Seo MinHyun’s jaw nearly dislocated. “What?!”

  Lee Aseok didn’t break stride. He kept walking straight past them, dragging faint smoke behind him.

  The holy sword floated back to his side like a well-trained pet, humming softly.

  They turned back to look into the chamber.

  Inside was pure wreckage. The boss monster, a colossal fire golem the size of a cathedral, lay in chunks.

  Not burned. Not frozen. Just... cleanly carved into slabs, like someone had been prepping meat.

  The dungeon’s core had already been destroyed. Or rather, what looked like destruction.

  Lee Aseok had absorbed it as usual, but to their eyes, it appeared shattered.

  Mu Yichen’s lips parted, but he said nothing.

  Park Taegun stared in silence.

  Seo MinHyun finally made a sound, something between a groan and a curse.

  “We just got to the entrance of the boss room…”

  “He already killed it.”

  “And the core’s gone,” Park added quietly.

  “That entire fight—fifteen minutes…” Seo looked between the remains and the path Lee Aseok had taken. “He did it all before we got there.”

  They followed him out of the gate in silence, the roaring flames behind them dying with the collapse of the dungeon.

  The air turned cool again as the gate dissolved, leaving nothing but a charred crater and dumbfounded staff staring from a distance.

  Mu Yichen, Seo MinHyun, and Park Taegun stood inside the collapsing dungeon, silent.

  They weren’t out of breath. They hadn’t even warmed up.

  The three of them had activated their high-rank skills and gathered their weapons with all the readiness of elite hunters. But none of it had mattered.

  Lee Aseok had already killed the boss.

  Already destroyed the core.

  And walked out like it was a morning jog.

  “…I blinked,” Seo MinHyun muttered, still gripping his staff. “I blinked, and now it’s over.”

  Mu Yichen hummed in quiet amusement, brushing ash off his shoulder.

  Park Taegun didn’t say a word. He just stared at the empty boss chamber in disbelief, his tank shield still glowing faintly, unused.

  Outside the gate, the staff stood in confused silence as the dungeon entrance evaporated into sparkling fragments.

  It hadn’t even been twenty minutes since the team entered. One A-rank gate cleared in under half an hour would’ve been shocking enough. But this was the second time in a row.

  “Wait, they’re… already done?”

  “Did they turn around or something?”

  “No one got hurt, right?”

  The murmurs grew as the four men walked toward the parked vehicle, the air still hot from the fire dungeon’s collapse.

  Lee Aseok opened the rear car door and got in without so much as a glance back.

  Mu Yichen moved to the driver’s seat, key already in hand, but before he could start the engine, Lee Aseok lifted a hand and pointed silently at the dungeon locator device.

  A red dot blinked.

  Another A-rank gate.

  “No rest, huh?” Mu Yichen asked, his voice light.

  Seo MinHyun leaned forward between the seats, eyes wide. “Wait, seriously? You’re not even going to take a nap or, I don’t know, drink some water?”

  Lee Aseok didn’t answer at first. He just stared out the window.

  Then: “If you’re tired, leave.”

  Seo MinHyun blinked. “Huh?”

  “I’ll keep going.”

  “...Are you a person? Or a dungeon-clearing machine?!”

  Mu Yichen chuckled under his breath and shifted gears.

  Park Taegun got into the passenger seat with a frown. For a moment, a chill settled in the car. None of them could quite name it.

  But three days later, they understood.

  They had entered hell.

  On the first day, they thought it was just Lee Aseok being dramatic.

  After all, A-rank dungeons were serious business. Even elite parties took at least a day or two to prepare, and longer to clear.

  But Lee Aseok didn’t believe in that. He believed in driving directly from gate to gate, barely giving time for a water break, let alone sleep.

  The average dungeon clear time?

  Under two hours.

  Each.

  And Lee Aseok wasn’t slowing down.

  In fact, the more dungeons they cleared, the faster he moved. By the end of day one, he’d reduced their battle formations to nothing more than decorative support.

  Seo MinHyun was casting spells mostly out of habit.

  Park Taegun started using his shield as a chair. Mu Yichen, at least, managed to keep up, not easily, but well enough not to get left behind.

  Day three, Seo MinHyun began to resemble a melted popsicle.

  His proud, stylish hunter coat had a scorch mark on one sleeve, and he hadn’t even bothered to fix his hair.

  Park Taegun’s eyebrows hadn’t moved in 24 hours. No one could tell if he was angry, exhausted, or simply dead inside.

  Only Lee Aseok remained eerily consistent, emotionless, calm, and utterly mechanical in his movements.

  Slash. Step. Cut. Absorb the core.

  Walk out.

  “Do we even need to be here?” Seo MinHyun groaned, sprawled in the back of the car like a withered plant. “Are we, like, lucky mascot charms?”

  “He did say we could leave,” Park Taegun said, eyes closed.

  “He also said he’d keep going anyway. And you know what? I believe him. I think if we left, he’d still keep clearing gates until the continent ran out.”

  “Can’t blame him,” Mu Yichen said from the driver’s seat. “If I had his level of stamina and zero care for human limits, I’d be bored too.”

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  “But why is he doing this?” Seo MinHyun whined, staring up at the ceiling. “He’s not getting paid more. He’s not making friends. He doesn’t even say ‘good job’ after we fight. He just looks at us like we’re background NPCs.”

  Mu Yichen didn’t answer.

  Because he had started noticing something, too.

  Lee Aseok wasn’t just fast.

  He wasn’t just strong.

  He was getting stronger.

  And yet, he showed no satisfaction, no rush of power, no desire to claim anything. No celebrations. No explanations.

  He would step into the gate, disappear into the chaos, and return like nothing happened.

  Even his holy sword barely had time to glow anymore, it just floated next to him like a bored, underpaid assistant.

  By the start of day four, Seo MinHyun was drinking energy potions like coffee, his hair frazzled and his face pale.

  Park Taegun had started murmuring to himself.

  Mu Yichen was holding up the best, but even he had developed a slight twitch in his left eye.

  Lee Aseok?

  He was checking the next gate location in complete silence, face lit only by the glowing dots of the device.

  That morning, as they cleared their eighth A-rank gate, Seo MinHyun stood outside the collapsed portal and whispered to himself, “This is the chill I felt that day…”

  “What?” Park Taegun asked, blinking.

  “That moment three days ago… when he pointed at the next gate and said nothing.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah.”

  Silence stretched.

  Mu Yichen finally spoke, his voice low. “This isn’t normal.”

  “No kidding,” Seo muttered.

  “I don’t mean his strength. I mean… him.”

  They all turned slightly toward the figure leaning against the car, quietly polishing the iron rod he sometimes used instead of his sword.

  Emotionless. Detached. As if the world around him didn’t exist.

  “He doesn’t look tired,” Park Taegun said.

  “He doesn’t look anything,” Seo replied.

  The three of them stood there in silence, watching Lee Aseok flick his gaze toward the next dungeon reading.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  “Of course,” Seo muttered. “Why rest when we can die on our feet instead?”

  They got back in the car, exhaustion and silent dread trailing behind them like shadows.

  Gate after gate, Aseok marched on.

  And none of them, despite their power, rank, or reputation, could keep up with the ghost of a man chasing something only he could see.

  The wheels of the car screeched as it turned the corner toward another A-rank gate. The tenth one this week.

  Inside the vehicle, the silence was thick, suffocating, even.

  Well, except for the occasional slurp.

  Seo MinHyun was chugging another mana potion like it was soda.

  It was his fifth one today. He didn’t even grimace anymore. He just stared out the window, his eyes twitching, face pale and drained, muttering incoherently.

  “Purple cap... good. Blue cap... poison. I don’t trust the blue cap anymore.”

  In the passenger seat, Park Taegun leaned back with his arms crossed, his expression unreadable.

  Except for the slight twitch in his jaw and the haunted look in his eyes, he almost looked normal. Almost.

  Mu Yichen, ever the composed knight, was the only one who still maintained a semblance of grace, but even he had taken to quietly massaging the bridge of his nose between gates.

  The SSS-rank hunter’s smile was still there, but it was thin, more like a war grimace now.

  Only one person in the car seemed untouched by the madness.

  Lee Aseok.

  In the back seat, leaning with his eyes half-closed, Pudding resting across his lap, his holy sword humming softly beside him, he looked like he had just returned from a nap. Not a 45-minute dungeon slaughter.

  It had been one week since their ‘training’ began.

  Seven days of endless dungeon clears.

  No days off.

  No breaks.

  No mercy.

  The world noticed, of course. How could it not?

  Gate clear speed had always been a matter of logistics, preparation, stamina, and most of all, teamwork.

  Even the top guilds staggered their elite units to avoid burning out.

  But not Lee Aseok. He moved like a storm, swallowing every gate in his path, dragging the unwilling remnants of humanity’s finest behind him like debris caught in his wake.

  A-rank gates that would take an entire guild to conquer were collapsing in under two hours.

  Then the B-ranks, just for fun, apparently.

  It became international news by the third day.

  “Mysterious Hero Clears 12 A-Rank Gates in 3 Days - Insane or Divine?”

  “Who Is Lee Aseok, and Why Won’t He Stop?”

  “Hunter Guilds in Uproar as Gate Market Threatened by One-Man Blitz”

  Yes, uproar. Because while the public marveled at the miracle, the hunter associations were losing their minds.

  Gates, after all, were sources of income. Gate taxes, core harvests, monster parts, clearing them too fast disrupted the economy.

  So, on day four, HQ officials finally tried to stop him.

  They came with forms, contracts, polite smiles masking panic. A few had even prepared speeches.

  Lee Aseok listened. Calmly.

  And then, without blinking, replied, “You’re welcome to join me.”

  One of the representatives looked up, confused. “Join…?”

  “If you think I’m moving too fast, you can follow me inside the next gate.”

  He didn’t even wait for a response. He walked away. Fifteen minutes later, another gate fell.

  The people who went inside with him to the gate…. They never came back to him again.

  Few day later, the phenomenon had a name: The Gate March.

  And Lee Aseok was the one leading it, with three unfortunate souls barely dragging themselves behind.

  Inside the next dungeon, a scorched wasteland of molten stone and ash, Seo MinHyun gasped as he leaned on his staff. His knees shook slightly.

  He looked at Lee Aseok, who stood untouched by the heat, the wind fluttering his coat.

  The man looked… peaceful. As if lava fields and flaming wyverns were just part of his morning stroll.

  Seo MinHyun stared.

  Then he looked at the charred, cracked walls.

  Then back at Lee Aseok.

  “What are you?” he whispered.

  Lee Aseok turned slightly, tilting his head. “Hurry up. The core is still warm.”

  “…That’s not an answer!”

  Mu Yichen arrived beside them, his armor only slightly scratched.

  He wasn’t even breathing hard, but the expression in his eyes gave away the truth, he was sweating mentally.

  Park Taegun trudged up last, dragging his shield behind him like it weighed a thousand tons.

  “Next location?” Lee Aseok asked as he opened the device.

  Seo MinHyun visibly flinched. “We’re… We’re not even going to pretend to rest?”

  “There’s a C-rank café near the highway,” Park Taegun said dryly. “We can rest there. Maybe in the next lifetime.”

  Mu Yichen glanced at Lee Aseok. “You know, most people rest because it’s biologically necessary.”

  “I’m not most people.”

  “Yeah,” Seo MinHyun muttered. “You’re the boss from a final dungeon who accidentally spawned in the early game.”

  The three looked at each other.

  Then at Lee Aseok.

  Then back at each other.

  They were thinner.

  They were quieter.

  Even Park Taegun, once the stoic pillar, had started hallucinating hot coffee between battles.

  Seo MinHyun now drank mana potions the way college students drank energy drinks during finals, by the pack, without reading labels.

  His bag looked like a traveling apothecary.

  Mu Yichen had started talking to his sword.

  But Lee Aseok?

  He never changed.

  Whether it was the 1st gate or the 30th, his expression remained the same.

  His body never lagged, never shook, never slowed. He didn’t eat in front of them. He barely spoke. He simply moved.

  And wherever he moved, dungeons fell.

  Seo MinHyun sipped his potion and stared at him again, eyes narrowed.

  “…Seriously, is he a robot?”

  Park Taegun gave a slow nod. “I think he’s possessed.”

  Mu Yichen, still smiling faintly, tilted his head. “Maybe both.”

  “Shut up and get in the car,” Lee Aseok said, already walking ahead.

  The three hunters groaned and followed like war prisoners.

  The staff at the next gate didn’t even try to speak this time.

  They just stood silently and opened the barrier, watching the four infamous figures step inside.

  As the gate closed behind them, one of the newer recruits leaned toward the control monitor, murmuring, “Do you think they’ll come out alive?”

  The operator sighed. “They’ll come out. But a little more dead inside.”

  And true to those words, exactly 1 hour and 43 minutes later, the gate shattered.

  Lee Aseok stepped out first.

  Calm. Expressionless.

  Followed by Mu Yichen, dusting off his coat.

  Then Park Taegun, silent, eyes half-lidded.

  And finally, Seo MinHyun, who slumped to his knees, raised his hands to the sky, and screamed, “I JUST WANTED TO BE A STAR MAGE, NOT A ZOMBIE!”

  The staff wisely didn’t ask questions.

  Lee Aseok just pointed to the next red dot on the device and got in the car.

  The world watched in awe and terror.

  And in just one week, they had learned one thing for certain:

  The hero may have returned.

  But he had no intention of saving them gently.

  The next day,

  The van door slid open with a mechanical hiss, and three men staggered out like survivors of a natural disaster.

  Their faces were pale, their shoulders slumped, and their eyes… Well, their eyes were empty.

  Mu Yichen’s armor no longer gleamed. It had scuffs and single marks, not because it couldn’t be cleaned, but because even cleaning felt like too much effort now.

  Seo MinHyun’s robe was crumpled, stained with potion spills, monster soot, and most recently, what he insisted was dragon sneeze.

  Park Taegun’s shield had a dent in it that no one dared mention anymore.

  But none of that compared to the radiant, refreshed figure stepping out behind them, Lee Aseok.

  Completely unbothered.

  The holy sword floated beside him, humming softly, ignored by its master. Its blade tilted downward as if sulking. It had been sulking for days now.

  Aseok, meanwhile, looked like he had just returned from a yoga retreat.

  He paused only to lean down and open the passenger side of the upgraded van. A fluffy husky immediately launched itself at him, tail wagging furiously.

  “Pudding,” Aseok said in his deadpan monotone, one hand petting the dog’s head as it whined and licked his face with desperate affection.

  Seo MinHyun, watching from a distance while sipping another mana potion, muttered, “Even the dog looks more energetic than me.”

  “That’s because the dog isn’t being forced to clear five gates a day,” Park Taegun said, dragging his shield behind him like a sack of despair.

  Mu Yichen, oddly composed, walked over with a quiet sigh. In his hand were two packed meals. He handed one to Lee Aseok.

  “You should eat,” Mu Yichen said with a tone that balanced concern and inevitability.

  Lee Aseok took the food and nodded once. But instead of opening it, he returned to petting Pudding, who barked and tried to climb into his arms.

  Mu Yichen sat down on the van’s step, calmly unwrapping his own meal. He took a bite. Chewed.

  Then looked at Seo MinHyun, who was still downing potions like he was trying to forget something.

  “You’ll burn your stomach lining at this rate.”

  “I already did two days ago,” Seo MinHyun croaked. “Don’t worry, I’ve switched to the ‘mild acidity’ potions. It only dissolves 10% of internal organs.”

  Mu Yichen nodded solemnly and looked away. He didn’t even flinch anymore. That was just how things were now.

  His gaze landed on the holy sword leaning against the inside of the van.

  It was still sulking, ever since Lee Aseok started ignoring it in favor of the puppy and the Irn rod. Mu Yichen tilted his head in sympathy.

  "Hang in there, buddy,” he said to the sword. “You’re not the only one being emotionally neglected.”

  The sword vibrated slightly.

  And then they heard footsteps.

  every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Yes, every week!

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