Chapter 119

The four of them watched Noquia vanish without a scream right before their eyes. They frantically checked beneath the trapdoor, but Noquia was nowhere to be found in the pitch-black darkness.

Regardless of who went first, they scrambled back down the vertical passage to search the room and even crossed back through the hole to the altar, but Noquia remained missing.

They had no idea where she had gone or where to look for her. It was bleak. As they stood there stomping their feet in frustration, a creak, creak—the sound of footsteps on floorboards—echoed from nearby. It seemed the Bride was still wandering the vicinity. It appeared that going back was not an option.

Inside the Survival Dungeon, the category chat didn’t work, so there was no way to check if she was safe. Whether she lived or died would only be known if they met her again or left the dungeon.

They couldn’t afford to wait indefinitely for someone whose fate was unknown. The group decided to give up on Noquia and move forward.

Returning through the trapdoor, they emerged back into the space lined with red pillars. They scanned the interior, but no clues or items were visible. Having gained nothing, they decided to look for an exit.

They expected one of the bunhapmun to open, but no matter how they pushed or pulled, the doors wouldn’t budge. Feeling momentarily flustered, they gathered in the center and put their heads together.

“Maybe there’s some kind of mechanism.”

Father said, resting her chin on her hand with a serious expression as she scanned the room.

“A mechanism?”

Holanghee asked, looking at Father. Father nodded, her eyes still surveying the surroundings.

“Yeah. A device to open the door.”

Holanghee looked at her as if that made sense and added while looking around, “Or maybe somewhere that doesn’t look like a door actually is one.”

At their conversation, Theo surveyed the area once more. However, Blaine, who had been silently lost in thought, spoke up cautiously.

“Could it be that they won’t open because the exploration isn’t finished yet?”

“Huh?”

The three of them questioned him simultaneously, turning to look at Blaine. Flustered by the sudden attention, Blaine stammered.

“I-I just thought… maybe they won’t open because there’s still something left for us to find.”

The three of them stared at Blaine with wide eyes before looking at each other, realizing his suggestion carried weight.

“He has a point.”

“There might be a clue left that we missed.”

“Let’s search a bit more then.”

As Theo, Father, and Holanghee responded positively one after another, relief finally spread across Blaine’s face. While he inwardly breathed a sigh of relief, the three began to scatter, moving toward different parts of the room.

Blaine quickly followed behind Theo. As Father moved away, she shouted back, “That said, we can’t rule out other possibilities, so keep them in mind while you search.”

And so, the exploration began anew.

This time, everyone checked their surroundings even more meticulously. They touched things they had only looked at before and tapped on the floorboards. Yet, despite the thorough search, nothing was found. Just as everyone was starting to grow weary, Theo, who was stretching his tired limbs, suddenly realized they hadn’t checked the ceiling at all.

“Hey, did anyone check the ceiling?”

Theo asked the group while pointing upward. Everyone stared at him blankly for a moment before shaking their heads vigorously and looking up to inspect the ceiling.

They discovered a scroll rod hanging from one of the large beams spanning the ceiling. It seemed they hadn’t noticed it because it was rolled up rather than unfurled.

The group gathered beneath the scroll.

“Do we have to go up and get that?”

Holanghee reached up as if measuring the daunting height, but there was no way she could reach it. Not giving up, Holanghee even tried hopping up and down. Ignoring her antics, Father scanned the area and asked a question.

“Is there anything we can use as a stepping stone?”

Theo shook his head.

“No. There’s nothing here.”

With no way to reach the scroll, Father stared at the nearest pillar with a grave expression. She wondered if she should climb the pillar and hang off the main beam. That was the kind of thing Noquia excelled at, and her absence was keenly felt.

If this had been a normal dungeon, they would have used jumps or weapons, but in a Survival Dungeon, there were no jump enhancements and no weapons. Lost in thought, Father slowly raised her head as if something had occurred to her. She looked back at the trapdoor they had emerged from.

“Do you guys know the ‘Gourd Breaking’ game?”¹

At the sudden question, Theo, Blaine, and Holanghee looked at Father with puzzled faces. Father pulled her gaze away from the trapdoor and looked at the three of them.

“The one where you throw lucky pouches to break the gourd.”

“I know it… but why bring that up?”

When Holanghee asked, Father pointed toward the trapdoor.

“Those pouches hanging all over the straw ropes down there. They wouldn’t be there for no reason. I was thinking, what if we gather those and try throwing them?”

Honestly, it was a suggestion no one had expected. Holanghee muttered, “You genius…” as if possessed, and Theo immediately headed for the trapdoor. Only Blaine looked disappointed, as he had been inwardly plotting a plan to give Theo a piggyback ride to reach the scroll.

The four of them returned to the path lined with pouches and began carefully collecting them from the ceiling. They didn’t forget to double-tighten the ones with loose openings to ensure the mysterious powder inside wouldn’t leak out.

With their hands full of dangling pouches, they climbed back up to the room. Gathering beneath the main beam, they piled the pouches together. There was a decent amount, but since the supply was limited, they had to throw them carefully.

With solemn faces like national athletes entering the Olympics, they warmed up and gripped a pouch each. Then, they began throwing them toward the beam with all their might.

Once the throwing started, it looked less like the Olympics and more like a neighborhood sports day. They were a total ragtag bunch. Some pouches fell short of the beam, while others went sailing far over it. However, as if proving there is strength in numbers, a few of the chaotically flying pouches struck the scroll rod with perfect accuracy.

How long had they been throwing? By the time a thick pile of white powder from the burst pouches had gathered on the floor, a loud thwack echoed. The scroll rod shook violently, and the rolled-up paper began to unfurl.

The scroll unrolled in an instant, spilling downward. Simultaneously, the bunhapmun surrounding them were all lifted at once, and the pale moonlight, which had been faint behind the paper doors, came pouring in.

Startled by the sound of the doors lifting, everyone spun around. The firmly shut folding doors were now all open, hooked onto the ceiling brackets. They looked around in a daze, but not a single closed door remained.

As they stared blankly at the doors, they remembered the unfurled scroll. They had to check what was on it. Returning their gaze to the scroll, the moonlight pouring through the open doors allowed them to examine it even without their lanterns.

On the scroll was a painting of a man. It was a portrait where the face had been blacked out with ink.

“What is that?”

Father frowned deeply at the painting, its identity and meaning unclear. Holanghee felt the same.

“It’s just a painting. Is that it?”

While the two grumbled, Theo, who had been staring intently at the image, asked, “Does it have something to do with the Bride?”

“Could it be the groom?”

“The clothes don’t look like wedding attire, though.”

Just as Theo said, the man in the painting was wearing an ordinary hanbok. Hoping to find some sort of unique detail or hint, they inspected the painting more closely and discovered an unnatural section.

Below the chest, a specific part had turned white, as if the entire section had been stripped away.

In the Unreturning Guest dungeon, things that were erased were usually covered in black ink—just like this man’s face. Yet, that specific part had turned white. It wasn’t just erased; it was as if it had vanished entirely.

What is that? What does it mean? Everyone stared at the painting with suspicious eyes. Then, Theo looked at Father as if he had realized something.

“That… looks like a waist cord. Didn’t you take one earlier, Father? The Seojodae or whatever it was.”

At Theo’s words, everyone looked at Father. Her eyes widened in surprise as she hurried to pull out the Seojodae. Comparing the two, the white void in the painting was an exact match for the cord.

“Then… did it disappear from the painting because we took it?”

Father asked in a murmur, and everyone looked back at the painting. When they had taken the Seojodae, the Bride had chased them screaming, and when she couldn’t find them, she had wailed in despair. It seemed certain that this cord belonged to the man in the painting, and that the Bride and this man shared a deep connection.

Perhaps he was her groom, or perhaps her lover.

Having gained no further major clues from the scroll, they moved outside the building. Stepping out through one of the wide-open doors, they saw a massive pond surrounding them on all sides.

They were standing in a pavilion rising up from the middle of the pond. It looked to be about two stories high—despite the fact that the climb through the trapdoor had felt much higher than that.

After looking around, they crossed the bridge connected to the pavilion and reached the other side. The place, bathed in the blue moonlight, looked like a rear garden. Numerous flowers and trees were in full bloom around the pond, bearing a resemblance to Hyangwonjeong.²