chapter 104

The Painter Who Draws Dungeons - Episode 104

It’s something I’m only saying now, but.

‘City of Emptiness,’ if we split hairs, could be seen as closer to an entry-type dungeon.

“In that it clearly has an entrance, at least.”

It was different from a virtual dungeon, a dimension where you don’t even know where it exists, let alone an entrance, and also different from a villa-type dungeon where its material existence isn’t hidden and everything is laid bare.

A Gio’s frame that contains only a passage can, indeed, be called an entry-type dungeon.

“And there are entry-type dungeons that are mobile too, so the basic form is similar.”

Separate from the three types above, dungeons could also be divided into mobile and fixed types.

Since it doesn’t stay in one place and keeps moving, if you were to organize it, you could define it roughly as a “mobile entry-type dungeon.”

“It’s my first time seeing one shaped like a frame, though...”

Originally, the entrance of an entry-type dungeon didn’t have a set form.

‘It could be a book, a pit, a curtain, after all.’

But most entry-type dungeon entrances took the shape of a door.

Should I say it was obvious enough that anyone could tell, “Ah, that’s the entrance over there.”

If it looked like it would be easy to go in without difficulty, it was often an entry-type dungeon.

“...”

Even so, normally you wouldn’t think a frame is an entrance.

“...To begin with, if no one had been dragged in, I wouldn’t even have thought it was a dungeon.”

He did know that normally Gio could come and go through a portrait in the gallery.

However, the portrait gave such a strong impression of being Gio’s “home” that he perceived it more like a building you couldn’t enter unless he allowed it.

‘It was the same when Hunter Cha Ara was invited to Gio’s cabin.’

Compared to dungeons that showed the cruel, harsh capital of modern society, ‘Gio’s Portrait,’ with its calm and heavy atmosphere, differed in many ways.

Because of that, perhaps he hadn’t realized the two were similar concepts.

It was all excuses, though.

‘All this time, I thought Gio would be closer to an object-like existence.’

He had said there was a possibility it was a monster, but he hadn’t considered the “dungeon” that naturally followed such a monster.

Because even by the source’s explanation, Gio was clearly a “portrait.”

“Then does that mean we should treat that portrait as a single dungeon...”

Gio was already creating dungeons by drawing pictures. Whether he drew ‘Gio’s Portrait’ himself was unknown, but hadn’t people witnessed, after ‘The Breathing Sea,’ even ‘City of Emptiness’?

“...If anything, now it’s harder to say it isn’t a dungeon.”

Yoo Seong-woon recalled the black portrait sleeping in Visabel’s gallery.

It had, by its own will, splashed its face with pitch-black ink, and with that it was erased from the minds of people in the world. The only people who knew what ‘Gio’s Portrait’ looked like were a tiny handful who had seen its face before.

‘Even then, they often forget.’

It was as though history itself had been erased without any sense of incongruity.

“...”

Wasn’t it a terrifying influence.

“I hope it doesn’t become hostile to us.”

‘Gio’s Portrait’ was something that became a threat to humanity just by existing.

If it ever gained the will to oppose humans, it would be hard to find a calamity on that scale.

Why was Yoo Seong-woon suddenly babbling about all this?

“...Hoo...”

Because ‘City of Emptiness’ was sitting right in front of him.

“It really appears out of nowhere.”

The place Yoo Seong-woon found this gray frame was none other than an aboveground subway station.

It was a place he’d once visited with Gio while giving him a tour of Seoul, and thanks to that, Yoo Seong-woon could form one hypothesis.

“Does this frame mainly appear in places Gio, the dungeon’s owner, has stopped by?”

Or in places the thing might take interest in.

If you listened through people’s witness accounts, it didn’t appear only in places Gio knew.

Sometimes it showed up out of the blue in the slums, sometimes on the road, and sometimes it popped up inside abandoned buildings.

‘From the standpoint of non-hunters, they wouldn’t know it was Gio’s painting, so it wouldn’t spread as a rumor.’

Surprisingly, this frame appeared more often in everyday spaces where civilians wandered around than in dungeons.

Among those, the higher-frequency ones were, as expected, spaces Gio had directly visited—though that was all.

Yoo Seong-woon, who suddenly felt intensely tired, planted himself in the aboveground subway station and sat down.

“Good grief...”

Every joint ached.

“At least there’s no one around.”

The current time was 4:16 a.m.

Since it was a time when exhausted modern people slept with one heart and one mind, it was only natural that the aboveground subway station—where you had to pay expensive money to enter—was empty.

‘Still, it’s only just become the 26th, so wouldn’t some aftereffects of Christmas remain?

More than anything, the aboveground subway runs 24 hours a day, so I thought there might be at least one drunkard coming home late after partying...’

Thinking that, Yoo Seong-woon soon nodded.

“...It hasn’t been long since people died in the ‘Deep Sea Temple’ after gathering like that.”

It was an event held in none other than a temple of the sun.

Even that place, a virtual dungeon appeared and swallowed the entire crowd who were watching an initiation ceremony.

Thinking of that, it was understandable that many people still felt uneasy about gathering.

“Thanks to that, this Christmas, people gathered noticeably less than usual too.”

Whenever it looked like a crowd might form, everyone seemed to recall the initiation ceremony disaster and quietly drifted away.

“Anyway...”

For Yoo Seong-woon, who didn’t want to blow things up, it was a good thing.

‘...To think I’d say it’s a good thing while watching citizens tremble in fear—I’ve really been dyed quite a bit too.

I just hope I don’t grow so narrow-minded living like this that I can’t be entrusted with a garden...’

His gaze landed on ‘City of Emptiness.’

“...”

Is it a bit eerie?

‘...It almost feels like there’s a sense of disillusionment with the city.’

Having lived as a curator for years, he could also feel the mental image imbued in a work.

A city where gray buildings were clustered to a grotesque degree felt as though it depicted a crowd that was noisy and chaotic, and yet also the silence of a crowd as if no one opened their mouth.

‘Even though you can’t even see the crowd itself.’

Staring at the gray frame that made the mind go blank, Yoo Seong-woon murmured softly.

“...So it doesn’t kidnap people just because they looked at the frame.”

Having walked around on foot, the number of witnesses he’d found was four.

All of them were ordinary citizens within Seoul who weren’t even awakened, and no one had suffered harm because of ‘City of Emptiness.’

‘Everyone just thought it was some random painting hanging in a strange place.’

Among the four witnesses was even an alcoholic who was hard to call kind.

According to neighbors, he lived alone, and sometimes did annoying nuisance behavior in front of the convenience store.

‘Does it not count that as an evildoer?’

Or does it only attack if you commit an evil deed directly in front of the frame?

“...With so few comparison cases, I can’t be sure.”

Yoo Seong-woon had a history of killing.

‘Not a rare history in this era.’

Of course, it wasn’t that he killed just anyone—it happened when he stopped fifth-grade citizens who clearly harmed society, or criminals on par with them.

Because fighting with the intent to kill is more advantageous than aiming only to subdue.

‘But that doesn’t mean it was a good deed.’

In this ominous, harsh era, what hunter hasn’t killed a person, but in the end, wrong is still wrong.

Judged morally, Yoo Seong-woon had committed a sin.

Even so, ‘City of Emptiness’ remained quiet.

“...”

There were many possible cases.

“...This frame doesn’t feel like Gio, the dungeon’s owner.”

In that case, this frame might simply be moving according to Gio’s commands.

‘So it doesn’t have the same level of emotional ability as Gio.’

Gio judged a person’s good and evil just by looking at them for a moment.

But this frame, which receives simple orders and executes them, lacks that level of ability, so perhaps it only weighs what happened in front of it and distinguishes good and evil accordingly. A degraded version of ‘Gio’s Portrait.’

“...Or else...”

It might have judged that Yoo Seong-woon or the alcoholic he saw weren’t “evildoers.”

If you split hairs, Yoo Seong-woon did what he had to do, and the alcoholic only caused nuisance annoying enough to be irritating.

Taking that into account, they might not be evildoers worth attacking by Gio’s standards.

‘If that drunk has committed a crime beyond mere nuisance, it’d be much easier to tell.’

If he had committed something beyond simple nuisance, it was highly likely that ‘City of Emptiness’ collected only evildoers confirmed to have committed an evil act directly.

“...”

But one thing was certain.

“...Gio’s good and evil are concluded according to his taste.”

If Gio had defined “murder” itself as an evil act, Yoo Seong-woon should already have been kidnapped and gone missing.

But since that hadn’t happened up to now, it meant Gio distinguished a target’s good and evil depending on the situation.

“I don’t know whether this will be good or bad for humans...”

Anyway, what Yoo Seong-woon had to do now was clear.

“...I’m tired to death.”

He had to go into that ‘City of Emptiness’ and confirm the condition of the hunter named Park Eun-gyeom.

Yoo Seong-woon approached the work hanging on the transparent wall.

“How do I get inside this?”

A typical entry-type dungeon didn’t require any special conditions to enter.

From the dungeon’s perspective, prey was rolling in on its own, so there would be no reason to block it in the first place.

‘But if Gio is still favorable toward humans, there’s definitely a reason to block that.’

At the very least, it wasn’t as if he wanted people to fall into his dungeon indiscriminately and die.

Staring at the painting that made his stomach feel stuffed the more he looked, Yoo Seong-woon noticed something in that empty city.

“...”

Sensing something off, Yoo Seong-woon looked more closely at the painting.

“...That is...”

Between the long boulevard and the buildings lined along both sides, and within the alleys created by them.

Something black and whitish caught Yoo Seong-woon’s eye.

“...A person?”

It also looked like someone crouching.

‘It’s too small to make it out.’

But in a city so clean it seemed there wouldn’t be a speck of dust, a black dot sticking out was certainly strange.

It was natural enough not to feel jarringly out of place, but after watching it consciously for a long time, he could tell it wasn’t a picture that belonged in ‘City of Emptiness.’

The black dot seemed to twitch faintly.

“...”

Yoo Seong-woon got goosebumps in an instant.

“...Is that Hunter Park Eun-gyeom?”

If you didn’t mean to look for it, it wouldn’t even enter your eyes.

Because no matter who saw it, it was a “painting.”

* * *

“Guruk?”

“Dad’s busy.”

“Gurur?”

“I’m watching your younger sibling, aren’t I?”

“Koong?”

Honey tilted her head repeatedly, but Gio held firm.

“Even now, we need to comfort our Emptiness.”

He was currently wrapping ‘City of Emptiness’ in a baby wrap, then rocking it gently.

Iser, who had dropped by briefly, nodded with his usual benevolent smile and left, but Gio instinctively felt that ‘City of Emptiness’ was quite pleased with this care of his.

“If our Emptiness had a mouth, I’d feed it, but what does it live on, anyway.”

“Gur...”

“People?

People, you say.

Unfortunately, that isn’t something you can eat.”

“Kooung?”

“I don’t know why my kids all say such scary things.”

While talking with his eldest, Gio noticed that the picture in ‘City of Emptiness’ had changed.

“What is it.”

It had taken on Yoo Seong-woon’s form.

“...”

“Gururur...”

“I don’t know why you’re smacking your lips, but it can’t be what you’re thinking, so calm down, and so what exactly is this situation.

Father, if you’re watching me, tell me the answer...”

The sun god gave him the answer.

“Coo-oo, coo-coo.”

“You’re saying Mr. Yoo Seong-woon is actually in front of our Emptiness right now?”

Is this the new-generation intercom?

‘Trends have looped so hard they’ve come back around to portraits now?’

Of course that couldn’t be.

Anyway, since ‘City of Emptiness’ could, in its own way, be considered one of Gio’s homes, he was grateful that it had an intercom function he’d never even put into the frame.

“I almost wouldn’t have been able to greet a guest.”

He didn’t know why that guest was in front of ‘City of Emptiness,’ but it didn’t matter.

Having kept his chastity even on the holy birthday of Jesus today, Gio was simply delighted and delighted by this familiar face.

Seong-woon hyung, it’s been a while, right?

“Emptiness, open the door for him.

He’s Dad’s friend.”

“ ”

“Feels like our kid just answered—was that a hallucination.”

“ ”

“My good kid, you babble well too.”

Does life need deep worry?

To Gio, the variables of life were nothing more than the appearance of new content.

Even in this sudden situation, he didn’t care at all and prepared to become a capital-E extrovert.

“I’ll get to see hyung’s face after a long time.”

Anyway, if it’s fun, that’s enough.

Fantasy, Modern,