Chapter 371

Jung Haseong focused on clearing the dungeon with extreme caution. By now, he was confident that he would not waver, no matter what kind of sweet temptation the dungeon placed before him. And judging by how quickly the man who had torn down his old room had joined him, it seemed his resolve was no different.

'The more I think about it, the more incredible his mental fortitude seems.'

Jung Haseong cast a single admiring glance at the hunter, whose expression remained as cold and composed as ever.

'Whoa, I found Haseong!'

Oh my. For a moment, I was genuinely startled, thinking I had lost the Earthling.

I had secretly reinforced him with all kinds of resistances, so there was no real need to worry. Still, once I had decided to protect a human, I could not help feeling uneasy whenever they slipped out of my sight.

It was around the time I reunited with the previously missing Jung Haseong. Beneath my perfectly composed expression, I was making quite a fuss internally. Being separated from the victim of my private tutoring scam, someone who absolutely could not be allowed to come to harm, had managed to fluster even a grand magician like me for a moment.

But the scattered tension quickly faded from my mind.

After all, finding the missing person had just been handled with magic.

'What kind of 'impenetrable' dungeon is this? Now that I've seen it for myself, the rescue setup is ridiculously sloppy!'

In this otherworldly space called 'Are You Happy?', the method of clearing the dungeon was hidden behind something so simple it was almost uninspired.

That much was obvious just from looking at the dungeon's layout.

To reveal only a small part of it, this place was even easier to escape than the lion-statue maze I had encountered early after my reincarnation.

'So rather than looking for some clever shortcut, we can just face it head-on.'

I walked along the path, checking every few seconds to make sure Jung Haseong had not disappeared from sight again.

But while my attention was focused in one direction, the black-haired hunter glanced toward the other side and spoke.

"Soccer balls."

Ah, come to think of it, I had not explained that yet.

"Could all those things over there really be soccer balls? Are they the same ones I'm thinking of?"

Jung Haseong's clear gaze was fixed on the northern side of the dungeon.

There, pristine soccer balls, the sort he had probably never kicked even once, lay scattered alongside yellow cushions.

And the group that usually used such objects was, in fact, already well known.

"This is where the police dog I'm holding was buried."

"Aha."

Even after that, the dungeon continued to reveal scenes that hardly resembled the lair of a monster.

"Huh? Hunter Kim? There's another missing person here--!"

A manifestation of happiness, huh.

Still, compared with other places crawling with monsters, perhaps this was the lesser evil.

A place where one could sleep wrapped in blankets carrying the scent of fabric softener.

A feast of delicacies someone earning a low wage could never even dream of affording.

And, most absurd of all, piles of gold and counterfeit banknotes that could not even be spent inside the dungeon.

Before long, we began finding the stranded Turks scattered among these various landscapes.

"What is this? A banknote?"

By the way, no hunter in their right mind would feel happy after receiving something like that.

Not when they still had not found the exit leading out of the dungeon.

Of that, I could be one hundred percent certain.

Which meant all of this was most likely evidence that this dungeon, too, was exploiting the [Confusion] status ailment.

In other words, it was like a dream.

Magic power smoothed over every contradiction and prevented the victim from questioning it.

Once a person's cognitive abilities were impaired by a status ailment, even tricks this shallow could deceive them with ease.

What year was it?

Why had they entered this place?

What had they come here to accomplish in the first place?

If someone forgot details like those, Jung Haseong probably would have remained in that room for quite a while.

"Hmm."

I tilted my head slightly in puzzlement.

But after thinking it over, I realized that the status ailments inflicted by this dungeon were not actually all that powerful.

"Excuse me. Everyone, wake up. Come to your senses."

Whoosh--.

Like a child playing in a bathtub, I pressed my palms together and shot a stream of water between them.

I began splashing cold water over people's heads to wake them up.

I did not carefully dispel the brainwashing magic, nor did I use some grand recovery spell.

And yet, even this cheap little water trick gradually brought people back to their senses.

That left me with a faint sense of doubt.

"Heuk!"

"Wh-where... is this...?"

"So now the main thing to watch out for in this dungeon is obvious. The [Confusion] status ailment it inflicts is low-level. Someone like Seo Esther, with the proper attributes and sheer capacity, probably wouldn't even feel it."

By my rough calculations, even an A-rank should have been capable of noticing the inconsistencies in such a flimsy illusion without much difficulty.

So how on earth had an S-rank from Türkiye, someone standing at the very top, ended up stranded here?

"Something about this feels strange."

For reference, the rescue work we carried out throughout the dungeon was hardly worth explaining in detail.

Jung Haseong and I simply rescued, and then rescued again, the Earthlings who had become lost in their various forms of happiness.

"Aaaah! Leave me alone! I'll just stay here! I'm never going back to a world overflowing with monsters and swindlers!"

Whenever someone rebellious like this appeared, I gave them a choice.

"Have you eaten anything inside this dungeon?"

I calmly informed the raging missing person of the reality of their situation.

"What?"

"Just so you know, monsters born inside dungeons are often inedible."

"You... you can speak Turkish...? Ah, a translator?"

"The ecosystem may look convincing, but if you examine most monsters closely, their source of energy is nothing more than magic stones. They're basically batteries--chunks of rock."

***

"So unless a monster was deliberately designed to be useful, its flesh is usually of no benefit to us in the first place."

"What exactly are you trying to say?"

"But do you really think creatures that produce cold flesh can somehow turn it into proper food?"

If they still insisted on remaining here after all that persuasion, things became a little more complicated.

"Don't trust the food here too much."

"Heuk."

"It may taste good and fill your stomach for now, but if you tried to live on nothing but this, you'd definitely run into problems."

"U, ugh...?"

"For reference, those of you who were just indulging yourselves don't need to worry too much. I'm talking about eventually dying from nutritional imbalance, not dropping dead from some immediate poison."

Were they really willing to die for the bliss this dungeon offered?

When I asked them that, not a single person nodded.

"No, I lost my head for a moment. I'm sorry. I really do need to find a way out of here."

Since most of them were still young, they could not afford to throw their entire lives away for a fleeting moment of pleasure.

Whenever we rescued another raider, Jung Haseong handed them a status ailment recovery potion to keep them from falling back into confusion.

"Looks like it's about time to retrieve the last survivor."

As we continued searching the dungeon like this, we were fortunate enough to finally encounter the last person on the missing-person list provided by the Turkish government.

Yes.

It turned out that the original raider, the S-rank hunter, had survived after all.

"Gasp!"

"Ah... That person..."

Hahaha, hahahaha.

By the way, could the laughter we had been hearing all this time have belonged to this mammal?

Standing before us was a man with such thick hair that one might assume he would never have to worry about baldness, laughing heartily.

Görkem.

He was an S-rank hunter from Türkiye.

From what I had heard, however, he was not quite at the level of representing his entire nation the way Jung Haseong did.

"I did a quick search on the internet before coming here."

"Haha."

If I had to compare him to something, he resembled a Doberman Pinscher.

He had stern, solid features, yet here this middle-aged man was, practically sprawled out inside the dungeon.

At the moment, he was resting his head on the thigh of an elderly stranger.

And as for the illusion he had become so deeply immersed in--well, I already knew exactly who they were, having seen them more than enough times through video calls.

"This is the couple who'll give me 5 billion won."

But the S-rank hunter's family was clearly still alive outside.

I questioned the situation only briefly.

Setting aside why he had been deceived by an illusion that was so obviously false, I first created a small ripple, just as I had done with Jung Haseong, so that we could communicate smoothly.

"Could he be deceiving himself even without a status ailment affecting him?"

Originally, I had planned to attack the illusion with the water and see how the brainwashed man reacted.

"No, that's not it. He's genuinely resisting."

But there was no need to conduct any further test.

The answer became obvious immediately.

Despite possessing such tremendous magical power, the S-rank hunter from Türkiye was genuinely immersed in the dungeon's illusion.

When I tried to attack his parents--or, more precisely, the illusions of them--the hunter reacted at once.

He rose to his feet and even attempted to use a skill to block the wave.

"So he specializes in manipulating metal, huh."

Fortunately, however, there was no need to fight the foreign powerhouse.

"--Clank!"

I expertly splashed the water I had prepared over his head, and the sudden cold shock soon brought the S-rank hunter back to his senses.

"Sir, are you coming to your senses?"

***

"Can you understand what I'm saying in your native language?"

The startled man froze in place for a moment.

While he was still gathering his wits, I quietly whispered to Jung Haseong beside me.

"It looks like the status ailment has been removed. But if he charges at us again, Haseong, do you think you can handle him?"

"Oh, yes. I understand."

"Thank you. This is what teamwork is all about."

Well, as for me...

I do not have the money to pay an assault settlement.

"According to Kim Goryeo's basic knowledge, it seems that even firefighters on this planet can be sued while carrying out their duties. So naturally, a hunter's immunity wouldn't be absolute either..."

The remark slipped out, nine parts serious and one part joking, as I worried about my assets being diminished.

Around that time, the hero of South Korea, who had been waiting beside me, somehow seemed to brighten upon hearing it.

"You, Korea?"

At last, the S-rank hunter at the center of the situation spoke.

"I don't know your name, but you're a famous hunter."

Yeah, well.

I'm not particularly good at remembering the names of foreign hunters either, so I suppose that makes us even.

"Hello. We are Awakened who came to assist at the request of the Turkish government."

"I... I haven't even managed to clear the dungeon yet, and you're saying you came here to help without knowing the strategy?"

"It wouldn't be entirely accurate to say we know nothing. But that's not the issue right now."

Still, I would have been disappointed if the man continued pretending ignorance even after I brought this up.

"How on earth did you fail to mention the negative effects of this place? As Jung Haseong and I just experienced ourselves, this gate shouldn't be capable of deceiving even an S-rank hunter."

For reference, roughly half of what I had just said was a lie.

The archmage was exempt because of the sheer caliber of his soul.

And as for Jung Haseong, before entering the dungeon, I had secretly reinforced him with protective magic in case anything went wrong inside an EX-rank gate.

That was why the two of us had been fine.

But would things really have turned out differently without those factors?

Not at all.

As implied by the fact that only half of my statement was false, this dungeon was weak enough that even an A-rank mental-type magician could achieve complete immunity.

"Of course, according to the strategy I've worked out, that's precisely why Seo Esther shouldn't be here."

But that doubt was quickly resolved.

"It's time."

"What?"

"When I first entered this dungeon, yes, I remembered everything perfectly. I was even relaxed enough to scoff at this ridiculous thing for taking the form of my parents."

The raider began to explain.

"But as I kept watching what they were doing, at some point the sense that something was wrong started to fade. Eventually, I completely stopped thinking of anything in this place as fake. It's time. Exposure time--that's the problem!"

That was indeed a plausible explanation.

In this case, I could point to a primitive man named Su Yahei as an example.

Magic that interfered with the mind generally became more powerful the longer its target remained exposed to it.

But...

"Wait a moment. If you knew from the beginning that they were fake, why did you just stand there and watch them?"

At the question, the hunter before us hesitated for a moment before finally answering.

"Because it's a paradise."

"Yes?"

"Well, I didn't notice exactly when everyone else came in, but with so many challengers having attempted this place already, the dungeon's rules must be obvious by now. It shows us whatever will tempt us most--whatever makes us happy. So what I'm saying is..."

"Those fake figures combing your hair... were they showing you something you'd always wanted?"

"It's a little embarrassing to admit now that I'm a grown man."

The rescued S-rank hunter spoke with a complicated expression.

"But now that there's no point hiding it, I'll be honest. Ever since I was a child, my parents somewhat neglected me, so I've always had a bit of a complex about affection... I suppose that's why I couldn't keep my head in front of such kind versions of them."

He had received little attention from his parents since childhood.

But by this point, there were a few small details in his story that required correction.

"Uh, for people who supposedly don't care about their son, they certainly burned through their assets in a spectacular way..."

"Yes?"

"To explain, the fundamental reason I came to this gate was actually because of a certain article. Outside, your parents offered what I believe was a reward of 100 million Lira to hire a mercenary. More precisely, they made the incident public as a request to rescue their son and bring him home."

The S-rank hunter from Türkiye stared at me in shock.

"That's impossible! There's no way they would spend that kind of money on me, someone who might already be dead..."

Their relationship was apparently so poor that he had needed a dungeon illusion to experience parental affection.

And yet an ordinary couple had been willing to sell off practically all their assets just to raise 5 billion won?

"Those miserable parents who only ever cared about business... really did that for a son they'd lost contact with?"

"Go outside and see for yourself."

It seemed as though a touching moment was unfolding.

But sorry.

The protagonist here is a mammal of uncertain disposition, so emotional synchronization is impossible.

The only thing I could tell was that, at the very least, the S-rank hunter would follow us without requiring any further persuasion.

So I immediately turned my attention toward wrapping up the incident.

"Hmm."

Ssshk.

My gaze stopped midway as I looked up at the dungeon ceiling.

A feeding box for space travelers, seemingly built with human happiness in mind.

Taken at face value, this space might even seem pleasant.

But considering everything we had learned, this was a gate where a lone B-rank hunter or anyone weaker had a one hundred percent chance of dying.

Therefore, the best course of action was to deal with this place immediately rather than foolishly leave it alone.

And yet the method for clearing the gate that had just occurred to me was, of all things, that kind of method.

"Well, anyway, since we've found all the survivors, let's clear it now."

"Oh, I'd like to, but I still haven't figured out the condition for opening the exit..."

"I'll take care of it."

This gate contained nothing but simple, benevolent illusions.

And besides, pain was the fastest antidote to bliss.

"Unlike other EX-rank dungeons that demand grueling hardships, this place simply considers the dungeon cleared once its condition has been fulfilled."

What a half-hearted feeding box.

"Are these things Gainche, or just trap fishermen?"

The method for breaking through this space, where there were no traps, no hidden mechanisms, and no monsters whatsoever, was exactly as simple as expected.

"Gates that are excessively safe like this usually collapse once you deliberately let yourself get caught in the trap."

"Yes?"