Episode 152 [ Cleaning – 1 ]
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The Hope Guild members in the Hidden Stage were standing at the end of the huge cavity.
It looked like they were huddled together like cornered cats, unable to get out.
The reason was because a black dragon was crouching about 100 meters away.
An entity that freezes players with just its atmosphere without any movement…
“Huh… dragon… wouldn’t it be a big deal if it wakes up?”
One of the guild members let out a voice of concern. I wasn’t unaware of the fact that Lee Hyeon-wook had attacked the black dragon earlier, but suddenly encountering a dragon in such a narrow place was a completely different situation. If that guy were to emit dragon breath… there was no way to avoid it. Isn’t there absolutely no space?
But……
“…at first glance, it looks like it’s already dead?”
Park Jun-mo whispered next to him. As he said, the dragon didn’t show any movement.
And Lee Hyun-wook’s eyes – the Insight Lens – couldn’t detect anything.
And most importantly, there was a sword stuck in its back. It looked like it was dead without it.
‘If that kind of sword isn’t a popular accessory among dragons, it’s already dead.’
As he got a little closer, Lee Hyun-wook was able to check the sword’s information with the Insight Lens.
“Huh…”
[Item Information]
– Name: Balmung (Legendary)
– Effect
1) Bond of Pain: Embracing numerous vengeful spirits. The sword’s mere presence imposes a ‘curse’ on the area.
* If you can endure this curse and suppress the vengeful spirits, the true power of the sword is unlocked.
3) Dragon Slayer: With the power to kill dragons, you can use some of the dragon’s power. ‘ Ignore it.
Balmung was known as the favorite sword of Siegfried, the protagonist of the Germanic epic [Song of the Nibelungen]. And it is identified with ‘Gram’ in [Nordic mythology] and ‘Nothung’ in [The Ring of the Nibelungen]. ‘…
and He is the most famous dragon slayer who kills the evil dragon Fafnir in Norse mythology.’
In that case, it was not unreasonable to assume that the black dragon was the famous ‘Fafnir’, but
in Lee Hyun-wook’s memory, Fafnir appeared in Melbourne, Australia four years later and devastated Australia.
‘At that time, Edward Woods mobilized this Balmung and Take [unique compatibility] and attack him.’
Like the [Gnome Ruins A3] that I entered in the past, there was not a single entrance to the ‘Hidden Stage’.
Multiple dungeons with similar themes shared one hidden stage.
In other words, Edward Woods in his previous life entered another dragon labyrinth. It seemed as if the entrance to this place had been found.
In that sense, the nameless dragon was a decoration and additional reward for Balmung.
‘Anyway, I don’t know when he died, but he looks so clean as if he’s just sleeping?’
In the first place, the corpse of a being the size of a dragon could not have easily decayed.
In other words, it was preserved in very good condition, so its value as a material was considerable.
‘And if this happens… you’ve killed two dragons, right?’
Gray dwarves and blacksmiths were currently researching how to use Aji Dahaka.
As it is an adult dragon, it was expected that hundreds of ‘dragon equipment’ could be produced.
Regarding this, one expert said that Lee Hyun-wook ‘captured the entire aircraft carrier . It was likened to ‘sem’
, meaning that the value that can be extracted from a single adult dragon is astronomical.
At that time, a guild member who was closest to the black dragon’s corpse clutched his chest.
“—Ugh!”
He stepped back, complaining in pain, and hurriedly ran towards the priest.
Everyone stopped at his urgent movements, like a person on fire running towards water.
“What is this!” A curse suddenly appeared! “Let me loose this!”
Everyone couldn’t help but look puzzled at those words.
“what?”
I was cursed out of nowhere… wasn’t there any sign of this?
However, the moment Lee Hyun-wook took one step forward, he was also cursed.
– caution! You have fallen into Balmung’s Curse ‘Bridle of Pain (Level 1)’.
* All healing effects are temporarily reduced. (-10%)
* Bleeding occurs temporarily in various parts of the body.
* Mental power temporarily decreases, causing hallucinations and auditory hallucinations.
In addition, many players who were in the same line began to complain of pain.
“Lee Hyun-wook, do you see that sword? The curse is flowing from there.”
It was Seo-eun who said that. As a Holy Knight, she sensed the black energy emanating from the sword.
“Stop—”
Lee Hyun-wook said, raising his hand, and the guild members hesitated and stepped back.
“What is it?”
With the dragon in front of him, his fear of the unknown phenomenon could not help but grow stronger.
Lee Hyun-wook looked down at the translucent shimmer encroaching on his entire body and then turned to Seo Eun-ha.
“Captain Seo, can you apply a healing effect to me? ? “I will draw that sword.”
Seo Eun-ha did not hide her worried expression at Lee Hyun-wook’s words.
“…Even though it is this far away, if it is this cursed, it is impossible to use that sword directly.”
But enduring that curse was Balmung’s ‘over handicap’.
“As long as I take ownership of that sword, I can handle it without having to wield it myself.”
Balmung is also metal, so Lee Hyun-wook was able to ‘control’ the sword while away from the cursed area.
According to Balmung’s item information, new skills are unlocked if you overcome the curse.
However, Lee Hyun-wook cannot overcome that curse, so he You won’t be able to acquire new skills.
‘But with this wide-area curse effect, you can use it like a kind of biochemical weapon.’
Having such a tricky and strange over-handicap was actually a good thing for Lee Hyun-wook.
‘From now on, if I put that thing in the middle of the enemy lines and enter the battle, it will be quite advantageous…’
Thinking like that, Lee Hyun-wook grabbed the tail of the black dragon corpse . I stepped on it and went up the back…
“Pfft!”
– Caution! I fell into Balmung’s Curse ‘Bridle of Pain (Level 2)’.
* All healing effects are temporarily reduced. (-30%) )
* Bleeding occurs temporarily in various parts of the body.
* Mental power temporarily decreases, causing hallucinations and auditory hallucinations.
* Body strength temporarily decreases. (-30%)
The closer you get to it, the more the concentration of the curse increases. It gets darker.
‘If I were to touch it directly or get stabbed like this… it would be huge, right?’
Lee Hyun-wook wrapped his entire body in steel boots and carefully stretched out his hand.
And the moment he finally grabbed Balmung’s handle—
– Caution! He fell into Balmung’s curse ‘Bridle of Pain (Level 3)’.
* All healing effects are temporary . (-40%)
* ‘Heavy’ bleeding occurs temporarily in various parts of the body.
* Mental power is temporarily ‘drastically’ reduced, causing hallucinations and auditory hallucinations.
* Temporarily, the body’s strength ‘drastically’ decreases. ‘ decreases. (-50%)
* All abilities decrease due to ‘evil spirit restraint’. (-20%)
Go—oh—oh—oh——
Black ghosts rise from the sword as if possessed by a ghost, Hyeonuk Lee. They surrounded the surroundings.
Uhhhh——Giggles——Kyakyakya——
They came closer as if they could smell Lee Hyun-wook and wrapped themselves around his entire body.
Every time they did that, the rigid skin oxidized with a clicking sound and the joints of the bones cracked. I felt a tingle.
I felt a sense of tightness and pressure, as if my whole body had been wrapped around by a huge anaconda.
‘Ugh… I heard it was a cursed sword that brought the death of its owner several times in the epic….’
Perhaps all kinds of vengeful spirits reside in it. It seemed like the setup was to have such a strong curse.
A curse so strong that it could even eat its owner… You had to overcome this to be able to use Balmung’s power.
– (!) Caution! You do not have the strength to withstand this curse!
However, Lee Hyun-wook seemed to have no conditions to overcome it and had no intention of overcoming it anyway.
‘I just have to take it somehow!’
Blood flowed from his eyes and nose, and even internal bleeding occurred, bursting out of his mouth.
“Damn it, Lee Hyun-wook!” The curse is too strong! “Stop it now!”
Not only Seo Eun-ha but also the priests of the Hope Guild rushed in and continued to heal.
Lee Hyun-wook’s body quickly collapsed, but he was barely able to hold on with their help.
“Ugh——”
He gritted his teeth, concentrated the strength that was gradually escaping into his left hand, and pulled it out.
Blink—!
Soon, the sword body that was stuck in the dragon’s skin was pulled out. Then, an even deeper curse flowed out, crawled up Lee Hyun-wook’s arm like a snake, and turned into a green hand, grabbing the nape of his neck.
Wow!
“No! Let go quickly and then you die!”
Seo Eun-ha approached and shouted. She could sense that Lee Hyun-wook’s body was being destroyed.
Following a whopping 3 levels of curse, multiple evil spirits attached themselves and inflicted continuous damage.
‘—I can still hold on!’
At that time, an AD-2 flew behind Lee Hyun-wook.
“Pff—!”
He lifted Balmung with difficulty and threw it into the lower part of the AD-2—into subspace.
Ugh——
At that moment, the curse of Balmung that had been weighing down the entire area disappeared as if evaporating.
Cheeeeeeee….
Hyunwook Lee, who had grabbed Balmung, Black smoke rose from his left hand.
“…Lee Hyun-wook, are you okay?”
Seo Eun-ha came closer and squeezed out the mana to give him strength.
“Yes… I got through it well thanks to you all.”
Every inch of his body still ached, but Lee Hyun-wook was able to endure this much.
He turned his head and calmly said to the guild members who were looking up at him.
“Now that the threat has been eliminated, let’s begin the search in earnest.”
The Hope Guild members looked blank for a moment, but soon got used to it and started working.
Such a sudden crisis and sudden solution… this was not the first time for the members of the Hope Guild.
After a while, I found a small box on one side of my wide pupil, and there was something inside it.
[Item Information]
– Name: Black Dragon’s Sari (Legendary)
– Effect: Grants the ‘Black Dragon’s Power’ to the item.
‘This is an orb that can contain acid properties, and it even reaches legendary level…’
Without thinking, it seemed appropriate to bestow this on the Balmung I had just obtained.
‘Wait a minute, but can blacksmiths handle Balmung?’
Just being nearby was a curse, so the work wouldn’t go smoothly.
‘I guess they’ll figure it out…’
But I believed that those who worked tirelessly to turn the impossible into the possible would do well.
“Boss, no matter how you look at it, it must weigh thousands of tons. How are we going to carry it out?”
Lee Jeong-jun asked, pointing to the black dragon. Lee Hyun-wook was also thinking about it at the same time. I
honestly doubted whether it would be possible to drag that massive being of 67 meters outside.
The first method that came to mind was, of course, an ’emergency return’ to Laputa using Prydwen. However,
because this was a ‘dungeon’ in a different dimension from the real world, spatial movement skills were limited.
“…I think we need to drag him outside first.”
Lee Hyun-wook used all the available metal to weave wire to tie the body of the black dragon, then made a wide iron plate that could hold the entire dragon, and attached several sturdy wheels to it. If this large ‘pull car’ could hold up, the Living Armorers would be able to drag it out somehow.
While Lee Hyun-wook was doing the work, the Hope Guild members worked on covering the stairs with iron plates.
“Huh… The overall height of the labyrinth is high and it’s wide, so I think I’ll be able to get through it easily.”
After a while, Living Armor 45 grabbed the wire rope and pulled the ‘pull truck’…
Kugugugu——
The super-large steel puller carrying the 67m long dragon began to slowly move forward.
“Oh— It’s okay!”
“Wow, this works?”
Next, Lee Hyeon-wook gave the pull car itself metal control and gave it strength, and it ran better than expected.
‘This is the end. There is nothing more to be gained from this.’
In this way, the exploration of the labyrinth was completely completed.
And from now on…
‘…it is time to respond to terrorism.’
***
At that time, two men were sitting in the VIP lounge of a hotel in Suwon.
“Hey, what should we do if CEO Lee is still going back and forth! huh?”
The man in the suit who said that was Hwang Yeon-soo, head of the Joint Operations Department at the Guild Support and Cooperation Office, and the middle-aged man wearing glasses he was facing was Lee Taek-su, the master of [Baekho], the largest guild in the southern region of Gyeonggi-do.
And the Baekho Guild was a fairly large force that rose to third place in the domestic guild rankings after the Taesan Guild collapsed.
“Haha… Director Hwang, is it because I’m getting older and less energetic? I’ve been worrying about it for a while.”
“No, Director Woo, are you still upset after seeing that person blow up the Taesan guild? If our director wins the presidential election, there will never be an atrocity in the future where a guild is destroyed like that.”
At those words, Lee Taek-soo licked his dry lips and avoided Hwang Yeon-soo’s gaze.
“Well, it’s not that we should go according to our wishes, but we should just say hello to our chief often, and the chief is slowly feeling sad. Are you really close with Director Woo?”
In response to that question, Taeksu Lee waved his hand.
“A—ay—of course I’m not saying that I like Director Woo either! You know what I mean, right?”
“Ah… Our CEO Lee, are you still scared of Director Woo? So, is that so?”
At that question, Lee Taek-su cleared his throat.
The consensus in the player world was that this man, Hwang Yeon-soo, would become the next key figure in power. They are trying to overthrow Oh Tae-moon, the head of the Guild Support Office, who is currently the strongest presidential candidate, and take Woo Seong-moon’s place.
But how many political players have been aiming for that position so far? In the end… Woo Seong-moon, the first director, had been sitting there for over a dozen years. Woo Seong-moon had such a strong image.
“To be honest, Director Woo, didn’t you say that the old tiger’s teeth were slowly shaking a few years ago? But didn’t you pick up a baby tiger named Lee Hyun-wook from somewhere and start dancing with his sword again? I trust Deputy Director Hwang, but honestly… how many family members do I have? Huh? It’s a lie to say I’m not worried…”
Then Hwang Yeon-su giggled and snapped his fingers.
“Good! Do you think you can instill that confidence today?”
“Oh… why? Is something big happening?”
“Well, CEO, let’s turn on the TV for a moment. It has a remote control.”
Then Lee Taek-soo picked up the remote control that was on top of the newspaper and turned on the TV news.
– …Soon, Lee Hyun-wook, who has finished conquering the labyrinth, will appear in front of the camera.
“Oh, there. There will be new news soon.”
At those words, Lee Taek-su’s eyes turned into surprised rabbit eyes.
“Director Hwang… did you plan this for Lee Hyun-wook to send you?”
“huh? What does that mean? “I don’t know.”
“Oh, that’s right! Anyway, did I say nonsense?”
In response to Hwang Yeon-soo’s joke, Lee Taek-soo tapped his mouth and waved his hand.
“CEO Lee, you have no idea how things will turn out in the world.”
He said that and sank into the sofa.
“And no matter how genius you are, if you don’t know what’s going on in the world, you’re just a kid.”
The biggest problem in taking power in this country was no longer Woo Seong-moon.
That pale young player was controlling this country and possibly the world.
He was planning to end that bastard today and take away everything that bastard had. ***
Stillane He finally came out of the labyrinth. Click
—
click—click—click—
“Mr. Lee Hyun-wook, did you succeed in conquering the labyrinth?”
“Hey, please just say one thing!”
A foreign reporter wearing a bowler hat escaped from the huge number of reporters chasing Lee Hyun-wook.
“Ha—pressing the shutter is harder than pressing the trigger? Are the Jenny cleaners ready?”
He mumbled in a low voice, and a voice came through the earphones in his ears.
– We are now 300 meters away. We will arrive in about 3 minutes.
The truck carrying the ‘City Cleaner’, the secret weapon to counter Lee Hyun-wook, is in another area. He was waiting in and returning here. It was a natural movement to avoid any possible surveillance.
“Okay, the first priority is to tie up the trash so it doesn’t fly away.”
As he said that, he pressed the shutter towards Lee Hyun-wook, who was visible from a distance.
“Link starts now.”
At that moment, a female reporter threw away her camera and took out a wand from her bosom.
The moment she swung the wand towards Hyun-wook Lee, her entire left hand flew off.
Ta— ang——! Hyun-
wook Lee was hiding somewhere. The sniper on guard reacted quickly.
But she wasn’t the only one. Two more reporters moved, and soon…
Z—!
The link magic shot from somewhere exploded above Lee Hyun-wook’s head, and cold air poured down. .
Blah blah blah——!
In an instant, the entire side of Paldalsan Mountain was frozen like an ice age. The target was definitely Lee Hyun-wook. His figure was covered by a wall of ice and disappeared, but that alone couldn’t have killed him. That was just a waste of time. “Now—Mana Station Field
. Hit!”
At that cry, his camouflaged subordinates stepped forward and took out wands.
Zung—Zung—Zeng—Zeng——!
The purple rays of light they shot stretched toward the sky and tangled with each other.
– A ‘multidimensional net’ is formed in the area. (Time Remaining: 00:09:59)
Inside the multidimensional net, transformation of space—that is, space movement magic—is limited.
Because Lee Hyun-wook was so new to the area, he blocked his escape.
“—That’s it! Now he can’t escape!”
He flashed a triumphant smile and threw down the camera:
“The cleaners clean out the biggest mold in the country!”
He shouted excitedly and took out two pistols from his pocket.
‘I puncture his neck.’
But…
“……Cleaners, start quickly!”
“Sweepers respond!”
– …….
“Hey! Jenny, why aren’t you saying anything!”
They were members of the city vacuum cleaner team who should have stepped in by now…
but then—
ugh——
a shadow appeared over his head.
He slowly raised his head…
and the thing he had been desperately looking for appeared there.
A truck . It was a truck containing a city vacuum cleaner.
“Huh?”
It was floating above his head like an airship. The
strange thing was that the driver’s seat was crumpled like aluminum foil.
“…Are you looking for this?”
Then, someone’s voice was heard.
It was Stillane’s voice. He was sitting on top of a truck floating in the air.
Squeak——!
As he moved his left hand slightly, the area around the driver’s seat became even more severely dented.
“Um…the one sent to me. “It looks like a package, but I can have it, right?”
At that moment—
kwa—ang——! Kwa—ang——!
“—Tsk!”
Two SUVs, two completely crumpled SUVs, fell on either side of him.
They were the cars escorting the truck containing the city vacuum cleaner.
And it was also the car in which the assassination team was riding to finish off the incapacitated Lee Hyun-wook.
Lee Hyun-wook He slowly made his way down to the ground and stood in front of the man in the fedora.
“I need to do some cleaning too…”
He whispered softly and moved his left hand, and two SUVs melted.
It crawled across the floor and landed on the leg of the man in the fedora. The spirit stuck:
“…I need to tell you where you are dirty.”
