LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 121
Chapter 121 There Are No Friends Here 1
[Breaking News: Gate Erosion from Hapjeong Station to the Hongdae Entertainment District] (4243)
Upvotes: 2423
『No joke, shit.
It’s an emergency right now.
The sky suddenly turned red, and then the dungeon alarm started blaring.
For fuck’s sake.
Of all times, I always stay cooped up at home, but I came out to meet an acquaintance to celebrate my promotion to S-rank at a festival, and right as I stepped into the entertainment district, the alarm goes off.
No joke, don’t come near here, Jangbungies.』
[????]
[Is this real?]
[It’s real, the news alerts are going crazy right now.]
[Just got an emergency alert message.]
[That area never had a dungeon erosion even during the Great Rift. What’s going on???]
[How would I know, fuck.]
[Honestly, this is terrifying.]
[Yo, head for a basement or a shelter quickly. If you’re lucky, you’ll only face weak mobs, or the hunters might save you.]
But that was too optimistic of a perspective.
If it were monsters like D-rank goblins or orcs, it wouldn’t be too serious, but if C-rank or higher monsters appeared, there could be countless casualties.
[Hey, Jangbungies, just stay holed up at home. Erosion has occurred right in the middle of Seoul.]
[Is this real?]
[Holy shit;]
[When was the last time erosion happened?]
[Isn’t this just an overbreak?]
[Nope, not even close. If it were an overbreak, other dungeons would be mutating, and emergency alarms would be going off everywhere. Right now, the only alarm is for a sudden dungeon erosion at Hapjeong Station.]
[Could this be a Great Rift?]
[If it’s a real Great Rift, this would be the third one.]
[Do you think the Great Rift is a joke?]
[Hey, there’s a picture posted in Nemgal.]
[Breaking News 2) Photo of the eroding dungeon is out.] (6534)
Upvotes: 5284
『Looking at the photo, you might not notice anything strange.
At first glance, aside from the red sky, it looks just like Hapjeong Station.
But check out the size of the people evacuating next to it.
A restaurant building that’s only three floors tall looks as huge as a 20-story high-rise apartment building.
It’s clearly a copy-dungeon type that replicates reality but inflates the area and size on a much larger scale.
And fuck, since it’s an eroded dungeon, you can enter from outside, but you can’t leave until you kill the boss monster or destroy the dungeon core.』
[?? Is that not Photoshopped?]
[Now’s not the time for talking about Photoshop, you idiot. It’s real, it’s an emergency.]
[The way that dungeon replicated buildings and objects so huge is insane.]
[Has there ever been a dungeon like this?]
[There are copy dungeons that replicate reality sometimes, but I’ve never seen one that makes a three-story building look like a 20-story tower.]
[Jangbungies near Hapjeong, get out now. And if you’re unlucky enough to be caught up in this, shut up and wait at a shelter for the hunters to save you. The emergency officials are passing around an urgent notice from the association.]
[The armbands are out.]
[If the armbands are out, it’s serious, damn.]
[Wow, fuck; I’ve never seen anything like this in my life.]
[Crazy, for real?]
Armband [(Urgent) Dungeon erosion from Hapjeong Station to the Hongdae Entertainment District. Danger level undetermined, erosion level undetermined.] (1142)
Upvotes: 3424
『The Hunter Association issued an emergency statement on every online community.
As of 11:30 AM, dungeon erosion began right in the heart of Seoul.
The eroded area currently spans from Hapjeong Station to Hongdae Entrance Station, and part of Sinchon Station, covering an area of about 2km in radius, but it’s still expanding.
You assholes better call your families and check if they’re safe.
If you can’t reach a family member or friend, immediately contact the Hunter Association’s civilian rescue office.
Given the current situation, any asshole drawing attention or spouting nonsense will be immediately banned and kicked out, so watch yourselves.
For any Jangbungies caught in the erosion, head to a shelter and wait for the hunters to arrive.
Nobody dies, you hear me?』
[Why is “nobody dies” so sad to hear…]
[Didn’t you know? That armband lost a friend during the 2nd Great Rift, so it’s famous that they took on the armband job after that.]
[Ah, for real?]
[I didn’t know…]
Normally, the genre hunter gallery’s netrunners and trolls would have been playing around, spouting strange gossip and making inappropriate jokes, but at this moment, they were all silent.
The situation was too dire for anyone to joke around.
Dungeon erosion wasn’t some far-off issue happening in another country. It was a national crisis, threatening not only the friends they hung out with yesterday, but also themselves and their families.
The danger level and the extent of the erosion hadn’t been measured yet.
If they were lucky, and the dungeon’s danger level was below B-rank, the crisis might be resolved quickly with minimal casualties, possibly none at all.
But if it turned out to be an A-rank or higher dungeon, it wouldn’t be a normal disaster.
With so many people swallowed up right in the middle of the city, no one could predict the scale of the catastrophe.
Most hunters, like office workers, were busy patrolling dungeons on weekdays. Even if they were resting, they’d be inspecting their gear at home or training at their guilds to sharpen their skills.
Most civilians were out enjoying the festival in the entertainment district, meaning there would be delays in deploying hunters.
If the hunters were delayed, a disaster of unimaginable proportions could unfold.
If a skilled hunter happened to be near Hapjeong Station or nearby before the dungeon erosion started, it would be different, but the odds of a strong hunter being at Hapjeong Station right when the erosion began weren’t very high….
[Heyyyyyy, the gallery lord, the gallery lord! The gallery lord!!!!]
[The gallery lord has appeared!]
[??]
[What are you talking about?]
[No, seriously, what’s the point of starting a stream when there’s an erosion happening right now?]
[No, you don’t get it. The gallery lord actually showed up in the eroded dungeon!]
[Yo, yo, I saw it too. The gallery lord is really there!!!]
[What? What’s going on?]
[What the hell?]
[Why is the gallery lord there?]
[(Roughly, a picture of the gallery lord waving under the red sky)]
[The gallery lord showed up in the eroded dungeon!!!!!]
[????]
[Crazy??????]
[How did this happen??]
[Seeing the gallery lord in person makes me feel reassured. Even though I’m also… well… you know, aroused.]
[No panties?]
[How would I know, dumbass? It’s not like she flashed her coochie at me.]
[You crazy fuckers, that’s not the point right now.]
[But for real, her chest is huge. It’s really massive. The broadcasts didn’t do it justice.]
And the photo one Jangbungie posted caused a massive reaction.
It was a photo of Hunter Shia, inside the eroded dungeon, setting up a giant white barrier to protect people.
Some malicious netrunners had thought that Shia’s fame was overblown, just because of her pretty face and large chest. They believed that broadcasts could always be manipulated, and that she gave up on her S-rank promotion match for no real reason because she lacked true ability.
But at this moment, none of that mattered.
If she had real skill, if the power Shia had displayed on the broadcast was genuine, then she could save people.
[A Jangbungie who just got to the shelter at Hongdae Entrance Station says it’s packed with people and chaotic. But Shia showed up and set up some kind of barrier for the shelter.]
[Holy shit.]
[Is it sturdy?]
[Given her abilities on the broadcast, it should at least work as a temporary measure.]
[Yo, Hunter Yeonhwa, who just got promoted to S-rank, is there too.]
[??]
[For real?]
[No one’s dying today.]
[This is an eroded dungeon where you can’t leave until the boss is taken down, but with Shia and Yeonhwa together, they could easily handle it.]
[That phrase sounds so damn sexual, “handle it together.” Heu-eung…]
[Lol, for real.]
[But honestly, I feel kind of reassured.]
○○○○○
The places people were mostly evacuated to were underground shelters in high-rise buildings or subway stations.
After the first Great Rift, shelters had been set up in various regions for situations like sudden dungeon erosion, and in densely populated areas like Seoul, the subway stations were the best-suited shelters.
By 2088, the underground shelters had the capacity to accommodate many people, and were built strong enough to withstand even a nuclear blast on the surface.
“Everyone, head this way!”
“Thank you…”
“Sniff, thank you, Yeonhwa noona!”
“You’ll be safe if you stay here.”
Yeonhwa, speaking in a voice imbued with mana, loudly guided people to
the shelter.
Shia also used her holy power to send telepathic messages to everyone, directing them to the nearest shelter.
Thanks to Shia’s guidance, everyone who heard her voice headed straight for the subway shelters without missing a step.
Yeonhwa had erected an ice wall as a first line of defense to block any monsters that might attack the civilians on their way to the shelter.
After that, Shia followed up with a miracle, creating a white barrier.
“Shinchon Station is done too. There were fewer people at Hongdae Entrance, so that wrapped up quickly.”
“…Phew. It would have taken so much longer without you, unnie.”
At least the people they could see had all been safely guided to the subway shelters.
“Normally, this kind of thing should be handled by safety officers dispatched by the Hunter Association, but I guess the upper levels are in a state of emergency.”
“They’re moving pretty slowly for an emergency.”
“It’s complacency. Honestly, no one expected a dungeon erosion right in the middle of Seoul without it being a Great Rift.”
Fortunately, by 2088, civilians had received enough education about dungeons that guiding them to the shelters wasn’t a major issue.
The problem was that since this was an eroded dungeon, while it was possible to enter from outside, it was impossible to exit until the boss was defeated.
It was the same type of dungeon where Yeonhwa and Shia had first met and roasted the Black Minotaur, Eopjinsal.
The only relief was that, even though an hour had passed since the erosion began, no monsters had appeared yet.
‘The problem is, there are a lot of hostages this time.’
Thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of people.
The people in sight had all made it to the subway shelters. While Yeonhwa’s ice wall and Shia’s barrier provided temporary security, in the unknown space of a dungeon, anything could happen.
[Ah, ah, can you hear me?]
[This is the safety officer dispatched by the association. Hunters hearing this transmission, please gather at Exit 2 of Hapjeong Station.]
[If you see civilians, guide them to the safe zone shelters at Hapjeong Station, Shinchon Station, and Hongdae Entrance Station!]
[Hunters below C-rank, head to the shelters!]
“The rescue team is finally here.”
Shia and Yeonhwa realized that the Hunter Association’s rescue team had finally been dispatched, as they heard the message from the drone.
“Oh, right, I forgot this drone wasn’t just for broadcasting but also for assisting hunters.”
Since Shia had never used the hunter-assistance function of her drone outside of broadcasting, she looked at her drone curiously.
“Let’s go, unnie.”
“Okay.”
While Shia and Yeonhwa had secured safety at Hongdae Entrance Station, the situation wasn’t so good when they arrived at Hapjeong Station.
“Please come slowly! Hunters below C-rank, please accompany the civilians to the shelter!”
“Hunters of B-rank and above, arm yourselves immediately!”
The safety officers and assistants dispatched by the association were hurriedly distributing equipment, safety supplies, and emergency food to the people.
The civilians, too, seemed anxious in this tense situation.
“Ah, you can’t come this way. Head to the shelter quickly…
“I’m S-rank Hunter Yeonhwa.”
“A…Ah!?”
The rescue officer, who had been frantically ushering civilians into the shelter, looked as if a savior had appeared, his face visibly brightening.
“As an S-rank hunter, I’m requesting a situation report. What is the dungeon’s danger level, erosion level, and what monsters have appeared? What about the environment?”
“J-just a moment, please. I’m terribly sorry, Hunter Yeonhwa! We’ve only just arrived, so we haven’t even finished setting up our equipment. I’m sorry.”
“Hurry up. I’ve already secured the evacuation at Shinchon Station and Hongdae Entrance Station with Shia-unnie here.”
“Shia-unnie, as in…Ah, you mean that Returnee! Understood!”
Though Yeonhwa had become well-known after her recent promotion to S-rank, the safety officer seemed to have heard of Shia too, as both of them were able to enter the temporary camp without issue.
“Hello~ Are you very busy?”
“Yes, as you can see…”
Despite the chaos, the safety officers began to flood Yeonhwa and Shia with information.
“Let me report what we’ve learned so far. First, the erosion area covers the Mapo District of Seoul, centered around Subway Line 2, from Hapjeong Station to Hongdae Entrance Station, and part of Shinchon Station. Line 6, from Sangsu Station to Gwangheungchang Station, as well as part of Hongik University, is also currently eroded by the dungeon.”
“The scale’s quite large.”
“What we’ve confirmed so far is that the dungeon is a copy dungeon.”
Shia had experienced a copy dungeon before.
It was the mutated raid dungeon in Andong where she had boiled walker bone soup.
Of course, since a fragment of the Demon King had been embedded in the dungeon, it had engulfed a vast area.
The monsters that appeared were the walkers, creatures that had never originally existed on Earth.
“But, normally, copy dungeons replicate reality on a 1:1 scale…”
“And? What’s the problem?”
“Please, look over there.”
The rescue officer pointed toward a large building.
The sky was red, but was there something unusual?
“That building was originally two floors.”
“What?”
“Not all buildings and objects are like that, but this copy dungeon replicates reality while inflating some buildings and terrain to exaggerated proportions. A building that originally had only two floors is now as tall and large as a 20 or 30-story skyscraper.”
“…Is there a particular significance to this?”
“We can’t be sure. Sometimes the dungeon core is consumed by the boss monster, so our priority is to find the boss first, unnie.”
“What about the monsters?”
“Well…so far, no monsters have been confirmed.”
No monsters had been confirmed.
Since copy dungeons generally had high danger levels, erosion rates, and mana concentrations, it was an unspoken rule that they were at least B-rank dungeons.
The safety officers, who had hurriedly been dispatched by the association, had ordered hunters below C-rank to be treated like civilians and to head to the shelters for this reason.
If you weren’t strong enough, you’d only end up dead.
The more people that died in a dungeon, the more dangerous mutations the dungeon would undergo as it feasted on the deaths.
But in such a dungeon, no monsters had appeared yet, driving the safety officers and higher-ups to the edge of insanity.
Without properly assessing the dungeon’s difficulty, they couldn’t request adequate support. But deploying S-rank hunters for this wasn’t feasible either.
Most S-rank hunters were fighting in critical battlefields for humanity’s survival, and Yeonseo, in particular, was overseas, unable to be contacted for assistance.
Moreover, assembling a team of A-rank hunters would take considerable time.
At least the fact that S-rank Hunter Yeonhwa and Shia, a person marked by the government as a high-risk individual with a peculiar power, were present on the scene was a stroke of luck for both the association and the civilians.
“Phew, Returnee Shia, Hunter Yeonhwa, we desperately need your cooperation. Right now, we can only rely on you two……”
“Excuse me for a moment.”
“Yes?”
At that moment, Shia turned to observe the procession of civilians heading toward the shelter.
“Hunter Shia?”
Then, Shia slightly bent her body.
As her pale thigh peeked out through the slit in her clothing, her leg muscles tensed and became visibly defined.
“Unnie?”
Bang!
In an instant, Shia kicked off the ground and shot forward like a bullet, reaching someone among the civilians faster than the blink of an eye.
And then…
“…!”
Crack!
She crushed the head of one person who had been about to enter the shelter with her fist.
“Kyahhh!”
“Wha?!”
“What are you doing!?!”
The nearby people, drenched in dark blood, screamed, while the safety officers gasped in shock, drawing their guns on Shia.
Was she really that crazy Returnee who had suddenly lost her mind?!
Wait, hold on…
Black blood?
“This…”
Shia lifted the crushed head with a tentacle.
“…This isn’t human.”
It wasn’t a human.
No, it had the appearance of a human, but black blood flowed from it, and there were no organs inside where they should have been.
“…Could this be a doppelgänger?”
“Insane.”
“Oh, so this is a doppelgänger?”
While Shia looked curiously into the doppelgänger’s crushed head, the faces of the safety officers and Yeonhwa turned pale.
“Emergency! Emergency!!! Dungeon identified!! Dungeon identified!!!”
“It’s a doppelgänger dungeon!!”
“Danger level Special S-rank! It’s confirmed as a doppelgänger dungeon!”