Chapter 63

The Painter Who Draws Dungeons — Episode 63

I tried a lot.

For Iser, it took a firm core and great altruism to come to hate humans overnight.

He tried many times to approach humans.

It wasn’t that I was trying to make excuses, saying I did as much as I could with that.

Yeah, I don’t want to be arrogant with something like that, but...

“...”

It really was fine.

“Are you injured anywhere?”

“H-hwaaak...!

A, a mermaid...!!”

Even after saving their life, being met with contempt and disgust was sad, but it was bearable.

“I can treat you.”

“Don’t lie, how can we trust a mermaid’s words?”

“But...”

“Touch me and I’ll kill you.”

“...”

Having the heart that tried its best to be considerate trampled on without a second thought was fine, too.

“Mermaid?

Isn’t that a monster?”

“...”

“I heard they eat people, wow, that’s horrific.”

Being blamed not for a sin I committed but for my very existence was also something I could endure, in its own way.

“...”

“...”

“Iser.”

My older sister called me.

“Giovanni has been sent to trial.”

“...He is a priest of the sun with a famous reputation, so won’t he be fine?

They’re on the same side.”

“He’ll be put to death for being a traitor.

You heard it too, didn’t you—humanity’s traitor.”

“But Teacher... has saved so many people.”

“What a great stretch.

Since when did humans ever care about that?”

“I don’t understand.

Didn’t anyone defend him?”

“He’s being criticized all the more for having hidden mermaids.

It’s no different from what we saw that day.”

“Why is no one...”

“Humans are such interesting creatures, aren’t they.

You have no idea how fickle they are.”

“...Why...”

“When did they praise Gio’s character and ability, hailing him as a child of God, and now that he shares that light with the sea, they’re loudly calling him humanity’s shame?”

He was the only one who affirmed the sea.

A noble being who waited with me for the day the sky and sea become one, saying mermaids and humans are no different.

I knew how immense a mercy my mentor had bestowed at his side, how much love and affection he poured out.

He truly cherished patients and respected friends.

“...This can’t be...”

All of that had been denied.

‘By humans, of all things.’

Even for a patient mermaid, that was too much.

I couldn’t endure it; it wasn’t fine; I couldn’t bear it.

Even we mourned and put things in order for years because his natural death would have been too precious to waste, so how can you kill him yourselves.

How can you be so cruel.

“...”

Does his pain not make you sad?

“I want to do an experiment.”

“...”

“Do you still like humans?

Do you still think they’re fickle yet lovable creatures?”

“...No...”

“Then do you trust them?

Do you believe they’ll repay goodwill with goodwill, that you can entrust your back to them?”

“...I don’t think so.”

“If you’ve sorted it out, then come back to the sea with me.”

My older sister whispered sweetly.

“You know, but we can’t move people like Giovanni can with a single look, a single touch.

If a mermaid’s cold hand touches a creature of the sun, it’ll only give them goosebumps.”

That was true.

“And because of that, we can give them pain.”

“Pain...”

That was true, too.

“My younger brother, Iser.”

“...Yes, Sister.”

“Will you come with me?”

So Iser decided to endure just one more time.

“No.”

It wasn’t for humans.

“I’ll find another way.”

It was for Giovanni, who loved everything in the world to the very end.

“To choose the soft road when humans and mermaids have already begun a war—one far more vulgar and cruel than you imagine.”

“I know.”

“If that is your choice, I must respect it.

Do your best until you have no regrets, Iser.”

“...Thank you.”

It was a very sad fact, but Giovanni was not the kind of person whose nature would dream of revenge for being betrayed by humans.

‘So for my mentor’s sake, tormenting humans and building infamy would only be a road to betraying him twice.’

I didn’t want to use that noble person as an excuse to vent crudely like humans do.

“...”

After that, Iser endured dozens, hundreds of times.

During the war, he saved an innocent child.

Mermaids could not understand their eccentric kin and simply ignored him, but humans instead pinned absurd false charges on Iser and attacked him.

“One.”

He pulled a pregnant woman who had fallen into the sea up onto land.

But the woman struggled not to be grabbed by the mermaid’s cold hands and drowned, and seeing that, humans screamed that the mermaid was now even eating pregnant women.

“Two.”

He pretended not to see a soldier writhing who wasn’t even worth attacking.

He didn’t want to see blood, but a month later that soldier came looking for him and poured out attacks and curses.

In the end, Iser had to see blood.

“Three...”

The humans he barely became friendly with either died or had betrayal in mind, and no matter what Iser did, they regarded it as filthy and his infamy grew.

Humans poured poison into the sea.

A child died.

He treated wounds.

His side was stabbed by a knife...

“...”

And one day, when he counted.

“...One thousand six hundred forty-three.”

It was already over a thousand.

“...Ah, ugh...”

On the last day he counted, Iser ate my mentor.

“...Hngh, hehehe...”

My whole body throbbed.

“Hha, aaahhhh...!

Aagh...!!”

I was hungry.

My stomach was so, so hungry.

“AaaAAAAAAH—!!!”

* * *

“...”

Even though it was evening, it was bright as midday.

‘It’s like the midnight sun.’

The phenomenon said to be seen sometimes in polar regions, where the sun doesn’t set even when night comes.

‘This is the city of romance, Seoul.

Dopamine is overflowing...’

Gio watched the temple’s priestly procession, fully enjoying the pounding of his heart.

The Part 2 event proceeded far more lavishly than Part 1. If Part 1 emphasized the solemnity unique to religion, Part 2 truly felt like an “event.”

Halos of light sparkled here and there, and the priests’ white robes fluttered.

There was so much to see it almost made his eyes dizzy.

“How is it, worth watching?”

“I like it very much.”

“That’s a relief.”

Yoo Sungwoon wore his characteristic light smile.

“The event period is long, so I wondered if you’d be okay.”

“It certainly is a bit tiring, but...”

Once he returned to the cabin, he was planning to hole up inside the house for a week.

Ever since he stepped outside, he had begun getting tired little by little, so Gio’s stamina had long since hit bottom.

“Still, it’s an event worth watching.”

“Is it the influence of the god you support, after all?”

Since he served the sun god, did he like the Sun Church’s event?

“That could be.”

It wasn’t as comfortable as his own home, but it felt about as comfortable as a friend’s house.

“...”

“Gio?”

“...I was thinking of old friends for a moment.”

You bastards, it’s been 31 years—are you even still alive?

‘I’m curious how the kids are doing too.’

It was something he thought about sometimes, but since he’d been outside this long, he naturally thought of the connections he’d known thirty-one years ago.

‘The elders of that mountain village in Gangwon-do were already old, so I’m not expecting much, but...’

Still, at least the students he taught might be people whose whereabouts he could roughly learn.

“...”

No, but what if I get dragged into a lab because of that...?

‘In movies, a single moment of carelessness based on nostalgia pushes someone’s life off a cliff—why would there be any guarantee it wouldn’t happen to me?’

Becoming a haunted portrait after evolving from a human was, judging by Yoo Sungwoon’s reactions that slipped out now and then, clearly an enormous thing even in this Hell Korea.

Gio decided again to shut up and hole up.

‘If it’s a connection I’m meant to meet, I’ll meet it even without intending to.’

With such a dream-and-hope-filled thought, that is.

“Ah... looks like it’s wrapping up soon.”

“It was quite long.”

“These kinds of initiation ceremonies are also events that show a sect’s prestige.”

Especially for the Sun Church, which boasted quite a large influence in Seoul, they would need to show off this level of splendor.

‘There was also that unsavory missing-person incident recently.’

Thinking that, Yoo Sungwoon glanced toward Gio.

‘...No matter how I think about it, it feels like it’s an incident related to this guy, but...’

Gio truly looked like he felt nothing.

‘Either Gio really knows nothing, or he knows and can’t feel much emotion about it.

Either way, if it’s Gio’s unique nature, it’s something you can accept, which makes it even more confusing.’

It was while they were watching the event come to a close.

“...”

A sudden instinct.

‘...What is it?’

It’s cold.

‘It’s not freezing.’

Because he was a gardener, he knew the essence of energy.

The pressure of nature that crushes the human body, and the fishy stench like blood that seeped out from it.

‘Then this is...’

Cold, damp, and dark oppression.

‘The sea?’

Yoo Sungwoon soon realized it was the energy of the sea.

Wasn’t it a sensation you could never feel naturally?

Yoo Sungwoon instinctively searched for the source.

“Ah...”

When his eyes met ‘Eunha’s’ blue hair, Yoo Sungwoon felt a sense of defeat.

“This is bad.”

Gururuk—...!!!

“Was I too careless.”

An achingly vivid blue energy surged in.

That energy wasn’t like wavering mist.

It had a poisonous relentlessness that sought to seize life, and a brutality that clawed at human fear with sharp nails.

He grasped the situation at once.

“A virtual dungeon.”

With Yoo Sungwoon’s rapid judgment as the end, the entire temple was dyed blue.

“■■■■■—...!!!!!”

A noise so loud it made his ears hurt erupted, like marble pillars being scratched by gigantic claws.

Scraping at his eardrums—kkrik, kkrik—while the whole world shattered in chaos like bursting glass, and waves foaming white greedily devoured people.

“...”

Yoo Sungwoon, who always wore an even expression, twisted his face tightly.

‘...I can’t predict the damage, but there’s one thing that’s certain.’

Overtime again today.

“Whew...”

Kwa-deuk—!!

“I’m already tired.”

Yoo Sungwoon formed an ice spear and drove it into the floor.

‘We can’t get swept away.’

Having made the judgment of an experienced hunter, Yoo Sungwoon braced his body with the spear embedded in the ground.

In the intense cold and shockwaves, Yoo Sungwoon turned back toward the portrait.

“Gio, be care—!”

And there was.

“...”

“...”

A gigantic ‘eye.’

Yoo Sungwoon felt a dreadful silence, as if time had stopped.

What is that?

An eye?

“...”

It resembled nature, yet he could not distinguish whether it belonged to the sun or the sea.

Shards of light, broken into pieces, scattered glittering; they flickered in chaos as if throbbing, and he saw an illusion reflecting deep waves of unknowable depth.

Yoo Sungwoon could not take his eyes off the portrait being swept up by the waves.

There was a sea there, inside it.

A white sea distorted by light.

And that sea spoke.

『Where the sun does not reach...』

That voice was like nature itself.

『You’ve come to the deep sea.』

Why did it sound like a god’s judgment?

Even as he held it in his eyes, he could not recognize it.

It felt like he could hear the sound of sunlight pouring down.

He heard the sound of warmth.

The waves mingled with it, then hid their teeth and shrank their bodies.

Yoo Sungwoon only came to his senses enough to realize something after that.

“...”

Sound returned, and time began to flow again as he escaped the silence.

As the harsh noise that hurt his ears and the tinnitus like the obstinacy of the dead vanished, the waves that had been ferocious like an abyssal monster died down and became still again...

“...”

“...”

“...”

The scenery of the world changed.

“Ah...”

A blood-stinking, eerie cold.

Yoo Sungwoon looked around.

He could see people.

“...Wh-where are we...?”

“A dungeon?

Fuck, don’t tell me it’s a dungeon?”

“Is there, is there any hunter here?!”

This place, where people who had just come to their senses were shouting in chaos, was clearly a dungeon.

“...”

Yoo Sungwoon took in the dim, bluish space like a shadow.

A pupil so vast you couldn’t even see the ceiling was reflecting eerie water-scales that seemed to come from nowhere.

Yoo Sungwoon’s gaze then landed on the bluish pillars of water standing here and there within the pupil.

A sigh came out on its own.

“...Oh, good grief...”

A bunch of chimeras that looked close to aquatic creatures were lodged all over.

“This is bad.”

It looked ominous from the moment they entered, and the dungeon’s difficulty seemed quite high.

‘It’s hard to call it a typical virtual dungeon when there are more than enough people dragged in... and...’

Yoo Sungwoon barely held on to his sanity, trying to return home, and coldly assessed the situation he was in.

A so-called “virtual dungeon” forcibly drags a group of people who meet arbitrary conditions into another dimension and runs a game.

By the number of participants and how absurd the game was, you could tell the capability of the dungeon’s owner.

‘And just counting the civilians gathered in this pupil alone, it’s close to twenty...

There could be people dragged in elsewhere too, so it’s excessive in many ways.

I can tell how much the owner of this dungeon has been grinding their teeth and preparing.’

And Yoo Sungwoon, as an A-rank hunter of one of Korea’s top three guilds, the collectors, had the responsibility to protect these people and complete the raid.

“...”

While dragging along this motley crowd of civilians.

* * *

‘As expected of an A-rank hunter.’

At Yoo Sungwoon’s cool appearance as he grasped and organized the situation in an instant, Eunha—Iser—admired him inwardly.

By Earth standards, they say that from B-rank upward, one’s way of thinking gradually departs from ordinary human standards.

If so, at the higher rank of A, it went without saying.

‘I heard he isn’t some particularly famous public figure.’

He was indeed not someone to dismiss.

‘But...’

In a situation like this, what could a single hunter do?

‘With all this baggage, at best he’ll die together with the citizens, or he’ll choose to run to preserve his own life.

That is the foolish creature called human.’

From within the shadows of the pupil, far from the commotion, Iser watched the humans panicking in terror.

“S-save me!

I don’t want to die here...!!”

“Where is this?

Where is this?

Hey, where is this, so where...”

“KyaaAAAAH...!!

Th-there’s a, a monster!

There’s a monster!!”

His ears grew tired.

‘...Are they incapable of doing anything but screaming.

Truly, there’s no idiot like them.’

At the squawking noise, a familiar disgust surged in—something he felt dozens of times a day.

A faded hatred for humans.

“...”

In this incident, Iser’s role was only to open the door—nothing more.

‘...If the predecessor hadn’t suddenly gone missing, I wouldn’t have had to step in.’

Opening a deep-sea door inside a Sun Temple took fairly seasoned skill.

‘That’s why I had already infiltrated and trained one of the humans.’

But somehow he was killed by an unknown powerhouse, and things became tangled.

The execution date was right around the corner.

And the only person who could open the door in that moment was Iser alone...

‘There’s nothing about this I like.’

After mixing among humans even briefly, not a single part of his body or mind was intact.

‘You really must not interact with this species for long.

It feels like their incompetence rubs off on you.’

He wanted to end this quickly and sink into the silent sea.

“Hunter, you’re a hunter, right!

How are you going to take responsibility for this!!”

“What... what does this have to do with me, don’t talk nonsense about responsibility!!”

“Where are the priests?

Fuck, where are the priests?!”

“Uh, um, the preliminary priests... they’re priests too, right?

Huh?

They’re priests, right?”

“Somebody help, what the hell is going on!!”

How could he ever set his heart on something so vulgar, flailing like that.

“...”

This place was one of the passages Earth humans call “dungeons,” located fairly deep in the later stages.

‘...It’s too far to return to the entrance, and it’s not a good situation to find the exit, so unless something changes, they’ll all die here.

Even if I don’t lay a hand on them, that will surely happen.’

As he thought of finishing things that way, the man wrapped in a black cloak suddenly came to mind.

The sun god named Gio.

“...Hoo...”

In a situation where all humans had scattered everywhere, he felt stupid for having unconsciously tracked that man’s location.

If he was going to kill them all anyway, why do something that foolish?

‘Right, let’s finish it quickly.’

If any individuals survive whole, they will have the honor of becoming Sister’s test subjects.

It might not be bad to ask to be granted ownership of one of them.

“...Then.”

He stepped out from the shadows, one step forward.

And just as he gripped the staff in his hand, about to do his “monster” work—

“...”

‘...A presence?’

Iser turned around.

“...”

Before he knew it, the black cloak was standing right behind him.

“...!”

That can’t be.

‘I confirmed he was not here?’

No matter if the other party was something that held divinity—even if it could kill gods—this was not something a mermaid would have anticipated.

‘Was I too careless?’

Iser retreated.

Perhaps because he was in a child’s body, an oddly strong pressure came from the black cloak.

Since such a large body had moved, at least one of the humans should have reacted, yet no one cast even a glance toward the black cloak and Iser.

‘Why?’

At that indescribable sense of wrongness, Iser bared sharp teeth.

Fangs that had even torn apart his mentor’s body.

“You, who the hell are you...!”

“Iser.”

“...”

...What?

“...”

“Ah, Iser...”

He called my name.

“...”

It was a call as low as a corpse.

Iser froze.

‘...He called my name.’

Like a fish touching ice water, he went rigid, unable to move.

When the man, tall as a thick wall, bent down and stroked the child’s cheek, that small body was swallowed by shadow in an instant.

The pitch-black cloak fell like a curtain, completely wrapping Iser like a waterfall.

‘How...’

And so the child-bodied mermaid could see the face of the one looking down at him.

“Weren’t you cold?”

“...”

“Did it hurt a lot?”

“...”

“You must have been lonely and afraid...”

A person who resembled sunlight scattering on the sea.

“...”

That warm platinum hair, and eyes that resembled radiant waves.

Those distant blue eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

“...”

“I’m sorry.”

He was crying.

“...Ah...”

Giovanni.

My mentor, who met the most wretched death in the world, was now a corpse, crying before me.

* * *

Gio lost consciousness.

Fantasy, modern,