The darkness was absolute, thick enough to choke on. In the silence, the skittering sounds from the ceiling grew into a cacophony of scratching metal.
"Emergency lights! Secure the corridor!" Director Kim shouted, his hand glowing with a golden mana.
He was an A-rank Hunter. Even without his main gear, the pressure he released was suffocating. But the shadows didn't retreat from his light. They absorbed it.
Clang.
A vent cover above Han Seol-ah's door tore open. A creature dropped down—it was small, the size of a child, but its body was a mess of jagged bone needles and rotted sinew. It had no eyes, only a vertical slit of a mouth filled with serrated teeth.
[Monster Identified: Bone-Scavenger (Rank D)][Note: They track the 'Mark of the King'.]
"Out of the way!" Director Kim roared. He threw a sphere of condensed light at the creature.
The blast should have vaporized it. Instead, the Scavenger split its torso in half, the light passing harmlessly through its hollow ribs. It landed on the wall and lunged—not at Kim, but at the door to Seol-ah's room.
"They aren't here for us," Kang-woo said, his voice cold. "They're here to finish the harvest."
Kang-woo moved. He didn't have his sword, but the 'Viper's Sense' was screaming at him, mapping the trajectories of the three other Scavengers emerging from the darkness.
He grabbed the metal IV stand and ripped the pole from its base.
[Skill: 'Grave Sovereign's Territory' (Suppressed) activated.]
He didn't let the black mist fill the room—it would expose him to Kim. Instead, he funneled the necrotic energy only into the metal pole. The steel turned a bruised black, humming with the weight of the souls he had consumed in the cave.
A Scavenger leaped at Kang-woo's throat.
Kang-woo swung. The pole didn't just hit the monster; it decayed the bone on contact. The creature shrieked as its skeletal structure turned to dust mid-air.
"You... that energy," Kim narrowed his eyes, even as he crushed another Scavenger's skull with his bare fist. "That's not Shadow Warrior mana."
"It's a variant," Kang-woo lied, his heart hammering. "Borrowed power. Ask questions after we're alive!"
They burst into Seol-ah's room.
Han Seol-ah was convulsing on the bed. The violet vein on her neck had spread to her cheek, glowing like a neon brand. A Scavenger was already perched on her chest, its needle-fingers inches from her eyes.
"Get off her!" Kang-woo threw the IV pole like a javelin.
The blackened steel pierced the monster's spine, pinning it to the headboard. The creature dissolved into foul-smelling smoke.
Kang-woo rushed to the bedside. He grabbed Seol-ah's hand. Her skin was ice-cold, but the mark on her neck was burning hot.
[The 'Mark' is attempting to summon a Greater Gate.][Suppression requires direct Soul-Link.]
"Kim! Keep them out!" Kang-woo yelled.
"What are you doing?"
"Saving her life! Just guard the door!"
Director Kim hesitated for a fraction of a second, then turned toward the hallway where a dozen more Scavengers were pouring in. "You better be right about this, kid."
Kang-woo looked at Seol-ah. Her eyes snapped open—they were entirely violet, the pupils gone.
"The King... sees... you..." she rasped, her voice not her own.
"Not today," Kang-woo hissed.
He leaned down and pressed his palm directly over the mark on her neck. He didn't use 'Harvest'. If he sucked her life force, she'd die. Instead, he used the 'Ring of the Usurper' to reverse the flow, using himself as a lightning rod for the curse.
[Initiating 'Curse Absorption'.][Warning: Your soul will be exposed to the King's Malice.]
A surge of pure, unadulterated hatred flowed into Kang-woo's arm. He saw flashes of a gray world, a throne of skulls, and an endless sea of kneeling dead.
"Who is this thief?" a voice boomed in the void of his mind.
Kang-woo bit his tongue until he tasted blood to keep from screaming. He didn't retreat. He pushed back. "My soul is collateral for the Grave, not your plaything!"
The violet glow on Seol-ah's neck began to fade, flowing into Kang-woo's hand.
Suddenly, the door to the room exploded inward. Director Kim was thrown across the room, his golden aura flickering out.
Standing in the doorway was a different kind of monster. It was human-shaped, wearing the white coat of a doctor, but its skin was translucent, showing the black worms crawling in its veins.
"The girl... is irrelevant," the Puppet-Doctor said, its voice multiple tones overlapping. "But you... you have the smell of the Usurper."
The Puppet raised a hand, and the floorboards beneath Kang-woo turned into grasping, skeletal hands.
Kang-woo was pinned to the bed. He couldn't move without breaking the link to Seol-ah. If he let go, she'd turn into a gate. If he stayed, the Puppet would take his head.
Seol-ah's hand suddenly gripped his wrist. Her eyes were returning to their normal color, filled with pain and clarity.
"Kang-woo... the bow..." she whispered.
She gestured to the floor where her broken, glass-like bow had been placed with her belongings. Even broken, it pulsed with a faint, holy light.
"Channel it," she gasped. "My mana... take it."
[Warning: Forbidden Synergy.][Merging Necrotic Power and Holy Radiance...]