Chapter 65
Minotauros (4)
A café inside Yeoksam Station’s subway concourse.
In the display case, whose lights were off, a number of desserts that actually looked appetizing were arranged.
“…Ugh, this tastes weird.”
The kid with the bowl-cut spat out the cake he had been eating.
Sehyun watched, clicking his tongue and shaking his head.
‘No wonder it’s strange. It only copied the appearance.’
There was no way the world the Rift had copied would have painstakingly imitated taste or texture as well.
It was lucky that picking something up at random hadn’t given them a stellar-power poisoning.
“Hmm…”
At that moment, Inha — who had been lying with his head on Sehyun’s knee — opened his eyes.
“You woke up?”
“…What about the Minotauros?”
“I shook him off for now. Rest for a while.”
“Mm.”
Inha closed his eyes again.
He shifted a little as if turning in his sleep, buried his face in Sehyun’s knee, and soon fell asleep again. He looked exhausted.
Just then, Seongcheol came over and sat opposite at the table.
“Is it okay to lounge around like this? That thing’s probably still roaming outside.”
“Don’t worry. That guy seems to have set the safeties properly.”
Sehyun nodded toward the entrance.
At the spot he indicated, Rachel and Kyle were seated with the priests, discussing something.
“Something like a counter-wave barrier? It said it can hide you from monster eyes.”
A few dozen minutes before.
While exploring the Rift, Sehyun had run into Seongcheol’s party.
They’d immediately rescued Inha and his teammates, who were in danger, and had returned to their safety point not long ago.
Sehyun looked at the sleeping Inha and asked Seongcheol, “So… what happened?”
Seongcheol summarized the events that had occurred.
The Saint Union and team leader Yeo Geon-hyeok had gone ahead as the vanguard. A wave occurred at the safety point. Then a bull-headed giant, a Minotauros, had suddenly appeared.
“A Minotauros, huh. So that’s what it was.”
Even in the previous life, the identity of the boss had not been revealed.
Everyone who had been called to the emergency assembly had been wiped out inside the Rift.
“As soon as I realized it was a labyrinth, I understood why that thing showed up.”
Sehyun could pretty much put the pieces together.
“Have you heard everything, Nam Sehyun?”
Rachel, apparently done with her conversation with the priests, had come over and sat.
“It seems these are all the survivors. So what’s the plan going forward?”
“…What choice do we have? We have to retreat.”
Saving these people was the priority.
Given the current situation, any desire to hunt the boss had to be abandoned.
‘…The matchup is just terrible.’
A basic rule when using artifacts is to gain an advantage in ability matchups.
But against the Minotauros that strategy wouldn’t work.
Simple fact: it was a monster with overwhelmingly strong stellar-power.
‘If we wanted to hunt it, we’d have to bring a much higher-level player.’
There was no such person available at the moment.
Seongcheol was a stellar-power thug, but he was at best planet-grade — not stellar-level.
Among Sehyun’s acquaintances, only Sasha might be stellar-grade, but…
‘Even then, only barely comparable. Not overwhelming.’
There was no way to counter it right now.
For the time being, retreating to regroup and devise a plan was safest.
Alternatively, forcibly sealing the Rift to prevent the thing from getting out might be the only solution.
“I agree with retreating. But getting back won’t be smooth. We might lose our way. Maybe it’s better to wait here for a rescue team…”
Seongcheol rested his chin on his hand and frowned.
Since they’d said they’d run straight into confusion after fleeing the Minotauros, his worry wasn’t unreasonable.
“Do you think we came here by chance, Choi Seongcheol?”
“What… what are you talking about?”
He had started to respond to Rachel’s question but stopped.
He’d just realized something late.
He realized that the conditions applied not only to his party but to Sehyun and Rachel as well.
“You don’t really think we found you by accident, do you?”
“…”
Of course not.
The labyrinth-type Rift was not something you could just stumble through and get lucky in.
When Seongcheol looked at Sehyun as if demanding an explanation, Sehyun shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal.
“It’s nothing special. This helped this time.”
Sehyun raised his arm.
A chain bracelet — Valley of Ashes — clinked at his wrist.
“With this I blocked the labyrinth’s stellar power and didn’t fall under its illusion.”
“…!!”
Thanks to that, he’d seen a rather interesting sight.
It had happened while he was going around with Rachel and Kyle looking for people.
-
…He just went into the wall, right?
-
Yes… Do you think we’re okay, senior?
The two had suddenly stopped and were whispering, so Sehyun turned around to look and they showed surprised reactions.
-
Gasp! Did you see that! He popped out of the wall!
-
…I see.
At first it sounded like nonsense.
But then he noticed that the view those two saw was different from what he saw.
“It was a spectacle, really. Heh heh.”
After hearing Sehyun’s story, Seongcheol glanced around.
“Don’t tell me this place is like that too?”
“The underground is different from the surface — the labyrinth’s illusion doesn’t work down here, so relax. That’s why we hid here.”
“Thank goodness… So that’s how you were able to find the way?”
“There’s one more thing.”
Sehyun took out Kyle’s map.
“…A map?”
Kyle said proudly, “Oh! My map was useful, huh?”
“No, what’s drawn is rubbish.”
“Wah… then what was useful?”
Kyle frowned in protest, and Sehyun smiled a little.
Although the map had been drawn under illusion and was therefore inaccurate, it was still helpful — but in a different way.
“The way he drew the map helped find the path.”
Kyle’s map had been drawn by analyzing the distribution of stellar power.
Areas where stellar power was shallow were empty space with no obstacles. Areas with no stellar power indicated obstacles like buildings. Areas where stellar power clumped indicated lifeforms.
Using that scheme, Sehyun had been able to find paths and people.
If he checked only where stellar power had lumped, one of those lumps would be Inha and Seongcheol’s group.
“So the place we first arrived at — that was the first safety point.”
Although it was empty, the soul-stones needed to activate the stationmaster made it easy to find.
In the same way, while checking around, they had found the priests Rachel had been talking to earlier.
And by sheer luck and razor-thin timing, they had met Seongcheol’s party along with Inha.
Of course, at the time the situation was so urgent that there hadn’t been any time to think. Looking back, it was a heart-stopping moment that made him break out in a cold sweat.
What would have happened if they had been even a little late?
‘In my previous life, that’s what happened — so everyone died.’
Seongcheol and Inha could have met the same end.
It was entirely possible in that scenario.
They could have gotten lost, been chased by the boss from behind, and were in an environment where monster packs could pounce at any moment — the worst possible circumstances.
Naturally, when he first found them, Sehyun had a strong urge to run off alone.
But no matter how urgent, he couldn’t behave like a child.
In the end, with Rachel and Kyle’s help, they’d narrowly saved them and retreated to the safety point.
It had turned out well, but the weight of it still lingered.
“…I’m sorry we didn’t get here faster.”
“You still found us in time.”
“If only I’d been a bit more…”
“No. If not for you, no one could have done it.”
Seongcheol’s encouragement eased Sehyun’s mind somewhat.
Anyway, despite the big crisis, two people were alive right in front of them.
“…Umm.”
Inha murmured in his sleep and shifted.
He looked noticeably more comfortable than before.
‘…Hold on.’
Seeing Inha, a thought crossed Sehyun’s mind.
“But the boss — has it never been reported before?”
“That’s right. Even among stellar-grade things, one like that is the first.”
“So the name ‘Minotauros’ was something Inha improvised?”
“Well, it looks similar, so… Is that a problem?”
“…It’s nothing.”
Seongcheol may have taken it lightly, but Sehyun could not.
‘It could be because this is a labyrinth Rift. And it’s not strange that a boss would be a bull-headed monster. But…’
It was too uncanny to be an accident.
It recreated the Minotauros from myth so precisely it was as if the original had been copied outright.
Furthermore—
‘Inha’s thread-sword. It was said to be a transformed explosive sword.’
And he had newly named it “Ariadne’s Thread.”
How could it have changed into such a perfectly timed, apt form?
Seongcheol thought Sehyun had tinkered with the sword somehow.
‘…There’s no way that kind of thing is possible by devices.’
The idea of unspooling a solid blade like a thread wasn’t something a gadget could achieve.
That was entirely an ability Inha had manifested.
But it differed somewhat from his previous abilities.
If Inha’s power was to understand the myth inside the weapon and bring its abilities to maximum effect…
‘This time the scope widened a lot. If I were to name it… yeah.’
A sort of “fictionalization manifesting” — no, [Narrative Manifestation].
‘Like cosplay, maybe.’
Not only did he immerse himself in a role, but he also drew the opposing role and the surroundings into the immersion, creating the ideal staged scene.
He was implementing the mythic narrative into the real world.
Not only himself, but the opponent and the surrounding environment as well.
It seemed as if Inha’s unique talent had simply transferred into a player’s ability.
More checking was needed, but it was certain that Inha had awoken a level.
Thinking that far, one possibility popped into Sehyun’s head.
‘…If Inha’s ability intervenes?’
From the moment he entered the Rift, Sehyun had ruled out attempting to kill the boss.
They couldn’t bring an artifact made specifically to face an unknown threat.
And after seeing the boss’s ability, they’d been certain there was no way to take it down.
But if they could make use of Inha’s awakening?
Across both lives, Inha’s ability was among the most unusual.
Even if Minotauros had no matchup per se, what if the mythic story applied directly?
‘It’s not completely impossible. The thread-sword is proof.’
A weapon that had been ineffective suddenly landed the first valid blow on that thing — that was Inha’s [Ariadne’s Thread].
If there was even a couple of relevant links, it was worth trying.
‘Think of it not as just a story but as pre-prepared boss monster information.’
That creature was a “real Minotauros.”
Not only did it look the part; its abilities, given conditions, limits, and weaknesses all matched the Greek-myth Minotauros.
Starting from that premise, Sehyun quickly listed possibilities and means.
Combine that with the labyrinth Rift’s characteristics and…
“Maybe there’s a way.”
Sehyun finished thinking and spoke.
“What?”
“Huh?”
Seongcheol and Rachel both reacted in surprise at Sehyun’s sudden words.
“We might be able to catch it. No, I think we can catch it. The Minotauros.”
Sehyun grinned and affirmed toward them.
