Chapter 90
The dungeon life of the four people began in earnest after they had razed the surrounding area once.
"Hmm, about aura... to be honest, there's not much I can tell you."
Baek Hyun-woo, who had dusted off his clothes that had gotten dirty from the fight with Lee Shin, said as he looked at Eun Yeon-woo and Lee Hyun-seok.
"As you both know, unlike internal energy and mana, aura is closely connected to mental strength and its power. But mental strength isn't something that can be raised so easily, right? So..."
Baek Hyun-woo paused for a moment before speaking.
"In your case, let's focus on training the abilities that each of you has awakened. If you keep focusing on developing your own abilities, your mental strength will naturally rise."
After saying that, Baek Hyun-woo looked at Eun Yeon-woo and Lee Hyun-seok and asked.
"What did you say were the abilities you two awakened?"
"Mine is [Acceleration]. I can raise my body's speed by one more level."
"Mine is [Swap]. I can swap the weapon in my hand with the weapon I have equipped."
Baek Hyun-woo, who heard the abilities of the two, nodded his head.
"Not bad. Just from hearing it, it seems like an ability that can be applied in various ways."
As Baek Hyun-woo was nodding his head, Lee Hyun-seok looked at him and asked.
"But what ability did you awaken, hyung? Seeing as something like an animal comes out, is it something like [Beast]?"
"To say that, there were also times when just a shockwave came out."
Baek Hyun-woo, who heard the words of Lee Hyun-seok and Eun Yeon-woo, said calmly.
"Me? It's [Manga]."
"Yes?"
"What?"
At Baek Hyun-woo's sudden words, Eun Yeon-woo and Lee Hyun-seok were flustered and asked again.
Baek Hyun-woo, as if he had expected such a reaction, chuckled and said once more.
"The name of the aura I awakened is [Manga]."
"...Is it possible for aura to awaken in that way?"
"There's also something called [Gun], so it's nothing new."
Eun Yeon-woo was so dumbfounded that he asked back like that.
"In the first place, the awakening of aura is influenced by an individual's mind, body, and soul. The reason I logged into Pantheon was because I wanted to imitate the characters from manga, so when I first checked, I was quite convinced."
After saying that, Baek Hyun-woo lightly opened his hand.
On Baek Hyun-woo's palm, aura was gathered in the form of a sphere and was rotating.
"Sometimes there are people who check their awakened aura and judge whether it's suitable for combat or not, but that's all nonsense. Depending on the person who uses it, it can vary in a thousand different ways, no matter what the awakened ability is."
Baek Hyun-woo poked his chest with his thumb as if to say, 'look at me', and the two who were convinced nodded their heads.
In front of the two was a fool who had turned the crazy idea of imitating manga characters using something called [Manga] into reality.
"The important thing is not to close your mind and not to doubt. Keep imagining and moving your heart. Then the aura will naturally respond."
Baek Hyun-woo said with a light smile.
"The so-called open mind and inspiration are really important for aura users."
The two, who had each realized something from Baek Hyun-woo's words, quietly sank into their own thoughts.
After thinking and thinking like that, when they raised their heads again.
Their eyes were sparkling as if they wanted to test the things they had thought of.
Thud-
At that moment, Lee Shin, who had been still until now, slowly approached the two.
"They say that inspiration is like a flame, and it comes to mind when it embraces a fierce heat. There's also a saying that you have to die once to fix a stereotype."
Lee Shin said, and aimed his spear at the two.
"Come at me with all your might. I'll push you until you see a revolving lantern."
At Lee Shin's words, the faces of the two, who had grasped the situation, turned black.
"I'll trust you to grow on your own."
Lee Shin was smiling brightly like a farmer who had reached the time of harvest.
***
Click-
The room that was visible when the door opened was a common room about 5 pyeong in size.
Tadadadadada-
However, among the things in that room, there was not a single thing that could be passed off as ordinary.
The three ultra-small supercomputers in the room worked hard, emitting heat.
Because each of the monitors that filled one wall had such tremendous performance that they couldn't even be properly traded in the general market.
Clatter-
'Well, the person in the room is also a tremendous person who is not inferior to this supercomputer.'
Kim Jae-hyun thought, and placed some simple snacks and an energy drink on the table.
"Fortunately, it seems you're not having any particular problems with your work."
Flinch-
When Kim Jae-hyun spoke, Joker, who had been typing on the keyboard at a tremendous speed, snapped to his senses and turned his head towards Kim Jae-hyun.
"Oh? Vice-guild master? Ah, I'm sorry. I was concentrating, so I didn't even know you came in."
"No, it's me who should be sorry for coming so suddenly. Would you like some?"
"Ah, thank you."
Joker took the snack that Kim Jae-hyun offered and looked at him with a puzzled expression.
"But what brings you all the way here?"
"Hmm, I happened to have some free time, so I came to talk about various things. Whether you're working comfortably, whether there's anything you want, things like that."
"You're kind."
"Well, we're allies. Come to think of it, we were both so busy with work that we didn't have a chance to have a proper conversation for two weeks, so I thought this was a good opportunity."
Kim Jae-hyun said, and took a small bite of the snack.
"Are there any particular problems with your work? If there's anything you want, I'm willing to provide it."
"Eum, the environment is already satisfactory enough, so I don't have anything more to ask for."
Joker's words were not humility, but pure sincerity.
After they formed a cooperative relationship with Lee Shin as a bridge, the three received various things from Kim Jae-hyun, and in return, the three provided him with manpower.
Alpha received a cultivation method that could reach the peak level and was training, while at the same time helping to deal with Black Guilds with [Underworld].
Beta focused on opening a blocked path by discussing various discourses on aura and was active here and there as an informant.
And Joker, after receiving the latest computer equipment and an alchemy workshop, was focusing on interpreting information about [Dawn] using his abilities as a hacker.
Although Joker was working hard for the other two's share, he had no particular complaints.
It was what he had always done, and it was a considerable pleasure to finish in a moment the tasks that had previously required a significant amount of time, with the support of the equipment from [Wonderland] and other hackers.
Joker was at the point of letting out a hollow laugh at the overwhelming ability that made his past efforts seem futile.
At the same time, Joker realized the reason why Lee Shin had said such things to them over the past two weeks.
'There's a facility of this scale right next to us, but we were holed up in a room and couldn't even process all the information we got from the factory in a week, so he must have thought our level as an organization was too low.'
At that thought, Joker, who felt a new sense of shame like someone recalling their immature school days, drank an energy drink to cool the heat in his head.
Watching him, Kim Jae-hyun quietly sank into thought.
'I thought he would be a genius from the moment I heard he had won against [Dawn] single-handedly, but he's more than I expected.'
Just as Joker was surprised by the facilities and resources of [Wonderland], Kim Jae-hyun was constantly surprised by Joker's achievements that came in through reports.
Just by adding one person, Joker, the work process became incomparably faster than before.
Joker processed the interpretation of the information, which was said to take about two months, in just one week, and the information they had obtained by spending a lot of time and capital was reborn as new information in Joker's hands.
The genius who had produced such astonishing results was now trying to secretly access [Dawn]'s system and steal information based on the information he had obtained so far.
'Not only Joker, but the other two are also much more talented people than I thought, so the work has become much easier.'
Kim Jae-hyun sent a small thank you in his heart to Lee Shin, who had rolled a pumpkin into his lap, and looked at Joker.
"I feel like it's a useless worry, but I would like you to pay more attention to not getting caught rather than digging up more information."
"Ah, you don't have to worry about that. I also prefer to steal information continuously without getting caught rather than taking a big chunk at once and leaving a trace. However..."
Grin-
"It's just that I'm a little motivated by the fact that what I had only been thinking about is right in front of me."
Joker twisted the corners of his mouth as he looked at the monitor where numerous numbers and letters were listed.
It was a sneer towards [Dawn].
'I expected it to be like this, but these guys haven't changed at all from before.'
[Dawn] in Joker's memory was a truly simple and stupid organization.
A gathering of idiots armed with a foolish pride and trashy arrogance derived from an old-fashioned elitist ideology that believed only they were superior.
That's why [Dawn] had a strange belief that it was more effective to use their own things as they were rather than accepting and applying new things.
Chuckle-
'Still, how can it be that nothing has changed from the time I was training?'
Of course, it wasn't exactly the same.
The firewall was incomparably thicker than before, and there were traps everywhere to finish off approaching enemies in reverse.
However, in the eyes of Joker, a genius of hacking, the core code was no different from before.
'The firewalls are inefficiently made with too many, and they weren't made systematically, so it's easy to invade using an ant hole.'
Gulp-
Joker downed the energy drink that Kim Jae-hyun had brought in one go and began the work of seriously stealing information using the back door of the firewall.
As he typed on the keyboard faster and faster, Joker smiled without realizing it.
He felt the reality of getting his revenge now.
The faces of the guys who had put him through training close to torture since he was young and had giggled while watching him and his comrades suffer.
The bastards who had watched his comrades die one by one as if they were looking at lab rats and had made a list, looking at them as worthless.
The moment he escaped, his comrades who were with him were shot by those trash's guns and rolled on the floor like fallen leaves, and he himself, who had turned his back and ran away because he had no power.
The fact that he was slowly unraveling the tangled skein of the past that he hadn't dared to unravel made Joker's heart pound loudly.
Halt-
As he was typing on the keyboard like that, Joker's eyes and hands, which had confirmed one piece of information, suddenly stopped.
At that, Kim Jae-hyun, who was about to open the door and leave, looked at Joker with a 'what's wrong' expression.
However, contrary to his expectation, Joker was not looking troubled, but was smiling like a cat that had caught a mouse.
"Just a moment, I've found some quite useful information."
Joker said, and pointed at a monitor with his finger.
On that monitor, a list of [Dawn]'s organization members and their profiles were written, and at the very top, something was written in Japanese.
And simple Japanese was not a problem for Kim Jae-hyun.
'It has been judged that an anomaly has occurred in Korea, and an investigator will be dispatched.'
Grin-
Seeing that, Kim Jae-hyun smiled, just like Joker.
'The prey is rolling in on its own...'
"Please continue to collect information."
"Yes, I'll try to move as much as possible without getting caught."
Thus, the two began to prepare to welcome the uninvited guest.
(End of Chapter)