D-Rank Constellation Hunter… Stuck Without Internet! - Chapter 68

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 68
“W-where is this place?”
Ha Gyuhyuk murmured in bewilderment, holding me tightly in his embrace.
At this point, it felt less like he was holding me and more like he was clinging to me.
“But where did Kim Gyuwun go?”
“Ah, he was heading toward Se-um, but Hunter Ji Chae-ah forcibly gave him an escape stone and sent him away, saying there was a funeral to attend to.”
“Good call. Why does he always come looking for me whenever something happens? I only have one heart.”
And that place had never once.
Not in the past, not now, not in the future—it would never be his. Yet he persists so stubbornly. I stroked his back several times.
Meanwhile, Tasha responded to Ha Gyuhyuk’s question in an offhand tone.
“Inside my brain.”
“Pardon?”
Tasha spoke gently to Ha Gyuhyuk, whose voice trembled as if he might faint.
“In human terms, you’d call it the Akashic Records.”
The Akashic Records.
The memory and cosmic record encompassing all time, knowledge, and worlds.
By Earth’s definition, that’s what it is—but for Tasha, who was gradually transforming into a tentacled being before my eyes, it was different.
For Tasha, it was simply a part of her own brain.
A being capable of storing all the world’s memories and knowledge within her brain.
“Well, it’s not actually my brain. It’s a Dimensional Space where I’ve relocated what was in my brain.”
“Allow me to introduce myself properly. This is Constellation Tasha. Na is my surname.”
“….”
Though she seemed to have much she wanted to clarify, Tasha accepted the reality of becoming the eldest daughter of the prestigious Na Family.
Ha Gyuhyuk awkwardly bowed toward Tasha.
“This is the Crown Prince.”
“Ah… You’re the Constellation who helped us earlier, aren’t you? It’s an honor to meet you.”
“Franson.”
Ha Gyuhyuk introduced himself with another deep bow.
Franson grinned widely and waved both hands.
“But where is the other person?”
Ha Gyuhyuk awkwardly glanced around at the three of us.
The Constellation who had tried to kill him was nowhere to be found, no matter how hard one looked. Tasha answered his bewildered expression.
“I didn’t bring them. Why would I bring a Constellation that Se-um dislikes?”
“Ah….”
“Don’t worry. A Constellation losing one avatar isn’t a major problem.”
Of course, if it were a Constellation like that one with insufficient karma, that would be a different story.
They probably won’t be able to return to Earth until Ha Gyuhyuk’s last breath.
Unless they were fortunate enough to escape, but it’s questionable whether they have enough karma remaining to exert that level of power.
“Then this is outside the Dungeon?”
“No, we’re hidden in a Dimensional Space inside the Dungeon. That special Gate will probably disappear within 2 minutes and 12 seconds.”
“Ah….”
“But this is my personal Dimensional Space, so other Constellations can’t see it.”
Strictly speaking, it’s treated as something akin to a Constellation’s private bedroom, so it falls under the jurisdiction of the Constellation System.
“That’s why clients can’t enter. The moment a client steps in, karma gets calculated by the minute and drains away.”
Tasha, now in her tentacled form, stared at Ha Gyuhyuk with an unreadable expression.
Despite his unfamiliar appearance, he showed no particular surprise.
He simply seemed flustered at the fact that he’d wandered into a place he shouldn’t have.
“Every minute you spend here costs me karma. I’ll collect that from Se-um later.”
“Understood….”
There was no helping it.
I’d have to spend the karma I’d been diligently saving for my son.
When the time came, I could either use an escape stone again or tackle an S-rank Dungeon with the three Constellations and Ha Gyuhyuk for some enjoyable content.
“But Se-um, I have a question.”
While Ha Gyuhyuk was being guided through my brain with Tasha’s permission, Franson approached me with a question.
I realized I was dwelling on the heartbeat I’d felt earlier and his body heat, and I startled without meaning to.
Franson, looking even more surprised than I was, carefully opened his mouth.
“Didn’t you say Major Dungeons could be exited anytime during an attempt?”
“An escape Gate must be activated.”
Creating an escape Gate and actually exiting takes well over thirty minutes.
But an abnormal Gate was approaching with terrifying speed right before our eyes.
If it had been a pack of werewolves, I would have retreated quickly and generated an escape Gate. But this wasn’t a Gate—or rather, it was.
Only then did he nod as if understanding.
“I see.”
Ha Gyuhyuk was looking at a book with interest, so I approached him.
“What are you reading?”
“Ah, it’s a book about non-human headaches.”
“Hm?”
“It seemed like you had a headache earlier. But you mentioned before that your body moves even when your heart stops, right?”
So he was checking the non-human headache compendium to see if there were any life forms similar to me.
A laugh escaped me unbidden at his utterly innocent expression.
I took the book from his hands, organized it properly, and placed it back on the shelf, then patted his shoulder.
“That’s a good thing.”
“A good thing? You mean the pain?”
“Yeah, the pain.”
There are two conditions for creating Constellations.
“How is pain a good thing? You looked so troubled earlier, Se-um.”
One is wealth karma above a certain threshold from countless virtues, and the other is karma itself—literally.
The origin of stars.
There was a reason all Constellations couldn’t die peacefully.
Humans compress it flatly into attachment to life, but the reality is somewhat different.
If I die while holding onto some value I couldn’t resolve throughout my life, carrying that karma, I gain the opportunity to become a Constellation.
Whether I become a Constellation or simply die is a matter of choice.
But the moment I become a Constellation, I cannot die unless I resolve that ‘karma’.
So the fact that window appeared before me means….
“Yeah, something like that.”
It’s a fact I still can’t discuss in front of Ha Gyuhyuk.
I gave his shoulder a light pat and turned around once as if to say everything was fine now.
“That’s not what matters right now.”
I smoothly changed the subject, but Ha Gyuhyuk’s expression remained skeptical.
Still, when I moved past it, he gave a slight nod as if to say there was nothing he could do about it.
Lately, he seemed to be subtly trying to nag me more and more.
It’s cute in its own way, but sometimes it’s exhausting.
“Ha Gyuhyuk, do you know what that Gate was earlier?”
Franson and Tasha, who had been slowly approaching from behind, let out sighs.
They also knew exactly what it was.
But the reason they hadn’t mentioned it at the time was probably for my sake.
“Ah, I only know roughly what Hunter Ji Chae-ah mentioned….”
“It’s natural that you don’t know.”
I let out a long sigh.
“It’s a Landquake.”
* * *
At first, Ha Gyuhyuk didn’t understand what I meant.
Once Tasha told the truth, she ushered us back into the Dungeon to leave.
In the empty Dungeon stood three Constellations and one human.
I watched him, his complexion pale as he seemed to replay those words in his mind, and smiled bitterly.
“It only appears occasionally. It won’t open again.”
“…It won’t open?”
“Right. Not for now.”
Anyway, the people who saw that Gate in the Dungeon today will leave and analyze the situation.
Then it won’t be long before they discover it’s a Landquake.
Public opinion will be turned upside down over whether the Landquake opens again or not. The Constellations might even watch their confusion while knowing the truth.
Some will come rushing to me wanting to hear the details.
At the very least, my client deserves to hear that story first.
“The Landquake is an unprecedented Gate. At minimum, nothing more severe than this will probably ever appear on Earth.”
“….”
“330 years ago, the Gate closed before the Landquake opened. But that wasn’t a clear—the Landquake is in a very long dormant period.”
I didn’t add that what’s blocking the Gate is the corpse of the one standing right before his eyes.
“A dormant period?”
“Yeah, if what’s blocking the Gate rots or disappears, it’ll open again. But for that to happen, I estimate at least 300 years.”
“At the current rate, 401 years and 21 days.”
I glanced at Tasha as she corrected me, then smirked again.
“That was just a rare premonitory symptom. It only absorbs—it doesn’t expel anything.”
That’s precisely what made it more troubling.
It meant monsters were teeming inside that Gate.
When the Gate opened again, it might prove impossible for humanity to contain it.
But if someone managed to stop it, they would become a hero. And so would their Constellation.
“If it’s sporadic, does this happen often?”
“Hard to say… The Constellations only recently arrived on this world. The flow of events remains uncertain.”
If countless Constellations were descending upon this land, the world’s fate could be delayed or accelerated accordingly.
After all, calamity itself rides upon the currents of the Constellations.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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