The dim room was lit by a single candle. Its wavering flame cast restless shadows that danced on the walls.
Aedin sat rigidly at the table, his face dark as water.
His eyes locked onto the strands of mycelium spreading across his arm. Pale, thin veins embedded deep under the flesh, as though they had always belonged there.
Beside him lay an empty vial—the one he had just drained of [Antiviral Elixir].
A rare potion that forced the body to expel foreign matter by over-drawing one’s life force. Powerful, but ruinously expensive—fifty gold coins, enough to make most adventurers balk.
For Aedin, it was still within reach.
Yet the result struck him like a hammer blow. Ten minutes had passed since he drank it, but the threads beneath his skin remained. If anything… they writhed more vividly.
“Useless! Completely useless!”
He hurled the vial to the floor. The sharp shatter cut through the silence like glass through skin. His hands clawed at his skull, knuckles pale with strain.
“Why me? Why only me!?”Even as he asked, he knew the truth. He alone could hide the symptoms with ease.
His illusions—ironically meant to save him—had only made him the perfect host.
What would he become?
A corpse hollowed out by fungus?
A twisted “mushroom”?
He dared not imagine. Even the thought choked his lungs with fear, like the strangling vines of dread he once felt in the Strawman Abyss.
And just as then, he chose the same answer. Escape.
Abandon everything.
The promised compensation tomorrow, the consequences afterward—let them all go to hell!
One thought remained, burning like air to a drowning man:
Run. Now. At once!
Run far from the Amethyst Dungeon, far from the Pujis—just as he had once fled the Strawman Abyss.
He stuffed his pack in haste and stumbled out of the guild.
The sky was buried under heavy clouds. The three moons showed only faint outlines, casting thin scraps of light.
Shops along the street were shut tight, the town dead in silence, save for the muffled glow and laughter spilling from a tavern.
A drunk lay collapsed in a corner, discarded like trash.
Aedin slipped into a narrow alley, exhaled, and vanished into the night.
He would leave quietly, unseen.
But the moment his foot touched the path to the wilderness, agony ripped through his right leg.
“Ahhh—!”
His invisibility shattered. Staggering, he looked down in horror.
Beneath his skin, the fungus writhed like venomous serpents, swelling, bulging. His flesh stretched thin until—“pop”—a fat, wet mushroom burst through, its cap trembling in the moonlight.
“Ha… hahaha… ha!”
The laugh was hollow, a revelation steeped in despair. He understood now.
He had always been watched.
Those invisible eyes—the will of the Pujis—never left him.
At any moment, it could crush him like an insect.
The silence before had been nothing more than a cat toying with its prey. Watching him struggle, drink his costly potion, flee in terror… only to pin him back with ease.
He stared at the road to freedom. But his legs would no longer move.
He stood frozen for an eternity before turning back, hollow as an empty shell.
When he passed the tavern, warm light spilled through the cracks, carrying the laughter and clinking of mugs.
Snatches of talk stabbed his ears like needles:
“Hah! The Pujis had mercy, sent you back whole!”
“Shame about Jerl, though—lost a leg. His payout will only buy him a quiet corner to rot in.”
“Forget him! Drink up, tonight’s on me!”
Words like “mercy” and “luck” only made the cold bite deeper.
He walked on. The noise and firelight receded like ebbing tide.
When he next looked up, he realized he had wandered outside the Amethyst Dungeon’s gate.
And there, a familiar figure stood.
Sensing him, Fifteen turned, a warm smile on his face. “Aedin? What are you doing here instead of resting?”
Aedin felt the man’s sincerity. After the battle, Fifteen truly saw him as a comrade.
He hadn’t expected this encounter.
He forced a smile. “Couldn’t sleep. You? Why are you here alone?”
“I was thinking.” Fifteen’s gaze turned back to the dungeon’s yawning dark. His voice lowered. “Why did the Pujis let us go? In that fight, even I might not have made it out alive had they pressed on.”
Aedin’s smile twitched, but the night was deep and shadows merciful. Fifteen didn’t see his face clearly.
“Who knows…? They say the Pujis always strip unruly adventurers on the fifth floor. Maybe this was the same. Or maybe… they fear us and wish to show goodwill?”
Or maybe it only wanted me free… The thought slid silent through Aedin’s heart.
“Goodwill, huh…” Fifteen murmured, then shrugged with a touch of relief. “Whatever it was, we survived. That’s what matters.”
He dusted his clothes and rose.
“Don’t stay too long, Aedin. Rest up. Remember—Fahl’s called us tomorrow for a meeting.”
“I know,” Aedin answered.
Only after Fifteen’s figure vanished down the road did he collapse against a tree, sliding to the cold earth.
Yes, to live… that was enough…
The thought was bitter.
He sat in silence until at last he lifted his gaze to the dungeon’s shadowed gate, like a beast crouched in the night.
This time, he didn’t resist.
He let himself sink into the unseen network of mycelium that had been growing within him, the one he had tried so hard to suppress.
He knew once he did, there would be no return. But—he only wanted to live.
“King of the Pujis,” his will rippled through the fungal web, “no more games. Tell me—what do you want from me?”
Silence. Then, a strange, resonant voice filled his mind:
“Aedin Klar. From this day on, you may call me—‘Boss.’”