The Support Ate it All

On Friday night,

Go Hyeon-woo and I headed toward the dungeon building a little earlier than the arranged time.

As we waited a bit out front, we spotted Jang Moo-geuk approaching from a distance.

As expected of an assassin, his stride was perfectly measured as if by a ruler, and his footsteps were nearly silent.

Jang Moo-geuk’s eyes gleamed as he met Go Hyeon-woo’s gaze.

“It’s been a while.”

“I’ve been waiting for this day.”

“Likewise.”

From their words alone, it seemed they might draw swords and start a duel at any moment, but the tone between them was surprisingly gentle.

The faint smiles at the corners of their lips meant they were actually pleased with the situation.

Go Hyeon-woo spoke up.

“Though we’re on the same side today, if the opportunity comes, I’d like to ask for another lesson from you, Jang-hyung.”

“A good day will come. When the time is right, I won’t avoid it.”

Jang Moo-geuk replied in an even tone.

Shortly after, Dang Gyu-young and Chae Da-bin arrived precisely at the scheduled time.

The two martial artists bowed their heads politely.

“You’re here.”

“Yes, let’s get going right away.”

Dang Gyu-young returned their brief greeting and took the lead.

Then, just as she stopped in front of the door leading down to the underground, she looked around at us and spoke.

“Come down after five minutes.”

“Yes, senior-nim.”

“See you below.”

There was no issue with accessing the F-floor itself, but if the five of us moved together in a big group, we’d be sure to catch the attention of the Disciplinary Committee.

Especially since two of them were the president and vice-president of the thieves club.

If word spread to the lower floors, security would only tighten unnecessarily, so we decided to split up for now and move separately even just to the F-floor.

Dang Gyu-young and Chae Da-bin went down first, and we waited a moment before following.

The moment I set foot on the spiral staircase, I felt it.

It’s cold down here.

The atmosphere permeating the entire underground level was visibly more tense than usual.

The expressions on the passing students’ faces looked downright serious.

And in one glance, I spotted three different students wearing Disciplinary Committee armbands.

For the F-floor where incidents are rare, this was an unusual amount of monitoring. I could only guess there would be even more security below.

All this was due to the chaos that A-rank villain had stirred up.

I moved my lips slightly to signal the two with me.

– Let’s act natural.

– Understood.

Neither Go Hyeon-woo nor I were strangers to the underground level, so keeping a poker face was no problem.

And as for Jang Moo-geuk whose profession as an assassin had trained him well, he was completely at ease.

If only his naming sense were as perfect as his skills.

Honestly, there’s just no fixing the “Jang Oh-Wang Gon” pair.

As I walked along, thinking about all this, a second-year member of the disciplinary committee passed by.

He glanced in our direction, but when we bowed our heads slightly, he simply gave us a quick nod before averting his gaze.

The same went for the other committee members we encountered after that.

Without drawing much suspicion, we changed elevators a few times and finally reached the lowest level of the F-floor.

In the next moment, a small shadow butterfly fluttered in front of us from somewhere.

We followed the butterfly’s lead, and soon, Dang Gyu-young and Chae Da-bin emerged from a shaded spot.

– This is just the beginning. Stay focused.

As soon as we regrouped, we stepped onto the E floor.

Just as expected, there were more committee members patrolling here than on the F floor.

Dang Gyu-young and Chae Da-bin exchanged a quick glance.

Dang Gyu-young’s usual guiding style was to spread shadow butterflies around and push forward based on the information they gathered.

But now, even a single butterfly in sight would set off an alarm across the entire floor, so the strategy had to change.

[Shadow Sanctuary]

A shadow rose from the ground and formed a large dome, like ink spreading over us all.

It was a skill that granted a stealth buff to allies within range for a limited time.

Highly useful, though it had one drawback.

There’s still the cooldown.

For a B-rank, the stealth lasted three minutes with a five-minute cooldown.

Which meant for two minutes, we would have to move without stealth or use another concealment skill.

Of course, that’s assuming only one person uses it.

If two people took turns using it, the story would change entirely.

[Activated ‘Copy-Skill’.]

[Registering the target’s skill ‘Shadow Sanctuary (B)’ in the slot.]

▷Copy – Skill [3/3]

1. Thief’s Step (B+)

2. Overheat (C)

3. Shadow Sanctuary (B)

If A and B each used the skill with a 3-minute duration once, it would last a total of 6 minutes.

Then, before B’s skill ended, A’s 5-minute cooldown would be over.

In effect, we could maintain stealth indefinitely.

The day before, I had confirmed Dang Gyu-young’s available skills and ranks, not just to gauge our strength before forming a plan but also to meet the copy conditions.

Dang Gyu-young mouthed a question.

– Are you ready? Can you copy it?

– Yes, I’m ready.

By now, I had built enough trust with her to give a hint about my copying skill, though only to the extent of letting her know I could mimic a few of her skills.

“……”

That alone was enough to seem ridiculous, and she kept giving me suspicious looks.

As if to say, “What are you, having so many cheat skills and traits?”

Meanwhile, Chae Da-bin was busy tapping on her tablet.

The screen split into multiple views and displayed the view of various parts of the E-floor.

In an instant, she had hacked the surveillance crystal balls in the area and seized control over the entire view.

That’s hardly second-year skill level.

As had already been proven in the Black Market, Chae Da-bin’s skill in magic engineering surpassed that of most graduates.

If her skill was to be represented on a hexagonal graph, it would look almost like a sharp spike.

Chae Da-bin stared at the tablet screen for a moment, then raised her hand to point toward the passage on the left.

– Over there.

She had pinpointed the spot with the weakest defenses.

We quickened our pace and pushed our way through, and once again Chae Da-bin set our direction.

Then, just as Dang Gyu-young’s stealth buff was about to end,

[Shadow Sanctuary]

I took over.

An identical dome of shadows spread over the group and renewed the stealth buff.

Seeing that, Chae Da-bin’s eyes gleamed with interest. As someone who regularly worked by Dang Gyu-young’s side, she immediately picked up on the subtle discrepancy.

– President, did you rank that up?

– Rank it up?

– The cooldown feels shorter.

– …Something like that.

Dang Gyu-young cast a sideways glance at me; she was clearly itching to say something, but she eventually let it go with a vague response.

Chae Da-bin continued guiding our route, and we took turns casting Shadow Sanctuary as we moved downward.

Unfortunately, we had to abandon using the elevator or teleportation magic circle.

With so many eyes watching, we’d be detected the instant we tried.

Dang Gyu-young and Chae Da-bin each made a remark.

– Been a while since I’ve had to ride it like this. Brings back memories.

– So this is what Byeong-cheol feels like.

We went down to the D floor. We stayed in stealth mode and moved quietly.

Here, the disciplinary committee members were even more densely positioned.

This was because most of the sightings of the Dark Oobleck had been concentrated on the C and D floors.

Chae Da-bin was still controlling all the crystal balls in the area, but she started taking longer pauses to strategize.

With more disciplinary committee members to avoid, the route naturally became more complicated.

– Wait a minute.

– …?

– Go back up. Quickly.

Sometimes, we even had to backtrack up the stairs we’d just descended.

Still, thanks to Chae Da-bin’s quick thinking, we managed to make slow but steady progress.

Then, Dang Gyu-young suddenly halted and hurriedly led us into a nearby shadow.

She pulled up a dense veil of shadows to cover us.

Rumble…

A wooden door suddenly emerged before us.

The door opened, and out stepped Kwak Seung-jae along with some other senior disciplinary members from the second and third years.

Did they spot us?

Everyone stared at them with bated breath.

However, Kwak Seung-jae’s group didn’t look in our direction and instead approached the other members patrolling nearby.

“Time for shift change.”

“Got it, thank you for your hard work.”

It seemed we had coincidentally arrived at the exact time and place for the shift change.

Kwak Seung-jae’s gaze flicked briefly in our direction, but he didn’t seem to sense anything.

Once the disciplinary committee members dispersed to their new positions, we carefully stepped out from the shadows.

I looked at Dang Gyu-young with a newfound appreciation.

– .…..

– Why are you looking at me like that?

– One win for you.

I had always seen her getting caught and chased by Kwak Seung-jae, but this time her stealth was flawless.

However, Dang Gyu-young looked less than pleased with my assessment.

– No, what do you mean? This is just my normal skill level.

– Let’s go with that.

– No, really, it is! When it comes to playing tag with Kwak Seung-jae, I win eight out of ten times. Right, Da-bin?

When Dang Gyu-young asked for backup, Chae Da-bin reluctantly agreed.

– …Yes, I guess that’s true.

– Why do you sound so unconvincing? I’m telling you, it’s true!

We continued making our way down amidst the whispering and bantering.

Finally, we arrived at the C-floor, the last section we had to get through.

The moment we entered, Dang Gyu-young let out a dry laugh.

– Wow, this just keeps getting better and better.

The security here was even tighter.

Above the D-floor, the disciplinary committee members were stationed in a tight grid, and even teachers were visible here and there.

The probability of an encounter with the Dark Oobleck was highest here, and the potential damage was worse than at the D-floor, so they’d stationed extra defenses.

Cha Da-bin diligently manipulated the tablet and checked the view here and there.

Her expression darkened slightly.

-This is going to be tough for me, too.

No matter how perfect the field of view was, it would be meaningless if we couldn’t map out a route.

At that, Dang Gyu-young and I exchanged a glance.

– Let’s use it here.

– Looks like we’ll have to.

We had one more trick up our sleeves from our discussion the previous night, and now was the time to put it to use.

[Activated ‘Amplification’.]

[The rank of ‘Shadow Leap’ has increased. (C → A)]

[Duration: 00:04:57]

[Cooldown: 00:29:57]

Dang Gyu-young had mastered a high-level movement skill called Shadow Leap.

It was a skill that allowed her to teleport to the next available shadow.

Like [Blink] or [Teleport] which were advanced space spells known only to high-ranking mages, Shadow Leap was a high-level space skill.

Naturally, the growth difficulty of this skill was extremely high, and even for a third-year club president like Dang Gyu-young, her skill rank was still at C.

Of course, the skill performed well even at that rank, but the upgrade to A-rank made it much more powerful.

With that upgrade, the number of targets increases.

At C-rank, the skill could transport two people including the caster; at A-rank, it allowed for up to five people.

In other words, she could transport all of us.

Dang Gyu-young sent a shadow butterfly fluttering to the opposite side.

When the butterfly fluttered to its destination, it spread wide and cast a large shadow.

[Shadow Leap]

Swoosh–

There was a sensation as if we were being pulled down beneath our feet, and then the scenery abruptly changed.

The next moment, we were standing at the spot where she had sent the shadow butterfly.

Chae Da-bin looked a little surprised and repeated the question she had asked earlier.

– Did you rank up on that too?

– …Something like that. Anyway, how’s this?

– It seems doable.

Chae Da-bin’s face brightened again.

She stared intently at her tablet and began to think hard. And I could almost hear it say, “Recalculating route”.

Then, Chae Da-bin pointed in one direction.

– Over there.

Dang Gyu-young sent the shadow butterfly to the next location again, then used Shadow Leap to instantly transport everyone.

Chae Da-bin would point out the direction, and we repeated this cycle of teleportation over and over.

In this way, we quickly descended the C-floor and almost reached the depths.

At that point, Dang Gyu-young leaned in close and whispered.

“…Hey, Kim Ho-ah.”

“Yes, noona?”

“The amplification… it’s worn off.”

The amplification’s duration had ended, and [Shadow Leap] had returned to C-rank.

The C-rank amplification duration was only 5 minutes, with a cooldown of 30 minutes.

I had saved it until the very end, but it still wasn’t quite enough to bypass the entire C-floor in one go.

– Over there.

Chae Da-bin wasn’t aware of this and continued pointing out directions.