At the top floor of the Hunter Association Headquarters in South Korea, five powerful individuals sat around a polished oval table, the atmosphere heavy with concern.
Go Gun-Hee, the Chairman, leaned forward with a grim expression.
His voice cut through the silence like a blade.
"It's already been a full day since the D-rank dungeon mutated… and then vanished. Are there any updates, Jin-Chul?"
Woo Jin-Chul, standing at attention beside the table, lowered his eyes.
"Unfortunately, sir, nothing has changed. We dispatched the two guilds responsible for managing that area, but as of now, the dungeon remains missing. Its disappearance is still without explanation."
The silence that followed was strained, until it was broken by Min Byung-Gyu, who looked uncharacteristically uneasy.
"Shouldn't we… at least consider bringing in outside help? A spatial mage? A dungeon researcher?"
"There were important people inside. That girl, Lee Joo-Hee, she was said to have entered just before it vanished, wasn't she?"
Across the table, Choi Jong-In and Baek Yoon-Ho exchanged glances, their expressions unreadable.
Choi Jong-In slowly pushed his glasses up, narrowing his eyes behind the lenses.
'How coincidental,' he thought, '... for that dungeon to mutate and disappear the moment she stood near it… especially right after reawakening. Something isn't adding up. I hope I'm just overthinking things.'
Baek Yoon-Ho leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, his wolf-like eyes filled with quiet frustration.
'What a waste… If that girl dies in there, we lose everything. The secret to her reawakening, such information is highly sought after, and any answers she might have are beyond helpful in unlocking the mystery of second awakening.'
Even Go Gun-Hee found his mind drifting.
He interlocked his fingers, resting his elbows on the table, eyes half-lidded but sharp with thought.
'That girl… she told me she could heal me. She knew about my illness. But Jin-Chul wouldn't have leaked that. No one should know… How?'
'And if she dies in that dungeon—'
He clenched his fists slightly.
'—then I may never know the truth.'
The room stayed silent for a moment longer, each man deep in his own calculations, questions, and quiet dread.
The mutation of a low-rank dungeon was already a rare and troubling phenomenon, often a prelude to a devastating dungeon break. But this time… it was different.
This was the first time in the history of South Korea, no—of the entire world—that a dungeon was reported to have vanished completely after displaying signs of mutation.
The five key figures continued their tense discussion, weighing their options and contingency plans. The situation had spiraled beyond protocol.
Jin-Chul had already received explicit orders from Chairman Go Gun-Hee.
"Keep this off the media's radar. The last thing we need is a public panic."
The chairman's voice had been cold and steady, his authority absolute.
To make things worse, Han Ji-Hoon, the Association's spatial mage, and Chae Hae-In, one of Korea's top hunters, had already been deployed to respond to an urgent A-rank dungeon on the eastern coast.
With very few other options, the Association could only resort to consulting dungeon researchers and scholars for insight.
As the meeting adjourned, the room gradually emptied, leaving only Go Gun-Hee and Jin-Chul behind.
The Chairman stood in silence, his hands clasped behind his back as he gazed out the panoramic window overlooking Seoul, its cityscape peaceful, unaware of the potential crisis brewing beneath it.
"Jin-Chul," he said quietly, his voice barely above a murmur, "... if anything changes, report to me immediately. No delays."
Jin-Chul nodded.
"Understood, Chairman."
But then, Go Gun-Hee added something else. Something unexpected.
"That healer girl... Lee Joo-Hee. She knows about my illness."
Jin-Chul's eyes widened in disbelief.
"W-What…?! Chairman, I swear on my life—I've never told a soul. I would never—"
The Chairman held up a hand, silencing him with a faint smile.
"I know you wouldn't. I trust you, Jin-Chul."
"But her knowing... despite the fact that I've never gone to a hospital, never had a formal diagnosis—"
His voice grew cold, his expression unreadable.
"It's beyond suspicious."
Go Gun-Hee turned away from the window and looked Jin-Chul dead in the eye.
"Her existence… it's been a mystery ever since she emerged from that Double Dungeon. This is now the second incident she's involved in—both tied to dungeon irregularities."
He paused, then said with quiet finality:
"If she ever comes back... investigate her thoroughly."
Jin-Chul straightened and nodded sharply.
"Noted, sir."
The air in the room was heavy with silent questions of fate, power, and secrets far deeper than the Hunter Association had ever prepared for.
...
Due to the disturbances caused by Joo-Hee, the Hunter Association found itself overwhelmed, redirecting its focus and manpower almost entirely toward the vanishing dungeon anomaly.
With the top guilds and officers deeply entangled in the investigation, Jin-Woo's dungeon expeditions became smoother than ever.
Fewer eyes. Less scrutiny. No interference.
In a certain dungeon, its halls now littered with piles of monster corpses, Jin-Woo stood atop the mound, blades dripping and steam rising from the gore below. He glanced around, surveying the aftermath, then narrowed his eyes slightly.
"Why are my ears... tingling?" he muttered, brushing his hair back with a faint scowl. "How odd."
For a moment, he stood still—his instincts twitching like a predator sensing something just out of reach. Then he shrugged.
"Whatever. Doesn't matter."
With a fluid motion, he leapt from the pile and landed on the ground with a low thud, the impact cracking the stone slightly beneath his boots.
"Jinho. I'm done here."
Yoo Jinho, ever the loyal second-in-command, raised a thumb and beamed proudly.
"Yes, Boss!"
He then began methodically harvesting essence stones from the monsters' corpses, whistling slightly to himself as he worked. The two of them moved in sync, efficient and relaxed.
Neither of them knew that the winds of fate stirred quietly behind them.
...
While Jin-Woo was cruising through dungeons with ease, Lee Joo-Hee, on the other hand, was caught in a situation akin to sitting on a ticking bomb.
Her breaths came in ragged gasps, chest heaving as she leaned on a bloodied sword. Her arms trembled, her uniform soaked in sweat and flecks of gore.
She muttered hoarsely, voice laced with fatigue and resentment, "These bastards... they're not even letting me rest for a second."
A green notification flickered in front of her eyes:
[You have killed a D+ Rank Goblin Thief.]
[You have gained 101 Experience.]
[You have reached Level 14!]
[You have gained enough proficiency. Nature Resonance has reached Level 3.]
She barely read through it, waving it away with a tired flick of her hand before stumbling against a nearby tree—the only one not stained in blood.
All around her, corpses of goblins littered the ground, their bodies tangled in roots, impaled on branches, crushed under vines, or torn apart by explosive plant mutations.
Some had been cleanly decapitated by her sword. Others were pierced through by bamboo-like purple roots, while a few suffered grotesque deaths—mutated arrows impaling multiple targets at once, bodies bursting from within, and limbs scattered in mangled disarray.
She collapsed against the bark, eyes half-lidded, and pulled out her phone with a trembling hand.
"When will this end...? I've been fighting nonstop for almost an hour now!"
She gritted her teeth and checked the time.
"I've even lost count of how many I've killed already… and I only have 11 hours left. If I don't finish this…"
Her voice trailed off. She didn't need to say it out loud. She'd seen what happened to the others.
"Open quest," she commanded mentally.
A notification popped up:
_______________________
[Freedom of Goblin Macabre]
Total Goblins Killed: (218/10,000)
Time Remaining: 11 hours, 16 minutes, 31 seconds
_______________________
Instead of feeling accomplished, a bitter frustration twisted her gut.
"Only 218… during that whole time? What a waste. At this rate, I'll never finish this quest..."
Her fingers dug into the dirt beside her as she closed the panel.
"Status window!" she mentally commanded, teeth clenched.
Her body was shaking—not just from physical exhaustion, but from the weight of the impossible task ahead.
As the Status Window popped up before her eyes, filled with numbers and growth that would have excited her on any other day, Joo-Hee couldn't even focus.
Instead, her mind drifted, unbidden, to what had happened just under an hour ago.