The Civil Servant Who Concealed Their True Strength Turns Out to be a Master of Possession - Chapter 120

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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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A Civil Servant Who Hides His Strength Is Exceptionally Good at Possession – Episode 120
Twenty minutes later.
The floor was covered with countless shell casings and a pale, murky sap oozing from the mandrake’s body.
Officer Oh Tae-won from the Dungeon Management Team, his face and hands smeared with the sap, spoke irritably to the rescue team that had arrived late.
“You’re here early. Huh?”
Beside him stood Kim Eun-kyeong, the team leader with an expressionless face as she carefully cleaned and stored her rifle barrel, Secretary Cheon Min-jun shoving his sickle back into a small pouch, and me awkwardly smiling while tying my shoelaces.
Kim Eun-kyeong—or rather, Pee So-won—had covered my position ever since I took down one D-Rank Mandrake.
Bang!
Rat-a-tat!
Bang!
She didn’t miss a single one, landing each shot with remarkable speed.
Despite the mandrakes’ incredible velocity against a .50 caliber rifle, she remained perfectly steady.
‘National team skills don’t fade, I suppose.’
And so we set out on this mandrake hunt with this formation.
Secretary Cheon and Officer Oh covered Kim’s position while she fired relentlessly at the mandrakes, and I weaved between them constantly drawing aggro. It was an oddly natural division of labor.
I’m not sure how it happened, but the work distribution felt completely organic.
Probably because I was the weakest at actually taking down mandrakes—
‘In conclusion, I was the only one running around uselessly.’
I felt a deep anger boiling up from my core as I leaned close to Pee So-won and whispered softly.
“You said to stay still. You said you two would handle everything.”
We promised that on my first day of work!
“But you didn’t stay still.”
….
With nothing to say, I immediately changed the subject.
“Ahem… The scenery here is quite nice.”
The four of us showed our injuries to the healer from the rescue team and received treatment with potions.
Naturally, I had the most injuries.
“M-my legs hurt….”
“There don’t seem to be any bite marks.”
“Yes. I just overused them.”
“…Pardon?”
And the reason wasn’t from monster attacks, but from overuse.
I’d kicked mandrakes to death, but I’d also been constantly running between them.
The healer looked at me with exasperation.
But I could only smile awkwardly.
“Hehe.”
What else could I say?
Actually, it was Kwon Ik-seong who had been injured.
Kwon Ik-seong, who had cut his arm trying to save me, was receiving potion treatment.
I looked at him, feeling a pang of conscience.
Even though I’d become Cheon Min-jun, Ik-seong was still Ik-seong—and here I was, attacking my favorite person.
My chest ached.
But thanks to the wound I’d inflicted, the fact that an A-Rank Hunter was concealed within Cheon Min-jun remained cleverly hidden.
“I see. Even a C-Rank Hunter would struggle against C and D-Rank Monsters.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“I think we should adjust this dungeon’s rating. And we’ll need to check if it regenerates. It would be nice if it did regenerate, but….”
The Rescue Team Member from the Guild smacked his lips briefly as he surveyed the corpses of the dead Mandrakes.
The dead Mandrake corpses had become byproducts of the dungeon.
Ginseng (C)
-Physical Enhancement Item
Remarkably, they were all ginseng.
They were unmistakably ginseng to the eye, so appraisal wasn’t even necessary.
“Mandrakes turning into ginseng? Is this a K-patch?”
Someone muttered.
But I knew exactly why this had happened.
I’d heard a voice just before clearing the dungeon.
[How amusing—the will of a righteous human. If I just let you go, Elder Brother will scold me. Let me give you a gift.]
So this was a gift from the tree.
The only proper thing I’d done was a single kick, yet the gift was quite generous.
This was all thanks to Elder Brother Zelkova.
And thanks to our Shibao.
‘When I get back, I need to feed Shibao lots of delicious food.’
“Was this dungeon really producing this many C-Rank items?”
Officer Oh frowned as he spoke.
Normally, when a dungeon was cleared, Hunters would divide the byproducts among themselves, so a dungeon producing this many byproducts should have been cause for celebration.
But the current situation was not ‘normal’.
“Damn it. What do I report to the higher-ups?”
These people were Dungeon Management Team members from the Hunter Association.
The Dungeon Management Team’s principle was to only measure the dungeon’s rating and return.
If a dungeon was cleared like this, the byproducts naturally belonged to the Hunter Association, and they’d have to file an incident report instead.
Otherwise, rumors could spread that the Association was monopolizing dungeons.
“Were there no boss monsters?”
Then, one of the Rescue Team members asked Officer Oh.
Officer Oh then looked at Kwon Ik-seong and me and asked.
“Well, did you discover any anomalies? If there’s a hidden dungeon or something, I’d at least have something to tell the higher-ups….”
Despite the hopeful expression on his face, Kwon Ik-seong’s expression remained unchanged.
“There was nothing. It seems we simply entered through the wrong entrance in the middle.”
My eyes met Kwon Ik-seong’s.
I couldn’t rule out the possibility that the Protective Tree might cause trouble again later, but for now, this was the best explanation.
Otherwise, there was no way to explain how we’d survived an encounter with an A-Rank Monster.
“Ha Dae-ri, did you see anything unusual?”
Officer Oh asked.
I shook my head with an awkward smile.
I couldn’t lie, so this was all I could say.
“No, well… the scenery is quite beautiful, I suppose?”
At my words, Officer Oh furrowed his brow.
“Our Ha Dae-ri was looking so impressive just a moment ago, and now suddenly he’s not?”
“I hear that kind of thing fairly often.”
Not fairly often—constantly, damn it.
While I was thinking that, Officer Oh and the rescue team members began discussing something more serious.
Taking that opportunity, Kwon Ik-seong showed me his phone screen.
Take my car on the way up.
It seemed the time to settle my karmic debts was approaching.
I typed my response into my phone with a dejected expression.
Would Hongseong Korean beef be acceptable for the last supper? I’ll pay.

* * *
“Please take our car. There’s a dungeon we manage nearby, so we know a faster route.”
“Ugh, I’m so sick of dungeons today.”
Officer Oh, brushing aside the guild staff’s suggestions, quickly turned on his phone.
Kang Han-geul’s number was displayed on his screen.
‘I need to report this immediately.’
Clearing the dungeon itself was grounds for a written apology, but Ha Dae-ri’s behavior today was extremely suspicious.
He’d said he only worked in administration at the Hunter Management Office, yet his physical control was far too refined for that.
His body control was at an insane level.
Honestly, when he kicked, I thought he must be some kind of taekwondo athlete.
And that wasn’t all.
The Mandrake’s scream contained a psychic attack that should have incapacitated hunters of D-Rank and below.
Even he, a C-Rank, had to wear earplugs.
Yet Ha Ye-seul didn’t wear earplugs or even cover her ears, constantly darting between the Mandrakes without pause.
Thanks to her drawing all the aggro, the three of them completed the hunt safely.
‘Ha Ye-seul is D-Rank?’
Either the personnel department had mixed up the files, or Ha Ye-seul was hiding something about her true identity.
Either way, Kang Han-geul needed to know about this.
Given the nature of the Hunter Association with its intense internal politics, each bureau and their subordinate teams engaged in dirty tactics to monitor each other’s movements.
In fact, Officer Oh and Kang Han-geul had joined this team through such methods.
‘To monitor Bureau Chief Choi Se-a.’
Just as he was thinking such thoughts.
Someone got into the passenger seat.
It was Cheon Min-jun, wearing black earrings.
A new subordinate under Bureau Chief Choi Se-a—someone perfectly suited to her tastes, a thug through and through.
‘No doubt he’s the type who attends to Bureau Chief Choi Se-a every night.’
With that thought, Officer Oh spoke up.
“Wow, does Secretary Cheon Min-jun have no manners? Just climbing into someone else’s car like that—didn’t anyone teach you that’s rude?”
Officer Oh feigned obliviousness while making his point to Cheon Min-jun, but rather than getting out, Cheon Min-jun simply pulled a stick of gum from the container in the car and began chewing it.
The sight was unmistakably that of a thug suited to Bureau Chief Choi Se-a’s preferences.
“Are you trying to call Division Chief Kang Han-geul?”
Yet in the next moment, as he turned around and pointed to Officer Oh’s phone, his expression was less that of a thug and more like—how to describe it—an expressionless machine—
“Hear me out first before you make that call.”
Officer Oh unconsciously lowered his phone.

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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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