Chapter 3 – Level Up!

“Ha. This dungeon is a real dungeon?”

He’d thought the girl had been using slang, but now, it didn’t seem like it. His head started to throb, so he pinched his temple.

After a moment, Woojin sighed, and started to sort through the message in front of his eyes.

<This dungeon has already been conquered. Basic monsters will be summoned.>

It was a fairly shocking situation, but Woojin wasn’t shocked. Instead, he felt like he was back on familiar ground.

“Isn’t this too similar to Alphen?”

Woojin had fought madly to survive back in that wretched game world. No. Should he call it a world with a game mode?

“Did Earth change? Or is it only like this for me?”

Woojin tried to figure it out, but he didn’t have enough information. All he wanted was to take a train home, but now he was in a dungeon. By the look of it, Earth had definitely changed in the last five years.

“Let’s get out first.”

If he couldn’t catch a train, then he’d just take the bus. But as Woojin started to walk back down the hallway, he ran smack into an invisible barrier.

<You do not have the Return Stone.>

“Huh. Jeez.”

Woojin scratched the back of his head. He had no idea what this Return Stone looked like, so he was in a bind.

“I guess it was locked for a reason.”

His curiosity had instigated this whole situation. He wanted to leave, but now he was stuck. Now, he had to find this Return Stone in order to get out.

“Let’s see.”

He had lost his magic. But he still had his body that’d been honed on the other planet. Moreover, he had his twenty years of survival experience backing him up.

First things first, he found a closed convenience store and rustled up a coat rack.

Ggee-reeek.

He dismantled the coat rack and fashioned the pole into a simple club. Still, he wasn’t happy.

“This is too light.”

He discarded his club and headed into the store next door. It was a mess, but he found something that looked better, a hammer.

Clang. Bong.

“This might be useful.”

Woojin took the hammer. His eyes fell on a nearby chair. He picked it up and braced it against the floor. With a sharp crack, he tore the back of the chair off. He knocked a couple of the rough edges off and fashioned it into a decent shield. At least, it would take a couple of hits.

“Should I get going?”

He didn’t know what the Return Stone looked like, but he had been told that basic monsters had been summoned. He wasn’t sure whether his preparations had been enough, but he wasn’t exactly in a position where he could go backwards.

He had no choice but to go forward.

Woojin walked down the hallway, relying on the blinking fluorescent lights. As he neared the subway restroom, his neck started prickling. As if someone was watching him.

He slowed, falling into an easy crouch. He picked up a nearby piece of broken tile and hurled it at the restroom door.

Te-eng!

The sound of the tile hitting the glass door caused it to react.

“Kreee-reee!”

Something bolted out of the restroom, letting out a shriek. It looked strange, certainly unlike anything on Earth. It had the fangs and structure of a dog, but the ears of a rabbit.

It was a creature that shouldn’t exist on Earth, but Woojin knew this monster well. He had faced this monster countless times on Alphen and knew it for what it was.

He growled, “Drabbit.”

“Kwaah!” The Drabbit snarled, twin fangs flashing as it lunged forward. Its hind legs were nearly half its body and the source of its powerful jump. The jump charge was the Drabbit’s specialty, and thankfully, its only method of attack.

Crash!

The Drabbit’s charge splintered the shield as Woojin met the charge head on, but in that moment, he swung his hammer.

“Ggraa-raak!” Woojin’s strike sent the Drabbit rolling on the floor, screaming in pain. Woojin didn’t miss his chance. He leaped forward, clamping down on its neck as he flipped the hammer to its clawed end and swung down.

Just because he didn’t feel threatened by a familiar monster didn’t mean that he would let his guard down. He would take any opportunity to guarantee a kill.

It was the most essential rule one learned in order to survive against a monster.

The Drabbit’s body sagged as it died, moaning weakly. Woojin didn’t relax though, glancing around hurriedly. Drabbits traveled in pairs.

As expected, another Drabbit was already leaping at him from behind, jaws wide open. But this time, his shield was already useless from blocking the first Drabbit’s charge.

Woojin hefted his hammer and swung.

Thunk!

“Ggueeeek.” The Drabbit hung off the hammer, its head pierced through by the clawed hammer. Woojin had timed his swing perfectly.

Woojin mused, “How come this feels like a weird deja vu?”

Woojin remembered the first time he was summoned to Alphen. He had been so afraid. However, his situation right now was incomparable to then.

He thought aloud, “How did the monsters of Alphen show up here? Even this dungeon feels out of place.”

He felt a familiar feeling of danger envelop him. A feeling that was far too familiar.

The message that showed up in front of his eyes, and even the monsters emerging from hiding were commonplace on Alphen. But the problem was that this was a subway station on Earth.

“I guess I’ll level up if this continues.”

It was one of the reasons Woojin had been able to survive on Alphen.

That planet, akin to a game world. No, it might have only been Woojin who thought that way, as a human who was familiar with Earth’s games.

It may have been that world’s method of natural selection, but it had felt like a game to Woojin. The only difference had been that it was real. Everything had been all too real.

Levels had existed, and Woojin had utilized them to become a powerful Necromancer. He hadn’t reached the end of the road, but he had gone far enough to meet the Dimensional Administrator. He’d then chosen to return to Earth without much in the way of qualms.

He had lost all the magic he had accumulated, but he hadn’t cared. He’d thought his abilities wouldn’t be needed on a planet where death wasn’t lurking around every corner.

Yet now he’d found himself in a dungeon, and he could only bemoan his lost abilities. He could take care of something at the level of a Drabbit without worry, but anything stronger and he would have to seriously risk his life.

The most optimal situation would be to find the Return Stone without meeting a stronger monster.

“If this place resembles Alphen, either a monster has it, or it should be emitting some kind of energy.”

If it was a stone or an item with an ability, then its existence itself would emanate energy. He riffled through the two fallen Drabbits, but they didn’t possess those unique mana gems he knew as Bloodstones.

He cursed, “These bastards are worthless.”

Woojin left the Drabbit corpses where he’d searched them and hid behind a nearby pillar. The scent of blood would act as bait for any nearby monsters. If nothing showed up, he’d continue searching for the Return Stone.

“Queereek?”

As if on cue, two Drabbits showed up, and started circling the corpses. Though they looked like dogs, their sense of smell wasn’t quite that powerful. They relied more on their sense of hearing.

Crack.

Woojin purposely broke a nearby tile, drawing their attention.

“Qweeeeee!”

The two Drabbits broke into a sprint, culminating in a lunge at Woojin’s head.

Woojin lifted his hammer and took the stance of a batter in the box.

Puh-uk, puk!

The two Drabbits had leaped towards him one after the other, and Woojin took full advantage as he unleashed a home run swing, bludgeoning their heads in mid air. As they crashed to the floor, a message popped up in front of his eyes.

<Level Up!>