Having completed the three-day dungeon outing, Jung Si-woo returned to the resting area. He had just confirmed that there were no other types of dungeons nearby, centipede or otherwise.
“Huu, I want to wash up.”
“We’ll be going home soon. Before that, let’s organize ourselves.”
“…Now you sound like a player.”
Sitting on the bed of the resting area he had grown so familiar with over three days, he checked his status. His status was overwhelmingly full compared to just a few days ago, which made him quite happy.
[Jung Si-woo]
[Underground Player]
[Lv. 25]
[Strength: 132 | Agility: 131 | Endurance: 150 | Mana: 25]
[Passive Skill – Tail of Chaos Lv1 | Courage of the Ignorant Lv3 | Poison Resistance Lv5 | Soul Collect Lv1]
[Active Skills – Amplification Lv13 | Strike Lv9 | Combat Sprint Lv4 | Mana Shot Lv5]
“The Centipede’s Lair…there are no more of them, right?”
“I’m sick of looking at centipedes now.”
They had cleared as many as six centipede dungeons in less than three days, practically living in the Centipede’s Lair. Even though they had managed to get several hours of sleep in the resting area, they could vividly recall how the centipedes’ legs moved about even when they closed their eyes.
“I wish I could’ve developed more poison tolerance,” said Jung Si-woo.
“I’ve encountered players that were willing to take damage from enemies to raise specific skills, but why does it have to be you of all people?”
Soo Ah-rin let out a sigh. After acquiring poison resistance, Jung Si-woo had tried to introduce poison into his system a little bit at a time. Though, if not for Soo Ah-rin’s detoxification magic, that would’ve been impossible.
Even though she was participating, Soo Ah-rin couldn’t help but think that it somehow felt wrong. However, her subtle emotions weren’t known to Jung Si-woo, who was adamant about developing his skills and devoting himself to poison resistance training. At first, he had poisoned himself by an ordinary centipede, then later by an elite centipede, and finally, by the boss centipede.
Their poison was definitely daunting, but the level of resistance Jung Si-woo obtained was so high that when he reached the fourth level, he was able to move even if he was hit by the boss centipede’s poison. After reaching level five, the poison of the boss centipede only stung a little bit, and of course, after that, his progress in the resistance skill slowed rapidly. If he had wanted to raise his ability, he would’ve done so, but at this point, there were no more Centipede’s Lair left, so stagnation was inevitable.
“Other than that…hmm, the combat sprint and mana shots.”
Neither were from training or skills acquired in the dungeons. They were rewards from the souls he had previously met. Of course, souls didn’t appear in all dungeons. It seemed a long time ago that ghosts had appeared in the first and second dungeons. They had gone through dungeon after dungeon, and it wasn’t until they got to the last one that they met another soul.
Both ghosts, waiting for someone to come, had presented quests to Jung Si-woo, the contents of which were subtly different. There were no strange rewards, like giving their souls. Instead, the awards he earned were active skills like combat sprint and mana shot.
“I still haven’t gotten used to this feeling in my body,” said Jung Si-woo.
“Because you have also inherited their achievements, it takes some time to permeate you completely. But I’m certain that, though they aren’t that easy to comprehend, both skills are precious.”
Like its name, combat sprint was a skill that consumed mana to raise your speed during combat. When using this skill with other combat skills, the effect of the other would be significantly improved. However, to properly shift the power from the sprint skill to another combat skill, he would need the technique to control and maintain the modification of mana during the process. It was still a little too risky to be safely used by Jung Si-woo.
Mana shot, on the other hand, was slightly more straightforward. It could be seen as an evolution of the throwing strike skill as it involved blasting aggregated mana in a particular direction but without needing a weapon. It was weaker than a strike, but it was also a lot faster than charging up for one. To handle this skill properly, he needed a technique to separate mana from objects.
“Players with this skill often use artifacts, also known as ‘Gunners,’ to boost the skill’s overall power. It was a difficult skill to find, to the point where it was considered cheating once someone obtained it.”
Perhaps they were strong players when they were alive? They hadn’t crossed the 10th stage dungeon and had retired, so it didn’t matter now. They should be grateful that Jung Si-woo might use their skills. But it didn’t matter either way. Of course, the changes that happened to him didn’t end there. In the second dungeon, all of the beads, including the boss centipede’s bead, were devoted to the altar. They succeeded in obtaining a single piece of venomous leather armor that looked similar to his gloves.
[Centipede’s Armor]
[Rank: D+++]
[Protection: 550 – 850]
[Proficiency: 27 / 200]
[Option – ???]
[A leather armor created with the essence of centipedes carrying a strong poison. It has a very tough material, retaining the poison from its origin.]
The Centipede’s Armor seemed very good. It was quite thin for leather, so it wasn’t noticeable if you wore it inside a jacket. According to Soo Ah-rin’s words, the defense was also on the upper-side of its ranking, so for the time being, he decided to stick with it. Of course, he hadn’t been hit with poison after wearing the armor, so he didn’t have the chance to find out how great it would perform.
However, Soo Ah-rin still felt he lacked something.
“Usually, if people acknowledge the existence of a set, they will try to acquire all the pieces to complete it.”
“Are you saying we should go around trying to find similar dungeons, knowing that we can only do a single run-through to find other items in the set? I’m not crazy!”
As luck would have it, he got the upper body armor from the second dungeon and collected the beads from all the other centipede dungeons he had cleared. He didn’t use them but kept onto them for the time. Other Players would lose their beads when they tried leaving the dungeon, but Jung Si-woo, the Underground Player, could send it all to the piggy bank in the resting area.
“Now that we’ve cleared all the centipede dungeons, we should see what the beads in the resting area can do.”
“You’re really…”
In fact, Jung Si-woo had felt that it was a waste to sacrifice the beads in the second dungeon to get armor. If it weren’t for Soo Ah-rin, he probably wouldn’t have done it. It wasn’t that he didn’t value his life, far from it; it was because he felt the resting area’s potential.
‘While I’m usually healthy, I haven’t been able to sleep these past few days. However, I’m in great shape now, thanks to the rest I got in this bed,’ Jung Si-woo thought to himself.
Time was gold. It was true that after graduating from college, he had only been staying in his room, but even then, he had put in the time to spend hours exercising and studying regularly. Now that he had become a player who could grow steadily by investing the time he had wisely, equipment that shortened time-waste for him was much more valuable than weapons and equipment.
“The first thing I need to do is level up this bed…”
He stretched out his hand; however, when he touched the bed, a notice came to his eyes.
[In order to raise the level of the resting area’s facilities, you must first raise the resting area’s level.]
[You can increase the level of the resting area by consuming 80% of the saved beads. Would you like to upgrade it?]
“…”
Anxiety struck Jung Si-woo as he read it. 80% of the beads to upgrade the resting area? No matter how much he thought about it, it didn’t feel like the remaining 20% could enhance the bed’s level.
“I collected all the beads from five dungeons but have to use up 80% of it to upgrade the resting area.”
“Doesn’t that mean the value of the resting place is just as great?”
Even though he had swept through five dungeons, Jung Si-woo had come back unharmed after three days, all due to their inferiority compared to his abilities. The value of the monster bead got higher as the level of the monster increased.
“Damn it. I can’t help it…”
‘I can’t just give up on what I’ve decided.’
Before he could stop himself, Jung Si-woo upgraded the resting place’s level and vowed to improve the bed later. Bang! Suddenly, the resting place had more than doubled in size. A blink of an eye and he would’ve missed the change. It was hard enough to catch as it was, even while paying full attention. A notice came before his eyes as if to block Jung Si-woo’s view of the change.
[The resting area is now level 2. The room has expanded.]
[Bathroom Lv1 is added.]
[Bathroom Lv1: Bath available. You can now wash away weak poison, curses, and other unclean energy remaining in the body.]
Jung Si-woo looked at it and nodded to himself. It turned out investing the beads in the resting place was the right decision; this new bathroom was more than enough to convince him of that. There was everything that he could possibly need in the small bathroom, though he decided not to care about how the water and sewage facilities worked.
“I think we can just live here?”
“I was wondering why you raised the level of the resting area…so it was your dream to have your own house.”
That was half-correct. Jung Si-woo scratched his head in response.
“We can’t just go back and forth from home to work.”
“That’s right. And I can’t stay in the dollhouse forever. I will wash up first.”
The bathroom was designed based on normal human standards, so it was a little difficult for the now mini-sized Soo Ah-rin to use, but she bravely flapped herself over to the bathroom, not giving the problem a second thought. Like the gentleman he was, Jung Si-woo had just closed the bathroom door and turned away when an additional notice emerged.
[Radar Lv1 can be created. Radar is a small device that searches for nearby dungeons by consuming beads stored in the resting area.]
[Creating a radar by consuming 50% of the remaining beads is possible. Would you like to create it?]
“Huuh…”
The moment he confirmed it, he couldn’t help the smile that lit up his face. A radar!? Something even better than the bathroom. It felt as if him clearing the dungeon with an incredible rank, getting a resting area, and gathering beads by robbing all the centipede’s dungeons around him was fated to be. If he hadn’t gotten the resting area or hadn’t invested his beads in them, he would’ve had to wander around a lot to find dungeons. He sighed with relief and immediately created the radar. Soon, a handheld terminal smaller than a smartphone was in his hand.
[It consumes ten beads from the centipedes and can be activated for three minutes.]
Fortunately, activating the radar didn’t cost much. Jung Si-woo only wanted to know the location to find it later, so he activated the radar. Immediately, a mini-map popped up on the radar’s screen that showed a radius of up to 10 km around the place they were staying at. There was a green dot around the edges of the mini-map.
[Based on the player, the difficulty level is ranked as green for easy, yellow for normal, and red for hard.]
“Yeah, I know that much.”
He muttered to himself. Despite the useless response of the radar, Jung Si-woo remembered the dungeons’ location on the mini-map. At that moment, his phone began to ring.
“Mom?”
“Yes. Where are you? Are you perhaps in Sanha-dong?”
“M-mom…”
The dungeon he located was in Sanha-dong! Goosebumps raised on Jung Si-woo’s body, but he was glad to know that his mother was doing well.
“That’s good then. My friend does business there. I’ll give you the address, so quickly go ahead and save him. You can do it, right? It looks weaker than you on TV.”
“Huh? What does that mean?”
‘Wasn’t there a dungeon in Sanha-dong? But what? Save him? TV? It looks weak?’
His mom then began to clarify since Jung Si-woo was still confused.
“The strange monsters, can’t you defeat them? Most of the guys who can fight the monsters, players or whatever they call them, are in the Sky Castle right now, and they say it’s hard to come here!”
“…What?!”
It felt like ice was being poured on his back. Jung Si-woo quickly hung up and connected to the Internet. In less than 30 seconds, he had his answer.
‘I guess I’ll have to do something about it.’
It was a more severe case than clearing the 32nd stage dungeon because it was happening in Seoul, Korea’s capital. Right then, there were monsters rampaging about in Sanha-dong, Seoul, and they meant business.
