Chapter 150
Chapter 150. Accident (2)
Yoo Ji-han took out his mobile phone from his pocket.
At the top of the phone screen was an icon indicating that there was no signal.
Not only was there no incoming calls, but internet access was also impossible.
“Si-hu, give me your phone.”
“Pardon?”
Kim Si-hu’s phone was similarly blocked from all communication.
Everyone else was likely experiencing the same.
Yet, no one, including those taking pictures of Chilla with their phone cameras, raised any questions.
Yoo Ji-han hurriedly spoke to Kim Si-hu.
“Don’t you feel something strange?”
“What do you mean?”
“The same scenery has been visible outside the window for a few minutes!”
“Oh, really?”
After receiving his phone back, Kim Si-hu reacted as if it was no big deal.
Yoo Ji-han, who had spoken up, was even more flustered.
‘Something is seriously wrong.’
Inside the train, a relaxed and calm atmosphere continued.
With urgency, Yoo Ji-han grabbed Kim Si-hu’s right shoulder and said, “Grab your staff.”
“Why the staff?”
“Just do as I say for now.”
Kim Si-hu, who had been drinking orange juice, picked up the staff he had set beside the chair.
Then he looked at Yoo Ji-han, blinking in confusion.
“What do you call the spell used to dispel someone’s magic?”
“Dispel, right?”
“Cast a dispel on the entire train car right now.”
“Why?!”
“Just do it! This is an order as the party leader.”
“……”
Although it was an impossible command to understand,
Kim Si-hu infused magical energy into his staff as Yoo Ji-han instructed.
And….
Bang!
The magical energy emanating from the staff spread evenly throughout the entire space, reaching the closed wall from Kim Si-hu’s position.
At that moment, everyone around stopped talking or flinched.
“Huh?”
Kim Si-hu, sensing something in the suddenly quiet train, furrowed his brows.
“Do it again!”
When Yoo Ji-han signaled, Kim Si-hu put even more magical energy into the staff.
Boom—!
Once again, the spreading magical power was strong enough to be felt against the skin.
Approximately five seconds later, all the heroes riding in the same car sprang up from their seats.
“Gah!”
“What was that?!”
“…What were we doing just now?”
“I… I don’t even know.”
The once calm train suddenly became noisy.
The heroes, who had even forgotten that Yoon Do-ha and Baek Kang-cheon were missing, recalled their original purpose.
Yoo Ji-han muttered as he watched the people return to normal.
“Mind-affecting magic, huh?”
“Seems like something was going on in this train.”
“How could this kind of magic exist…?”
Kim Si-hu, who had answered Yoo Ji-han’s question just a moment earlier nonchalantly, was now feeling chills.
He had completely overlooked the most important detail without even feeling a slight sense of discomfort.
Even Chilla, who had been napping, suddenly snapped to attention and returned to Min Yu-ri’s side.
At this moment, Jung Young-wook, who was in the front seat, turned to Kim Si-hu and said, “That was you just now, right?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“……”
Jung Young-wook turned his head with a slightly annoyed expression.
Soon after, Park Jae-kyung approached Kim Si-hu.
“Si-hu! Thank you. But how did you notice the magic?”
“Hyung Ji-han told me first.”
“Hyung Ji-han did…?”
Park Jae-kyung looked at Yoo Ji-han with great surprise.
To notice a magic that even he hadn’t sensed.
‘He truly is someone extraordinary.’
I never thought he was just an ordinary hero since Yoon Do-ha showed interest in him.
The more you see of Yoo Ji-han, the more he truly seemed to possess incredible abilities.
If it weren’t for him, it would have been impossible to gauge just how much time they might have wasted.
“Jae-kyung. It seems like the train is passing through the same place repeatedly.”
“Yeah. I saw that too.”
Yoo Ji-han and Park Jae-kyung both turned to look out the window simultaneously.
There was no sensation of the train going round and round, yet the same scenery kept repeating.
There were doubts about whether they were even heading to a proper destination.
“Let’s head to the driver’s cab.”
“Casters from each party, please come to the front!”
Leading the way, Park Jae-kyung and the heroes who had gotten up opened the door leading to the front car.
The people in the front car welcomed them as they crossed through the door.
“Jae-kyung-nim!”
“Hello!”
“Want some popcorn?”
People lounging and eating snacks or smiling widely.
It was exactly the same situation as the heroes from earlier who had been enchanted by the magic.
Park Jae-kyung hardened his expression and said, “Everyone, snap out of it!”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The casters, including Kim Si-hu, spread their magical power throughout the train.
Then heroes in other compartments started regaining their senses one by one.
They advanced a compartment at a time, shattering the spell enveloping the train.
“Driver! Open the door!”
Thud! Thud!
Park Jae-kyung banged on the door leading to the driver’s cab after reaching the front car.
Even after knocking several times, there was no sound from inside.
“What’s happening?”
“Is there even someone in there?”
“I met them, and we even said hello before departure.”
“Everyone back off for a moment.”
Bang!
Jung Gi-jun, who had joined the group on their way to the driver’s cab, kicked the closed door with his foot.
The door, crushed inward by his powerful kick, broke the lock and swung open widely.
“No one’s here?”
However, the train operator was nowhere to be seen in the driver’s seat.
The view through the driver’s window looked nearly identical to the scenery they had seen from the rear compartment.
“The machinery seems to be completely off.”
“……!”
The monitors or various devices used for operating the train were devoid of any light.
Park Jae-kyung pressed various buttons experimentally and confirmed that none of them were functioning at all.
Yet the train continued moving, which was quite a ghostly phenomenon.
“Hmm…”
“……”
As those in a panic pondered their next steps,
Yoo Ji-han, who had been waiting in the back, offered his input.
“Let’s exit the train for now.”
“How do we do that?”
“We’ll break a window.”
“That’s…”
Suggestions to escape from a rapidly moving train were met with dubious reactions from some heroes.
Yet no one else offered a better idea.
“I’ll go out first.”
Jung Gi-jun raised his shield and swung it over the wide window.
Crack!
Cracks formed across the window, protected by the train’s magic.
Then, the moment Jung Gi-jun was tearing it off—
Whoosh!
Something flew in through the broken window.
It bounced off Jung Gi-jun’s arm, protected by his armor.
“What is this?”
The small, round object that bounced off his armor resembled a seed from a plant.
Recognizing it, Yoo Ji-han shouted, “It’s a Hound’s Ajiweed seed!”
It was the seed of a dogweed that had transformed into a monster.
Crack! Crack!
Soon, the entire train’s windows seemed to quake in shock and began to crack.
The waiting heroes each raised their weapons.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Countless seeds were intruding through the shattered windows!
Park Jae-kyung swung his sword to slash one of the seeds and said, “Tankers from each party, to the front window! Casters and ranged dealers, lower your stances!”
Following the command, the tankers raised their shields to block the attacks.
The crouching ranged dealers unleashed their attacks out through the window.
However…
“Eh?”
“What’s that?”
Outside the window, the ground was filled with densely growing green grasslands.
It was a scenery completely different from what was visible through the window.
A horde of Hound’s Ajiweeds rooted and grown on that grassy field was launching an attack on the train.
“Anyone confident, follow me!”
Boom!
Jung Gi-jun blasted out an entire window and leaped outside.
Behind him, several heroes, including Yoo Ji-han, followed.
Thud!
[Taunt]
As Jung Gi-jun used his skill on the plains, countless heads of Hound’s Ajiweeds turned toward him.
It was a wide-area taunt that was hard to believe had originated from just one tanker.
Soon, most of the attacks focused solely on Jung Gi-jun, and the heroes following him retaliated.
‘There’s quite a few of them.’
Maintaining his firmly planted shield against the ground, Jung Gi-jun calmly surveyed the surroundings.
Hound’s Ajiweed, a Rank 3 monster, was unable to move from its rooted position in the ground.
In contrast, the majority of the heroes boarding the train were Rank 2 heroes.
They were only slightly startled by the sudden ambush; it wasn’t particularly hard to deal with them.
‘That’s…’
However, among the heroes who had followed Jung Gi-jun, one was moving exceptionally quickly.
‘It’s the spirit master who passed on the information about Baek Kang-cheon being alive.’
The leader of Yoo Ji-han’s party, who had recently been promoted to Rank 3, Yoo Ji-han himself.
He might just be the hero who had made it possible to form the vanguard today.
[Root of Breeze]
Swish!
Yoo Ji-han used magic to immobilize the stems and, while dodging seeds flying at him, effortlessly sliced off the heads of the Hound’s Ajiweeds up close.
It was a brilliant attack that precisely targeted the enemy’s weakness.
“……?!”
As Jung Gi-jun watched Yoo Ji-han, an uncommon sight of a warrior using magic, he realized something amazing.
‘That guy is only taking down monsters that aren’t affected by my taunt.’
While the other heroes hunted the monsters caught up in Jung Gi-jun’s taunt,
Yoo Ji-han was selectively targeting only the monsters that were unaffected by it.
Thanks to that, unbeknownst to him, the battle became significantly more stable.
‘He’s very perceptive.’
With interest, Jung Gi-jun gazed at Yoo Ji-han.
It had truly been a long time since he paid interest to a newcomer.
*
“Please tell the people waiting in the other compartments to exit the train.”
“Yes!”
After the situation was somewhat under control,
Someone received the command to inform the news about escaping the train and rushed to the back compartment.
The remaining people waiting in the train exited through the smashed windows.
“There’s a smell of grass.”
“This is really a grassy plain.”
“What amazing magic.”
“How on earth did this happen?”
“It’s incredible how the sensation of speed was created inside a stopped train…”
The heroes outside expressed their admiration as they observed the train.
Even though the long train had completely stopped on the plains,
Inside the train, they felt the illusion that the train was still moving forward.
“This, this is truly my first time seeing something like this.”
“Chirp chirp.”
Nam Ho-yeol, who had been crouched inside the train, was wide-eyed as he peered outside.
The Sylph, whether happy to have come from the cramped train to the wide plains, flitted around in the air.
At that moment, Kim Si-hu approached Chilla and said, “The space is heavily distorted here.”
Space distortion.
Just like the dungeon they had entered during their promotion test.
It was a space where the interior was much larger than it appeared to the eye from the outside.
Everyone aboard the train had become trapped in that location.
“There seems to be an entrance connected to the distorted space in the middle of the tracks.”
“Could something like that appear on its own?”
“Absolutely impossible! This must have been intentionally set up by someone.”
Magic that induces a sense of mental ease.
A train that induces the illusion of movement while being stationary.
Plus, the magic of space distortion composed of a huge grassland.
The complex magic intricately linked in this situation could only suggest someone designed it with intent.
Min Yu-ri looked at the train, where the windows were breaking one by one.
“Was that train prepared by the Hero Department?”
“Probably.”
“The Hero Department has quite a few problems, huh?”
The Hero Department was the one who had prepared the train with hidden magic.
Min Yu-ri harbored suspicion toward the Hero Department regarding that train.
Kim Si-hu looked up at the sunny sky and said, “Space distortion magic must have an exit somewhere by its structure. We should be able to leave through that… The problem is we need to find it.”
By the time everyone aboard the train had managed to disembark,
Park Jae-kyung and Jung Gi-jun gathered everyone in one place.
“The current time is 1:20 PM. It has been approximately 5 hours since we departed from Yongsan.”
Under normal circumstances, they would have been well past their destination by now.
But the people trapped in the distorted space had lost track of where the train had even traveled.
“We will now disperse to find the exit.”
“We’ll distribute artifacts; please only use them if you’ve definitely found an exit.”
“To those with support team status, please come this way, and we’ll provide protection for you.”
The Red Hole handed out disposable artifacts resembling fireworks to party leaders from each team.
Using them would send up a pillar of light high into the sky, sharing their current location as a signal flare.
They had originally brought it for use in dark evenings, but it turned out to be a useful item.
The parties who received the artifacts dispersed in different directions.
Yoo Ji-han’s party was no exception.
“Chilla! Can you carry Ho-yeol?”
“Chirp!”
“No, no! It’s fine.”
“Just carry him.”
Although the Dice and Red Hole promised to thoroughly protect their support team,
Nam Ho-yeol chose to stick together with Yoo Ji-han’s party.
“Hyung, where are we heading?”
“Hmm…”
“You found the path very well in the last promotion test.”
During the test to exit the dungeon with the applied space distortion,
Yoo Ji-han had navigated almost flawlessly, following the shortest route calculated by the Hero Department.
He was able to exit the dungeon first solely due to that.
“Yeah. I don’t know how you managed it, but it was really precise.”
“Truly a human navigation system! I’ll trust you again this time, hyung.”
“Chirp chirp!”
Kim Si-hu, along with Min Yu-ri, was filled with a strange sense of expectation.
Receiving that expectation, Yoo Ji-han licked his dry lips.
‘I sealed the sampling, though.’
Yoo Ji-han, who habitually calculated probabilities, had been told by Nirochi that it wouldn’t be strange for his brain to explode.
That’s why he had declared that he would refrain from using his unique skill directly moving forward.
However, he began to ponder whether it would be acceptable to use it in such an exceptional situation.
‘…Let’s walk a little longer.’
Yoo Ji-han resisted the temptation rising from within and walked in a direction no one was heading.
Maybe they would find the exit soon.
But then.
Piiing!
A white, glowing thread-like object floated in front of Yoo Ji-han.
As he froze in surprise at the wriggling thread, his party members also came to a stop.
“Hyung Ji-han?”
“What’s wrong?”
“……?”
All those walking together looked at Yoo Ji-han, who suddenly had come to a stop, but everyone didn’t seem to pay any attention to the thread floating in the air.
It appeared completely invisible to them.
Whoosh!
The Sylph, flying in the air, spiraled above the starting point of the long thread.
And immediately thereafter, a familiar sensation enveloped Yoo Ji-han’s entire body.
‘Yeah… It’s starting to feel right.’
The long thread pointed the way from their current location to another place.
Having stopped in his place, he turned his body and walked in the direction the thread led.
“Hyung? Are we heading that way?”
“I know the way.”
His voice was filled with strong conviction.
