MTLNOVEL 70.
70.
“Jian, I never thought you’d be like this…”
Jihwan looked at Jian with a bitter expression. Unable to say anything, Jian could only offer an awkward smile.
As if making a declaration of war, Sehun had announced to Hyunsu and even to others close to Jian that they were dating. Only Hyunwoo, who wasn’t present, and Seonjun, who was in America, hadn’t yet received the shocking news.
“I was the one who confessed to hyung first. Jian hyung just accepted my confession.”
Sehun, who had been sitting quietly, diverted the potential blame from Jian to himself.
“I always thought you weren’t an ordinary kid, Sehun, but… Wow, I feel like my lifespan just decreased by 10 years. First you disappear and make everyone worry, then you casually say you were on a trip, and now you two are dating…”
Jian wholeheartedly agreed with Leo’s words. If he were in a third person’s position, he would have been even more shocked than Leo.
“I can still vividly remember when you were just a little kid…”
“Hey, that’s enough.”
Jihwan elbowed Leo in the side, who seemed unsatisfied even after his outburst.
Although the shock was great, they weren’t actually blood-related brothers, and knowing that Jian had raised Sehun in difficult circumstances, they decided to accept it.
Sometimes they had thought Sehun’s gaze towards Jian was unusual, but they never expected the two to end up like this.
“It’s not like they’ve committed a crime. My heart is still racing, but well, what can we do? They say they like each other.”
Jihwan summarized the situation. Jungsu, being generally uninterested in others’ affairs, quickly shook off the shock and was just fiddling with his earlobe.
Just as the commotion was settling and everyone was calming their surprised hearts…
Boom, Boom—!
Suddenly, an ominous sound resonated throughout the house. Simultaneously, the floor and walls shook violently as if a major earthquake had struck.
“Ugh!”
“Wh-what…”
Cracks began to form on the windows, and the curtain rod broke and fell. Small decorative items on the TV stand rolled noisily across the floor.
Jihwan, who had been sitting on the sofa, fell to the floor. Hyunsu quickly spat out the fork he had in his mouth.
The agile Jungsu stood up, creating wind in his palm as he surveyed the surroundings, while Leo crouched down, covering his head with both arms.
‘Could it be…’
Jian raised his trembling eyes. As soon as he sensed something was wrong, his face turned pale in Sehun’s embrace. If he wasn’t mistaken, something pitch black was flickering beyond the window.
Beep beep beep—!
While everyone was still trying to make sense of what was happening, a sharp sound pierced the air.
The highest level of alert sounded from the smart watches on their wrists. The same was true for their phones.
Everyone’s expression turned serious at the sound that would typically only be heard when an S-rank dungeon appeared.
“Unidentified tower appearance? What does this mean?”
Junggi was the first to check the text message that appeared on his watch screen. Jian closed his eyes tightly.
Finally, the starting point of the original story had arrived.
Although the original plot had already been twisted beyond recognition, the setting where a tower appears and throws South Korea into chaos remained unchanged.
‘Come to think of it, why hasn’t Hyunsu awakened as a hunter yet?’
Jian looked at Hyunsu, who was panicking and at a loss. Surely, around the time the tower appeared, Hyunsu had already awakened as an S-rank hunter. The novel described him awakening not long after turning twenty.
Could it be that he was hiding his awakening as a hunter? Since Sehun hadn’t revealed it either, it was entirely possible for Hyunsu to do the same.
“It’s an emergency summons. From S-rank to F-rank, everyone.”
“Even F-rank is being summoned? What kind of tower is this that they’re calling all hunters?”
“Is it an S-rank dungeon? There’s never been one in Korea before.”
Just as S-rank hunters were rare, S-rank dungeons had appeared less than ten times worldwide.
However, each time one appeared, the impact was enormous, and some areas still remained in ruins, unable to recover.
“The tower’s location is right in front of us…?”
At Hyunsu’s words as he held his phone with trembling hands, everyone’s gaze turned outside. Leo strode towards the half-broken window.
“…It’s real.”
A massive tower, easily several hundred meters in diameter, filled their vision. It was on a completely different scale from the gates that had appeared before.
Recalling all the information they knew, there had never been a case where a dungeon appeared in the form of a building like this.
The streets were filled with people in chaos. The impact of the tower’s appearance had caused roads and sidewalks to bulge unevenly, and trees could be seen snapped like twigs.
“Where did the buildings and people that were originally there disappear to?”
At Leo’s muttered words, Jian observed a moment of silence. Everything that had been at the site where the tower appeared, both people and inanimate objects, had been swallowed by the tower.
Unable to even find bodies, bereaved families had protested in front of the Dungeon Management Office for a while.
It was an unpredictable disaster, but those who lost family members needed someone to blame.
The tower was completely different from existing dungeons, more like an anomaly, and the Hunter Management Bureau’s dungeon prediction system had become useless.
They only realized the tower’s existence after it had appeared right in front of their eyes. By then, hundreds of casualties had already occurred.
Still, the speed at which the emergency summons message was sent and the national disaster text message arrived was impressively fast, worthy of being called “as expected of South Korea.”
“Let’s go out and help for now. There must be many injured people.”
Jungsu was the first to rush out of the house. Leo and Jihwan followed suit. In an instant, only Jian, Sehun, and Hyunsu remained in the empty living room.
“I can’t reach hyung…”
Hyunsu grabbed Jian’s arm with a pale face. The screen showed the saved name “My Brother,” but only the dial tone could be heard.
“It’ll be okay. You two should stay here for now.”
“What about you? Stay with us, please? Don’t go anywhere, okay?”
As Jian seemed about to leave, Hyunsu tightened his grip on Jian’s arm. His large eyes were filled with tears, seemingly frightened by the sudden situation.
“Okay. I won’t go. So don’t worry too much.”
Jian sat Hyunsu down on the sofa. The floor was a mess, but the sofa was intact. Although he wanted to help the injured, Sehun and Hyunsu’s well-being was more important to Jian.
He had once had a painful experience when he left Sehun’s side to help others.
Now, he knew that Sehun had awakened as a hunter and had hidden powers, but he still felt uneasy.
“Sehun, you come here too.”
Unlike the others who were very shocked, Sehun’s expression remained impassive. He slowly approached at Jian’s gesture.
The sofa sank deeply on one side. With the boys on either side, Jian tried to organize his complicated thoughts.
‘If things are following the original story, a vanguard will be formed soon, but what should I do?’
Naturally, South Korea was in an uproar over this unprecedented event. The government immediately ordered the Hunter Management Bureau to send high-ranking hunters into the tower.
As a result, the first team entered the tower on the day it appeared, and more than half of them died at the threshold of the fifth floor.
Hyunsu and Sehun met in the third suicide squad. While Hyunsu volunteered, Sehun infiltrated by concealing his identity, intending to cause greater chaos in South Korea.
Then, as Sehun became intensely attracted to Hyunsu, he kidnapped him while climbing the tower and escaped.
Jian didn’t know when the body he had possessed entered the tower, as it didn’t appear in the novel.
Since he was a person who had concealed his rank and lived in seclusion, he might not have entered at all. The problem was the tower’s location. It appeared right in front of the cafe he operated, so he must have been involved somehow, but there was no way to know.
‘I need to contact Hyunwoo hyung first…’
Jian swallowed hard as he watched Hyunsu staring blankly at his phone. Seeing him biting his lips nervously, Jian patted his back.
“He’s probably overwhelmed with calls from everywhere. You’re the most important to Hyunwoo hyung, so he might be on his way here…”
“Hyunsu!”
Speak of the devil. The front door burst open, and the person they were waiting for appeared.
Relief flashed across his sweat-drenched face. Hyunwoo bent over, hands on his knees, catching his breath.
“Everyone’s safe…”
“Hyung!”
Hyunsu rushed into Hyunwoo’s arms as he slumped to the floor.
“Why didn’t you answer my calls… Do you know how worried I was?”
“I’m sorry. The tower’s location came up near the cafe, so I was in a rush to get here.”
Unfortunately, his smartwatch had also run out of battery. Hyunwoo showed an apologetic expression at the numerous missed call notifications on his phone screen.
“Are you two okay as well?”
After patting Hyunsu’s head, Hyunwoo got up and approached Jian and Sehun.