I Awakened as a Dark History - Chapter 4

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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 4
The vines and flowers that had been protecting them began to wither all at once.
Soon enough, Ha Cho-eun could see past the edge of the vines to what lay beyond.
The Hunter was nowhere to be found—only a bear-like Beast-type Monster and fish-men were visible.
“Wait—the Hunter—! He’s gone!”
“What did you say?!”
“The Hunter’s been taken down?!”
The crowd gasped in alarm, stumbling backward.
But then they realized the monsters and fish-men were all staring at the same point.
There was someone standing on water suspended in mid-air.
A piercing shriek tore through the Dungeon.
The bear-like Beast-type Monsters charged at him as one.
He tapped the water beneath his feet lightly with his toes.
The water at his feet rippled, becoming a thin blade that swept in all directions.
Slash. Slash. Slash.
The thin water blade cut through the bear-like monsters with tremendous force, slicing them all to pieces.
Having dispatched every last one, he descended gently to the ground.
In his arms was a student they hadn’t seen before.
Among the crowd, someone recognized the girl’s face.
“Cho-eun!”
A couple rushed forward, and the Hunter set the student down on the ground.
“She’s unharmed. Please, don’t worry.”
“Thank you. Thank you so much.”
“We’re so grateful!”
The couple bowed their heads frantically in thanks. The Hunter offered them a gentle smile.
“It’s what I’m here for.”
Only then did the couple look directly at his face.
He appeared to be roughly the same age as Ha Cho-eun.
The only remarkable feature was his eyes.
Over pitch-black irises, golden light flashed like lightning in a constant, flickering pattern.
Strange eyes, certainly—but there was no time to admire them.
Crack! Crack-crack-crack!
A fish-man raised a trident and charged toward them.
The couple instinctively pulled their daughter into a tight embrace.
The Hunter waved his hand dismissively behind his back.
The earth erupted, becoming jagged stones that pierced through the fish-men.
The Hunter rose to his feet and gestured to the couple.
“You should take her outside the Dungeon now.”
“Outside? But the path—”
The Hunter pointed with his finger to something ahead.
There, a swirling vortex had appeared where none had existed before.
The luminous spiral was unmistakably a Gate.
“Some Dungeons produce a Gate once you’ve cleared the monsters. This appears to be one of those cases. That’s your way out.”
“Ah, yes. Thank you.”
The crowd cheered at the sudden appearance of the Gate and rushed toward it.
The couple hoisted their unconscious daughter onto their back and stood.
Choi A-rin approached them.
“Auntie, Uncle! Is Cho-eun all right?”
“Yes, yes. She’s fine. You should hurry and go too.”
The couple nudged Choi A-rin forward.
Choi A-rin’s parents were waiting at the Gate, gesturing urgently for their daughter.
The family turned away from the Hunter and took their leave.
But then the Hunter suddenly called them back.
“Just a moment.”
All three turned to face him at once.
The Hunter’s gaze was fixed on Choi A-rin.
Choi A-rin tilted her head in confusion.
“That Notebook in your hands.”
Choi A-rin hugged the Black History of her friend—which she’d carried carefully this far—closer to her chest.
She didn’t mind looking through it herself and laughing, but she had no intention of showing it to anyone else.
“This is something we brought out from outside the Dungeon by mistake. It’s not an item or anything like that.”
“I understand.”
Hunter looked directly at Choi A-rin’s face.
“You’ll keep quiet about it, won’t you?”
“Oh, yes… well.”
I was past the age of playing tricks that would upset a friend.
It was only natural.
As I nodded, Hunter added one more thing.
“To yourself as well.”
“What? To myself? Why?”
Choi A-rin asked reflexively. The other person made no effort to hide a vague embarrassment.
“Because I’d be far too ashamed.”
Choi A-rin understood the meaning behind those words and her mouth fell open.
Stuffing the Notebook into my chest was a reflex.
“But we’ve been carrying this the whole time? How could…?”
Hunter shook his head silently. Then a sudden gust from nowhere pushed all four of us.
Beyond the Gate, the view no longer showed any Dungeon.
Now only very real sounds remained around us.
Cries, sirens, automated announcements.
Choi A-rin turned her head to look back at her friend.
“Is this patient with you?”
A paramedic approached her unconscious friend.
The reality that it was finally all over came flooding back.
* * *
The bed felt strangely hard, unlike usual. And everything around me was so loud.
I rubbed my eyes and pushed myself up.
“Cho-eun! You’re awake? Honey! Cho-eun’s up!”
“She’s awake?”
Then from the unfamiliar ceiling, familiar faces came into view.
“Mom? Dad?”
“That’s right. You’re okay. Thank goodness. Thank goodness.”
My mother pulled me into her arms.
Only then could I see my surroundings properly.
This place, filled with pristine white tiles, was unmistakably a Hospital.
“Right—the Dungeon! I fell into the Dungeon!”
And I was attacked by a Beast-type Monster too. I moved my hand downward.
Thud.
My hand settled naturally onto my leg.
The memory I had forgotten because it seemed so ordinary came rushing back late.
“My leg!”
“Your leg…?”
“It was torn off!”
“Torn off?”
My parents’ interjections beside me barely registered.
My leg was perfectly intact where it should be.
I began to wonder if it had all been a dream.
“We fell into the Dungeon, didn’t we? Who saved us?”
As I sat up and asked, my mother nodded.
“That’s right. The Hunters came running and saved us. There were some who couldn’t make it out, but A-rin and we all got out safely.”
Those yellow eyes.
The Hunter with the yellow eyes really had saved me—it wasn’t a dream.
“What a relief.”
“Yes, truly a relief.”
Patter-patter.
The sound of the medical staff still rushing about was loud.
Someone came running to my bed.
“Ha Cho-eun! You’re awake?!”
Not a nurse—it was Choi A-rin.
“Hey! You’re all right!”
I couldn’t help but beam with joy.
Choi A-rin stared at me with a strangely contorted face.
She looked like she was laughing and laughing at the same time.
Choi A-rin’s lips trembled as she thrust something into my hands.
“Hey… I’m not the only one who made it. This survived too.”
“Aaaah! The cursed Notebook!”
What is this thing—why didn’t it die, and why is it back again!
As I screamed and snatched the Notebook, a startled nurse came rushing to the bed.
“What’s wrong!?”
“Oh, no. I’m sorry. I was just startled…”
Choi A-rin and I bowed together in apology.
The nurse gave us a stern look and left again.
I managed to collect myself and tucked the Notebook into my chest.
As my heart settled, someone I’d forgotten for a moment came back to mind.
“That Hunter with the yellow eyes—he saved us, right? And he healed me too?”
“Uh… um…?”
Choi A-rin blinked, looking genuinely confused.
“I remember the Hunter saving us, but everything after that is blank. After we hid on that road, what happened?”
The longer my question went on, the wider Choi A-rin’s mouth opened.
What finally came out of it was this.
“Oh! I really should have filmed it on my phone!”
“What are you talking about.”
Choi A-rin cried out in great frustration before finally collecting herself.
“Right. That person saved us. But it was someone else who healed you, not him—and that person left quickly, so you didn’t see them.”
“Ah, I see.”
The fact that I hadn’t seen the Hunter felt strangely disappointing.
But thinking of the person who never came back from the Dungeon, such disappointment was a luxury.
I toyed with the Notebook for a moment, then leaned quietly toward my parents.
“I’m so glad we all made it through.”
“I know.”
My parents held me tight in silence.
We wiped away tears and shared the gratitude of survival. And in this moving moment, Choi A-rin poked me gently.
“What are you going to do with that Notebook anyway?”
“Burn it.”
“Come on, you two survived the Dungeon together. Keep it as a memento.”
Choi A-rin said something that made no sense.
I smiled slightly and opened my mouth.
“I’d burn it even if you gave me a billion won.”
“Do you know how much trouble I went through keeping that thing alive?”
“I’d burn it even for ten billion.”
“…Chloris, you have no sense of loyalty. Is that what the Flower Garden taught you?”
Where did the frying pan go?
Lacking that, I grabbed the pillow and wrung it in my hands.
Choi A-rin’s quick instincts kicked in and she bolted from the room.
“Hey, think about keeping it anyway! It’s special—a Notebook that survived the Dungeon with you.”
Yet she still added an extra comment, oddly stubborn about it.
‘Did she open it while I was unconscious?’
The suspicion was rational enough that my eyes narrowed on their own.
Once that doubt crossed my mind, my resolve to burn the Notebook only grew stronger.
The groans and cries around me faded from my ears.
I could go back to my everyday life now.
That fact alone struck me deeply.
* * *
And as time flowed like a river, eight years passed.
My family was fortunate enough to reclaim our ordinary life.
The accident from eight years ago—which had seemed like a scene from a novel—became just another old memory.
The threat of Dungeons remained, Dungeon Disaster Alerts still existed, and Designated Danger Zones continued to spread.
Yet people could commute to work and school, come home, and laugh with each other.
Our family became like that too.
Though our house changed, it never became a wound.
Our home would still welcome me warmly, anytime I returned.
“Wow, has it really been eight years already? I couldn’t believe it when I saw the date.”
Time flies. We got the Suburban House practically free out of that whole mess, so we actually came out ahead. I’m glad we added the Dungeon rider to the homeowner’s insurance.
“You kept the coverage on the current house too, right?”
Of course. What about you? Your Self-boarding Room treating you well?
My mother’s voice came through the phone, tinged with worry.
Even after three years of living on my own, her concern showed no signs of letting up.
“Yeah, everything’s fine. I just got home from work and I’m eating chicken right now.”
You should eat proper meals. You can’t just substitute junk food for rice.
“I had rice for breakfast and lunch.”
My hasty excuse met with a silence of skepticism on the other end of the line.
I answered with equal silence and picked up my beer can.
In the end, my mother was the first to let her suspicion go—without any way to verify, she seemed to lack the will to press further.
Make sure you eat a proper breakfast. Should I send you some side dishes?
“No need. I still have kimchi left.”
You still have some? You should eat it all up.
“Mom, you sent too much! Right now my diet is basically kimchi fried rice with kimchi stew and kimchi on the side!”
Well, you’re eating well then.
“Oh, Mom!”
I heard my mother laugh on the other end.
I smiled softly myself and took a sip of beer.
Whenever the events of eight years ago came up, I found myself thinking of the Hunter who had saved me back then.
That Hunter whose face I could barely remember.
Curious, I’d searched news articles about our apartment complex trying to find him, but I never saw him again.
‘I wonder if he’s still active. He’s not… gone, is he?’
Ding—
“Huh?”
A message?
I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at the screen.
But there were no new notifications on the display.
Tilting my head in confusion, I noticed a rectangular box appear before my eyes.
[Congratulations on your Awakening.]
Awakener: Ha Cho-eun
The box crackled faintly, as if aware I had noticed it, and displayed the next message.
[Trait: Black History]
You can draw out and utilize another side of yourself.
“Ahhhhh!!”
After eight years, the prairie dog screech made its grand return. On the other end of the phone, my mother jumped and raised her voice in alarm.
—Why, what, what’s wrong?! What happened?!
I screamed on reflex, but there was absolutely no way I could explain this honestly.
“My boss called me! The lunatic! On a Friday night, no less! Can you believe it?!”
Scrambling together every bit of quick thinking I had in the presence of Black History, I answered, and my mother sighed as if exasperated.
—Don’t scare people like that. Why would you yell over something so trivial?
Fortunately, late-night calls from my boss were common enough that my mother didn’t suspect anything and moved on.
“Oh, sorry. I’ll call you back later. Bye.”
—Okay. Bye.
The call ended, and now there was only Black History in front of me.
Sadly.

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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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