Walkthrough for the Transcendental Hunter's Ruins - Chapter 81

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

Episode 81
The Hunter Bureau had called an emergency meeting for the first time in ages.
The executives gathered their subordinates and issued their orders.
“Search thoroughly and find it as quickly as possible.”
“Yes, sir!”
“And remember—if you find the sword, don’t touch it carelessly.”
The hunters rushed to prepare for entry into the North Korean Dungeon, following their superiors’ instructions.
Most of them were displeased by the sudden summons.
“Ugh. This is driving me crazy.”
“What’s with suddenly having to find some sword in a dungeon?”
“We’re already swamped with the Legendary-grade Ruin situation…”
But orders were orders. When the brass spoke, you obeyed.
Kim Yu-min wasn’t heading into the dungeon himself. He was preparing for something else.
“Senior!”
He crossed paths with Na Yu-gyeong in the corridor.
They were the same gender, similar in age, and both S-rank hunters.
With so much in common, the two had grown quite close over time.
Na Yu-gyeong noticed Kim Yu-min’s gear and asked him a question.
“Oh, are you heading into the Legendary-grade Ruin already?”
“Yeah. I’m just doing a quick reconnaissance today and coming back out.”
Na Yu-gyeong’s expression darkened.
“I wish I could go into the Ruin with you instead. Search missions make me too tense…”
“I’m not much use in search operations anyway. But I’ll make sure to bring back solid intel on the Ruin.”
“Sometimes I wonder if I should’ve switched to the martial combat track like you did.”
“Don’t make me laugh. Just help find what we lost, all right?”
Na Yu-gyeong tilted her head.
“But is that Demonic Sword really that important? It seems like a powerful weapon, but it’s not like the Hunter Bureau doesn’t have other weapons at that level, right?”
Na Yu-gyeong’s question was reasonable enough.
But Kim Yu-min had used the Demonic Sword once in the dungeon, so he knew better.
He knew how dangerous the blade truly was.
Any target imbued with Mana faces a test of control the moment it makes contact. If the wielder lacks sufficient ability to properly command the Magical Tool’s power, Mana Runaway and similar phenomena place the user in peril.
But that Demonic Sword endangered those around the wielder too—that was the problem.
‘The blade seeps into your mind, makes you feel its repulsion so acutely that it puppeteers you.’
That eerie, creeping disgust when he’d held the blade—as if the weapon itself would turn its wielder into a mere puppet.
Despite its form as a sword, it seemed far more accurate to call it a Magical Tool designed for mental attacks.
There was also a real possibility that the weapon had fallen into the hands of the very monster that had killed those hunters.
In fact, that possibility seemed quite high.
‘…Did the blade somehow draw the surrounding monsters toward it?’
Monsters wouldn’t be immune to that instinctive pull the Demonic Sword exerted.
They were only supposed to be conducting safe reconnaissance on the outer perimeter, yet senior hunters had vanished abruptly—it made no sense.
Of course, whether the blade fell into a monster’s claws or not, danger remained either way.
Even if the Demonic Sword drove a beast into Runaway, monsters were creatures that attacked humans unconditionally, lashing out indiscriminately without rhyme or reason.
And even if someone wielded the Demonic Sword, the North Korean Dungeon—one of the most treacherous on Earth—teemed with monsters far more dangerous than any creature carrying the blade.
“Take care of yourself out there.”
“I will. You be careful too, senior. Though I don’t think you’ll have much trouble, given those Shuriken Jeon Jae-woo gave you.”
“You’re using the weapon Jeon Jae-woo gave you, then?”
“I could tell how incredible it was the first time I used it, but the more I use it, the more impressed I get. Speaking of which, senior—are you close with Jeon Jae-woo? I heard he gave you a weapon as a gift too.”
If someone asked whether he was close with Jeon Jae-woo…
He was a hunter with a Transcendent-grade Trait, so Kim Yu-min ran into him fairly often.
Whenever they passed each other at the Hunter Bureau, they’d exchange warm greetings and trade light conversation.
“I wouldn’t say friends exactly, but we’re definitely on familiar terms.”
“Honestly, I wish I could get closer to him so maybe I’d get another Magical Tool as a gift. I’m so grateful that Jeon Jae-woo sells Magical Tools to the Hunter Bureau.”
“Hmm?”
“My combat strength went up because of it, so work’s gotten so much easier than it used to be.”
“That’s good.”
Everyone’s peace of mind had improved considerably since then.
The pressure of conquering Legendary-grade Ruins had worn everyone down, body and soul.
But now that spirits had lifted, hunters could throw themselves more fully into combat.
Jeon Jae-woo had already been a savior to Kim Yu-min and a number of other hunters at the Bureau.
After he began selling Magical Tools, their regard for him had only deepened.
“Hunter Na Yu-gyeong!”
At the sound of someone calling from below, Na Yu-gyeong turned away.
“Right, senior. I’ll be heading out now.”
“Sure. Good work.”
Moments later, colleagues gathered around Kim Yu-min as well.
The hunters entered the Legendary-grade Dungeon together.
***
—Boom! Boom! Boom!!
Inside the Legendary-grade Dungeon.
It was another dungeon with a sea as its backdrop.
In the center of the dungeon, a massive explosion erupted as dozens of great whales thrashed simultaneously.
Fish-man monster soldiers that had surfaced were caught in Myeol-geop’s barrage and swept away.
Piranha-like fish beasts leaping upward were dealt with by swinging a sword to cut them down.
The surviving fish-men realized they faced an enemy beyond their capability and fled back into the sea in a panic.
Jeon Jae-woo had entered the new Legendary-grade Dungeon to procure materials.
To create a new Transcendent-grade Trait for Kat-si.
[Master, I’m fine without an upgrade.]
‘What are you talking about? You’re the only one of my summoned creatures left who doesn’t have a Transcendent-grade Trait.’
[I don’t necessarily need a Transcendent-grade Trait, and your summoned creature forces aren’t lacking either. We have only a few Conquest Tokens left to use—wouldn’t it be better to save them?]
Kat-si, for her part, suggested postponing her own upgrade and conserving the remaining number of clearances as much as possible.
‘It’s fine. I still have six unused Conquest Tokens left.’
If my summoned creatures are to bear the title of Transcendent-rank hunter’s forces, at least one of them should have a Transcendent-grade Trait.
It’s a shame that new Legendary-grade and above dungeons no longer yield additional Conquest Tokens as rewards.
Lately, even after clearing every newly discovered dungeon, there’s not a single additional Conquest Token reward—it almost seems like the dungeon system itself has cut off that reward entirely.
I wish it were just an unlikely coincidence that they haven’t appeared for so long.
The sudden disappearance of additional Conquest Tokens from dungeon clearances honestly doesn’t feel coincidental.
‘Could it be that the dungeon system blocked them because I was taking them all?’
In any case, he could have asked the Hunter Bureau to search for the necessary materials, but since Yoo Jung-tae seemed busy lately, he decided to find them himself by entering dungeons.
No-bum quickly identified which dungeon contained the materials he needed.
‘A Black Pearl—said to be created once every thousand years and regarded as the very essence of the sea’s life…’
He didn’t know what it was ordinarily used for, but judging from the description alone, it sounded like an extraordinarily precious treasure.
“If you were to convert that stone you’re looking for into human currency, it would easily be worth trillions of won. Perhaps even more.”
Right. As expected. Raising a summoned creature to possess a Transcendent-grade Trait was no simple matter.
In the old days, without a recipe, he’d simply brute-forced materials of similar properties in large quantities.
Now that there was a recipe, the requirements had shrunk considerably, yet procuring materials was still difficult.
Even after obtaining the pearl, that wasn’t the end—he’d have to bring it to Mutant to refine it properly according to Kat-si’s specifications, and then find new materials…
Jeon Jae-woo called out to Myeol-geop, who was about to dive into the water after the monsters.
“Won’t there be a problem with you going into the water?”
[I don’t understand what you mean, Creator.]
“I mean, you’re a machine, so wouldn’t water get inside your body and break you or something?”
[……]
Why was a golem giving him that baffled look?
[I’ll take that as an unnecessary joke not suited for the battlefield.]
After rebuking his master that way, Myeol-geop submerged without issue.
Now that he thought about it, quite some time had passed since he became a hunter, yet he knew nothing about underwater combat.
The undead knights summoned by the Lich King floundered when they entered the water.
‘Maybe I should practice it sometime.’
Jeon Jae-woo leaped down from the Cloud and dove into the sea.
The moment his entire body was submerged in seawater, real fear seized him.
‘Damn, it’s not just a figure of speech—I genuinely can’t see anything.’
Moreover, being underwater made sound difficult to perceive as well, so if he actually fought here, his body would definitely stiffen from fear even without illusion magic.
He was about to steady himself and begin proper training when—
—Boom! Boom! Boom!!
‘Damn, that scared me.’
The shockwave from deep within the sea sent him off balance, and he floundered.
Myeol-geop seemed to be fighting the monsters quite vigorously.
‘Looks like it went down pretty deep. I can barely sense anything even with Mana Detection.’
First, he regained his composure, steadied his posture, and swung his sword through the water.
The Ego Sword cut through the water current and slashed forward, but—
‘…Yeah, this isn’t working well.’
Being underwater meant that even swinging the Sword Energy didn’t produce the fluidity he wanted.
-Grrrr…
Maybe he really did need Myeol-geop’s help—a combat specialist—to train properly.
And the longer he stayed in the black water, the heavier his body felt.
‘A brief spell shouldn’t cause any real damage, should it?’
The Legendary-rank Dungeon he’d entered was called the Black Sea.
True to its name, the seawater was pitch black.
It wasn’t poisonous, but visibility was zero, and prolonged immersion triggered all manner of nightmares and hallucinations.
The Fish-man Beasts themselves weren’t particularly strong compared to monsters in other dungeons, but the water made entry impossible—which was why the dungeon remained unconquered.
If any Beast escaped, he’d have to hunt down and exterminate every last one.
When Jeon Jae-woo surfaced to breathe, the Lich King spoke up.
“All the Beasts are gone anyway. What’s there to worry about?”
……
In the meantime, he continued doing the absurd thing—swinging a blade in water he couldn’t see through.
-Whooosh.
??
Jeon Jae-woo stared hard at the sword he’d just swung.
For an instant, the arc of his blade seemed to leave an afterimage in its wake.
‘Wait—it wasn’t just seeming…’
If he wasn’t mistaken, there really was an afterimage forming?
True, the shape was visible, but it hadn’t filled in with substance yet.
The Black Sea concealed everything from sight—yet made hallucinations visible.
Was the apparent afterimage of his blade a hallucination born from that unique underwater environment?
Come to think of it, Kat-si had mentioned once that creating a blade’s afterimage resembles Illusion Magic in how it plays with perception.
‘Maybe the key is generating these visions for myself?’
Above the surface, his Summoned creatures watched their master wield his blade underwater with bemused curiosity.
“Lich King, what exactly is he doing down there?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
From the outside, he looked like someone who’d lost his mind.
Whether he’d achieved some revelation or not, Jeon Jae-woo pressed on, swinging his blade tirelessly until Myeol-geop returned.
Transcendent-rank Hunters’ Guide to Dungeon Conquest
Author
: Autumn
Publication Date
: July 2, 2026
Publisher
: Acesis Media Corp.
Editor
: Acesis Media Editorial Team
Address
: 10F Urban Bench Building, 325 Teheran-ro, Gangnam-gu, Seoul
Email
: [email protected]
※ This work is published by Acesis Media Corp. under contract with the copyright holder.
No part of this work may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means without the permission of the publisher and author.
This e-book is protected by copyright law. Unauthorized reproduction or copying may result in legal liability.
UCI
: G720:N+A129-20260615033

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