Ch.145Weekend Work for Everyone – 4

– The Third Eye is activated.

◎ The Silver Gatekeeper

: Subject does not meet assessment standards.

: Conditions for trait activation not satisfied.

: Trait is not activated.

– Subject falls below assessment criteria.

– Will not be counted in assessment attempts.

…That’s harsh. Even though I took it down in one hit, it doesn’t even count toward my assessment attempts.

Damn it. If I’d known this would happen, maybe I should have used my sword instead of shadows and gone a bit easier?

I guess hanging around The Elder has raised my level considerably without me realizing it.

That’s definitely it. I never expected an A-grade boss to be sent to meet its maker in a single strike.

If I’d known, I would have held back a bit. Given it a chance to resist at least.

Then depending on its level of resistance, it might have met the assessment criteria.

It could have been valuable experience points, being A-grade and all, but I ruined it with a one-hit kill.

“Wow, Arbiter. That’s really too much!”

While I’m examining the boss monster sprawled out on the ground, Hyunwoo Lee grumbles beside me.

Don’t tell me he’s upset that I didn’t help them earlier when they were struggling, if I could take down a boss this easily…

“You should have told us there was another one! We could have handled it!”

“…Pardon?”

“Don’t you agree, everyone?!”

What are you talking about, you lunatic? Everyone clearly looks exhausted.

Look at that. Dasom Yoo’s eyes look like they’re about to devour you, Hyunwoo.

“Not at all, junior.”

“Really? I thought so…”

“Junior? Please, can we just rest quietly for a bit?”

Dasom Yoo, who was treating Soohyun’s arm, slightly furrows her brow.

Hyunwoo clears his throat with a “Ahem!” and scratches the back of his head before quietly returning to his seat.

I see you in a new light, Dasom. You’re not just a healer; you’re Hyunwoo’s restraining device.

But what’s also interesting is that Hyunwoo got quite injured while leading the charge.

Even though he gets healed immediately, the pain inflicted on the body in that moment remains.

For normal people, that pain would accumulate and cause mental fatigue.

So even with a perfectly healed body, they’d reach a point where they’re too mentally exhausted to move.

But Hyunwoo seemed completely at peace, as if mental fatigue was a foreign concept to him.

“Hmm…”

Glancing to the side, I see Hana Kang examining the boss monsters with drool at the corner of her mouth.

She’s so focused that she doesn’t notice me approaching.

“Ms. Hana.”

“Ah, yes! Arbiter. What is it?”

She turns her head as if just noticing my presence when I carefully call out to her.

“Your mana. It must have been running on fumes.”

“I’m fine. I thought I’d experience mana exhaustion, but it didn’t happen.”

“That’s good. Looks like all your hard training paid off.”

She used magic continuously for nearly an hour without rest.

Normally, a Magic Class user would have taken at least one break to recover mana.

But Hana managed to endure without mana exhaustion, without any rest.

“More importantly, I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

“You mean the boss monster.”

Or more accurately, boss monster”s”.

I’ve never seen this before either. And never heard of it.

Dungeons have boss monsters. And there’s only one of them per dungeon.

Just as there can’t be two suns in the sky, and a country has only one king.

A boss monster is also a concept where only one exists in each dungeon.

Whether it respawns after death or not, that’s an unchangeable concept.

…Well, it “was” unchangeable, which is the problem now.

“How can there be two bosses? I can state with absolute certainty that the Academy never taught us about such cases. They covered boss peculiarities and other things, but never this.”

“Um, is there any chance they’re not actually bosses?”

Dasom’s suggestion has a fairly high probability.

The problem is that the aura emanating from each monster is definitely not that of ordinary monsters.

Even with the monster upheaval, there’s still a clear difference between regular and boss monsters.

It’s like comparing Normal grade to Rare grade, if I had to make an analogy.

And the more skilled the ability user, the more clearly they can sense this difference.

“No, Dasom. These are definitely bosses. I’m certain. They can’t be anything else.”

“If you say so, unnie… But if that’s true, it makes even less sense. There’s never been a reported case of more than one boss appearing!”

“Right. Never. Not in academia or even unofficially.”

Hana stands up and points at the bosses.

“But now there is. Something that made no sense before now makes sense.”

“…When we collect the monster byproducts, there will be two boss drops when there should only be one.”

“Exactly, junior. That’s definitive evidence. And look at our team members—who would dare call our words malicious lies?”

That’s true. Hana is the daughter of the Magic Tower Clan Master.

Plus, Soohyun is Minseong Kang’s granddaughter, and Dasom is the granddaughter of a major corporation’s owner.

Hyunwoo may not have special family connections, but his skills more than make up for it.

As for me, well, I could just ask, “Have you fought The Elder?”

“Since we’ve completed the dungeon raid, let’s head outside. We need to report this quickly.”

I nodded in agreement with Hana’s words.

This can’t be just an extremely unlucky incident that only happened to us.

Similar phenomena must be occurring elsewhere too.

If that’s the case, others will face difficulties or even bigger problems because of it.

Come to think of it, this is going to be a real headache for the government.

Not just the Ability Users Association, but the Ministry of Public Administration and Safety and others will be in chaos.

Gates appear unpredictably, monsters suddenly got stronger.

And now dungeons can have more than one boss.

At this point, every relevant department would be justified in cursing, “What the hell!”

“Good work everyone. As expected, it didn’t take long.”

As we exit the dungeon, a dispatcher welcomes us cheerfully.

If there had been anything suspicious, they would have fled as soon as we entered.

Or at the very least, they would show some signs of confusion.

But looking at them carefully, there’s no sense they’re lying at all.

…Hmm, thinking about it, that’s more concerning?

Given the Clan Master’s words, they must have checked the dungeon beforehand.

That means the dungeon was perfectly normal until just a few days ago.

Yet in that short time, it changed dramatically.

Dire wolves should have appeared, but fog cats came instead.

The environment, which had no particular peculiarities, became filled with fog.

And critically, two bosses appeared out of nowhere.

“Um, everyone? Why are you looking at me like that…”

Apparently I wasn’t the only one staring at the dispatcher.

Dasom and Soohyun also seem somewhat suspicious.

“Excuse me, could you come over here for a moment?”

Hana, who was beside me, explained the situation in detail.

When we entered the dungeon, everything was completely different from what we were told.

The environment, the monster types, even the number of bosses—all different!

“…What? W-wait. Wait a minute. What did you just say?”

The dispatcher’s reaction was exactly as expected.

They clearly couldn’t understand it, thought it was nonsense.

“Fog cats? Not dire wolves? That’s impossible! We confirmed all the dire wolf specimens just three days ago! How could… No, wait! And you say two bosses appeared?”

“Yes. It’s hard to believe, but it’s all true.”

“That makes no sense…”

The dispatcher trails off after looking at our group.

They probably can’t think we’re lying.

Our team composition is too ridiculously overpowered for that.

“Please wait a moment. If this is true, I need to report it immediately!”

I sincerely hope they do. It would be awkward if they didn’t believe us.

The dispatcher runs frantically toward somewhere.

The national ability users who came with us earlier were there.

They probably want to inform the relevant departments through them.

“…What nonsense…”

“…But the person who reported this is…”

They’re talking so loudly that we can almost hear them from here.

I was considering going over to explain again.

“I’ll go.”

“…Soohyun?”

Soohyun, who had been quietly standing beside us, steps forward slightly.

“I’ll explain what we saw and experienced in the dungeon to those people.”

“Um… Soohyun? Is that really necessary? Our clan member will explain it well. The Magic Tower Clan wouldn’t make false reports to the government…”

“No, Hana unnie. I don’t like anyone doubting the Arbiter’s… ahem. Our findings.”

She says she’ll go quickly to confirm it’s true.

They won’t be able to dismiss it casually knowing who’s backing her.

Soohyun asks us to trust her and heads toward the dispatcher and national ability users.

“She wasn’t usually this proactive…?”

Hana, after saying that, suddenly stares at me intently.

What. Why.

“Do you have something to say, Ms. Hana?”

“No. Just… um, have a beautiful romance?”

Sorry, but we haven’t reached that stage yet.

“Arbiter!”

Turning my head slightly, I see Soohyun smiling brightly.

And behind her, the national ability users are no longer questioning our report.

Instead, they’re urgently contacting various places.

Meanwhile, Soohyun runs back and stands right in front of me.

Her eyes are sparkling so much as she looks at me, like a puppy.

“I took care of everything at once. Did I do well?”

“Ah, yes. Soohyun. You did well, but… how did you do it?”

“I told them that if they informed my grandfather, it would go straight to the minister’s office, so they should handle it quickly.”

“…”

Somehow I ended up using the Minseong Kang card without realizing it.

Well, it’s not like he’d mind. He’d probably be secretly disappointed if we didn’t use it.

He may be a hero of the past Great War, but as Hakjun Ma said, he’s somewhat childish.

“Let’s move to another location! Come on!”

The dispatcher who brought the vehicle calls for us to get in quickly.

I nod and start gathering the team members when…

Swish swish—

‘Oh.’

For a moment I thought I was mistaken. But I wasn’t.

The shadow I had secretly hidden inside after the dungeon raid.

Its tendrils suddenly trembled slightly and then went still.