Hoarding In Hell [EN]: Chapter 62

Plude (4)

Seo Tae-kyung had unconsciously considered that possibility, but dismissed it as absurd.

The Five Stars Commanders of the Almighty Union were renowned for their overwhelming strength. He’d once witnessed one of them casually enter a 1-star dungeon, and even then, the monsters hadn’t hesitated to attack.

‘It has to be a skill.’

He couldn’t explain it any other way. It was definitely an anomaly.

“Branch Manager Seo Tae-kyung! Th-that!”

Just then, the werewolf, who had been behaving like a puppy, broke free from the man’s grip and tried to escape.

Seo Tae-kyung prepared to order an attack, anticipating the werewolf’s attempt to break through their encirclement.

“Awooooooooo!”

A chilling roar echoed, sending shivers down his spine. Seo Tae-kyung covered his ears. Some of the lower-level hunters even collapsed.

The werewolf’s body began to transform. Its size, teeth, and limbs grew, and its fur turned white. It was an ominous change.

‘Monsters sometimes undergo transformations.’

Nothing good would come of it. Seo Tae-kyung looked at the man who had been taming the werewolf. The man was watching blankly, as if waiting for the transformation to finish.

‘Does he think this is a magical girl anime?’

Seo Tae-kyung realized he was doing the same thing and hurriedly tried to order the hunters to attack. But the werewolf roared again.

“Awooooooooo!”

Seo Tae-kyung staggered. The howling was much more powerful than before.

The werewolf’s appearance, now visible through the dust, was even more menacing.

Its eyes glowed with red, ominous energy, and its mane was thicker. Its size and limbs seemed to have grown by more than 50 centimeters (approximately 20 inches).

“Good heavens, I’ve never seen anything like that before…”

A hunter with as much experience as Seo Tae-kyung muttered beside him.

Seo Tae-kyung agreed. He had faced werewolves before, and he had seen them transform, but never like this.

Seo Tae-kyung wasn’t confident in facing it. Could anyone here be confident?

‘We need at least a deputy branch manager.’

The problem escalated. The howling echoed again. Seo Tae-kyung realized it was a response.

Several werewolves emerged from the dungeon entrance, answering the transformed werewolf’s call.

A situation with multiple werewolf dungeon bosses appearing at once was beyond anything he had imagined.

“Is this… a Plude…”

Seo Tae-kyung murmured, groaning.

Then, the werewolf lunged and bit the neck of the man who had been standing blankly. Screams erupted. Seo Tae-kyung’s face turned white. If that man was harmed, the other hunters wouldn’t stand a chance.

“Everyone, charge now!”

***

[Madness-Infused Werewolf (LV 38)]

Its level jumped by 10 just from the transformation. Difficulty: Hell. It was a level he wouldn’t have been able to face if it were Difficulty: Hell. But Hyun-woo was faintly recalling memories from Difficulty: Hell even as he looked at the approaching werewolf’s large teeth.

For example, rats in alleys, cockroaches, pigeons, stray dogs, and the like.

‘Those guys seem a bit faster.’

The madness-infused werewolf, driven by a wildly rampaging attack instinct, forgot its fear and charged at Hyun-woo.

As dozens of teeth were about to sink into Hyun-woo’s neck, Hyun-woo grabbed the monster’s jaws from above and below.

“……?!”

The jaws, powerful enough to chew through steel bars, didn’t move. Hyun-woo, still gripping the front teeth, swung the werewolf back.

With the inertia that felt like its neck would break, the werewolf floated into the air and slammed into the ground. The floor shattered, sending fragments flying. But the werewolf quickly recovered.

“It’s gotten tougher, too.”

But Hyun-woo had no intention of playing around.

He couldn’t show an equal footing.

He had to overwhelm it.

That’s why he had deliberately absorbed the mosquito. Hyun-woo licked the werewolf’s blood from his hand.

The werewolf’s neck was already injured from the impact. But even though it must have been in tremendous pain, its anger was too great for it to feel it properly.

Hyun-woo, too, was burning up thanks to the adrenaline coursing through his body. Their throats were parched in the same way.

The werewolf charged at Hyun-woo again.

“Uooooooo!”

From near the dungeon entrance, the roars of other werewolves could be heard. They were werewolves that had not yet been exposed to Hyun-woo’s energy.

They seemed focused on helping their kin. In an instant, three werewolves joined the battle.

The werewolves’ claws grazed the spot where Hyun-woo had been. Fragments flew menacingly. Only the ratmen swept away by the fragments died.

Hyun-woo was already standing just a few steps away. The werewolves’ claws rushed in like a storm. It was an attack that would have dismembered an ordinary person, but Hyun-woo was as elusive as mist.

Disappointment was settling on Hyun-woo’s face.

It wasn’t that he had a competitive spirit, but the werewolf was far below his expectations.

It might be due to the difficulty adjustment, but at this rate, there was no need to even take out a weapon.

If the enemy could be taken down with just his hands and feet, it would be difficult to achieve his initial goal.

He had to become the savior who prevented an incident that could have been the beginning of humanity’s destruction, but he couldn’t just end up as a great hunter.

‘But at this rate, it’ll be hard to stand out.’

Hyun-woo recalled Noh Ha-eul, who had been inspecting the Cheonggye Dungeon.

‘1.5 Noh Ha-euls would be able to catch a strengthened werewolf.’

Noh Ha-eul had become a measure of combat power, but it seemed difficult to become the protagonist of the plan to stop the Plude and become a rising star who would instantly capture people’s attention. At that moment, a werewolf swung its claws at Hyun-woo, who was lost in thought.

At that moment, the monster was hit by something and sent flying with a bang.

“Are you okay!”

Seo Tae-kyung’s shout. And he saw other hunters rushing in. Hyun-woo’s face instantly contorted. He hadn’t shown enough of his abilities yet, but he had taken too long.

Seo Tae-kyung thought he had saved a young man, but the moment he faced Hyun-woo’s face, he slightly wet himself.

It was fleeting, but Seo Tae-kyung felt more fear from Hyun-woo than from the werewolf. Hyun-woo quickly erased his expression and nodded.

“Thank you.”

Hyun-woo decided to end it here with regret.

‘Useless bastards.’

That’s how Hyun-woo valued the werewolf in front of him. It was the moment when the madness-infused werewolf swung its fifth claw.

Hyun-woo swung his hand to the side. With a sound like “kwajik,” the werewolf’s claws shattered like glass.

Even the werewolf, who had forgotten pain, felt the emptiness of its claws strangely. Hyun-woo grabbed the werewolf’s snout and kicked its chest.

His intention was to break its neck bones, but Hyun-woo’s foot instead pierced through the werewolf’s chest.

“Oops.”

He felt his foot, which had dug into the inside of its chest, becoming lukewarm and wet. Hyun-woo pulled out his foot and pushed the werewolf away, grumbling.

The werewolf died instantly from the impact. Its huge body collapsed. Before the second werewolf could even realize that its kin had been defeated, its head was crushed.

It didn’t even take a breath from the madness-infused werewolf to the other two werewolves being defeated.

Hyun-woo flicked the blood off his foot. The blood that had been all over his hand seeped into his skin through the ‘Blood Absorption’ skill.

Hyun-woo felt his thirst slightly quenched. Just in time, the effects of absorption were also ending.

‘Mosquitoes don’t have many calories, so the duration is short.’

Since mosquitoes have little impact, he would need to absorb something sturdier to be useful in a prolonged battle. At that moment, Hyun-woo suddenly felt that the surroundings were too quiet and looked around.

The hunters had just barely managed to catch one werewolf. Dozens of them were rushing in to pin the werewolf down, and around Hyun-woo, there were three werewolf corpses sprawled out. One of them was even a strengthened werewolf that had completed its transformation.

A strange silence descended.

The sound of car engines and helicopter propellers was still there, but no one dared to speak. It was a silence where everyone would turn around even if you just swallowed.

Hyun-woo looked at the hunters in disbelief.

“What are you doing?”

“Ye, yes?”

Seo Tae-kyung asked back without realizing it. He looked anxious, wondering if he had offended him in some way.

Hyun-woo answered as if he was pathetic.

“The Plude isn’t over yet. The ratmen are still coming out, so let’s clear the front lines first.”

Seo Tae-kyung finally realized the situation and began to direct the hunters. It didn’t seem like Hyun-woo needed to step in for the ratmen.

Seo Tae-kyung, the hunters, and the soldiers had been constantly training for such cases, and they quickly rebuilt the defense and completely suppressed the ratmen that were still crawling out.

There might be other werewolves coming out, but as long as the follow-up support units continued to arrive, there was no need to worry. At the same time, as the boss was suppressed, the number of ratmen coming out of the dungeon entrance began to decrease significantly.

The Plude, which had been feared as the ‘worst-case scenario,’ was completely cleared in just one hour after it started.

***

“What are the casualties?”

“Other than the two who were taken away due to injuries, there are none.”

Seo Tae-kyung was surprised that they had suppressed the Plude without any casualties other than the two injured. There was no case anywhere in the world where the Plude had been suppressed so easily. All of this was because the boss was cleared quickly and easily. Seo Tae-kyung hurriedly looked for the unidentified hunter. He was afraid to face that face again, but he couldn’t just let him go.

Fortunately, he was still near the Guillotine Dungeon.

“Th-there!”

Hyun-woo turned around when Seo Tae-kyung called out.

“It’s not ‘there,’ it’s Kang Hyun-woo.”

Hyun-woo held out his hand to Seo Tae-kyung.

He knew who he was.

Seo Tae-kyung, the Gangbuk Branch Manager of the Almighty Union. There was no particular connection, and he had seen a video of him attacking a 3-star dungeon on TV before.

He remembered him because the tattoo of 「Jackpot」 engraved next to his shiny bald head was impressive.

“I’m Seo Tae-kyung, the Gangbuk Branch Manager of the Almighty Union.”

‘A branch manager.’

Even if the average level of the Almighty Union is low, the branch manager level is in the top 10% in Korea because of the large number of members.

Such a high-ranking hunter, whom he would never have met in the old days, was groveling before him.

Hyun-woo suddenly realized that countless searchlights and camera lenses were pointed at him.

It was the moment when the person in charge of the scene was meeting the hunter who had made the greatest contribution after the situation was resolved. Hyun-woo realized that all the viewers across the country were paying attention to what he was saying now.

What should he say?

Hyun-woo said the prepared lines calmly but powerfully.

“I’m twenty-nine years old, and I’m a rookie hunter, but I’ll try to work hard. Thank you.”

Another long silence followed.

Seo Tae-kyung wanted to ask if this was some kind of club self-introduction session.

He had just taken down three werewolves with his bare hands in an instant, and he was saying that he was twenty-nine years old and a rookie? There was no bullshit like this.

But Seo Tae-kyung valued his life too much to argue.

He could somehow face a werewolf one-on-one. If there were no small fries around and no interference.

But to kill countless ratmen with a heart attack, and to overwhelmingly crush even a transformed werewolf in a one-sided fight?

It was impossible.

The transformed werewolf seemed to be at a level where the deputy branch manager or the commander had to step in, not the branch manager. But Hyun-woo killed it without using a single item.

‘This guy is a monster… no, a monster-nim [term of respect].’

Seo Tae-kyung swallowed hard.

‘Hmm, it’s quiet.’

Meanwhile, Hyun-woo felt a bit awkward because the silence continued for a long time after his self-introduction. He thought he had shouted quite confidently, but there wasn’t even a single clap. He felt like he was being ostracized.

It was then. Someone started clapping from the back. At the same time, the applause spread like a contagion.

As the thunderous applause broke the silence, the reporters who were broadcasting the situation quickly began to report.

The three letters of Kang Hyun-woo’s name were engraved on the entire terrestrial broadcast as breaking news.

Hyun-woo smiled. The countless flashes pouring in from all directions, the cameras constantly moving to capture even a little of his appearance, the gaze and applause of thousands of people watching. All of it was what Hyun-woo had wanted.

‘It’s wonderful.’

The past few months of rolling around in orphanages and scavenging for algae residue in underground sewers.

Compared to that, entering Difficulty: Hell was only a few months ago.

The current flash of light seemed to say that his life before Hell was meaningless.

‘This is what I wanted, and what these people wanted.’

Hyun-woo pursed his lips.

Everyone is looking at him, watching his every move.

It wasn’t a bad feeling.

He already knew that the sunlight at the top was much more noticeable than the dirty bottom life. What did it matter how he had lived until now?

‘The days ahead are much longer, after all.’