"Hyung, just a moment. I have a request."
At that, Jurim sat back down and asked indifferently.
"What is it?"
"Hyung, can I take Biat’s Void? I kinda... broke Biat’s Aspiration... Tehe~!"
Jurim frowned and pressed his temple.
"Alright, do as you want. But that thing is with the Management Bureau right now."
"Huh? Why? We—I mean, Hyeonak—caught it."
The moment Jurim’s expression stiffened at the words we, Gidan quickly corrected himself.
The fact that Guru had participated in the Malikian raid was a classified secret, so he had to be extremely careful with his words.
"Watch your mouth."
"Y-yeah..."
Jurim hesitated for a moment before speaking again.
"Didn’t you notice anything strange about Malikian?"
"Strange? ...Isn’t he just born looking weird?"
Yeah. Guru inwardly agreed as he recalled those grotesque three eyes.
"I heard there was a rat inside the Management Bureau. That rat was the one who let Malikian loose in the dungeon."
Gidan's jaw dropped in shock. He had thought running into Malikian again after he escaped was just an absurd coincidence.
"Is... that even possible? Moving around an S-rank monster like that?"
Hunting an S-rank monster was one thing, but capturing one alive and relocating it to a desired location was on an entirely different level of difficulty.
Jurim leaned his chin on his hand and lightly tapped the armrest.
"There is one place that could make that possible."
At that moment—
Both Jurim and Gidan simultaneously turned their heads toward the hospital room door.
'Huh? What’s that?'
Guru, glancing between the two, also turned to look at the door.
'There’s nothing there?'
Then—knock knock—someone rapped on the door and pushed it open.
"Excuse me. I came to see Hunter Gidan. Could you spare me a moment?"
Guru’s face brightened with delight.
"Ahjussi!"
Jin Siwon Ahjussi. The S-rank Awakener Candidate he had met at the Awakener Registration Center!
He had worried whether they would ever meet again, but to run into him in such an unexpected place!
"Annyeonghaseyo!"
"We meet again, little princess."
Siwon chuckled, reaching out to pat Guru’s head, but midway, he suddenly retracted his hand as if sensing something.
Gidan’s voice came sharp.
"You two know each other?"
"We met briefly at the Awakener Registration Center..."
Head nod, nod, nod.
"Ah! I’m not some suspicious person! I’m Jin Siwon, Team Leader of the Special Investigation Division in the Awakener Management Bureau."
"Jin Siwon? That Jin Siwon?"
Gidan stared at him warily, his entire posture radiating distrust. Siwon forced a stiff smile, pulling up the corners of his mouth.
"Probably that Jin Siwon. Here, my business card..."
He extended a card.
Gidan didn’t let his guard down. Jurim, who had been watching, slowly spoke.
"Gidan."
Gidan glanced at Jurim, who looked utterly unbothered, then quietly slipped the dagger he had been hiding away back into his inventory.
Siwon gave a slightly awkward smile.
The moment he had reached toward the child, both of them had immediately reacted with an overwhelming, finely honed bloodlust. The sheer intensity of it had been suffocating.
"Hunter Gidan, are you feeling well?"
"What brings you here?"
Despite making an effort to be polite, Gidan’s tone remained thoroughly grumpy.
"Ah, well, I came to ask a few questions regarding Malikian."
"Shoot."
Gidan raised an eyebrow.
"Do you happen to know Gnosis?"
"Of course. What hunter doesn’t know Gnosis?"
Gidan folded his arms and answered curtly.
"Haha, I figured as much."
Siwon chuckled lightly, his downward-tilted eyes narrowing into slits.
He reached into his inner pocket to take out his phone—but dropped it.
Tap.
Jurim caught it and casually handed it back.
"Th-Thank you, Guildmaster On..."
Siwon's face turned beet red as he flusteredly bowed his head.
Watching his clumsy behavior, Gidan’s eyebrow shot up.
‘This guy... is Jin Siwon?’
Jin Siwon.
The man who, the moment he defected to Korea, shot up to Rank 2, causing a massive uproar in the hunter world.
Rumors had swirled for a long time about what he had been up to before defecting, as he was allegedly a former agent of a national intelligence agency.
Ranking points are usually obtained by hunting monsters inside dungeons.
However, it’s also possible to earn points through skill usage.
But since the amount gained that way is minuscule, the standard way to accumulate ranking points has always been dungeon activity.
Most people assume that’s all there is to it—but there’s actually one more method.
By killing another hunter.
The killer absorbs all of their target’s ranking points.
Of course, ranking points are nothing more than a symbol of prestige. Because of that, extreme cases where hunters attack others just to climb the rankings are rare.
To prevent even the possibility of such incidents, the Management Bureau never made this information public.
Yet, among those aware of it, one question often arose.
Since the last Great Cataclysm, Korea had been one of the world’s leading powerhouses.
No matter how strong a hunter was in their home country, it was no easy feat to survive among Korea’s rankers.
And yet, a defector from a fallen nation’s intelligence agency had skyrocketed to Rank 2 in Korea right after arriving?
Had he really just been that active inside dungeons?
Or...
Had he been engaging in point-earning activities outside of them?
Whether Jin Siwon was pretending not to notice their suspicions or was truly oblivious, he merely gave a clumsy smile and asked Guru, "Want me to peel an apple for you?"
Of course, since his defection, he hadn’t participated in any external operations, so public interest in the matter quickly faded. His ranking had also dropped significantly since then.
After all, «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» his sudden debut at Rank 2 had ignited fierce competition among the top rankers, leading to an all-out ranking war.
"We suspect that Malikian was contaminated and mutated due to Gnosis. I came to ask if anything seemed unusual to you."
"Well... I dunno... I don’t really know much, so I can’t tell what’s supposed to be special or not."
When Gidan shook his head, Siwon gave a slow nod.
"Then, did you happen to see anyone else inside the dungeon?"
At that moment, Jurim tapped the armrest.
"Team Leader Jin."
"Yes?"
Siwon turned his head.
"We already provided a full, detailed report on the Malikian raid. So before you go repeating the same questions all the way to a hospital bed, why don’t you first explain why you need to ask them again? I’ll decide whether it’s an appropriate reason before answering."
Jurim curved his lips into a small, deliberate smile.
"As you know, this one is a minor. And I’m his guardian."
Siwon scratched his cheek awkwardly.
"Ah... I’m just following the procedures from above. If I’ve caused any inconvenience—"
"It’s inconvenient."
Jurim deliberately cut him off with a sharp response, diverting the man’s focus. It was to ensure that he didn’t realize there had been an extra participant in the Malikian raid.
"Please understand. That ‘above’ you’re following orders from left all the cleanup work to Hyeonak anyway."
"O-Of course, that makes sense. My apologies. Once our Gnosis investigation is complete, we’ll return Hyeonak’s items as soon as possible.".
Just as Jurim intended, the dim-witted man fumbled out an awkward apology, flustered.
That was when Guru, who had been quietly listening, suddenly spoke.
"Ahjussi, what’s Goonosis? Is Gnosis a super bad villain?"
"Ah..."
Siwon hesitated, rubbing his chin as he pondered how to explain it.
Gnosis.
Publicly, they were known as a terrorist organization—but they weren’t like typical terrorist groups.
They had no political or ideological demands.
Their leader was unknown. Their motives were unknown.
The only thing known about them was that they were a group of researchers conducting repeated experiments using the System that had appeared after the Great Cataclysm.
And those experiments were happening all over the world.
They used any means necessary.
Their methods were unethical.
And they had already claimed countless victims.

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