Please Give Me A Kiss, Healer! Chapter 122

‘Just like that time, I jumped in without thinking.’

But the difference this time was that I wasn’t the only one jumping in.

[This is Shin Il-guk, a Hunter from the Gongbaek Guild. I volunteer for the search operation in Area A!]

[Hunters Yoo Jae-gyeong and Cha Tae-pyeong will go as well.]

Oh Nara, her face pale with fear, grabbed the collar of Ji-woo’s clothes.

“Ji, Ji-woo, are you going too? Area A is way too dangerous…”

Even in Area B, where relatively fewer monsters had appeared, it was difficult to withstand the attacks.

By now, Area A, where all the Hunters had withdrawn, must have become a land filled with death and despair.

“You can stay here, Nara. More Hunters will keep gathering here, so you’ll be safe if you stay near the portal.”

“But…”

“They’ll need someone to treat the injured in Area B, too.”

But Nara, who had been hesitating, shook her head.

“I-I’ll go with you.”

“What?”

“There are plenty of other Healers here besides me… I think I’d rather be with our team than stay here alone.”

It was an unexpected response. Nara, who had been so afraid of monsters, was actually stepping forward first.

And so Ji-woo joined the group of Hunters heading to Area A with Nara.

Besides the Special 7 Team, there were several familiar faces. Kim Cheol-su and Team Leader Go Jae-pil, whom he had met at the Donghae Dungeon, and Kang Jae-gyu, who had been practically dragged there by Go Jae-pil.

And…

“Hunter Lee Yeon-woo?”

Lee Yeon-woo was there as well, along with a Dealer whose face was as pale as a corpse and a Tanker wearing a black helmet.

“Weren’t you told to withdraw from Area A?”

“That’s the official instruction from the Emergency Disaster Team. What we’re doing now is something we’re choosing to do individually.”

The Tanker in the black helmet asked,

“Why not come with us?”

“Hmm…”

Ji-woo looked back at the Special 7 Team. Normally, he should stay with his team, but since they had an A-rank Healer like Nara, he thought it would be fine for him to leave.

‘If I want to use my abilities without restrictions, it’s better to join them.’

Lee Yeon-woo and the other two Hunters already knew about his abilities, so he could summon the Residents if necessary.

Ji-woo nodded and followed the three members of the Emergency Disaster Team.

 

 

*****

 

 

 

 

Every street they passed was filled with signs of death and destruction.

Broken cars had been overturned like toys, and buildings were burning as if they had been bombed.

“Ugh.”

Ji-woo thought he had a strong stomach, but the smell of blood was far too strong. Corpses were scattered across the ground, and it was impossible to tell which ones were monsters and which ones were people.

Fortunately—or unfortunately—there was no time to feel sick, because monsters came rushing at them.

The closer they got to Area A, the fiercer the monsters’ attacks became.

Monsters fell from the sky. Others suddenly jumped out from between buildings.

Most of them were much larger than humans, with claws and teeth as sharp as blades.

“Fuck, isn’t this basically suicide?!”

Kang Jae-gyu’s huge voice came from several blocks away.

The monsters reacted to the sound and disappeared toward where it had come from.

‘That idiot!’

They were supposed to search as quietly as possible, so why was he calling the monsters over?!

Lee Yeon-woo seemed to have the same thought and let out a deep sigh.

She fired arrows of light, blowing the heads off two monsters in a single attack, then pointed toward a building.

“Let’s search this building first.”

The building she pointed to had suffered the least damage.

The entrance was also intact, so it seemed that no monsters had entered yet.

“Then I’ll start from the top floor and work my way down.”

Ji-woo activated Whitebird’s wings. He quickly flew into the air and landed on the rooftop.

Grrrrr.

Several monsters that had fallen onto the rooftop turned toward Ji-woo.

“〈Homeowner’s Guard〉, summon Antman!”

Until now, Ji-woo had deliberately avoided summoning the Residents. In the middle of a chaotic battle, the Residents could be mistaken for enemies and put themselves in danger.

But right now, Ji-woo was the only one standing here!

While the Antmen fought the monsters, Ji-woo opened the rooftop door.

The moment it opened, darkness swallowed everything around him.

The building was without power, and only faint emergency lights illuminated the floor beneath his feet.

“[Light].”

A small light floated into the air. Ji-woo carefully stepped onto the stairs.

The inside of the building was quiet. There were no screams from outside, nor the cries of monsters.

Just as Ji-woo’s steps were growing heavier—

“Sniff…”

A faint sob came from somewhere. Ji-woo quickly ran toward the direction of the voice.

When he pushed open a transparent glass door, an office came into view.

The office was a mess, as if everyone had fled in a hurry, but there was no sign of anyone inside.

‘Did I hear it wrong?’

Ji-woo used his Search skill to scan the office.

“We’re a search team dispatched to Yeouido. We’re here to rescue survivors.”

From the nearby break room came the sound of something crashing to the floor.

The door opened, and inside were ten men and women huddled together. When they saw Ji-woo, hope appeared on their faces.

“Are all the people on this floor here?”

“Yes. Everyone else went downstairs… We don’t know what happened to them.”

If they had gone outside the building, there was a very good chance they were dead.

‘They probably became one of the corpses scattered around the entrance.’

Ji-woo pushed away the dark thought and picked up his communicator.

“Hunter Lee Yeon-woo, I found ten survivors. How is it on your side?”

[There’s no one here. I think the survivors you found are the only ones.]

The building was too large, and there was a limit to how much he could search by himself.

For now, Ji-woo decided to move to the first floor with the survivors. Before long, he reunited with his teammates.

After taking over the survivors, they decided to move straight to the portal.

“I’ll search the inside of the building one more time, just in case.”

The Dealer with corpse-pale skin casually said,

“Take care of yourself.”

“I will. Thank you.”

Left alone, Ji-woo summoned as many Antmen as he could.

His efforts to use 〈Homeowner’s Guard〉 whenever he had time had paid off. The skill, which had originally been F-rank, had grown all the way to B-rank.

Around a hundred Antmen filled the hallways.

“From here to there. Divide yourselves into groups of five and spread out.”

Ji-woo assigned each group one floor to search. He added a few warnings.

“If you find a person, never go near them. Tell me instead. Got it?”

The Antmen, who had gotten into trouble the last time they revealed themselves in front of people in the dungeon, followed his orders faithfully.

Thanks to that, Ji-woo found five more survivors.

After contacting Lee Yeon-woo, Ji-woo evacuated the survivors to a safe place.

Before moving to the next building, Ji-woo finally had a brief moment to catch his breath. He looked out the window.

The sky had turned pitch-black, yet the enormous gate still cast an unreal light over everything.

Below it, the wide roads were filled with monsters that had lost all reason.

‘There seem to be even more than before.’

The emergency plan for this security mission had only been prepared to deal with possible Doppelgänger appearances.

Who could have imagined that a gate would open in the sky and monsters would pour out of it?

‘For now, I’ll just do what I can.’

Just then, a transmission came from the Special 7 Team saying they had found a large number of survivors.

Ji-woo was about to head straight to that building when something caught his eye.

“Huh…?”

In the darkness filled with monsters, one person walking down the road stood out.

The familiar back made Ji-woo’s heart sink.

“Gang-woo… It’s Gang-woo.”

Without thinking, Ji-woo rushed out of the building.

“Gang-woo!”

He shouted his name, but Gang-woo didn’t turn around or answer.

And that wasn’t all.

The monsters acted as if they couldn’t see either of them.

Thanks to that, Ji-woo was able to follow Gang-woo without any interference.

‘Where the hell are you going?!’

His chest felt tight.

Gang-woo continued moving deeper into areas crowded with monsters.

It was like being trapped in a nightmare. No matter how hard Ji-woo ran, he couldn’t catch him.

Gang-woo kept getting closer and farther away, always just within reach.

When Ji-woo finally stopped, panting heavily, the man in front of him stopped walking as well.