IN GAMAND
NO. 15
W. Seolha
TRIGGER WARNING!
Bloodshed warning,
Contains graphic depictions of violence.
He raised his trembling arm and aimed his gun. The moment the magic bullet pierced the monster's forehead, its massive body collapsed to the floor. He rolled over, confirmed the creature's demise, and relaxed his grip. His body, barely able to lift a finger, sank limply to the floor. "Wow, I'm going to die. Even if I fall, what's the point of falling directly into the center of the monster den?" A sight no different from the one he'd seen countless times over the past three days unfolded before his eyes. A mountain of monster corpses. They were low-level monsters, so he could probably handle them alone.
“…Ah, my shoulder…,”
A terrible pain shot up from my left shoulder, where I couldn't move. The dislocation compounded my sense of despair. What's worse, something hot kept dripping from the back of my head, suggesting I'd hit my head somewhere in the process. I gently patted the back of my head with my good hand, and sure enough, a thick layer of crimson blood covered my hand. Fortunately, it was just a torn patch of skin; nothing seemed to have been seriously damaged.
I had to get moving. The sun was already setting. I tore my tattered clothes into long strips and roughly fixed my dislocated arm. It wasn't even first aid, but there was nothing more I could do in this situation. I pulled out some all-purpose ointment I'd used before, applied it roughly to the back of my head, and then stood up. Oh, judging by the throbbing pain in my ankle, I thought I'd sprained it. At this point, it would be faster to find a healthy spot.
After quenching my thirst with the nearby flowing water, I continued moving. Kim Taehyung and Jeon Jungkook weren't even in sight, but if they had the ability to think, they'd follow the water's path and find me. I continued walking toward the waterfall. Fortunately, my thoughts were correct, and it wasn't long before I found Jeon Jungkook sitting by the campfire.
“…! Julia…!”
“What about Kim Taehyung?”
"I went to search the area. Luckily, we landed not far away, but I couldn't see you… your shoulder…"
"I was unlucky. I didn't know I'd fall into the middle of a monster den. I think I dislocated my leg…"
"Just try to put it back on, even if it's just a little," I said, unwrapping the cloth that had been wrapping my arm. The pain continued. Putting the dislocated bone back on would be even more painful. Fearing I might bite my tongue, I rolled up the cloth and put it in my mouth. Jeon Jungkook grabbed my dislocated arm, seemed to hesitate, then, under my urging gaze, reluctantly grabbed my shoulder and tightened his grip. The pain was so intense that tears welled up in his eyes. For a moment, I felt dizzy.
“…Are you okay?”
I spat out the cloth I'd been holding onto onto the floor. Perhaps because it had been stained with the monster's blood, my mouth was filled with a pungent odor. I gave it a quick wave of my hand to show my relief and rinsed my mouth with the stream water. My shoulder still ached, but it was better than leaving it in that state.
“Come here. The bone is set, but it would be best if you didn’t use this arm as much as possible.”
Jeon Jungkook, who had been watching my movements with considerable anxiety, gestured towards me. I approached him without much resistance. He took a look at the messy cloth he had bitten and spat out, then at my clothes, sighed deeply, and took off his shirt. It was so embarrassing to be wearing only a shirt that had become translucent from the water… I coughed and slowly looked away. Jeon Jungkook’s curves were fully visible beneath the wet shirt.
Jeon Jungkook tore the long strip of cloth he'd been wearing over his shirt, and with swift movements, he wrapped the cloth around his other shoulder to avoid straining his injured one. He tied the knot several times to keep it from unraveling.
“…You are really, strangely calm.”
“…Me? Is that so?”
"You don't usually think about falling down a waterfall just because you're surrounded by beasts. And…"
“…….”
“After being hurt this much, wouldn’t it be difficult to respond with composure like you did?”
“…….”
“…You seem like someone who is used to this kind of thing.”
…Is that so? Jeon Jungkook accepted my answer without a word. A brief silence fell between us, as we didn't say anything else. Jeon Jungkook, who had tied his knot tightly, tapped my healthy shoulder and said, "It's done. Be careful." Hearing those brief, concerned words, I simply nodded silently.
IN GAME
By the time Kim Taehyung returned to the campfire, darkness had already descended upon the forest. "This is going to be a mess at the academy," Kim Taehyung snickered, leading the way as we continued our walk. It was because Kim Taehyung had mentioned that while searching the area, he'd discovered a cave a short distance away. Anyway, staying up all night by the river, with a campfire lit without any protection, was tantamount to suicide, so we decided to venture into the cave, risking the dark forest.
It would be a lie to say the journey was smooth. Above all, this valley was one of the monster habitats, and as such, we were bound to encounter countless monsters. The only silver lining was that the three days of subjugation had proven effective, as the number of monsters appearing had decreased significantly. Thanks to this, Jeon Jungkook and Kim Taehyung were able to defeat the monsters on their own, even without my [Barrage] skill, which had become useless due to the loss of one arm. As for me, my injured self, all I had to do was fire a few shots from behind. It was clear that two people were doing the work of three, yet Jeon Jungkook and Kim Taehyung were more than capable of taking down the monsters. This was likely due to the synergy between Jeon Jungkook's powerful swings of his longsword and Kim Taehyung's silent, focused strikes at vital points.
"Julia, let's switch. Get some sleep."
"Oh, okay."
It was a night that felt particularly long. Spending the night in the middle of a monster habitat, never knowing what might pop up from anywhere, made rest a luxury. One person guarded the cave entrance, while the other two simply took a brief nap to rest. Jeon Jungkook gently tapped my shoulder, telling me to rest, and I rose from my crouch at the entrance. The thuds of having remained in one position for so long made my body ache.
"Nothing happened?"
“Huh? Yeah. There doesn’t seem to be any monsters nearby.”
"That's fortunate,"
“Go in, it’s cold.” I replied, “Good work,” to Jeon Jungkook’s words, and walked into the cave. Near the campfire that Kim Taehyung had lit, I saw him curled up, lightly asleep. The thick blanket that Jeon Jungkook had probably been covering him with just a moment ago was lying on the other side. Thanks to Kim Taehyung, who had kept a blanket in his inventory, saying you never know what will happen to people, I was able to have a slightly warm night. I laid the blanket, which still had a little bit of Jeon Jungkook’s warmth, on the hard stone floor near the campfire and lay down.
Perhaps it was because I had spent such a spectacular day, but even though my whole body was covered in fatigue, I couldn't easily fall asleep. After tossing and turning for a while, I finally got up and threw some firewood I had gathered into the campfire. "Whew-," the blazing flames instantly engulfed the firewood. Perhaps because the crackling sound had suddenly grown louder, I heard Kim Taehyung, who was lying across from me, groan in his sleep. I watched him silently, then wrapped the blanket around my shoulders and walked away. The faint sound of my footsteps echoed within the cave.
Jeon Jungkook sat at the cave entrance, looking much the same as I had before. The dense forest was silent, save for the occasional eerie sound of the wind. Without saying a word, I sat down beside the rock where Jeon Jungkook was perched. I felt his eyes, which had been staring at the cave entrance, glance towards me.
“Why didn’t you come out without resting?”
"I can't sleep. Do you want to sleep a little more?"
“Okay, I’m not that tired either….”
"……."
"……."
Since we didn't say anything else, only silence flowed between us, but it wasn't uncomfortable. I gazed at the leaves swaying in the wind, then briefly leaned my head against Jeon Jungkook's arm. I could clearly feel him flinch, but I didn't straighten up. It felt like warmth was radiating from where we touched. Only after a long moment did I finally open my mouth.
“…I grew up with a single mother.”
I felt Jeon Jungkook's eyes widen and he looked at me at the sudden start of the story, but I continued talking without looking at him.
"Even though we weren't well off, I wanted to raise my daughter to the fullest, and he let me do almost anything I asked. Thanks to him, I experienced a lot of different things…"
"……."
"I've been to many camps, tried volleyball, basketball, table tennis, there's no sport I haven't tried... shooting was one of them."
“…Have you learned shooting?”
"Yeah, since my first year of middle school. That's why I was so happy when the system handed me a gun."
After that, I continued to babble, spouting off stories that came to mind. Most of them were stories from before I became "Yulia." Jeon Jungkook didn't react much, but he would occasionally chime in with, "Yeah, I see," to show he was listening.
“…Sometimes, when I think back on things like this before going to bed, the fact that I forgot my own name makes me feel so wronged.”
"……."
“You know, there are so many stories contained in that one name, I wonder how you could forget that….”
"It's not your fault."
"Right, it's not my fault. I just forgot my name, not my entire life."
The tone was strangely sharp. Jeon Jungkook must have sensed it, too. I felt his gaze, which had always been fixed on the lush forest, reach me. I didn't look at him. I rose from where I was leaning on his shoulder. I smoothed my slightly tangled hair, stood up, and halfheartedly brushed the dust off my pants. I looked at Jeon Jungkook. He was still looking at me.
"I'm not Julia."
"……."
"Even though I'm borrowing her body, it's clear that my essence is not Julia, and her life will never be mine."
“…Why,”
"Why are you saying this? That's something you need to think about carefully from now on, Jeon Jungkook."
"……."
"You are not Kylos Chesla von Crea."
The slightest sense of unease I felt from Jeon Jungkook was nothing more than a tiny suspicion that he might be forgetting that he was "Jeon Jungkook." When I first encountered him—his speech, his actions, his appearance—everything that was uncharacteristic of a crown prince—I simply dismissed it as "possible," but not anymore. He knew things that "Jeon Jungkook" couldn't know, and he couldn't think of things that "Jeon Jungkook" couldn't think of. He had become Kylos without even realizing it, and that wasn't good news for us at all.
"Think carefully about who you are."
With those words, I slowly moved away from Jeon Jungkook. Jungkook, who had been watching me walk out of the cave, didn't say anything like where I was going. He simply stared at me with a strangely complex look in his eyes, lost in thought.
/
"Wow, how many of these are there?"
I muttered, looking at the monster corpses strewn about in a mess. It was just a coincidence that I'd come this way. I hadn't even considered turning back, and after walking for a while, I stumbled upon the monster corpses Jeon Jungkook and Kim Taehyung had mangled. Only then did a little reality begin to creep back in. We were attending the academy, and it was our internship. Ultimately, I even realized that harvesting the nuclei from the monster corpses before me would affect my grades. Honestly, whether my grades were good or bad, I just needed to avoid being kicked out. But while I was at it, wouldn't it be better if I got high grades? I'd have the face to face Jin, too.
Pulling out the dagger I'd stowed in my inventory, I headed for the nearest monster's corpse. The thick hide seemed impenetrable, so I kicked the creature over, flipping it over. Even monsters have weaknesses, so instead of targeting the tougher skin near the back, I opted for the relatively weaker skin on the belly. The dagger, its sharp blue blade, sliced through the creature's flesh effortlessly. Extracting the core, located near the dantian, was now a skill I could do with my eyes closed.
“…Was this the original color?”
Surely he hadn't killed a mid-level monster. The creature that held the core was of a very weak species. I tilted my head. The core extracted from the monster had a strange color, and it seemed to glow strangely, as if a normal core had been bathed in moonlight. I held the core up in the air to get a better look. The core, bathed in moonlight, sparkled even more.
"It's pretty,"
It wasn't as sparkly as a jewel, but the soft moonlight it radiated was quite pretty. What exactly made it different from the other cores? I opened my inventory, wondering if I could compare them side by side. I pulled out a lavender monster core, and all I could do was let out a dumbfounded "Huh?"
“Why is this….”
The core of the monster I'd taken out also glowed softly, as if bathed in moonlight. I opened my closed inventory and pulled out the cores as they were. I didn't even need to examine them one by one. The moment I removed them from my inventory, they began to emit a soft glow.
‘Could this be…?’
I quickly opened the quest window. When I checked the quest window during the day, holding the Demon Core, the condition to find the medium hadn't been completed. But what if one of the conditions posed by that medium only applied during "night," not "day"? I quickly checked the [Conditions] in the quest window.
[Main Quest: Search]
Required Quest
[Main Quest: Cooperation]has been completed.
You have not met the entry requirements for the linked quest.
Related quests are automatically granted… .
Crea Empire: Begin searching the northern region.
.
.
.
[Condition 1]Find the 'medium'. (Complete)
[Condition 2]Find the 'source'.
[Condition 3]Conditional disclosure
"Crazy, I found it."
The monster's core was the medium.
I started running toward the cave, forgetting I had to extract the core from the monster's corpse. I clutched the glowing core in my hand. I must have come quite far without realizing it; the cave was quite a distance away. One thing I noticed while running, clutching the core in my hand, was that the closer I got to the cave, the brighter the light from the core grew. With that thought in my mind, I could easily clear Condition 2. I ran without stopping.
Still guarding the cave, Jeon Jungkook looked thoughtful. He knew it was because of what I'd said, and he felt a slight sense of awkwardness. But more importantly, the quest. Jeon Jungkook saw me approaching from afar, and his large eyes widened even further, staring at me.
“Don’t run, you’ll fall…!”
"I found it,"
Speaking of the medium, I showed Jeon Jungkook the monster core I was holding. Jeon Jungkook, who had been gazing at the monster core, which shimmered beautifully in the moonlight, quickly opened his quest window and confirmed the search quest. "Condition 1, completed?" I asked, and Jeon Jungkook nodded.
“But there was clearly no response earlier….”
"That's right, you're saying that when you checked the quest with the monster's core during the day, there was no response? That's the gist of it."
I pointed with my hand to the moon, floating round in the sky. The moon, a medium, only functions at night.
"And I think we might be able to find the second condition, the 'origin'."
"how?"
"When I extracted the monster's core in the forest over there, the light wasn't this bright. It was just a faint glow, but as I got closer to the cave, the light grew brighter."
"I guess there's something in the cave."
"that's right,"
Jeon Jungkook and I entered the cave without hesitation. I saw Kim Taehyung, fast asleep in front of the campfire. "Kim Taehyung, wake up." Jeon Jungkook shook him awake. Kim Taehyung's eyes snapped open the moment he touched me. Realizing it was us who woke him, he rubbed his eyes and sat up. "Why? Is it morning?" Hearing his tired voice, I showed Kim Taehyung the core of the monster. It was shining so brightly.
"The medium," Kim Taehyung muttered. He opened the quest window once, confirmed that [Condition 1] was completed, and then stood up completely. "The source?" I added a brief explanation to Kim Taehyung, who was mumbling about Condition 2.
"The source seems to be deep within that cave. The light inside the cave is brighter than it was outside."
After hearing my explanation, Kim Taehyung quickly got up. He seemed to have guessed why we'd woken him. While he picked up the blankets strewn across the floor and put them in his inventory, Jeon Jungkook and I put out the still-burning campfire.
The further I walked into the cave, the brighter the light became. What had once been a soft glow now illuminated the cave like a fluorescent light. I chuckled at Kim Taehyung's joke that I should've brought sunglasses if I'd known this would happen.
"Wait a minute, this is a dead end."
Kim Taehyung slowed his pace and spoke. He was right. The cave, where it should have been, had no further path. Nevertheless, Jeon Jungkook glanced at the monster's core, which was emitting even brighter light than before, and felt around the wall, searching for a small gap.
I examined the wall, flicking the core of the monster I was holding here and there. Something, something was off… My eyes, scanning the area near the wall, narrowed as I felt something was off. A crack, a very small crack, but it was definitely a crack. I raised my head along the long crack and tapped the wall near the crack. Something was off. I literally just 'tap tap' it, but a lot of stone crumbled out.
"It looks like someone artificially built this wall."
Kim Taehyung spoke. His gaze was fixed on the cave's ceiling. He tapped the wall with his fist, and as if waiting, a torrent of dust poured down. Jeon Jungkook, who had been searching for a hole on the other side where a person could fit, approached Kim Taehyung.
"Should I break it and go in?"
"I'll do it. Take Julia and stay away from her. She'll get hurt."
Jeon Jungkook said, pulling out his longsword. Wait, you're going to break this? At my shocked words, the two just shrugged their shoulders as if nothing was wrong. Is that possible? No, considering how you used to slay monsters, it seems possible... Kim Taehyung grabbed my arm and moved slightly away from Jeon Jungkook. Jeon Jungkook swung his sword after making sure that the distance was enough to avoid flying debris. The sound of the sword clashing with the wall rang out. Jeon Jungkook's sword that was touching the wall began to turn bright blue.
Sword energy, it was Jeon Jeong-guk's skill.
The wall crumbled with a loud "kwarur" sound, and it only lasted a moment. A huge cloud of dust flew up, obscuring my vision. I covered my face with my arms and squeezed my eyes shut. My eyes stung as the dust got into them.
The sound of something collapsing gradually died down. Now, the only sound I could hear was the thud of small rocks rolling around, so I pulled my arm away from my face. Beyond the dust, I could only gape, my mouth agape, as I gazed at the place hidden by the massive wall. Jeon Jungkook, who had been blocking the collapsing rubble with his Royal Guard, was speechless, staring beyond.
It was a sight that belied the cave setting. Above all, the trees flaunting their lush leaves nestled near the lake. A vast lake, so dark it was impossible to gauge its depth, but one thing caught our eye. Right in the center of the lake, a single, faintly glowing sphere of unknown identity.
[Main Quest: Search]
Required Quest
[Main Quest: Cooperation]has been completed.
You have not met the entry requirements for the linked quest.
Related quests are automatically granted… .
Crea Empire: Begin searching the northern region.
.
.
.
[Condition 1]Find the 'medium'. (Complete)
[Condition 2]Find the 'source'. (Complete)
"Found it," Kim Taehyung muttered. The core of the monster in his hand glowed madly.
[Condition 3]'Source'Protect yourself.
/
The quiet, thumping sound of footsteps echoed through the cave. A man with jet-black hair, who had been walking into the cave, looking around as if searching for something, suddenly stopped. Not far from the cave entrance, he gazed down at a pile of half-burned firewood and branches that looked like they had been picked up from the forest. He slowly raised his head. He stared into the empty space. Thin, jet-black smoke followed his gaze. Here? The man muttered quietly. Jet-black smoke swirled around him. It was a sign of approval.
“…You really came this far into the deep forest?”
The man, who had been looking down at the remains of the fire, turned. Someone was entering the cave entrance with cautious steps. "Found it," the man's quiet voice startled the light-brown-haired man who had entered the cave. "Really?" he asked, and a smile returned to his face. The man with jet-black hair walked to where Min Yoongi had stood, and a faint smile appeared as he observed the traces of the bonfire.
"It's true, it seems like he's already left."
"I didn't go out, I went inside."
"Huh? Inside the cave?"
"huh."
“There’s a strange noise coming from over there,” Min Yoongi said. The brown-haired man, Jung Hoseok, flinched at those words, trembling and taking a step closer to Min Yoongi. “Should I go in?” Min Yoongi walked, ignoring the terrified voice. His pace was slow, but his destination was clear. A fork in the road? On the right? A pile of rocks… , Ah, Jung Hoseok flinched at the sight of Min Yoongi muttering to the air, as if answering someone. It was a scene he’d seen countless times while searching this mountain, but as expected, he couldn’t get used to it. Jung Hoseok was startled by the distance between them that had suddenly grown, and he quickened his pace.
"Are you sure you went inside here?"
"I'm sure."
Min Yoongi answered. Jung Hoseok nodded at the confident tone. "Yes," he replied, leaving no room for doubt. They walked deeper and deeper into the cave.
A deep smile appeared on someone's face.
✨
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