Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Episode 19. The Ribs Are Still in Good Condition

Immediately after the body slam landed, the raincoat man was driven into the stone chamber wall.

BANG!

His back struck the rock. Jinho did not immediately pull away.

The right hand that had lost its rhythm when struck by the stone earlier. The hand whose sounds had made the dead wolves move in time.

He had decided that all he needed to do was stop that hand.

But something was strange. It did not feel as though he had slammed into a person.

It was lighter, thinner, and seemed hollow inside...

At that moment, something inside the raincoat snapped with a series of cracks.

"---ra!"

The creature said something. However, Jinho could not understand what it meant.

Jinho immediately stepped on the part he thought was its wrist.

Thud-

At the same time, the rhythm stopped, and the black raincoat collapsed. Dry twigs and black threads spilled from inside.

What fell to the ground at its center was not a person.

It was a straw doll about the size of his palm.

Its eyes and mouth were sewn with black thread, and a small square pattern was drawn on its chest. The straw doll's arms and legs had been broken halfway by the impact just now.

Jinho froze briefly.

'It wasn't a person?'

At that moment, the black thread sewn around the straw doll's mouth trembled faintly.

"--ji-go!"

Once again, an incomprehensible sound came from it, and another click rang out behind Jinho.

'The fingers are still moving?'

He hurriedly looked toward the source of the sound. Black threads hanging from the end of the arm he had just stepped on were tapping against the ground.

Click-

A scream erupted from the clearing in front of the den.

"The Red-Mane Wolf is moving again!!!!"

Jinho's eyes turned cold.

'So the problem wasn't the fingers, but the threads.'

No, more precisely, it was the center where those threads gathered. Jinho looked down at the straw doll's chest.

A small square pattern.

That was where the greatest number of black threads extended from.

'Is that where it's sending out the rhythm?'

"Is it here?"

The straw doll's mouth trembled.

"If you... touch that..."

Jinho raised his foot.

"I have to finish this before the meat spoils!"

CRUNCH.

His foot crushed the straw doll's chest. All the black threads snapped at once. At that moment, a series of dull thuds came from the clearing in front of the den.

Thud-

Thud-

Thud-

The undead wolves collapsed to the ground one by one. Those with broken necks, those with only legs remaining, and even the corpses whose mana stones had been removed all went limp.

The Red-Mane Wolf's corpse also stopped moving.

The hunter who had nearly had his neck bitten moments earlier collapsed to the ground, breathing heavily. Only the marks where the wolf's teeth had grazed his neck remained.

If they had been two seconds later, his head would have been separated from his body.

Jinho returned and looked toward Yoon Gitae. His expression was complicated.

"...This was a violation of orders..."

He let out a series of heavy sighs.

"Yes."

'I should get out of here before he starts giving me shit.'

Jinho answered without taking his foot off the remains of the straw doll.

Yoon Gitae fell silent for a moment. Then he glanced at the hunter sitting on the ground.

"...But someone survived thanks to you, so I'll let it slide."

Only then did Jinho nod.

"But are the Red-Mane Wolf's ribs okay? I need them."

Yoon Gitae's face stiffened.

"Is that really what's important right now?"

Jinho looked toward the Red-Mane Wolf.

Its blood was draining out. The flesh beneath its mane had also turned black, apparently affected by the undead contamination.

'They're still usable, right? Please.'

Jinho's expression became serious.

"Yes."

_____________

A short while later, Yoon Gitae regained his composure and spoke rapidly into his communicator.

"Yoon Gitae. Field support unit. Failed to directly subdue the unidentified individual. Turns out it wasn't human. Confirmed a proxy medium in the form of a straw doll. Suspected illegal necromancy-related incident. Check the injured and request a site lockdown. I repeat, requesting a site lockdown."

Before he had even finished speaking, Jinho had already returned to the clearing in front of the den.

The Red-Mane Wolf's corpse was still there. Although the black stains had spread to the ends of its mane, fortunately, they did not seem to have reached the area beneath its ribs.

Jinho first picked up his insulated bag from the ground. One side had been torn open, and the ice packs had burst, so it looked unusable.

'Should I just throw it away?'

Jinho folded the torn section inward and set the insulated bag beside him. Then he crouched in front of the Red-Mane Wolf, inserted his knife beneath its ribs, and pried the flesh apart.

It was fine.

"What a relief."

A hunter standing nearby asked with a dumbfounded expression.

"What is?"

Jinho answered sincerely.

"The ribs are still in good condition."

The surroundings fell silent. Someone muttered very quietly.

"Is this guy fucking crazy?"

Jinho did not deny it. Instead, he adjusted his grip on his dismantling knife.

"About processing those byproducts. Can I do it first? I don't need the mana stone or the hide. I just want to take the meat."

One hunter looked at him in disbelief.

"...You're asking that in a situation like this?"

"It'll get tough if I wait too long."

At that moment, Yoon Gitae returned. He looked extremely pissed off, making the hunter standing nearby unconsciously watch his reaction.

"Dismantle it or turn it into a bloody rag, do whatever you want. That damn thing, seriously..."

Yoon Gitae's voice rang out across the site again.

"Prepare to seal off the area! Evacuate the injured first, and recount all personnel!"

The site became noisy again. People were busy putting the straw doll into a sealing bag, carrying the injured, tying up the corpses that had turned undead, and shouting into communicators.

Jinho did not miss the opportunity.

'I need to finish quickly and get out of here.'

[Would you like to dismantle it?]

[Your current skill levels are ‘Appraisal Lv.1,’ ‘Purification Lv.3,’ and ‘Dismantling Lv.3.’]

Faint lines appeared beneath the ribs, following the area where the chest had once risen and fallen with each breath. When he inserted the knife, the membrane and flesh separated almost too easily. The tough portions, the parts to keep, and the parts to discard naturally became distinguishable.

[Purification has been applied.]

[Necromantic contamination has been removed.]

Jinho selected only the sections of ribs that were still in good condition and separated them whole. He did the same with the layer of fat attached underneath. The mana stone? That had been removed first and placed in the recovery container.

'Are there any other parts worth taking?'

The hide was unusable because the black contamination had spread across it, and even if it had been intact, it was not something Jinho could take.

He was probing through the wolf with his knife when something hard caught against the tip beneath the membrane touched by the black stain. Jinho carefully opened the membrane beneath the ribs.

A black, square cube about the size of a finger joint emerged.

'What's this?'

It was neither stone, bone, plastic, nor metal. He had no idea what it was.

In any case, this foreign object had mysterious thin lines engraved across it.

[You have acquired an unidentified cube.]

[It cannot currently be appraised.]

Jinho's hand stopped for a brief moment.

'What is this thing?'

But there was no time to think about it. People around him were watching with curious eyes.

For now, Jinho wrapped the ribs he had cut off and the cube together in the torn fabric of his insulated bag.

The very moment the insulated bag's fabric blocked them from view, he opened his inventory.

The Red-Mane Wolf's ribs, lean meat, red fat layer, and the unidentified cube. Everything disappeared from his fingertips.

From a distance, it would have looked as though he had stuffed bloodstained byproducts into the insulated bag.

Jinho immediately placed a few bone fragments with wolf fur attached and some bloodstained byproducts inside the bag. That way, even if someone opened it later, it would not be completely empty.

[You have successfully dismantled part of the Red-Mane Wolf!]

[You have gained experience!]

[The ‘Dismantling’ skill has leveled up!]

[The ‘Purification’ skill has leveled up!]

[You have acquired ‘Red-Mane Wolf Ribs.’]

[You have acquired ‘Red-Mane Wolf Lean Meat.’]

'Then, shall I start making my escape?'

Jinho thought as he heard a shout erupt behind him.

"Clear the rear! Patient coming through!"

An injured person was being loaded onto a stretcher. The recovery assistants began moving toward the exit all at once.

Jinho reflexively adjusted the strap of his insulated bag and moved alongside the stretcher. The incident was already over, so there was no particular reason for him to stay any longer.

'Surely they won't say I ran away, right?'

"Emergency patient! Please clear the way!!"

Someone shouted while carrying the stretcher. Jinho followed it, blending in among the recovery assistants as they passed through the gate.

The outside air entered his lungs.

Jinho passed between the waiting vehicles and tents, then walked briskly toward the return station. He could run, but why bother?

The employee at the return station frowned upon seeing his bloodstained insulated bag.

"Is that waste?"

"Yes. I'm throwing it away."

The employee casually checked the inside of the torn insulated bag before attaching a disposal sticker.

"If you're taking anything else out, it's at your own risk. And don't use public transportation while carrying unwashed waste."

"Yes."

Jinho dumped the entire insulated bag into the disposal bin. Only after reaching the outskirts of the parking lot did he finally exhale.

"Ah, fuck. I'm never entering as a recovery assistant again."

Even if it was legal, it still shortened his lifespan.

He would rather just get a Hunter ID.

Of course, that was something he would have to think about a little more.

______________

Meanwhile, inside the gate.

Only after confirming that the straw doll had been placed inside the sealing bag did Yoon Gitae look around.

"Where is he?"

"Pardon?"

An employee standing nearby asked.

"The recovery assistant who fought so well earlier."

"He just left with the patient transport team."

Yoon Gitae's expression stiffened.

"He left?"

"Yes. Well, there's no need for a recovery assistant to stay here any longer, is there? Is there some problem...?"

Yoon Gitae pressed a hand to his forehead.

"Ha, looks like he ran off. That rib-obsessed bastard, seriously."

But he did not know that the incident was not over yet.

______________

A novice participant sitting at the edge of the waiting area looked down at his phone again.

It was a video he had saved a little earlier.

Wolves leaped out, and people screamed. The dead wolves rose one by one.

As people became tangled together, someone shouted.

- Keep them from getting up! Tie them down!

But then a black-hooded figure moved at one side of the screen.

That person shoved an undead wolf to the ground, ran deeper inside, and threw himself onto the Red-Mane Wolf's corpse as though climbing on top of it.

Then, much later, the black raincoat slammed into the wall, and something resembling a straw doll fell to the ground. But the video did not end there.

While everyone around him was still stunned, the black-hooded figure crouched beside the Red-Mane Wolf's corpse.

And said.

- The ribs are still in good condition.

The novice participant watched the video about three times.

No matter how he looked at it, the guy was insane.

As he left the gate, he accessed HunterNet. Then, without thinking much about it, he gave the post a title.

[Crazy Bastard Takes Down Zombie Wolves at Public Gate, Checks the Ribs First]

Then he pressed the upload button.