Chapter 10
[Entry: Abyss – Sector 0]
[WARNING! This place is not the domain of the living.]
[Ambient magic concentration exceeds lethal levels.]
The moment I passed through the dimensional gate, a stench that stabbed my lungs and a bone-chilling cold enveloped my entire body. It wasn’t simply a matter of being cold or smelling bad. It was a primal revulsion, as if billions of needles were piercing my skin and rancid water was being poured down my nostrils.
A blood-red moon hung in the sky, dyeing the world crimson. The land was covered in rotten, blackened soil and the byproducts of magical beasts. There was no sign of life to be foundāa perfect land of death.
But in the middle of that land of death, there was a single, precarious flame of life, burning like a dying candle.
“Haah… haah…”
Yi Soo-su was barely standing, using a broken sword hilt as a cane. Her appearance, once hailed as the ‘Goddess of the Battlefield’ who commanded the Republic of Korea, was pitiful.
Her brilliantly shining silver hair was matted with blood and dust, turned into an ashen mop. The legendary armor ‘Valkyrie’s Breastplate,’ said to be made from dragon scales, was tattered and shattered, enough to reveal her skin beneath.
Before her eyes, an endless horde of magical beasts surged like waves. Tens of thousands of low-level Abyss monsters, [Ghouls] and [Skeleton Warriors]. And behind them, the predatory eyes of mid-level monsters biding their time.
‘I’m tired…’
It had been three years. There was no day or night here. Only the eternal twilight cast by the red moon. Thousands of nights spent with no sleep, for if she closed her eyes even for a moment, monsters would come to tear at her throat. Hunger, thirst, and endless vigilance.
There was only one thing that kept her from going mad. The last promise she made with her husband, Jin-hyuk, whom she’d left behind on Earth.
‘I’ll be back soon. Have dinner ready.’
That trivial promise was the sole pillar that had sustained the strongest hunter of humanity until now. The view of the apartment living room behind her husband’s back on the day the gate closed. Her husband’s rough hands, likely simmering a stew while waiting for her.
“Damn… I want to eat… Kimchi stew with lots of pork chunks…”
Yi Soo-su let out a hollow laugh, clinging to her fading consciousness. This was the limit. Her magic core had long been depleted, and her life force was flashing a warning light. If they pushed just once more, this gate would break. And Earth would be doomed.
With trembling hands, she fumbled inside her clothes. A final resort. Detonating herself by causing the remaining magic power in her heart to rage out of control. She had to at least destroy this gate, preventing those monsters from crossing over to Earth.
“Sorry, honey. Looks like I’ll be going first… Let’s have that meal… in the next life.”
Just as she closed her eyes and began to reverse the flow of mana within her bodyā
Kuguguguā!
The black sky of the Abyss screamed. A roar different from the monsters’ howls, the deafening sound of space itself tearing apart. A dazzling purple rift split the pitch-black darkness, opening in the middle of the sky.
[KUUOOOOOHā!]
A heaven-and-earth-shaking roar poured down. Yi Soo-su’s eyes snapped open. Beyond the rift, a massive red form was plummeting like a meteor. A phantom beast wreathed in hellfire. An apex predator that could even make the Abyss monsters tremble in fear. The S-Rank Fire Dragon, Balakas.
And on the dragon’s back, one strikingly incongruous white dot.
“OUT OF THE WAY!! Patient’s guardian coming through!!”
A voice resounded clearly through amplification magic. A voice that didn’t match the apocalyptic scenery at allāa whining, insistent tone. But to Yi Soo-su, it was more familiar than any trumpet of an angel.
The voice she’d yearned for even in her dreams, that grumbling voice.
“Ji… Jin-hyuk?”
KWOOOOSH!
Balakas landed on the ground. No, to be precise, it crashed down into the middle of the monster horde. Simultaneously with landing, a massive wave of flame spread in all directions. Thousands of ghouls that had been swarming like ants turned to ash without even a scream.
“Keeeaack!”
“Grrrr…!”
The surviving monsters scattered in panic. The dust cloud cleared, revealing the massive silhouette of the red dragon. And from atop it, a man jumped down.
A man wearing a crisp, starched white coat instead of armor. Carrying a worn leather doctor’s bag instead of a weapon. His casual gesture of taking off his sunglasses and dusting himself off was as natural as if he’d just stepped out onto the streets of Gangnam.
“Hey, Team Leader Yu.”
Jin-hyuk walked over with steady steps. The surrounding mid-level monsters growled at him, but Balakas, standing guard behind him, glared and snorted, making them yelp and retreat. Jin-hyuk didn’t seem to care about the monsters at all. He approached the dazed Yi Soo-su.
“What the hell is this look? You look like a beggar. Haven’t showered in three years?”
“You… really… is it really you, Jin-hyuk?”
Yi Soo-su’s voice trembled. Was it an illusion? Was it a final flash of memory before death, brought on by exhaustion? She staggered towards him, reaching out a trembling hand to touch his cheek. Not cold armor, but the feel of warm skin. A warmth that was different from the Abyss’s chilling airāthe warmth of a human being.
“Yeah, it’s me. You said let’s eat. Were you planning on starving your husband to death?”
Jin-hyuk grinned and clasped her dirty hand in his. At that moment, any doubt that this was an ‘illusion’ vanished from Yi Soo-su’s mind. It’s real. My husband came.
A tsunami of relief, joy, and a sense of injustice washed over her. The tears she’d held back burst forth like a dam breaking.
“WAAAAH! You bad guy!”
SLAP!
“Ow!”
Just as one might expect a touching embrace, Yi Soo-su’s sharp palm struck Jin-hyuk’s back. Jin-hyuk yelped and doubled over. Her magic power might have been depleted, but an S-Rank hunter’s smack could still rattle bones when delivered to an unarmored body.
“Are you crazy! Why did you come here! Do you even know where this is! Did you lose your mind wanting to die?!”
Yi Soo-su grabbed Jin-hyuk by the collar and shook him, her tear-streaked face screaming.
“Go back! Go back right now! This isn’t a place for a civilian like you! Just breathing here rots your lungs, don’t you understand!”
She was desperate. She was already broken, but she had to save her husband. Since he’d come on Balakas, he could go back. She had to send him away immediately.
But Jin-hyuk didn’t budge. Rubbing his throbbing back, he instead pulled her into a tight embrace.
“I’m not going.”
“What? Do you even understand the situaā”
“I said I’m not going without you. If you’re not coming, then I’ll just stay and rot here with you.”
Jin-hyuk’s resolute voice. The sound of his heartbeat felt through his chest. Yi Soo-su’s body stiffened. Her resisting hands fell limply. She buried her face in his chest and began to sob like a child.
“Huuuh… huhk…”
The smell she’d missed so terribly. The smell of homeāa mix of antiseptic and coffee. The only scent of heaven permitted in this hell.
Watching this scene from behind, the three menāLee Shin-woo, Ma Dong-tak, and Seo Ji-hooāstood awkwardly.
“Um… are we invisible or something?”
“Read the room, you clueless bastard. Ma Dong-tak, are you crying?”
“I am not! It’s just dust in my eye! Sniff!”
Even the strongest hunters of the Republic of Korea were merely background scenery in the face of this tearful reunion.
After crying for a long while, Yi Soo-su pushed Jin-hyuk away. Her expression darkened again. She had come to terms with reality.
“…I can’t go.”
Yi Soo-su murmured in a small voice.
“What?”
“I can’t. I can’t go back to Earth.”
Yi Soo-su raised her head. Her ashen eyes were trembling. She pointed to her chest. Through the gap in her shattered armor, a grotesque sight was revealed. Black veins were sprouting near her heart, and those veins extended deep into the ground beneath. Like the roots of a massive tree, they bound her to this land.
[Diagnosis: Abyss Assimilation Syndrome]
[Status: Heart sharing life force with the ‘Abyss Core’.]
Jin-hyuk’s eyes narrowed. [Eyes of Truth] pierced through her condition clearly.
Three years ago. To block the pouring monsters, she had performed a sealing ritual, using her own heart as a medium to suppress the land’s ‘core.’ As long as she lived, the gate remained closed. But the moment she left this place, the seal would break and the gate to Earth would open permanently.
Compounding the issue, her physical changes were even more severe.
[WARNING! The patient’s body has mutated to adapt to the Abyss.]
[If exposed to Earth’s atmosphere, immediate respiratory distress and shock-induced death will occur.]
She was already halfway through monsterification. The clean air of Earth would be like a deadly poison to her now.
“If I move, the gate opens. And… I’m not human anymore. Going to Earth would kill me.”
Yi Soo-su smiled bitterly. That smile was so sorrowful it tore at the hearts of those who saw it.
“So at least you go. Please… don’t make me more pathetic. Just let me hear that you’re doing well, that’s enough for me.”
A hopeless situation. A state with no answer, medically or magically. An ordinary person would have given up, shed tears, shared a farewell kiss, and spent the rest of their life mourning her.
But Kang Jin-hyuk was no ordinary person. He was the man who’d cured a dragon’s constipation with a simple solution and operated on a giant’s cataract-ridden eye. In front of the Republic of Korea’s best ‘quack… no, medical genius,’ there was no such thing as an incurable disease.
“Ha, seriously.”
Jin-hyuk let out a scoff of disbelief. Then, even harder than before, he flicked Yi Soo-su’s forehead.
TAP!
“Ow! Hey! That hurts!”
Yi Soo-su cried out, clutching her forehead.
“Hurts, right? You’re alive. If you’re alive, that’s enough.”
Jin-hyuk pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and roughly scrubbed Yi Soo-su’s dirty face.
“I hit you because you don’t listen for shit. Hey, who do you think I am?”
“Who else could you be… a grumpy baggage carrier.”
“Correct that. I’m a doctor. An S-Rank doctor who can even cure dragon constipation.”
Jin-hyuk tapped the leather bag he’d set on the ground with his foot.
“Can’t go to Earth? The air won’t agree with you and you’ll die?”
“Yes! That’s why you should go!”
“Then we’ll just live here until I fix it.”
“…What?”
Yi Soo-su’s eyes went wide. What did she just hear? Jin-hyuk gestured to Lee Shin-woo, Ma Dong-tak, and Seo Ji-hoo, who were shuffling nervously behind him.
“Hey, assistant gentlemen. Unpack the luggage.”
“Excuse me? H-here?”
Lee Shin-woo asked, his jaw practically dropping in disbelief.
Look around.
Piles of ghoul corpses, toxic fog thick in the airāand he wanted them to unpack here?
“Yes. If the patient can’t come to the hospital, the hospital comes to the patient. That’s what a house call is, isn’t it?”
Jin-hyuk rolled up his sleeves. His eyes glinted. This wasn’t simple bravado. He wasn’t perceiving this situation as a ‘disaster,’ but as a ‘difficult surgical environment.’
Surgery room dirty? Clean it.
Patient can’t move? Bring the bed to them.
“Can’t go back? Then we’ll live here until you’re cured. I never had time to spend money on Earth anyway. The air is nice here… well, no, it’s not. The scenery is… not great either. Anyway, we can just stay for some recuperation.”
“J-Jin-hyuk? Are you out of your mind?”
“Shut up. You’re the one who’s a patient with too much to say. Your nutritional status is a mess. Let’s set up the tent first. I’m hungry, let’s eat.”
Jin-hyuk started spreading a picnic mat right there on the spot. In the middle of the Abyss, swarming with monsters. At that moment, the Republic of Korea Hunters’ base camp was established.
“Ma Dong-tak! Move that rock! It’s lumpy under the mat!”
“Oh, yes! Understood!”
“Seo Ji-hoo! Use some ice magic to cool us down a bit. It’s hot.”
“This is the demon realm! Mana efficiency is terrible!”
Yi Soo-su stared blankly at the scene. It was hell. Definitely hell. So why was she laughing?
For the first time in three years, under the Abyss’s red moon, the sound of human life began to echo.
This was the beginning of the most reckless, most romantic, and most absurd ‘Abyss living’ in hunter history.
