The man who usually moved with robotic calm and dead-eyed detachment was now…tense. Not visibly. Not to an untrained eye.

  But Mu Yichen had been observing him long enough to spot the subtle clench in his jaw, the flicker in his gaze.

  “Something wrong?” he asked carefully, keeping his voice low.

  No answer.

  Pudding let out a low whine and nudged his leg.

  Still no answer.

  Lee Aseok’s eyes stayed locked on the glowing numbers on his screen.

  He knew this place.

  The timing wasn’t right. It was happening too fast. This gate hadn’t opened until much later in his previous life.

  But he recognized it anyway.

  That cursed subway station.

  The one that collapsed.

  The one that broke open without warning.

  The one no one stopped in time.

  The beginning of his end.

  The start of everything that went wrong.

  The betrayal.

  The death.

  The rebirth.

  Lee Aseok’s lips thinned.

  He felt a strange numbness crawl up his spine—not fear.

  Not dread.

  Something heavier.

  Mu Yichen stepped closer, voice calm. “Is something wrong with this one?”

  Still nothing.

  Lee Aseok simply turned toward Yoo Eunsae and extended a hand toward her.

  She blinked. “M-me?”

  He pointed at Pudding.

  “Oh…?”

  She looked at the husky, then back at him.

  “You want me to..wait, me?”

  Pudding looked up at her with judgmental eyes.

  Lee Aseok didn’t answer. He didn’t even look at him. Instead, he turned to Yoo Eunsae and pointed at the husky sitting obediently at his side.

  “Take care of Pudding,” he said flatly.

  “Eh?” Yoo Eunsae blinked. “Wait—”

  “He Ziqin,” Lee Aseok interrupted, not giving her a chance to argue. “Teleport.”

  “Wait, wait, wait..!” Yoo Eunsae’s arms flailed a little, but before she could throw a proper protest, the team disappeared in a flash of light, leaving her behind.

  The husky stared at her.

  She stared back.

  “…Don’t look at me like that,” she muttered.

  Pudding huffed and padded away with the air of a disappointed elder. Eunsae’s lips twitched. “That damn dog is exactly like its master.”

  With a groan, she jogged after it, mumbling something about babysitting being above her pay grade.

  The air shimmered as He Ziqin’s teleportation faded, depositing the group right into the heart of the city. Chaos greeted them.

  Sirens screamed across rooftops. Police shouted orders to civilians, directing them toward barricaded zones.

  Hunters in standard-grade armor moved in tense formations, assisting evacuation efforts while casting wary glances toward the colossal structure in the distance—the S-rank gate.

  It hovered in the sky like a malignant eye. Unblinking. Thrumming with suppressed energy.

  Its core pulsed a deep blue, spinning slow and steady, framed by jagged runes that floated around its circumference like orbiting satellites.

  Most of the group, Mu Yichen, Seo MinHyun, Park Taegun, Kang Juwon, and He Ziqin, barely blinked.

  This wasn’t their first S-rank emergency. Protocol demanded evacuations, and the city was following it to the letter.

  Park Taegun folded his arms and observed the panicked flow of civilians with a soldier’s detachment. “Typical.”

  “They’re efficient this time,” Kang Juwon noted, glancing at a squad of younger hunters setting up barricades. “Looks like someone taught the HQ how not to trip over their own feet.”

  Seo MinHyun let out a bored yawn. “All this because of a gate Aseok’ll clean up in half an hour.”

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  A few nearby hunters looked up from their posts and quickly noticed the approaching group. One nudged another, whispering, “Is that…?”

  “Lee Aseok. And the Moon Guild’s big shots,” another muttered, half in awe, half in dread.

  Their awe wasn’t unwarranted. Among the group, one man stood apart—without even trying.

  Lee Aseok’s steps were silent, but the air around him felt heavier. The holy sword floated behind him as always, glinting under the city’s emergency lights like a silent guardian.

  Hunters watching him averted their gaze quickly, some out of respect, others out of something closer to fear.

  No one spoke to him.

  Mu Yichen greeted the officer approaching them with a nod.

  A uniformed man from HQ, clearly used to being ignored by a certain someone, addressed Mu Yichen directly. “Hunter Mu. Thank you for responding quickly. Are you planning to enter the gate now?”

  Not a single glance toward Lee Aseok. Everyone knew better.

  Mu Yichen looked over at him. “Aseok?”

  Lee Aseok didn’t move right away.

  Seo MinHyun clicked his tongue impatiently. “Why even ask? This guy’s addicted to S-rank gates. He probably thinks they’re exercise bikes.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised if he names them,” Kang Juwon added dryly.

  He Ziqin chuckled. “Don’t give him ideas.”

  But before their light teasing could carry on, Lee Aseok spoke. His voice was quiet, but clear enough that it cut through the noise like a wire pulled taut.

  “No.”

  The chatter stopped.

  “…What?” Seo MinHyun blinked. “Did you just say no?”

  Lee Aseok finally turned to face them fully. His expression was unreadable. “We’re not going in.”

  Now even Mu Yichen raised an eyebrow. “You don’t want to clear it?”

  “There’s no need,” Lee Aseok said. He turned his head slightly toward the gate. “It’s going to break soon.”

  Silence fell across the group like a dropped curtain.

  “Wait, wait,” Seo MinHyun waved a hand. “Are you saying it’ll break… like, today?”

  Lee Aseok didn’t answer him. Instead, he looked toward the gate.

  And in that moment, everything changed.

  The color of the S-rank gate shifted.

  In an instant, what had been a pulsing deep blue cracked into a vivid, bleeding crimson.

  Before anyone could process Lee Aseok’s cryptic warning, the air grew heavy with mana.

  The shimmering veil over the gate vibrated violently, then ripped open like flesh tearing apart.

  A piercing screech split the sky as the first monster stepped out.

  It was a reptilian horror, long-limbed and covered in armored scales that shimmered like wet obsidian.

  Its jaws dripped with acidic drool. Then came the second. And the third. Then the stampede.

  Chaos followed.

  Screams erupted across the city as civilians, who had still been evacuating, saw the monsters pour into the streets.

  He Ziqin’s pupils narrowed. His mind went blank for a beat, then came the cursing.

  “You lunatic—! You knew and still didn’t warn us?” he snapped at Lee Aseok, but Aseok didn’t even glance back.

  With a frustrated grunt, He Ziqin activated his teleportation skill, blinking rapidly across the street, grabbing civilians and warping them to a safe zone one after another.

  Every teleport thinned his mana, but he pushed harder.

  “You better not die here, you crazy bastard,” he muttered, eyes locking once on Lee Aseok’s still figure.

  Meanwhile, Mu Yichen stepped forward, sword unsheathed with elegance and precision.

  His calm demeanor didn’t falter even as a monster twice his size charged. One clean slice, monster down.

  Beside him, Park Taegun swung his spear like a war machine, keeping monsters from flanking their position.

  Kang Juwon’s chains lashed through the air like vipers, binding limbs and tearing scales apart.

  Seo MinHyun, true to form, yelled mid-fight, “What kind of shopping trip is this, huh?! These things breathe fire!”

  One of the lizard-like creatures spat out a flaming blast. Seo barely dodged, singed at the edges.

  “I swear,” he muttered, slicing through its throat. “The next time Aseok says ‘we’re going’, I’m calling in sick.”

  Amid the battle frenzy, Lee Aseok still hadn't moved.

  Not a step.

  Not a twitch.

  Only his eyes stayed fixed on the gate.

  A monster rushed at him from the side.

  Just before it could bite, the holy sword floating behind him moved on its own, like a loyal guard dog, and sliced the monster into pieces without touching the ground.

  Blood splattered his boots. Aseok didn’t blink.

  The others spared him glances, curious, wary, half-angry. But no one dared speak.

  Because no one dared ask Lee Aseok questions when he looked like that, like something ancient had awoken inside him.

  Lee Aseok stood still in the middle of the battlefield, eyes unmoving, the chaos around him fading into silence.

  The city screamed. Fire bloomed against the skyline. Hunters shouted commands, monsters roared, weapons clashed, but Lee Aseok heard none of it.

  Because his mind was no longer here.

  He was remembering something that hadn’t happened yet.

  A gate.

  Not this one.

  One from a lifetime ago.

  B-rank gate, Past Life—Six Years Ago

  The air was thick with ash and blood. Sirens echoed from far away, and the streets were littered with broken glass and overturned vehicles.

  Back then, Lee Aseok had no one.

  An F-rank hunter barely scraping by, and no one ever remembered his name at the Hunter’s Registry Office.

  Only his master Mu Haejoon came to check on him often and for the sword lessons.

  He was just there for training, because at that time, Lee Aseok was obsessed with swords and wanted to learn everything he could from his master.

  And then suddenly, the sky split open.

  The B-rank gate had broken.

  Monsters poured out like a tide. Buildings shattered under their weight. Civilians screamed and scattered, and all Lee Aseok could do was run.

  But not fast enough.

  A lizard-like beast slammed him against a wall, its claws digging into his shoulder. He couldn’t even scream. Just a rasp of breath and a broken arm.

  That’s when they appeared.

  Light exploded across the battlefield like a divine judgment. At the center of it stood a man, calm, dressed in pristine silver armor, his holy sword cutting through monsters like thread.

  Mu Yichen.

  And behind him, a unit of powerful hunters. Together, they carved a path through the chaos.

  Aseok had stared, slack-jawed, from where he bled on the ground.

  It was the first time he saw something that amazing.

  Mu Yichen’s sword, a beautiful thing carved with old runes, glowed with light.

  Monsters burned where it passed. Aseok didn’t know its name back then, and didn't know what it meant.

  He only knew it was something far beyond him.

  Mu Yichen’s team saved the area, pushed the monsters back, and began cleanup. The civilians were pulled out.

  Guild members were arriving. Hunters from the Moon Guild and the Palace Guild were already reporting.

  Lee Aseok was forgotten again, just a bleeding man on the sidelines.

  He remembered slumping against a wall, trying to tie his shirt around the wound on his arm.

  And then it happened.

  The sky, already cracked, was ripped open a second time.

  Another gate, massive, wrong, appeared out of nowhere.

  A second dungeon break.

  This one wasn’t B-rank.

  It was something else entirely.

  A shadow descended, massive and monstrous.

  Wings like hurricane clouds.

  Eyes like molten gold.

  A dragon.

  Even Mu Yichen looked shocked.

  The battlefield was swallowed again. Mu Yichen and his team rushed back in without hesitation. Swords sang, explosions rang, and skills lit up the sky like fireworks.

  Aseok, still sitting, struggled to breathe. He watched as Yichen’s sword clashed with the dragon's claws again and again.

  And then, somehow… the sword fell.

  Mu Yichen lost grip during an explosion, and the weapon flew, spinning, glowing, and landed only a few meters away from Lee Aseok.

  The impact cracked the ground.

  He stared at it.

  The blade vibrated softly, as if alive. The runes pulsed. It didn’t feel like a sword. It felt like… something breathing.

  He would’ve left it.

  But then he saw it, behind Mu Yichen, a man creeping with a long black coat, a glint of metal in his hand.

  A gun.

  The barrel was aimed straight at Mu Yichen’s back.

  Without thinking, Aseok moved.

  He lunged, broken arm and all, fingers wrapping around the hilt of the glowing sword.

  Author Note:

  Every “OH MY GOD ASEOK STOP” gives me the strength to write the next disaster.

  Mon ? Wed ? Fri

  (Yes, I too question my life choices.)

  https://www.patreon.com/c/LithutheBloom

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