The 7th-Run Regressor Collects Calamities - Chapter 30

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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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Episode 30. Incheon Gate (3)
“A labyrinth, of all things….”
In the sector where Eun Seo-jin was trapped, two USAA Hunters and one Korean Hunter found themselves sealed together.
A U-shaped corridor with the far end blocked off. Ancient patterns etched into the floor pulsed with a faint, phosphorescent glow.
“Check communications, please.”
Following Eun Seo-jin’s order, the Hunter holding the radio pressed the switch hard enough to crack it, but all that came back was static.
“No response at all.”
“Damn it! We can’t lock onto any frequency! We’re not reaching the safe zone either….”
Crackle-crackle—!
“Let’s move. Sitting around won’t solve anything.”
Eun Seo-jin nodded, tilted her head slightly, and began to move.
‘The mental link is still there, but it’s faint. The distance is making it hazy….’
As they moved, the connection would strengthen.
“At least we have the mental barrier. Without it….”
“Even now it feels like there’s a mosquito buzzing in my ears… without this….”
The Hunters’ faces went hard at the mere thought.
“For now, our objective is to make contact with the other scattered Hunters. Formation: diamond. I’ll take point.”
Following Eun Seo-jin’s orders, the Hunters locked into formation and began moving slowly into the darkness.
While Eun Seo-jin was regrouping and advancing, Marcus found himself trapped in a massive domed hall with three USAA Hunters and one Korean Hunter, completely sealed on all sides.
Stone fragments began cascading down from dozens of holes punctured through the ceiling and walls.
“Everyone, prepare for combat!”
One advantage they had that Eun Seo-jin’s group didn’t: Marcus’s mental link with Song Ji-hu remained unbroken.
Defend, defend.
Song Ji-hu poured a constant stream of fragmented sensations and commands into Marcus’s mind.
‘Song Ji-hu… I have to bring him to USAA no matter what. I need to speak with the Guild Master about this.’
Marcus was astonished by Song Ji-hu’s capabilities.
Composed. Precise.
“Back to back! They’re coming from all sides!”
As he spoke, the stone fragments cascading down absorbed the crimson aura from the walls, beginning to take on a definite form.
***
“Hey! Anyone respond!”
“Try a different frequency.”
“It’s the same on every frequency. It’s completely cut off.”
“Had to happen in a labyrinth….”
The Hunters remaining in the safe zone grew anxious as the radio fell silent.
“Remain calm.”
Song Ji-hu kept his eyes closed, leaning against the wall, and gently raised one hand.
“Communication blackouts are a common occurrence in labyrinths, are they not. The skills remain active.”
“Ah…!”
At Song Ji-hu’s voice, the anxiety began to subside.
“My apologies.”
“I understand. You’ve just entered an A-rank Gate, and a labyrinth one at that, in a foreign country. It’s natural.”
The fact that Song Ji-hu spoke so calmly meant he had a plan—and he did.
‘Eun Seo-jin’s link is faint, which means she’s probably thirty meters away… For now, I focus on Marcus.’
Song Ji-hu pushed aside Eun Seo-jin’s murky signal and concentrated on Marcus’s perception.
‘This pattern….’
Deep wrinkles formed across Song Ji-hu’s brow as he observed the layout through Marcus’s eyes.
Familiar. Painfully familiar. It made his skin crawl.
‘The fourth cycle.’
Memories of his fourth life—stained with blood and betrayal—surfaced in his mind.
During those days when he treated every human as a chess piece solely to deal with the Abyss Lord, he had been the head of the underground information guild called the Shadow.
Years spent gathering intelligence, using knowledge of the future as capital, analyzing patterns in every dungeon and catastrophe in the world.
Among the extinction reports the Shadow had collected in those times, there was one about this gate.
[Incheon Harbor A-rank Mutant Gate. Labyrinth type. Three-party raiding team annihilated. Break-up processing.]
Because it was the gate that had swallowed Lim Jae-hyuk, he had read and analyzed that report dozens of times.
‘This labyrinth appears to move randomly, but it actually operates according to one of three fixed patterns.’
And the pattern that now encompassed the hall where Marcus stood was:
‘The third pattern. Spiral contraction.’
A faint smile crossed Song Ji-hu’s lips.
He checked his wrist watch. Twenty minutes since they’d entered the gate.
The data Song Ji-hu had analyzed in the past now overlapped with real-time information, and the outline of the entire labyrinth began to slowly take shape in his mind.
***
About thirty minutes after entering, conditions within the labyrinth were steadily deteriorating.
In Eun Seo-jin’s sector, a USAA hunter was attempting to break through a wall by slashing it apart.
Crash! Crash!
But the wall, composed entirely of mana structures, didn’t even crack under ordinary attacks.
Even Eun Seo-jin’s freezing chill only frosted the surface—it wouldn’t shatter.
Marcus’s dome hall.
The situation there was far more dire.
Rock debris flowed endlessly from holes in the walls, and the creatures continuously became golems, attacking the hunters.
“Formation Delta! Focus strikes on the joints!”
As Marcus commanded with systematic precision, the hunters formed ranks and began methodically dismantling the golems by targeting their joints.
The battle wasn’t going badly, but there was no sign the numbers were decreasing.
In the other sectors.
“Aaaaahhhhh—!”
A sharp scream fell within the range of a skill and was transmitted to Song Ji-hu through Eun Seo-jin’s connected hearing.
One party’s mental barrier had finally crossed its threshold and shattered.
A drop of cold sweat traced down Song Ji-hu’s forehead along his jaw.
‘The barrier is… deteriorating faster than I thought.’
A mental barrier was a skill whose output, once cast, became fixed.
It naturally evaporated over time, and the dungeon’s own mechanism—mental attacks—was undoubtedly accelerating the consumption rate.
‘The labyrinth’s curse is far harsher than expected. At this rate….’
Song Ji-hu’s eyes darted rapidly beneath his eyelids.
Given the current deterioration rate, the barriers of hunters in the deepest sector would likely collapse within the next five minutes.
When Eun Seo-jin had said she was at exactly thirty meters away, even they couldn’t guarantee ten minutes of safety.
Song Ji-hu took a deep breath and expanded his Mental Detection skill.
“Ungh….”
A groan escaped from the strain of overusing the skill, and a thin line of blood seeped from his lips.
‘Because it’s C-grade, the limits are clear.’
At the edge of Mental Detection, faint and nearly fading, there was a discernible tangle of negative emotions—despair and resignation, pain and rage—caught within the skill’s range.
‘The people who were already deployed seem to be scattered.’
Song Ji-hu counted the number of emotions caught in his Mental Detection and clenched his lips.
‘If it matches what I understood from the fourth iteration….’
The terrible structure of this labyrinth, the timing of the walls’ movements, and the cycle in which that mind-gnawing whisper grew stronger.
‘In this entire world right now, I alone see through this damned labyrinth completely.’
This was the moment of choice.
Remain in the safe zone, maintain the mental barrier for as long as possible, and hope the vanguard finds Lim Jae-hyuk.
The safest option. He wouldn’t be hurt.
But the walls kept moving, the party was separated, and the vanguard, ignorant of the labyrinth’s pattern, had a high probability of falling to mental contamination before reaching the center.
In the meantime, not just Lim Jae-hyuk but many hunters would lose their lives.
And Song Ji-hu had never once chosen the safe path in a situation like this.
‘Choosing safety has never led to good results.’
Song Ji-hu opened his eyes.
He pushed himself away from the column, brushed dust from his hands resting on his knees, and slowly rose to his feet.
Then he pulled a compass from the inner pocket of his chest.
The worn brass surface trembled faintly in the palm of his hand. The needle pointed subtly toward the stone gate.
“Where exactly are you planning to move?”
At that moment, an A-grade USAA hunter standing guard beside Song Ji-hu blocked his path with a massive frame and asked.
“The mental barrier’s durability has reached its critical point.”
Song Ji-hu answered calmly.
“I need to go inside myself and cast it again.”
Half of that was true. The mental barrier was indeed deteriorating, its limit would come soon, and total annihilation was only a matter of time.
The other half was simple. To save Eun Seo-jin and Lim Jae-hyuk.
The USAA hunter’s thick brow furrowed. It was reckless.
“Song Ji-hu’s safety is the absolute priority, but you are to follow his every tactical judgment without objection.”
But the special directive from Director Rick Wesley echoed in the hunter’s ears. The USAA hunter hesitated briefly, then nodded.
“…We’ll accompany you as well. Please follow our lead.”
The two USAA hunters checked their weapons and stood before Song Ji-hu.
“Your safety is our absolute priority here.”
Whoosh—
Song Ji-hu drew the compass from his waist and nodded.
“Let’s go.”
The shadows of three people stretched rapidly toward the colossal stone gate.
The stone gate’s oppressive presence bore down on him with a force several times greater than it had seemed from afar.
The moment Song Ji-hu crossed the boundary of the stone gate.
Snap—!
A translucent window materialized before his eyes. Not the familiar, plain blue system window he’d grown accustomed to seeing, but an unfamiliar window tinted blood-red.
[The Labyrinth recognizes a new intruder]
[Assigning a trial]
[……]
[Analyzing target]
[……]
[ERROR]
[Unable to analyze target’s mental structure]
[System reboot. Attempting secondary forced scan.]
[……]
[ERROR]
[ERROR]
The characters that had been cluttering his vision fractured and flickered before scattering into thin air with a crackling noise.
Song Ji-hu stared at the window and let out a soft laugh.
‘It’s treating mental contamination immunity itself as an error?’
When the analysis failed, the Labyrinth switched to its most primitive response.
Crunch-crunch-crunch—
The walls of the corridor where Song Ji-hu stood began to twist forcefully, abandoning their original rhythm.
“Run! Head for the center passage!”
The Labyrinth began to openly express its hostility toward the intruder who had caused a system error.
Everyone started running in accordance with Song Ji-hu’s command.
‘The pattern changed. What pattern is it? It definitely moves within three patterns.’
Song Ji-hu recalled the map from the entrance and the Labyrinth’s patterns in his mind.
While he was recalling the patterns, the whispers that had been gnawing at the mental fortitude of the other hunters began to concentrate on Song Ji-hu.
It was as if dozens of mosquitoes were buzzing around his ears, yet Song Ji-hu’s expression remained unchanged.
‘The pattern is scrambled. I need to move.’
Song Ji-hu gripped the compass tightly.
As strength flowed into his hand gripping the hilt, the silver liquid of the blade rippled in response.
“Follow me.”
Song Ji-hu half-turned his body and glanced back over his shoulder.
“Follow me. You must stay as close as possible.”
The two hunters nodded, their legs braced with tension.
A C-rank hunter was about to lead the way through the labyrinth of an A-rank variant gate. By any normal standard, the situation made no sense.
Yet here it was: the Labyrinth seizing for the first time, scattered comrades, and Song Ji-hu’s unwavering confidence.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
From deep within the Labyrinth’s darkness, heavy footsteps were drawing near.
Song Ji-hu’s pace quickened.
The sound of walls shifting echoed from all sides, and the golem’s footsteps grew steadily closer.
Snap—!
Song Ji-hu kicked off the ground and leaped toward the shifting wall.
Amid all that noise and chaos.
There was but a single thought in Song Ji-hu’s eyes.
‘Save them. I will save them, no matter what.’
The 7th Regression Collector of Calamities
Author
: Song Tan
Production Date
: July 13, 2026
Publisher
: A.SYS Media Co., Ltd.
Editor
: A.SYS Media Editorial Team
Address
: 10F, Urban Bench Building, 325 Teheran-ro, Gangnam-gu, Seoul
Email
: [email protected]
※ This work is published by ACESIS Media according to a contract with the copyright holder,
and the content may not be used in any form or by any means without the permission of the company and author.
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UCI
: G720:N+A129-20260709064

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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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