Chapter 138: Do Ae-Young Arrives

Kang Ian was always the one who stood ahead of everyone else. No matter how powerful the monsters he encountered were, no matter how perilous the mission, he had never once left her to shoulder the consequences alone.

And yet, right now, he had vanished right inside a Dungeon without leaving behind a single word. With Kang Ian gone, they simply lacked the strength to rescue him from that place on their own.

Moon So-Yeon pivoted on her heel and strode rapidly toward the door.

"Guild Leader So-Yeon!" A hunter called out after her. "Who should we notify first? The Hunter Association, other Guilds, or—"

"Notify everyone who needs to know. We need the strength of any high-rank hunter we can possibly get in touch with."

Moon So-Yeon halted, then slowly turned her head to say: "But first, I must go find Kei."

Kei was sitting in the office alongside Kim Sora when he spotted Moon So-Yeon returning to the shop.

She stepped inside in a rush, her usually composed face drained of color. The hand clutching her coat trembled uncontrollably.

A single glance at that posture was all it took for Kei to realize the situation had turned for the worse.

"What happened?" Kim Sora stood up instantly, eyeing Moon So-Yeon with deep anxiety.

Moon So-Yeon looked at the two of them, her lips parting slightly, yet no words came out. Kei didn’t press further; he simply rose gently, picked up the jacket resting nearby, and walked toward the door.

"Let’s go."

"Kei-nim..."

Kei offered a soft smile, cutting off the apology hovering on Moon So-Yeon’s lips. "You want us to help find Kang Ian, don’t you?"

Moon So-Yeon pressed her lips into a tight line.

In that fleeting moment, she had no idea how to respond. The Crying Ghost Guild possessed plenty of powerful hunters, but facing a disappearance that left zero traces behind, nobody knew where to even begin.

As for Kei...

Kei was the sole person capable of perceiving things they couldn’t possibly comprehend. Ever since Kei crafted the rings that enabled the Black Rose Guild hunters to escape a Dungeon and revealed his mastery of magic... Moon So-Yeon believed he might just be the key!

Finally, she gave a firm nod. "I’m sorry for dragging you into this."

"It’s fine." Kei shook his head. "If it’s that Dungeon, I’d like to take a look anyway."

He harbored a faint curiosity toward those strange plants. Could they perhaps share similarities with the bizarre new monsters popping up in Dungeons, and were they tied in any way to his old world?

Kim Sora hurriedly grabbed her coat, then glanced down at Nora, who was curled up fast asleep beneath the table. "We’ll be gone for a little while. Be a good kitty and stay home, Nora."

The cat merely twitched an ear, showing zero intention of waking up. Sora stared at it for a few seconds before resigning herself to closing up the shop.

The moment they left, Nora, who had been lazing about in slumber abruptly sat straight up. It hopped onto the windowsill, locking its golden eyes unblinkingly onto Kei’s receding back as its feline pupils narrowed slightly.

The three of them departed quickly.

On the journey toward the Crying Ghost Guild’s headquarters, Moon So-Yeon recounted everything that had transpired. She spoke at a measured pace, striving not to miss a single detail, yet her voice grew increasingly heavy with palpable unease.

Kei listened in silence.

Everything Moon So-Yeon described evoked a strange, deeply familiar sensation within him, though he couldn’t pinpoint the exact reason why.

That stream of light...

Had he laid eyes on it somewhere before?

Kei furrowed his brow, frantically trying to dredge up memories buried deep beneath layers of time. Yet the harder he tried to recall, the more intense his headache became.

Kim Sora glanced sideways at him. "Kei, are you alright?"

"I’m fine." Kei reached up to gently massage his temples. "I just have a feeling that Dungeon might not be an ordinary one."

"You think so, too?" Moon So-Yeon asked.

"Mhm." Kei gazed out the car window. "Could that place not be detaining monsters at all... but rather holding something else entirely?"

Moon So-Yeon fell silent.

*Something else entirely?* If that was truly the case, just where had Kang Ian stepped into, and what on earth had taken him away?

By the time they reached the Crying Ghost Guild headquarters, Do Ae-Young had just stepped into the main lobby.

She came to an abrupt halt the instant she spotted Kei.

Do Ae-Young’s gaze swept swiftly over him from head to toe. Only after confirming that Kei remained completely uninjured did she let out a silent sigh of relief.

*Thank goodness...* she muttered under her breath.

Hearing that, Kim Sora blinked and looked over with curiosity. "Are you worried about Kei, too, Sister Do Ae-Young? Nothing out of the ordinary even happened to him today?"

Do Ae-Young immediately averted her gaze. "I simply have no desire for Dong-San City to be hit with any more troublesome incidents."

The response sounded perfectly logical.

Yet the truth was that Do Ae-Young had never intended to stick her nose into this mess.

The Black Dragon Guild and the Crying Ghost Guild had yet to officially sign a mutual support pact within the borders of Dong-San City. Strictly speaking, Kang Ian’s disappearance wasn’t her responsibility.

And yet, the scouts she had secretly dispatched to protect Kei kept feeding her bizarre reports.

A giant white wolf suddenly materializing inside Kei’s shop, Hwang Do-Hyun and Lucas dropping by to see Kei, followed by news of Kang Ian going missing inside a Dungeon, and Moon So-Yeon rushing over to the shop only to escort Kei straight back to the Crying Ghost headquarters.

Piece by piece, the intelligence made Do Ae-Young feel as though this situation was spiraling entirely out of hand. She had promptly dropped her workload at the main branch and set off for Dong-San City.

Regardless of anything else, Kei’s safety always had to take absolute priority. Because Kei’s safety was directly tied to her clan’s Black Dragon Kai keeping his sanity.

If anything were to happen to Kei, the very first person to lose their mind wouldn’t be Do Ae-Young, it would be that idiot black dragon.

"Sister Do Ae-Young." Moon So-Yeon stepped forward. "Thank you so much for rushing over to assist right away. I am deeply grateful."

"No need for thanks," Do-Young replied, her eyes shifting back toward Kei. "I simply wish to know what on earth you people ran into, and why a hunter’s crisis managed to drag Kei into it?"

Moon So-Yeon retold the entire sequence of events.

The longer Do Ae-Young listened, the graver her expression grew. Especially upon hearing about the stream of blue light, she snapped her head toward Kei and demanded, "Have you ever laid eyes on that thing before?"

Kei didn’t answer immediately. "I’m not certain," he said. "However, I believe... Kang Ian might not be dead. He likely triggered a magic array and was summoned somewhere else."

Moon So-Yeon snapped her head up. "What did you say?"

"There were no signs of a struggle, no blood, and no corpse. If that light matrix was truly a type of teleportation, he was likely whisked away to another location."

"But transported to where?"

Kei lowered his gaze to the floor. "I don’t know."

Inside the room, absolute silence reigned.

Moon So-Yeon clenched her fists tightly, striving to cling to the fragile sliver of hope that had just been ignited. If Kang Ian was still breathing, she was determined to find him no matter what.