Player of a Ruined World - Chapter 138

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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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Player of the Ruined World – Episode 138
Crack!!!
A momentary resistance felt at my fingertips.
The magnetic field enveloping the creature’s body pushes back against my fist.
But a shockwave erupts from my fingertips, shattering the magnetic field that had wrapped around the Eighth Mutant Variant, and I drive my fist straight into its face.
Whoooosh—
Simultaneously, I sense a strange energy concentrating the surrounding air onto the Eighth Mutant Variant’s face.
Boom!!!
A colossal conical explosion erupts.
The bare-handed attack effect of a shockwave extending across a 25-meter radius.
When shockwave collides with shockwave, the stronger one tears apart the weaker one, or so I’ve heard.
With Shockwave reaching its maximum level, it becomes powerful enough to completely pierce through the Eighth Mutant Variant’s magnetic field.
That force obliterates every Mutant and Zombie within the shockwave’s range without leaving a trace.
Boom—!! Bang!! Bang!!
Two car horns blare from ahead in succession.
I’d asked them to corner the Seventh Mutant in one location, and it seems the herding is complete.
Boom!!
I kick off the ground and leap skyward.
With Skill Frenzy on cooldown, I can’t secure visibility through the fog right now.
Since it’s more advantageous to confirm from outside the fog, I use Skill Alert to climb as high as possible.
Below me, I spot two vehicles.
With their high beams on and moving about, I can roughly determine their location.
I dive toward them using the alert.
Whoooosh—!!!
I spot hundreds of strands of hair clinging to the vehicle’s side.
“Baek Doyun!!”
The driver’s window lowers, and Park Sangil points in a specific direction.
The Seventh Mutant is gripping the grille attached to the vehicle’s side and won’t let go.
The tensile strength of the hair is so great that even the modified vehicle’s engine power can’t shake it loose.
“Even pointing with my finger won’t show me where they are!”
“If you can’t see them, follow the hair!”
Right, I can’t secure visibility now, but I can tell the direction the hair is coming from.
Tap— tap tap!
Using the thick strands of hair gripping the vehicle as a foothold, I dash toward where the Seventh Mutant is located.
“Screech?!”
The Seventh Mutant’s face clinging to the building exterior comes into view, and I feel the taut hair suddenly lose its tension.
It’s releasing the tension in its hair to prevent me from approaching.
Does it think I’ll plummet if the hair I’m using as a foothold goes slack?
Hah—!
I have Skill Alert.
I kicked off the empty air and flew toward the Seventh Mutant, driving my fist forward with every ounce of strength I possessed.
Boom—!!! Crash!!!
A deafening roar echoed as the Mutant’s face caved inward, and the Shockwave Skill’s effect slammed against the Building Exterior Wall.
As if a mortar had pierced straight through, the building was hollowed out from where the Mutant stood to the opposite exterior wall.
Of course, the Seventh Mutant’s face had been obliterated beyond recognition.
‘Faster.’
I couldn’t afford to give them time.
With one dead, the others watching the situation would scatter like cockroaches.
Since my alert resets whenever I touch ground anywhere, I scaled the building and hunted down the Seventh Mutants.
Boom!!! Crash!!! Crash!!!
Deafening roars erupted continuously through the air.
Collapsing buildings and acrid dust spreading across the area.
Where the haze had cleared, grayish-brown cement powder and the blood of the Seventh Mutants took its place.
Hundreds of strands of hair that had wrapped around the vehicles vanished, and Vehicle 1 and Vehicle 2 accelerated again, resuming their culling of Zombies.

* * *
“Ugh… where… am I….”
“Huh?! It worked, it worked! It’s effective!”
“….”
“Are you coming to?!”
“Who… are you?”
“Can you see? How many fingers? Are you regaining consciousness?!”
Meanwhile, in the Research Laboratory, Bae Hyeonseok and Song Junhyeok stared at each other in disbelief as they watched the man lying on the bed.
The man, restrained on the bed with his limbs bound, lifted his head slightly and gazed at his own arms and legs before asking in a terrified voice.
“W-who are you people? Why, why are you doing this?!”
“Pardon?”
“Let me go. Please, let me go!”
“Calm down. We just need to ask you a few questions, then we’ll release you immediately.”
“Who the hell are you?!”
“What’s the last thing you remember? Just tell us that.”
At Bae Hyeonseok’s question, the man bound to the bed only blinked his eyes without answering.
Fragmented memories tangled together in disarray.
He had been one of Kim Hanna’s Subordinates and the first Zombie to receive the injection to test the cure’s effectiveness.
The Unnamed Man’s complexion had returned, his cognitive function and pain sensation restored.
His pupils had regained focus, and his pulse had returned to normal readings.
He moved his lips like a fish gasping for air before asking in disbelief.
“I… I was a Zombie….”
“Your memories are returning?”
“The memory of being bitten by a Zombie is vivid….”
The man furrowed his brow and squeezed his eyes shut, then began complaining of a headache.
“Water, could you… give me some water?”
Following the man’s request, Bae Hyeonseok unscrewed a bottle of mineral water and trickled it slowly into his mouth.
The man moistened his parched lips and raw throat with the water, then took several deep breaths before speaking again.
“Did I… turn into a Zombie?”
“Yes. Until just a moment ago, you did.”
“How? How did this even happen?”
“Do you have any memories from after you turned into a Zombie?”
“I’m not sure. Whether these are even my real memories… there are many gaps, and the scenes I do recall aren’t very clear.”
As Bae Hyeonseok looked toward Song Junhyeok, Song Junhyeok picked up his notebook and began jotting down the man’s words.
In states of extreme excitement, temporary memory loss can occur.
Those infected with the Zombie virus experience excessive dopamine and adrenaline surges, maintaining them in a state of extreme agitation.
“Since there are fragments of memory, it’s not complete blackout—more like psychogenic or dissociative amnesia.”
Bae Hyeonseok nodded at Song Junhyeok’s assessment and looked back at the man.
“What we administered to you is the first treatment we developed.”
“I’m sorry?”
“There could potentially be side effects, so we’ll keep you restrained for a while just in case.”
“Wait, hold on. Side effects?”
“It’s highly unlikely. The System approved this treatment.”
“The System? What do you mean by that?”
“We’ll have plenty of time to explain later. For now, just focus on resting and recovering.”
Bae Hyeonseok exhaled a sigh of relief and glanced at Song Junhyeok.
“Think we can develop a vaccine?”
“Yes. When we completed the treatment earlier, the System Message told us to analyze the antibodies extracted from Kim Hanna’s plasma and the antibodies from this man’s blood.”
“Really? Why didn’t I see that?”
“You had the message closed while checking this man’s pulse.”
“Ah, right, that time.”
“Yes. Anyway, if we just go through that process, we should be able to create the antigen.”
“Good. Let’s accelerate the pace.”
“Yes!”
Since completing the treatment, Bae Hyeonseok and Song Junhyeok’s confidence had reached towering heights.
The two of them intended to ride this momentum and complete vaccine development in a short timeframe.
Bae Hyeonseok checked the condition of the man who had returned to humanity one more time, while Song Junhyeok moved toward the centrifuge.
Just as Song Junhyeok was about to place the man’s blood sample, which had been drawn earlier, into the centrifuge.
“Eehehehehe.”
An eerie laugh echoed from the corridor.
Song Junhyeok wondered if he’d misheard, so he peered through the glass toward the hallway.
“Eehehehehe, ehehehe, hehehehe.”
Then, accompanied by a spine-chilling laugh, a long shadow stretched across the corridor.
From the shadow alone, it was clear that the limbs were disproportionately long compared to the torso.
“H-hyung!”
Song Junhyeok turned to look at Bae Hyeonseok, and Bae Hyeonseok was already staring down the corridor.
“Did you hear that too?”
“It’s, it’s a Mutant. A Mutant…!”
As Song Junhyeok panicked, Bae Hyeonseok covered his mouth and ducked beneath the desk.
“Don’t make a sound.”
Bae Hyeonseok spoke with composure, and Song Junhyeok nodded, trembling like a wet puppy despite his fear.
“H-hey, over here.”
But there was one presence they had forgotten.
A person who had returned from being a Zombie to human lay bound to the bed.
With a bewildered expression, he merely lifted his head and called out to the two men.
“W-what’s going on? What’s happening?!”
“Shh, just a moment…”
“Let me go, let me go too!”
As the man struggled, Bae Hyeonseok could do nothing but cautiously peek his head out and turn his gaze toward the corridor.
And then.
“Uheehee.”
He came face to face with a Mimicry Species pressing its face against the glass window.
Separated only by the transparent glass, Bae Hyeonseok and the Mimicry Species were mere centimeters apart.
Bae Hyeonseok was so startled that his hair stood on end, and he froze in place, even forgetting to breathe.
The Mimicry Species pressed its forehead against the glass window and slowly began to apply pressure.
Crack—crack—
As cracks began to spider across the reinforced glass, Bae Hyeonseok finally snapped back to reality and grabbed the steel pipe lying on the floor.
“W-weapon. A weapon!”
Song Junhyeok, equally panicked, seized the club that lay in the corner.
How had it gotten inside?
The Brain Research Institute was completely sealed off by Kim Hanna’s subordinates and the Hunting Dog Federation members operating as Shooters.
Could the perimeter have been breached?
With the vaccine development so close at hand, everything seemed about to crumble to dust.
Bae Hyeonseok forced strength into his trembling legs and spoke.
“Junhyeok, gather the data.”
“What?”
“I’ll handle this somehow, so you get the data and go!”
“How am I supposed to develop the vaccine alone without you, hyung?!”
“Didn’t you hear what Baek Doyun said? If we fail this time… the Korean Peninsula is finished.”
“…”
“For the greater good, someone has to survive.”
Bae Hyeonseok knew it too.
That defeating a Stage 1 Mimicry Species alone was beyond his limits.
But if someone had to be sacrificed, he believed Song Junhyeok—slightly younger and faster than himself—deserved to live.
There was a saying that you only truly know a person’s nature when they face death.
Bae Hyeonseok offered a bitter smile as he looked at Song Junhyeok.
“Thank you for playing this game with me.”
Song Junhyeok stood there, caught between options, visibly restless.
Then he gripped the club tightly and positioned himself beside Bae Hyeonseok.
“Cause or no cause, I’m not leaving.”
“Didn’t you hear what I said? What Baek Doyun told us….”
“I don’t care! If we all die, then everyone else dies too! What are we, heroes?!”
….
“Strangers can live or die for all I care—I’m going with you, hyung!”
“Think about the people in the Shelter. They’re not strangers.”
At Bae Hyeonseok’s words, Song Junhyeok bit his lower lip.
The mention of people in the Shelter shook him.
Crack—crash!
The Mimicry Species’ head burst through the glass and came inside.
“You think, hyung.”
Song Junhyeok finished speaking and charged at the Mimicry Species one step ahead of Bae Hyeonseok.
The firm resolve he’d made before leaving the Shelter.
The words of Baek Doyun and his companions—that they would all die together if death came.
‘Yes, let’s all die together.’
If death was inevitable anyway, Song Junhyeok thought it easier on the heart to die first rather than watch those he cherished slip away.
Crack!!
But the moment he struck the Mimicry Species’ head with the club, he understood.
What choice he had just made.
“…What?”
“Hehehehe.”
He’d swung with all his might, hard enough to break the club, yet not even a scratch appeared on the Mimicry Species’ head.
This was not a creature he could defeat.
Crack—clang!
The Mimicry Species completely shattered the glass and entered.
As if savoring the situation, it didn’t kill the two men immediately.
It was deriving pleasure from watching their terrified expressions.
“You… think… hyung… does? You… think…?”
The Mimicry Species mimicked Song Junhyeok’s words, tilting its head in an eerie manner.
Snap!
It seized Song Junhyeok’s throat and lifted him effortlessly, then spoke with a grotesque grin.
“I… do… the… thinking.”
“Gack…!”
“Junhyeok!”
Bae Hyeonseok didn’t hesitate—he grabbed the steel pipe and rushed forward.
His body was already moving on instinct.
Who could stand idly by and watch a comrade who had survived alongside them for months in this hellish world perish before their very eyes?
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
Yet no matter how fiercely Bae Hyeonseok swung the steel pipe, he could inflict no damage upon the Mimicry Species.
The vaccine development was so close now.
We were almost there.
A burning sense of injustice began to sear through Bae Hyeonseok’s heart.
But no matter how much he poured that anguish into his strikes, he was no match for this creature.
“Kekeke! I’ve… decided. Kekeke, I’ll kill you all.”
The Mimicry Species hurled Song Junhyeok, whom it had been gripping, toward Bae Hyeonseok.
In that instant.
Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat!!!
Urgent footsteps echoing from the end of the corridor.
Everyone in the research laboratory turned their heads without hesitation.
And at that very moment…
Slash!!
The arm of the Mimicry Species that had been holding Song Junhyeok was severed clean off.
“You’re the one who dies.”
It was Park Sangha, eyes blazing with fury, who came rushing in.

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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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