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The moment she entered the dungeon, Hyeonseong checked the scenery first.
Skyscrapers packed tightly together, roads and rail lines installed on both the ground and in the air, aerial transit facilities, and a dull, earthen haze that wrapped around it all.
It was a textbook image of a desolate, future-style city.
‘This field looks like a real headache.’
After finishing her rough scan of the environment, Hyeonseong clicked her tongue.
A field like this made searching even harder than jungles or labyrinths. Depending on the situation, they might have to inspect every single room inside those towering buildings, or even check trains sitting on the elevated tracks one by one.
On top of that, aerial facilities could sometimes be impossible to enter at all unless you had a skill that let you fly.
At least this field being a “future city” was a small mercy. In that case, there was a good chance there would be some way to access those facilities, or equipment that could bring them down to the ground.
While she was quickly scanning the interior, the dungeon info appeared. It was information she already knew. At least nothing dramatic had changed in the meantime.
Additional details followed. They matched the advance party’s report exactly.
‘So the debuff trigger condition really is breathing.’
Hyeonseong looked over the team. Everyone either wore items like gas masks or respirators, or had buffs like immunity and purification active.
The supporters responsible for group-wide immunity and protection also deployed their skills. A buff zone spread out around them, blocking and purifying the contaminated air.
“Alright, last check—headcount again before we move.”
Hyeonseong called out loudly to the team. Before moving, they had to make sure no random outsider had slipped in.
After checking each face one by one, Hyeonseong confirmed there was no problem.
Sometimes people who weren’t supposed to be there got mixed in, but thankfully there was no such accident today.
“Everyone done? We’re moving.”
While Hyeonseong verified personnel, the others finished their final checks on gear and skills. Now the only thing left was to depart.
The strategy team started moving. Their first objective was to rendezvous with the advance party that had entered earlier to survey the dungeon.
“They’re all still safe, right?”
As Hyeonseong searched through the advance party’s records on her hunter terminal, she heard one team member speak.
“At least they should all be alive, right? We came in and the headcount hit full.”
“And if something major happened, they would’ve reported it.”
Once one person spoke, others chimed in.
“Yeah, fair point.”
“By the way, where did they say the scouts are right now?”
“According to this…… they arrived about ten minutes ago at a place called Libra 7th Academy.”
“Sounds like it used to be a school building.”
“Seems so. They say the gym is completely empty, so they’re resting inside for a bit and then moving again.”
“Then shouldn’t we tell them to just wait there if nothing happens? If they wander around, we could miss each other—or they could run into monsters.”
Hearing the discussion, Hyeonseong glanced toward Kwon Seojin.
The conversation was shifting from idle chatter to something that required judgment. Hyeonseong was curious how Kwon Seojin would react.
‘Judging by her face, she doesn’t look like she’s thinking much…….’
But at that moment, Kwon Seojin’s eyebrow twitched. It looked like something bothered him.
‘Did she think the same thing?’
Hyeonseong believed that even if they didn’t move far, the advance party should still come out of the building. If Kwon Seojin thought similarly, that reaction made sense.
“Um……”
Kwon Seojin turned his gaze to Hyeonseong. Their eyes met by chance.
“What do you think, Hyeonseong?”
Kwon Seojin asked. The other team members also looked at Hyeonseong.
“Now that I think about it, you were supposed to make the final call, right?”
“What do you think?”
“Tell them to come outside once they’ve rested enough. Even if they wait there, resting inside a building isn’t a good move.”
Hyeonseong answered instantly.
“Why? Wouldn’t it be more comfortable inside?”
A few members looked confused.
“It’s a field with lots of mechanical monsters. That means there’s a high chance we’ll see high-performance androids, scout drones, killer robots, stuff like that…… and I think you get what I’m saying even with just that.”
Many mechanical monsters came equipped with detection functions—infrared, heat, mass, mana sensing, and so on.
And those detection systems could track enemies at a distance, or even enemies hiding inside buildings, without much difficulty.
‘If you’ve got C- to A-rank Awakened huddled together in one spot, they’ll track you way too easily. And…….’
If tracking were the only issue, they wouldn’t strictly need to come outside. The real issue came after that.
The main weapons of mechanical monsters included guns, cannons, bombs, optical weapons, and biochemical weapons.
That meant that depending on the unit, it could simply blow the entire building apart to kill targets hiding inside—or release lethal toxins and pathogens into the structure.
‘If you’re inside a building, it’s hard to notice enemy approach or anomalies. Worst case, you could get wiped out inside.’
Most team members nodded as they understood Hyeonseong’s reasoning.
“Now that you mention it, we were taught that in fields dominated by mechanical monsters, you can use buildings for cover—but you shouldn’t stay sealed up inside enclosed spaces too long.”
“Then we should tell them, too.”
“I’ll do it.”
After answering the team, Hyeonseong operated the hunter terminal. Once she sent a message to the advance party, a reply came back immediately saying they’d come outside.
“Alright, that’s settled—let’s keep moving.”
They had stopped briefly while discussing the advance party, but the team resumed movement.
About five minutes into navigating the city streets, a message came in on the hunter terminal. It was from the advance party.
It looked like multiple people had sent messages at once, because the info appeared almost without delay.
Finally, a message arrived stating they would retreat to avoid combat.
“Isn’t this a dangerous situation?”
After reading the updates, several team members grew agitated.
“They sent similar messages a few times this morning too. Every time, they managed to shake the monsters off.”
“Some people got nicked up or hit with debuffs, but the supporters handled it.”
“Still, that was earlier. This is now.”
Even with multiple similar incidents recorded, one member remained anxious.
“Let’s hurry. We’re planning to rendezvous anyway.”
Hyeonseong said. The team immediately picked up speed.
“That’s the second building they mentioned—Libra 4th General Hospital.”
“And after that, it was over there, right?”
They followed the route based on the advance party’s messages. Since the shared map on the terminal wasn’t perfect, it was hard to gamble on taking an unverified shortcut.
‘Good thing we have movement-speed buffs.’
Those with their own speed buffs cast them on themselves. For those without, the two buffers responsible for combat buffs applied boosts.
And on the way, they barely encountered monsters. The few they did meet were at most C-rank—some mechanical types and a few zombies. Enemies this team could clear quickly.
Thanks to that, the rear team closed the distance at high speed. Even Hyeonseong had to admit they’d been fairly lucky so far.
‘The problem starts now.’
In her experience, sudden trouble usually erupted right around this point—when things felt strangely like they were going too well.
The moment Hyeonseong started tensing up, a Constellation message arrived.
‘Knew it.’
It was exactly what she expected. Constellations generally disliked it when things proceeded smoothly. From their perspective as spectators, it was boring.
‘For them, this is the exact timing when the boredom starts. If nothing happens, they’ll try to make something happen.’
Sure enough, it was itching to cause trouble again.
‘I can’t tell if it’s really that thoughtless, or if it’s putting on a show.’
Hyeonseong looked away from the messages, hoping it was the former. Judging by the chat, it was still only whining about boredom—no other moves yet.
They continued following the path the advance party had taken. Soon, they would reach Libra 7th Academy, where the advance party had last stayed.
“That building, right?”
One team member pointed at a relatively low building ahead.
“Looks like it. The location matches the map, and that building over there next to it—doesn’t that look exactly like a gym?”
“They said northwest from there, right?”
“Yeah. The roads are all visible here. If we follow this road straight, we—”
“We’ve caught up a lot. At this rate—”
“Wait, it looks like they aren’t moving right now!”
Someone said urgently. At that, Hyeonseong checked the hunter terminal map too.
‘They’re really not moving any further from here.’
The map that had been revealing itself along the advance party’s path stopped updating. That meant either the advance party had stopped in place—or they’d doubled back into an already revealed area.
‘Either way, it means something’s wrong. Like they ended up in a fight…….’
As if on cue, a message arrived from the advance party. Exactly what she’d feared.
“If escape is impossible, doesn’t that mean they’re fully surrounded?”
“Yeah. Otherwise they’re people who’d find some way to get out.”
The team grew agitated again. They needed to move even faster.
“Can you accelerate us more from here?”
Hyeonseong asked the supporters.
“We’re already squeezing out the maximum we can in the current setup.”
“If we want more acceleration, we have to reduce the coverage range.”
They couldn’t raise everyone’s speed further all at once. That meant they had to split temporarily.
Hyeonseong quickly scanned the team. She first identified those who had self-cast acceleration buffs, then checked their traits. As expected, the traits and roles were heavily skewed to one side.
‘Send a few ahead first, and bundle the missing roles separately.’
She selected several team members with traits like mage, archer, and shooter, and grouped them with one buffer who could apply speed buffs.
“……Twelve of you, move out first.”
She sent an advance group roughly similar in size to the original advance party. The selected members stacked their acceleration buffs to the maximum and departed. Then the rest followed behind.
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