipede’s tail swept through the spot where he had been standing just moments ago.

BOOM—!

The floor shattered, sending fragments flying in every direction. If he had remained there, there might not have been enough of him left to bury. Kang Mujin steadied his stance and squeezed out the remaining magic power within him. As he coated his sword in magic, a sharp blue light wrapped around its blade.

The boss had already endured countless attacks, and cracks had spread across various parts of its armored body. To target the third segment, Kang Mujin pressed as close to the boss as possible.

Dozens of centipede legs rained down like spearheads. Thanks to Eunseong’s skill, Kang Mujin’s physical abilities had been pushed beyond their limits, allowing him to see their trajectories with perfect clarity.

THUD!

He narrowly avoided the legs plunging into the ground and finally forced his way into the boss’s guard. Kang Mujin stomped on the final leg blocking his path and leaped into the air. At last, the gap in the wide-open third segment came clearly into view.

The boss’s only weakness.

“…Now. Cut it!”

The instant Eunseong finished speaking, Kang Mujin’s sword carved a blue arc through the air. The blue magic power condensed along the blade burst forth, slicing precisely through the centipede’s third segment.

KIEEEEEEK!

With a final scream, the centipede’s enormous body split in two and collapsed to the ground.

[Successfully defeated the boss ‘Venomous Shadow Centipede’ of B-Rank Dungeon ‘Shadow Swamp’.]

As the centipede fell, sticky green bodily fluid splattered in every direction.

‘Aaaaaah! It’s splashing! It’s coming toward me!’

Eunseong was horrified inwardly and squeezed his eyes shut. He already felt like he might faint just from being here, and if he got drenched in the monster’s bodily fluids, he might genuinely die of a heart attack.

But the horrible sensation he had braced himself for never came.

Instead, the air briefly fell silent, as though something—or rather, someone—had blocked it.

When he cautiously opened his tightly shut eyes, what filled his vision was a broad, solid back.

Kang Mujin had positioned himself in front of Eunseong, shielding him with his body and sword from the boss’s remains flying in every direction.

‘……He protected me?’

Eunseong stared blankly at his back for a moment. Along with the relief of being alive came the urge to look away and pretend he had no idea what was coating the ground beneath his feet. At the same time, an inexplicable sensation made his heart sink.

‘Wait. He got hit by the poison.’

Worried, Eunseong unconsciously took half a step closer and looked him over. That was when Kang Mujin slowly lowered his sword.

‘Phew….’

[Forced Awakening state of Tyrant’s Guidance has ended.]

[Physical backlash due to expiration of the duration has been negated.]

As the skill’s effects wore off, all the sensations that had been suppressed returned at once. His shoulder throbbed, while the skin touched by the poison burned as though it had been scorched by fire.

Kang Mujin turned his head while breathing heavily.

Then their eyes met head-on.

The dark eyes looking down at Eunseong were strangely distorted.

‘He knew the weakness exactly. How?’

Baek Eunseong had never been interested in dungeon strategies. He had been too busy rushing into subjugations without even knowing what kind of dungeon he was in, and he was a coward who hid behind others and only swooped in for the final blow.

To Kang Mujin, the fact that this Baek Eunseong knew the boss’s weakness felt completely out of place.

Kang Mujin stepped right up to Eunseong and looked down at him. As his body, made to look even larger by his armor, approached while dripping blood, Eunseong’s entire body broke out in goosebumps despite the fact that he was standing in front of his favorite character.

Their distance narrowed until they were close enough for their breaths to touch.

“Baek Eunseong.”

Kang Mujin asked in a growling voice,

“Why… didn’t you finish it?”

His murderous gaze made Eunseong go pale, his lips merely trembling without a sound. He had no time to think about something like that at that moment.

‘…Because I thought you were going to die!’

Eunseong screamed inwardly as he frantically searched for an answer.

If this were the original Baek Eunseong, he would have stolen the final blow at the perfect moment.

But he wasn’t that Baek Eunseong.

More than anything, the state of Kang Mujin standing right in front of him was the problem. Blood was dripping from a body that had barely a single uninjured spot, and the areas affected by the poison were gradually melting away.

The sight made nausea rise all the way to Eunseong’s throat, and he forced himself to grit his teeth.

“……You smell.”

Eunseong lowered his gaze with his face gone pale and squeezed his eyes shut.

He simply couldn’t bear to look at Kang Mujin’s battered body or the monster remains scattered across the floor any longer.

But to Kang Mujin, it looked completely different.

The representative who never allowed even a speck of dust to touch his pristine white clothes appeared disgusted at the sight of his blood-covered body.

Kang Mujin was about to turn away.

“Wait.”

Eunseong stretched out a hand and pulled a small glass vial from his inventory. His fingertips trembled slightly.

“Take this.”

He practically shoved it into Kang Mujin’s hand, which was covered in blood and monster fluid.

The wet, slippery sensation against his fingers made Eunseong feel as though his stomach were about to turn inside out, but there was only one thought in his mind:

Kang Mujin had to recover quickly.

‘Please, drink that and get better already!’

Eunseong abruptly turned his head away and bit his lip hard. His jaw trembled slightly, and his throat tightened. His vision began to blur.

He urged Kang Mujin inwardly to drink it quickly.

If he stayed here any longer, he really felt like he was going to faint.

Kang Mujin stared blankly down at the palm-sized glass vial in his hand.

[Dawn Elixir (S)]

Rank: S
Type: Consumable Item
Effects:

• Completely restores destroyed magic circuits
• Repairs critical physical damage
• Instantly purifies critical status ailments

Restriction: One-time use (disappears upon consumption)

It was an S-rank Dawn Elixir, an item so difficult to obtain that even billions of won would not be enough. It was said to be capable of saving even someone standing on the threshold of death.

A deep furrow formed between Kang Mujin’s brows.

Baek Eunseong was a man who despised the guild’s low-ranking hunters. For someone like that to give him an S-rank elixir…

It was far too valuable to simply accept.

There had to be some ulterior motive.

“……Are you planning to count the price of the elixir as a debt?”

Open disgust appeared in Kang Mujin’s eyes.

He looked at Eunseong as though he were staring at something he would not be satisfied even if he killed right then and there.

“…Who said anything about money? Just drink it.”

“You’re giving me a Dawn Elixir? An S-rank one, at that?”

“Yeah, drink it!”

He had reached his limit.

A near-scream burst from Eunseong’s mouth.

He could barely stand the smell of blood or the monster remains.

But what he could tolerate even less was seeing Kang Mujin badly injured.

He could no longer simply stand there and watch his favorite character suffer right before his eyes.

Veins bulged along the back of Kang Mujin’s hand gripping the elixir.

To his ears, Eunseong’s desperate voice sounded like an irritated command.

The crimson liquid shimmering inside the transparent vial reminded him of the blood he had shed in his previous life.

‘…He wants me to drink this.’

Before his regression, he would have lowered his head and thanked him.

Back then, he had been in a position where he had no choice but to submit before the enormous power of the guild.

But things were different now.

The betrayals and sensation of death he had experienced in his previous life were etched too deeply into his bones for him to accept this as pure goodwill.

Yet he had no justification for refusing an order from the representative.

Kang Mujin flicked the stopper off the elixir with his thumb and poured it into his mouth without hesitation.

The liquid was cold against his tongue, but the moment it passed down his throat, it transformed into a scorching heat that swept through his entire body.

[Destroyed magic circuits are rapidly recovering.]

[Damaged muscles and nerve cells are regenerating.]

A dazzling light spread across Kang Mujin’s torn shoulder.

The wound where flesh had been ripped away and bone exposed knitted itself back together as though time were being rewound, new flesh growing over it.

The burns on his cheek, which had been melted raw by the acidic poison, also subsided completely.

Within just a few seconds, Kang Mujin’s battered body had recovered perfectly, as though nothing had ever happened.

Eunseong watched silently and breathed an inward sigh of relief.

‘Thank goodness. He won’t be in pain anymore. …Ah!’

Only after seeing Kang Mujin recover did Eunseong belatedly notice the smell of blood.

He also realized that he had been staring directly at the sight of flesh regenerating.

Once again, he had to forcibly swallow back the stomach acid rising up his esophagus.

‘Urgh…! Why did I look at that?’

Apparently, his senses had briefly gone numb under the extreme fear.

Coming back to his senses, Eunseong hurriedly covered his mouth with both hands.

He couldn’t throw up in front of his favorite.

“…Clean this up.”

Eunseong forced down the dry heaving trying to escape and gave a brief command before walking away without looking back.

Squish. Squish.

The sound of his feet stepping into the sticky slime pooled beneath him sent chills straight to his bones.

Filth splattered onto the hems of his pristine white suit pants, but he no longer had the mental capacity to care.

That was when Team Leader Park, who had retreated earlier and had been nervously watching from the sidelines, timidly approached him with a servile expression.

“Representative! Thank goodness you’re safe! To think you would step in personally like that… Thanks to you, we were all able to survive. As expected of you, Representative!”

“……”

“But… giving an S-rank elixir to a disposable item like that is too generous.”

Eunseong’s footsteps stopped.

Displeasure flashed across his pale face.

But the tears gathering in the corners of his eyes from suppressing his nausea and his bloodshot eyes were interpreted by everyone else as anger.

‘What? Kang Mujin is a disposable item? This bastard, again?’

Eunseong’s stomach was already completely turned upside down, and those words were the worst possible insult to his favorite.

Ever since reading the original novel, Eunseong had hated Team Leader Park more than anyone for cunningly pushing Kang Mujin into deadly situations.

For a brief moment, his anger once again suppressed his fear.

Eunseong lowered the hands covering his mouth and nose and stared coldly at Team Leader Park in front of him.

“My hunter.”

“Pardon?”

“Don’t run your mouth carelessly about him.”

His low voice, heavy with tension and anger, echoed deep through the cavern walls.

It was only a short sentence, but the weight behind it seemed to crush the air around them.

Not only Team Leader Park, but even the surrounding hunters held their breath.

Team Leader Park, his face drained of color, hunched his shoulders and bowed at the waist.

“……I apologize. I overstepped my bounds….”

“Shut up.”

Eunseong frowned irritably.

Even the voices echoing around his ears felt like nothing but noise.

Without wasting any more time, he hurried toward the blue gate.

Watching him leave, a sneer curled at the corner of Kang Mujin’s mouth.

‘My hunter.’

That possessive declaration Eunseong had thrown at Team Leader Park continued to echo in his ears.

Kang Mujin took those words as a warning directed at him.

Before his regression, Baek Eunseong had been the kind of man who would frown in annoyance rather than worry when he saw a subordinate lying around with broken bones.

Treatment was out of the question.

Even when someone could barely stand, he would push them back into deadly situations, and when they collapsed, he would simply walk past them as though they were insects.

‘Does that mean I’m valuable enough that he doesn’t want anyone else touching me?’

The touch of the hand that had passed him the elixir had been disgusting.

Yet the faint tremor he had felt from those fingertips kept lingering in his mind.

Kang Mujin stared obsessively at the blue gate Eunseong had passed through.

The sweetness of the elixir remaining on the tip of his tongue had already faded.

But the cool warmth lingering on his fingertips refused to disappear.