Please Give Me A Kiss, Healer! Chapter 85

“Huh? Who?”

Jiwoo’s head turned automatically.

Kang Jaegyu.

That name made her blood boil even in her dreams!

She’d thought she’d never have to see him again after he left the guild.

‘But why the hell is that bastard’s name coming up here?’

Jiwoo looked in the direction Cha Taepyeong was pointing.

In the distance, she could see a man coming out of the Donghae Guild building.

His sharp, slanted eyes and the piercings clustered around his ears were exactly the same as before.

Jiwoo instinctively ducked out of sight.

“E-Eric, come here for a second!”

Luckily, Shin Ilguk had just arrived after parking his car.

Jiwoo clung to his back like a barnacle, completely hiding herself behind him.

Kang Jaegyu, who had suddenly appeared, spotted Special Team 7 standing together and headed straight for Yoo Jaekyung.

“Senior, long time no see.”

“What brings you here?”

“Is it strange for me to be at the guild I work for?”

Yoo Jaekyung frowned and asked in return.

“The place you joined after quitting your old job was the Donghae Guild?”

“Why bother asking when you already know? That’s why I came to bring you along, Senior. …Oh, I guess I can’t call you that anymore.”

Kang Jaegyu shoved his hands into his pockets. There was a strangely mocking tone to his voice.

“What are you trying to say?”

“Well, something like this. We can call each other by our names now, right? Team Leader Yoo Jaekyung.”

At his insolent attitude, Cha Taepyeong, standing nearby, charged forward with fire in his eyes.

“You little punk! I’ve been listening to you run your mouth for a while now, and you think you can talk down to us like that?”

“Let’s not throw around words like ‘punk.’ We’re not even in the same guild anymore. …Fuck, if we were still family, you wouldn’t have dumped me and pretended not to know me.”

“That’s…… Ah, forget it. What’s the point of talking about it now?”

Yoo Jaekyung held her head and let out a sigh.

“Whatever. Just show us the meeting room. We don’t have time to waste standing around here.”

“Do you think I’m happy about this either? My team leader practically forced me to come here and drag you along.”

Kang Jaegyu picked at his ear.

But then, at that very moment, Kang Jaegyu’s gaze met Jiwoo’s, whose head was just barely poking out from behind Shin Ilguk.

“You……”

“Eeeek!”

Jiwoo sucked in a breath and hurriedly pulled a staff out of her clothes.

It took less than three seconds to restore the shrunken staff to its original size and assume a battle stance.

“……”

But Kang Jaegyu, who looked like he was about to start swearing at any moment, didn’t say a word.

“…Just follow me, Senior. The other teams have already arrived and are waiting.”

Kang Jaegyu turned around without showing any particular reaction.

Oh Nara gave the frozen Jiwoo a few light taps.

“What’s wrong? Aren’t you coming, Jiwoo?”

“Ah! Please don’t say my name so loudly!”

“Huh?”

Oh Nara was startled, but Jiwoo didn’t have time to worry about her.

Jiwoo clung to Shin Ilguk instead.

“E-Eric, do you think that guy really didn’t recognize me?”

Shin Ilguk was just as confused.

“No, that can’t be. He should know that Hunter Do Jiwoo joined the guild, too……”

“Then why is he pretending he didn’t see me? Could he have face blindness?”

Amnesia? Or maybe his memory was as bad as a crow’s?

“Maybe he’s changed his ways? Maybe he’s decided to live a better life from now on.”

“That guy? I’d sooner believe a dung beetle had stopped rolling dung.”

He’d been the same just a moment ago. The way he’d cursed and snapped at Team Leader Yoo Jaekyung was exactly the same thug-like attitude she remembered.

‘I have a bad feeling about this.’

Jiwoo stared at Kang Jaegyu’s back.

 

 

****

 

 

 

 

‘Another damn meeting!’

Jiwoo scanned the predicted map of the new dungeon’s interior.

It was a detailed map divided into twelve zones, from Zone 1 to Zone 12.

There were thirty sets of these maps, each containing well over a hundred pages.

Gates that appeared in new areas were difficult to predict, but most Gates were identical or very similar to ones that had appeared in the past.

The analysis teams at the Association and the various guilds studied records of previous raids to work out which monsters were likely to appear and what patterns they might follow.

That was one reason dungeon raid success rates were getting closer and closer to 100 percent as time went on.

‘So it’s true that you have to be smart to be a Hunter. Sob.’

Jiwoo clutched her head and buried her face in the pile of papers.

She was starting to get used to the mountains of documents.

There was only one thing that was different from usual: this wasn’t the Void Guild building, but the Donghae Guild’s Third Conference Room.

Beneath the wave-shaped logo representing the Donghae Guild, twenty Hunters had gathered.

Seven from the Donghae Guild.

Eight from the Osan Guild, sent as support.

And finally, five members of Special Team 7 from the Void Guild.

The Donghae Guild’s conference room wasn’t as large as the Void Guild’s, but it was cool and comfortable.

However, a heated argument was taking place in one corner……

“Looks like you think we came all this way just to have fun. Dungeons aren’t child’s play, you know. Tsk.”

“Anyone listening to you would think we begged you to come! This dungeon is more than manageable with just one team. Why waste manpower so recklessly?”

“You’re the reckless ones! How do you know whether one team is enough or not?”

The raid teams from the Donghae Guild and the Osan Guild had started fighting.

The reason for the argument was simple.

After the recent A-rank dungeon transformation incident, the Association had issued a new guideline.

[Each raid party must include at least two teams: a main team and a support team.]

[However, dungeon spoils will be divided at a ratio of 7:3 between the main team and the support team.]

The main team was responsible for the main raid and overall command.

The support team handled secondary supplies and assistance, and would switch places with the main team to clear the dungeon if necessary.

‘In other words, they’re emergency backups.’

The guideline was meant to maximize the raid party’s chances of survival in the event of an unexpected incident, such as a dungeon transformation.

It was true that talent had been flowing overseas lately, but there were still plenty of Hunters in the country.

So for the time being, grouping multiple teams together and letting them clear dungeons with a little breathing room wasn’t a bad strategy.

‘And the spoils are divided fairly between the main and support teams, so there shouldn’t be any pro—’

As if!

Jiwoo grabbed her hair and tugged at it.

‘Which crazy idiot came up with this and just scribbled it down without thinking?!’

What the Association had overlooked was the rivalry and greed between guilds.

The raid teams were now fighting over who would get the main team position, which came with a bigger share of the spoils.

“This Gate appeared within our guild’s territory. Isn’t it only reasonable for the Donghae Guild to lead the main team?”

“If that’s the case, then we should lead it. We traveled all this way to get here, after all. And we have the most people here, too~!”

“Oh, come on. What does the number of people have to do with anything? Skill and experience come first, don’t they? Besides, this Gate is a textbook C-rank Gate.”

“And how can you be so sure of that?”

“The location and timing both match. I’ve told you several times that we’ve cleared Gates like this together before. Why can’t you understand a word I’m saying?”

“Understand? You’re getting a little too casual with me, aren’t you? What year did you graduate from the Academy, punk?”

“Punk? Hey, I may be old, but I look younger than anyone else in my guild!”

“Show me your Hunter ID! Show it, you bastard!”

In the end, the argument ended with the two team leaders grabbing each other by the collars.

“What an embarrassing spectacle…… Tsk.”

Yoo Jaekyung clicked her tongue. She’d long since withdrawn from this muddy argument.

She wasn’t desperate enough for the main team position to get caught up in that mess and raise her voice.

Their team was smaller, too, and they’d only come on this trip to gain experience.

The fight finally began to die down, and during a short break, Jiwoo went to the restroom.

‘Are we even going to get into the dungeon this week?’

If they dragged things out too long, a Dungeon Break might occur.

If a Gate remained open for too long without anyone clearing it, the monsters inside the dungeon would start coming out through the Gate.

An endless flood of monsters, no matter how many were killed.

A living hell where monsters burst out of the dungeon like waves, sweeping away everything in their path.

It was extremely rare in Korea, but it still happened from time to time in distant countries overseas.

“Come on, the team leaders aren’t all sea cucumbers and sea anemones. They’ll settle this before that happens.”

Jiwoo shook the water off her hands and left the restroom.

Then, in the hallway on her way back to the conference room, she ran into an unexpected intruder.

Thud.

“Hey, long time no see?”

“Holy crap!”